GOTHS, an ancient Teutonic tribe, whose earliest known home was the shores of the Bal tic, between the Vistula and the Oder, where they were living in the 1st century after Christ. Thence they migrated in the 3d century to the regions adjoining the Black Sea. Many other tribes were incorporated with them, and by continual advances and conquests they estab lished, under Ermenric (about 350), the great Gothic kingdom, extending from the Black Sea to the Gulf of Bothnia. This naturally brought the Goths into continual contact, on the west with the western Roman Empire, and on the east with the Eastern empire as centred at Con stantinople. About the year 369 internal com motions produced the division of the great Gothic kingdom into the kingdom of the Ostro goths (eastern Goths), on the shores of the Black Sea, from the Don to the Dnieper, 'and the kingdom of the Visigoths (western Goths), from the Dnieper to the Danube. About the year 375 vast multitudes of the Huns and of the Alans, which latter had been subdued by the Huns, poured out of Asia, and drove back the Ostrogoths upon the Visigoths. The Goths obtained permission from the Emperor Valens to settle in Thrace, but were driven to rebellion by the oppression of the imperial governor. In the war which ensued Valens himself was de feated and slain by them at Adrianople in 378. The Emperor Theodosius incorporated the Gothic army into his legions, and henceforth they had an important influence in the affairs of Constantinople. After many vicissitudes the Ostrogoths obtained a settlement in Pannonia and Slavonia, but not till the destruction of the kingdom of the Huns in 453. The Visigoths in process of time obtained a degree of power which excited alarm in Greece and Italy. In
369 Alaric made an irruption into Greece, laid waste the Peloponnesus, and became prefect of Illyria and king of the Visigoths. He invaded Italy about the beginning of the 5th century, and by that measure brought on the destruc tion of tl.e Roman Empire, since Stilicho, the Roman general, could only obtain a victory over Alaric at Verona (i.i 403) by withdrawing all the Roman troops from the borders of the Rhine. Alaric himself soon returned to Italy, and sacked Rome in 409, and a second time in 410. In 552 the Goths in Italy were finally overthrown in battle and expelled from the peninsula by Narses, general of Justinian. The Visigoths succeeded in establishing a new king dom, called Gothia, in the southern parts of Gaul and Spain, of which, toward the end of the 5th century, Provence, Languedoc and Catalonia were the principal provinces, and Toulouse the seat of government. The last king, Roderick, died in 711 in battle against the Moors after which the Goths became merged in the Spanish kingdoms. Since the time of Con stantine, Christianity appears to have taken root among the Goths, whence a Gothic bishop is mentioned as present at the Council of Nicwa, 325 A.D. Their form of Christianity was Arian, like that of their protector Valens, and their bishop Ulfilas. The introduction of Christianity among these Goths, and the cir cumstance of their dwelling near and even among civilized subjects of the Roman Empire, greatly contributed to raising them in civiliza tion above the other German tribes. Consult Bradley,