AL'ARIC (Goth. from al. all + yeas, ruler). The great chieftain of the Visigoths. Ile makes his first appearance in history in 394 A.D., as leader of the Gothic auxiliaries of Theodosius in his war with Eugenius; but after the death of the former he took advantage of the dissensions and weakness that prevailed in the Eastern Em pire to invade (395) Thrace, 21acedon, Thessaly, and Illyricum. devastating the country and threatening Constantinople itself. Rufinus, the minister of Arcadius, appears to have sacrificed Greece in order to rescue the capital, and Athens was obliged to secure its own safety by ransom. Alaric proceeded to plunder and devastate the Peloponnesus. but was interrupted by the land ing of Stilicho in Elis with the troops of the West. Stilicho endeavored to hem in the Goths on the Peneus, but Alaric broke through his lines and escaped with his booty and prisoners to 111yrieum, of which he was appointed governor by the Emperor, Arcadius- who, frightened by his successes, hoped by conferring this dignity on him to make him a peaceful subject instead of a lawless enemy (396). In 101 he invaded upper Italy, and Honorius, the Emperor of the West, sled from Rome to the more strongly fortified Ravenna. On the way to Gaul, in 402 or 403, Alaric encountered Stilicho at Pollentia on the Tanarus; and soon after, the result of the battle of Verona forced him to retire into Illyricum. Through the mediation of Stilicho, Alaric con cluded a treaty with Honorius, according to which he was to advance into Epirus. and thence attack Arcadius in conjunction with the troops of Stilicho. The projected expedition did not take place. yet Alaric demanded indemnification for having undertaken it, and lionorius, by the advice of Stilieho, promised him 4000 pounds of gold. When, after the death of Stihicho Honorius failed to fulfill his promise, Alaric ad vanced with an army and invested Rome, which he refused to leave until he had obtained the promise of 5000 pounds of gold and 30,000 of silver. But neither did this negotiation produce
any satisfactory result, and Alaric again be sieged Rome (409 A.D.) . Famine soon rendered it necessary that some arrangement should be made, and in order to do it, the Senate pro claimed Attains, the prefect of the city, emperor instead of Honorius. But Attains displayed so little discretion that Alaric obliged him publicly to abdicate. The renewed -negotiations with Honorius proved equally fruitless with the form er, and Alaric was so irritated at a perfidious attempt to fall upon him by surprise at Ravenna that he advanced on Rome for the third time. His victorious army entered the city August 14, 410, and continued to pillage it for three days, Alaric strictly forbidding his soldiers to dis honor women or destroy religious buildings. When Alaric quitted Rome it was only to prose cute the conquest of Sicily and Africa. The oc currence of a storm, however, which his ill constructed vessels were not able to resist, obliged him to abandon the project. He died before the close of the year at Consentia (Cosen za), in Bruttimn. Legend says that in order that his body might not be discovered by the Romans it was deposited in the bed of the river Busentinns, which was temporarily diverted from its course, and that the captives who had been employed in the work were put to death. Rome and all Italy celebrated the death of Alarie with public festivities. Consult: Hodgkin, Italy and Her Invaders (Oxford. 1885) : F. A. Grego rovius, History of Rome in the Middle Ages, Eng lish translation. Volume 1. (New York, 1892) ; R. Lanciani, The Destruction of Ancient Rome (Boston, 1899).