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Where was Attila's Camp?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

Robert Browning
Robert Browning
Affiliation:
University College, London
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Extract

Many scholars who have studied Priscus' account (frg. 8, pp. 289 to 323 in L. Dindorf, Historici Graeci Minores, vol. 1, to the pages and lines of which reference will be made throughout) of his visit to the court of Attila in summer 449, have concluded that the Hun king's camp was on the North-eastern part of the Hungarian plain, between the Theiss and the Körös, and all whose works I have been able to consult have stated, or implied by their narrative, that it was somewhere in Hungary.

That Attila usually made his headquarters in the plain of Hungary is true and early became a commonplace. It is perhaps as a result of this that scholars have been so ready to assume that in 449 he was there, and have even ‘emended’ the text of our one and only eye-witness to accord with their views. Let us begin by a fresh examination of Priscus' narrative.

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Notes
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The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 73 , November 1953, pp. 143 - 145
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1953

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References

1 For the arguments in favour of this date rather than 448 cf. Thompson, E. A., Attila and the Huns, pp. 219–21.Google Scholar

2 Cf. Schmidt, L. in Cambridge Mediaeval History 1. 365Google Scholar; Bury, J. B., History of the Later Roman Empire I 2. 276Google Scholar; Thompson, op. cit. 221–2, whether further literature is cited.

3 E.g. Greg. Tur. 2. 6 ‘Chuni a Pannoniis egressi, ut quidam ferunt, in ipsa Sanctae Paschae vigilia ad Mettensem urbem reliqua depopulando pervenerunt.’

4 Tomaschek, Melich, Fluss, and others wish to alter Τίγας, the name of a river in Priscus 300. 2, to Τίσας or ΤίƷας, the Theiss.

5 Cf. Thompson, op. cit. 102–3.

6 Cf. Vulić, , RE 1A. 261.Google Scholar

7 Cf. Domaszewski, von, Westdeutsche Zeischrift für Geschichte und Kunst, 21 (1902), 175.Google Scholar

8 The same triad is mentioned by Jordanes Get. § 178 ‘Tisia, Tibisiaque et Dricca’ and Geogr. Ravenn. 204. 13 ‘Tisia Tibisia Drica Marisia’, both no doubt obtaining their information directly or indirectly from Priscus (though Geogr. Ravenn. quotes as his authorities, besides Jordanes, ‘Menelao et Aristarchurm, Gothorum philosophos’!). Be that as it may, it is noteworthy that Geogr. Ravenn. makes all three rivers flow into the Danube: it would be difficult, on the Hungarian hypothesis, to find a tributary of the Danube to identify with the Δρήκων.

9 Cf. Tomaschek, , RE 5. 1696Google Scholar; Patsch, , RE 5. 1706Google Scholar (Δρήκων); Fluss, RE 6A. 941 (Τίγας) and ibid. 6A. 1426 (Τιφήσας); Thompson, op. cit. 221–2.

10 There seems to be nothing in Priscus' text to imply that the whole of their journey was necessarily in a Northerly direction.

11 Cf. Tomaschek, , RE 1. 1707.Google Scholar The of Ptol. 3. 8. 2 is not, as the cartographers generally suppose, the Jiu, but the Drâncea, an insignificant little stream flowing into the Danube almost opposite Vidin. Cf. Tomaschek, , RE 2. 365.Google Scholar

12 Cf. Enciclopedia Italiana 25. 312.

13 Cf. Fluss, , RE 15. 590.Google Scholar

14 Cf. Danoff, , RE 17. 2034. 8–25.Google Scholar

15 Cf. von Domaszewski, op. cit. 190.

16 Patsch, RE 3. 1801, places it in Central Transylvania, near the headwaters of the Târnava Mare and Târnava Mică (German Gross-and Kleinkokel), tributaries of the Máaros, and this has been the general view. The same writer in his Beiträge zur Völkerkunde von Südosteuropa III (Sitzungsb. d. Akademie d. Wissenschaften in Wien, ph.-h. Kl., 208 (1928) 2. Abhdl.), p. 64, advancesarguments for identifying it with the Banater Gebirge, the rugged, mountainous country North of the Danube Gorge. Diculescu, , Die Wandalen und die Goten in Ungarn und Rumänien, 1923, p. 41Google Scholar, wishes to place the Caucalandensis locus in the region of Buzǎu, in North-eastern Wallachia, South of the Transylvanian Alpa. The argument of the present article is unaffected by these differences of view.

17 Cf. Thompson, op. cit. 177.

18 Cf. Thompson, op. cit. 95–7, Tomaschek, , RE 1. 131.Google Scholar