Battle of the Catalaunian Fields General Information
Date September 20 to 22, 451
Location Surroundings of Troyes, Champs Mauriaques
Undecided Outcome
Belligerents
Roman Empire, Visigoths, Franks, Alans, Burgundians, Armoricans and Bagaudes
Huns, Ostrogoths, Gepids, Heruli, Skires, Ruges, Pannonians, Akatzires and Gelons
Commanders
Aetius, Theodoric I, Merovée, Gondioc and Sangiban
Attila, Valamir, Ardaric, Berik
Forces present
120,000 500,000 (figure uncertain)
Losses
Unknown Unknown (up to 160,000 total dead and wounded counting both sides)
In 451 AD, the battle of the Catalaunian fields saw the coalition forces made up of Gallo-Romans and federated peoples led by the Roman patrician Aetius, against the Huns troops led by Attila. It was so called because the Greek chroniclers, a century later, located the place of this battle around Châlons-en-Champagne (Duro Catalaunum in the Gallo-Roman era). Even today, near "Great Romania", an ancient Roman road between Reims and Toul, converted into a straight departmental road, one can come across land bordered by ditches (remains of an ancient Roman military relay or an enclosure Celtic?) called "the camp of Attila" (cf. commune of La Cheppe).
Aetius had the opportunity, as a hostage in his youth, to mix with the Huns and, on several occasions, had enlisted them as auxiliary troops. It is therefore likely that this good knowledge of the habits and customs, especially military, of this nomadic people served him usefully in the course of the battle.
The Roman victory made it possible, very temporarily, to maintain the presence of the Empire and prohibited any establishment of the Huns in Gaul. It reinforced there, on the other hand, the presence of the federated barbarian peoples. The battle of the Catalaunian Fields marks the extreme advance in the West of the Huns established in Pannonia (the current Hungarian plains).
The precise location of the battlefield remains uncertain. At present, it is more easily accepted that the site of this particularly bloody fight actually took place in a place called Campus Mauriacius, Champs Mauriaques, near Troyes, in the plain of Moirey, commune of Dierrey-Saint-Julien (Dawn).
Probable routes of the Huns as they invaded Gaul, showing the fate of major cities in their path.
Probable routes of the Huns as they invaded invaded Gaul, showing the fate of the main cities in their path.
Attila had the support of Genséric (Gaiseric), king of the Vandals who also served as his intelligence agent and diplomat.
Attila encountered no significant resistance until he reached Aureliani (now Orléans). Sangiban, king of the Alans, whose territory included Aureliani had promised to open the gates of this city to Attila, but the Romans learned of this plot in advance and were not only able to occupy the city by force but compelled the troops of Sangiban to join the allied army. When Attila shows up and finds that he cannot count on this city, he retreats. Pursued, he decides to stand up in the hope of killing Aetius, who was his comrade in arms in their youth, at the risk of his own life. Plus it's slowed by loot.
The two armies brought together combatants from many peoples (see table) but it cannot be seen as an east-west confrontation, on both sides there were many Germanic tribes, sometimes related (Goths), and the Huns were a minority among the Attila's army.
The night before the main battle one of the forces on the Roman side encountered a band of Gepids loyal to Attila where approximately 15,000 men on each side were put out of action.
The battle is said to have involved 30,000 to 40,000 fighters. The massacre begins at 3 p.m. and does not end until late at night. The losses are very heavy on both sides, but the barbarians of Aetius, equipped in Roman style, take the upper hand in close combat.
With the forces of Aetius occupying the top of the hill, the Huns launched a cavalry attack. Repulsed, they were pursued by the Visigoths, whose leader Theodoric I was killed, and placed themselves behind their chariots in a circle at nightfall.
The next day Aetius and Theodoric I's son, Thorismond, discussed. The latter wanted to attack the encircled camp of the Huns but Aetius feared without saying it that the Visigoths would become too powerful, he advised his ally to return to Toulouse to secure his kingdom against his brothers. Such is the version given by Jordanes in his Getica (§215-216). It would in fact be Thorismond himself who would have chosen to leave the battlefield since he objectively had more advantages than Aetius in not completely annihilating the Huns:thus, the threat represented by his brothers was real (his short reign ends the following year after a plot to which some of his brothers were no strangers) not to mention that a rout of the Huns would no doubt have largely provided the Roman army with auxiliaries.
Attila was desperate enough to have placed a pile of saddles to make a possible inferno into which he would have had his body thrown if the situation became critical. When he saw that the Visigoths were leaving, he thought it was a feint, but he ended up understanding that Aetius was leaving his way back open. The other Barbarian allies disperse. Aetius cannot attack Attila alone, who stays there for a while and then slowly retreats to the Rhine, guided by Bishop Loup de Troyes.
If the number of combatants was undoubtedly very high, it is very difficult to know the number of losses because we have no direct inventory and Attila was demonized by historians. The Alans contingents from Orléans nevertheless had to suffer heavy losses, because nothing was heard of them again.
Strategically, there was no winner:the allies of Aetius broke up, and Attila led an attack against northern Italy the following year without encountering resistance.
The myth developed on the battle
The battle of the Catalaunian fields became the myth of victory against the Huns, with all the historical alterations that forge a myth:thus, a gigantic fresco by Wilhelm von Kaulbach depicts it as a battle of the Christians against the Huns, where King Theodoric died in combat hovers in the middle of the painting, holding a cross that radiates in all directions. Struck by this fresco, Franz Liszt composed in 1857 the symphonic poem The Battle of the Huns (Hunnenschlacht), mixing Gypsy theme for the Huns, Wagnerian style for the engagement and Gregorian evocation for the finale.