close. We need not follow the tedious story
of the negotiations with Adamantius, which were interrupted by this
sudden success of the Imperial arms. In fact at this point our best
authority,[41] who has been unusually full and graphic for the events of
478 and 479, suddenly fails us, and we have scarcely anything but dry
and scanty annalistic notices for the next nine years of the life of
Theodoric. He seems not to have maintained his footing in Epirus, but to
have returned to the neighbourhood of the Danube, where he fought and
conquered the king of the Bulgarians, a fresh horde of barbarians who at
this time made their first appearance in "the Balkan peninsula" Whether
the much desired reconciliation with the Empire took place we know not.
It seems probable that this may have been the case, as in the year 481
we find his rival, the other Theodoric, in opposition, and planning an
invasion of Greece. But the career of the son of Triarius was about to
come to an untimely close. Marching westwards, he had reached a station
on the Egnatian Way, near the frontiers of Thrace and Macedonia, called
"The Stables of Diomed", and there pitched his camp. One morning he
would fain mount his horse for a gallop across the plain, but before he
was securely seated in the saddle the horse reared. The rider, afraid to
grasp the bridle firmly lest he should pull the creature over upon him,
clung tightly to his seat, but could not guide the horse, which, in its
dancing and prancing, came sidling past the door of the tent. There was
hanging, in barbarian fashion, a spear fastened by a thong. The horse
shied up against the spear, whose point gored his master's side. He was
not killed on the spot, but died soon after of the wound. After some
domestic dissensions and bloodshed, the leadership of his band passed to
his son Recitach, apparently a hot-tempered and tyrannical youth.

[Footnote 41: Malchus of Philadelphia, from whose history certain
"Extracts concerning Embassies" were made by order of the Emperor
Constantine Porphyrogemtus.]

Three years after his father's death (484), Recitach, now an enemy of
the Empire, was put to death by Theodoric the Amal, acting under the
orders of Zeno. The band of Triarian Goths, thirty thousand fighting men
in number, was joined to the army of Theodoric, an important addition to
his power, but also to his cares, to the ever-present difficulty of
finding food for his followers.

(481-487) Backwards and