mbrians and Teutons, with
as little success, had betaken themselves southwards, while under the
empire the pressure of peoples had more and more increased, and Trajan
could hardly maintain the northern frontier on the Danube. In the third
century, Alemans and Sueves advanced to the Upper Rhine, and the Goths,
from dwelling between the Don and Theiss, came to the Danube and the Black
Sea. Decius fell in battle with them. Aurelian gave them up the province of
Dacia. Constantine the Great conquered them, and had Gothic troops in his
army. Often they broke into the Roman territory, and carried off prisoners
with them. Some of these were Christians and introduced the Goths to the
knowledge of Christianity. Theophilus, a Gothic bishop, was at the Nicene
Council in 325. They had clergy, monks, and nuns, with numerous believers.
Under Athanarich, king of the Visigoths, Christians already suffered, with
credit, a bloody persecution. On the occasion of the Huns, a Scythian
people, compelling the Alans on the Don to join them, then conquering the
Ostrogoths and oppressing the Visigoths, the latter prevailed on the
emperor Valens to admit them into the empire. Valens gave them dwellings in
Thrace on the condition that they should serve in his army and accept Arian
Christianity. So the larger number of Visigoths under Fridiger in 375
became Arians. They soon, however, broke into conflict with the empire
through their ill-treatment by the imperial commanders. In 378, Valens was
defeated near Adrianople; his army was utterly crushed; he met himself with
a miserable death. After this the Visigoths in general continued to be
Arians, though many, especially through the exertions of St. Chrysostom,
were converted to Catholicism. Most of them, however, seem to have been
only half Arians, like their famous bishop Ulphilas. He was by birth a
Goth--some say a Cappadocian--was consecrated between 341 and 348, in
Constantinople. He gave the Goths an alphabet of their own, formed after
the Greek, and made for them a translation of the Bible, of great value as
a record of ancient German. He died in Constantinople before 388--probably
in 381.

Under Theodosius I., about 382, the Visigoths accepted the Roman supremacy,
and the engagement to supply 40,000 men for the service of the empire, upon
the terms of occupying, as allies free of tribute, the provinces assigned
to them of Dacia, Lower Moesia, and Thrace. After this, discontented at
the holding