page_title: Gaiseric
section_title: Later exploits and final years
hierarchical_section_title: Gaiseric / Later exploits and final years
caption_attribution_description: English: Augustine, La Cité de Dieu (Vol. I). Translation from the Latin by Raoul de Presles: Pope Leo the Great persuades Genseric, prince of Vandals, to abstain from sacking Rome (2nd of 2 images). Place of origin, date: Paris, Maïtre François (illuminator); c. 1475; 1478-1480 Material: Vellum, ff. 467, 440x300 (270x185) mm, 46 lines, littera hybrida, Binding: 18th-century brown leather (c. 1769) Decoration: 11 two-column miniatures (257/204x190/177 mm); 277 column miniatures (c. 120x80 mm); 11 illustrations in the margin (coats of arms); decorated initials with border decoration Provenance: made for Jacques d'Armagnac, duke of Nemours (1433-1477) and after his capture continued for Philippe de Commines (1447-1511), lord of Argenton (coats of arms in margin and on edge). Purchased in 1751 at the sale of J.-A. Crozat de Tugny (1696-1751) at Thiboust, Paris,by L.-J. Gaignat of Paris; purchased in 1769 at the Gaignat sale at G.F. De Bure le Jeune, Paris (cat. 1 Febr., no. 242) by Gerard Meerman (1722-1771) of Rotterdam, later The Hague; by descent to his son Johan Meerman (1753-1815); acquired between 1816 and 1824 by Willem H.J vanWestreenen van Tiellandt (1783-1848) of The Hague; by legacy to the kingdom of the Netherlands Annotation: Vol. II now: Nantes, BM, fr. 8
context_page_description: Gaiseric, also known as Geiseric or Genseric who established the Vandal Kingdom and was one of the key players in the difficulties faced by the Western Roman Empire during the 5th century. Through his nearly 50 years of rule, he raised a relatively insignificant Germanic tribe to the status of a major Mediterranean power. His most famous exploit, however, was the capture and plundering of Rome in June 455. He also defeated two major efforts by the Romans to overthrow him, the first one by the emperor Majorian in 460 or 461, and another by Basiliscus at the Battle of Cape Bon in 468. After dying in Carthage, Gaiseric was succeeded by his son Huneric.
context_section_description: Sometime in 460, the Emperor Majorian began collecting an invasion fleet for an assault against the Vandals. Once Gaiseric received word of this initiative, he preempted the attack by sending vessels from Carthage to Carthago Nova, where the Vandal ships burned the imperial boats at their moorings, again proving himself "more than a match for the imperial establishments of both West and East." Then in early 462, Gaiseric sent the empress Eudoxia with her daughters Eudocia and Placidia—captured during the sack of Rome—back to Constantinople from Carthage in an act of reconciliation with the Empire, likely intending to preserve the marriage of his son Huneric to Eudocia. 
  While rhetorical writing from the period still distinguished between "barbarian" and Romans and the imperial state attempted to exercise control over the empire and its peripheries, the elite population in the lands controlled by the likes of the Germanic chieftains Theodoric and Gaiseric, preferred the certainties of their leadership over "the vagaries and ineptitude of the would-be imperial government in Italy."  
  In 468, Gaiseric's kingdom was the target of the last concerted effort by the two-halves of the Roman Empire. They wished to subdue the Vandals and end their pirate raids, so Emperor Leo sent an armada from Constantinople led by Basiliscus. Gaiseric sent a fleet of 500 Vandal ships against the Romans, losing 340 ships in the first engagement, but succeeded in destroying 600 Roman ships in the second battle, during which fireships were employed by Gaiseric to devastating effect. This catastrophic defeat of the Roman fleet by Gaiseric's forces was claimed to have cost the imperial coffers upwards of 64,000 pounds of gold and 700,000 pounds of silver.  The Romans abandoned the campaign and Gaiseric remained master of the western Mediterranean until his death, ruling from the Strait of Gibraltar all the way to Tripolitania.
  Following up the Byzantine defeat, the Vandals tried to invade the Peloponnese but were driven back by the Maniots at Kenipolis with heavy losses. In retaliation, the Vandals took 500 hostages at Zakynthos, hacked them to pieces, and threw the body parts overboard on the way to Carthage.
  In 474, Gaiseric made peace with the Eastern Roman Empire through a treaty negotiated by the Constantinopolitan Senator, Severus, who was acting under Zeno's authority. After enjoying just a few short years of peace, Gaiseric died at Carthage in 477, succeeded by his son Huneric, who did not have his father's enviable reputation and Vandal authority began to diminish. Nonetheless, the peace established by Zeno between Vandal-controlled Carthage and Constantinople lasted until 530, when Justinian's conquests broke it.
caption: Pope Leo the Great attempts to persuade Gaiseric, prince of Vandals, to abstain from sacking Rome. (miniature ca. 1475)
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