In the article titled The Barbarian Threat, by Sabine Goerke-Shrode, I learned of how the Huns movement through Europe caused many tribes to move their populations in search for safety. I also gained knowledge on who the Ostrogoths and the Visigoths were, and why it was necessary for the Roman Empire to take them under their wing. .
Until the mid 200's AD, the Roman Empire was the leading power of Europe and by about 250 Ad the Roman Empires leaders and generals were losing authority over Rome's outer cities. Tribes outside of Rome's control realized the weaknesses stirring and began to move across the borders.
A tribe from Gothenburg, Sweden which pushed south and west towards Rome in around the 1st century B.X. was the Goths. Around A.D. 230 they settled near the Black Sea on the northeastern edge of the Roman Empire, known today as the Ukraine. Around 248 or 249 the Goths attempted an invasion of the Roman province of Moesia, but were repelled. About the same time the Goths split into two groups Goths that began emigrating to the east were the Ostrogoths, and the ones who moved to the west were the Visigoths.
By 374 a new barbaric group of invaders called the Huns appeared. Around 378, the Huns began to move from the east toward the Visigoths in the west. According to the Roman historian Ammianus Marcellinus, the Huns were "prodigiously ugly" and lived off plants and half row flesh which they warmed a little by placing it between their thighs and the backs of their horses. The Huns brutal invasions made tribes such as the vandals, Burgundians and the Franks leave their homes and scourer Europe in search of safety. Both the Ostrogoths and the Visigoths lost their kingdoms to the Huns. Over 200,000 Visigoths crossed the Danube River in hopes the Emperor Valens would allow them to settle inside the Roman Empire. Since there were so many Goths, the Romans could not keep them out, so they let them in.
