Attila’s military prowess was such that he threatened the destruction of the Roman empires in both east and west. At one moment he was at the walls of Constantinople in a position to demand huge tributes in gold. . . . To his Christian enemies he was known as the Scourge of God. . . . Posterity has for the most part pictured Attila [r. 445-453] as a bloodthirsty tyrant, yet there is on record a first-hand account [in which] he emerges as a much more attractive character. . . . From some fifteen hundred years the Western world has gained its knowledge of the Huns from prejudiced and predominantly hostile sources. . . .

They pick their kings on the basis of noble birth, their generals on the basis of bravery. Nor do their kings have limitless or arbitrary power. . .

marriages there are strict, and one would praise no other aspect of their civilization more. . . .

they live with chastity secured, corrupted by no attractions of games, by no seduction of banquets. . . .

Whenever they are not involved in wars, they devote little time to hunting, much more to leisure, with attention focused on sleep and food, all the bravest and most warlike men doing nothing, with the care of the home and household and fields assigned to the women and the old men and the most feeble of the family. . . .

The Germanic successor states which emerged from the wreckage of the empire . . . accepted Christianity. . . . It was particularly significant that this occurred at a time when two other processes were shattering the cultural unity of the Mediterranean world. One of these was the withdrawal into herself of the eastern, Byzantine, Orthodox half of the former Roman empire. The other was the irruption of Islam into the Mediterranean. . . . The growth of Christendom decisively affected the character of European culture and thereby, because of European dominance in human affairs for several centuries before the twentieth, the civilization of our world.

Galla Placidia (r. 425-450)

After the Visigoths sacked Rome in 410, Galla Placidia (the half-sister of emperor Honorius) was taken hostage by Alaric. In 414 she was married to Alaric's successor, Athaulf. Upon Athaulf's death, she returned to the empire, joined Honorius, and in 416 married the consul Constantius in Ravenna. In 421, Constantius briefly usurped the throne and ruled as Augustus. Upon her husband's death, Galla Placidia was banished by Honorius. Seeking refuge in Constantinople, she eventually returned to Ravenna in 425. Ruling the Western empire in her own name as Augusta, the empress was the primary sponsor of church building in Ravenna.