ATTILA

died 453 byname Flagellum Dei (Latin: Scourge of God) king of the Huns from 434 to 453 (ruling jointly with his elder brother Bleda until 445). He was one of the greatest of the barbarian rulers who assailed the Roman Empire, invading the southern Balkan provinces and Greece and then Gaul and Italy. In legend he appears under the name Etzel in the Nibelungenlied and under the name Atli in Icelandic sagas. Additional reading The only comprehensive history of Attila in English is that of E.A. Thompson, A History of Attila and the Huns (1948); but the sources for his life and times are translated from the Latin and Greek by C.D. Gordon in The Age of Attila (1960). For what appear to be the archaeological remains of the Huns, see J. Werner, Beitrge zur Archologie des Attila-Reiches, 2 vol. (1956).