TAGINAE, BATTLE OF

also called Battle Of Busta Gallorum (June or July 552), decisive engagement fought near what is now the town of Gualdo Tadino, Italy. In the battle the Byzantine general Narses defeated the main body of the Goths, who were led by their Christian king, Totila. The Byzantine emperor Justinian I sent his commander in chief, the eunuch Narses, with an army of 20,000 men into Italy, where, at the Apennine village of Taginae near the Flaminian Way, he defeated the Goths; Totila, who had ordered his army to use only spears, was fatally wounded. The victory, credited to imperial archers and described by the historian Procopius, allowed Narses to march through Italy and eventually liberate Rome.