Editing Alaric II (section)

==Reign==
[[Herwig Wolfram]] opens his chapter on the eighth Visigothic king, "Alaric's reign gets no full treatment in the sources, and the little they do contain is overshadowed by his death in the [[Battle of Vouillé]] and the downfall of the Toulosan kingdom."<ref name=Wolfram-191>Wolfram, ''History of the Goths'', p. 191</ref> One example is [[Isidore of Seville]]'s account of Alaric's reign: consisting of a single paragraph, it is primarily about Alaric's death in that battle.<ref>Isidore of Seville, ''Historia de regibus Gothorum, Vandalorum et Suevorum'', chapter 36. Translation by Guido Donini and Gordon B. Ford, ''Isidore of Seville's History of the Goths, Vandals, and Suevi'', second revised edition (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1970), pp. 17f</ref>

The earliest-documented event in Alaric's reign concerned providing refuge to [[Syagrius]], the former ruler of the [[Domain of Soissons]] (in what is now northwestern [[France]]) who had been defeated by [[Clovis I]], King of the [[Franks]]. According to [[Gregory of Tours]]' account, Alaric was intimidated by Clovis into surrendering Syagrius to Clovis; Gregory then adds that "the Goths are a timorous race." The Franks then imprisoned Syagrius, and once his control over Syagrius' former kingdom was secure, Clovis had him beheaded.<ref name=Gregory-27>Gregory of Tours, ''Decem Libri Historiarum'', II.27; translated by Lewis Thorpe, ''History of the Franks'' (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1974), p. 139</ref> However, Wolfram points out that at the time "Clovis got no farther than the Seine; only after several more years did the Franks succeed in occupying the rest of the Gallo-Roman buffer state north of the [[Loire]]." Any threat of war Clovis could make would only be effective if they were neighbors; "it is nowhere written that Syagrius was handed over in 486 or 487."<ref name=Wolfram-191/>

Despite Frankish advances in the years that followed, Alaric was not afraid to take the military initiative when it presented itself. In 490, Alaric assisted his fellow Gothic king, [[Theodoric the Great]], in his conquest of [[Italy]] by dispatching an army to raise [[Odoacer]]'s siege of [[Pavia]], where Theodoric had been trapped.<ref>Wolfram, ''History of the Goths'', pp. 281f</ref> Then when the Franks attacked the [[Burgundians]] in the decade after 500, Alaric assisted the ruling house, and according to Wolfram the victorious Burgundian king [[Gundobad]] ceded [[Avignon]] to Alaric.<ref>Wolfram, ''History of the Goths'', p. 291</ref> By 502 Clovis and Alaric met on an island in the Loire near [[Amboise]] for face-to-face talks, which led to a peace treaty.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Gregory of Tours |title=A History of the Franks |date=1976 |publisher=Penguin |pages=150 |edition=trans. Lewis Thorpe}}</ref>

In 506, the [[Visigoths]] captured the city of [[Dertosa]] in the [[Ebro]] valley. There they captured the [[Roman usurper]] [[Peter (usurper)|Peter]] and had him executed.<ref>Collins, Roger. ''Visigothic Spain, 409–711''. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2004, p. 35.</ref>