23 Facts About Totila

Totila proved himself both as a military and political leader, winning the support of the lower classes by liberating slaves and distributing land to the peasants.

Totila followed these victories by defeating the Romans outside Florence and capturing Naples.

Rome held out, and Totila appealed unsuccessfully to the Senate in a letter reminding them of the loyalty of the Romans to his predecessor Theodoric the Great.

When Totila left to fight the Byzantines in Lucania, south of Naples, Belisarius retook Rome and rebuilt its fortifications.

Totila was succeeded by his relative Teia, who later died at the Battle of Mons Lactarius.

Totila was elected king of the Ostrogoths in 541 after the assassination of his uncle Ildibad and having surreptitiously engineered the assassination of Ildibad's short-lived successor, his cousin Eraric, in 541.

Meanwhile the Roman forces retreated back to Faenza, where Totila met them with 5,000 men to give battle, while another 300 Gothic archers surprised them from the rear, resulting in a rout, whereby the Goths acquired both prisoners and battle standards.

Correspondingly, historian Thomas Burns claims that Totila was a gifted warrior and governor, and as an Ostrogoth ranks only second to Theodoric the Great himself.

Totila captured Beneventum as well as Cumae, which remained a Gothic stronghold even after Gothic kingship no longer existed.

Totila's strategy was to move fast and take control of the countryside, leaving the Byzantine forces in control of well-defended cities, and especially the ports.

Procopius reported that during the next two campaigning seasons Totila was able to take several strategically important centers, including the fortress at Auximum, which allowed him to cut off land communications between Rome and Ravenna.

Additional strongholds at Caesena, Urbinus, Mons Feretris, Petra Pertusa, Campania, Lucania, Apulia, Bruttium, and Calabria fell to Totila's forces, placing the Goths in command of nearly all of southern Italy.

When Maximin attempted a ploy and sent ample food supplies via ships to give the appearance of a much larger army, it failed as Totila was fully informed of all the facts.

Nonetheless, Totila offered generous terms to Conon's starving garrison at Naples and they opened their gates in the spring of 543 to the Goths.

On this occasion Totila exhibited a considerable humanity which was not to be expected, as the historian Procopius remarks, from an enemy or a barbarian.

Totila knew that if an abundance of food were at once supplied, the famished inhabitants would gorge themselves to death.

Totila posted sentinels at the gates and in the harbor and allowed no one to leave the city.

Conon and his followers were embarked in ships with which the Goths provided them, and when, deciding to sail for Rome, they were hindered by contrary winds, Totila furnished horses, provisions, and guides so that they could make the journey by land.

Totila spent the following season establishing himself in the south and reducing pockets of resistance, besieging the Roman garrisons that remained at Hydruntum, all the while building pressure on Rome itself.

Unpaid Imperial troops in central Italy made such poor reputations pillaging the countryside that when Totila turned his attention to taking Rome, he was able proudly to contrast Goth and Greek behavior in his initial negotiations with the senate.

Hearkening back to the rule of Theodoric and Amalasuintha as a reminder of more peaceful times between the two peoples, Totila tried to convince them to throw in their lot with the Goths.

Once the siege of the city was complete, Totila planned to raze the city, but Belisarius sent message and convinced him otherwise, claiming that judgments into posterity would follow Totila if he did, so the latter refrained.

Totila's next exploit was the conquest and plunder of Sicily, after which he subdued Corsica and Sardinia and sent a Gothic fleet against the coasts of Greece.