A.D. 381 heretics, pagans, and the dawn of the monotheistic state ( PDFDrive )

the toughest of the Roman infantry must have been exhausted. Once again
Fritigern tried to sue for peace, but by now nerves were frayed. The Goths had
added to the heat and confusion by lighting fires on the plain, and smoke drifted
towards the Romans making them even more uncomfortable. Skirmishing broke
out, which degenerated into full-scale fighting even before the Roman army had
been properly deployed.
Despite this, the battle started well for the Romans. They advanced with their
infantry in the centre and a combined force of cavalry and infantry on each wing.
The left wing of the cavalry pushed the Goths back on to their wagons, and their
line appeared to be about to break. Suddenly a large contingent of Gothic cavalry
bore down on the Romans and to their horror they found themselves trapped
between the wagons and the enemy cavalry. As the Roman cavalry disintegrated,
the Goths were able to attack the infantry from the left. Roman legionaries were
virtually unbeatable on open ground, where they could make use of their
weapons, but in a restricted space they quickly lost the initiative.
Ammianus Marcellinus, writing a decade later, describes the battle:
The infantry was so closely huddled together that a man could hardly wield his
sword or draw back his arm once he had stretched it out. Dust rose in such
clouds as to hide the sky, which rang with frightful shouts. In consequence it was
impossible to see the enemy’s missiles in flight and dodge them; all found their
mark and dealt death on every side. The barbarians poured on in huge columns,
trampling down horse and man and crushing our route so as to make an orderly
retreat impossible. Our men were too close-packed to have any hope of escape;
so they resolved to die like heroes, faced the enemy’s swords, and struck back at
their assailants ... In this mutual slaughter so many were laid low that the field
was covered with the bodies of the slain, while the groans of the dying and the
severely wounded filled all who heard them with abject fear ... In the end the
whole field was one dark pool of blood ... 7
As many as 20,000 of the best Roman troops may have died at the battle of
Adrianople, and killed alongside them, some reports say burned to death in a
house in which he was taken after being wounded, was Valens. His body was
never recovered. It was an appalling disaster. The empire was left virtually
unprotected, its borders open to further invasion, and if the Goths had been
better organised and skilled in siege warfare they could easily have taken some