Roman Empire
- barbarians Rising (2016–…): Season 1, Episode 1 - Resistance - full transcript
- Barbarians Rising (2016–…): Season 1, Episode 2 - Rebellion - full transcript
- Barbarians Rising (2016–…): Season 1, Episode 3 - Revenge - full transcript
- Barbarians Rising (2016–…): Season 1, Episode 4 - Ruin - full transcript
barbarians Rising (2016–…): Season 1, Episode 1 - Resistance - full transcript
An epic 700-year battle for freedom begins as the barbarians rise against Rome; Hannibal builds a rebel alliance and conquers the Alps; the shepherd Viriathus unleashes a wave of resistance to save his people from destruction.
The decline of the Roman Empire begins at 15,000 feet,
on some of the world’s most unforgiving terrain.
Fifty-thousand barbarian warriors from across the ancient world
have united against a single enemy.
Leading them is a general, bound by blood,
to avenge his family honor,
and destroy Rome
before it consumes everything in its path.
History may regard the Roman Empire as inevitable,
but its rise was neither swift, nor guaranteed.
To achieve its goals,
Rome blankets the continent in blood and tyranny. ets the t
Pillaging resources from the land and the people who live there,
dividing the ancient world in two,
Roman and barbarian.
From the hordes, emerge the unlikely leaders
who will challenge Rome’s domination.
Bandits,
slaves,
warriors, rebels.
This is the story of their rise.
In the 3rd century B.C.,
Carthage is the most powerful state in the Western world.
It builds its wealth through trade,
and uses its advanced naval force to dominate the Mediterranean.
Carthage really was Rome’s only competitor as an empire
in the central and western Mediterranean.
There were no other great states that could compete with it.
Rome is a small but growing republic with outsized ambition.
It knows that to defeat Carthage is to control the ancient world.
The conflict between Rome and Carthage
escalated into a life-and-death struggle
between the two principle powers in the western Mediterranean.
When the two sides clash over Sicily,
Rome is the rising power.
And it’s also adaptable, building a navy from the ground up
that deals Carthage a shocking defeat.
Rome forces Carthage to sign a crippling peace treaty
in an attempt to break its enemy.
It’s implications for Carthage are pretty stark.
Uh, among other things, Carthage is effectively de-militarized
or de-navalized.
Uh, it is also subject to paying a substantial indemnity.
The defeat is a personal humiliation
for the Carthaginian General in Command, Hamilcar Barca.
His oldest son, Hannibal, is only nine years old.
Hamilcar forced his young son, essentially,
to dedicate his entire life to one purpose,
the destruction of Rome.
The oath, Hannibal.
I swear by the deathless Gods
that I shall not rest until the heart of Rome
bleeds dry on the sword of Carthage.
Again!
I swear by the deathless Gods
that I shall not rest until the heart of Rome bleeds…
Again!
I swear by the deathless Gods
that I shall not rest until the heart of Rome bleeds dry
on the sword of Carthage!
Hannibal waits nearly two decades for a chance at revenge.
In 219 B.C., Rome makes an alliance with Saguntum,
a fortified city on Carthage’s northern border.
Hannibal sees the move as an act of war.
Our neighbor has been turned.
Saguntum is on our side of the border.
Forget borders. They’re for politicians.
Rome’s alliance with Saguntum was designed as a deliberate insult.
And if we don’t respond?
Who are we? Cowards?
You know the answer to that.
Then we fight!
And avenge the vow we made to our father.
We take the city.
Rome will have no choice
but to fight for its new ally.
We call her out.
Draw her here, to Hispania.
Hannibal besieges Saguntum for eight months.
When the city falls, he launches his master plan,
to unite the barbarians of the ancient world against Rome.
Outside of the great empires,
the people of Europe are organized into small tribal groups, essentially.
They don’t really have an overarching national or ethnic identity.
They are tribal societies,
and often spend a lot of time fighting amongst each other.
Hannibal faced an enormously difficult challenge.
How to build an alliance with disparate groups of barbarian tribes,
who spoke different languages.
And they really saw no distinction between Rome or Carthage.
It’s safe to say they hated both of them equally.
He had to give them a good reason
why they should fight with him.
And the good reason was,
if we win, then you will be free.
If we lose, then you will be slaves.
Hannibal g calls to arms tribes
from Iberia, to Gaul, to North Africa,
and the Lusitanians of western Hispania.
The Lusitanians were great warriors.
They were fantastic fighters.
And, um, they were used to independence
for centuries and centuries, so they would never give up.
The Lusitanians will complete our army.
It is said they have no word for truce.
They’ve never needed one.
Well, they’ll either listen to us or kill us.
The last time your people were foolish enough to come here,
they tried to conquer us.
They failed.
So, why have you come back now?
We face the same great enemy.
Rome.
And it will not rest until it’s consumed us all.
Rome is your enemy, not ours.
And even if it were, we fear no one.
A good warrior never underestimates the might of its enemy.
Or himself.
Carthage cannot defeat Rome by itself.
So if we fall to her legions, you will be next.
It already has eyes on Hispania and Lusitania.
But Rome can be stopped if we fight together.
Then perhaps we should fight with Rome against you and Carthage.
Go ahead.
And see what happens, when it uses you to destroy us,
and then turns on you and Lusitania.
And you?
And Carthage?
Would reward you.
With, uh…
The riches of a republic
whose wealth is beyond imagining.
When you pay tribute to our honor,
understand this,
you are not buying it.
Then it is settled?
You are their creature now.
And soon, they will be ours.
Let us hope.
They will join us.
If they do not,
they’ll all be dead.
As Hannibal waits for allies to respond,
Rome gathers an army of its own.
The senate calls on the most feared military family in the republic.
Wealthy, powerful and ruthless,
Publius Cornelius Scipio commands a vast army of highly-disciplined soldiers.
Scipio is the greatest general of the Romans,
and has the full support of the Roman Senate
to take on and destroy the army of Hannibal.
The Roman fighting machine was, um,
an incredibly disciplined and organized body.
People were trained systematically,
they were formed up in cohorts.
Um, they knew how to fight by system.
They practiced their weapons. These were professionals.
Within seven months,
Hannibal’s barbarian army grows to 30,000 men.
But still, he waits on the Lusitanians.
Without them, Hannibal’s favorite kind of war is mobile war.
He’s not much given to static warfare.
And the Lusitanian’s epitomize mobile warfare.
They’re fast, they have light cavalry,
they’re good at ambushes.
So Hannibal and the Lusitanians are made for each other.
If you’re right,
and Rome is the greatest fighting force the world has ever seen…
I am right.
Then you’d better have something they don’t.
I do.
And his name is Cumelios.
The empire that will one day rule the ancient world
begins as a small but ambitious republic,
with designs on absolute power.
Power can either be good or bad.
Uh, what really matters is who is wielding that power,
what motivates them and how they use it.
But as Rome spreads its culture by force,
some rise up to fight back.
Among them is Hannibal Barca of Carthage.
To challenge the Republic,
he unites an army of disparate barbarian tribes under one banner.
And gambles on a bold strategy that has never been attempted before.
Military leaders who have become great captains in history,
have done so because they had the ability
to visualize several moves ahead
and plan for them.
Each move is like a separate game of chess.
Rome will cower
when they dock at Saguntum
and see thousands of us waiting.
They won’t.
They won’t come ashore at Saguntum?
They won’t see thousands.
We’re not fighting in Saguntum?
We’re going to destroy them on their own soil.
I don’t understand.
We’re going to march on Rome.
Impossible.
You only say that because it’s never been done.
You’re going to march an army more than 2,000 miles?
Have faith.
Hannibal’s force sets out for Rome.
But 700 miles into the journey,
his plan is disrupted
when Scipio decides to resupply
on his way to intercept the barbarians in Hispania.
Hey!
Romans!
Half a day to the south.
They have discovered our scouts.
They’ve smelled their prey,
now they want to hunt us down.
We can face them now.
Tell the lookouts downriver and call out the men.
Prepare the cavalry and get provisions. We must leave tonight!
No.
We must strike camp
and head east into the mountains.
But, Han… Now!
Strike the camp!
Leadership is about confidence,
sometimes, self-delusional confidence.
I always think that you’ve got to believe
with such an unshakeable amount of confidence
that others might think you’re crazy.
If you insist on sticking to the plan…
We’ll look like cowards!
If we stay and fight Scipio’s army,
we’d win a great and glorious victory.
Exactly! But it would mean nothing.
We’d win the battle but not the war.
They’d come at us again and again.
But, brother… We strike at the heart of Rome.
We scale the walls of the Republic.
Rome believes the mountains are an impenetrable fortress,
a natural barrier protecting it from attack.
Hannibal’s plan to invade by land is a blind side.
And crossing through the Alps is a move calculated to intimidate the enemy.
The crossing of the Alps is spectacular because it’s unique
in the ancient time.
Nobody before him had ever dared,
not even to imagine to do something like that.
Hannibal’s willingness to take on this challenge
to cross the Alps, to go into the unknown,
tells us volumes about him as a leader.
It’s why he’s recognized as one of the greatest military leaders
in all of human history.
Hannibal seems to have completely outthought Scipio at this point
by the speed of his advance.
The fact of the matter is that Hannibal alludes him.
Um, and had he not alluded him, uh, the dream of invading Italy
uh, might have been prematurely halted.
The mighty Alps.
Carved out of the landscape more than two million years earlier,
are the gateway to Rome.
To this day, the Alps stand as a synonym, as a shorthand if you will,
for an impenetrable barrier.
Hannibal’s force begins its ascent in October, 218 B.C.
Thirty-eight thousand barbarian warriors,
twelve thousand African cavalry and their horses
and 36 war elephants,
prized as Hannibal’s signature attack weapons.
It’s apparently insane.
And strange enough,
he didn’t wait for spring.
He started the enterprise in the fall.
So he got ready to cross the Alps
in the worst conditions possible.
What begins as a grand and glorious campaign,
quickly becomes a nightmare.
When Hannibal gets to the high passes of the Alps,
he’s dealing with an environment
such as he’s never faced before.
It’s winter in all its fury.
It’s ice, it’s snow, it’s wind,
It’s avalanches, it’s ravines,
it’s frostbite. It’s just terrible.
How many more men have to die
before you admit your mistake?
You and your arrogance.
Your visions of glory.
You can’t eat glory, Hannibal.
We’ve not lost yet.
They’ll sing songs about us.
I promise.
And what if we’re dead?
Especially if we’re dead.
For Hannibal,
the darkest time of his career,
without a doubt, had to be when they were bogged down in the Alps.
Even when you have doubts,
you cannot reveal them
because doubt could become contagious.
The leaders must use a light of hope
in the darkness of despair.
It looked like he had led his army into unmitigated disaster.
Two titans of the ancient world
are battling for supremacy.
By 218 B.C.,
Rome has set out to conquer the continent,
but Carthage is determined to stop its advance.
Hannibal recruits a massive barbarian army
to execute an audacious strategy,
an over-land attack through the Alps.
Caught in the high passes of the mountains,
Hannibal’s bold gambit is becoming a disaster.
He loses 25,000 men in a single month.
When you look at these, um, examples of strong leadership,
it’s not about them, it’s about the people who they are leading.
It’s bigger, um, than any one of them as individuals.
Mago was right.
Who was I to think I could
do the impossible?
You won’t find the courage to lead in yourself,
you’ll find it in the belief of those who follow you.
The great leader is able
at the worst of conditions, at the worst of times to continue on.
The man who can conquer his own feelings, thoughts and emotions,
can conquer the world.
Mago!
Cumelios!
Seven months after leaving Hispania,
Hannibal escapes the Alps.
But he arrives in Italy with half of the army
that marched into the mountains.
Only four of his 36 mighty war elephants survive.
Once Hannibal arrives into the Italian Peninsula,
uh, he’s in a bit of a bind.
Because on the one hand, his forces are depleted
and he needs to recruit new allies to supplement his forces.
But in order to do this, in order to build up his rep,
he actually has to start beating the Romans on the battlefield.
The crossing of the Alps had an amazing effect on the Roman psyche.
They didn’t see this coming.
He’s taken them completely by surprise.
So now, they have to face, unexpectedly,
a hostile army in northern Italy.
Hannibal sets out to conquer Rome.
His barbarian army leaves a trail of death
as they head for the capital city.
They rout the Romans in battle after battle.
At Ticino,
Trebbia, Lake Trasimene.
With every victory, Hannibal is one step closer to Rome.
Determined to press his advantage,
Hannibal seizes a critical grain supply at Cannae,
to starve the Republic into submission.
The move forces a showdown.
On the plains outside the city,
the armies meet for an apocalyptic clash.
I swear by the deathless Gods
that I shall not rest
until the heart of Rome bleeds dry
on the sword of Carthage.
Sixteen legions.
Eighty-five thousand men.
We’re outnumbered almost two-to-one.
Good.
Let them bring their remaining men to this field.
They’ll fall right into our trap.
It was the barbarians who sought to protect their own freedom.
It was the barbarians, so called,
who opposed slavery.
It was the barbarians who refused to succumb
to the efforts of Rome to make them slaves.
They were the earliest freedom fighters.
Two thousand miles ago,
we could have stayed and fought Rome in Hispania.
But we didn’t want to fight just an arm of Rome.
We wanted to wrap
our jaws around her neck and bite off her head.
A thousand miles ago, we could have fought Rome again,
but we fought the mountains instead.
And the thousands who stand here today,
won that battle.
Here,
on Roman soil,
we are finally ready to fight!
No more waiting. No more walking.
No more dreaming.
Today, we will be victorious!
Today, we will take our revenge!
Rome’s power is on the rise.
But it has one formidable rival for control of the ancient world,
Carthage and its great general, Hannibal.
His barbarian force scaled the Alps
to strike directly at Rome’s heart.
Now, two ancient armies stand ready for an epic clash.
On one side,
eighty-five thousand Roman soldiers.
On the other, 50,000 barbarian warriors
determined to stop Rome’s advance across the continent.
Scipio imagines a glorious victory,
but he’s underestimated the barbarian commander.
Hannibal has set a trap.
Hannibal’s plan for the Battle of Cannae is absolutely brilliant.
Strategists, tacticians, ever since,
have striven to copy what he achieved
because it represents tactical perfection.
Hannibal’s battle plan hinges
on three key moves.
First, he concentrates his infantry in the center,
to attract the Roman advance
and pull them inside the barbarian line.
It’s extremely important
to Hannibal’s plan
that the frontline holds.
If they break, if the cohesion is lost,
the entire plan is undone, and the Carthaginians will be defeated.
Then, two bands of elite troops
advance from the flanks,
boxing the Romans inside.
Finally, a surprise cavalry attack from the rear
surrounds them on all sides, cutting off their escape.
If Hannibal succeeds, Rome will have nowhere to run.
Hold the line!
Hold!
Hold!
Now!
The Roman Army is designed to steamroll forward.
That’s what it does best.
And that’s going to work fine,
unless, you deal with an enemy who practices jujitsu.
Who knows how to turn your strength against you, and turn it into a weakness.
And that’s what Hannibal can do.
The result is slaughter on an unprecedented scale.
While only 6,000 barbarians fall in battle,
Rome loses a staggering 70,000 men,
more than 80% of its troops in a single day.
The Battle of Cannae was a bloodbath.
And there were more people killed in one battle,
than all the Americans killed in the Vietnam War.
Such a defeat on the battlefield,
should lead to the Romans seeking terms
and the Carthaginians imposing them.
The Senate sends word to Hannibal, seeking to negotiate.
But Scipio has other plans.
Why are we talking of peace?
We lost.
Now we await their terms to… You dare…
Dare speak of surrendering to Hannibal
and his army of animals, of barbarians?
It need not be over yet.
A negotiated treaty is very different from unconditional surrender.
We agree to neither.
Hannibal is waiting for us to bow our heads in obedience.
Well, we let him wait
while we beat this great general at his own game,
by taking the fight to Carthage.
For the next 15 years,
Hannibal and Scipio battle for control of Italy.
The rival powers fight themselves into a stalemate.
Hannibal never reaches the capital city,
and Scipio must constantly keep the barbarians at bay.
The Romans are very fast learners when it comes to their military.
They are very adept at taking the best bits from their enemies,
of analyzing their tactics and their formations and their troops,
and assimilating those into their own tactics,
and to turn the enemy’s strengths
into Roman strengths as well.
Scipio breaks the standoff in 204 B.C.
He invades North Africa,
forcing Hannibal to chase him
across the Mediterranean to defend Carthage.
Their final showdown takes place at Zama,
where Scipio defeats his nemesis,
using the maneuver Hannibal unleashed on him,
at Cannae, 14 years earlier.
One of the sad ironies of Hannibal is that in the end,
he ends up being Rome’s military schoolmaster.
It must have been incredibly distressing and frustrating for Hannibal
to see that Scipio had been able to use
his own tactics against him in this final conflict.
It is Hannibal’s first and only defeat.
If you look at the record of great captains,
um, they may win two times, three times, four times,
but they don’t necessarily always dominate forever.
They have their day. Someone else comes along
and can do the same thing, with more resources,
better troops, new technology, and their day’s over.
After his loss, the great general retires.
But Rome continues to see him as a threat,
long after he lays down his sword.
Hannibal is one of the few figures
who actually knocked the Romans down.
And he is the one that comes closest to winning.
He shows the world that it’s possible to take down this empire.
In 195 B.C.,
the Republic demands that Carthage hand over their old enemy,
but Hannibal refuses to surrender.
He volunteers to be exiled.
Now in his early 60s,
the man who is perhaps the greatest soldier the world has ever known
deals his mortal enemy one final defeat.
Hannibal’s united army won some battles,
but not the war.
And the next time the barbarians stand against Rome,
they’ll need a new tactic to defeat an enemy
that’s becoming unstoppable.
With Carthage defeated,
the Republic is free to conquer the Mediterranean.
By 150 B.C.,
its borders stretch from Greece in the east
to Hispania in the west.
But as the barbarians continue to resist the Roman way of life,
they learn the consequences of rebellion against the Republic.
Those barbarians that had aligned themselves with the Carthaginians
have to pay a price, and they’re gonna pay a terrible price.
Tribes that allied with Hannibal against Rome
are the first to come under the sword.
The Lusitanians,
Celtic warriors of western Hispania are Rome’s next target.
The Roman action had to be so terrible,
so cruel to dissuade, uh,
the rest of the Spanish nation from resisting.
Twenty-eight years after Hannibal’s death,
Rome invades western Hispania.
Governor Servius Galba is granted authority
to use force against the Lusitanians.
But he does far more.
Galba summons the tribes to hear the terms of a peace treaty.
A deal that promises to resettle them to new lands.
What follows is a brutal lesson in Roman diplomacy.
Father!
Viriathus!
The barbarians of western Hispania are under siege
as Rome invades their homeland
seeking revenge for their part in Hannibal’s war.
Lured by the promise of peace,
the Lusitanians instead become the latest victims of Roman treachery.
He gathers them together and massacres them.
Uh, it’s an act of great brutality.
It’s an act of betrayal.
And it shows how little respect he has for them.
Thousands lie dead.
The survivors are running for their lives.
Among them is a shepherd named Viriathus.
Thirty thousand are butchered or enslaved in Galba’s massacre.
The few Lusitanians who survive
are hunted by Roman death squads.
When a military force rounds up the women and children
and eliminates the population
or attempts to do so, that’s genocide.
Genocide can never be 100% effective.
And if it isn’t 100% effective,
it will simply generate the desire for revenge.
The overreaction of the oppressor to the oppressed,
removes fear.
When their back’s against a wall,
the oppressor removes all options.
Then the poor lash out and they rebel.
They promised new lands.
Said the soil was rich.
Yeah, it is…
with Lusitanian blood.
You cannot stay here.
Galba’s murder squads will return.
But the children need food, water.
Scavenge what you can from here.
Use the cover of night.
Keep to the low lands.
You’re coming with us?
But we need you. You’re a fighter.
I am a shepherd.
I’m no fighter.
Yet you fight?
Do as he says, Reburrus, go.
Go!
If you leave, these people will die.
We all die, old man.
We all die, shepherd,
but not today,
not here.
Will he live, Tagus?
He will.
Only wish he hadn’t.
The Republic now occupies
more than 100,000 square miles
of barbarian territory in Hispania.
Roman roads begin to cut across the landscape,
part of the transportation network
that ferries plundered resources back to Rome
and carries death squads to put down any resistance.
The Romans built forts, encampments.
Establishing roads, lines of communications,
buying supplies from the local population.
That’s what enables the transformation
of a wilderness into a territory
Isn’t much.
You need it more than me.
Galba has these territories surrounded.
We are prisoners in our own land.
His men will return.
They will not stop hunting us.
We strike camp, move forward again today.
Head for the mountains.
We took what we could from the village.
No food, no blankets.
No tools, weapons. Nothing of use.
These people will die, too,
if we don’t find food and shelter for them.
Then don’t go forward.
Go back to Galba’s killing field.
Take what you can from the bodies.
We can’t!
You must.
We must.
Did you find your wife and boy?
Soldiers on the new road.
Get them to the lowlands. Follow the river west.
I will find you.
Where are you going?
Hunting.
Barbarian tribes
living on the borders of the Republic are thrown into chaos
as the Roman killing machine descends on their lands.
But Viriathus, a shepherd, decides to make a stand.
Lusitania has a message for Galba.
Viriathus' message to Rome is clear.
Lusitania won’t surrender without a fight.
Get that bound again, and get some rest.
We move on at first light.
Is this what we’ve become?
A nation of refugees?
We must fight.
If Rome wants this land, then let us bury them in it.
The sources tell us that Viriathus was a shepherd.
To survive as a shepherd, you had to be a bit of a bandit.
You were out there in the mountains, you had to deal with wolves,
uh, and other predators, and you often had to deal with real bandits.
So I think that Viriathus has exactly the skills
that the surviving Lusitanians desperately need
in order to continue the resistance against Rome.
Viriathus begins to transform his band of survivors
into an organized resistance.
They use the forest as cover
to launch small-scale raids and escape undetected.
Viriathus knew very well how to attack and retreat.
And run away.
This can be converted very easily
into a very effective military action.
This is what we call today guerilla warfare.
It’s perhaps the most ancient form of warfare,
revived and rebooted to play to the strengths
of the outnumbered and under-equipped tribes
fighting for their freedom.
The enemy was invisible.
It would attack and disappear.
Hit and run.
He’s going to their very psyche.
He wants to create the impression
that the Romans are not operating in friendly territory.
This will become the signature weapon of the barbarian resistance
in the battles to come.
And in Lusitania, it’s a strategy that catches the Romans off guard.
Viriathus starts to build a name for himself,
and Rome takes notice.
A rebellion is like a virus.
You know, if you can get it right when it starts,
when it’s in its infancy,
you have a good chance of eradicating it.
But if you ignore it or you allow it to grow,
it’s gonna continue to spread
until it reaches a point where you can’t handle it.
Who is this Viriathus?
This ghost?
And still the sound of silence is deafening.
Three years into Viriathus’ rebellion,
Rome appoints a new commander.
Gaius Vitellius is Galba’s former enforcer.
He’s handed control of Lusitania with one simple mission,
end the barbarian uprising.
You’re the last of your people.
Tell me where I can find Viriathus,
and I will let you go.
We take their weapons, we take their land,
we take their lives, and still they fight back.
They are a proud people.
Then we will take their pride.
Let the men have him.
When they’ve finished, cut off his sword-hand and let him go.
If Viriathus unites the tribes?
I cannot go back to Rome without the head of Viriathus.
The head of your ghost, sir?
We don’t even know who he is.
Someone does, Marcus.
And I will find him, and hunt that bastard to the edge of the earth.
You do not need to fear us.
We’re not bandits.
It’s what they’ve made us become.
Scavengers?
Survivors.
My name is… Viriathus, the shepherd.
And you are?
Ditalicus, last of the Igeditani.
The others?
There are no others.
Gaius Vitellius, there were repercussions.
From what?
From your so-called rebellion.
Something we see again and again in Roman history
is the tremendous dilemma that faces rebels.
Every success against the Romans will lead to a reprisal.
Every victory will lead to bloodshed on the part of the innocents.
So, those fighting against Rome face a paradox.
I am responsible for the massacre of his tribe.
Vitellius has murdered his people, not you.
My actions.
How many more people has your rebellion saved?
It is a path that Rome
has forced you to walk, Viriathus.
And there will be more Lusitanian blood on your hands before this is over.
Despite the danger,
Viriathus must convince new allies to join him
to keep the fight going.
The oppressed must never surrender to suppression.
They must resist.
And that becomes a great temptation
when you become weary and tired.
“Maybe we can’t win.”
And that’s where leadership
has to merge against all these odds.
“Yes we can, we will, we must.”
I know what many of you think of this fight.
This war.
I do not want war. I do not crave it, but we need war.
We cannot stop what is coming.
We cannot hide any longer.
We cannot run or watch as our people starve at the hands of Rome.
Do nothing as our children die, as Lusitania dies.
So I stand here asking you to fight,
not for me, but with me.
Look at us.
We are an army of refugees.
How are we supposed to take on the entire Roman Army
with a handful of weapons between us?
If we fight Romans like Romans, we will fail,
so we must fight them as Lusitanians.
Without our fathers’ swords?
Yes, they took our fathers’ swords,
but we still have their weapons.
The weapons our fathers left us are here
and here.
We know this land.
This terrain, it is in our blood.
Rome took our blades,
but we still have the most precious weapon of all.
The barbarians of ancient Hispania
have defended their homeland
against invasion for hundreds of years.
But Rome is unlike any enemy they have faced before.
In Lusitania, Vitellius cracks down on the population
in order to crush their rebellion
and flush out its leader, Viriathus.
He intensifies weapons collections,
tortures captives
and hunts down refugees in hiding.
For Vitellius, the pressure is enormous.
He has no alternative.
There is only one acceptable outcome.
And that is, he returns with the head of Viriathus.
But despite the danger, survivors flock to the rebel cause.
The Romans expected that the Lusitanians would give up, terrified.
Instead, it was the opposite.
They were eager for revenge.
With followers now numbering 10,000,
Viriathus escalates his guerrilla raids on the Roman occupiers.
Viriathus seems always to be
one step ahead of Vitellius, one step ahead of the Romans.
He’s a natural at this.
He’s been trained
in dealing with the countryside
and living off the land his whole life.
Viriathus is putting in motion a plan
to deliver Rome a death blow.
But success depends on his ability to evade Vitellius,
who has now launched a full-scale manhunt
to find the rebel leader.
And he calls us barbarians.
Is what we’ve done any better?
There are more hidden throughout the village.
Vitellius chases Viriathus for months,
but is outsmarted at every turn.
When they’re chasing a fugitive or an escapee
and they’re in their own backyard,
you know, from our perspective, it’s like chasing a ghost,
I mean, these guys, they disappear,
they get help from people on the outside,
they know the environment,
they certainly know, you know, their own backyards
and where they feel comfortable in hiding.
Bribes of food and shelter fail to entice the barbarians
to betray their leader.
Brutality also fails.
Vitellius changes tactics and offers the refugees a chance at peace.
He travels from camp to camp to spread the word.
And you are?
Gaius Vitellius, Praetor of Hispania Ulterior.
Supreme authority in these lands.
And you?
Rome’s aggressive expansion provokes an uprising
in the Lusitanians’ homeland.
Deep in the forest,
Viriathus comes face to face with the man
who has been chasing him for four years.
If he’s identified, it will mean the end of the barbarian rebellion
and of the Lusitanian people.
And you are?
Gaius Vitellius, Praetor of Hispania Ulterior.
Supreme authority in these lands.
And you?
A shepherd.
A Lusitanian.
And a poacher?
A free man.
A shepherd?
And yet…
You lead these people?
I do not lead these people.
You may need to tell them that, shepherd.
What do you want, Roman?
I can grant these people,
your people,
lands in our territories.
They are not your lands to give.
Galba murdered our families, he stole the land from us.
Praetor Galba is no longer in charge.
I am.
And now I’m offering the lands back.
At what cost?
Silver.
Iron.
Whatever these lands can provide.
The Republic is expanding. It needs grain.
To feed the army that comes to kill us.
War is an expensive business.
We require your people to farm the lands again.
And the Republic will take a small tax.
These are our lands.
These are Rome’s lands now.
You have a choice.
Stay in these camps and watch your nation
and your people die.
Or take my offer and live again.
Speak with the other tribes,
many of them have already agreed the terms.
You have until dawn to decide.
And if we do not?
You have until dawn.
Ditalicus led them here.
I saw him.
You’ve endangered us all bringing them here.
No more than you do attacking them.
You’ve heard them, Viriathus, they offer…
They offer death!
We are already dying.
They offer life.
They bring more food than can be said for your…
My what?
rebellion.
I fight for these people.
These people follow you because they are lost!
They are not soldiers.
We cannot win this war. You cannot win this fight!
Are you going to kill me for speaking the truth?
You are more Roman than they are.
I know Gaius Vitellius cannot be trusted.
But what they offer us is survival for our people.
They offer us nothing.
These lands are our birthright,
yet Rome takes them.
They murder our people, our traditions, our culture.
This fight is a fight for our freedom.
You say you don’t believe in this rebellion,
yet you did not tell Gaius Vitellius my name?
He would have slaughtered us all.
You do as you must,
but I will make no deal with Rome.
Gaius Vitellius wants an answer by dawn,
we will give him one.
I have a message for Vitellius.
This was my father’s.
As long as that bastard lives or breathes,
this is the last silver he will take from these lands.
There is a fire coming.
Who are you?
Viriathus, the shepherd.
The barbarians’ battle for control of the ancient world
rages on in western Hispania.
Where after four years of fighting in the shadows,
the rebel leader Viriathus,
has finally revealed himself to the Roman who is out for his head.
Crude, isn’t it?
The shepherd is my ghost.
And you allowed him to escape.
We will hit their camp at first light.
That camp is already gone.
I want you to double my guard.
Burn every refugee camp…
But many will be camps we’ve made deals with. We can’t just…
I’m renegotiating our terms!
We will burn them anyway.
Send word to Rome.
If Viriathus wants a war of fire…
I shall give him one.
With the elusive barbarian leader finally revealed,
Vitellius raises two legions, as many as 10,000 men, to hunt him down.
The Romans are playing right into Viriathus’ hands.
He’s planned a full-scale assault
designed to give his fighters the advantage
against Rome’s superior numbers.
It’s an evolution of the barbarian’s guerilla war.
The campaign’s reached a crucial point now,
and Viriathus wants to end this.
To annihilate his enemy is basically the way that he thinks
is the best to go forward.
The paradox of guerilla warfare
is that you can cause the enemy great pain,
but you can’t win a war with simply guerilla tactics.
At a certain point, you have to switch over,
and put everything on the line
and risk everything in a big engagement.
The Lusitanians won’t face Rome on an open battlefield
or in small lightning raids.
Instead, Viriathus engineers a series of coordinated guerilla attacks,
using the natural terrain as a gauntlet
that will give Rome no escape.
This is the third camp. Nothing.
Tracks lead off in every direction.
The shepherd gathers his flock.
There has been another Viriathus ambush.
Only one guard dead, the rest, they maimed.
He pushes me, Marcus.
He’s evaded us for all these years and now he shows himself.
Why?
He’s trying to distract me.
What is it he doesn’t want me to see?
The warrior shepherd and his guerrilla army
draws Vitellius and his force of 10,000 legionaries deeper into the forest.
He aims to spread the Roman line thin,
like a snake winding through the ravines and gullies.
Viriathus will target the head.
And 9,000 barbarian allies will push the tail towards a deadfall,
over the edge of a high cliff.
The plan depends on Vitellius taking the bait
and chasing Viriathus without let up.
Viriathus let you live?
Why?
I do not fear death.
Perhaps you should.
Where is my ghost?
Where is Viriathus?
He runs for Tribola.
The mountains.
Where?
I don’t know, but he knows you will follow.
If this is true. If…
If this is true, Viriathus will be forced into the open.
We will lead both legions on Tribola.
Crush the insurgence before he can unite any remaining tribes.
Viriathus is no fool.
Even he would not lead his men against an army of 10,000.
You will lead the advance party, lure him out.
The legions will back up our rear.
And Ditalicus,
shall I kill him?
No,
he may be of some use.
Set him free.
Forward!
Formations!
Formations!
We cannot wait for the legion.
We must take the auxillia!
Hunt that bastard down!
Stay together!
Vitellius leads his men directly into a narrow gully…
The Roman forces are stretched into a thin line,
two miles long, on the edge of a deadly ravine.
Nine thousand barbarian warriors
are poised to descend from the forest
and push the Roman line into the abyss.
Formations!
In western Hispania,
Viriathus and his barbarian rebels
launch a coordinated guerrilla attack against the Roman legions
that have brutalized them for four long years.
It is the most ambitious battle plan they’ve ever attempted.
Formations!
Testudo! Testudo!
The barbarian attack descends from the hills,
pushing the Roman legions back towards the edge of a deadly cliff.
Have you come for this?
No.
Keep it.
My father took that from a dead Roman at Zama.
Rome will pour men onto this land
until ever corner of every field
is ripped from your hands.
Let them come.
For it is Rome who have united us, and we will not be defeated.
Rome will never fear you…
shepherd!
It is not I they should fear,
but the generations to come.
Viriathus and his guerilla army
slaughter 4,000 Romans in the Battle of Tribola.
Thousands more are wounded.
Viriathus’ ambush at Tribola is a great shock to the Romans
and it’s a great achievement for him and his army.
Lusitania became
the Roman Empire’s Vietnam.
- Formations!
- Testudo! Testudo!
They were on an unknown environment,
unknown landscape,
unknown way of fighting.
This defeat of the Romans
at the hands of what were effectively a small bandit nation,
sends a message to the rest of the communities there
that they can make it on their own.
The barbarians hold the upper hand for the next eight years.
Being a successful guerilla warrior is like walking a tightrope.
You know that it’s very difficult to keep your balance,
and you know how easy it is for the enemy
to get to you and how vulnerable you are.
Viriathus understood that he couldn’t keep fighting against Rome forever,
and that’s why he eventually decides to seek peace terms.
But Viriathus makes a fatal error.
The Republic cannot be trusted to make peace deals.
Using gold plundered from Lusitania,
Rome bribes Viriathus’ own men to betray their leader.
Eight years after his victory at Tribola,
he’s assassinated.
Lusitania falls to Rome less than a year after his death.
The Republic seizes control
of all of the trade routes across the Mediterranean.
It’s now the unrivalled superpower of the ancient world.
Rome uses the riches it plunders from across the continent
to build its wealth and influence,
while it slaughters and enslaves
the barbarians in its path.
The tactics that Viriathus used to defeat the Romans,
these guerrilla tactics, this mobile nature, the hit and run,
is something that will become part of the way
that the barbarians take on the Romans in the future.
But every time the barbarians rise,
it chips away at Roman power.
Freedom is inevitable.
The arc is long, the journey’s long,
but it bends towards freedom.
Next time on Barbarians Rising…
You will regret making enemies of us!
From today, we cease to do Rome’s bidding.
From today, we go to war with Rome.
I have something you have never known, freedom.
They don’t need to respect me,
they need to fear me.
We’re no longer the underdogs.
We’re the rising power.
Nothing can save you now.
Barbarians Rising (2016–…): Season 1, Episode 2 - Rebellion - full transcript
Rome brings its enemies inside its borders as the age of Empire begins
Previously on Barbarians Rising…
The ancient world
divides in two.
Rome is ambitious.
Ruthless.
Built on blood and glory.
These are Rome’s lands now.
The barbarians unite
to challenge its growing power.
On Roman soil,
we are finally ready to fight!
…is a fight for our freedom.
Now, Rome spreads tyranny
as it storms across the continent,
plundering the people, as the barbarians step up the fight.
Those inbreds are still resisting.
We must bring them to heel.
But the larger Rome grows,
the more enemies it brings on the inside.
The vast barbarian army,
waiting for a leader to rise.
Rome is now the supreme power in the ancient world,
stretching across Italy, to North Africa,
through Hispania and into Gaul.
The Roman fighting machine was, um,
incredibly disciplined and organized,
and it moved with a rhythm, and with a power
that would break apart a less disciplined and well-trained force.
These were professionals.
The people beyond the borders of the Republic,
who Rome calls barbarians,
become targets in a new phase of domination.
Rome wants a number of things from the territories it conquers.
It wants wealth. It wants glory.
And it wants human capital. It wants slaves.
Rome builds its power by enslaving people from the lands it conquers,
transporting them into the Roman provinces where they’re sold,
to farm its fields and fight in its armies.
An estimated 20% of the Roman population,
as many as one million people, are barbarian slaves living on Roman soil.
Slavery is nothing new to the ancient world.
What’s different is the scale of Roman slavery.
This is slavery on a massive scale.
The fiercest men among them
are forced to fight for sport,
competing in the arena as gladiators.
We think immediately about the Colosseum,
we think about this huge arena,
50,000 to 60,000 spectators
egging on their favorite competitors
fighting to the death.
But the reality in the Republic was very different.
This scale was much more modest.
In the provincial amphitheaters,
you’re talking about local events
that are dirty and sordid and grubby and violent.
Gladiators were subject
to every type of abuse imaginable,
both physical and sexual.
Most gladiators died in their 20s or 30s.
Uh, it’s a very, very dangerous job
and life expectancy is not long.
Spartacus. My name is Spartacus.
Spartacus is a bit of an enigma to us.
It seems that he came from Thrace.
He may have been from a noble background
because the name Spartacus itself
could be an aristocratic name from that region.
It’s a place known for, uh, great fighters.
So much so that the Romans incorporate those fighters into their military.
But ultimately, he is sold into slavery,
and he ends up in a Gladiatorial school in Capua.
Spartacus! Spartacus! Spartacus!
Spartacus! Spartacus!
Spartacus! Spartacus! Spartacus!
One thing worse than slavery
is to adjust to it.
And because it’s painful and violent, most people adjust.
Spartacus?
Spartacus, the invincible.
King of the shit house!
No man would want to be in that situation,
and if there was any opportunity to get out of it, you would.
I want to give you something to remember me by.
No. No. No.
Rome tightens its grip on the Mediterranean,
and as it grows,
the future that Hannibal envisioned 140 years earlier
is now coming true.
The Republic is making slaves of the barbarians.
But one man, Spartacus, is making a break for freedom.
Let’s get out of this shithole.
Crixus, no!
Swords!
Now we have two swords.
Now we have two dead soldiers and an army sure to follow.
Spartacus and a group of 60 barbarian slaves
seize the opportunity to escape,
but they break out of Capua without a plan.
He wants to get away from Capua.
Put distance between himself and his former captives.
By the same token, he needs food, he needs shelter and he needs weapons.
When they get over that wall, they gotta hit the ground running.
Law enforcement’s gonna be right behind ’em,
once they figure out, you know, they’re gone.
The clock is ticking as the fugitives move south.
Rome responds by dispatching a small militia to track them down.
Freedom is what’s motivating these individuals
to stay out there and again, they’ll fight their way out,
they’ll kill somebody, they’ll kill themselves,
they’ll do whatever it takes, because, uh, you know, give me freedom or give me death.
Nearly every Roman household in the area holds barbarian slaves.
Spartacus' escape quickly becomes a real problem
for the wealthy estate owners of Campania.
Uh, first of all, he and his men are trained killers.
Secondly, they begin attracting other slaves to them.
Look what I found.
Let’s go.
Let’s get to higher ground, where we can see what’s coming for us.
Here, they’ll round us up like sheep.
Vesuvius?
Demons live there.
No.
They live here.
Up there, we can see for 50 miles in all directions,
we can bide our time.
You do what you want, Spartacus.
I’m going to enjoy my freedom.
Fine.
And when the Romans roast you like the pig you are,
you tell them we’re going East, back to Thrace.
If you come with us, you’ll likely die.
If I don’t, then I’ll die for sure.
Very quickly, we see Spartacus evolve.
He frees other slaves, there’s strength in numbers. He secures equipment.
Most significantly, he decides
to head toward Vesuvius, his high ground, if you will.
When were you taken from Thrace?
I think maybe it was 10 years ago.
I’ve lost count.
They dragged us from our homes.
Burned our towns.
To my great shame, I fell into their hands…
…and, well, you know the rest.
The others are getting anxious.
Tell them to enjoy their freedom.
We’ve got an army snapping at our feet, my friend.
Spartacus is invincible. I know that, we all know that.
He has got a plan.
I’ve seen a giant fade to nothing before my eyes.
He wasn’t even hurt.
He laughed at me, as if to say, “Is that the best you can do?”
I knew I had killed him.
And then he knew.
So, you are invincible then.
People like Spartacus,
like some of the slave revolts in our country,
they made a decision
that they’d rather make the effort,
to be free and risk their lives
than to spend one more day
as a slave in captivity.
Soldiers!
Roman soldiers!
How many?
Maybe three.
And we’re 60.
Maybe we shouldn’t wait for them.
If we don’t meet them here, we’ll have to meet them somewhere else.
Let’s show them who we are.
Three miles up the slopes of Vesuvius,
Spartacus holds his position on the high ground.
In the valley below, 300 Roman soldiers make camp.
There’s only one road up and down Vesuvius.
They feel that they’ve got Spartacus cornered
and they merely have to wait for him to try
to foolishly fight his way out or to starve to death.
Spartacus has his men fashion ropes of vines
that they find growing on Mount Vesuvius.
And launch a surprise attack on the Romans.
By choosing to stand, by choosing to fight
and coming up with a military solution,
Spartacus is showing what kind of man he is.
Rome is rapidly expanding as it seeks to dominate the ancient world.
But some are rising up to fight back.
The defeat at Vesuvius was a complete surprise to the Romans,
they weren’t expecting to be ambushed.
They thought they were dealing with fugitives
and the fugitives would run rather than that the fugitives would take the fight to them.
Best part about this, they’re brothers!
Kill him.
Do it!
Kill him!
Or I’ll bury you both alive.
Go to your commanders.
Tell them what you’ve seen here today. Go!
No more.
We are better than this.
We’ve got as many swords as we can carry.
Now we need to head north to freedom.
Before Rome unleashes hell on us.
Spartacus isn’t looking to start a war.
He’s searching for a way home.
Thrace is 700 miles away through hostile territory.
His target is the Cisalpine pass,
a break in the Alps leading to the homelands the barbarians left behind.
Word of Spartacus’ victory at Vesuvius spreads.
Barbarian slaves from across the Republic
flee their masters to join the man they believe will set them free.
He’s reminiscent of other people in history.
Abraham Lincoln never expected to be leading an army engaged in a great civil war.
Nelson Mandela didn’t expect that he would become the head of a revolutionary movement.
And yet these people, like Spartacus,
show that it is possible to rise to the occasion.
The whole society functions using slaves.
So if there is an uprising,
this is gonna really strike at the core of how the Republic works.
Rome’s plan to bring the barbarians within its border
is starting to backfire.
We need to get rid of the Romans. Wipe ’em out.
Not just free ourselves. Yes, but here?
In their own country?
That’s a death wish.
I don’t care how many there are of us.
There will always be more of them.
But in our homelands, in Gaul, in Thrace, it is possible.
Maybe.
Maybe not.
But what we can do is we can damage them, badly.
I say we go South to Sicily.
Kill as many of ’em as we can along the way.
Crixus, you are a warrior.
You will die in battle, that I know.
If we were an army, Crixus, I would turn and fight,
but look around you.
These people are not warriors.
They’re farmers, nurse maids, artisans.
Yes, more’s the pity.
They want to live! They’ve a right to live.
We are near the mountains.
And beyond the mountains, are the roads, North to Gaul, East to Thrace.
Now you do what you will.
You die a warrior’s death.
My greatest shame is that I was captured.
Mine, too.
We valued our lives above our freedom.
Would you make that choice again?
No.
Then I’ll see you in the next life.
Spartacus and Crixus divide their forces.
Crixus and 3,000 fighters splinter off
and move South to confront the Romans head on.
He’s set out to buy Spartacus and his followers,
now numbering more than 12,000, time to escape North.
Crixus’ split from Spartacus gives Rome a major problem.
Now they have two very capable and very mobile enemies that they have to deal with,
and they have to deal with them piecemeal.
While Spartacus marches for the Alps,
Roman citizens flee in fear.
But first, they ensure the slaves they leave behind
won’t be able to join the rebellion.
They blind them and lame them so they cannot run.
You.
You are Spartacus?
I am.
No!
You bow to no one.
All I wanted was to escape that hellhole Capua
and get back to Thrace.
I know you didn’t want it,
but the people now look to you.
They see you as salvation.
And where do they expect this to end?
What do they think I can do?
When a leader achieves success and others start flocking to your standard,
then that responsibility takes over yourself, also.
And, “How do I handle this?” “What do I do with it?”
“How do I take care of my people
“and wield them into a force of maximum power?”
And this is one of the great problems of Spartacus.
By the autumn of 73 BC,
Spartacus’ flock is growing at the rate of hundreds a day.
Rome is now expanding faster than ever.
But its growth depends on enslavement,
the latest weapon in the 300-year war to crush the barbarians.
Spartacus’ followers now number 25,000,
with hundreds more joining the cause every day.
Spartacus knows that the Romans will be bent on his destruction.
He has no choice but to not only lead, but to train an army.
No!
To create an elite force,
you’re talking an investment of two to three years minimum.
Hit me.
He doesn’t have the luxury of years
to create a well-trained cohesive army,
he has months at best.
He had this great mass of people
that could be slaughtered if they fought as individuals.
So, he took that time that he had during the winter
to train his forces and to turn them into an army themselves,
that could meet the Romans on the field of battle with a good chance of success.
When Spring finally arrives,
Spartacus and his newly trained army, now numbering 50,000,
continue their journey home.
Every slave owner is thinking, “Will my slaves be next?”
“Will they join Spartacus?”
“Just how far is this going to go?” It’s an enormous threat.
Rome responds, dispatching four legions to crush the uprising.
The estimates are that at this point,
Crixus has about 20,000 Germans and Gauls with him, um,
Spartacus presumably has about 50,000 people with him
and there is a real danger at this point
that the rebellion actually spreads beyond just slaves.
The plan is to intercept the rebels
using a classic Roman military tactic called the Pincer Movement,
a simultaneous attack on the enemy from two sides.
The first army, under Consul Gellius,
has orders to go South to wipe out Crixus,
then circle back to attack Spartacus and his rebels.
The second army targets Spartacus head on,
to cut off his escape to the North,
and push his forces south into the jaws of Consul Gellius.
Spartacus!
Tell me.
The Romans are coming.
How many?
Two legions.
Crixus…
Dead?
Not one was left alive.
You see how scared they are of us.
Not one was left alive.
For more than a century,
Rome has been the dominant power in the ancient world.
But now, a growing slave rebellion
threatens to take it down from within.
Spartacus! Spartacus! Spartacus!
Spartacus! Spartacus! Spartacus!
Spartacus!
When the massive slave army
defeats the first two legions sent to destroy them,
they’re just miles from their escape route through the mountains.
But two more legions are still in pursuit.
We did the impossible today.
And the murderers of Crixus are only half a day away.
You’d stay and wait for them? Why wait?
Spartacus.
Spartacus, we are home.
This is our escape.
The door is open.
It is.
Brothers.
Sisters.
Warriors.
The Romans outnumber us but they only fight for money.
They have no answer for our courage…
…and our thirst for freedom.
The men who murdered our brother Crixus have come to meet us here.
Do we run from them? No!
Do we let them come for us like wolves?
We are warriors. We’re free to fight
and free to die if need be, the way we choose, on our terms.
We can make Rome bleed.
We can make her weak the way she made us.
If we can take Sicily, we can starve Rome and bring her to her knees.
Let’s avenge our fallen brothers!
You know, one of the great mysteries of Spartacus is why
having come within sight of the Alps
does he turn around and decide to stay in Italy.
And we can only speculate.
He’s become more than an individual.
He’s become the leader of an army.
There’s so much vengeance to wreak upon the Romans.
Why give up now?
Spartacus turns his army around,
and marches straight into a collision
with Consul Gellius and his 20,000 men.
When their armies meet, Spartacus scores a critical victory.
Consul Gellius’ legions are the last viable defense force
standing between the rebel army and the vital strategic territory of Sicily.
A province that provides most of Rome’s food supply.
If Spartacus can take the island, he’ll have Rome by the throat.
Sicily is of immense geostrategic importance for Rome.
It’s almost a dagger pointed at the toe of the Italian boot.
Whoever controls Sicily controls access to Italy.
The Roman Senate moves quickly to crush the barbarian threat.
They hand over supreme control of the military to one man.
General Marcus Crassus.
Rich and ruthless,
he uses his fortune to raise an army of 30,000 men to take on Spartacus.
Power that few men within Rome have ever been given before.
Crassus knows that putting this rebellion down
despite the fact that it is ostensibly an army of slaves,
is going to make him appear to be the savior of Rome.
We’re here.
Sicily is here.
And we need to be there.
Spartacus plans to bribe pirates and merchants
to ferry his army across the sea to Sicily.
Go now, the three of you.
Race ahead, and make the deal.
Tell them that for every man, woman and child they carry,
there will be five pieces of gold.
Go.
Spartacus’ rebellion has been the greatest threat
to Roman supremacy in a century.
Now he’s aiming to crush the enemy by cutting off their food supply from Sicily.
But General Crassus bribes the Sicilian pirates with Roman gold
before Spartacus ever reaches the coast.
Spartacus has beaten the odds for two years.
But now, just 19 miles from his goal,
he’s left with only one option.
Turn and face his enemy.
Can you hear me, Spartacus?
Can you see this cage?
I’m going to take you back to Rome in this cage.
Don’t let them take you.
I won’t.
And don’t be afraid of death.
Kill him!
No!
What better way for him to die than to die fighting, to die as a warrior,
to die staying true to his guiding principles?
40,000 barbarians fall at Messina.
Those who survive the battle face a more gruesome fate.
Crassus parades the captured slaves through the streets of Rome,
and crucifies all 6,000 along the Appian Way.
Rome’s warning is clear.
Rise against us and you will pay with blood.
Though Spartacus fails to overthrow the Republic,
his uprising reveals a weakness at the core
of its plan to dominate the barbarians.
It tells us that Roman society has tremendous vulnerabilities
and that the Roman system is not nearly as strong as the Romans thought it was.
As Rome expands its frontier, it encounters more and more resistance.
Military glory becomes the quickest path to power.
Rome descends into chaos as a handful of men fight for control.
The death of the Republic really comes with one-man-rule,
and that one man is Julius Caesar.
He is the perpetual dictator.
And it’s his successor, Augustus, that takes it even further.
Augustus was the legal heir of Julius Caesar.
The hand-picked successor of the great dictator.
He has the control of nearly all of the Roman army,
and with that, he’s able to do pretty much what he wants.
Augustus succeeds where Caesar fails
and perfects the art of empire building.
Forty-five million people, 15% of the world’s population, are now under Roman control.
Augustus doubles the size of the empire during his reign,
pushing its borders deep into barbarian territory,
completing the conquest of Gaul and Spain,
and setting his sights on a new prize to the north. Germania.
A vast, untamed wilderness that will be the new front
in the barbarians’ fight for freedom.
Augustus invades in 12 BC
in search of resources like cattle, amber, and leather.
But above all, he wants warriors.
The Romans viewed these warriors from the North
as tall, fierce, blood thirsty warriors who,
if turned into soldiers for the Empire, could protect the Empire and help it expand.
Defeating these tribes won’t be easy.
The Empire ignites a storm of resistance from the moment it sets foot in Germania.
The campaign drags on for 30 long years.
The Roman army spent huge amounts of money in order to conquer all of Germania.
But still, the Germans refuse to fall.
Leading the resistance are the Arivarii and the Cherusci,
who fight to keep Rome at bay.
Segimerus is Chief of the Cherusci,
who grooms his sons, Arminius and Flavus,
to one day take his place and lead their people.
But before his oldest son, Arminius, can claim his birthright,
the Empire steps up its assault on his tribe,
unleashing a new weapon from its arsenal of tyranny.
The Roman Empire is the ancient world’s undisputed superpower.
It spans 2.5 million square miles of territory
from Hispania to Syria, a dominion built on barbarian blood.
And still the Empire grows.
It sets out to conquer Germania.
But unable to defeat the barbarians by force,
Rome once again resorts to a familiar strategy.
It begins to negotiate deals with the rebels,
promising gold and peace in exchange for surrender.
One by one, battle-weary Germanic tribes accept Rome’s terms.
But this time, the Empire requires something more.
To secure their loyalty, Rome forces the tribes
to surrender their sons to the Empire.
A generation of heirs born to be the next leaders of Germania
become Romans instead.
These sons will now be raised and accustomed to Roman ways.
And ideally, they would see themselves as more Roman,
than as Germanic barbarians.
Help! Help!
Let… Let go!
Father, stop them!
Thusnelda! Take this.
Help!
You can’t do this! My father’s the chief!
He’s the chief!
Let go!
Arminius! Uncle!
Uncle!
Remember who you are.
Cherusci. Always.
Always.
This policy is called Romanization
and is largely successful,
but it depends on the obedience and loyalty
of the barbarians being brought inside the walls of Rome.
This is messing around with people’s sense of themselves, their sense of identity,
their sense of the landscape
and their sense of family
and that is when the stakes get dangerously high.
Brother.
I have heard good things of both of you.
Thank you, sir. Flavus,
you have distinguished yourself as a servant of Rome.
And as reward, I will grant you a promotion.
You will serve under
General Germanicus in the east.
Prove yourself in the theater of war, Flavus,
and you will rise in the ranks
just like your brother.
Congratulations on making the rank of Equestrian.
Our most trusted officers.
Well done, Arminius.
A remarkable feat for, uh,
a barbarian.
You will be posted to Germania.
Governor Varus will continue
to monitor the borders of the Rhine
and I will send auxiliaries for you
to aid the garrison of the North.
Those inbreds are still resisting,
we must bring them to heel.
You return to your homeland not as a barbarian,
but as a son,
a son of Rome.
He’s our Emperor.
Can you show some respect?
He’s no God, Flavus,
even though you think him to be one.
You are just angry that they’re sending you back to Germany,
away from your villas and privilege, back to the rain and filth.
Remember what you are.
Where you’re from. I remember enough.
I remember that I hated it.
It was our home, Flavus.
That was 15 years ago, brother.
And for 15 years I have dreamt of the Rhine, to taste the waters again.
This is our home now.
Our father surrendered us to Rome. To bring peace to our tribe.
To bring gold, Arminius.
Our noble father surrendered his sons and his weapons
for Roman gold.
Rome’s 400-year march toward total domination of the ancient world
comes north to Germania
where the barbarians' fiercest resistance yet
is keeping the Emperor from claiming his ultimate prize.
Born to the Cherusci tribe but captured and raised by the Empire,
Arminius returns to his homeland
as one of the highest ranking barbarians in the Roman army,
with orders to crush the uprising.
Arminius would have been greatly conflicted.
In all likelihood, he would have burned villages.
Slaughtered whole peoples.
And then as he stands at the Rhine,
looking eastwards towards his own homeland
he would have been thinking, “I may be called upon to do
“the same thing for Rome to my own people.”
Arminius! Remember who you are.
Cherusci. Always.
Arminius will be under the command
of the Emperor’s most notorious enforcer,
General Varus.
Quintilianus Varus had a reputation for using raw Roman power
to deter rebellions and to put them down fiercely whenever they occurred.
Dispatched to crush the barbarian resistance once and for all,
Varus intensifies the efforts to round up children for surrender to Rome.
And imposes harsh taxes on the tribes, to be paid under penalty of death.
Take me to Varus.
Any more skirmishes, and I want them pacified again.
Well, what are you waiting for?
I can’t drink this filth for much longer.
Arminius.
The boy hostaged by his tribe to Rome.
The boy who rose through the ranks to become Equestrian,
in our great and mighty army.
What an abomination.
I need an enforcer,
someone capable of enlisting warriors and capturing tax evaders.
Can you do that?
Yes, sir.
And how would you do that?
I know how the Germans think.
Of course you do.
That’s what you are.
A Roman hero with a barbarian soul.
We need more men for our armies.
For some reason, the Emperor wants these uncultured savages.
Most of the tribal leaders will fall in line and give up their sons
without much resistance.
Like your father did.
Those that don’t will answer to you.
Arminius.
I do not have to question your loyalties here, do I?
You know who you belong to now.
For the Emperor.
For the Empire.
Your once proud nation.
This is what you left behind, Arminius.
Germans selling Germans, for nothing more than trinkets.
Is that what I am, is it? A trinket of Rome?
What else are you?
You climb to the highest rank of any barbarian in the Roman army,
and yet the Emperor sends you back here?
Who am I to question the Emperors wisdom?
After all,
you crucified 2,000 Jewish rebels in the Syrian uprising,
and the Emperor saw it fit to send you here.
Sir.
Careful, Arminius, I’m beginning to like you.
Why haven’t you not paid your taxes, Emsger?
I have.
Not all.
I’ll take her instead.
Take the boys.
They would be more useful, no?
What did he say?
He called me a traitor.
Very well.
Do not mistake my leniency for weakness, Emsger.
The Emperor will have his payment,
one way or another.
The sons of the Arivarii
will cover your debt.
I’ll kill you!
You are Cherusci tribe, yes? Yes.
You will go and collect their unpaid taxes.
Show them we are no longer in a position of striking deals.
Yes, sir.
Come down hard on them, Arminius.
They must fear you.
No negotiations, grain, soldiers,
and silver. That is all.
Arminius’s people, the Cherusci, live in small tribal groups
scattered across North-Western Germania,
united by alliances forged in war
and steeped in a tradition that reveres its ancestors.
Wait here.
When Arminius sees the reality of Roman imperial domination
and what it means to his people, he’s faced
with difficult choices.
What does he do?
Is he going to be the enforcer of Rome’s Empire that he’s been trained to be?
Is he going to turn back to his own society and lead resistance to Rome?
And if he does decide to take that path, will anyone believe him?
At last.
Our favorite son has returned.
An Equestrian, no less.
Your father would have been very proud.
As am I.
I see you’ve taken my family home?
When your father died, I only did as was expected of me.
The bones of our ancestors lay scattered and plundered.
My own father’s grave defiled.
Yet you do nothing.
Your countrymen take taxes.
Yet, you have still defaulted, Segestes?
With our favorite son rising to Equestrian,
I hoped we could renegotiate?
That we could have a special favor.
Rome favors no one but itself.
Bring me the harvest, or its value in silver, or you will be in contempt.
Where is Iguiomerus?
I would stay away from him if I were you.
Your uncle is very much like your father.
Wants nothing but trouble.
Where is he?
Where he always is.
Thusnelda?
No!
I am not what you think me to be.
I heard you were back.
From Emsger.
I’m not one of them.
Your actions will decide that.
So…
Who are you?
I’m Cherusci.
Like you.
Cherusci are not in the habit of abducting their friend’s children.
I had to save his girl. I can get his boys to freedom later.
I had no choice.
Your father was devastated.
Surrendering his sons to Rome.
You, putting on that uniform.
Not knowing what you would become.
Drove him to his grave.
His son,
the Roman.
But that’s not who I am.
So you say.
I was just a boy, Uncle.
It was not my choice to go to their hateful city.
I did what I had to do to survive.
I did what I did to protect my brother.
I have done horrible things in their armies,
things that I will never be able to forgive, but I will do them no more.
I must atone.
How?
By doing what you and he did.
I must fight.
You are a Roman now.
I am Roman.
And that’s why I can beat them.
They will never suspect me,
Arminius, the Equestrian.
I know their movements,
how they fight,
their weaknesses.
If we can gather enough men,
we can beat Varus and his legions.
Drive Rome from our lands.
We can be free again.
Why would anyone trust you,
the Roman?
You will vouch for me, Uncle.
Why would I do that?
Because I am my father’s son.
Out of the crucible,
of unfreedom emerges somebody with an extra dose of will and sacrifice
and becomes leader.
Arminius’ uncle, Iguiomerus,
travels to all the Western tribes, seeking allies.
As word spreads, it awakens a sleeping giant.
Roman imperial domination challenged something that lies at the heart of everything
that we’re told about Germanic society.
That it’s all about political independence.
It’s all about political freedom
and faced with a challenge to those ideological traditions,
I think a lot of Germanic warriors felt they had no choice but to fight.
Arminius acts as a catalyst to bring everyone together.
And that makes him dangerous, much more dangerous than Rome could ever imagine.
Arminius knows Rome’s plans and tactics.
Intelligence he’ll use to take them down.
He’s devising a battle plan that combines the barbarians’ guerilla tactics
with the scale and precision of a Roman attack.
Arminius is uniting the Germanic tribes under one leader
for the first time.
To guard against betrayal,
Arminius decides that tribal leaders must join, or die.
Those who resist, give him the perfect cover.
This one wouldn’t pay his taxes.
Food supplies are low, and I tire of this rat-hole.
I don’t want to be here any longer than I have to.
We move South for our winter camp
in seven days.
Or does that not agree with you?
I will make sure the tribes have made their contributions before then.
The plan has changed.
We have seven days.
The barbarian tribes of Germania
are uniting to fight for their freedom from the Roman Empire.
Leading them is Arminius, a son of Germania, who was raised as a Roman,
an enemy on the inside,
with a plan to defeat the Empire using its own battle plans,
combined with a barbarian guerilla tactics.
Where are my boys? Where are they?
Where are they?
They’ve been taken to Rome.
Then they’re dead, you bastard!
When they get word of your rebellion in Rome,
they will kill them. They were dead anyway.
They would have been taken next year as fodder.
At least this way they have a chance.
Your daughter did not.
You must trust me, Emsger,
as I trust you.
It’s all right.
You do as you must.
But hear me out.
I need you and the Arivarii to join with me, with us.
Our tribes have always been allies.
Varus marches South in seven days.
And we need to gather as many men as we can.
Varus commands three legions,
around 20,000 men.
We will be slaughtered.
We cannot beat them on open ground.
We know that, our scars are proof.
We force them into the Teutoburg Forest.
Varus is no fool, he will never take his army through the forest.
Then we make him!
Varus believes this whole area is under his control.
So we make him believe there is a rebellion brewing in the East.
And we give him no choice but to take the forest.
Arminius, we can’t…
We can! And we will!
I have fought with them long enough,
I know their weaknesses. Without their formations, they cannot fight.
And I know our strengths.
How do we hide an army?
We build ramparts along the tree-line.
We’ve done it before.
It’ll be too late before they see us.
We can slaughter them all.
Arminius has designed a complex battle plan
that depends on luring Varus and his legions into the Teutoburg Forest.
There, the tribes have hand-built a primitive rampart, two miles long,
concealed by the dense woodland.
He cuts through terrain that’s perfect for an ambush,
a thin track with a steep bank on one side and marshland on the other.
He aims to funnel the Roman legions into the kill zone.
Where 15,000 Germanic warriors will stream from behind their fortifications,
and slaughter the Romans where they stand.
Now, more than ever, secrecy is critical.
But as the tribes grow more desperate under the occupation,
it becomes impossible to maintain.
There’s plenty of opportunity for divide and rule.
You only have to offer a not massively advantageous set of terms
to one Germanic group and they will fight their neighbors.
What’s even more incredible is that there’s
a member of his own tribe in the end who will sell him out.
Find Arminius. Now.
Never underestimate your enemy.
Always think the other guy’s stronger,
smarter, better than you are, because it keeps you hungry.
We are betrayed. Varus knows.
Her father sold us out for gold and favor.
Varus has sent riders to get you.
Get her to safety. East,
to the Elbe River.
Where are you going?
Segestes condemns us all to the blade.
I need to find a way to reason with Varus.
Varus will cut your heart out, boy.
The Empire has already cut my heart out.
Arminius is under an enormous amount of pressure,
he’s really riding both sides of the fence and on the one hand,
he’s preparing the ambush, preparing those troops,
getting ready for this slaughter,
and on the other hand, he’s gotta perform his normal functions
as a Roman military man.
And all the while, Varus is becoming suspicious.
You’ve been cut?
Ah. Resistance from a Chauci leader.
He now rots in the marshes along with his ancestors.
You can never trust Germans.
There are always undercurrents of deceit.
Huh.
Cover it. He already has a taste for barbarian flesh.
Your old friend Segestes was here.
And what tax concession did he barter for this time?
He says there are fires of a barbarian rebellion.
He says that it is you who fans the flames.
That you mean to kill me.
That wine will kill you quicker than I ever could.
The locals piss in it.
But my gut tells me the rebellion is real.
I would not move South.
I would hold up here for the winter,
pacify any tribal uprising.
Why would Segestes say such things
when he knows the price of lying?
I am to wed his daughter.
You knew?
I too have ears and eyes everywhere, Arminius.
He promised her to another
in order to unite their two tribes.
A move that stands to make him very powerful.
But he’ll lose it all when I take her back to Rome.
Send auxiliaries to reinforce our garrisons in the east.
Protect the route to the Rhine.
They piss in it, you say?
Uh-huh.
I’ll drink to that.
Varus suspects an insurgence.
The scouts will be vigilant.
We still have over a mile of ramparts to build.
If they suspect anything…
We will be ready.
If they see anything out of place, any bit of the structure,
we’re all dead.
Look around you, Arminius,
there are thousands prepared to fight.
Prepared to die.
They need this more than you.
We will be ready.
Just to conceive of how you get the Roman Army
spread out, in a line,
in terrain that will nullify all its military advantages.
This is an extraordinary act of intelligence, daring and imagination.
Arminius builds a dam to turn the only other forest path
into an impassable swamp.
This will force Varus' men directly into the line of fire.
Finally, Arminius lays the bait.
He gets his allies, the Cimbri,
to start a revolt for Varus to crush.
The only way to reach the uprising,
is to travel east through the Teutoburg forest.
Most courageous of all, has to put himself right beside Varus
and guide him, walk him into the trap personally.
Tell me of the Cimbri.
A once proud tribe of the Rhine.
They have no love of the Empire.
Why?
Your predecessor burnt their families alive.
If the Cimbri are in revolt, they should be crushed before it escalates.
We should make a point.
And what point are we trying to make?
That any disloyalty will be met by force.
If we let this fester over the winter it will be out of control when we return.
Tomorrow we leave this camp and I lead my men through this hostile territory.
They’re nothing more than farmers, they wouldn’t attack three marching legions.
And if the tribes are aligned as Segestes says?
The route is open,
but we lead through marshlands.
Progress will be slow.
But defendable.
I shall sleep on it.
Let the Gods…
…and the wine decide.
Arminius.
Tomorrow, you shall ride alongside me.
As you wish.
Tonight, the Gods judge me.
Tomorrow, they will judge us all.
The barbarians of ancient Germania have united for the first time,
to reclaim their freedom and expel the Empire from their homeland.
Their fate depends on their native son, Arminius.
Varus orders his 20,000 Roman legionaries
deep into the dense Teutoburg Forest.
Hidden there are 15,000 Germanic warriors poised to strike.
When the time comes,
small bands of Germanic warriors hiding in the marsh
will attack on Arminius’ signal.
They’ll launch a series of lightning strikes as a distraction,
giving him the cover he needs to escape and lead his people into battle.
Arminius’ entire plan depends upon the success of his disinformation campaign.
He has to get Varus and his commanders
and all the various other troops to go the appointed route.
That’s where he’s laid the trap.
If they go another route, the problem is at that point the whole thing is lost.
The other route is also flooded.
Can we cross the marsh?
Not without the fork. Go around.
If you value your tongue,
don’t even think about questioning me, boy.
You dare bring an entire army to a halt?
I have a message for Rome.
Arminius.
These are for you.
They were your father’s.
Arminius.
The scouts are upon us.
Get it covered now.
We can’t strike until the vanguard has passed.
We wait for Varus.
If we hit them too soon, they’ll regroup.
Do not let them get into formation.
In the deafening silence of battle,
you discover who you really are.
Cherusci.
Next time on Barbarians Rising…
I will kill you. Then let us begin.
For freedom!
You will regret making enemies of us!
I doubt that, you filthy animal.
What are you doing with our queen?
No!
Teach her some respect.
Barbarians Rising (2016–…): Season 1, Episode 3 - Revenge - full transcript
NARRATOR: Previously on Barbarians Rising…
Rome grows from a city state to an empire.
But its path to power is furious and fatal.
[MEN SCREAMING]
As the barbarians rise against them time and time again,
[GRUNTS]
Rome crushes each rebellion.
[YELLING]
The Empire relies on total domination,
but now it faces a traitor on the inside.
Arminius, a son of Germany, surrendered to Rome,
emerges as the Empire’s greatest threat.
VARUS: The boy hostaged by his tribe to Rome,
what an abomination.
NARRATOR: Sent to destroy his own people,
he turns on Rome instead.
Rome is unbeatable. No, they’ll bleed.
NARRATOR: Hatching a secret plot…
ARMINIUS: They will never suspect me.
I know their movements, how they fight.
NARRATOR: …to drive the Romans out…
If we can gather enough men, we can beat Varus and his leaders.
NARRATOR: …and reclaim their freedom.
[MEN SCREAMING]
[HORSE WHINNYING]
[BREATHES DEEPLY]
[THEME MUSIC PLAYING]
[HORSE SNORTING]
[BIRDS SQUAWKING]
Arminius…
These are for you.
They were your father’s.
NARRATOR: Arminius and his army of Germanic warriors
wait as Governor Varus’ legions march directly into their ambush.
Go, go, go.
[BREATHES HEAVILY]
We can’t strike until the vanguard has passed.
We wait for Varus.
If we hit them too soon, they’ll regroup.
Do not let them get into formation.
[INHALES SHARPLY]
[EXHALES]
[GRUNTS]
[HORSE WHINNYING]
[SOLDIERS SCREAMING]
[GROANS]
[ALL GRUNTING]
[GROANS]
[NEIGHING]
[YELLING]
[GROANING]
[YELLING]
[GROANS]
[YELLING]
[GRUNTS]
ARMINIUS: At last, no viper.
You cease to hiss.
[BIRD SQUAWKING]
NARRATOR: The Battle of Teutoburg Forest rages for three days.
The bloodiest showdown between Rome and the barbarians
since Hannibal’s victory at Cannae 200 years earlier.
The Empire loses nearly all of its 20,000 men.
Arminius’ victory is utterly unprecedented.
It should never have happened.
For a bunch of untrained Germanic tribesmen to hem in three legions
and basically wipe the whole of them out,
this should never have happened.
The irony here is that Rome created its own worst enemy.
NARRATOR: And Arminius sends a message directly to the Emperor.
Rome is no longer invincible.
For Augustus, this is a betrayal of the greatest magnitu NARRATOR: Augustus expels all Germans from the capital
and withdraws his troops from Germania,
retreating south of the Rhine.
But the Emperor refuses to accept defeat.
He att*cks again two years later.
This time he doubles his force,
to 40,000, to destroy Arminius
and bring Germania under the eagle.
PETER HEATHER: Rome never forgives and it never forgets.
NARRATOR: The barbariansr tw,
while their leader, Arminius, evades capture.
HEATHER: You can’t win a great victory in Germania
if the people don’t want you to.
People are spread out, there are trees everywhere,
you’ve gotta find your enemy before you can defeat them.
People can fight a great guerrilla warfare
against you, more or less forever.
COLONEL FARRELL: For the Germans,
there is a larger cause that motivates them.
That cause, that reason is freedom.
It was the barbarians who refused to succumb NARRATOR: The Empire unleashes waves of v*olence against the tribes,
but fails to draw Arminius out of hiding…
Until its legions target his own family.
[DOG BARKING]
[FLIES BUZZING]
Is this the price of freedom?
Is this to be our lives now?
Hiding in the darkness, watching our world get destroyed.
It will end.
Will it?
[HORSE APPROACHING]
It’s Thusnelda. They have found her.
Her father struck a deal with the Roman Commander.
[DOGS BARKING] [MAN GRUNTING]
[BABY CRYING]
It was your brother… Flavus.
No!
NARRATOR: Surrendered to Rome alongside his brother Arminius 15 years earlier,
Flavus has proven himself in battle,
and is now one of Rome’s most trusted commanders.
He’s among those sent to finally conquer Germania.
Capturing Arminius’ wife and unborn child achieves the desired result.
Arminius comes out of the shadows
with a response that is swift and apocalyptic.
ERIC L. HANEY: If your opponent has nothing left to lose
but their honor and their sense of dignity,
he’s utterly dangerous.
[BIRDS SQUAWKING]
[MEN SCREAMING]
NARRATOR: When the two sides meet,
Arminius commands an army of 20,000 warriors from tribes across Germania.
Rome’s force of battle-hardened troops numbers 40,000.
It’s the first time in 200 years
that the barbarians face the Empire on an open b*ttlefield.
DAVID FURLOW: When Arminius emerged Brother. s
Where is she?
Rome has made you blind.
I can still see you’re covered in filth,
some of it even your own.
If only you could see my villas, my baths.
Even the slaves are magnificent.
What do you have to show for your betrayal, brother?
A bed of straw and the loyalty of a pack of beasts.
No, I have something you have never known.
Freedom.
I’m nobody’s magnificent sl*ve.
A golden cage is still a cage, Flavus.
The Empire has taken everything from us,
even our brotherhood.
But here you sit like some bastard son of Rome.
Where is she?
She’s in Rome…
With your son.
Oh, you didn’t know you had a son?
He’ll be brought up as a good Roman.
I’ll raise him as my own.
My own Roman sl*ve.
I will k*ll you for this.
I will k*ll you.
Then let us begin.
[HORSE WHINNYING]
[MEN SCREAMING]
[ALL YELLING]
[GROANS]
[GRUNTS]
[GROANING]
[GRUNTS]
Brother.
Your rebellion will fail.
FLAVUS: Yet here you are,
on your knees, before Rome.
I will never kneel before Rome.
[ARMINIUS GROANING]
Germany will never kneel before Rome.
Then you will die along with Germany, my brother.
[GRUNTING]
[GRUNTS]
[THUNDER RUMBLES]
[BREATHING HEAVILY]
[GRUNTING]
[GRUNTS]
[BREATHING HEAVILY]
[GRUNTS]
Remember who you are.
[STRUGGLING]
Cherusci, always.
Now, you crawl back to Rome and you tell them
this soil is already rich with Roman blood.
And if they come back, they will bleed by my hand
and for generations to come.
[ARMINIUS GRUNTS]
[GRUNTS]
NARRATOR: For the first time in nearly 300 years,
the barbarians are shifting the balance of power against Rome.
Still determined to conquer Germania,
the Empire launches a series of att*cks over the next eight years.
Arminius repels them all.
But he never reunites with his family.
His son is raised as a c*ptive in Rome.
His story lost to history.
Arminius is m*rder*d in 21 AD
by allies who fear he has grown too powerful.
But he’s forever remembered as a liberator,
the first barbarian to expel Rome from his homeland.
Arminius was, undoubtedly, the liberator of Germania.
He fought the Romans when their power was at its height
and decisively defeated them.
GENERAL WESLEY K. CLARK: Most accepted their lot, the few don’t.
They don’t wanna be subjected
to somebody else’s power over them,
and they fight back.
NARRATOR: Germania was to be Rome’s greatest prize,
instead, it’s their most crushing defeat.
The Empire abandons its campaign in 21 AD,
forty years after its first invasion.
Sets its borders at the Rhine,
and never again sets foot in Germania.
But Rome must expand to survive.
Its strength comes from conquering new lands,
resources and populations to fuel evermore growth.
This underlying Roman ambition to expand,
it affects everything.
The entire Roman civilization is built upon it.
NARRATOR: Driven out of Germania in the east,
Rome turns its eye north to one of the last remaining barbarian strongholds,
Britannia. A place unlike any Rome’s conquered before.
The Romans viewed Britannia as the land beyond ocean,
as the place beyond the end of the civilized world that lured them forward.
It was a land of mists and mysticism,
where supernatural spirits stalked the land.
STEVE KERSHAW: It was exotic, it was wild, it was barbarous.
And on the other side, they thought it was very rich.
It had gold and silver they thought.
Hunting dogs, slaves, grain for the army.
The price of victory was a good one.
NARRATOR: Over the last 100 years,
the Empire launches five separate invasions of the island,
all of them fail, beaten back by the Celts.
Ferocious pagan warriors who ride chariots into battle
and fight naked or covered in w*r paint designed to instill fear.
COLONEL FARRELL: For Rome, Britannia represents something very different.
The people there are as alien as any they’ve encountered.
They seem, literally, to the Romans, insane.
And, of course, they’re also going after your head.
They won’t be content to defeat you
until they’ve got your head.
So that’s very frightening to the opponent.
[SOLDIERS SCREAMING]
[GRUNTS]
NARRATOR: When Rome invades again in 43 AD,
it makes a foothold in the south-east.
Emperor Claudius sends 40,000 troops to take the island.
The Celts rise up once again,
but this time, they are no match for the Roman w*r machine.
One by one the tribes begin to fall.
Those not defeated in battle are bribed into peace treaties.
Among them are the Iceni, who have been at w*r with Rome for two decades.
Their leader, King Prasutagus,
accepts the Empire’s peace terms.
ARYA: We’ve already seen this kind of tactic in Germania,
it’s just what the Romans do.
They offer up a treaty in agreement with the tribe,
you sign it, you’re a friend, you’re an ally of Rome.
You don’t sign it, you’ll be destroyed.
NARRATOR: But 10 years later, Rome gets a new Emperor,
the infamous Nero, who demands the total submission of the Celts.
[BIRDS SQUAWKING]
Prasutagus, King of the Iceni,
we are gathered to speed your passage to the other world.
You brought your people peace,
now you go to yours.
Your daughters will succeed you at the head of this great tribe,
guided by your beloved Queen Boudica.
They will endure in this world
as you take your place in the one beyond.
[BIRDS SQUAWKING]
[GOAT BLEATING]
Guardians of the Sacred Mystery,
accept this sacrifice.
May this lifeblood ease the journey of this king.
[INAUDIBLE]
The other world is his.
[BREATHING SHAKILY]
Sleep well, my king.
May the other world love you as I do.
[EXHALES DEEPLY]
[HORSE WHINNYING]
Tell me.
VANESSA COLLINGRIDGE: The death of Prasutagus
leaves the Iceni in a very vulnerable position.
Nero would fully expect the kingdom to be handed over to Rome.
Instead of that, he’s left half of his lands to his daughters.
Now, leaving your kingdom to two female
barbarian children is utterly abhorrent to Rome.
[DOG BARKING]
[INDISTINCT CHATTERING]
[EGUS GRUNTING]
The King still burns.
Whatever you have come for can wait, Decianus.
My husband, the King, made a deal!
Your husband, the King, lays dead.
What was his now belongs to Rome, and so do you.
CATHBAD: You dare to insult the Queen!
You dare to break Emperor Claudius’ deal!
Claudius is dead.
I answer only to Nero.
The Empire is calling in its loans, and they will pay.
My husband did what Rome asked.
He honored every promise.
If Rome betrays our alliance now, know this, Decianus,
you will regret making enemies of us!
I doubt that, you filthy animal!
How dare you!
[ICENI MEN YELLING]
What are you doing with our Queen? Let her go!
The mighty Queen of the Iceni,
a woman who thinks herself fit to rule.
What a joke!
I’ll k*ll you!
Your v [GRUNTING]
We don’t make deals with dogs.
Ah!
No!
Teach her some respect.
[SCREAMS]
[WHIP LASHING]
No!
[WHIP LASHES] [GRUNTS]
[WHIP LASHES] [GRUNTS]
[CONTINUES GRUNTING]
Mom!
Take her girls!
EGUS: Not the girls!
No!
No!
Not the girls!
[GIRLS SCREAMING]
No!
Not the girls!
[CRYING] No, no, no!
Do whatever you want with me, but leave the children alone.
Show some mercy!
Mercy is for fools.
EGUS: Leave her alone!
Turn them into women!
[SCREAMING]
[WHIP LASHES] [GRUNTS]
[GROANING]
[WHIP LASHING CONTINUES]
Look after your sister.
Look after your sister. [SOBBING]
COLLINGRIDGE: The Romans grossly misread the situation.
Boudica is not going to take this lying down.
This is an insult to her tribe,
it’s an insult to her god,
and it’s an insult to her and her status.
There is really only one way out of this,
and that way is to meet v*olence with v*olence.
[SCREAMING]
[BIRDS SQUAWKING]
[BREATHING HEAVILY]
I promise, I will do this with your sword.
We will destroy them all.
[EXHALES DEEPLY]
NARRATOR: The barbarians’ uprising against Rome reaches a turning point.
For the first time in 300 years,
they roll back the Empire’s gains,
driving it out of Germania.
But Rome’s next target is Britannia,
where it unleashes a wave of v*olence to crush the Celts.
[SCREAMS]
Now, Boudica,
Queen of the Iceni seeks revenge for Rome’s savage betrayal.
You don’t know you’re a great leader
until really bad stuff happens to you.
And then you either rise to the occasion or you die.
This I [HORSE WHINNYING]
NARRATOR: Boudica sets out to amass an army.
The tribes critical to launching a rebellion are the Trinovantes,
the fiercely anti-Roman Silurians, and the Catuvellauni,
who turned back Julius Caesar’s invasion 100 years earlier.
KERSHAW: Boudica has a lot of unique challenges.
She is untried, she’s untested, she has no track record.
The British tribes have a long history of fighting one another,
so it’s never going to be easy for her to bring the tribes together under one banner.
NARRATOR: To bring the Celts under control,
Rome escalates its w*r.
Emperor Nero installs a new Governor,
General Gaius Suetonius Paulinus.
Paulinus had a really good record at putting down revolts.
He’d fought in North Africa and done that there.
So now he came into Britain as the Governor to a territory that was still unstable.
NARRATOR: Paulinus’ first move is to attack the heart of Celtic culture.
The Druids are the tribes' religious and political advisors.
[BIRDS SQUAWKING]
POWELL: The Druids have a very special place in Celtic societies.
They manage the relationship between the gods in Heaven
and the people on Earth.
The Druids would always feel a great threat coming from the Roman Empire.
They’d been dominant in Gaul but they’d been pushed out,
and now they were in Britannia.
So from the Druids’ perspective,
the Romans were the big enemy.
NARRATOR: The island of Mona, deep in Celtic territory, is home to the Druids.
In 60 AD, Paulinus launches a campaign to destroy it.
But when he sets out with 10,000 legionaries,
he leaves the Roman settlements in the south,
virtually undefended and vulnerable to attack.
This is Boudica’s opportunity.
[DOG BARKING]
We need you here.
I am needed in Mona.
Egus and his warriors will protect you if Decianus returns.
That won’t be needed.
I’m not waiting for the ax to fall.
I’m already sharpening my own blade.
You don’t know what you’re doing.
I know what needs to be done!
Don’t let revenge blind you.
If I need your advice, Cathbad, I will ask for it.
And when you ask for it, I will tell you this…
Know that the only thing worth living for
is the only thing worth dying for.
[BIRDS SQUAWKING]
FURLOW: Boudica occupies a special status as
the leading woman of the Iceni.
She’d been whipped, her daughters had been r*ped,
she symbolized the worst of the Roman conquest,
and therefore stood as a perfect person
to inspire the British people to rise in rebellion.
POWELL: But on the oth
Meeting like this is su1c1de.
Not meeting like this is su1c1de.
Let her speak!
A great darkness has come,
and threatens to consume us all.
My people will never be cowed.
m the brutality thrust upon me
that none of us are safe from the Empire.
Unless we stand now,
we will be the last generation
of Britons to have known a taste of freedom!
We must drive out these demons from our lands!
How?
Last time we fought them, we were annihilated.
You know this.
Your Iceni tribe was beaten into submission
‘cause your King signed the treaty with Rome.
From this day on, the Iceni pays no more tribute
DREST: Your choices need not be ours.
It was not our children who were r*ped.
The two children r*ped by the Roman animals
may have been born of this body,
but they belong to no-one.
They belong only to this!
Our island!
And now, now they send Paulinus and his legions
to Mona to slaughter the Druids.
And you stand there and talk of treaties!
What do you know of them going after the Druids?
Cathbad told me.
The Empire rides west as we speak.
This may be our only opportunity to strike!
Where?
At their heart.
Camulodunum.
We burn their capital to the ground.
And what of the people there?
We slaughter them all.
ARTHFAEL: I came out of respect for your husband.
But I will not die alongside you,
and neither should anyone else.
My people will not die for your personal vendetta.
This is personal for all of us.
Why should we die in w*r
when we can keep what we have in peace?
The Emperor Claudius used such words to seduce our people.
But Rome… Rome has changed.
Emperor Nero is not satisfied with deals.
Now is the time to act, not cower.
But let us not decide this alone.
Let us put this to the gods.
For the pagan Britons, their beliefs in the gods
are like the air that they breathe.
So if she can tap into this and make something of it,
maybe even manipulate it to her advantage,
she’s got something going for her that’s very powerful.
[CAWING]
BOUDICA: Behold the crow!
The spirit of our mighty Goddess Andraste.
Let us ask her
if it is right to expel
the Roman magpie from our island.
Let us ask her, if together we can emerge victorious.
MEN: [CHANTING] Ask, ask, ask.
[CAWS]
[CROW CAWING]
[GRUNTS]
[SOFTLY] Look at me, Andraste.
Look at me.
Look at me.
Look at me.
[GASPING]
Look at me, Andraste.
Look at me, Andraste.
Look at me, Andraste.
[BREATHING HEAVILY]
Look at me, Andraste.
[CAWING]
When does the k*lling begin?
NARRATOR: The barbarians’ victory in Germania Without the Catavell
forces the Empire to find a new frontier to conquer.
In the north, Britannia promises
a wealth of silver, gold and slaves.
But the Celts intend to fight for their survival.
Queen Boudica of the Iceni wants revenge,
and does whatever it takes to convince the tribes to join in her fight.
HERJAVEC: Incredible sacrifice
is very difficult on an individual level.
For a greater cause, people will give up their life,
their money, their family, everything for the cause.
COLLINGRIDGE: In ancient Britain,
entire communities would rise up
and they would all go on to the battle site.
This means that if it goes wrong,
you’re not just facing the loss of a battle,
you’re facing the loss of, potentially,
your entire people.
[DOGS BARKING]
The tribes are on the move.
We have tens of thousands all getting into position outside Camulodunum.
We’ll be ready to strike in two days.
The first k*ll is the hardest.
But like any warrior, you’ll cross that bridge when the time comes.
How could you?
How can you ask me that?
You tricked an army, but you can’t fool me.
[SHUSHING] Look, I have tricked no-one.
You want all their blood on your hands, too?
What?
How many people do you have to destroy?
As many Romans as I can.
And how many Britonstay at home? Need to Home?
Home is not a place, it is a privilege.
And unless we fight to keep it,
it will be taken from us.
And if you die?
Then I will wait for you in the other world
with your father.
Okay, come, come, come.
Shh.
NARRATOR: Camulodunum is the Roman capital in Britain,
one in a string of settlements across
the south-east that keep the Empire anchored on the island.
With Paulinus and his legions heading to fight
the Druids in Mona
the town is nearly defenseless.
COLLINGRIDGE: Camulodunum is the festering boil
for anyone with a grudge against Rome.
Not only is it the administrative heart
but it’s filled with retired Roman soldiers.
They’re the ones who’ve extracted the money from taxes,
they’ve insulted the gods, they’ve violated the people.
TULSI GABBARD: The challenges that face any leader are the same
whether you are a male or female.
What it really boils down to
when people look up to this person,
who is asking them to risk their lives to go into combat,
is what is motivating that person.
And do they have my best interest at heart?
Can I trust them to lead us?
Time to see how you fight.
[CLEARS THROAT]
BOUDICA: Listen here!
Lookouts and sentries first.
Cause as much terror as possible.
We want news of our wrath to reach Rome.
These leeches have gorged on our blood long enough!
Tonight, they will choke on it!
[MEN YELLING]
[YELLING CONTINUES]
KERSHAW: Boudica goes into Camulodunum to cause utter carnage.
She needs to send a message of utter terror
to Roman Britain and throughout the Roman Empire.
The Britons are on the rampage.
Rome, you have never seen anything like this before.
[MEN SHOUTING]
[GRUNTING]
[MEN SHOUTING, GRUNTING]
[GRUNTING]
[PANTING]
[SCREAMS]
[GRUNTS]
[BREATHING HEAVILY]
Boudica.
[MEN SCREAMING]
Where’s Decianus? I don’t know.
Where is he? Where is he?
Rome. He’s gone to Rome!
[GASPS, GRUNTS]
[GRUNTING]
[PANTING]
NARRATOR: The Roman Empire controls the ancient world,
but 300 years of resistance chips away at its power.
[SCREAMING]
Now Boudica’s Celtic horde strikes a violent blow
determined to fight blood with blood. [GRUNTS]
[GRUNTS]
We’ve beheaded all their high-ranking men
and slaughtered their women, as they’d done with ours.
And where are the others?
Hiding in the temple they built to honor Claudius.
KERSHAW: The Temple of Claudius was a focus of emperor worship,
so in many ways a really obvious target.
This was everything they hated about the Romans in one place.
WOMAN: Please help us.
Please. [BABY CRYING]
[VOICE BREAKING] There are children here.
Please, in the name of the gods, let us out!
Boudica, the children.
WOMAN: My children!
Please!
Have you no mercy?
[WHIP LASHES]
Mercy is for fools. WOMAN: No!
No, no, no.
[WOMAN SOBBING]
[SCREAMING]
[PEOPLE SCREAMING]
NARRATOR: Boudica’s army slaughters tens of thousands of civilians at Camulodunum.
They burn it to the ground.
A fire so devastating, that 2,000 years later
archeologists discover a thick layer of ash where the city once stood.
Boudica’s beating Rome at its own game
through a campaign of shock and awe.
There’s no way that Rome is going to allow this act
to go unpunished,
and there’s only going to be one outcome.
She has in effect, mobilized all of Rome
against her and her allies.
NARRATOR: Rome gets word of the attack within hours.
In response, it dispatches troops from Londinium,
eighty miles away.
Roman legionaries.
A few thousand of them. No more than a couple of hours away.
They’re heading straight for the caravan,
the carts and the children.
Head for the hills and cut them off.
And you?
I’ll meet you there.
KERSHAW: The shift now between attacking and destroying
a poorly-defended city
to take on a detachment of a Roman Legion in proper combat,
that’s escalating things to another level entirely.
POWELL: This is th [SHOUTING]
Formation!
Formation!
[NEIGHING]
[SHOUTING]
[ALL SHOUTING]
[SCREAMING, GRUNTING]
[SCREAMING]
[GRUNTS]
[MEN SHOUTING]
[GRUNTING]
[NEIGHS]
[GRUNTS]
[SCREAMS]
[GROANS]
[GRUNTS]
[GRUNTING]
[GRUNTING]
[GRUNTS]
[SHOUTING]
[GROANS]
[ROMAN SOLDIER SCREAMING]
[MAN SCREAMING]
[SCREAMING]
[CONTINUES SCREAMING]
[GROANS]
[CONTINUES SCREAMING]
[GRUNTING]
[BOUDICA CONTINUES SCREAMING]
[GROANS]
[GRUNTS]
Goddess Andraste, grant us vengeance,
grant us victory.
[GRUNTS]
[GROANS]
NARRATOR: The barbarians’
is gaining momentum in Britannia.
Boudica’s rebellion begins with the bloody attack
that leaves tens of thousands dead and the capital in flames.
[GRUNTS]
The Celts are using guerrilla tactics
that the barbarians have adapted to fight Rome.
But this rebellion is an escalation,
targeting civilians, including women and children,
the kind of cruelty usually displayed by the Romans.
The capture and destruction of Camulodunum
was highly symbolic for the Britons
because it was a major Roman center,
but it was also an extremely soft target.
It was an easy conquest.
There were no walls.
The inhabitants were Roman veteran soldiers by and large.
So now, they could and should expect the full might of Rome to be deployed against them.
[BOUDICA CHUCKLES]
I knew nothing would happen.
[BOUDICA SIGHS]
You were right.
BOUDICA: They have att*cked your people?
Worse.
Mona.
BOUDICA: Mona?
The Druids are no more.
[HORSE NEIGHS]
FURLOW: Paulinus’ attack on the island of Mona was brutal.
He turned loose the legionaries,
they slaughtered the women,
they went in and m*rder*d the Druid priest.
It would be the equivalent
of an army marching into the Vatican,
murdering all the nuns, k*lling all the priests
and then burning down St. Peter’s.
The eradication of the Druids was absolutely catastrophic for the people of Britain.
It had ripped the heart out of their religion,
their politics, their leadership,
er, their communication with their gods.
It was… It was a true apocalypse for them.
[EXHALES]
DREST: The gods have abandoned us.
We can’t go on.
We must.
Without the Druids, what hope do we have?
Without us, what hope do these people have?
The Druids were slaughtered to tear us apart.
If they succeed and our unity breaks,
it ends all opposition against the Empire.
We have no choice but to go on.
We are the only ones who can carry on this fight.
We must answer blood with blood!
She’s right.
Look at what you have done here.
The fight has already begun.
Their troops lie dead, their city destroyed.
If you continue, you can drive them back into the sea.
If you give in,
Britannia will fall.
What is your plan?
We give their legions nowhere to retreat to.
And then we tear them apart!
NARRATOR: The Roman occupation depends on the belt
of fortified cities it has established
across the Celts’ territory.
Camulodunum, now in ruins, Verulamium and Londinium, the center of Roman commerce.
Boudica plans to destroy them all.
ARYA: This is the ancient equivalent
of Sherman’s March in the American Civil w*r.
It’s pretty much slash and burn everything.
Burn it to the ground, leave nothing behind,
no form of infrastructure is intact.
It’s a really shrewd move now
for Boudica to attack Londinium.
It’s a major port, it’s very strategically located,
so now she can drive a wedge between Paulinus and the rest of Rome
and cut off his supplies.
NARRATOR: The Celts unleash vengeance on Londinium.
KERSHAW: Boudica’s troops burned, they hanged,
they beheaded, they cut throats,
they cut the breasts of the most noble and best-looking women
and stitched them over their mouths
to make them look like they were eating them,
and then they impaled the women.
If you want to shoNARR s races to Londinium, arriving in time to watch it burn.
NARRATOR: Six months into their rebellion,
Boudica’s Celts have k*lled 70,000
and destroyed three Roman towns.
But they’ve yet to face Paulinus in battle.
They’ll have to fight his legions
in order to win the w*r.
Paulinus and his men are returning from Mona.
Take another rider and find them so we can end this.
[SIGHS]
Egus will find them.
In time?
We cannot wait much longer. The people are starving.
Then seize more grain. We have run out of places to raid.
The harvest is missed. What food there was now rots in the soil.
Soon people will die.
You can be sure Roman hunger bites just as hard.
They must be near, and we will defeat them.
Soon we will be able to plant again, eat again,
and live again.
BOUDICA: Goddess Andraste,
please come to me.
Come to me, guide me the way.
Please, help me.
[HORSE APPROACHING]
RIDER: Paulinus’ scouts caught him.
The Romans are close, one day’s ride.
[BOUDICA SOBBING]
Give that to my husband.
Tell him, tomorrow we will be free.
We must not let them dig in.
We leave at dawn.
NARRATOR: Rome is the most powerful empire in the ancient world,
built on domination through expansion.
And now, fighting to conquer Britannia,
[w*r CRY] where Boudica is beating them at their own game,
waging a guerrilla w*r with Roman-style vengeance.
KERSHAW: We’ve had tens of thousands of dead.
We’ve got three cities in flames.
Rome has never had to cope with
anything like this before in its history.
NARRATOR: Boudica’s Celtic Army outnumbers Rome’s forces three to one,
as the two sides prepare to battle for the first time.
General Paulinus, a master military tactician,
looks to even up the odds.
GENERAL CLARK: No commander ever wants to go
on the b*ttlefield for a fair fight.
Why would you ever want a fair fight?
You want an unfair fight with all of the advantages on your side.
e.
Instead, he devises a plan forcing the Celtic warriors into a narrow defile
where he can take them out one by one.
For Boudica to stand any chance of survival,
she must get her troops through the defile as quickly as possible
so that they can then spread out
and use their tactics, that have worked so well.
But speed is of the essence
if she has any hope of winning this battle.
NARRATOR: Boudica is attemptin Your men are ready?
Ready.
[EXHALES]
What would Father say?
He would say to you what he says to me.
I am with you, my love.
[WARRIORS SHOUTING]
[SHOUTING]
[SHOUTING STOPS]
Our enemy believes we are a divided land,
a conquered people
who are easily made slaves.
But we have shown them
there is a greater truth in our hearts.
We are one battle away
from our freedom!
One battle away from our destiny!
We are one battle away from driving
these b*stards from our shores!
Forever!
[ALL SHOUTING]
To those who would oppress us,
welcome to your death!
[ALL SHOUTING]
[INAUDIBLE]
[GRUNTS]
[SOBBING]
[FEEBLY] Run.
Run!
[SCREAMING] Run!
Run! [SOBBING] Run!
Run.
[HORSE APPROACHING]
[EXHALES]
[STOPS BREATHING]
[CROW CAWS]
FURLOW: Boudica’s final battle was a catastrophe
for the British rebellion against Rome.
Eighty thousand British rebels died on that b*ttlefield that day.
After the battle, Roman forces carried out a policy of annihilation,
virtually of genocide.
The Roman forces even used famine against the Britons
to starve out those they did not k*ll
and did not forcibly subjugate.
She led the way she’d been taught
and she led with her heart, and it worked for a while.
NARRATOR: Boudica’s rebellion ends in defeat,
but inspires more tribes to rise up against Rome.
POWELL: She put a face on what rebellion in Britain looked like.
It was a terrifying face.
It had taught the Romans that they could never properly trust the Britons.
They always had to be on their guard.
That somewhere there might be another Boudica
planning another rebellion.
NARRATOR: It takes another 60 years for the Empire to finally conquer the island.
NARRATOR: The campaigns to take Britannia and Germania come at such great cost
that the Empire can no longer afford to keep fighting the barbarians.
Rome’s age of expansion is over.
Rome stopped expanding for a number of reasons.
One was military.
The resistance on the borders
was getting increasingly severe.
The other was bureaucratic.
The Romans couldn’t maintain the domains they’d already conquered
because they didn’t have a sophisticated enough government to do it.
NARRATOR: The Empire now builds walls to keep the barbarians out.
In Scotland to the far north, along the Rhine River in the west, and in the east,
the Danube becomes the dividing line
between Empire and eastern Europe.
For the first time in four centuries,
barbarians living on Rome’s frontier
are free from its tyranny.
The barbarians were essentially enjoying a kind of a peace dividend,
there were good opportunities for trade with the Empire.
So generally speaking, being just outside the borders was a really good thing for them.
NARRATOR: Among them are the Goths,
a multi-ethnic people who settled north of the Danube 200 years earlier.
O’CONNOR: The Goths were a Germanic tribe
who had moved into what is now Romania.
They were a settled agricultural society
but they were ruled by a powerful warrior elite,
who were famous NARRATOR: The Goths often skirmished with the Romans,
but managed to maintain an uneasy truce along the border,
until a dark force rising in the east shatters the peace,
[HORSE NEIGHS] Huns.
The Huns are a new phenomenon when they appear
at the end of the 4th Century.
No-one’s seen them before and no-one knows how to deal with them.
They were a warrior race who lived by plunder and w*r.
NARRATOR: With the Roman Empire to the west
and the Huns to the east,
the Goths are caught between two deadly threats.
[PEOPLE SPEAKING AT A DISTANCE]
Alaric,
more wood.
[GROANS] ALARIC: Father!
[GASPS]
[CLANKING]
[DOG BARKING] ALARIC’S MOTHER: Alaric!
[WOMAN SCREAMING] [HORSE NEIGHING]
[HORSES APPROACHING]
[PEOPLE SHOUTING, GROANING]
[SWORDS SWISHING]
AVINA: Mother!
is a vast superpower,
commanding 40 million people.
But as Rome’s age of expansion ends, a rising threat
emerges on its eastern border
and catches the Goths in the crossfire.
[GROANS]
[CLANKING] They have no answer for the Huns deadly raids.
[SCREAMING]
To save his people, the Goths’ leader,
Fritigern, is forced to make a bargain with his enemy.
O’CONNOR: Fritigern was a military leader
of one of the groups of Goths.
He certainly had been involved in a number of wars.
NARRATOR: Fritigern asked Rome for asylum in exchange for safe passage across the border
into the protection of the Empire.
He agrees to provide Emperor Valens
with an army of Goth mercenaries to help fight the Huns.
KERSHAW: Fritigern didn’t really have much of an option here.
He was caught between a rock and a hard place.
He had to get away from the Huns
and doing a deal with the devil,
in the person of Roman Emperor Valens,
was the only option he had really.
NARRATOR: Fritigern must gather his tribes before it’s too late.
[CROWS CAWING]
You’re safe.
Come.
[AVINA GASPS]
GABBARSee if there’s ink about the s anyone left alive. ers
Take any grain, livestock.
And have them buried.
We don’t have much time.
This was just a scouting party.
When the next wave comes, the earth itself will tremble.
Take this.
You’ll live.
NARRATOR: Alaric is just a young man when he survives the Hun raids.
Fritigern takes him into his protection as they head for Roman soil.
KERSHAW: One of the effects that the Huns had
was to make people flinch away from them,
and the direction that people flinched
was towards the Roman Empire. That’s where security was.
So as all these barbarian tribes moved away from the Huns,
it created an absolutely massive refugee crisis,
a bit like we’re seeing today.
We’re gonna cross the Danube, and start a new life.
Everything will change now.
The Romans will help us.
NARRATOR: The Goths descend on the Danube like a tidal wave.
Fritigern’s people number around 50,000,
but thousands more converge on the river.
Emperor Valens assigns his eastern legions to organize a safe crossing,
but they fail to follow his orders.
The Goths are walking into a death trap.
[WATER SLOSHING]
[HORSE NEIGHING]
NARRATOR: On the Roman frontier, the growing threat of the Huns
is throwing the barbarian world into chaos,
driving the Goths into the arms of their enemy.
But the Empire’s promise of safe haven across the Danube River
is over before it even begins.
The crossing of the Danube was a disaster
from beginning to end.
The Romans were in no way prepared for the number of Goths
who they eventually had to transport over the river.
They wound up bringing them over in rafts that were too small,
some of the capsized and went into the river and people drowned.
[SLOSHING]
[HORSE NEIGHS]
[GRUNTS]
NARRATOR: Hundreds of Goths die in the crossing.
Those who survive, confront the harsh reality
[CRYING] of their so-called alliance with the Empire.
MICHAEL KULIKOWSKI: The Goths are disarmed, so they have no way
to defend themselves.
And the Roman officers begin to exploit them
the moment they cross the Danube.
Hey!
Hey!
[GROANS]
LUPICINIUS: Enough!
KERSHAW: They encounter this renegade Roman Commander, Lupicinius.
He’s just trying to make money out of this process so he treats them like the vermin he thinks they are.
And you are?
I’m Fritigern.
So you’re their leader.
You don’t look like much.
And this is your spineless rabble.
There’ll be no trouble here.
I will not tolerate it.
Raise your hand again to one of my guards, you’ll hang.
You’ll see that it grants us the right to safe passage.
You are careless with your Emperor’s words.
We can’t have barbarians just wandering across the country causing mayhem.
We’ve come in peace.
Have you?
If any one of you is concealing a w*apon, you’d better hand it over now.
My men have all complied.
And your women?
Need food. My people are hungry.
LUPICINIUS: Do you have payment for this food?
Or is it charity you want?
We have money.
[SNIFFLES]
They can start on that.
You think we’re savages?
[SWORDS UNSHEATHING]
No.
No, the Huns are savages.
You are, what,
cowards, maybe.
Parasites.
If you don’t like it,
you can go back across the river and deal with the Huns,
like men.
LENSKI: Lupicinius was only enacting the kinds of feelings
that had been inculcated in him
by a Roman system that said, “Scorn all barbarians.”
These people were, in the Romans eyes, inferior,
and they deserved to be fleeced and they deserved to be abused.
NARRATOR: The Empire settles the Goths in a string of camps
along the riverbank, under military guard.
I think is a combination of The Roman soldof the Goths
straightforward logistic problems and Roman ill-will.
They control food supplies, so they can control the Goths by threatening starvation.
UNWEN: We have to send a message to the Emperor.
I’m convinced he’s ignorant of what has happened here.
And how do we do that?
The last I heard, he was fighting out in Persia.
[SIGHS] We could fight these b*stards, but then what?
We’d be outlaws.
That’s not what I brought us here for.
What did you bring us here for?
For a home,
as the Emperor promised,
so that you and your sister could be safe.
And we will get that, it just…
It just may take time.
LENSKI: The Romans were more than happy to abuse them,
and that began immediately.
It was partly because that there weren’t enough resources to go around.
They didn’t have enough food to feed as many refugees as came into the Empire.
But it was okay to abuse these people and treat them as slaves
[INDISTINCT CHATTER]
We’ve had 12 people die today from hunger.
UNWEN: Parents are selling their children.
Their selling their children?
For dog meat.
We can’t hold out much longer.
[GUARD LAUGHING]
Avina? Avina!
[HUMMING]
Avina!
Avina!
AVINA: Alaric!
Alaric!
Alaric!
Avina!
Alaric!
Avina! Alar [GRUNTING]
What is it?
They’ve taken her! What?
[SOBBING] You lied!
You said we’d be safe.
You said we’d be safe.
[CLAMORING]
[INDISTINCT]
NARRATOR: Lupicinius’ arrest of their leader Fritigern,
[CLAMORING] provokes the already restless Goths into action.
KERSHAW: Lupicinius has made a terrible misjudgment here.
The Goths are in fact not the weak, starving,
helpless people he thinks they are.
They’re some of the mightiest warriors in the ancient world.
So he’s stirred up an absolute hornets’ nest.
[CLAMORING IN DISTANCE]
Your mob brays like a wounded donkey.
FRITIGERN: They fear for my well-being.
As they should.
You hit a guard.
That’s a capital offense.
Is he dead?
I should have hit him harder. [SCOFFS]
You’re a troublemaker.
We came in peace
and you’ve done everything you can to make enemies of us.
My people are starving whilst you enjoy good food and wine.
How will that taste when they tear you limb from limb?
Are you threatening me?
Not I.
But I think it would be wise to let me return to my people
so that their minds can be put at ease.
LENSKI: The Romans just assume their own superiority
because that is what they’d been told since they started their service in the Army,
in fact, since they were little infants.
They had, I think, no idea how powerful these Gothic forces were going to be.
Now is the time.
JNARRATOR: SON: Fritigern has secretly been stockpiling weapons
smuggled into camp or stolen from Roman guards.
His people ready to revolt.
Like Boudica before him, Fritigern realized
that the treaty sign with Rome was worthless.
And it wasn’t that he was just stuck between a rock and a hard place,
he’s literally starving.
So he has no choice but to take the fight to Rome.
[w*apon SWISHING] [SOLDIERS GROANING]
Stop them!
[On the eastern edge of the Empire, NG]NARRATOR:
a 300-year period of relative peace between Rome and the barbarian world
comes to an expl*sive end.
Now is the time.
NARRATOR: …when Fritigern and his horde of 15,000 Goth warriors
overthrow their military guards and break free
inside Rome’s borders.
[GOTHS SHOUTING]
FRITIGERN: We came in peace.
We came in friendship.
What idiot makes an enemy of me
when I come in peace?
We’ll send a message to the Emperor.
Rome now has an absolutely nightmare scenario
of its own making.
So not only do we have the Huns outside the Empire
and all the terror that they’re instilling,
but now you’ve got a fully-fledged rebellion inside the Empire, as well,
by warriors who could have been used to fight the Huns.
LENSKI: Once Fritigern and his forces had overcome Lupicinius,
all these other people came flooding over the Danube,
joined the Goths, and they took over all the territory
of what’s today Northern Bulgaria.
[SWORDS SWISHING]
KERSHAW: Towns, villages, encampments, farms, everything is being
burned, pillaged, destroyed.
NARRATOR: Occupied fighting a w*r in Persia,
Rome fails to mount a defense against the Goth raids.
Fritigern controls the frontier for two years,
seizing territory and closing in
on the most important cities in the eastern Empire,
the heavily fortified Adrianople and the capital, Constantinople.
Emperor Valens sends his men back from Persia
to stop the Goths’ advance.
[HORSES NEIGHING] The Saracen mercenaries [GRUNTS]
[SWORDS CLANKING]
[CROWS CAWING]
There.
Hello, boy!
You came back.
NARRATOR: If the Goths are going to survive Rome’s legions,
they need to change their strategy.
KERSHAW: Fritigern can’t go on the rampage forever.
He didn’t come into the Roman Empire to go on to the rampage,
he came in there to settle.
Adrianople is there for the taking.
If we breach its walls, there’s enough food there for half a year.
All the supplies and weapons we could ever need are waiting.
We lost good men yesterday.
All but one.
Alaric, join us.
We have a choice.
Risk everything and attack Adrianople head-on,
or stick to the forests and continue raiding,
make life as difficult as we can for the Romans.
I saw what happened yesterday.
The Saracens can pick us off at will.
There’s no safety amongst the trees.
I say we take Adrianople.
And so be it.
Kunimund, send out the raiding party.
If we’re to take Adrianople, we need to be supplied.
And send our cavalry men with them.
We can’t afford to be taken by surprise again.
That puts us at risk. Without our horsemen, we’re unprotected.
Can you see another way?
NARRATOR: Adrianople is a large fortified city
that serves as a military base for the eastern Empire.
O’CONNOR: Adrianople was full of Roman wealth,
it had a large population.
It was strategically important and it had strong walls.
So for all those reasons, it would make a good base for the Goths.
NARRATOR: Fritigern’s army numbers
a massive wagon train of warriors and civilians.
But the Romans know he’s coming.
Thirty thousand soldiers stream out of Adrianople
to take on the Goths before they reach the city.
Leading them is Emperor Valens himself.
KERSHAW: Valens takes command personally of the Roman forces,
and he will be the last Roman Emperor to do that
for about 200 years.
NARRATOR: ink t Fritigern improvises a plan
to circle the wagons as a defensive line to protect the civilians.
Between them and the oncoming Roman force,
he builds a chain of bonfires.
It’s high summer, and when the fires are lit,
the stifling heat of the sun, the flames and the smoke will as*ault the Romans head-on.
Fritigern knows that the Romans have been marching
for about eight hours
in the heat of a baking hot summer day.
They’re exhausted, they’re without water.
The Romans feel like they’re just walking straight into hell.
NARRATOR: Struggling to fight off the Roman legion,
the Goths are pushed all the way back to the wagons.
They suffer heavy losses trying to hold the line.
But reinforcements arrive
just in time.
[SWORDS CLANKING] [MEN SCREAMING]
As the cavalry turns the tide of battle,
Emperor Valens flees from the frontline,
running for shelter as his men carry on the fight.
The Goths burn Valens alive.
Barbarians have k*lled an Emperor of Rome.
The outcome of the battle was an unmitigated disaster for the Roman Army.
They lost as much as two-thirds of their entire force.
And to lose a Roman Emperor in battle against barbarians on Roman soil
was unheard of.
NARRATOR: The victory is so devastating that Rome has no choice but to surrender.
The Goths emerge from battle as a free barbarian nation within the Empire.
But the fight against Rome is not over.
In the struggle to come, a new leader will rise to challenge the Empire
as no barbarian has done before.
His name is Alaric.
Next time on Barbarians Rising.
W’ere no longer the underdogs.
[SCREAMS]
W’ere the rising power.
[AHHHH]
[SCREAMS]
They don’t need to respect me.
They need to fear me!
From today we cease to do Rome’s bidding.
Today,
We go to w*r with Rome.
[WARRIORS YELLING]
[HORSES NEIGHING]
This,
is treason!
Nothing can save you now.
[SWORDS CLINKING]
[EVIL LAUGH]
Barbarians Rising (2016–…): Season 1, Episode 4 - Ruin - full transcript
Alaric’s Goths sack Rome; Attila the Hun seizes power through chaos and destruction while the barbarians move in for the kill. The Vandal king, Geiseric, masterminds the end of Rome; the Empire falls.
(ALL SCREAMING)
NARRATOR: Previously, on Barbarians Rising…
For 600 years, the barbarians challenge Rome’s power,
fighting battle after battle in the name of freedom.
But as the rebels fall one by one,
the empire endures
and the uprising intensifies.
Germany will never kneel before Rome.
NARRATOR: The Barbarians fight blood with blood.
- Mercy is for fools.
- EGUS: (CRYING) No!
No, no, no. No!
NARRATOR: Bringing the empire’s age of expansion
to a violent end.
Once the ancient world’s fastest-growing power,
Rome now builds walls to keep the barbarians out
and fights to protect its frontier from a rising threat.
(HORSE NEIGHING)
The Goths seek refuge in the empire…
We have a message from your emperor,
guaranteeing us protection.
NARRATOR: But Rome’s betrayal…
What idiot makes an enemy of me when I come in peace?
…unleashes an apocalypse of its own making.
(THEME MUSIC PLAYING)
By 285 AD,
the Roman Empire has grown so large
that it must divide to survive.
The emperor Diocletian officially divides the empire
in to two halves, east and west.
It’s easier to govern.
It’s easier to defend from external forces.
NARRATOR: The two sides work together to protect the Eastern border,
the unconquered frontier,
where the line separating Roman from barbarian begins to blur.
The Romans were becoming less and less confident
in their own military abilities
and more and more reliant on those of the barbarians.
NARRATOR: By 394 AD,
most of the soldiers serving in the Roman armies are barbarian mercenaries.
Among them are the Goths,
who’ve lived as a separate nation within the empire for more than a decade.
MICHAEL KULIKOWSKI: Some of the children of Adrianople,
became good Romans, they became Roman officers.
One of those was Alaric.
NARRATOR: Alaric, now 24 years old, is a general,
commanding a division of 20,000 Goths
who fight on behalf of Rome.
Alaric’s prepared to fight because he’s been promised land.
This is his great opportunity now
to end the refugee status of his people
and to be able to settle within the Roman Empire.
NARRATOR: Alaric serves under General Stilicho,
commander of the Eastern army.
A Roman soldier with a barbarian bloodline.
He’s a person who has a Vandal father, and a Roman mother,
who’s grown up inside of Roman military circles,
but is still treated like something of an outsider.
NARRATOR: Barbarians now live, fight, and die under Rome’s banner,
but they are not Roman.
And the empire sees them as expendable.
NARRATOR: When war breaks out, Alaric and his men become pawns in a deadly game.
(DOGS BARKING) We are to attack just before first light.
And?
You and your men will lead the first assault across the river.
Where?
Here.
That’s their stronghold.
You’re proposing an assault on their most fortified position.
That’s where they will least expect it.
So we’re to be fodder for their archers.
Half my men will die before we reach the banks.
You have your orders.
Friend.
Persuade the emperor this is a bad idea.
It’s the emperor’s idea
and he has absolute faith in you to implement it.
He’s condemning us to death.
(MAN YELLING)
Alaric and his Gothic soldiers
bore the brunt of the casualties
fighting on the Eastern side
against western Roman soldiers.
Rome abused the Goths in combat situations.
They put them on the front line,
used them as sort of cannon fodder.
O’CONNOR: Thousands are lost and his troops were committed
before any Romans were thrown into the fray.
You still have men on your eyes.
I lost 10,000 of my men today.
Slaughtered. As we knew they would be.
And they were sacrificed for him!
Alaric, think, they could drink and be glad to be alive.
The Emperor is in a mood for celebrating, not dissent.
You celebrate the victory, I’ll mourn my loss.
Don’t do anything rash, my friend.
You’re angry now, but things are changing.
The world we live in now is very different from the world you were born into.
Yes, it is.
Then, we fought against these bastards
and were proud to.
Now, we do their dirty work and lick their boots.
Stay calm, be patient.
Who knows what changes may come.
Change? Yes.
You know what I’ve learned, my friend?
Change only comes through the power of the sword.
They sacrifice us in their wars,
they work us to death on their roads and in their cities.
They take our daughters and invade our bloodline.
In 30 years, the Goths will be extinguished.
I think the betrayal that Alaric felt after the Frigidus
was such that he really
despaired of any accommodation with the empire after that.
Everything becomes very clear for Alaric at this point.
He realizes that he’s never going to be able
to end this refugee status within the empire.
If he can’t work with the empire,
he’s gonna have to go back to type and work against it.
NARRATOR: An estimated 100,000 Goths lived inside the empire.
Alaric intends to unite them all under one leader.
KULIKOWSKI: Kings had always existed outside the Roman Empire.
Alaric was effectively saying
that he was not going to be a subject of the Roman Empire anymore.
Today you crown me king.
An honor.
What is a king without a kingdom?
What is a crown on a king without a kingdom?
(PEOPLE MURMURING)
Without a homeland,
we are forsaken.
For years, we’ve swallowed Rome’s lies and cruelties
and grasped at the crumbs from their table.
Today, you crowned me king.
Well, I demand a kingdom!
We will take this land
either as conquerors or as dead men.
From today we cease to do Rome’s bidding.
From today we go to war with Rome.
Rome dominates the ancient world for 600 years,
but no empire lasts forever.
(PEOPLE SHOUTING)
By 400 AD, it struggles to hold on to its power
against the rising barbarian threat.
Alaric’s Goths push deeper into Roman territory
carving out a home from the lands they conquer.
A campaign of destruction that goes on for eight years.
If Rome is to survive, General Stilicho,
now the supreme commander of Rome’s western armies,
must end the war.
We’ve journeyed far, the both of us.
Perhaps.
Doesn’t all this killing tire you?
Ah, I’ve seen what Rome calls peace.
There is no need for us to be at war.
You have power, we have none.
You have a homeland, we have none.
There’ll be no peace
until my people have a land to call their own.
I can give you that.
(LAUGHS MOCKINGLY)
With the Huns to the east,
they respect no border.
I need you and the Visigoth people to work with me.
Why would we?
Because I can give you what you want.
Help me fight our enemies and I promise you, you will have your land.
You have my word.
The word of a Roman doesn’t count for much,
I’ve learned.
The word of a friend then.
Then know this.
Should I accept
and you betray me,
no woman, child or man in Rome
will escape my vengeance.
I would expect nothing less.
NARRATOR: Alaric has seen Rome betray his people time and again
since they arrived 29 years ago
seeking refuge from the Huns.
But he seizes the opportunity.
Stilicho’s deal promises the Goths
the prize they’ve long been fighting for.
A permanent homeland.
NARRATOR: In exchange, Alaric and his men
agree to help defend the empire against the Huns.
NARRATOR: The Goths known spend the next five years
fighting to protect the eastern frontier,
holding up their end of the bargain.
But Stilicho never delivers on his promise.
The Roman Empire is watching
as the central part of its territory
is being taken over and held by non-Roman peoples,
a rising tide of anti-barbarianism is growing
and it leads to suspicion of Stilicho.
Even though he’s always served Rome well
and even though he’s led their armies effectively,
he’s seen as a potential enemy within.
The immediate consequence for Alaric
of the assassination of Stilicho,
is that the deal is dead in the water.
It’s precisely the arrogance
of the oppressor of Rome that precedes the fall.
(SCREAMING VIOLENTLY)
How is it possible,
these Romans so completely duplicitous and unworthy,
have ruled the world for centuries?
Well, they’ll rule no longer.
LENSKI: It was a colossally stupid move to have Stilicho executed.
It eventually lead to the defection of huge numbers of barbarian troops
over to Alaric’s side.
KERSHAW: Alaric has been betrayed and disappointed time and time and time again.
He wanted his homeland, but the Romans constantly took it away from him.
So what he decides to do is that he’ll take away the homeland from the Romans.
He’s gonna go and sack Rome.
Rome is the center of the empire.
Five sprawling square miles
surrounded by walls 40 feet high.
A model of the empire’s vision
for how to build the world in its image.
Thousands of Goths
and thousands more of Stilicho’s men,
who now pledge loyalty to Alaric,
march to Rome.
Alaric has the city in his sights.
Rome has been the ancient world’s supreme power for 600 years.
In that time, no barbarian leader
has ever marched on the city itself.
LENSKI: It seemed impregnable, but, of course,
its Achilles heel was that it needed
massive amounts of food in order to supply
the nearly one million people who lived there.
Alaric understood that,
and when he undertook the siege,
that was the weapon he would use.
NARRATOR: The barbarians surround the city,
cutting off supply lines,
trying to starve Rome into surrender.
Alaric besieges Rome three times in 18 months.
The Goths manage to effectively blockade the city,
even from access to the sea,
which they usually rely on for their food supplies.
So starvation reaches a very serious pitch in Rome.
NARRATOR: But the war of attrition takes its toll on Roman and Goth alike.
KERSHAW: You get dire consequences on both sides.
At Rome there’s plague and famine,
there are calls to legalize cannibalism.
On the Gothic side, there’s plague in their army.
So they really need to come to a resolution.
NARRATOR: Alaric sends an offer of peace to the Roman senate.
What word from your senators?
There are to be no terms.
The senators believe your offer was made from weakness.
We’ll fight you here.
ALARIC: And if we leave now,
do they give their word you won’t come after us?
KERSHAW: Roman point of view,
this looks really good, it looks like victory.
It looks like they’ve withstood the siege
and Alaric is going to slope off
and they might even be able to pick him off at a later stage.
But they’ve seriously underestimated Alaric and his brilliance.
Unwin, send them a message.
If they grant us this last night
to prepare our dead for burial,
I’ll make a gift to the senators of Rome.
A gift, my Lord?
300 of our best men
as slaves.
NARRATOR: The senate agree to the deal,
but Alaric does not intend to retreat.
ROBERT HERJAVEC: Arrogance is a two-way sword.
In one hand, you’ve gotta have the unshakable belief
that you’re the greatest thing ever in the world
and no one can take you down.
On the flip side,
it can lead to failure.
You’ve gotta be really brutally honest with yourself.
Great empires have been lost because they refuse to see their weakness.
KERSHAW: The brilliant and rather ironic thing
is that the Romans trace their ancestry back to the Trojans,
and what Alaric has given them
is effectively a Trojan horse.
These slaves are not any old slaves,
they’re actually 300 of his finest warriors.
You know who we’re burying today?
Don’t address me, Goth scum. Move on.
No.
I’m asking.
Do you know who we’re burying today?
Your idiot brother maybe?
Your whore of a sister?
No.
We’re burying Rome.
(GRUNTS)
This is for my sister. Now what d(SCREAMS)nk of that?
Rome essentially undergoes the sa(PEOPLE GRUNTING)
(SCREAMS)
Enough!
Enough.
We’re not Romans.
We’re not Huns.
We have our victory.
Let some live so they can tell of it.
Tell your children your days of power are over.
Psychologically, this was a massive blow.
This was the capital of this world empire being brought to its knees.
GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Empires rise and fall.
What makes them great may not be lasting.
NARRATOR: The sack of Rome is Alaric’s greatest victory.
A strike so devastating,
that the empire never recovers.
KERSHAW: The tide has really turned now essentially.
Once upon a time, the barbarians were at the mercy of Rome,
but now Rome is at the mercy of the barbarians.
NARRATOR: In the aftermath It of its defeat, bered.
the empire cedes 30,000 square miles of territory in southern Gaul to the Goths.
Alaric delivers the homeland he promised his people…
But he never sees it.
He dies of fever just one month after the attack on Rome.
For the first time in generations,
the empire is no longer fighting for domination,
it’s fighting for survival.
Rome’s enemies begin to move in for the kill,
and a new threat is born.
(THUNDER RUMBLING)
(BABY CRYING)
His name is Attila!
NARRATOR: The barbarians are the rising power
battling to take back control of the ancient world
from the empire that has ruled for nearly seven centuries.
Alaric’s sack of Rome is a critical victory in the long fight for freedom.
And as the empire picks up the pieces,
it must fend off threats closing in on all sides.
The Goths in the west,
Huns to the east,
and in the south,
the Vandals…
A Germanic tribe displaced by the Huns
and forced to roam the empire
for the last 20 years.
LENSKI: They cross the Rhine frontier in 406
as part of a coalition of people,
and eventually make their way into Spain,
and they’d been kind of the whipping boy
of the Goths and of the Romans
and of other peoples who had settled in Iberia.
NARRATOR: Their unlikely leader
is the illegitimate son of a king.
His name is Geiseric.
HEATHER: The Roman sources report that Geiseric had a physical disability,
but apart from that what they emphasize is his intelligence.
KULIKOWSKI: Geiseric was an almost uniquely perceptive statesman.
He was ruthless in negotiations
and ruthless when he chose to put his army into action.
NARRATOR: Geiseric emerges as a threat
when he strikes at the jewel in the empire’s crown.
The territory that Rome has held
since its defeat of Hannibal over 600 years earlier.
A crossroads ideal for building a new Vandal kingdom.
O’CONNOR: Like many barbarians,
Geiseric was a recent convert to Christianity.
He was an Arian Christian, the Romans were Catholics
and each considered the other to be heretics.
That meant that they were required by God
to wipe each other off the face off the Earth.
Please. In the name of God,
show some clemency.
When has a Catholic or a Roman ever shown us any clemency?
(GROANING)
Ever since we entered this hateful empire,
you and your Roman puppeteers
have been the cause of all our torment.
The horrors I have seen.
I watched our babies thrown on a pyre.
Women, nailed to your crosses and cut in half.
An entire generation of my people annihilated.
Huh?
All in the name of your…
…Catholic God.
Huh?
Oh…
So tell me, Priest… Mmm?
(CHUCKLES)
Where was your clemency then?
Hmm?
(YELLS) Where was your clemency then?
Huh?
Huh?
Hurt them.
Geiseric’s capture of Carthage
is the single most devastating blow to the Roman empire.
Geiseric now controls the food supply
to the armies of the Western Empire, the food supply to Rome.
He is in complete control.
NARRATOR: Rome scrambles to defend its territories against barbarian expansion,
as politics weaken it from within.
In the divided empire, power is split between two emperors
with two different agendas.
Theodosius II rules from the Eastern capital,
Constantinople.
While his young cousin, emperor Valentinian III,
rules the Western Empire from Ravenna.
KULIKOWSKI: The emperor Valentinian came to the throne as a child.
He was young, he was weak,
he was not taught the politics that earlier Roman emperors had been taught,
and he was not a soldier.
He was also very much under the thumb of his mother, the imperial princess, Galla.
HEATHER: Galla is an astonishing woman.
Not only is she the sister of one emperor,
she’s married to another, and then she’s the mother of a third.
And she exercises a great deal of personal power
within the imperial political circles.
True power is not about dominating the weak.
True power is inspiring the strong to your will.
NARRATOR: Galla turns to the only man capable
of saving her son’s crumbling empire.
General Flavius Aetius.
He’s been hostage to barbarian Goths, to barbarian Huns.
That’s meant he understands the languages, the customs,
and also the personalities, the power relationships, of these peoples.
HEATHER: The main internal political problem
Aetius faces is that he’s distrusted by the royal family.
Basically, because he becomes too powerful.
To start with, his power is balanced
by that of several other generals,
but he manages to eliminate them
and take over complete control of Roman military forces in the Western Empire himself.
Lady Galla.
You can dispense with the pleasantries, Aetius.
You were never very good at them.
My Lady. Avitus.
We have news.
The Vandal king, Geiseric, has taken Carthage.
AETIUS: And the fleet?
At harbor in Carthage Bay.
If Geiseric is in control of the fleet,
then Rome, Ravenna and Constantinople are vulnerable to attack.
The Vandal will not risk all-out war against the Western Empire.
No.
But if he blockades our shipment of food and gold,
then he already has Rome by the throat.
Only if he can hold Carthage.
Precisely.
You will take back Carthage and bring me that cripple’s head.
We no longer have the armies to fight on multiple fronts.
We suppress the Huns and the Goths…
I am aware of our position, Aetius.
I will petition the Eastern Empire for reinforcement.
Geiseric poses as much of a threat for them.
These are my orders.
And the emperor’s orders?
Let me deal with him.
(SOFT MOANING)
Have you no respect for imperial privacy, Mother?
Not when my son has no respect for his empire.
Get out! Now!
()
You will speak with your cousin.
We need the support of the Eastern armies
if we are to defeat Geiseric. You will do as I ask.
Careful, Mother, on how you address your emperor.
If I do this, they will think I am weak.
You are weak.
NARRATOR: The Western Empire is overrun with political intrigue,
nowhere more than in the imperial family.
You know my mother and the emperor
will never forgive you for what you did?
Backing another against my brother’s claim to the throne.
So they always remind me.
That leaves you in a rather dangerous position doesn’t it, Aetius?
The most powerful man in my brother’s empire,
and the least trusted?
We’re all in a rather dangerous position with your brother, Lady Honoria,
especially you.
KULIKOWSKI: Honoria had never been allowed to take a role
in imperial politics the way she wanted to,
and the way imperial princesses often did.
She was effectively a prisoner in the palace.
She, moreover, had spent her life at an imperial court.
She knew about power games and how to play them.
VALENTINIAN: Aetius…
Magister militum of the Western army,
patriarch of my empire.
Give this to my cousin Theodosius.
I have decided to petition the Eastern empire
to ally their armies and their fleet
for you to drive the Vandal king from Carthage.
You know the Huns,
you know of King Ruas’ death.
AETIUS: It is no secret I was hostage to Ruas
when Rome was forced to sign the treaty.
I know of his death. This Attila…
Is he the devil, as they say?
No.
Much worse.
NARRATOR: Of all the threats circling the declining empire…
(ARROW WHOOSHING)
…none is more fearsome than the Hun.
Hailing from the steppes of Eurasia,
the Huns are expert horsemen.
Warriors who live, fight and negotiate on horseback.
They scar their faces with deep cuts
to intimidate their enemies
and mourn those fallen in battle.
KERSHAW: They’re described as being incredibly ugly,
almost glued to their horses.
They’re fantastic archers.
They use strange, unorthodox battle tactics.
O’CONNOR: The Huns seemed to be more interested in the acquisition of plunder
than they were in territorial conquest.
They didn’t found cities,
they weren’t trying to create a settled society.
What they were trying to do was conquer as many tribes as possible
and become more and more powerful.
(MAN GRUNTING)
NARRATOR: The Huns terrorize the empire’s borderlands for decades under King Ruas,
but his death sets off a deadly power struggle.
HEATHER: There are no rules of succession operating in the Hunnic world.
The pattern would appear to be that all the royal children
are potential heirs to the throne
and they simply fight it out,
whichever one Attila, the sons of Ruas are here.
They’ve made claim to the throne and seek our allegiance.
I will not pledge alliance to them.
We must align with them, brother.
It is their birthright.
What about our birthright, brother?
(BOTH GRUNTING)
Now, I lay claim to the throne.
That was a grave mistake, brother.
The Ruas’ were the rightful heirs.
Your claim will be challenged.
And the challengers will meet the same fate.
We will make council.
Gather the tribal leaders.
How?
We’ll buy their loyalty.
Gold cannot buy you respect.
They don’t need to respect me.
They need to fear me.
NARRATOR: The barbarians have the advantage over the empire
for the first time in 700 years.
Victims of Roman cruelty and violence for generations,
they showed no mercy
as they begin to dismantle the empire that once forced them into submission.
Rome is under attack from all sides.
In the south, the Vandals hold Carthage.
In the east, the Huns rampage across the borderlands,
raiding and capturing Roman towns,
then offering them back to Rome for a price.
But Attila has his sights on even greater power.
ATTILA: You all knowlook at me me and my brother, other.
and our…
My claim to the Hun throne.
Since the death of King Ruas,
many have vied for leadership.
Many of you… (YELLS) Sit down!
Ruas was content to have us maraud the plains like thieves,
scavengers,
when we should be conquerors.
Support my claim
and we will no longer feed off the empire’s scraps.
You will see riches beyond your wildest dreams.
But oppose me,
and you will see your tribes massacred.
And of that,
you have my word!
NARRATOR: Rome moves to confront what it believes
is the greatest threat to its survival.
Not Attila, but Geiseric.
NARRATOR: The Eastern and Western Empires
gather 1,100 ships and 100,000 men to retain Carthage.
It’s the largest invasion force
the empire has ever assembled.
But the campaign requires Rome to deploy nearly the entire military,
leaving the eastern border virtually undefended.
HEATHER: Most of the Eastern Empire’s forces for the expedition
have come from the Danube frontier.
Attila and Bleda know this
as they unleash the Hunnic hordes on the Danube frontier
while the expedition is still in Sicily.
NARRATOR: Attila begins a new phase in his campaign of destruction.
Heavy siege weapons like towers, catapults and battering rams
allow him to escalate his attacks.
This technology sets Attila apart from other barbarians.
Using Roman siege tactics,
Attila can now overtake a fortified city in a matter of days.
(MEN SCREAMING)
This is a seismic shift in the strategic balance of power.
Earlier enemies rampaging through the Balkans, like the Goths,
couldn’t take defended cities.
They never conducted successful sieges.
The fact that the Huns can do it,
and they can take really major Roman bases,
that changes everything. (MEN SCREAMING)
Attila’s goal was to demonstrate he now had the power
to take over the road to Constantinople
in such a way that he could threaten the eastern capital.
Who are you?
I am Attila.
The whip of God.
(GRUNTS)
We have sent our message, brother.
Time to await the Roman terms.
Let them wait for my terms.
Look around you, Attila.
We have done enough.
More war will bring us nothing.
True.
But panic and terror will gain us everything.
Attila the Hun stand NARRATOR: The barbarians are closing in from all sides around the weakening empire.
Goths in the west,
Vandals in the south
and Huns in the east.
Aetius fights to save Rome from its most urgent threat,
Geiseric’s stranglehold on its food supply.
The general gathers the largest invasion force the empire has ever assembled
to take back Carthage.
That fleet is our one chance to save the empire.
If we do not take it, Geiseric will reinforce.
Attila can be held.
We sail to Carthage and join the fight against the Hun on our return.
Avitus, you do not understand.
His brother Bleda keeps him on the leash, but…
You fear Bleda cannot contain him?
If he doesn’t, Attila will not stop until the entire empire burns.
We have orders to withdraw.
Emperor Theodosius has called back our entire Eastern army
to defend Constantinople from the Huns.
We leave at dawn.
I’m sorry, my friend.
Without the Eastern fleet, we’re done.
We cannot sail alone.
What do you suggest?
We leave Carthage to Geiseric, for now.
Agree terms with the Vandals to let grain into the empire.
If and when we defeat Attila,
I will return and remove that traitor’s head.
NARRATOR: Rome turns its invasion force north to confront Attila,
opening an opportunity for Geiseric,
who is playing a different kind of power game.
The fact that the expedition never sails from Sicily means everything to Geiseric.
It allows him to start to build a real kingdom in North Africa.
It basically secures his existence
as an independent power.
While the empire heads for all-out war with the Huns,
Geiseric outmaneuvers them with strategy.
Rome’s forces are retreating.
If Valentinian fears this Attila,
then we must befriend him.
Gendo,
take the Hun the gold we took from this city as a gift,
a sign of our alliance.
HUNERIC: We must use this time to reinforce.
The empire will not stay away forever.
GEISERIC: Precisely.
I want every dissenter in the city slain immediately.
Anyone who may have drunk from the cup of Rome,
string them up by their innards.
And, Huneric,
I have great plans in store for you, my son.
Begin the purge.
(MAN CHOKING)
Your empire has deserted you, Commander.
They’ve left you here to rot.
And as we starve your people to death,
other tribes will rise up.
Your people will be obliterated from the face of this Earth.
Ah, you see…
Now your masters begin to truly understand.
We’re no longer the underdogs,
we’re the rising power.
NARRATOR: The Vandals hold Carthage in their grip unopposed.
Rome lacks enough fighting men
to face them and the Huns at the same time.
Geiseric exploits Rome’s weakness,
demanding ever greater amounts of gold
to keep the grain supply flowing back to Rome.
Geiseric forces Emperor Valentinian
to marry his daughter, Eudocia, to his son, Huneric.
Either he is going to have his son at the court in Ravenna
or else the daughter of the emperor is going to be in Carthage.
Either one, it is a new alliance.
It’s a new power axis.
What does he have to lose? Nothing.
NARRATOR: With his son now a prince of Rome,
Geiseric infiltrates both the seat of power
and the imperial bloodline.
On the frontier,
the Roman military fails to stop the Huns’ advance.
The Eastern emperor requires his wealthiest citizens,
to pay the annual tribute of gold
that keep the Huns at bay.
Even senators who are usually exempt from tax
are forced to pay.
Theodosius also sets out to negotiate
a new deal.
(HORSE NEIGHING)
Your name, envoy?
Ariobindus, commander in…
You have our traitor princes?
I’m under orders from Emperor Theodosius to speak directly with Attila.
ATTILA: We do not recognize your emperor here.
Constantinople only stands
because I allow it.
The emperor has instructed me to negotiate the terms of the peace treaty.
This is not a negotiation, Roman.
These are my terms.
You will hand over the last sons and heirs
of the Hun traitors that hide in your empire.
A token of goodwill from Emperor Theodosius.
You will also double the tribute
to 1,400 pounds of gold.
Reject these terms,
and I will send you and your men back to Constantinople in bags.
I will present your terms to the emperor.
My men will ensure your safe passage to the borders.
They will pay the tribute.
Spoken like petty thief that you are.
I’m not one of your dogs, brother.
Do not treat me as such!
I am no thief.
I am the one that convinces our enemies to pay the tribute,
to raise the gold that brings up your army.
I am both our politician and our conscience, Attila.
I do not need a conscience, brother.
(SCREAMS)
NARRATOR: The barbarians are growing in power
and the once great Roman Empire
now faces an all-consuming threat.
Attila builds an empire
based not on territory, but on plunder.
His strategy is to capture Roman cities
and demand the empire pay enormous ransoms to win them back.
LENSKI: Attila was fundamentally predatory.
He did not have a massive taxation system set up
in order to extract revenue from his subjects.
Instead, his goal was to use the Roman Empire
as a sort of bank from which he could draw whenever he needed more money
in order to supply, above all,
those people who were his leaders, with gold.
NARRATOR: When Attila’s warpath
comes dangerously close to the eastern capital, Constantinople,
Emperor Theodosius tries to negotiate a deal to keep the Huns out.
But Attila demands nearly a ton of gold in tribute.
Every territory we lose costs us taxes we need for my army,
which is now in tatters.
You haven’t heard, have you?
Heard what?
Theodosius has grown bold.
He has refused the Hun’s peace terms.
Tell Theodosius to pay the ransoms.
Send word to Bleda.
He’ll put Attila’s leash back on.
How much longer am I to listen to this fool?
Valentinian… Shut up!
Get her out.
Get her out of here.
They say Attila has found the Sword of Mars in Scythia.
They say it has magical powers,
that it proves his divine right to lead.
That’s nothing but folklore, superstition.
I know that!
But his armies don’t.
They believe it.
They think they are following a God.
I will send word directly to Bleda myself, promise him more gold.
He will stop this Hun rampage.
Do you not know anything?
ATTILA: Fate has presented me with this sword.
Now,
I will no longer hide in the shadows.
I will no longer be shackled to the weak like you, brother.
I will build an army to destroy them all…
(GROWLS)
…with every nugget of gold they hurl at my feet.
And as they cower behind their city walls,
their cathedral of arrogance, I will rise.
Without my conscience
I will become
a God.
NARRATOR: The empire’s refusal to pay the tribute is a fatal error.
Attila escalates his attacks, bent on complete destruction.
The Huns sweep through the Eastern Empire, leaving a trail of terror
as they head east towards Constantinople.
LENSKI: He took over most of the cities
in what is today Bulgaria and Serbia.
Something on the order of 80 cities were captured,
probably on the order of 100,000 people were taken into captivity.
NARRATOR: With the Eastern Empire on the verge of collapse,
Theodosius surrenders.
Attila now demands triple the annual tribute payment.
2,100 pounds of gold a year.
The settlement causes a crisis within the Eastern economy
leaving Valentinian and the west
to confront both the Huns and the Vandals alone.
And while Rome unravels, Geiseric prepares to strike another blow.
This time from inside the empire.
I hope I am not intruding.
No more than anyone else does.
My father knows a way for you to escape the box your brother keeps you in.
A way for you to become empress of Rome.
A goddess.
You just need
to make a deal with the devil.
NARRATOR: The emperor’s sister, Honoria,
secretly sends a message to Attila,
promising her hand in marriage.
And an invitation to take the Roman throne away from her brother.
O’CONNOR: Before Honoria’s proposal,
it seems like Attila is intent on preying on the Roman Empire,
on raiding it, possibly on invading it and taking over its territory.
After he receives the ring from Honoria,
he now has a legitimate claim to the imperial throne.
NARRATOR: Attila sets out to accept the offer,
marching his great Hun horde into the heart of the empire.
The barbarians are picking apart
the Roman Empire piece by piece.
Attila’s killer horde strikes out to claim the Roman throne…
…and Geiseric, the mastermind behind the plot
to unravel the empire from the inside,
prepares for the end game.
(SEAGULLS CAWING)
The wheels are now in motion, Gendo.
Go to the Hun. Tell him it’s time to ready his men.
He takes the north, we’ll keep the south.
With all due respect,
after Attila gets what he wants,
he will never honor any agreement with us.
To him we are weak refugees.
Mmm.
And I will let him continue to think that.
We’ll deal with him when the time comes.
Have you brought me here to talk or to have me killed?
Spare me, Aetius, I’ve no time for theatrics.
Attila has granted us an audience
north of the Danube.
When did he agree to this?
You’re not the only one in the empire with friends, Aetius.
I need you to send Avitus.
I need him to look for weakness in Attila’s camp.
I need to know which of his allies
fear him the least and may be fit to turn against him.
None of his allies fear him any less than anyone else.
They live in terror of him.
Do you know why the Huns cut themselves?
When someone they love dies,
they scar their faces in mourning.
They would rather shed blood than tears.
Well,
I will not shed any tears for Attila.
Send Avitus.
NARRATOR: Galla’s plot to gather intelligence on Attila
comes too late.
The Hun army is already marching towards the empire.
Attila sends word to emperor Valentinian
revealing his sister’s deception
and demanding half the Western Empire as his wedding gift.
What have you done?
You know what I have done.
You traitor. I promised Attila my hand in marriage
if he would free me from you.
I am an emperor’s daughter.
I should have you executed.
None of us will survive this.
None of us would have survived anyway.
At least this way, our family will still have a hand in the empire.
(CHUCKLES) What empire?
There will be no empire.
Place her in my care.
I will see she never leaves her room
until I work out what to do with her.
Are you in on this plot?
Is this your doing?
Of course not.
How dare you implicate me in this disgrace?
Take her to my chambers and lock her in!
Bring in Aetius.
Has Avitus returned?
Yes, but with grave news.
Attila and his armies have vanished.
know exactly where he is,
but I have no doubt Attila rides on us.
Then send the legions to reinforce the northern borders.
Hunt him down.
With all due respect, we do not have enough men.
If and when he attacks, we will not be able to hold him.
We cannot defend our borders.
We cannot rely on the East for reinforcements.
It leaves us with just one option.
We must send word to the barbarian tribes
to form a coalition, just as Hannibal did.
Have you lost your mind?
First we beg the East for help
and now you ask us to beg our enemies?
They are Attila’s enemies, too,
and they know that when he comes,
they will be forced to submit or die.
If they unite with us, they may stand a chance. (SCOFFS)
GALLA: Then you must send them a message.
I already have.
Messengers ride to the Alani, Burgundians and Franks.
Avitus rides to seek an audience
with Theodoric and the Goths.
You dare to send word without my consultation?
This is treason!
It would be treason to do nothing
and it would be treason to let this Empire fall
under the rule of this family.
(CHUCKLES)
What makes you think Theodoric and his Goths would fight alongside us?
They hate us, and you most of all.
Theodoric may hate me, but he also respects me.
I have beaten him twice in battle.
And let us not forget, it was the Huns
that drove his people into the empire in the first place,
and to his mind,
we might just be the lesser of two evils.
Avitus taught Theodoric as a boy.
Theodoric listens to him,
and trusts him.
And if he doesn’t?
Then we are truly lost.
Up to this point, the whole of the strategy
of the empire has been to try and keep the Goths in line.
Now the empire has to go cap in hand to the Goths to keep itself in being.
I should have you killed for coming here,
no matter what you meant to me in the past.
Maybe you should hear me first, Theodoric.
If you fight alongside us against the Hun,
you will be granted safe lands until the end of days.
Even if I were to believe you,
it wouldn’t be the first promise broken by an emperor.
For 70 years the empire has asked us to die in battle
and butchered us when the battle was won.
We’re offering you a Gothic state untouchable by the empire.
Do you think Attila will offer you that?
If he defeats us, he will turn on you next.
You will be forced to surrender or die, just like all the others.
Attila is unbeatable.
He has no weaknesses.
Attila does have a weakness.
They’ve lost their speed.
They can’t attack and retreat without a trace.
But your cavalry can.
Even if that is true,
Attila is still unbeaten.
So is Aetius.
No one knows that better than you.
Theodoric, my old friend, you have two choices.
Fight alongside us or face the Hun alone
and watch the Goths being driven into oblivion.
I’ll await your answer.
How do I know you will honor the deal?
You don’t.
NARRATOR: Before Theodoric can decide whether to ally with Rome,
Attila forces his hand.
His horde, as many as 100,000 warriors
cross the Rhine into Roman territory,
attacking a string of cities in a bid to seize Gaul.
Aetius scrambles his forces to confront Attila.
I’m not here to help you, Aetius,
I’m here to save my people.
I expect nothing less.
THEODORIC: I lead my own men.
We will not be used as fodder.
You have my word.
AVITUS: Attila knows we’re preparing for battle.
He’s broken off the siege and rides to meet us on the plain.
It’s imperative we arrive first.
(SIGHS)
We ride at first light.
WARLOCK: Three leaders will meet.
One will win.
One will lose.
One will die.
Who dies?
There’s too much confusion, I cannot…
(GROANING)
Know this.
It will not be me that dies on that battlefield.
I will fulfill my destiny
and claim their throne.
Their time is over!
It is the end of their rule
and the beginning of mine!
Pack up the camp.
We ride to the plains.
NARRATOR: For 700 years, the barbarians have challenged Roman supremacy
and fought back against its tyranny.
But facing a greater threat, two foes now become allies
as Roman and Goth unite to fight
Attila’s mighty Huns.
This is the most powerful Hunnic army there has ever been.
This is a confrontation on a colossal scale.
NARRATOR: The Catalaunian Plains will be their battlefield.
A vast area of flat land dominated on one side
by a steep sloped ridge overlooking the fields below.
This will be the deadliest ground
as both sides fight to claim the advantage.
Then, as now, high ground proves advantageous,
even more so in the ancient world.
NARRATOR: Aetius commands a combined force of Romans and Goths
numbering 80,000 men on the north of the battlefield.
On the opposite side,
Attila leads as many as 100,000 warriors, set to charge.
When the battle begins, it will be a race to claim the crest between.
ATTILA: Today
we will rip their empire
from their dead hands.
There will be great sacrifice!
There will be death!
But we will be victorious!
(ALL YELLING)
I will cast the first spear at our enemy
and if any man stand at rest
while I’m still fighting,
he’s already a dead man to me!
Sound the advance.
(HORNS BLOWING)
(ALL YELLING)
NARRATOR: Control of the high ground
changes hands again and again during the battle.
ELM: The battle was brutal.
(GROANS)
The most destructive battle that the ancient world had seen.
NARRATOR: Finally, the Goths break through re the Huns’ frontline. utmost
(ALL YELLING)
We have the higher ground.
Tell the flanks to move in.
We must push the advantage.
(MAN YELLING)
NARRATOR: The killing continues unrelenting for 12 hours.
(GROANS)
(SIGHS)
My men saw you enter the tree line.
What’s happening?
Who has the advantage?
Both sides have lost many.
We hold the advantage, but at great cost.
Theodoric has fallen.
His men have scattered, as have ours.
Where’s Attila?
Retreated behind his own wagons.
We engage with them again at dawn.
For Attila to lose the high ground,
to think that now he no longer held the advantage,
to think the unthinkable,
that in fact his forces might lose,
this was too much to bear.
Why did you lose my advantage?
I will not be taken alive by them.
This is to be my funeral pyre.
They will not parade my corpse on the streets of Rome.
(GROANS)
NARRATOR: The Battle of the Catalaunian plains
is one of the bloodiest in the history of the Roman empire.
(ALL YELLING)
Rome’s coalition loses 40,000 fighters,
including the Goth king, Theodoric.
50,000 of Attila’s 100,000 men fall.
The Huns arrived on the battlefield
as the most feared menace in the ancient world.
They leave it as a shattered empire.
(AVITUS PANTING)
Let’s slaughter them as they run.
No, let them go.
We’ll not get the chance again.
We won’t need to. IHe is finished.
His myth is broken.
He’s nothing.
Attila loses his mystique, his aura of invincibility at the Battle of Chalons.
This monster of the Roman imagination
has been proven a general like any other.
One who can be beaten.
HEATHER: It starts to make people question his rule.
And not surprisingly, the sources report Attila
thrown into a kind of slough of despond
in the immediate aftermath of battle.
NARRATOR: Attila never claims Honoria as his bride.
Unable to conquer Rome, the Huns go on to plunder Italy and eastern Europe,
but never regain their previous strength.
(BREATHING HEAVILY) Then, in 453 AD…
(RETCHES) (SCREAMING)
…Attila dies on his wedding night.
His empire dies with him.
CLARK: If you’re a great empire and you lose,
you have to redeem yourself
with the blood of your soldiers
because you’ve shown weakness
and that weakness will invite challenge
and challenge again, and challenge again.
NARRATOR: Aetius returns to Rome as the commander of a destroyed army.
The battle is a strategic victory for the Empire,
but its military losses are so great,
that it struggles to defend itself against any new threats.
(FOOTSTEPS APPROACHING)
Attila is beaten,
and Aetius rides to Rome a hero.
This is a disaster.
It’s not a disaster, Gendo,
it’s destiny.
And now that Attila is beaten, he’s nothing but a ghost.
Aetius is now the most powerful man in the empire
and Rome fears its strong.
They’ll never let him survive.
(DROPS SCROLL)
We lost seven legions in the battle.
The northern borders are in mayhem.
We do not have enough manpower to reinforce them.
Geiseric continues his blockade of Sardinia,
severing us further from the sea.
We must again ask the Eastern Empire for reinforcements.
You dare to question my rule by blaming the troubles of the empire on me.
I blame no one… Oh, enough.
Do you wish power for yourself?
I seek nothing.
You seek to usurp me.
You won’t get the chance, you traitor bastard!
(GROANS)
(SNIFFLES)
For Aetius, he should be celebrated as the great hero who has defeated the Huns,
he has done the impossible.
Arguably the greatest military figure Rome has known.
Certainly the greatest military figure
Rome has known for a long time.
But Rome fears those who are strong militarily
and no one better than he knows
how vulnerable his position is.
O’CONNOR: The death of Aetius deprives Rome
of its most effective protector.
His reputation alone is probably enough
to keep barbarians away from the gates of Rome.
But without him
they become much more vulnerable.
NARRATOR: The decline of Rome accelerates
as the barbarians dismantle the once great empire.
The imperial household begins to implode.
You never did get the chance to rule,
did you, Mother?
NARRATOR: Valentinian has Galla executed.
What are you doing?
(GROANS)
NARRATOR: Within a year, Valentinian is assassinated by soldiers loyal to Aetius.
The emperor’s daughter, Eudocia,
is one of the last remaining members of the imperial family.
Still engaged to Huneric, son of the Vandal king.
Geiseric sails for Rome to claim his son’s inheritance.
Geiseric is the dark knight.
He is the one that really brings
the Western Empire to its knees.
NARRATOR: The Vandals arrive at the gates of Rome in 455 AD.
O’CONNOR: Geiseric’s intention is not to
conquer Rome but to plunder it.
What he’s seeking to do is to increase the strength of his own kingdom
at the expense of Rome.
He wants to carve out a domain for himself
from of the ashes of the empire.
NARRATOR: It takes the Vandals less than two weeks to defeat the city’s defenses.
After centuries of Roman supremacy by the sword,
the barbarians finally strike the empire’s death blow
and sit on the imperial throne.
GEISERIC: The most powerful of your kind lie dead, their heads around you
and all you deem precious is now in our hands.
You stupid fools.
(CHUCKLES)
You never saw this coming, did you?
Tomorrow we will sail back to Carthage
to accelerate the growth of our empire
and watch from afar as yours collapses into the sand.
You’re done.
Now it’s our time.
(SHIVERING)
(GROANS)
NARRATOR: Geiseric returns to Carthage,
the new Vandal kingdom, where he rules for the next 20 years
until his death at the age of 88.
Soon, barbarians from across Europe,
including Goths, Franks and Saxons,
move in for the kill.
By 476 AD, the West has lost the lands it fought to conquer.
From Britannia, to Gaul, to Hispania,
Germania and North Africa.
Its territory rolled back to borders not seen in six centuries.
(CROWD CHANTING)
After 700 years fighting for freedom
against total domination,
brutality, slavery and tyranny,
the barbarians rise
and the empire falls.
The barbarian kingdoms that emerge from the ashes
will be new states
that lay the foundations of modern Europe and shape the world to come.
TULSI GABBARD: No one wants to be incarcerated,
no one wants to be placed into shackles under someone else’s control,
but the physical incarceration can be transcended
with a sense of spiritual freedom.
CLARENCE B. JONES: They were barbarians.
But barbarians to whom?
To the Romans they were barbarians.
To themselves, they were freedom fighters.
JESSE JACKSON: When one has the power to look death in the eye
and not succumb to it and see life beyond death,
that’s the power
that cannot be stopped.
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