The Battle of Nedao, the Nedava, a tributary of the Sava, was a battle fought in Pannonia in 454. After the death of Attila the Hun, allied forces of the Germanic subject peoples under the leadership of Ardaric, king of the Gepids, defeated the Hunnic forces of the numerous sons of Attila, who had struggled for supremacy after Attila's death and intended to divide the allies among them like slaves, according to the 6th century historian Jordanes.:

And so the bravest nations tore themselves to pieces. For then, I think, must have occurred a most remarkable spectacle, where one might see the Goths fighting with pikes, the Gepidae raging with the sword, the Rugi breaking off the spears in their own wounds, the Suavi fighting on foot, the Huns with bows, the Alani drawing up a battle-line of heavy-armed and the Heruli of light-armed warriors. (Origins and History of the Goths , l.261).

Hunnic dominance in Central and Eastern Europe was broken as a result. The victors were granted lands by the Roman emperor, the Gepidae in Dacia, now outside the Empire, "demanding of the Roman Empire nothing more than peace and an annual gift as a pledge of their friendly alliance. This the Emperor freely granted at the time, and to this day that race receives its customary gifts from the Roman Emperor." Thus the victorious Ardaric and the Gepidae passed out of the arena of Roman history. The Ostrogoths received Roman lands in Pannonia, and their future remained bound with the career of the Late Empire. Jordanes relates that the Sciri and the Sadagarii and certain of the Alani with their leader, Candac, received Scythia Minor and Lower Moesia. The Rugi, however, and some other races asked that they might inhabit Bizye and Arcadiopolis. Hernac, the younger son of Attila, with his followers, chose a home in the most distant part of Lesser Scythia. Emnetzur and Ultzindur, kinsmen of his, won Oescus and Utus and Almus in Dacia on the bank of the Danube, and many of the Huns, then swarming everywhere, settled in Romania.

After the victory at the Nedao, the Gepids finally won a place to settle in the Carpathian Mountains; however, not long after the battle at Nedao the old rivalry between the Gepids and the Ostrogoths spurred up again and they were driven out of their homeland in 504 by Theodoric the Great, the son of Theodemir.

Related Topics

• Huns
• Gepids
• Ostrogoths
• Theodemir
• Theodoric the Great
• Germanic tribes