Alboin

Alboin, who lived from the 530s until 28 June 572, ruled the Lombards as king from around 560 to his death. Under his leadership, the Lombards stopped their wandering and settled in Italy, where Alboin conquered the northern part between 569 and 572. His invasion kicked off centuries of Lombard control in Italy, and his victory over the Gepids, followed by his move out of Pannonia, put an end to Germanic dominance in that region.

Alboin’s time as king in Pannonia, after his father Audoin died, was marked by ongoing clashes with the Gepids, their main rivals. The Gepids initially had the upper hand, but in 567 Alboin allied with the Avars and crushed them; the Avars then took over Gepid lands. Worried about his powerful new neighbors, Alboin decided to leave Pannonia for Italy, hoping to exploit the Byzantine Empire’s weakened defenses after the Gothic War.

March to Italy

In 568, leading a large coalition of peoples, Alboin crossed the Julian Alps into an almost undefended Italy. He quickly seized most of Venetia and Liguria.

In 569, he took Milan, northern Italy’s main city, without resistance. Pavia held out, however, and fell only after a three-year siege. During that siege, Alboin turned his attention to Tuscany, but divisions among his supporters and his slipping control over the army became clear.

Alboin was killed on 28 June 572 in a coup backed by the Byzantines. His foster brother Helmichis organized it, with help from Alboin’s wife Rosamund, daughter of the Gepid king Alboin had killed years earlier.

Aftermath

The coup failed because most Lombards opposed it; they elected Cleph as the next king, forcing Helmichis and Rosamund to flee to Ravenna under Byzantine protection. Alboin’s death left the Lombards without the one leader who could have held their new Germanic kingdom together—he was the last of the hero-kings who had guided them from the Elbe valley to Italy. For centuries afterward, Saxon and Bavarian epic poetry celebrated his bravery and battlefield success.

Etymology

The name Alboin comes from the Proto-Germanic roots albiz (“elf”) and winiz (“friend”), making it related to the Old English name Ælfwine. In Latin he was Alboinus, in Greek Ἀλβοΐνος (Alboinos), in modern Italian Alboino, and in modern Lombard Alboin.

Father's rule

Alboin was likely born in the 530s in Pannonia to Audoin and Rodelinda. Rodelinda may have been a niece of King Theodoric, betrothed to Audoin through Emperor Justinian’s mediation. Like his father, Alboin was raised pagan, though Audoin had once claimed Christianity to win Byzantine support against his neighbors. Alboin’s first wife was the Christian Chlothsind, daughter of the Frankish King Chlothar.

This marriage, soon after the Frankish ruler Theudebald’s death in 555, likely reflected Audoin’s wish to distance himself from the Byzantines, who had been halfhearted in supporting him against the Gepids. The Frankish alliance was valuable because the Franks were known enemies of Byzantium, giving the Lombards more options. However, The Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire interprets events differently, suggesting Alboin married Chlothsind when already king, in or shortly before 561, the year Chlothar died.

Alboin first made his mark in battle against the Gepids at the Battle of Asfeld in 552, where he killed Turismod, son of the Gepid king Thurisind. This victory led Emperor Justinian to step in and keep the balance between the two regional powers.

After the battle, according to a tradition reported by Paul the Deacon, Alboin had to ask for hospitality from a foreign king and receive his weapons as a gift to earn the right to sit at his father’s table. For this initiation, he went to Thurisind’s court, where the Gepid king gave him Turismod’s arms. Walter Goffart thinks Paul likely used an oral tradition here and doubts it can be dismissed as just a typical epic poem trope.

Alboin became king after his father’s death, sometime between 560 and 565. Following Lombard custom, the tribe’s freemen elected him from the dead king’s clan.

Soon after, in 565, a new war broke out with the Gepids, now led by Cunimund, Thurisind’s son. The cause is unclear: the Lombard Paul the Deacon blames the Gepids, while the Byzantine historian Menander Protector blames Alboin—a view favored by historian Walter Pohl. The Byzantine Theophylact Simocatta gives a sentimental account, claiming the conflict started with Alboin’s frustrated courtship.