Black Horse and Haunted Fish: The Many Deaths of Theodoric
or, how many gruesome legends and rumours can one man spawn?
Modern historiography tends to give a fundamentally positive judgement of Theodoric the Great, the second barbaric king of Italy after the downfall of the Western Roman Empire, the one who really picked up the pieces; and yet he has been a very controversial figure since his lifetime. The legend of old Theodoric carried away by a demonic black horse and plunged into a volcano comes from a rumour spread by the Catholic Church to prove that the Arian king had been punished by God for his heresy and his persecution of the Church. Side by side with these rumours, however, a whole other field of legends cropped up.
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Gregory the Great (540-604): Dialogues (IV, 31)
Possibly the origin of the legends about the damnation of Theodoric. Some tax collectors, coming back from Sicily, ended up in the Lipari Islands, where they met the saintly hermit Calogerus. He told them that the day before, at the ninth hour, they saw Pope John and the patrician Symmacus, who led Theodoric in chains towards the volcano and threw him into the crater.
According to Fra Salimbene, the thirteenth-century chronicler of Parma (Cronica), it was St. Gregory the Great himself who ordered the desecration of Theodoric's tomb, but there are no other sources on this. His body was thrown out of its red porphyry sarcophagus in the Mausoleum in Ravenna, according to Bishop Andreas Agnellus (Ravenna, ca. 801 - ca. 850): "ut mihi videtur, ex sepulcro proiectus est, et ipsa urna, ubi iacuit, ex lapide pirfiretico valde mirabilis, ante ipsius monasterii aditum posita est" (Liber Pontificalis).
- Procopius of Caesarea (d. 562 p.q): the historian, author of "The Gothic Wars" in Greek, relates Theodoric's death thus: "While he was dining, he was presented with the head of a large fish; Theodoric thought he recognized the head of Symmacus, recently slaughtered as per his order; and with its teeth sticking into its lower lip and the baleful eyes fixed on him, it seemed to him extremely threatening. Frightened by such a marvel, and seized by very strong tremors, he hastily retreated to his bed and, after asking to be covered with a pile of blankets, he was silent. Later he related everything to his physician Elpidius, regretting the injustice against Symmacus and Boetius. And a few days later he came to death, having committed against his subjects this first and only crime."
Another version of the legend, of which I cannot find the source now, has Symmacus's body being thrown into the sea, so the fish, when opened in front of the king, is revealed to contain the patrician's head itself.
Incidentally, the Anonymous Valesianus relates Theodoric's last hours in more earthly terms, attributing his death to dysentery (fluxum ventris). However tradition attributed the same kind of death to Arius.
- Rök stone (Norway/Sweden, 1st half of the 9th century). This famous runic inscription should deserve a book all by itself; that's why I refer to Wikipedia which has a fairly general overview, and encourage readers to research it on their own, especially regarding the Theodoric connection. According to several interpretations, a part of it concerns the historical Theodoric the Great:
Þjóðríkr the bold,
chief of sea-warriors,
ruled over the shores of the Hreiðsea.
Now he sits armed
on his Goth(ic horse),
his shield strapped,
the prince of the Mærings
I mention it only because of the possible Wild Hunt connection: according to some sources, it does not refer to a statue of Theodoric but to his continuing return astride his horse to ride in the Furious Host. If it were so, it would be the most ancient trace extant of this legend.
- Otto of Freising (German bishop and historian, 12th century) tells of a black rider on a black horse, who crosses the Mosel river and appears before the frightened Theodoric, who mounts on the horse, is carried to the Etna and thrown into the volcano. Possibly the first unquestionable appearance of the black horse theme. A bas-relief of the Church of San Zeno in Verona shows a man identified as Theodoric blowing his horn and chasing a deer, while a mysterious figure watches in the corner – is it supposed to be the devil?
- Thidrekssaga (about 1250). The adventures of Dietrich von Bern, the legendary counterpart of Theodoric the Great. Here is the ending (badly translated by me):
When Lord Dietrich was very old, he rode to a pool in the river that was called Dietrich's Bath. While he was bathing, a young squire said to him: "There runs the most beautiful stag that I ever saw in all my life." Lord Dietrich sprang out of the water and wrapped himself in his cloak and bade bring his steed and his hounds.
His squires went to fetch his steed, but the king thought the wait was too long. He saw the deer leap away, and he found a black steed beside him with saddle and harness. At once he jumped in the saddle and ran after the deer. The squires freed the hounds, but the hounds refused to move.
The steed leaped as high as the bold flight of any bird. One of the king's thanes followed him on his white steed, and the hounds followed him. Lord Dietrich realized that this was no steed he sat upon, and would gladly dismount, but he could not move from the wooden saddle.
The thane who followed him called out: "My lord, you ride too fast, when will you turn back home?"
Lord Dietrich said: "I think this is an ill ride, and I will come back if God and the Virgin Mary so desire." Then he at once disappeared from the thane's sight, and was never seen again.
- John the Deacon (14th century), or Giovanni Mansionario, in his Historia Imperialis, has a biography of Theodoric. Here the king is not thrown into Hell but he returns to hunt in the night. The author calls it the logical conclusion for a man generated by the devil, but we can finally identify a indubitable resurfacing of the Odinic Wild Hunt theme.
- Leon of Rozmitel, Veronese Chronicles (1466). I know absolutely nothing else about this writer, but according to my source he describes Theodoric, naked and drunk and yelling, and the Devil comes to fetch him on a black horse spurting fire from its nostrils.
- Ravennate tradition. A seer had predicted to Theodoric that he would die struck by lightning, as a punishment from God. Frightened, Theodoric had an underground gallery built, so wide that he could ride his chariot in it, that connected his palace to his mausoleum. As soon as he spied storm clouds approaching, he used to take refuge in the mausoleum. However one day a lightning bolt struck him through the cupola and killed him. To this day you can see the crack in the marble of the cupola. (Which of course has an entirely different explanation.)
- Giosue Carducci, The Lay of Theodoric
The most famous modern Italian version of the Black Horse legend. Carducci draws both from the Church's derogatory tradition and from the heroic sagas, describing a Theodoric who is ultimately damned but who keeps his dignity to the last. If you check the link, you will see how closely related Carducci's text and the Thidrekssaga ending quoted above are. The Kriemhild episode relates to the Thidrekssaga too, but especially to the Nibelungenlied, where it is indeed Hildebrand, and not Dietrich, who strikes the queen dead.
Source: W. Bendazzi, A. Bolognesi: Theodericus Rex. Longo Editore, Ravenna, 2005 (ISBN 88-8063-461-5) has a list of the legends; some of them I haven't been able to find anywhere else, but I'm still searching.
Background: Absolute Background Textures Archive
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The Dragon and the King
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