ABSTRACT
The Ostrogoths had been even there dominated by the Huns and fought for Attila as his subject allies at the Catalaunian Fields; but they took a prominent part in the revolt of his subjects after his death, and freed themselves. The undisturbed rule of Odovacar and his Rugians, but it laid foundations for that of the Ostrogoths: the shock of having a class of barbarian federates superimposed on their landowning class fell upon the Roman provincials under Odovacar, and was merely continued by Theoderic. Theoderic’s maintenance of the whole fabric of Roman civil life for the provincials was perhaps occasioned by his knowledge of and veneration for civilitas, for the Roman life he had known at Constantinople; but would seem to have been inevitable. The lives of Cassiodorus and his family show the old senatorial class striving to make the best of Germanic rule in Italy and save the Roman culture and tradition.
