Isidore of Sevilla and the Vandals of North Africa

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At the beginning of the 7th Century, the bishop Isidore of Sevilla wrote a History of the Kings of the Goths, Vandals and Sueves. In this book, among other topics, he writes on the Vandal kings of North Africa. This is an important work, as unlike other historical sources, it is not hostile to the Vandals.

Isidore of Sevilla was born around 560, in Carthagene (ancient Carthago Nova), in a rich and influential family of Roman Spain. His family played an important role in the political-religious maneuvering that led to the Spanish Visigothic kings’ conversion from Arianism to Catholic Christianity: his older brother Leander was bishop of Sevilla at the time of King Reccared’s conversion in 589.

Around 600, Isidore succeeded his brother as bishop of Sevilla. During his episcopate, he supervised a renewal of popular education in Sevilla, and the city became an influential cultural center in Spain. He reintroduced Aristotle to his countrymen, several centuries before the Arabs.

Isidore of Sevilla is the author of several books. His main work, Etymologiae, is an encyclopaedia of all knowledge available at his time: he mostly concentrates on the origins of words, but also writes on a great diversity of subjects, from grammar to mathematics, astronomy, medicine, law, theology, etc. This book contains quotes of many works of classical Antiquity that would otherwise be lost. Isidore of Sevilla is considered as the last great scholar of the ancient world.

Another book written by Isidore of Sevilla is his History of the Kings of the Goths, Vandals and Sueves, a historical work on the Germanic kingdoms that succeeded the Romans in Western Europe and North Africa. The largest part is on the Visigoths in Spain, the author’s country. Isidore’s goal was to show that, far from being foreign invaders, those people were fully part of European (and North African) civilization. While the author was hostile to their Arian faith, he saw their recent conversion to Catholicism as the step required for them to take their legitimate place as heirs of the Romans in the region.

The part on the Vandal kings of Carthage is quite short, and largely inspired from the Chronicle of Victor of Tunnuna. It remains interesting, as the only historical source on the Vandals that is not hostile to them: while older Roman authors depict them as violent invaders, Isidore of Sevilla writes a much more measured narrative on their conquest of North Africa, and on the reign of each of their kings.

Next to the Vandals, the author also mentions several Gothic incursions into North Africa, which the historians of the region have mostly forgotten.

Isidore of Sevilla’s book can be read online on this page. The part on the Vandals starts here.