20 mai 875 - Viking raid Rome of 875

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Following the Viking raid on Rome in 865, subsequent Viking attacks on Italy remained relatively small in scale, with Rome largely avoided. However, in May 875, the Vikings returned with a formidable force of five hundred ships and nearly twenty thousand warriors.

The previous raid in 865 prompted the pope to bolster the city's defenses, increasing the garrison to about two thousand men and establishing a militia force of around six thousand volunteers. Despite their irregular training, these defenders were able to hold the walls when needed. Once again, the raiders landed south of the city and began pillaging the countryside, prompting farmers to seek refuge within Rome's walls and urgent calls for help to be dispatched.

The trying to bribe the Vikings had failed as the pope could not offer enough treasure to satisfy them. And the Vikings then set about construction of siege weapons, ditches were dug around the city, and catapults and mangonels were put into place to bombard Rome, while the ground before the walls was flattened to allow the siege towers forward. On June 4 the Vikings made a massive effort against the city, this attack was repelled with heavy losses. According to rumors, during this fighting the pope himself grabbed a spear and heroically led the defense of one of the cities gates after Viking forces succeeded in achieving a foothold on the nearby wall.

Over the course of June the Vikings tried twice more to take the city, but each time were thrown back by the defenders. However, on the second of July the Viking forces successfully overran the Porta San Pancrazio, and then the entire city west of the Tiber, including the Vatican. In the subsequent destruction the basilica of Saint Peter was burned, the holy relics destroyed, and the treasures looted. The tomb of Saint Peter himself was wrecked. Hastein, the lead of this raid, is said to have sworn an oath to sacrifice pope in his own basilica to avenge Christian destruction of pagan sites in northern Europe. In desperation the defenders retreated, tearing down the bridges behind them to prevent the Vikings crossing.

Upon hearing of the siege, Constantine V of Constantinople dispatched a substantial force to aid Rome, including infantry from Moesia, Anatolia, and Greece, as well as the Tagmata. These soldiers were ferried over to Italy on a large fleet of merchant vessels, landing at Tarentum in early-July 875. They gathered more soldiers from southern Italy, and began marching north.

Meanwhile the Imperial fleet had been dispatched and swept around Italy, and successfully blockaded the entrance to the Tiber. The Vikings were trapped. Word of the Imperial army’s arrival was greeted with some hesitation by the Vikings, who weren’t actually expecting a significant response yet. But as the Imperial army emerged on the Via Appia in early August, and the Vikings were forced to leave Rome and move south to meet them.

The two forces met south of Aricia, among a set of hills. The eighteen thousand Vikings formed into their standard formation of a shieldwall, against which the Romans deployed ten thousand infantry in a phalanx between two hill, while three thousand cavalry on each flank, on the two hills. As the Viking shield wall advanced on the Roman phalanx this force was held in reserve, while the Viking line was pelted with darts and arrows from the Roman lines. These were returned of course, and soon the two lines were engaged in the a match to try and push through one another’s lines.

Realistically the Vikings were the superior force here, and had these two armies been alone they probably would have won the day, if the Romans didn't concealed nine thousand remaining horsemen behind the nearby hills. After a signal was sent out, the hidden Roman cavalry, as well as five thousand light infantry, circled behind the Viking shieldwall, and suddenly emerged from hiding, loosing their own darts and arrows into the rear of the Viking line. As the Vikings tried to turn to meet this new threat the Roman cavalry lowered their spears and charged. Panic swept through the Viking ranks as they realized the trap, and men began to flee back north. In the subsequent slaughter twelve thousand Vikings were killed, and four thousand taken prisoner. Only about two thousand made it back to their boats and fled back down the Tiber.

But as the Tiber’s mouth they were met by the Imperial fleet. In the subsequent naval battle another eighteen hundred Vikings were killed. Of the five hundred ships that had set out to sack Rome only eight returned home. After this fight, though the Vikings raids would still continue, but never a similar scale would ever be attempted again.

The captured Vikings were brought back to Constantinople, where they were forced to kneel before the Emperor, who was impressed with their abilities, and ordered them to serve as solders for a term of ten years before they would be allowed to depart the Empire. Thus, quite accidentally, the first proper infantry segment of the Tagmata, which later known as Varangian Tagma, was established. The Vikings who initially had been conscripted would largely remain in Imperial service the rest of their lives, passing positions on to their children when these men converted to Christianity over the coming years, and settled inside the Empire. But far more famously, the Varangian Tagma would draw in soldiers from across the north, particularly the Varangian whom later become the name of whole Tagma. The Varangian Tagma would be a key part of the later Imperial army, until it was mostly destroyed along with the rest of the Tagmata when the Emperor Nikephorus III, last of his dynasty, marched out to meet his doom.

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