Hydatius

Hydatius or Idacius (c. 400 – c. 469), bishop of Aquae Flaviae in the Roman province of Gallaecia (almost certainly the modern Chaves, Portugal, in the modern district of Vila Real) was the author of a chronicle of his own times that provides us with our best evidence for the history of the Iberian Peninsula in the 5th century.

Life

Hydatius was born around the year 400 in the environs of Civitas Lemica, a Roman town near modern Xinzo de Limia in the Spanish Galician province of Ourense. As a young boy, he travelled as a pilgrim to the Holy Land with his mother, where he met Jerome in his hermitage at Bethlehem. About the year 417 he entered the ecclesiastical state, and in 427 was consecrated bishop probably of Chaves (the Roman Aquae Flaviae) in Gallaecia. As bishop he had to come to terms with the presence of non-Roman powers, especially a succession of kings of the Suevi, in a province where imperial control became increasingly nominal during the course of his lifetime. The Suevi had settled in Gallaecia in 411, and there was constant friction between them and the local Hispano-Roman provincials. In this context, Hydatius took part in a deputation of the year 431 requesting assistance in dealing with the Suevi from the general Flavius Aëtius, the most important representative of the imperial government in the West.