AETIUS, a Roman general of the closing period of the western empire, born at Dorostolus in Moesia, late in the 4th century. While detained for some time as a hostage in the camp of Rhuas, king of the Huns, he acquired an influence with the barbarians that was afterwards of much advantage to himself, though the same cannot be said of it as regards the empire. He led into Italy an army of 60,000 Huns, which he employed first to support the usurping Emperor John, and, on the death of the latter, to enforce his claim to the supreme command of the army in Gaul upon Placidia, the empress-mother and regent for Valentinian III. Afterwards, when he incurred the disfavour of Placidia for the death of his rival Boniface, he again employed an army of Huns to compel her to reinstate him in his former position. In Gaul he won his military reputation, upholding for nearly twenty years, by combined policy and daring, the falling fortunes of the western empire. His greatest victory was that of Chalons-sur-Marne (20th Sept. 451), in which he utterly routed Attila and the Huns—the number slain on both sides being, according to one computation, 300,000, though this is obviously an exaggeration. This was the last triumph of the empire. Three years later (454) Aëtius presented himself at court to chain the emperor’s daughter in marriage for his son Gaudentius; but Valentinian, suspecting him of designs upon the crown, slew him with his own hand....
AETIUS, surnamed “the Atheist,” founder of an extreme sect of the Arians, was a native of Coele-Syria. After working for some time as a coppersmith, he became a travelling doctor, and displayed great skill in disputations on medical subjects; but his controversial power soon found a wider field for its exercise in the great theological question of the time. He studied successively under the Arians, Paulinus, bishop of Antioch, Athanasius, bishop of Anazarbus, and the presbyter Antonius of Tarsus. In 350 he was ordained a deacon by Leontius of Antioch, but was shortly afterwards forced by the orthodox party to leave that town. At the first synod of Sirmium, he won a dialectic victory over the homoiousian bishops Basilius and Eustathius, who sought in consequence to stir up against him the enmity of Caesar Gallus. In 356 he went to Alexandria with Eunomius in order to advocate Arianism, but he was banished by Constantius. Julian the apostate recalled him from exile, bestowed upon him an estate in Lesbos, and retained him for a time at his court in Constantinople. Being consecrated a bishop, he used his office in the interests of Arianism by creating other bishops of that party. At the accession of Valens (364) he retired to his estate at Lesbos, but soon returned to Constantinople, where he died in 367. The Anomoean sect of the Arians, of whom he was the leader, are sometimes called after him Aëtians. His work De Fide has been preserved in connection with a refutation written by Epiphanius.
AETIUS, a Greek physician, born at Amida in Mesopotamia, who lived at the end of the 5th or the beginning of the 6th century. Of his personal history little is known, except that he studied at Alexandria, and was physician to the court at Constantinople with the title comes obsequü. He wrote a work entitled Βιβλία ’Ιατρικά 'Eκκαíδ∈κα, which is mainly a compilation from the works of previous authors. Eight books of this were issued from the Aldine press at Venice in 1534; various other parts have been frequently published; and a Latin translation of the whole, by Cornarius, appeared at Basle in 1542.
[257 words — estimated reading time: 2 minutes]