Huneric

Huneric or Honeric (died December 23, 484) was King of the Vandals (477 – 484) and the oldest son of Geiseric. He dropped the imperial politics of his father and concentrated mainly on internal affairs. He was married to Eudocia, daughter of western Roman Emperor Valentinian III (419–455) and Licinia Eudoxia. She left him probably in 472. She had one son with him, Hilderic.

Huneric was a fervent adherent to Arianism. At the beginning of his reign, he allowed the election of a new Catholic bishop of Carthage but then started persecuting Catholics. Furthermore, he tried to make Catholic property fall to the state, but when this caused too much protest from the Byzantine emperor, he chose to banish a number of Catholics to a faraway province instead. On February 1, 484 he organised a meeting of Catholic bishops with Arian bishops but on February 24, 484 he forcibly removed the Catholic bishops from their offices and banished some to Corsica. A few were martyred, including the former proconsul Victorian along with Frumentius and other wealthy merchants, who were killed at Hadrumetum after refusing to become Arians. [ [http://www.saintpatrickdc.org/ss/0323.htm Saint Patrick's Church: Saints of March 23] ]

Huneric also murdered many members of Hasdingi dynasty and also persecuted Manichaeans.

Huneric was the first Vandal king who used title of "king of Vandals and Alans". He was succeeded by his nephew Gunthamund (reigned 484–496), and was little mourned by either the Vandals or their subjects due to his cruelty.

In his relations with other states, Huneric did not have the prestige that his father Geiseric had enjoyed. Nevertheless, the Vandals maintained their seapower and their hold on the islands of the western Mediterranean Sea. But the Moors in the inlands of Algeria, who had been quiet in Geiseric's days, managed to conquer some Vandal outposts in their area, thus severing the connection between the Vandal heartland around Carthage and their westernmost possessions around Tangiers.

References