Rechila (died 448) was the Suevic

king of Galicia Galicia is an autonomous community and historical nationality in modern-day northwestern Spain on the Iberian Peninsula, which was a major part of the Roman province known as Gallaecia prior to 409. It consists of the provinces of A Coruña, ...

from 438 until his death. There are few primary sources for his life, but

Hydatius Hydatius, also spelled Idacius (c. 400 – c. 469) was a late Western Roman writer and clergyman. The bishop of Aquae Flaviae in the Roman province of Gallaecia (almost certainly the modern Chaves, Portugal, in the modern district of Vila Real), ...

was a contemporary Christian (non- Arian) chronicler in Galicia. When his father,

Hermeric Hermeric (died 441) was the king of the Suevi from at least 419 and possibly as early as 406 until his abdication in 438. Biography Before 419 Nothing is known for sure about Hermeric before 419, the year in which he is first mentioned; ...

, turned ill in 438, he retired from active political life (dying in 441) and handed the reins of government and the royal title over to his son. He endeavoured to expand the Suevic kingdom to fill the vacuum left by the retiring

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and

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. In 438 he defeated Andevotus, the '' comes Hispaniarum'', on the river Genil (Singillio). The Roman position in Iberia became so tenuous that three ''magistri utriusque militiae'' (masters of both services) were sent to the peninsula between 441 and 446. Invading southern Iberia, Rechila took the provincial capitals of Mérida in 439 and

Seville Seville (; es, Sevilla, ) is the capital and largest city of the Spanish autonomous community of Andalusia and the province of Seville. It is situated on the lower reaches of the River Guadalquivir, in the southwest of the Iberian Peninsula ...

in 441. These conquests were extremely significant, but nothing of the sequence of events leading to them is known. The provinces of Lusitania,

Baetica Hispania Baetica, often abbreviated Baetica, was one of three Roman provinces in Hispania (the Iberian Peninsula). Baetica was bordered to the west by Lusitania, and to the northeast by Hispania Tarraconensis. Baetica remained one of the basi ...

, and

Carthaginiensis Hispania ( la, Hispānia , ; nearly identically pronounced in Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, and Italian) was the Roman name for the Iberian Peninsula and its provinces. Under the Roman Republic, Hispania was divided into two provinces: Hispan ...

were subjected to the Suevi with the exception of the Levante and the Mediterranean seaboard. Rechila was involved in near constant war with the Romans. While returning in 440 from his third embassy to the Suevi, the Roman legate

Censorius Censorius (died 448) was a count (''comes'') of the Western Roman Empire from 432 until his death. He is mentioned in the ''Chronicle'' of Hydatius under the years 432 and 440. In 432, 437, and 440 he was sent into Hispania as an ambassador to th ...

was captured by Rechila near

Mértola Mértola () is a municipality in southeastern Portuguese Alentejo near the Spanish border. In 2011, the population was 7,274, in an area of approximately : it is the sixth-largest municipality in Portugal. Meanwhile, it is the second-lowest popula ...

(''Myrtilis''). The king had him imprisoned for the remainder of his reign. Rechila died a pagan in Mérida: ''gentilis moritur'' ("died a gentile") according to Hydatius, but Isidore of Seville, writing well over a century and a half later, and whose source was Hydatius, says ''ut ferunt, gentilitatis vitam finivit'' ("finished his life a gentile, so they say"). There is no reason, however, for accepting Isidore's doubts, which were probably precipitated by the fact that Rechila's son and successor was the Catholic Rechiar. Some scholars have raised the contention that his father raised him that way in order to foster good relations with the Church and bring about the easy conversion of the Suevi.Thompson, "The Conversion of the Spanish Suevi", 79, who denies this. Rechila may have been the father or perhaps uncle of the ''

magister militum (Latin for "master of soldiers", plural ) was a top-level military command used in the later Roman Empire, dating from the reign of Constantine the Great. The term referred to the senior military officer (equivalent to a war theatre commander, ...

Ricimer Flavius Ricimer ( , ; – 18/19 August 472) was a Romanized Germanic general who effectively ruled the remaining territory of the Western Roman Empire from 461 until his death in 472, with a brief interlude in which he contested power with An ...

.Gillett, "The Birth of Ricimer".

Notes

Sources

* Gillett, Andrew. "The Birth of Ricimer." ''Historia: Zeitschrift für Alte Geschichte'' 44, 3 (1995): 380–84. * Thompson, E. A. "The Conversion of the Spanish Suevi to Catholicism." Edward James, ed., ''Visigothic Spain: New Approaches''. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980. . * Thompson, E. A. ''Romans and Barbarians: The Decline of the Western Empire''. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1982. .
{{Galician monarchs 5th-century Suebian kings Germanic warriors Medieval Portugal 448 deaths Year of birth unknown