Turismod (

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power ...

: ''Turismodus''Martindale 1992, ''s.v. Alboin'', pp. 38 – 40) was a son of the king of the

Gepids The Gepids, ( la, Gepidae, Gipedae, grc, Γήπαιδες) were an East Germanic tribe who lived in the area of modern Romania, Hungary and Serbia, roughly between the Tisza, Sava and Carpathian Mountains. They were said to share the religion ...

Thurisind Thurisind (Latin: ''Turisindus'', died ) was king of the Gepids, an East Germanic Gothic people, from c. 548 to 560. He was the penultimate Gepid king, and succeeded King Elemund by staging a coup d'état and forcing the king's son into exile. Th ...

. He was killed in 551 or 552 on the battlefield by

Alboin Alboin (530s – 28 June 572) was king of the Lombards from about 560 until 572. During his reign the Lombards ended their migrations by settling in Italy, the northern part of which Alboin conquered between 569 and 572. He had a lasting effe ...

, son of the king of the

Lombards The Lombards () or Langobards ( la, Langobardi) were a Germanic people who ruled most of the Italian Peninsula from 568 to 774. The medieval Lombard historian Paul the Deacon wrote in the '' History of the Lombards'' (written between 787 an ...

Audoin Alduin ( Langobardic: ''Aldwin'' or ''Hildwin'', ; also called Auduin or Audoin) was king of the Lombards from 547 to 560. Life Audoin was of the Gausi, a prominent Lombard ruling clan, and according to the ''Historia Langobardorum'', the so ...

. Turismod was the oldest son of Thurisind and a brother of Cunimund; his sibling eventually succeeded their father in circa 560. Thurisind seems to have given to his eldest son the rank of commander of the Gepids in the city of

Sirmium Sirmium was a city in the Roman province of Pannonia, located on the Sava river, on the site of modern Sremska Mitrovica in the Vojvodina autonomous provice of Serbia. First mentioned in the 4th century BC and originally inhabited by Illyrians an ...

as a way to guarantee his succession to the throne, as this position made him heir apparent. He seems to have had a son, Reptila, who under the reign of Cunimund held Sirmium. According to Paul the Deacon, he participated in the third Lombard-Gepid War; in 551 or 552 in the decisive battle of Asfeld he was slain there by

, son of the king of the

. His death was according to Paul the turning point of the battle, as when the other Gepids saw their leader dead they broke the ranks and escaped. After the war, tells Paul who probably took the story from oral tradition, maybe an heroic lay dedicated to Alboin, Turismod's killer, Alboin, in order to obtain the right to become his father's table-companion as was customary to Lombards had to ask for the hospitality of a foreign king and have the king arm him; for this initiation he went with 40 companions to the court of Turismod's father Thurisind.Ausenda 1999, p. 433 Thurisind, in observance of the laws of hospitality, lets Alboin and his companions participate to a banquet given in their honor offering Alboin the seat where Turismod habitually stood. Following a mockery by Turismod's brother Cunimund and Alboin's rejoinder, a clash is avoided just by Thurisind's intervention, who puts peace and sends away Alboin with Turismod's arms. According to István Bóna, who believes in the veracity of this story, the facts may have taken place as described by Paul but it also could reflect a secret peace condition imposed by Audoin on Thurisind under which the Gepid king had to arm his son's killer.Bóna 1976, pp. 7 – 8, 12

Notes

References

* Ausenda, Giorgio. "Current issues and future directions in the study of Franks and Alamanni in the Merovingian period", ''Franks and Alamanni in the Merovingian Period: An Ethnographic Perspective''. Ian Wood (ed.). Woodbridge: Boydell, 1998, pp. 371 – 455. . * Bóna, István. ''A l'aube du Moyen Age: Gépides et Lombards dans le bassin des Carpates''.

Budapest Budapest (, ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Hungary. It is the ninth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits and the second-largest city on the Danube river; the city has an estimated population ...

: Corvina Press, 1974 976 . * Gasparri, Stefano. "Kingship rituals and ideology in Lombard Italy", ''Rituals of Power: From Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages''. Frans Theuws and Janet L. Nelson (eds.).

Leiden Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration wit ...

: Brill, 2000, pp. 95 – 114. . * Goffart, Walter. ''The Narrators of Barbarian History (A.D. 550 – 800): Jordanes, Gregory of Tours, Bede, and Paul the Deacon''.

Princeton Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ni ...

Princeton University Press Princeton University Press is an independent Academic publishing, publisher with close connections to Princeton University. Its mission is to disseminate scholarship within academia and society at large. The press was founded by Whitney Darrow, ...

, 1988, . * Huizinga, Johan. '' Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play-Element in Culture''. New York:

Routledge Routledge () is a British multinational publisher. It was founded in 1836 by George Routledge, and specialises in providing academic books, journals and online resources in the fields of the humanities, behavioural science, education, law, ...

, 1938

998 Year 998 ( CMXCVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events By place Europe * Spring – Otto III retakes Rome and restores power in the papal city. Crescent ...

. * Jarnut, Jörg. ''Storia dei Longobardi''.

Turin Turin ( , Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital from 1861 to 1865. Th ...

: Einaudi, 1982 995 . * Martindale, John R. (ed.), '' Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire - Volume III: A.D. 527 – 641'', Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992, . {{DEFAULTSORT:Turismod Gepid warriors 552 deaths Year of birth unknown People killed in action