Resumen de Les Goths, des fédérés de l’Empire et la « défense du Nom romain » en Méditerranée occidentale de 416 à 457
This contribution aims to show that the Goths participated, as foederati, in the defense of the Nomen Romanus in the West. If the gens gothica foederata and its foederati were an essential tool of Fl. Constancius for his renovatio imperii in Hispania and southern Gaul, it was not until the years 440-450 – under Aetius and the emperor Avitus – that they become an essential political, military and strategic partner of Western imperial power. This assertion was not made without difficulty since the employment of the foederati goths in Hispania was, after the campaigns of Vallia, disappointing in the years 420 - to the point that in Hispania, the Suevi had to act against the enemies of the Empire - while in Gaul, recurring tensions (425, 430, 436-439) affected their relations with the Empire. These conflicts and tensions nuance the image of the legitimist and legalistic Goths and, on the contrary, testify for the Goths of Aquitania to a certain disavowal on the part of the central power since the Goths do not appear as imperial troops in Gaul as in Hispania before the foedus of 439 which allowed Aetius to make the Goths as foederati acting as a mobile intervention army called to intervene on several fronts (Hispania, Gaul, Italy), evolution and position confirmed under the reign of Avitus. In doing so, they participated in the defense of imperial hegemony in the West, while demanding increasing advantages from the central power.
