Honorius was still a minor ; as his guardian, Theodosius had appointed the magister militum Stilicho.

From there Alaric escaped with difficulty, and not without some suspicion of connivance by Stilicho, who supposedly had again received orders to depart.

Stilicho is alleged by some to have wanted control of both Emperors, and is supposed to have had Rufinus assassinated by Gothic mercenaries in 395 ; though definite proof of Stilicho's involvement in the assassination is lacking, the intense competition and political jealousies engendered by the two figures compose the main thread of the first part of Arcadius ' reign.

During the first part of his reign Honorius depended on the military leadership of the general Stilicho, who had been appointed by Theodosius and was of mixed Vandal and Roman ancestry.

With Stilicho ’ s fall, Olympius moved against all of his former father-in-law ’ s allies, killing and torturing key individuals and ordering the confiscation of the property of anyone who had borne any office while Stilicho was in command.

As both were underage, Theodosius had appointed Stilicho as the caretaker for Honorius until he came of age.

The army that had been victorious at the Frigidus was still assembled, and Stilicho led it toward Alaric's forces.

In late 406, Stilicho demanded the return of the eastern half of Illyricum ( which had been transferred to the administrative control of Constantinople by Theodosius ), threatening war if the Eastern Roman Empire resisted.

Stilicho, scraping together thirty legions ( roughly 30, 000 troops-legions during the Late Roman Empire had around 1, 000 soldiers ) through a variety of desperate methods, including efforts to enroll slaves in the army in exchange for their freedom, led a coalition of Romans, Alans, and Huns to defeat Radagasius at Ticinum in 406.

In Rutilius ' view, Stilicho, fearing to suffer all that had caused himself to be feared, removed the defences of the Alps and Apennines that the provident gods had interposed between the barbarians and the Eternal City, and planted the cruel Goths, his skinclad minions, in the very sanctuary of the empire: " he plunged an armed foe in the naked vitals of the land, his craft being freer from risk than that of openly inflicted disaster ... May Nero rest from all the torments of the damned, that they may seize on Stilicho ; for Nero smote his own mother, but Stilicho the mother of the world!

The relations between Alaric and Stilicho had been closer and more mysterious than those between Alaric and Theodosius, however, and men who had seen Stilicho surrounded by his Goth bodyguards, naturally looked on the Goths who assailed Rome as Stilicho's avengers.

The Christian historians even asserted that Stilicho ( a staunch Arian ) had designed to restore paganism.

Stilicho returned as soon as the passes had cleared, meeting Alaric in two battles ( near Pollentia and Verona ) without decisive results.

In 406 Stilicho, hearing of new invaders and rebels who had appeared in the northern provinces, insisted on making peace with Alaric, probably on the basis that Alaric would prepare to move either against the Eastern court or against the rebels in Gaul.

Stilicho had news of the coup at Bononia ( where he was probably waiting for Alaric ).

The conspiracy then massacred the families of the federate troops ( as presumed supporters of Stilicho, although they had probably rebelled against him ), and the troops defected en masse to Alaric.

* 402 – Stilicho stymies the Visigoths under Alaric in the Battle of Pollentia.

In 401 Alaric invaded Italy, but he was defeated by the Roman half-Vandal general Flavius Stilicho at Pollentia ( modern Pollenza ) on April 6, 402.

Stilicho now marched east against Alaric.

After spreading desolation through North Italy and striking terror into the citizens of Rome, Alaric was met by Stilicho at Pollentia, today in Piedmont.

Alaric became the friend and ally of his late opponent, Stilicho.

Stilicho was absent in Raetia in the latter months of 401, when Alaric, who was also the eastern empire's magister militum in Illyricum, suddenly marched with a large army to the Julian Alps and entered Italy.

Stilicho defeated Alaric at Pollentia, on the river Tanarus on Easter Day ( 6 April 402 ) Alaric retreated to Verona, where Stilicho attacked him again.

In early 408, Stilicho attempted to strengthen his position at court by marrying his second daughter, Thermantia, to Honorius after the death of the empress Maria in 407 Another invasion by Alaric was prevented in 408 by Stilicho when he forced the Roman Senate to pay 4, 000 pounds of gold to persuade the Goths to leave Italy.

Finally, after the western general Stilicho was executed by Honorius in 408 and the Roman legions massacred the families of 30, 000 barbarian soldiers serving in the Roman army, Alaric declared war.

Stilicho now marched east against Alaric.

Two years later, in 397, Stilicho defeated Alaric's forces in Macedonia, although Alaric himself escaped into the surrounding mountains.

Edward Gibbon, drawing on Zosimus, criticizes Stilicho for being overconfident in victory and indulging in luxury and women, allowing Alaric to escape.

In a surprise attack on Easter Sunday in 402, Stilicho defeated Alaric at the Battle of Pollentia, capturing his camp and his wife.

In 403 at Verona, Stilicho again bested Alaric, who as Gibbon said only escaped by the speed of his horse.

The exact reasons for this are unclear, but it is possible that Stilicho planned to employ Alaric and his battle-hardened troops as allies against the bands of Alans, Vandals and Sueves that were threatening to invade the West.

In 405 there was a major invasion of Italy by those Alans, Sueves, and Vandals under the command of Radagaisus, disrupting Stilicho ’ s plans to re-take Illyria from the Eastern Empire with the help of Alaric.

Meanwhile, Constantine ’ s rebellion having broken off the negotiations between Alaric and Stilicho for the joint attack on Illyria, Alaric demanded the payment he was owed, threatening to attack Italy again if he was not given a large amount of gold.

The senate, “ inspired by the courage, rather than the wisdom, of their predecessors ,” as Gibbon laconically put it, was in favor of war with Alaric until Stilicho persuaded them to give into Alaric ’ s demands.

* Stilicho drives the Visigoths out of Greece and Macedonia.

* Stilicho, Roman general ( magister militum ), defeat the Visigoths and Huns in Thrace.

Without a strong general like Stilicho to control the by-now mostly barbarian army, Honorius could do little to break the siege, and adopted a passive strategy trying to wait out Alaric, hoping to regather his forces to defeat the Visigoths in the meantime.

* Stilicho appears in the X-O Manowar # 1 ( 2012 ) where he surprise attacks Aric and the Visigoths on Easter Sunday.

Stilicho defeated Alaric and his Visigoths here in 403.

Greece faced invasions from the Heruli, Goths, and Vandals during the reign of Theodosius I. Stilicho, who acted as regent for Arcadius, evacuated Thessaly when the Visigoths invaded in the late 4th century.

At the close of the 4th century AD, Claudian, court poet to the emperor Honorius and the patrician Stilicho, habitually uses the ethnonym Getae to refer to the Visigoths.

** 403, Battle of Verona, Visigoths pushed into former Illyricum by Stilicho.

* 408, Failed invasion of Moesia by Huns and Germanic mercenaries led by Uldin the Hun, Capture of thousands of Germanic mercenaries, Execution of Roman General Stilicho, Slaughter of wives and children of barbarian foederati, Siege of Rome by Visigoths, Attacks on Roman Britain by Saxons, Death of Eastern Emperor Arcadius.

Stilicho, who acted as regent for Arcadius, evacuated Thessaly when the Visigoths invaded in the late 4th century.