Rechiar

Rechiar or Flavius Rechiarius (after 415 – December 456) was the third Suevic king of Gallaecia, from 448 until his death, and also the first one to be born in Gallaecia. He was one of the most innovative and belligerent of the Suevi monarchs. Hydatius, the contemporary bishop and chronicler from Galicia who is the sole contemporary source for biographical details of Rechiar, established his reputation as that of a barbarian with little sense of Roman law, culture, or custom; accusations already discredited, but very common at that time. He was the first Germanic king who professed Nicene Christianity.

Religion

Rechiar was almost certainly not raised Christian, though some scholars have raised the contention that his father raised him that way in order to foster good relations with the Church and the Romanized population who were, for the most part, Catholics as well. What is certain is the Rechiar had been converted (catholicus factus according to Isidore's Historia Suevorum) before reaching the throne. to his succession, but the basis of this opposition he does not mention. It is not inconceivable that it was religiously motivated. The marriage of Catholic to Arian was not advantageous for the church of the former and the influence of Rechiar's queen and another later Arian queen helped bring about the conversion of the Suevi not to Catholicism, but to Arianism.

Administration Rechiar was a powerful enough ruler to mint his own coinage, on which he had stamped the legend ivssv rechiari reges. bearing his name and the first to claim the right (iussu) to mint them, in Latin legend: "IVSSV RECHIARI REGES" ("By order of King Rechiar"). Rechiar's kingship was "primitive" enough, however, that it appears he took the royal thesaurus (treasure) with him on his campaigns. Despite Hydatius' misrepresentation of Rechiarius, he was the first Suevic king to be born in Gallaecia and with a Roman education, like many Gallico-Roman leaders of the time, thanks to which he also gained influence in the autochthonous social layers. He kept his capital at Braga.

Wars Rechiar was a bellicose ruler, who made war on all of his neighbours. In 448, at the commencement of his reign, the Roman count Censorius was executed at Seville by a Suevic nobleman named Agiulf. It has been surmised by some that this act was connected with Rechiar's warlike attitude towards Rome. Rechiar also impelled the first contact between the Suevi and the Basques: he made war on them in February 449. Later in 449 he visited his father-in-law in Gaul. On his return home to Galicia, Rechiar allied with Basilius, leader of one of the Bagaudae, and raided the Ebro valley, attacking Caesaraugusta and even entering Ilerda (Lleida) "by a trick". He took many prisoners, but he failed to take the region and thus complete the Suevic conquest of Hispania. Rechiar did not approach Tarragona, the provincial capital. According to Jordanes, he had "presumed" on the basis of his relationship to the Visigothic king and Roman foederatus Theodoric II (his brother-in-law), that he could rule all of Hispania. On 5 October 456 Theodoric defeated Rechiar in a battle at the Campus Paramus twelve miles from Astorga on the Urbicus (Órbigo). Jordanes is almost certainly wrong; at Porto Rechiar was captured and executed in December. The Suevic monarchy collapsed, rapidly disintegrating into rival factions over the following years. Braga fell on 28 October and the Visigoths brutally sacked the city and the churches before moving on to conquer Baetica During the century of Arianism that soon commenced, nothing about the Suevi was recorded.