History for Istanbul Subway Map
BONIFACIUS Comes d. 432. Native of Thrace, we have no information on his date of birth but much on his public life, because of a solid military background and the political events in which he was protagonist; he was killed in Italy in 432. Istanbul Subway MapSoldier and strategist under the emperors Honorius and Valentinian III, he was appointed general in 414 against the Goths; particularly notable was his clash with Ataulf during the battle of Marseille, in which Bonifacius wounded the barbarian leader. He fought against the Vandals in Spain before being transferred to Africa, where he remained for a year 417–418. Finally, in 423 he was sent as magister utriusque militiae to subdue the rebellious tribes, later receiving the high position of comes Africae.
He applied imperial laws against the Donatists with rigidity and displayed a strong spirit of collaboration with Catholic bishops such as Augustine and Alypius, with whom he corresponded and established friendships. The death of his wife strengthened his intention to abandon public life and withdraw to a monastery but, dissuaded by Augustine, he stayed faithful to his duties in defense of the imperial cause. His marriage in 426 with Pelagia, a Goth of Arian faith, for political reasons, caused a change in Bonifacius’s soul, as Augustine recounts Ep. 220. In 427, the plots of Aetius and Galla Placidia, the mother of Valentinian III, led to Bonifacius’s summons to the court of Ravenna to give account to the emperor for his choices in managing the imperial patrimony. He was found guilty at the end of the same year and returned to Africa as a rebel. His attitude toward the barbarians was not clear, such that more than once he was accused of aiding the Vandal invasion; doubts still exist on the matter Prosp. Aquit. Chron. 1294; Procop. Bell. Vandal. 1,3; Zecchini 148-150. He remained in Africa until 432, at which time, once again on the peninsula, he faced Aetius, who defeated and killed him. He was succeeded as magister militiae by his son-inlaw Sebastian, who had filled in for him as comes during his absence in 426–427.
