Alaric makes ready for another departure, but…
September 410 CE
Alaric makes ready for another departure, but dies suddenly, probably of fever, at the age of forty, during his preparations.
He is reportedly buried, together with his treasure looted from Rome, in the riverbed of the Busento, the stream being temporarily turned aside from its course while the grave was dug.
When the work is finished, the river is turned back into its usual channel and the captives by whose hands the labor had been accomplished are put to death so that none might learn their secret.
Alaric’s brother-in-law, Ataulf, succeeds him as commander in chief the Visigothic army.
The chief authorities on the career of Alaric are: the historian Orosius and the poet Claudian, both contemporary, neither disinterested; Zosimus, a historian who lived probably about half a century after Alaric's death; and Jordanes, a Goth who wrote the history of his nation in 551, basing his work on the Trojan War.
The legend of Alaric's burial in the Buzita River comes from Jordanes.
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