428 Explained

Year 428 (CDXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Felix and Taurus (or, less frequently, year 1181 Ab urbe condita). The denomination 428 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Events

By place

Roman Empire

• Flavius Felix is elected consul for the Western Empire and issues consular diptychs during his political office.
• Flavius Aetius gains appointment as master of both services (magister militum praesentalis), after gaining victories in Gaul over Visigoth and Frankish forces.

Europe

• King Gunderic, age 49, dies after a reign of 21 years, and is succeeded by his half-brother Genseric. He is styled with the title Rex Wandalorum et Alanorum ("King of the Vandals and Alans"). Genseric increases his power and wealth in the residence of the province of Hispania Baetica (Southern Spain).
• King Vortigern invites a number of Germanic warriors to aid him in consolidating his position in Britain, according to the Historia Brittonum. He hires Saxons who are probably settled in Kent as mercenaries to fight against the Picts and the Scots beyond Hadrian's Wall.
• Frankish War (428): Commander-in-chief of the Roman army Aetius put an end to the invasion of Chlodio, king of the Salian Franks in Northern Gaul.

Asia

• Artaxias IV, last king of Greater Armenia, is deposed by Bahram V. The Arshakuni Dynasty ends and the kingdom becomes a province of the Persian Empire.

By topic

Astronomy

• October 26  - The planet Venus occults the planet Jupiter.

Religion

• April 10  - Nestorius is made patriarch of Constantinople. He preaches a new doctrine that will be called Nestorianism. It makes a distinction between the divine and human natures of Jesus but comes under immediate attack from pope Celestine I and Cyril of Alexandria.
• Hydatius becomes bishop of Aquae Flaviae in Gallaecia (modern Chaves) in Portugal.
• John succeeds Theodotus as patriarch of Antioch, and gives his support to Nestorius.
• Euthymius the Great builds a monastery in Palestine, near the Dead Sea.

Births

• Tuoba Huang, prince of the Xianbei state Northern Wei (d. 451)

Deaths

• Gunderic, king of the Vandals and Alans (b. 379)
• Qifu Chipan, prince of the Xianbei state Western Qin
• Theodore of Mopsuestia, bishop and theologian

References

• Giusto Traina: 428 A.D. An Ordinary Year at the End of the Roman Empire. Princeton University Press, Princeton 2011, .