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Amalaric (died 531), king of the Visigoths, son of Alaric II,
was a child when his father fell in battle against Clovis I, king of the Franks (507). Gesalec was chosen king and the child Amalaric was carried for safety into Spain, which country and Provence were thenceforth ruled by his maternal grandfather, Theodoric the Ostrogoth, acting through his vice-regent, Theudis, an Ostrogothic nobleman. In 522 the young Amalaric was proclaimed king, and four years later, on Theodoric's death, he assumed full royal power in Spain and that part of Languedoc called Septimania, relinquishing Provence to his cousin Athalaric. He married Clotilda, daughter of Clovis; but his disputes with her, he being an Arian and she a Catholic, brought on him the penalty of a Frankish invasion, in which he lost his life in 531.
This article incorporates text from the public domain 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica.
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