Attila (/əˈtɪlə/,[3] /ˈætələ/;[4] fl.c. 406–453), frequently called Attila the Hun, was the ruler of the Huns from 434 until his death in March 453. He was also the leader of an empire consisting of Huns, Ostrogoths, Alans, and Bulgars, among others, in Central and Eastern Europe.
During his reign, he was one of the most feared enemies of the Western and Eastern Roman Empires. He crossed the Danube twice and plundered the Balkans, but was unable to take Constantinople. His unsuccessful campaign in Persia was followed in 441 by an invasion of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire, the success of which emboldened Attila to invade the West.[5] He also attempted to conquer Roman Gaul (modern France), crossing the Rhine in 451 and marching as far as Aurelianum (Orléans), before being stopped in the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains.
He subsequently invaded Italy, devastating the northern provinces, but was unable to take Rome. He planned for further campaigns against the Romans, but died in 453. After Attila's death, his close adviser, Ardaric of the Gepids, led a Germanic revolt against Hunnic rule, after which the Hunnic Empire quickly collapsed. Attila lived on as a character in Germanic heroic legend.[6][7]
Many scholars have argued that the name Attila derives from East Germanic origin; Attila is formed from the Gothic or Gepidic noun atta, "father", by means of the diminutive suffix -ila, meaning "little father", compare Wulfila from wulfs "wolf" and -ila, i.e. "little wolf".[8]: 386 [9]: 29 [10]: 46 The Gothic etymology was first proposed by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm in the early 19th century.[11]: 211 Maenchen-Helfen notes that this derivation of the name "offers neither phonetic nor semantic difficulties",[8]: 386 and Gerhard Doerfer notes that the name is simply correct Gothic.[9]: 29 Alexander Savelyev and Choongwon Jeong (2020) similarly state that Attila's name "must have been Gothic in origin."[12] The name has sometimes been interpreted as a Germanization of a name of Hunnic origin.[9]: 29–32
Other scholars have argued for a Turkic origin of the name. Omeljan Pritsak considered Ἀττίλα (Attíla) a composite title-name which derived from Turkic *es (great, old), and *til (sea, ocean), and the suffix /a/.[13]: 444 The stressed back syllabic til assimilated the front member es, so it became *as.[13]: 444 It is a nominative, in form of attíl- (< *etsíl < *es tíl) with the meaning "the oceanic, universal ruler".[13]: 444 J. J. Mikkola connected it with Turkic āt (name, fame).[11]: 216
As another Turkic possibility, H. Althof (1902) considered it was related to Turkish atli (horseman, cavalier), or Turkish at (horse) and dil (tongue).[11]: 216 Maenchen-Helfen argues that Pritsak's derivation is "ingenious but for many reasons unacceptable",[8]: 387 while dismissing Mikkola's as "too farfetched to be taken seriously".[8]: 390 M. Snædal similarly notes that none of these proposals has achieved wide acceptance.[11]: 215–216