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Liuvigild, Leuvigild, Leovigild, or Leovigildo (Spanish language and Portuguese), ( – 586) was a Visigoths king of Hispania and Septimania from 569 to 586. Known for his Codex Revisus or Code of Leovigild, a law allowing equal rights between the Visigothic and Hispania population, his kingdom covered modern Spain down to Toledo and Portugal. Liuvigild ranks among the greatest Visigothic kings of the Arianism period.
Liuvigild was married twice: first to Theodosia, who gave birth to two sons, Hermenegild and Reccared I, and after her death, to Athanagild's widow Goiswintha.
Almost every single year of his kingship, Liuvigild marched against the Byzantine Empire, the Suebi, the Basques, or domestic competitors. According to the chronicle of John of Biclaro, as co-king Liuvigild initiated the first of several campaigns to expand the territory of the kingdom of the Visigoths, which Peter Heather describes as a "list of striking successes". Liuvigild's first campaign began against the Suebi in 569, during which he very quickly subdued Zamora, Palencia, and Leon. Then in 570, he attacked the district of Bastania Malagnefla (the ancient Bastetania), where he defeated imperial forces. In 570, Liuvigild "laid waste the region of Bastetania and the city of Málaga, defeating their soldiers". The following year he captured Medina Sidonia, assisted "through the treachery of a certain Framidaneus". Then, around the time he became sole ruler with the death of his brother Liuva (which occurred in either 571 or 572), seized Córdoba from the Byzantine Empire. Though constantly at war with the Byzantines in southern Hispania, Liuvigild accepted the administration of the Byzantine Empire, adopted its pomp and ceremony, the title Flavius, the throne, crown, scepter, and purple mantle, and subsequently struck gold coins in his own name to commemorate the event.
Determined to exact revenge upon Liuvigild and reclaim their territories, the Suebi invaded the regions of Plasencia and Coria, Las Hurdes, Batuecas, and the territory of the Riccones. Whilst preparing to check the imminent advance of the Suebi in 573, Liuvigild received news that his brother Liuva had died, which left him ruler over the entirety of the Visigothic dominions. Liuvigild made efforts to secure a peaceful succession, a perennial Visigothic issue, by associating his two sons, Hermenegild and Reccared, with himself in the kingly office and placing certain regions under their regencies; namely, making them dukes over Toledo and Narbonne.
The Visigoths were still a military aristocracy and kings had to be formally ratified by the nobility. Visigoths and their Ibero-Roman subjects were still separated by religion and by distinct law codes. Liuvigild modified the old Code of Euric which governed the Goths and created his own Codex Revisus. He also repealed old Roman laws dating back to the late 4th century forbidding intermarriage between Visigoths and Ibero-Romans. Such marriages had once been considered a crime punishable by death. Through this action and others administrative moves, Liuvigild reassured his rule and when he had secured the capital, began a new campaign, during which he conquered the district of Sabaria, the province of Braganza, and Torre de Moncorvo along the Suebian frontier.
Gregory of Tours contended that Liuvigild exceeded his power when he divided the kingdom between his two sons, but it is feasible that he took this action to weaken the authority of the nobles from amid both the Visigoths and the Spanish-Romans. Whatever Liuvigild's original motivation was or whether this move to empower his children can be viewed as beyond his authority, the act stirred several insurrections— first among the Cantabri, then amid the people of Cordova and Asturia, and lastly in Toledo and Evora—at a time when the Suebi and Byzantines were planning attacks against Liuvigild. Undeterred by these manifold threats, he attended to the concerns within his empire and with his son Reccared's assistance, he succeeded in subduing the rebels who rose to oppose him. In doing so, he seized Ammaia, the capital of the Cantabri; he took the Asturian stronghold, Saldania (Saldana); he also successfully quelled insurgent activities in Toledo and Evora (Aebura Carpetana). Not given to mercy—in every rebellious region—he sealed his victories by exacting terrible punishments upon his erstwhile enemies. Sometime during this campaign in 576, Liuvigild's predominance led to the Suebian king Miro rapidly agreeing to a treaty which included paying tribute, if but for a short period.
In 577 Liuvigild marched into Orespeda, a region in southeastern Spain, and after suppressing an immediate revolt "of the common people" added this province to his kingdom. Upon the conclusion of these campaigns, Liuvigild celebrated his victories by founding a city in Celtiberia, which he named Recopolis for his son Reccared. In 582 Liuvigild then went on to capture Mérida, which had been under the political control of its popular bishop Masona since the early 570s. Over the course of his reign, Liuvigild had conquered most of the peninsula.
Hermenegild's revolt worried Liuvigild, as it raised concerns about his relations with the Merovingians; namely, since Ingund's brother, Childebert II—who had gained power following the death of his Merovingian father, Sigibert I—began taking an interest in the developments of his sister's realm. Attempting to counteract any possible Frankish support for the Hermengild's rebellion, Liuvigild pressed for a marriage between Reccared and Chilperic's daughter, Rigunth, which proved diplomatically useless upon Chilperic's death.
During this father-son feud, Hermengild presented himself as a victim as he tried to forge alliances in the name of Catholicism. Despite having Pope Gregory's tacit support, contemporary Catholic writers—including Isidore of Seville and Gregory of Tours—expressed little to no sympathy for Hermenegild's revolt against his father. When the Byzantines failed to send aid for the revolt, Liuvigild besieged and took Seville and in 584, banished his son to Valencia, where in 585, he was later murdered. Leander of Seville was also banished and later canonized as a saint. Hermenegild's wife Ingunthis was delivered to the Eastern Emperor Tiberius II Constantine and was last heard of in Africa. Pope Gregory held Liuvigild responsible for Hermengild's death and asserted that the latter died for his conviction in the Catholic faith.
According to Gregory of Tours, Liuvigild fell ill in 586 and on his deathbed repented, wept for seven days and "embraced the Catholic faith" before he "gave up the ghost." He was succeeded by his second son Reccared, who converted to Catholic Christianity in 589 and brought religious and political unity between the Visigoths and their subjects.
Later successors to Liuvigild included the likes of King Chindasuinth (642–653) and his son Recceswinth (653–672), both of whom reformed Visigothic laws and legal codes that essentially eliminated the distinction between Romans and Goths and which permitted intermarriage between the two peoples. Challenge to Visigothic rule came abruptly in the form of Muslim Berbers led by Umayyad commander Tariq, whose forces defeated the Visigothic King Roderic in 711 and by 725, the Visigothic kingdom in Hispania was fully overwhelmed by Muslim invaders.
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