LEOVIGILD, King of the Visigoths. — Brother of King Athanagild and Liuva I, he was associated with the throne by the latter in 568, becoming sole sovereign upon Liuva’s death (573). From his first wife, Theodosia, he had Hermenegild (q.v.) and Reccared. When Hermenegild converted to Catholicism, Leovigild was incited by his second wife, Goswintha, to wage a long and bitter struggle against his son, who was slain in 585. At a Council convened in Toledo in 580, Leovigild attempted to draw the Catholics of his realm toward Arianism, but failing in this, he turned to persecuting them, exiling the leaders of the opposition, among them Leander of Seville, Fulgentius of Astigi, and John of Biclar.
During his reign, Leovigild achieved glorious victories against the Suebi, the Cantabri, and the Basques, and secured for his descendants the hereditary succession to the throne, which had hitherto been elective. To him is also owed the revision of the Euric Code, promulgated a century earlier by King Euric. Upon his death in 586, he is said to have entrusted his son Reccared, who succeeded him, to Bishop Leander, who had been recalled from exile.
LEPANTO. — L., in Greek Ναύπακτος, is a city and port in Greece, situated on the northern coast of the strait that divides the Gulf of Patras from that of Corinth. It became renowned in ecclesiastical history for the battle fought there on 7 October 1571 between the Christian and Turkish fleets.