VALENTINIAN III (Flavius Valentinianus Augustus), Western Roman Emperor. - Son of Flavius Constantius and of Galla Placidia, sister of the emperor Honorius, b. in 419, d. at Rome on 16 March 545.
On the death of his uncle Honorius (423), the Byzantine court, where Placidia had taken refuge with her son, sent V. and his mother to Italy with an army in order to eliminate the usurper John; John was defeated and V. was able to be crowned at Rome (425). He fixed his residence at Ravenna and, given his tender age, the effective government was in the hands of his mother. Placidia knew how to give great impetus to art by adorning the city with splendid monuments, and she availed herself of the strong and brilliant work of the general Aetius to hold in check the barbarians who were pressing upon Gaul and Spain. In 429 the Vandals landed in Africa, and, despite the agreement of 435, a few years later (439) they were masters of those regions and were threatening Italy itself. In 451 Attila invaded Gaul but was defeated by Aetius at the Catalaunian Fields near Châlons; he came into Italy the following year and V. took refuge at Rome, whence he sent the barbarian an embassy of which Pope St. Leo was a member: Attila, who had already occupied and destroyed several cities, unexpectedly withdrew. At Rome meanwhile V., left the sole arbiter of the government after the death of his mother (450), showed himself libertine and inept, making enemies of everyone and especially of the nobles, whom he offended in their honor. A conspiracy led by Petronius Maximus, also to avenge the death of Aetius (Sept. 454), eliminated him while he was on the Via Labicana.
The religious policy of V. was directed toward repressing paganism ever more, protecting the Catholic faith and combating heretics. In 451 he forbade, under penalty of death and confiscation of property, that temples already closed be reopened or that sacrifices be made (Cod. Iustin., I, 11, 7). He wrote together with his mother and his wife to Theodosius II so that proceedings might be taken against Eutyches (PL 54, 858 ff.), and in 452 he decreed that the memory of the patriarch Flavian be rehabilitated (Cod. Iustin., I, 3, 23); in 451 he confirmed all the privileges granted to the Catholic Church and abrogated contrary decrees (ibid., I, 2, 12). He published decrees against heretics and especially against the Nestorians in 428 and in 435 (ibid., I, 1, 3; I, 5, 6); in 445 he issued a constitution against the Manichaeans, by which they were declared enemies of the State, it was ordered that they be driven from the cities, they were forbidden to accede to civil and military offices and were deprived of every civil right (PL 54, 622-24).
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Agostino Amore