those appointed to the work--a dreadful pay for their
labor; and thus sudden death was the lot of those who
buried him as well as of him who was buried.

[Sidenote: DISSOLUTION OF THE KINGDOM OF THE HUNS 454]

[Sidenote: Battle of Nedao 454]

L After they had fulfilled these rites, a contest for 259
the highest place arose among Attila's successors,--for the
minds of young men are wont to be inflamed by ambition
for power,--and in their rash eagerness to rule they all
alike destroyed his empire. Thus kingdoms are often
weighed down by a superfluity rather than by a lack of
successors. For the sons of Attila, who through the
license of his lust formed almost a people of themselves,
were clamoring that the nations should be divided among
them equally and that warlike kings with their peoples
should be apportioned to them by lot like a family estate.
When Ardaric, king of the Gepidae, learned this, he 260
became enraged because so many nations were being
treated like slaves of the basest condition, and was the
first to rise against the sons of Attila. Good fortune
attended him, and he effaced the disgrace of servitude that
rested upon him. For by his revolt he freed not only his
own tribe, but all the others who were equally oppressed;
since all readily strive for that which is sought for the
general advantage. They took up arms against the destruction
that menaced all and joined battle with the
Huns in Pannonia, near a river called Nedao. There an 261