阴火牛年 (female Fire-
Ox) 504 or 123 or −649 — to — 阳土虎年 (male Earth-
Tiger) 505 or 124 or −648
Year 378 (CCCLXXVIII) was a
common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the
Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Valens and Augustus (or, less frequently, year 1131 Ab urbe condita). The denomination 378 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the
Anno Dominicalendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.
Gothic War: Valens sends Sebastian with a body of picked troops (2,000 men) to Thrace and renews the
guerrilla war against the
Goths. He chases down small groups of Gothic raiders around
Adrianople.
July –
Frigeridus, Roman general, fortifies the Succi (
Ihtiman) Pass to prevent the "barbarians" from breaking out to the north-west (
Pannonia).
Gratian sets out from
Lauriacum (
Austria) with a body of light armed troops. His force is small enough to travel by boat down the
Danube. He halts for four days at
Sirmium (
Serbia) suffering from
fever.
August – Gratian continues down the Danube to the "Camp of Mars" (frontier
fortress near modern
Niš), where he loses several men in an
ambush by a band of
Alans.
Fritigern strikes south from Cabyle, following the
Tundzha River towards Adrianople, and tries to get behind the
supply lines to Constantinople.
Roman
reconnaissance detects the Goths. Valens, already west of Adrianople, turns back and establishes a fortified camp outside the city.
The Goths, with their
wagons and families vulnerable to attack, withdraw back to the north. Roman scouts fail to detect the
Greuthungi cavalry
foraging further up the Tundzha valley.
Fritigern sends a Christian
priest to the Roman camp with an offer of terms and a letter for Valens. The peace overtures are rejected.
Valens leads an elite Roman army to Thrace to confront revolts, but is defeated in the
Battle of Adrianople.[1]
The Goths attack Adrianople; they attempt to scale the
city walls with ladders but are repelled by the defenders, who drop lumps of
masonry.
The Goths, supported by the
Huns, move on to Constantinople. Their progress is checked by the
Saracens, recruited from
Arab tribes who control the eastern fringes of the empire.
October – The Greuthungi, faced with food shortages, split off and move west into Pannonia. Followed by their families, they raid villages and farmland.