The Battle of Pollentia was fought on 6 April 402 (Easter) between the Romans under Stilicho and the Visigoths under Alaric I, during the first Gothic invasion of Italy (401–403). The Romans were victorious, and forced Alaric to retreat, though he rallied to fight again in the next year in the Battle of Verona, where he was again defeated. After this, Alaric retreated from Italy, leaving the province in peace until his second invasion in 409, after Stilicho's death. Background Theodosius I, the last emperor of both the eastern and western halves of the Roman Empire, died in 395, leaving his sons Arcadius and Honorius emperors of the East and West, respectively. However, the weakness of character of the two brothers, and their young age upon their accession to the throne, made it possible for ambitious and sometimes unscrupulous ministers to assume the effective rule of the Empire. In the west, the able Magister Militum, Stilicho, assumed the administration. In spite of his supposed Vandal extraction, Stilicho had earned Theodosius' favor, and consequently was married by him to his niece, Serena, thus uniting him to the imperial family. At his death, Theodosius nominated Stilicho to govern the Empire during the minority of his sons. Rufinus who had ascended to the prefecture of the East, usurped control of the Eastern Empire in the name of Arcadius, and demonstrated open hostility to Honorius, resulting in permanent division between the courts of Theodosius' sons in the east and west. Zosimus, the Byzantine historian of the 5th century, describes the state of the Empire after the death of Theodosius: "The empire now devolved upon Arcadius and Honorius, who, although apparently the rulers, were so in name only: complete control was exercised by Rufinus in the east and Stilicho in the west." Even as Honorius grew older (he was ten at his ascension and seventeen at the Battle of Pollentia) "[he] was a feeble nonentity." Stilicho, intending to rid the Empire of Rufinus and assume sole control over the whole of Theodosius' inheritance, in accordance with the latter's express orders, dispatched Gainas, a Gothic general, to destroy the haughty prefect. Gainas effected the commission, though he was reduced to flagrant treachery. Next, however, he turned on his patron Stilicho, joining with the Eunuch Eutropius to supplant the influence of the Vandal minister over Arcadius; later, they would declare Stilicho a public enemy. The eastern and