Jordanes wrote that the Goths were arrayed, west to east, in two groups, the Visigoths, whose name does not mean "west Goths" (the west was ill omened), between the Danube and Dniester and the Ostrogoths, whose name does mean "east Goths", in the Ukraine. This account is not supported by any contemporary sources. The Visigoths ("Vesii" the valiant ones) may have been a fusion, much later, of three groups the entered the Empire separately, the Tervingi, the Greuthungi and survivors from the Gothic army led by Radagaisus into Italy in 405.

In 373-374 the Greuthungi (Ostrogoths) were overthrown by the Huns. Their allies, the Rosomoni, deserted them and Hermanric (Ermanaric) was defeated and killed himself. His successor, Vithimiris, was killed in battle. Hunimund succeeded but under the Hunnish king Balambar.

In 375-376 Athanaric was defeated on the Dniester. Alavius and Fritigern led the migration across the Danube into Moesia inferior authorised by a treaty with Valens.

Lupicinus and Maximus, the Roman agents in Moesia Inferior responsible for the settlement, robbed and abused the Goths despite a treaty with the Roman emperor Valens.

Alatheus and Saphrax, with the juvenile successor to the Ostrogothic crown, crossed the Danube without a treaty leaving a remnant in the Crimea. Roman exactions caused the Visigoths, led by Fritigern and joined by the Ostrogoths, to begin the plunder of the Balkans leading to the defeat and death of Valens at Adrianople (Erdine) in 378 CE.

At Adrianople, the "second Cannae", the heavily armoured Gothic cavalry rode down the Roman infantry.

Armoured, mounted aristocrats dominated the battlefields of Europe until their defeat at Crecy in 1346.