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574-578] continually endeavouring to suppress all possible rivals, and to make the succession to the throne hereditary or at any rate dynastic. Gregory of Tours states that the kings were in the habit of killing all the males who were in a position to compete with them for the crown; and the frequent confiscation of the property of the nobles to which the laws of the period refer, shews clearly the means to which the kings had recourse in the struggle. Whether Leovigild exceeded his power by dividing the kingdom between his two sons (and this is the view taken by Gregory of Tours); or whether he tried in general to lessen the authority of the nobles — and perhaps not only that of the Visigothic nobility, but also of the Spanish-Romans — the result was that the nobles stirred up several insurrections; first amongst the Cantabri, secondly amongst the people of Cordova and the Asturians, and thirdly, in Toledo and Evora, at a time when the Sueves and Byzantines were planning attacks. Leovigild, undismayed by these manifold dangers, attended to everything and, by dint of good luck, with the help of Recared, he succeeded in subduing the rebels. He took Ammaia (Amaya), the capital of the Cantabri; he obtained possession of Saldania (Saldaña), the stronghold of the Asturians; he quelled the insurgents in Toledo and Evora (Aebura Carpetana) and in every case he sealed his victories with terrible punishments (574).

When he had suppressed these preliminary internal rebellions Leovigild proceeded to conquer various independent territories in the provinces of Galicia and Andalusia. The former consisted of that mountainous district known as Aregenses, situated in what is now the province of Orense, and of which a certain Aspidius was king. The Andalusians possessed the whole of the tract of country round the Orospeda mountains, from the hill of Molaton in the east of the present province of Albacete, to the Sierra Nevada, passing through the provinces of Murcia, Almeria, and Granada, that is to say, the lands of the Deiittani, Bastetani, and Oretani. In both parts of the country Leovigild was successful, but his victories, and especially those in the Orospeda mountains, which bordered on the Byzantine dominion, naturally excited the jealousy of the imperial governors. In order to check the progress of Leovigild, now threatening them at such close quarters, they stirred up fresh strife in the interior of the kingdom, instigating rebellions in the province of Narbonne, on the coasts of Catalonia and Valencia, and in the central region of the Ebro. Leovigild, assisted by his son Recared, also succeeded in suppressing these insurrections; he made triumphant entries into Narbonne, Saragossa, Loja, Rosas, Tarragona, and Valencia, and punished the rebels with the utmost severity. These campaigns, and the preceding ones in Galicia and Andalusia, lasted from 575 to 578. A notable incident in them — which, although it had no connexion with the action of Leovigild, yet to some extent favoured his design — was the attack made by the Byzantine general Romanus, son