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ATHANAGILD. ports on the southeastern coast of the peninsula. Agila was defeated at Seville, and murdered by his followers, and Athanagild succeeded to the throne. He built the churches of Saint Justa and Saint Rufina at Toledo.

ATHAN'ARIC (?-A.D. 381). A king of the Western Goths (Visigoths), whose settlements lay on the north bank of the lower Danube. Having taken advantage of the weakness of the Roman Empire when the imperial armies were engaged in suppressing the rebellion of Procopius, war was declared against him by the Emperor Valens. Athanaric acted strictly on the defensive during two campaigns, in which the Romans gained no advantage over him; but in the third year of the war (A.D. 369), he hazarded a general battle, and was defeated, whereupon he sued for peace, and, with that object, had a conference with Valens in a boat on the Danube. Peace was concluded, and Athanaric had his attention occupied in settling dissensions arising out of the Arian controversy, which then agitated his people, when the first advance of the Huns on Europe alarmed the Gothic nation. Athanaric attempted to secure the eastern borders of his kingdom; but the Huns forced the passages of the Dnieper, defeated the Goths, and advanced in great force into the plains of Dacia. When, in 375, the Western Goths were received by the Romans as allies, and had settlements granted them on the south of the Danube, Athanaric, with a part of his people, refused to accompany them, removing to the west, and fortifying himself against the new enemy. In 380, however, he was obliged to retire, when he accepted the hospitality of the Empire, and removed to Constantinople, where he met with a cordial and honorable reception by the Emperor Theodosius. In 381 died Fritigern, King of the Goths that had settled to the south of the Danube, and Athanaric was thereupon made king of the whole Western Gothic nation. He concluded a treaty of peace with the Empire, and died at Constantinople before the close of the year. Consult: Hodgkin, Italy and Her Invaders, Vol. I. (Oxford, 1880).

ATHANASIA, ath'a-na'zhi-a. (c. 810). She was born on the island of Ægina. After her second husband had taken monastic orders, she converted her house into a monastery, over which she presided as abbess. She is usually represented with a star upon her breast and a spinning-wheel. August 14th is dedicated to her by the Church.

ATHANASIAN (fith'a-na'zhan) CREED, Often called the Quicunque, from its first Latin word. The longest of the three so-called ecumenical creeds, and the latest in time of composition. (See and .) It was long supposed that the Athanasian Creed was the work of the saint whose name it bears. Mediæval legend said that Athanasius wrote it while in exile in Rome, during the episcopate of Julius I. (337-352), but since the Seventeenth Century this theory has been shown to be untenable. Among the arguments against it are these: The creed was written in Latin, whereas Athanasius spoke and wrote Greek; it is nowhere mentioned by Athanasius, or by any of the other Greek fathers of the century after his death: it omits certain forms of statement which Athanasius was specially interested in maintaining, and includes others which were not formulated until a later time; and it appears first in the West, and never received the sanction of the Eastern Church at all. On the other hand, a study of the contents of this so-called creed, and a careful comparison of other documents, make it appear probable that what we have is in fact not a creed at all, but rather an explication, or setting forth, first, of the Catholic doctrine of the Trinity, and, secondly, of the person and work of Christ. The creed thus falls into two main divisions, the former clearly depending upon the teaching of Saint Augustine, the latter upon the Christology of Chalcedon (q.v.). It may have been, wholly or in part, a sermon on the creed, such discourses being very common at that age of the Church. And indeed Hincmar of Rheims (Ninth Century), expressly calls this creed sermonem Athanasii de fide. Or it may have been regarded as a sort of hymn or chant, to be used in public worship, like that other great Christian piece, the Te Deum. We know- that in the Middle Ages the Quicunque was actually recited at Prime by the monks in the monasteries of Southern Gaul. This liturgical use of our symbol can be traced as far back as the Carolingian period, and the formula itself is doubtless still older. It is apparently referred to in the acts of the Synod of Autun (c. 670 A.D.), and most modern scholars are inclined to place its composition, or compilation, in the Sixth Century.

Striking parallels, amounting sometimes to verbal identity, are found to the Athanasian Creed in a sermon falsely attributed to Augustine, but really perhaps by Cæsarius of Arles (ps. Augustine, Sermo 244), in the Commonitory of Vincent of Lerins (A.D. 434), and in Augustine's treatises on The Trinity and Christian Doctrine, which are still older. At least one of the characteristic phrases of this creed was current in the West early in the Third Century (Tertullian: adv. Prax. 13, "The Father is God, and the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God, and each is God"). It would appear, therefore, that we have to do, not with the work of any single writer, but with a document which was produced gradually, perhaps put together from various sources, but worked into a unity under Augustinian influence, and reaching its present form by the Sixth Century, probably in Southern Gaul.

At the beginning of the Athanasian Creed, and also at the end of each of its two divisions, occur damnatory clauses, pronouncing eternal doom upon all who do not accept the Catholic faith as here set forth. So far as doctrine is concerned, the creed agrees with the theology of Western Christendom, including Protestantism. But objection has often been made, by some critics, to the way in which the faith is here expressed, especially to its rigid form, its highly artificial refinements, its mathematical precision, the minute detail arising from its great length, and the damnatory clauses. Most Protestant churches do not make use of this creed, although it is retained in the English Book of Common Prayer, and is appointed to be read in that Church on thirteen special days of the year. The American Episcopal Church has dropped it entirely.

For the text of the Athanasian Creed, consult the English Prayer Book, and Philip Schaff, Creeds of Christendom, Vols. I. and II. (New