Battle of Mons Lactarius

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Date	October 553
Location	Monte Lattaro, Campania, Italy
Result	Decisive Byzantine victory

Combatants

Commanders

Wars of Justinian I
Iberian War - Gothic War - Lazic War - Ad Decimum – Ticameron - Taginae – Mons Lactarius – Volturnus

The Battle of Mons Lactarius (also known as Battle of the Vesuvius) took place in 553 during the Gothic War waged on behalf of Justinian I against the Ostrogoths in Italy.

After the Battle of Taginae, in which the Ostrogoth king Totila was killed, the Byzantine general Narses captured Rome and besieged Cumae. Teia, the new Ostrogoth king, gathered the remnants of the Ostrogoth army and marched to relieve the siege, but in October of 553 Narses ambushed him at Mons Lactarius (modern Monte Lattaro) in Campania, near Mt. Vesuvius. The battle lasted two days, and Teia was killed in the fighting. The Ostrogoth power in Italy was eliminated, but Narses allowed the few survivors to return to their homes as subjects of the empire. The absence of any real authority in Italy immediately after the battle led to an invasion by the Franks, but they too were defeated and the peninsula was, for a short time, reintegrated into the empire.

The battle can be considered revenge for the Roman defeat at Adrianople (378), since at Mons Lactarius the imperial infantry annihilated the Ostrogoth cavalry.