In 376 BC, Goths from the Black Sea area came pouring into the Roman Empire: they had been driven out by a horde of mounted archers: this is the first glimpse we have in the west of the dreaded Huns.
We know little of their history prior to their eruption on the European scene. It has been suggested that they were the descendants of the Xiongnu who had terrorized the east several hundred years earlier.
Their presence in Central Asia and the movements that brought them to Europe can be traced archaeologically from a number of clues. The Huns practised skull deformation, binding the heads of their new-born babies to make them artificially elongated: such distinctive skulls have been found in sites right across the area, including western Europe.
The bronze cauldrons used by the Huns, and golden bows, employed as badges of office by Hun nobles, have been discovered over the same wide area.
The Huns were mounted archers par excellence, using the extremely efficient composite reflex bow with which they shot 'showers of arrows' according to their unfortunate adversaries.
As warriors they seem to have carried all before them, experiencing declining success only when they ventured outside the terrain suited to their horse-dependent mode of warfare.
However, it was only under Attila (r 434-453) that they presented a unified threat; at other times, they seem to have operated as smaller tribal bands, raiding and looting, joining other barbarian confederacies or being employed as Roman mercenaries.
