The
Battle of the Catalaunian Plains (or
Fields), also called the
Battle of Châlons or the
Battle of Maurica, took place in AD 451 between a coalition led by the
Roman general
Flavius Aetius and the
Visigothic king
Theodoric I against the
Huns and their allies commanded by their leader
Attila. It was one of the last major military operations of the
Western Roman Empire, although
Germanic federates composed the majority of the allied Roman army. The battle was strategically inconclusive: the Romans stopped the Huns' attempt to establish vassals in
Roman Gaul, and installed
Merovech as king of the
Franks. However, the Huns successfully looted and pillaged much of Gaul and crippled the military capacity of the Romans and Visigoths. The Huns were later destroyed by a coalition of their
Germanic vassals at the
Battle of Nedao in 454.