August 28, AD 430

Augustine of Hippo

Augustine dies of fever during the Vandal siege of Hippo Regius

With a Vandal army outside the walls, Augustine had short penitential psalms copied onto sheets and hung where he could read them from his bed.

28 August 430, inside a besieged city

Augustine died at Hippo Regius on 28 August 430 while Gaiseric's Vandals besieged the city. The calendar date comes from Prosper's Chronicle.

Possidius, a fellow bishop who had taken refuge in Hippo and was present at the end, says the fever set in during the third month of the siege and kept Augustine confined to bed.

Ten days behind a closed door

Possidius says the sheets of penitential psalms were hung within reading distance of the bed; Augustine read them and wept.

For roughly his final ten days he admitted only physicians and the attendants bringing food, leaving himself uninterrupted for prayer. Possidius and others stood beside him praying when he died.

The siege outlasted him

A funeral service followed and he was buried while the blockade continued. Possidius says it ultimately lasted almost fourteen months, and Hippo was abandoned and burned only later.

Augustine left no personal will. He had repeatedly directed that Hippo's church library and its books be preserved.

He was 75 years and 9 months old by modern reckoning; ancient sources describe the same span as his seventy-sixth year.

Sources

Researched 23 Aug 2026 5 sources 2 audit passes

How this was checked

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What the sources leave uncertain

Possidius supplies the eyewitness account of the illness and death but not the calendar date; 28 August comes from Prosper's Chronicle.
Born on 13 November 354, Augustine was 75 by modern completed-year reckoning. Possidius's “76 years” means that he was in his seventy-sixth year and may also reflect inclusive ancient counting.
Possidius was an intimate admirer writing a saint's life. His observations of the siege, fever, witnesses, burial, and books are direct evidence, while his reported miracle during the illness is a religious claim rather than independently verifiable history.