September 13, 533 · North Africa (near Carthage) Theater

Landing in Africa with only 15,000 men, Belisarius marched on Carthage and met the Vandal army at the tenth milestone from the city. Gelimer's ambush went awry through poor coordination and the death of his brother in the fighting; when Gelimer paused to mourn instead of pressing his advantage, Belisarius rallied and routed the disorganised Vandals.

December 15, 533 · North Africa (west of Carthage) Theater

Gelimer, reinforced by his brother Tzazon's army returned from Sardinia, made a final stand at Tricamarum. Belisarius's cavalry charged the Vandal centre in successive waves; Tzazon was killed, the Vandal line broke, and Gelimer fled. He surrendered months later after a siege in the mountains, and was paraded in Belisarius's triumph at Constantinople.

November 536 · Campania, Italy Theater

Having crossed from Africa to Sicily and up into Italy, Belisarius besieged the walled city of Naples. When assaults failed, his men discovered a disused aqueduct and infiltrated a party through it to open the city from within by night. The sack that followed was brutal, a warning to other Italian cities.

537 – 538 · Rome, Italy Theater

Belisarius occupied Rome, and King Vitiges came south with a huge Gothic army to retake it, besieging the small Byzantine garrison for over a year. The Goths cut the aqueducts — silencing the great baths forever — and stormed the walls repeatedly, but Belisarius's sallies, his archers, and the arrival of reinforcements wore them down until Vitiges withdrew.

May 540 · Ravenna, Italy Theater

Belisarius besieged the impregnable marsh-girt Gothic capital of Ravenna. With the Goths desperate, they secretly offered to make Belisarius himself emperor of the West; he feigned acceptance, entered the city, and then seized it in Justinian's name, taking King Vitiges and the royal treasure prisoner without a sack.

December 546 · Rome and central Italy Theater

The able and charismatic Totila rallied the Goths and swept back across Italy, retaking city after city from the neglected, unpaid Byzantine garrisons. In 546 he starved Rome into surrender and, in fury, drove out its population and threw down stretches of its walls — the city was left all but deserted. Belisarius, sent back with pitifully few men, could only claw the ruin back briefly.

July 552 · Apennines, Umbria, Italy Theater

The aged eunuch Narses arrived with a large, well-paid army and forced a decisive battle in the Apennines. He anchored his line with dismounted heavy infantry and massed archers on the wings; Totila's headlong cavalry charges were shot to pieces in a killing pocket, and the Gothic army was annihilated. Totila was mortally wounded in the rout.

October 553 · Near Vesuvius, Campania, Italy Theater

The last Gothic king, Teias, made a final stand with the remnant of his people on the slopes of Mons Lactarius near Vesuvius. Blockaded and starving, the Goths fought a desperate two-day battle; Teias was killed sword in hand, and the survivors were allowed to depart Italy in peace.

552 – 555 · Southern Spain Theater

Exploiting a Visigothic civil war, Justinian sent a small expedition that seized a strip of the southern Spanish coast around Cartagena and Málaga, creating the province of Spania. It was the furthest western reach of the reconquest.

554 · Casilinum, Campania, Italy Theater

A huge invading host of Franks and Alemanni, drawn into Italy by the chaos of the Gothic War, was confronted by Narses on the Volturnus river. Narses again anchored his centre and enveloped the deep barbarian wedge with his cavalry and horse-archers, all but annihilating the invaders and killing their leader Butilinus.