Germania
Germania | |
---|---|
Today part of |
Germania (
The
From the 3rd century AD, Germanic people moving out of Magna Germania began encroaching upon and occupying parts of Roman Germania. This contributed to the
Etymology
"The name Germany, on the other hand, they say, is modern and newly introduced, from the fact that the tribes which first crossed the Rhine and drove out the Gauls, and are now called Tungrians, were then called Germans. Thus what was the name of a tribe, and not of a race, gradually prevailed, till all called themselves by this self-invented name of Germans, which the conquerors had first employed to inspire terror."[1][2]
— Tacitus
In
The main source on the origin of the names Germania and Germani is the book Germania (98 AD) by Tacitus.[2] Tacitus writes that the name Germania was "modern and newly introduced". According to Tacitus, the name Germani had once been applied only to the Tungri, west of the Rhine, but it became an "artificial name" (invento nomine) for supposedly-related peoples east of the Rhine.[1][2] Many modern scholars consider Tacitus's story to be plausible, but they are unsure whether the name was commonly used by Germani to refer to themselves.[4][5][6][2]
Geography
The boundaries of Germania are not clearly defined, particularly at its northern and eastern fringes.[7] Magna Germania stretched approximately from the Rhine in the west to beyond the Vistula river in the east, and from the Danube in the south and northwards along the North and Baltic seas, including Scandinavia.[8][9][10][11] Germania Superior encompassed parts of modern-day Switzerland, southwest Germany and eastern France, while Germania Inferior encompassed much of modern-day Belgium and Netherlands.[7]
In his Geography (AD 150), the Roman geographer Ptolemy provides descriptions of the geography of Germania.[12] Modern scholars have been able to localize many of the place names mentioned by Ptolemy, and associated them with place names of the present day.[13]
Germania was inhabited by a large number of peoples, and there was not much unity among them.
History
During the
"There are still to be seen in the groves of Germany the Roman standards which I hung up to our country's gods... [O]ne thing there is which Germans will never thoroughly excuse, their having seen between the Elbe and the Rhine the Roman rods, axes, and toga... If you prefer your fatherland, your ancestors, your ancient life to tyrants and to new colonies, follow as your leader Arminius to glory and to freedom..."[23]
— Arminius
In the late 1st century BC, the Roman emperor
Areas of Germania independent of Roman control were referred to as "Magna Germania".[12] Modern scholars sometimes refer to the Magna Germania as "Free Germania" (Latin: Germania Libera) or Germanic Barbaricum.[25] As parts of Roman social engineering efforts, large numbers of Germani, including Ubii and Sicambri, were settled within Roman Germania in order to prevent revolts by resident Gauls. Roman Germania became characterized by a mixed Celtic, Germanic and Roman population, which became progressively Romanized.[12][7]
By the mid 1st century AD, between eight and ten Roman legions were stationed in Roman Germania to protect the frontiers. From AD 69 to AD 70, Roman Germania was heavily affected by the Revolt of the Batavi.[12] Tacitus writes that the leader of the revolt, Gaius Julius Civilis, recruited a vast amount of warriors from his self-described "kinsmen" all over Germania, and hailed Arminius for having liberated Germania from slavery.[26][27][28] Civilis' rebels seized Colonia (modern-day Cologne), capital of Roman Germania and home of the Germanic Ubii, who according to Tacitus were considered traitors by other Germani for having "forsworn its native country".[28][29] After initially seeking to raze all of Colonia to the ground, the forces of Civilis declared the city returned "into the unity of the German nation and name" and "an open city for all Germans".[30][29] Although initially declaring the rebels and "other Germans" their "kinsmen by blood", the Ubii, a Germanic Tribe eventually assisted the Romans in recapturing the Colonia.[12][30]
In the late 1st century AD, under the leadership of the
In the late 1st and early 2nd century AD, the Romans reoccupied areas lying between the Rhine, Main, and Danube rivers. This area became known as the Agri Decumates.[7] Additional numbers of Germani were settled by the Romans within this area.[12] The Roman fortifications on the border with Magna Germania were known as the Limes Germanicus. The 3rd century AD saw the emergence of several powerful Germanic confederations in Magna Germania, such as the Alemanni and Franks.[12] The Crisis of the Third Century included raids on Roman Germania by Alemanni and Franks, and the area briefly became part of the Gallic Empire established by the usurper Postumus.[12] Around 280 AD, the Agri Decumates were evacuated by the Romans and occupied by Alemanni.[7]
Under
Archaeology
From the 1st to the 4th century AD, Magna Germania corresponds archaeologically to the
Legacy
The name Germania is attested in
See also
Citations and sources
Citations
- ^ a b Tacitus 1876a, II
- ^ a b c d Murdoch 2004, p. 55. "[T]he origins of the name “Germani” are uncertain. Our main source for this, as for so much about Germany at this period, is Tacitus, whose Germania, subtitled On the Origin and Geography of Germany (De origine et situ Germanorum) was completed toward the end of the first century. He suggests that the name is a modern invention. “It comes from the fact,” he tells us in the second chapter of the Germania, “that the tribes which first crossed the Rhine and drove out the Gauls, and are now called Tungrians, were then called Germans. Thus what was the name of a tribe, and not of a race, gradually prevailed, till all called themselves by this self-invented name of Germans, which the conquerors had first employed to inspire terror.” It is as plausible an explanation as any..."
- ^ James & Krmnicek 2020, pp. XI, XVII. "Augustus, Rome's first emperor, tried to conquer Germania ("land of the people(s) called Germani") but failed.... Germania means "lands where people called Germani live". The etymological origins of the word Germanus remain obscure. It might well, as Tacitus claimed (Germania 2), originally have been the name of one small group, which was picked up by the Greeks and Romans, perhaps following Gaulish usage, and applied to any other foreign neighbours considered similar in language and other aspects of culture."
- ^ a b Todd 2004, p. 9.
- ^ Wolfram 2005, p. 4.
- ^ James & Krmnicek 2020, p. XVII.
- ^ a b c d e f g James & Krmnicek 2020, p. XII.
- ^ Heather 2007, p. 49. "Germanic-speaking groups dominated most of central and northern Europe beyond Rome's riverine frontiers. The Germani, as the Romans called them, spread all the way from the Rhine in the west (which, before the Roman conquest, had marked an approximate boundary between Europe's Germanic and Celtic speakers) to beyond the River Vistula in the east, and from the Danube in the south to the North and Baltic Seas."
- ^ James & Krmnicek 2020, p. XII. "In recent decades, a vast amount of new information has been discovered and published about the peoples and cultures of the region, both inside the empire (in Germania Superior, Germania Inferior, and other nearby provinces) and beyond the imperial frontiers in Germania Magna ('Great Germany' or central European Barbaricum). This vast and (especially to the east and north) ill-defined and fluid region spanned what today comprises multiple modern countries from the Netherlands to Poland, and from Scandinavia to the Danube..."
- ^ Wolfram 1999, p. 466. "Germania, an area, roughly speaking, between the oceans in the north and the Danube in the south, the Rhine in the west and the Vistula in the east. This ancient Germania also included Scandinavia, which was considered to be an island in the Baltic Sea."
- ^ Davidson 1988, p. 5. "What the Romans knew as Germania was the area between the Rhine and the Danube, extending possibly as far as the Vistula, and including in north Denmark and the southern parts of Norway and Sweden."
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Scardigli 1998, pp. 245–257.
- ^ Kleineberg et al. 2012.
- ^ Heather 2007, p. 53.
- ^ Heather 2007, p. 53. "While the territory of ancient Germania was clearly dominated in a political sense by Germanic-speaking groups, it has emerged that the population of this vast territory was far from entirely Germanic... [Germanic] expansion did not annihilate the indigenous, non-Germanic population of the areas concerned, so it is important to perceive Germania as meaning Germanic-dominated Europe."
- JSTOR 40849016.
- ^ Wolfram 1999, p. 467. "The Romans borrowed the Germanic name from the conquered Gauls... Caesar did not discover the Germans..."
- ^ Wolfram 2005, p. 6. "Caesar advanced into Germania..."
- ^ Caesar 1869, 5. 55
- ^ Caesar 1869, 6. 32
- ^ Caesar 1869, 6. 24
- ^ Caesar 1869, 2. 3–4
- ^ Tacitus 1876b, 1. 59
- ^ Murdoch 2004, p. 57.
- ^ James & Krmnicek 2020, p. XIII.
- ^ Tacitus 1876c, 4. 14
- ^ Tacitus 1876c, 4. 17
- ^ a b Tacitus 1876c, 4. 28
- ^ a b Clay 2008, pp. 136–138.
- ^ a b Tacitus 1876c, 4. 63–65
- ^ a b Drinkwater 2012, p. 612.
- ^ James & Krmnicek 2020, p. XI.
- ^ James & Krmnicek 2020, pp. XVII–XIX.
- ^ Murdoch 2004, pp. 64–65.
- ^ James & Krmnicek 2020, p. XVI.
Ancient sources
- Caesar (1869). Commentaries on the Gallic War. Translated by McDevitte, William Alexander; Bohn, W. S.
- Ptolemy (1932). Geography. New York Public Library.
- Tacitus (1876a). Germania. Translated by Church, Alfred John; Brodribb, William Jackson.
- Tacitus (1876b). The Annals. Translated by Church, Alfred John; Brodribb, William Jackson.
- Tacitus (1876c). The Histories. Translated by Church, Alfred John; Brodribb, William Jackson.
Modern sources
- Clay, Cheryl Louise (2008). "Developing the 'Germani' in Roman Studies". .
- ISBN 0-8156-2441-7.
- ISBN 9780191735257. Retrieved January 26, 2020.
- ISBN 9780199978618.
- Kleineberg, Andreas; Lelgemann, Dieter; Knobloch, Eberhard; Marx, Christian, eds. (2012). Germania und die Insel Thule: Die Entschlüsselung von Ptolemaios' "Atlas der Oikumene" (in German) (2 ed.). ISBN 978-3534721795.
- Murdoch, Adrian (2004). "Germania Romana". In ISBN 157113199X.
- Scardigli, Barbara (1998). "I. Geschichte. B. Germania (Provinzname) - Germania Magna" [I. History. B. Germania (Provincial Name) - Germania Magna]. In ISBN 3110158329.
- ISBN 978-0199665730.
- ISBN 1-4051-1714-1.
- ISBN 0-674-51173-5.
- ISBN 9780520244900.
Further reading
- ISBN 3110158329.
- Howatson, M. C., ed. (2011). "Germany". ISBN 9780191739422. Retrieved January 26, 2020.
- ISBN 1-4051-1714-1.
External links
- Germania at UNRV.com