Classification of ancient Germanic tribes

The Roman writer Pliny the Elder (23-79 A.D.) wrote about the Teutons in his great work Natural History. He gave a classification of Germanic tribes.

1. The Vindili (including the Goths and the Burgundians) were the tribes who lived in the eastern part.

2. The Ingaevones – the north-western part (the Angles, the Saxons, the Jutes)

3. The Iscaevones (Istaevoneas ) -the western part on the Rhine (the Franks)

4. The Hermiones - the southern part of Europe.

5. The Peucini and Bastarnae who lived near Rumania

6. The Hilleviones in Scandinavia – northen part of the territory.

The tribes of the fifth group can be joined with the first group/

This classification still coincides with the modern point of view on the classification of ancient Germanic languages and is correlated with modern Germanic languages. The physical features of each tribe were very similar to each other. Tacitus described the Germans as blond-haired, blue-eyed people with large frames. Other accounts tell of reddish-blond-haired figures that were well built and long skulled. Their facial features are preserved on Roman monuments.

Although the earliest mention of the Germans is by a Greek navigator who saw them in Norway and Jutland in the 4^th cent. B.C., their real appearance in history began with their contact (1^st cent. B.C.) with the Romans. The Roman general, statesman and writer Julius Caesar (100 – 44 B.C.) in his Commentaries on the War in Gaul gives several chapters to the Germans, whom he combated and dealt with on the Rhine. Apart from describing their barbarity and warlikeness, Caesar Commentaries tell little. It also follows from Caesar’s account that the Teutons were nomads in his time.

Вопрос 5

In the 1st century A.D. Germanic languages were only spoken in Germany and in territories adjacent to it and also in Scandinavia. It is considered that they lived in the territory between the rivers Elbe and Odra, on the peninsula Jutland and in the Southern Sweden. At that time old Germanic tribes were passing through the stage of development which is marked by the term “barbarism”. From archaeology it is clear that the Germans had little ethnic solidarity; by the 7th cent. B.C. they had begun a division into many peoples. They did not call themselves Germans; the origin of the name is uncertain. Their rise to significance (4th cent. B.C.) in the history of Europe began roughly with the general break-up of Celtic culture in central Europe. From these areas they spread out in great migrations southward, south-eastward, and westward. Geography made it attractive to the Romans as a potential province to add to the already powerful Roman Empire.

Вопрос 6

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