(Jody Gray): It appears that our Piper Family Ancestors in England and Continental Europe (present-day France and Germany) and Russia were of the Germanic Tribes; originating in the southern regions of Scandinavia, along with the Schleswig-Holstein area and that area of what is now Hamburg, Germany. Climate change between 850 BCE to 760 BCE in Scandinavia and “later a more rapid one around 650 BCE might have triggered migrations to the coast of Eastern Germany… as early as 750 BCE the proto-Germanic population was becoming uniform in its culture. As this population grew, it migrated south-west, into coastal floodplains due to the exhaustion of the soil in its original settlements. After the fall of the Roman Empire, the various Germanic tribal cultures began their transformation into the larger nations of later history, English, Norse and German, and in the case of Burgundy, Lombardy and Normandy blending into a Romano-Germanic culture (our Piper Family ancestors took part in every migration and every historical event).
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| Nordic Bronze Age culture, 1200 BCE. coastal Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Schleswig-Holstein |
... generally speaking, western Germanic people while still migratory, were more geographically settled, whereas the eastern Germanics remained transitory for a longer period. Three settlement patterns and solutions come to the fore: 1st, is the establishment of an agricultural base in a region which allowed them to support larger populations; 2nd, periodically cleared forests to extend the range of their pasturage; 3rd (and most frequent), they emigrated to other areas as they exhausted the immediately available resources. War and conquest followed as the Germanic people migrated bringing them into direct conflict with the Celts who were forced to either Germanize or migrate elsewhere… West Germanic people eventually settled in central Europe and became more accustomed to agriculture… The eastern Germanic people continued their migratory habits. Roman writers characteristically organized and classified people… may have been deliberate (as a way to recognize) the tribal distinctions of the various Germanic people so as to pick out known leaders and exploit these differences to their benefit. For the most part however, these early Germanic people shared a basic culture, operated similarly from an economic perspective, and were not nearly as differentiated as the Romans implied. In fact, the Germanic tribes are hard to distinguish from the Celts on many accounts simply based on archaeological records.
Culture (according to Julius Caesar): “[The Germani] have neither Druids to preside over sacred offices, nor do they pay great regard to sacrifices. They rank in the number of the god those alone whom they behold, and by whose instrumentality they are obviously benefited, namely, the sun, fire, and the moon; they have not heard of the other deities even by report. Their whole life is occupied in hunting and in the pursuits of the military art; from childhood they devote themselves to fatigue and hardships. Those who have remained chaste for the longest time, received the greatest commendation among their people; they think that by this growth is promoted, by this the physical powers are increased and the sinews are strengthened. And to have had knowledge of a woman before the twentieth year they reckon among the most disgraceful acts; of which matter there is no concealment, because they bathe promiscuously in the rivers and [only] use skins or small cloaks of deer’s hides, a large portion of the body being in consequence naked.
They do not pay much attention to agriculture, and a large portion of their food consists in milk, cheese, and flesh; nor has anyone a fixed quantity of land or his own individual limits; but the magistrates and the leading men each year apportion to the tribes and families, who have united together, as much land as, and in the place in which, they think proper, and the year after compel them to remove elsewhere. For this enactment they advance many reasons-lest seduced by long-continued custom, they may exchange their ardor in the waging of war for agriculture; lest they may be anxious to acquire extensive estates, and the more powerful drive the weaker from their possessions; lest they construct their houses with too great a desire to avoid cold and heat; lest the desire of wealth spring up, from which cause divisions and discords arise; and that they may keep the common people in a contented state of mind, when each sees his own means placed on an equality with [those of] the most powerful.”
Tacitus described the Germanic people as ethnically uniform or “unmixed” with a “distinct character” and he even generalized them by claiming that “a family likeness pervades the whole.” He also reported that their eyes were “stern and blue” and they had “ruddy hair” with “large bodies” that rendered them capable of “powerful exertions.” This image portrayed them as a fearsome people deserving Rome’s attention. Caesar was wary of these “barbaric” people of Germania and invoked the threat of expansions such as that by Ariovistus’ Suebi as justification for his brutal campaigns to annex Gaul to Rome in 58-51 BCE. Both Ariovistus and another notable Germanic warrior king named Maroboduus attempted to rule heir warrior-based empires in autocratic fashion but were killed by the treachery of other warrior-nobles who strove for their own glory.
...Roman expansion along the Rhine and Danube… population groups from this area had a complex relationship with Rome; sometimes the peoples of Germania were at war with Rome, but at times they established trade relations, symbiotic military alliances, and cultural exchanges with one another. Nevertheless, the Romans made concerted efforts to divide the Germanic tribes… encouraging inter-tribal rivalry so as to diminish the threat of an otherwise formidable enemy. Over the following centuries, the Romans sometimes intervened, but often took advantage as their neighbors slaughtered one another using Roman-influenced techniques of war…
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| Roman Empire and Greater (Magna) Germania, early 2nd Century |
By the middle to late 2nd Century AD, migrating Germanic tribes pushed their way to the Roman frontier along the Danube corridor, which resulted in conflicts known as the Marcomannic Wars; these conflicts ended in approximately 180 AD. Not long thereafter, larger confederations of Germanic people appeared, groups led by tribal leaders acting as would-be kings. The first of these conglomerations mentioned in the historical sources were the Alamanni who appear in Roman texts sometime in the 3rd century AD. This change indicated that the tribalism of the Germanic people was being abandoned for consolidated rule. (Rome adapted itself)...
...Barbarians (Germanics) composed the mobile army of emperor Constantine (306-337 AD) with many of them, particularly the more organized ones like the Franks and Alamanni, reaching levels of high command… Warriors and leaders among the Germanic peoples had an advantage over their Roman counterparts as they knew and could dexterously traverse both worlds, whereas the Romans despised “barbarian” culture and customs and were unable to secure trust amid the Germanic soldiers on their payrolls. In this way, the ethnic and regional ties within the evolving bureaucratic Roman-Germanic world began to favor the ‘barbarians’.
Roman Britannia was contemporaneously under constant threat during the 3rd and 4th centuries AD by northern Picts as well as the Germanic Saxons who sailed from north of Gaul to the eastern coast of the British Isles. Late in 367 AD, the Roman garrisons in Britannia collapsed as the Germanic barbarians poured into the region from all directions… Germanic invaders had burned down standing settlements, ravaged cities on the isles, interrupted trade and annihilated entire Roman garrisons. By the middle of the 5th century, the Picts, Scots and Anglo-Saxons began to dominate the once Roman Britannia.
Battle of Adrianople, 8/9/378 (part of the Gothic War 376-382), is often considered the start of the process which led to the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century… Between the 2nd and 4th centuries the Goths slowly filtered deeper into the south and eastwards, making their way to what is now Kiev in Ukraine… The arrival of the nomadic Huns along the Black Sea corridor in 375 AD further accelerated the Goth’s exodus across the Roman border.
By the 5th century AD… numerous Germanic peoples, under pressure from population growth and invading Asian groups, began migrating in mass in far and diverse directions, taking them to Great Britain and far south through present day Continental Europe to the Mediterranean and northern Africa. Over time, this wandering meant intrusions into other tribal territories, and the ensuing wars for land escalated with the dwindling amount of unoccupied territory. Roaming tribes of Germanic people then began staking out permanent homes as a means of protection… resulted in fixed settlements from which many, under a powerful leader, expanded outwards… (Jody Gray): I’m focusing on our ancestral Franks) Franks (among other Germanic tribes), conquered much of Gaul… In Denmark the Jutes merged with the Danes, in Sweden the Geats and Gutes merged with the Swedes. In England, the Angles merged with the Saxons and other groups (notably the Jutes), as well as absorbing some natives, to form the Anglo-Saxons (later known as the English). Essentially - Roman civilization was overrun by these variants of Germanic peoples during the 5th century.
...It has been confirmed that the Frisian graves had been used without interruption between the 4th and 9th centuries and that inhabited areas show continuity with the Roman period... and the 5th century. Also, people continued to live in the same three-aisle farmhouse, while to the east completely new types of buildings arose. More to the south in Belgium, archaeological evidence from this period indicates immigration from the north.
Role in the Fall of Rome. Historians and archaeologists have since the 1950s shifted their interpretations in such a way that the Germanic peoples are no longer seen as invading a decaying empire but as being co-opted into helping defend territory the central government could no longer adequately administer. Germanic tribes nonetheless fought against Roman dominance when necessary… At about the same time Alaric was sacking the Empire’s capital (410 AD), there was a Roman exodus from the British Isles, a departure which provided the Germanic Angles and Saxons the opportunity to occupy and control the eastern coastlands of Britain, the southern regions of Sussex, and move into the valley of the Thames. While Germanic tribes overran the once western Roman provinces, they also continued to strive for regional ascendancy closer to Rome’s center; meanwhile the threat along the periphery from the Huns created additional difficulties for the Empire.
The Empire recruited entire tribal groups under their native leaders as military officers. Historian Evangelos Chrysos relates the recruitment of the “barbarians” - “offered them experience of how the imperial army was organized, how the government arranged the military and functional logistics of their involvement as soldiers or officers and how it administered their practical life, how the professional expertise and the social values of the individual soldier were cultivated in the camp and on the battlefield, how the ideas about the state and its objectives were to be implemented by men in uniform, how the Empire was composed and how it functioned at an administrative level… (economically) The service in the Roman army introduced the individual or corporate members into the monetary system of the Empire since quite a substantial part of their salary was paid to them in cash. With money in their hands the “guests” were by necessity exposed to the possibility of taking part in the economic system, of becoming accustomed to the rules of the wide market, of absorbing the messages of or reacting to the imperial propaganda passed to the citizens through the legends on the coins. In addition the goods offered in the markets influenced and transformed the newcomers’ food and aesthetic tastes and their cultural horizon. Furthermore Roman civilitas was an attractive goal for every individual wishing to succeed in his social advancement.”
Assisting with defense eventually shifted into administration and then outright rule, as Roman government passed into the hands of Germanic leaders. Odoacer (who commanded the German mercenaries in Italy) deposed Romulus Augustulus, the last emperor of the West in 476 AD. Odoacer ruled from Rome and Ravenna, restored the Colosseum and assigned seats to senatorial dignitaries of successor states controlled by a nobility from on of the Germanic tribes is evident in the 6th century... Germanic kings worked in-tandem with Roman administrators to the extent possible to help ensure a smooth transition and to facilitate the profitable administration of once Roman lands.
Early Middle Ages. The transition of the Migration period to the Middle Ages proper took place over the course of the 2nd half of the 1st millennium. It was marked by the Christianization of the Germanic peoples and the formation of stable kingdoms replacing the mostly tribal structures of the Migration period… Theodoric’s reign when the Germanic conqueror entered Rome in 500 AD… (his) Germanic subjects and administrators from the Roman Catholic Church cooperated in serving him, helping to establish a codified system of laws and ordinances which facilitated the integration of the Gothic peoples into a burgeoning empire, solidifying their place as they appropriated a Roman identity of sorts. The foundations laid by the Empire enabled the successor Germanic kingdoms to maintain a familiar structure and their success can be seen as part of the lasting triumph of Rome.
In continental Europe, this Germanic evolution saw the rise of Francia in the Merovingian period under the rule of Clovis I who had deposed the last emperor of Gaul… they remained the most powerful kingdom in Western Europe and the intermixing of their people with the Romans through marriage rendered the Frankish people less a Germanic tribe and more a “European people” in a manner of speaking… Frankish historian Gregory of Tours relates that Clovis converted to Christianity partly as a result of his wife’s urging and even more so - due to having won a desperate battle after calling out to Christ… Clovis used his new faith as a means to consolidating his political power by Christianizing his army. Against Germanic tradition, each of the four sons of Clovis attempted to secure power in different cities but their inability to prove themselves on the battlefield and intrigue against one another led the Visigoths back to electing their leadership.
When Merovingian rule eventually weakened, they were supplanted by another powerful Frankish family, the Carolingians, a dynastic order which produced Charles Martel, and Charlemagne. The coronation of Charlemagne as emperor on Christmas Day, 800 AD represented a shift in power structure from the south to the north. Frankish power ultimately laid the foundations for the modern nations of Germany and France.
In England, the Germanic Anglo-Saxon tribes reigned over the south of Great Britain from approximately 519 to the 10th century until the Wessex hegemony became the nucleus for the unification of England. Scandinavia was in the Vendel period and eventually entered the Viking Age, with expansion to Britain, Ireland and Iceland in the west and as far as Russia and Greece in the east. By 900 AD the Vikings secured for themselves a foothold on Frankish soil along the Lower Seine River valley in what is now present-day France, thereafter establishing the Duchy of Normandy, a territorial acquisition which provided them the opportunity to expand beyond Normandy into Anglo-Saxon England. The subsequent Norman Conquest which followed in 1066 AD wrought immense changes to life in England as their new Scandinavian masters altered their government, lordship, public holdings, culture and DNA pool permanently.
The various Germanic tribal cultures began their transformation into the larger nations of later history, (our Piper Family ancestors) English, Norse and German, and in the case of Burgundy, Lombardy and Normandy blending into a Romano-Germanic culture. Many of these later nation states started originally as “client buffer states” for the Roman Empire so as to protect it from its enemies further away...
Post-migration ethnogenesis. The territory of modern Germany was divided between Germanic- and Celtic-speaking groups in the last centuries BCE. The parts south of the Germanic limes came under limited Latin influence in the early centuries CE but were swiftly conquered by Germanic groups such as the Alemanni after the fall of the Western Roman Empire. The Germanic tribes of the Migration period had settled down by the Early Middle Ages, the latest series of movements out of Scandinavia taking place during the Viking Age.
The Viking Age Norsemen split into an Old East Norse and an Old West Norse group, which further separated into Icelanders, Faroese and Norwegians on one hand and Swedes and Danes on the other. In Scandinavia, there is a long history of assimilation of and by the Sami people and the Finnic peoples, namely Finns and Karelians. In today’s usage, the term “Nordic peoples” refers to the ethnic groups in all of the Nordic countries. In Great Britain, Germanic people coalesced into the Anglo-Saxon (or English) people between the 8th and 10th centuries.
On the European continent, the Holy Roman Empire included all remaining Germanic-speaking groups from the 10th century. In the Late Medieval to Early Modern period, some groups split off the Empire before a “German” ethnicity had formed, consisting of Low Franconian (Dutch, Flemish) and Alemannic (Swiss) populations.
The various Germanic peoples of the Migrations period eventually spread out over a vast expanse stretching from contemporary European Russia to Iceland and from Norway to North Africa. Over time, such groups underwent ethnogenesis, resulting in the creation of new cultural and ethnic identities (e.g., the Franks and Gallo-Romans becoming the French). Thus, many of the descendants of the ancient Germanic peoples do not speak Germanic languages, as they were to a greater or lesser degree assimilated into the cosmopolitan, literate culture of the Roman world. Even where the descendants of Germanic peoples maintained greater continuity with their common ancestors, significant cultural and linguistic differences arose over time, as is strikingly illustrated by the different identities of Christianized Saxon subjects of the Carolingian Empire and pagan Scandinavian Vikings.
More broadly, early Medieval Germanic peoples were often assimilated into the walha (Roman) substrate cultures of their subject populations (permeated by Roman culture)...
The Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain resulted in Anglo-Saxon (of English) displacement and cultural assimilation of the indigenous culture, the Brythonic-speaking British culture, causing the foundation of a new kingdom. As in what became England, indigenous Brythonic Celtic culture in some of the south-eastern parts of what became Scotland and areas of what became the Northwest of England succumbed to Germanic influence ca 600-800, due to the extension of overlordship and settlement from the Anglo-Saxon areas to the south. Cultural and linguistic assimilation occurred less frequently between the Germanic Anglo-Saxons and the indigenous people who resided in the Roman dominated areas of England, particularly in the regions that remained previously unconquered… Over time, the Anglo-Saxons, with their distinct culture and language, displaced much of the extant Roman influence of old.
Perhaps the final incursions by Germanic people which altered in some ways the ethnographic map of Europe was made by the Vikings. Between the 8th and 11th centuries, these Scandinavian/Norse traders and pirates ravaged most of north and central Europe as well as the British Isles, spreading eastwards as far as Russia and into Byzantium. While their initial exploits were generally raids for plunder, they later settled and mixed with the indigenous people of Europe, which resulted in both conquest and colonization. Other examples of assimilation during the Viking Age include the Norsemen, who settled in Normandy along the French Atlantic coast, and the societal elite in medieval Russia... Known for their unique ships, there is evidence of the Viking presence all over mainland Europe, as no lands with navigable waters or coastlines escaped their pillaging. Vast territories in eastern England were overrun and occupied by the Vikings and the Danish King, Canute, eventually succeeded to the English crown.
Between ca 1150 and ca 1400, most of the Scottish Lowlands became English culturally and linguistically through immigration from England, France and Flanders and from the resulting assimilation of native Gaelic-speaking Scots although Lowland Gaelic was still spoken in Galloway until the 18th century. The Scots language is the resulting Germanic language still spoken in parts of Scotland and is very similar to the speech of the Northumbrians of northern England. Between the 15th and 17th centuries Scots spread into more of mainland Scotland at the expense of Scottish Gaelic although the Gaelic maintained a strong hold over the Scottish Highlands, and Scots also began to make some headway into the Northern Isles. The latter, Orkney and Shetland, though now part of Scotland, were nominally part of the Kingdom of Norway until the 15th century. A version of the Norse language was spoken there from the Viking invasions until replaced by Scots in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Culture - Law. A main element uniting Germanic societies was kingship, in origin a sacral institution combining the functions of military leader, high priest, lawmaker and judge. Germanic monarchy was elective; the king was elected by the free men from among eligible candidates of a family tracing their ancestry to the tribe’s divine or semi-divine founder.
...In early Germanic society, the free men of property each ruled their own estate and were subject to the king directly, without any intermediate hierarchy as in later feudalism. Free men without landed property could swear fealty to a man of property who as their lord would then be responsible for their upkeep, including generous feasts and gifts. This system of sworn retainers was central to early Germanic society, and the loyalty of the retainer to his lord generally replaced his family ties.
[weregild: aka man price, was a value placed on every being and piece of property, for example in the Frankish Salic Code. If property was stolen, or someone was injured or killed, the guilty person would have to pay weregild as restitution to the victim’s family or to the owner of the property]
Early Germanic law reflects a hierarchy of worth within the society of free men, reflected in the differences in weregild. Among the Anglo-Saxons, a regular free man had a weregild of 200 shillings (classified as a “200-man”)… while a nobleman commanded a fee of six times that amount (“1200-man”). Unfree serfs did not command a weregild, and the recompense paid in the event of their death was merely for material damage, 15 shillings in the case of the Alamanni, increased to 40 or 50 if the victim had been a skilled artisan.
The social hierarchy is not only reflected in the weregild due in the case of the violent or accidental death of a man, but also in differences in fines for lesser crimes. Thus the fines for insults, injury burglary or damage to property differ depending on the rank of the injured party. They do not usually depend on the rank of the guilty party, although there are some exceptions associated with royal privilege.
Free women did not have a political station of their own but inherited the rank of their father if unmarried, or their husband if married. The weregild or recompense due for the killing or injuring of a woman is notably set a twice that of a man of the same rank in Alemannic law.
All freemen had the right to participate in general assemblies or things, where disputes between freemen were addressed according to customary law. The king was bound to uphold ancestral law, but was at the same time the source for new laws for cases not addressed in the previous tradition. This aspect was the reason for the creation of the various Germanic law codes by the kings following their conversion to Christianity: besides recording inherited tribal laws, these codes have the purpose of settling the position of the church and Christian clergy with society, usually setting the weregilds of the members of the clerical hierarchy parallel to that of the existing hierarchy of nobility, with the position of an archbishop mirroring that of the king.
In the case of a suspected crime, the accused could avoid punishment by presenting a fixed number of free men prepared to swear an oath on his innocence. Failing this, he could prove his innocence in a trial by combat. Corporal or capital punishment for free men does not figure in the Germanic law codes, and banishment appears to be the most severe penalty issued officially. This reflects that Germanic tribal law did not have the scope of exacting revenge, which was left to the judgement of the family of the victim, but to settle damages as fairly as possible once an involved party decided to bring a dispute before the assembly. A fascinating component of early Germanic laws were the varying distinctions concerning the physical body, as each body part had a personal injury value and corresponding legal claims for personal injury viewed matters like gender, rank and status as secondary interest when deliberating cases.
Generally speaking, Roman legal codes eventually provided the model for many Germanic laws… Traditional Germanic society was gradually replaced by the system of estates and feudalism characteristic of the High Middle Ages in both the Holy Roman Empire and Anglo-Norman England in the 11th and 12th centuries… (but also) because political structures had grown too large for the flat hierarchy of a tribal society.
Warfare. The Germanic idea of warfare was quite different from the pitched battles fought by Rome and Greece. Instead the Germanic tribes focused on raids. Warfare of varying size however was a distinctive feature of barbarian culture. The purpose of these was generally not to gain territory, but rather to capture resources and secure prestige. These raids were conducted by irregular troops, often formed along family or village lines, in groups of 10 to about 1,000. Leaders of unusual personal magnetism could gather more soldiers for longer periods, but there was not systematic method of gathering or training men, so the death of a charismatic leader could mean the destruction of an army. Armies also often consisted of more than 50 percent noncombatants, as displaced people would travel with large groups of soldiers, the elderly, women, and children. War leaders who were able to secure ample booty for their retainers were able to grow accordingly by attracting warrior bands from nearby villages.
(Jody Gray): for anyone interested, there is more information about warfare, weaponry, tactics… and economy (an interesting note: cattle and humans usually lived together in the same house)... well-preserved corpses have been found in former marshes on several locations in Denmark (providing examples of clothing)... Kinship patterns… Children were valued, and according to Tacitus, limiting or destroying one’s offspring was considered shameful… slavery was uncommon… Their slaves (usually prisoners of war) were most often employed as domestic servants. Polygamy and concubinage were rare but existed, at least among the upper classes… Marriage: (based on Tacitus) most of the “barbarians” were content with one wife which indicates a general trend towards monogamy. For those higher within their social hierarchy however, polygamy was sometimes “solicited on account of their rank”... wives came to their husbands “as a partner in toils and dangers; to suffer and to dare equally with him, in peace and in war.” ...Thus it can be presumed that ancient Germanic brides were on the average about twenty and were roughly the same age as their husbands… Anglo-Saxon women, like those of other Germanic tribes, were marked as women from the age of twelve onward… implying that the age of marriage coincided with puberty. Evidence of Germanic patriarchy is evident later in the 7th century AD Edict of Rothari of the Lombards which stated that women were not allowed to live of their own free-will and that they had to be subject to a man and if no one else, they were to be “under the power of the king”.
For Germanic kings, warrior chieftains, senators and Roman nobility, a certain degree of intermarriage was undertaken to strengthen their ties to one another and to the Empire, making marriage… an instrument of politics.
Religion. Prior to the Middle Ages, Germanic peoples followed what is not referred to as Germanic paganism: “a system of interlocking and closely interrelated religious worldviews and practices rather than one indivisible religion” and as such consisted of “individual worshippers, family traditions and regional cults within a broadly consistent framework”. It was polytheistic in nature, with some underlying similarities to other Indo-Germanic traditions… Archaeological findings suggest that the Germanic barbarians practiced some of the same ‘spiritual’ rituals as the Celts, including human sacrifice, divination, and the belief in spiritual connection with the natural environment around them… Many of the deities found in Germanic paganism appeared under similar names across the Germanic peoples, most notably the god known to the Germans as Wodan aka Wotan, to the Anglo-Saxons as Woden, and to the Norse as Odin, as well as the god Thor -known to the Germans as Donar, to the Anglo-Saxons as Punor and to the Norse as Porr… Christianity had no relevance for the pagan barbarians until their contact and integration with Rome.
While the Germanic peoples were slowly converted to Christianity by varying means, many elements of the pre-Christian culture and indigenous beliefs remained firmly in place after the conversion process, particularly in the more rural and distant regions… Many of the Germanic tribes actually revered forests as sacred places and left them unmolested. Conversion to Christianity broke this pagan obsession with protecting the forest in some locations and allowed once migrant tribes to settle in places where they previously refused to cultivate the soil or chop down trees… (some) converted to Arianism rather than orthodox Catholicism, and were soon regarded as heretics...The Franks were converted directly from paganism to Catholicism under the leadership of Clovis about 496 AD without an intervening time as Arians… Several centuries later, Anglo-Saxon and Frankish missionaries and warriors undertook the conversion of their Saxon neighbors. A key event was the felling of Thor’s Oak near Fritzlar (Germany) by Boniface, apostle of the Germans, in 723 AD. When Thor failed to strike Boniface dead after the oak hit the ground, the Franks were amazed and began their conversion to the Christian faith… Eventually for many Germanic tribes, the conversion to Christianity was achieved by armed force, successfully completed by Charlemagne (the Saxon Wars), that also brought Saxon lands into the Frankish empire. Massacres, such as the Bloody Verdict of Verden, where as many as 4500 people were beheaded according to one of Charlemagne’s chroniclers, were a direct result of this policy.
https://www.quora. Where are modern white French people mostly descended from? Genetic Map: Vinicius Emygdio Chaulet. Europe, genetic map: red, R1b (Celtic, Basque, Italic, Frisian, Saxon) and pale green, I1: Germanic (Nordic) 12b: Germanic (Saxon). French are descendants of the Gauls (Celts) and were his greatest contribution, as we can see on the map, the area in red, R1b (Celtic, Basque, Italic, Frisian, Saxon), as well as the Romans, other peoples also had their contributions, Germans, Greeks and etc…
Genetics. It is suggested by geneticists that the movement of Germanic peoples has had a strong influence upon the modern distribution of the male lineage represented by the Y-DNA haplogroup I1, which is believed to have originated with one man, who lived approximately 4,000 to 6,000 years somewhere in Northern Europe, possibly modern Denmark (see Most Recent Common Ancestor for more information). There is evidence of this man’s descendants settling in all of the areas that Germanic tribes are recorded as having subsequently invaded or migrated to. However, it is quite possible that haplogroup I1 is pre-Germanic, that is I1 may have originated with individuals who adopted the proto-Germanic culture, at an early stage in its development or were co-founders of that culture. The Y-DNA genetic composition of the earliest Proto-Germanic speaking population would most likely be an admixture of the aforementioned I1, but would also contain R1a1a, R1b-P312 and R1b-U106, a genetic combination of the haplogroups found to be strongly-represented among current Germanic speaking peoples.
Haplogroups I1 accounts for approximately 40% of Iceland's males, 40%-50% of Swedish males, 40% of Norwegian males, and 40% of Danish Human &-chromosome DNA haplogroups. Haplogroup I1 peaks in certain areas of Northern Germany and Eastern England at more than 30%. Haplogroup R1b and haplogroup R1a collectively account for more than 40% of males in Sweden; over 50% in Norway, 60% in Iceland, 60%-70% in Germany, and between 50%-70% of the males in England and the Netherlands depending on region. However this might simply be because of more ancient similar settlement patterns of pre-Germanic, Celtic and certainly pre-Roman, populations once established, are often difficult to change and that post-agriculture populations became more fixed and genes often don’t correspond necessarily to either language or culture. Nonetheless, the presence of R1b-P312 and R1b-L21 among the modern Germanic speaking population is reflective of the Germanic presence in former Celtic regions in the Alps, the Netherlands, and lowland Britain where they likely absorbed people along the way. Peaking in northern Europe, the R1b-U106 maker seems particular interesting in distribution and provides some helpful genetic clues regarding the historical trek made by the Germanic people.
Modern Germanic peoples include the Afrikaners, Austrians, Danes, Dutch, English, Flemish, Frisians, Germans, Icelanders, Lowland Scots, Norwegians, and Swedes.
Later Germanic studies and their influence… The Viking revival of the 18th century Romanticism finally establishes the fascination with anything “Nordic”... Later still, the development of Germanic studies as an academic discipline in the 19th century ran parallel to the rise of nationalism in Europe and the search for national histories for the nascent nation states developing after the end of the Napoleonic Wars. A “Germanic” national ethnicity offered itself for the unification of Germany, contrasting the emerging German Empire with its neighboring rivals of differing ancestry. The nascent belief in a German ethnicity was subsequently founded upon national myths of Germanic antiquity. These tendencies culminated in a later Pan-Germanism, Alldeutsche Bewegung which had as its aim, the political unity of all German-speaking Europe into a Teutonic nation state.
Contemporary Romantic nationalism in Scandinavia placed more weight on the Viking Age, resulting in the movement known as Scandinavism. The theories of race developed in the same period, which used Darwinian evolutionary ideals and pseudoscientific methods in the identification of Germanic peoples (members of the Nordic race), as being superior to other ethnicities. Scientific racism flourished in the late 19th century and into the mid-20th century, where it became the basis for specious racial comparisons and justification for eugenic efforts; it also contributed to compulsory sterilization, anti-miscegenation laws, and was used to sanction immigration restrictions in both Europe and the United States.
Related: https://en.wikipedia. Gauls, were Celtic peoples in the Iron Age and the Roman Period (roughly from the 5th century BC to the 5th century AD). Map: Gaul and Vicinity, 1st Century BC. showing the relative positions of its three tribes: Celtae (Galli), Belgae and Aquitani.
*Other Sources -Books and Movies -Germanic Tribes
*Germanic Tribes (Amazon.com $20.14)
(Documentary) The four-part series The Germanic Tribes shows the rise of the tribes of the North; developing from a primitive culture on the fringe of Europe into the heirs of the Roman Empire. For a long time the view of the Germanic people of many peoples was distorted by the Germanic cult of the 19th century and the Nazi dictatorship. Due to new methods and discoveries, research is now able to present a more accurate picture of the Germanic tribes. Many clichés about the barbarians of the North have to be discarded as myths.
The linchpin of Germanic history is the conflict with the Roman Empire. Since the age of Caesar this Roman-Germanic conflict was characterized not only by fierce battles but also by phases of coexistence and cooperation. The Germans dug the grave of the Roman Empire, but they were also the preservers of the Roman legacy.
The series breathes new life into the little known world of the Germanic tribes. We see how they lived, fought, and worshipped their gods. Intricate 3D animation shows us how they built their settlements, buried their kings, vanquished their enemies. Roman cities such as ancient Cologne, home of the Romanophile Germans, and the Roman limes, the border to free Germania, are also reconstructed through magnificent computer graphics. The Germanic Tribes portrays the protagonists of an epoch of formative influence for Europe whose legacy is still with us.
http://docuwiki.net/index. The Germanic Tribes. *list of Related Documentaries: 400 Year Old Cold Case: The Body in the Bog (BBC); The Roman War Machine; The Battle Against Rome; The Lost Legions of Varus; Ancient Warriors; Barbarians (BBC)
Episodes:
The Battle of the Teutoburg Forest: Since Caesar's days, Germanic warriors and Roman legionaries had often met in battle. Rome's power seemed invincible. But then, in the year 9 AD, the Germans mounted a rebellion.
Pax Romana: We see how the Germans they lived, fought and worshipped their gods. Intricate 3d animation shows how they built their settlements, buried their kings, vanquished their enemies.
In the Sign of the Cross: Clovis was the first Frankish king to acknowledge the Christian faith. This changed the direction of Europe's history.
Conclusion: (Jody Gray): I’m focusing on my ancestors, the Franks (Carolingian Dynasty) and the Anglo-Saxons (House of Wessex, England).
*Germanic Tribes. Source: *98 AD. The first written record of the Germanic tribes (Germania) was by the Roman historian Tacitus. German tribes were moving into the region that is now southwestern Germany about the same time the Romans were conquering Gaul. http://www.sjsu.edu *
Who are the Germanic tribes? The western German tribes consisted of the Marcomanni, Alamanni, Franks, Angles and Saxons, while the Eastern tribes north of the Danube consisted of the Vandals, Gepids, Ostrogoths, and Visigoths. The Alans, Burgundians, and Lombards are less easy to define.
Where did the Germanic people come from? Across the centre of Europe the Celts move gradually west through Germany into France, northern Spain and Britain. In the 2nd century BC, Germanic tribes move south and east from Scandinavia. The Goths and the Vandals drive the Balts east along the coast of the Baltic.
Who were ancestors of Germanic Tribes? (some are of the opinion) that the Germans descended from Paleolithic hunter gatherers who moved north from south central and south western Europe as the ice sheets melted and were later joined by much smaller numbers of migrating neolithic peoples. They moved from the Scandinavian areas and settled down in the West and Central Europe region during the Roman Empire Period. Thus, Scandinavian and German are related linguistically and racially. Several tribes who settled in Germania adopted a Germanic culture and assimilated in.
Why did the Germanic people invade the Roman Empire? The Roman Empire began to break apart with the continuous invasions and loss of binding cultural aspects. The Goths were chased out of their native lands in Scandinavia by the Huns...
(illustration, left): 6th-7th century necklace of glass and ceramic beads with a central amethyst bead. Similar necklaces have been found in the graves of Frankish women in the Rhineland. https://en.wikipedia.*Franks (Latin: Franci or gens Francorum) are historically first known as a group of Germanic tribes that inhabited the land between the Lower and Middle Rhine in the 3rd century AD, and second as the people of Gaul who merged with the Gallo-Roman populations during succeeding centuries, passing on their name to modern-day France and becoming part of the heritage of the modern French people. Some Franks raided Roman territory, while other Frankish tribes joined the Roman troops of Gaul. In later times, Franks became the military rulers of the northern part of Roman Gaul. With the coronation of their ruler 37th GGF Charlemagne as Imperator Romanorum by Pope Leo III in 800 AD, he and his successors were recognised as legitimate successors to the emperors of the Western Roman Empire.
*Who are the Franks? Frank, member of a Germanic-speaking people who invaded the western Roman Empire in the 5th century. Dominating present-day northern France, Belgium, and western Germany, the Franks established the most powerful Christian kingdom of the early medieval western Europe.
Where did the Franks come from? The Franks originated as a federation of smaller West-Germanic tribes who settled in what is now the Netherlands and the German federal states of Lower-Saxony and North-Rhine Westphalia, who had a few centuries earlier had come down from Scandinavia.
*The Early History of the Germanic Tribes. http://www.sjsu.edu * What is known of the origins of the Germanic Tribes is based upon linguistic evidence. The Germanic languages belong to the Indo-European family of languages that span Eurasia from Ireland on the west to India on the east. The origin of the Indo-European languages is believed to have been in the merger of three peoples in the region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea. One of the three excelled in warfare, one in agriculture and one in metal-working. The synthesis of these three strengths produced a folk that spread east and west. The western branch splits into the ancestors of the Baltic, the Celtic, the Germanic and the Slavic tribes as well as a welter of smaller groupings such as those of the Latins and Greeks. The languages of the Germanic tribes underwent a systematic sound change that distinguished them from the languages of the other branches.
(after the fall of the Roman Empire) By about 500 BCE the Germanic tribes were occupying the southern shores of the Baltic and southern Scandinavia. Some of these Germanic tribes migrated and established control of new territories... (Jody Gray): I’m focusing on my ancestors, the Franks (Carolingian Dynasty) and the Anglo-Saxons (House of Wessex, England). Later the Franks from what is now Germany moved west and conquered the Low Lands and Roman Gaul, giving it their name as France. The Angles and Saxons, along with Justes, invaded Britain and created England…
Conflicts between the Germanic Tribes and the Roman Empire before the fall of the Roman Empire. http://www.sjsu.edu *70 BCE. Julius Caesar defeated the Suevian tribe, thus established the Rhine River as the boundary between Roman and German territory. But, Roman fear of militaristic peoples on their borders prompted the Roman governor Varus to invade the territory beyond the Rhine. *9 AD. the Battle of Teutoburg Forest. Their victory freed the German tribes of any serious threat of domination by the Romans.
https://en.wikipedia.org * Germanic Tribes and Frankish Empire. -Germania, Migration Period, Frankish Realm.
*260. the Germanic peoples broke into Roman-controlled lands. *3rd century. a number of large West Germanic tribes emerged: Alemanni, Franks, Chatti, Saxons, Frisii, Sicambri, and Thuringii. *375. invasion of the Huns, forcing the migration of many tribes, which brought them into conflict with the Roman Empire… The Frankish kingdom was founded by Clovis I, crowned the first King of the Franks in 496. The Expansion and Decline of the Carolingian Dynasty: Under the continuous campaigns of Pepin of Herstal, Charles Martel, Pepin the Younger, Charlemagne, and Louis the Pious; the greatest expansion of the Frankish empire was secured by the early 9th century. -Charlemagne was crowned Holy Roman Emperor in 800 AD. In 843, after the death of Louis the Pious, the Carolingian Holy Roman Empire was divided among his heirs: his eldest son, Lothair I, King of Middle Francia (d. 855; his lands divided between his three sons); Louis II, King of East Francia (d. 876, succeeded by his son Charles III d. 888, the last Carolingian Emperor, he was deposed of power before his death); Charles the Bald, King of West Francia; in 875, after the death of Emperor Louis II, supported by the Pope, Charles became Holy Roman Emperor (d. 877; his son Louis the Stammerer succeeded him as King of West Francia but wasn’t crowned Emperor). Eventually, the singular use of the name Francia shifted towards Paris, referred to as the Island of France which gave its name to the entire Kingdom of France.
Note: Louis II, son of Louis the Pious, was given the appellation Germanicus (the German) after his death in recognition of the fact that the bulk of his kingdom was in the former Germania [Roman term for the geographical region in north-central Europe inhabited mainly by Germanic peoples].
Following the breakup of the Frankish Realm, for 900 years, the history of Germany was intertwined with the history of the Holy Roman Empire, which subsequently emerged from the eastern portion of Charlemagne's original empire. The Ottonian rulers (919-1024) consolidated several major duchies and the German king Otto I was crowned Holy Roman Emperor of these regions in 962.
Besides the German tribes that entered and conquered or damaged the Western Roman Empire, there were the tribes that remained back in Germany proper. These were the Saxons, the Alemanni, the Thuringians, and the Rugians. When the Rugians were destroyed by Odoacer in 487, a new confederation of Germans formed in their place, the Bavarians. All these tribes in Germany were eventually subjugated by the Franks, the Alemanni in 496 and 505, the Thuringians in 531, the Bavarians at some point after 553, and then finally the Saxons by 804. When Germany eventually separated as East Francia, the old tribal areas assumed new identities as the Stem Duchies. (Jody Gray): I’m focusing on my ancestors, the Franks (Carolingian Dynasty) and the Anglo-Saxons (House of Wessex, England). 34th GGF Liudolf, Count of Saxony [Germanic]… 32rd GGF Henry the Fowler [father of 32nd g-uncle Otto I, [German] Holy Roman Emperor; (cognatic) to 30th GGF Hugh Capet of the Robertian Dynasty [origins, Neustria and Austrasia, Germanic]. 38th GGF Lambert II, Count of Hesbaye, Neustria (father-to-son) to 28th GGF Henry I, King of the Franks [France, Franks]; 27th GGF Hugh Magnus, Count of Vermandois by right of marriage to Adelaide de Vermandois [her father a direct male descendant of Charlemagne, Franks]; (cognatic) to 8th GGF Richard Woodhull, New York…
North: Norwegians 565-present (Normans, Normandy 911-1204)-32nd GGF Rollo (father-to-son) to 28th GGF Robert the Magnificent [father of 28th g-uncle William the Conqueror] (cognatic) to 11th GGF Fulk Woodhull (father-to-son) to 8th GGF Richard Woodhull, New York... Swedes 565-present. -37th GGF Ragnar (father-to-son) to 30th GGF Olof II Skotkonung, King of Sweden (para-lineal) to 8th GGF Richard Woodhull, New York...
West: Franks 447-present [Francia: France; Italy; Germany] -40th GGF Pepin of Herstal… Charlemagne… (father-to-son) Charles Duke of Lower Lorraine (cognatic) to 27th GGF Walter aka Seier the Fleming (father-to-son) Walter de Wahull to 8th GGF Richard Woodhull, New York... Saxons -785, 804; Angles 491-927. (Anglo-Saxon, England) -35th GGF Alfred the Great; daughter Elfthryth m: Baldwin II, Margrave of Flanders [son of 33th GGM Judith, Princess of West Francia, great-granddaughter of Charlemagne]; (father-to-son) to 27th GGF Walter aka Seier the Fleming (father-to-son) Walter de Wahull to 8th GGF Richard Woodhull, New York... 491-1066 -conquered by the Normans) -William the Conqueror
My direct father-to-son lineage is from 36th GGF Anacher, Great Forester de Flanders... 27th GGF Walter aka Seier the Fleming migrated to England after his uncle, William the Conqueror became King of England… all descendants from this Walter down to Richard Woodhull were born in England and assuming their wives were from noblemen who also came to England after the 1066 Norman Conquest of England they are likely of the same DNA mix.
*Germanic Tribes, early Middle Ages, Migration to new Monarchies.
While they are all indigenously German, historians distinguish between them. These four are the Generic German, Carolingian, Anglo-Saxon, and Viking.
From the 4-5th centuries, the Roman Empire in the west, centered at Rome, was going through a series of significant changes, including invasions from the Germanic Tribes and the Huns, horrendous financial deficits due to a doubling of the military expenditures, political unrest, falling birth rates, and the disruptions caused by Christians, Parthians, etc. In the early 4th century, the emperor Constantine established a new Roman capital at Constantinople (present day Istanbul), and eventually a new Eastern Roman Empire will evolve into what historians call the Byzantine Empire.
What emerges in Europe is a new dynamic culture composed of four different political and religious groups: Roman, Christian, Celtic, and Germanic. Over the coming centuries, new nations and kingdoms will form into what will be called Europe. Four specific societies will be highlighted in this discussion of the Early Middle Ages. While they are all indigenously German, historians distinguish between them. These four are the Generic German, Carolingian, Anglo-Saxon, and Viking.
In the earliest centuries there were tribes not united kingdom's, these monarchs would surface later. The structure of the tribe was pyramidal with birth and wealth determining nobility. War and hunting were reserved for the noblemen, while farming was generally left to the women, old men, serfs and slaves. The war band or comitatus and their warring were celebrated in such epics as Beowulf, akin to Homer’s Iliad. Out of this glorious occupation of war, will come the nobility ranks of counts, earls, margraves and dukes. Kinship or descent was bilineal, traced usually through both the father and mother, but at times just matrilineal.
While the beginnings of the Anglo-Saxon period of English History are obscure (circa 500-1066), the political names were established during this time. Celtic and Roman Britain became known as angle land, i.e. England. Seven kingdoms were established and later became counties: Wessex, Sussex, Essex, East Anglia, Mercia, Northumbria and Kent. Wessex, Sussex, and Essex derived from the West Saxons, South Saxons and East Saxons. Anglo kingdoms of East Anglia or East Angles and the North Folk and South Fold became Norfolk and Suffolk. Northumbria was the area north of the Humber River. Three kingdoms took turns being supreme: Northumbria in the 7th century, Mercia in the 8th century and Wessex in the 9-10th centuries.
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*Terminology: Lineage (anthropology) [https://en.wikipedia.] is a unilineal descent group that can demonstrate their common descent from a known apical ancestor. Unilineal lineages can be matrilineal or patrilineal, depending on whether they are traced through mothers or fathers, respectively. *Patrilineality [https://en.wikipedia.], also known as the male line, the spear side, or agnatic kinship, is a common kinship system in which an individual’s family membership derives from and is recorded through his or her father’s lineage. It generally involves the inheritance of property, rights, names, or titles by persons related through male kin. A patriline (“father line”) is a person’s father, and additional ancestors, as traced only through males. (father-to-son). *Cognatic kinship [https://en.wikipedia.] is a mode of descent calculated from an ancestor or ancestress counted through any combination of male and female links, or a system of bilateral kinship where relations are traced through both a father and mother.*
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