They were driven out of the country by the Chatti. 2. The Hermunduri, beyond the Chatti, extended from the Werra towards the East; they were placed by Tacitus at the source of the Albis, but that writer was probably not well informed as to the higher course of the river Elbe.* C. The Cherusci and the neighbouring tribes. The Cherusci are mentioned by Cæsar among the chief tribes of Germany, their name being found with those of the Suevi and Sigambri. After the Romans had broken the power of the latter, the Cherusci made an obstinate resistance: they destroyed the legion of Varus and withstood the arms of Germanicus. They defeated the army of Maroboduus, and the Suevic confederacy united under that leader. In later times the Cherusci, as heads of the Saxon Confederacy, opposed themselves to the Franks and Thuringians. The territory occupied by this great and powerful nation cannot be exactly determined by any extant account. According to a statement obtained from Ptolemy, they occupied the countries to the northward of the Hartz forest, which in later times separated the Saxons from the Thuringians, as in Cæsar's time the forest of Bacenis divided the Cherusci from the Suevi.§ The Cherusci are mentioned together with the neighbouring tribe of Fosi. The Angrivarii inhabited both sides of the Weser, adjoining the Cherusci. The Langobardi had, according to Ptolemy, the Chauci on their northern side, and reached eastward to the Elbe, to the southward of Hamburg, and towards Saltzwedel.** Velleius nearly agrees with Ptolemy in his account of the position of the Langobards. He places them near the Chauci, and reaching towards the Elbe.++ It seems, from the narrative of Tacitus, that the Langobardi were neighbours of the Cherusci, whom they joined in the war against Maroboduus, but they were comprehended in the great Suevian Germ. 41. Zeuss, 104. + Cherusci sociique eorum, vetus Arminii miles, sumpsere bellum in Maroboduum. (Tac. Ann. ii. 45.) Ptolem. loc. cit. Zeuss, 107. § Bell. Gall. vi. 10. ** Zeuss, 110. Tac. Germ. 36. ++ Velleius, ii. 106. Ruptæ Chaucorum nationes:-fracti Langobardi, gens etiam Germanâ feritate ferocior; usque ad flumen Albim Romanus cum signis perductus exercitus. VOL. III. A A empire of that chieftain. Next to the Langobards Tacitus. enumerates several nations, evidently beyond the Elbe, with the exception of the Angli, who are proved, by a passage of Ptolemy, to have inhabited the left bank of that river. The Langobards were already celebrated in the time of Tacitus for the valour which they displayed in their warlike enterprises.† The Dulgibini, Chaulci, and Chasuarii were inferior tribes near the Langobards, to the eastward of the Elbe.‡ D. The Marcomanni and the surrounding nations. The celebrated tribe of the Marcomanni are first mentioned by Cæsar among the followers of Ariovistus: their position appears to have been on the upper and middle course of the Mayne, whence their warlike bands found an easy path towards the east, south, and west.§ Hence Maroboduus led them into a country, surrounded by mountains, which had been previously abandoned by the Boii, and which retained from its ancient inhabitants the name of Bojohoemum or Bohemia. Strabo is not clear in his account of this event, but the situation of the Marcomanni is distinctly marked by Ptolemy. He mentions the Varisti as living on one side of the—Γάβρητα ὕλη— Silva Gabreta, and the Marcomanni on the other. The Gabreta Silva, as M. Zeuss observes, can be no other than the Böhmerwald, or Bohemian forest. To the eastward the Marcomanni were separated from the Quadi by the Hercynian forest. Even towards the south they extended not beyond the chain of mountains: between the latter and the Danube, lesser and evidently Celtic nations are placed. At the head of the Suevic kingdom founded by Maroboduus were the Marcomanni; they are called especially Suevi. By this name Tacitus distinguishes them in more than one passage. • Germ. 40. Ptol. ibid. Zeuss, ibid. +"Langobardos paucitas nobilitat, quod plurimis ac valentissimis nationibus cincti, non per obsequium sed præliis et periclitando tuti sunt." (Tac. Germ. 40.) Tacit. Germ. 34. Ptolem. ibid. § Bell. Gall. iv. 3. || Gens Marcomannorum, quæ Maroboduo duce excita sedibus suis atque in interiora refugiens incinctos Hercyniæ silvæ campos incolebat. (Vellej. ii. 108.) -Boiohoemum : id regioni quam incolebat Maroboduus, nomen est. (Vellej. ii. 109.) Manet adhuc Boiohoemi nomen signatque loci veterem memoriam, quamvis mutatis cultoribus. (Tac. Germ. 42. Zeuss, ubi supra, 15.) ¶ Annal. ii. 62. i. 44. Zeuss, p. 107. The Quadi were the castern neighbours of the Marcomanni. The eastern part of the Hercynian forest which surrounded Bohemia, the wald or forest of Moravia, separated the Marcomanni from the Quadi,* beyond whom Ptolemy places the Aouva λn-Lunian wald, the country of anciently worked iron mines, which in the time of Tacitus were dug by the Gothini. It does not appear that in Cæsar's time the Quadi had yet settled in this country. That writer places the Volca Tectosages, who were Celts, in the Hercynian forest; and M. Zeuss has observed that they cannot with probability be fixed in the forest country of Moravia, and that the Quadi were perhaps bands of the victorious Marcomanni who pushed their conquests on the eastern side.‡ Beyond the Quadi and the Luna sylva, that is towards the south-east, Ptolemy places the Bæmi, whom he terms “a great nation reaching to the Danube, and there bordering on the Teracatriæ." The latter were perhaps a Celtic people. It seems that after the leaders Maroboduus and Catualda had fallen, the Suevic bands founded a new domain under Vannius, at the head of the Quadi, and these are probably the Bæmi, who preserved the name of Bohemia, from which they had been driven. By Tacitus this new Suevian state, which reached to the Carpathian mountains, is termed "dives regnum, quod Vannius trigenta per annos auxerat." His subjects are termed Suevi by Tacitus, and this tribe of Suevi, which in later times had the name of Bæmi, were the farthest of all the German tribes towards the south-east, where they reached, according to Ptolemy, from the Lunian forest to the Danube.§ It was in the eastern region of Germany, and among the Suevian tribes, that those warlike confederations began in the second century which first disturbed the Roman empire. At the head of these were the Marcomanni and other Suevic bands, as the Quadi, whom Ammianus terms "immensum quantum antehâc bellatrix et potens."|| E. The Lygian tribés. The Lygii or Lugii are placed by Tacitus to the eastward Tac. Germ. 41. C. Ptol. loc. cit. Zeuss, 118. + Tac. Germ. The name of the Quadi is perhaps preserved in Quedlinburg. Ammian. xxix. 6. of the nations already mentioned. They were a groupe of nations distinct from and in hostility with the Suevi. Ptolemy reckons among them the Buri, who are placed by Tacitus nearly in the same quarter, and makes them extend to the Vistula.* The country of the Buri was near the sources of the Oder and the Vistula.+ F. The Bastarnæ. The Bastarnæ are the first German nation mentioned in history they are enumerated among the troops led by the Macedonian king Perseus against the Romans, in the first half of the second century before Christ. Their abode was on the northern bank of the Lower Danube, whence they reached to the Carpathian mountains, behind the Dacians. As the Greeks were accustomed to the inroads of Gauls from the adjoining tracts of the Scordisci, they mistook the Bastarna for Gauls, and Polybius, Plutarch, and Livy, who copied Greek accounts, mention the Bastarnæ as Galatæ. Strabo, however, declares them to be of the Germanic race:‡ he was the first writer who gave any distinct account of them and of their tribes. Pliny likewise asserts them to be Germans, and Tacitus fully confirms that opinion by reference to their language. "Peucini quos quidam Bastarnas vocant, sermone, cultu, sede ac domiciliis, ut Germani agunt."§ The physical characters of the Bastarnæ must have been remarkable, since they are noticed by many writers, as resembling those of the great northern races of Europe. Polybius mentions their great stature and boldness in combat, and Livy observes their "procera et immania corpora," and "quanta in periculis audacia." Plutarch terms them "ärpes v¥ndoì μèr τὰ σώματα, θαυμαστοὶ δὲ τὰς μελετάς, μεγάλαυχοι δὲ καὶ λαμπροὶ ταῖς κατὰ τῶν πολεμίων ἀπειλαῖς.” The Bastarnæ, as M. Zeuss observes, appear as the first numerous German nation who moved gradually towards the Euxine from their ancient abode, which was probably near the higher course of the Vistula in the neighbourhood of the • Tac. Germ. xlv. Ptolem. Geog. lib. ii. cap. 11. Strabo, vii. 306. + Zeuss, 125. § Plin. iv. 14. Tac. Germ. xlvi. Polyb. xxvi. 9. Liv. xl. 5. et seqq. Plut. Aemil. Paul. Lygii. By Scymnus Chius they are mentioned as a new people in the neighbourhood of the Pontus.* Their movements have an historical importance which we shall have occasion to notice when we come to the history of the Goths. Paragraph 2.-German tribes inhabiting the Low Countries on the sea coast, supposed to be the Ingævones of Tacitus. A. Frisii,† Chauci, and the neighbouring tribes. The name of the Frisii, which is still preserved in that of Friesland, appears first in history in the account given by Tacitus of the expedition of Drusus, by whom they were obliged to pay tribute:" Frisiis, transrhenano populo, Drusus tributum jusserat modicum pro angustia rerum, ut in usus militares coria boum penderent."+ Pliny mentions the Frisii and Frisiabones with other nations between the mouths of the Rhine, above the Batavi.§ Ptolemy makes the "porio” inhabitants of the whole sea-coast of the German Ocean, as far as the mouths of the Ems, or Amisios. The Chauci are joined with the Frisii in the earliest accounts of that people, with whom they appear to have been nearly connected. The Weser flowed through the country of the Chauci and divided them into two bodies. "Visæ nobis Chaucorum gentes, qui majores, minoresque appellantur," says Pliny. Ptolemy mentions the Lesser Chauci as succeeding to the Phrissii, that is, situated to the northward of them, and reaching to the river Visurgis or Weser, after whom were the Greater Chauci, reaching as far as the Elbe or Albis. The Greater Chauci occupied the modern Dutchy of Bremen. Tacitus describes the situation of the Chauci in a similar manner. He says, as we turn from the west of Germany towards the north, we first discover "the country of the Chauci, which though it begins immediately from Frisia and occupies part of the sea-shore, yet stretches so far as to border on all the nations before mentioned till it winds round to meet the territory of the Chatti." He represents the Chauci as bordering to the northward on all the western nations of Germany. "This immense . Seym. Ch. v. 50. Οὗτοι δὲ Θράκες, Βαστάρναι τ' ἐπήλυδες. Tac. Ann. iv. 72. § Plin. H. N. iv. 15. |