Essay in the academic discipline "History of the World"

on the topic: "History of Germany. German tribes."

Plan

1. Introduction.

2. Germany. Prehistoric times.

3. Germanic tribes within the Roman Empire.

4. History of the German lands until the beginning of the 10th century.

5. Conclusion.

6. List of references.

1. Introduction.

The history of Germany has many blind spots, myths and dubious facts. The fact is that it never had clearly defined borders, nor a single economic, political and cultural center. The territory of present-day Germany was a place that was constantly crossed by various nomadic tribes. The ancient Germans, migrating from the northern part of Europe, gradually colonized these lands. The Germanic tribes were not united, sometimes fighting among themselves, sometimes concluding alliances. The difference between them, even despite the established Germanic ethnic group, was entrenched for many centuries. Moving south, they systematically displaced and assimilated the Celts. They were to play a decisive role in the fate of the Roman Empire, as well as participate in the formation of a number of European peoples and states. Therefore, in the future, the Germans will be closely connected with the British, French, Belgians, Swiss, Scandinavians, Czechs, Dutch, etc. This abstract will be devoted to the early period in the history of Germany.

2. Germany. Prehistoric times.

In prehistoric times, glaciers advanced onto Central Europe four times. On the territory of present-day Germany there were sites and migration routes of the most ancient hominids. The found remains of Heidelberg Man date back to the first interglacial warming, approximately 600 - 500 thousand years ago. Later, archaeologists discovered other finds: parts of the skeleton from Bilzingsleben, the skeletal remains of the Steinheim man discovered near Stuttgart (second interglacial period), Schöningen and Lehringen wooden spears, the remains of a Neanderthal man found near Düsseldorf (third interglacial period). Neanderthal man is now known to have evolved from Heidelberg man. These prehistoric people lived in harsh climatic conditions and fought an intense struggle for survival. In especially dangerous areas, on the border of glaciers, they tried to settle as close to each other as possible. Of course, it’s too early to talk about tribes, much less consider these ancient people Germans. After all, archaeologists believe that Germany was unlikely to be inhabited before the Middle Paleolithic.

During the Upper Paleolithic period, traces of the migration of the Cro-Magnon man (an early representative of modern man) were discovered. The onset of the Mesolithic is distinguished by tools made from bones, characteristic of this time. The Dufensee culture is considered dominant, but the Tardenoise culture is gradually beginning to penetrate. Over time, stone tools began to be used in everyday life. Near Rottenburg, several sites were discovered and explored, in which dwellings and workshops are clearly visible. The Late Mesolithic (6000-4500 BC) brings climate changes, from a continental climate to an Atlantic climate. Large forests appeared in which deer, wild boars and other animals lived, becoming one of the main sources of food for ancient man. In addition to animal food, there is also plant food: nuts, berries, acorns. Stone processing is being improved.

In the early Neolithic era, new population groups gradually penetrated the lands of Germany from modern Austria and Hungary. Their main activity is livestock and crop production. Ceramic products (linear-band ceramics) appear. With the advent of the Middle Neolithic, the culture of spiked ceramics developed. The Münchshefen culture belongs to the late Neolithic, which included the Copper Age. It was largely shaped by cultures from neighboring Bohemia and Moravia. It is characterized by large ceramic vessels and cups with legs. Products made of copper are not common, but apparently, it was already mined in the Alps. The Münchshefen culture is inherited by the Altheim culture, with the advent of which dwellings began to be built in marshy areas on stilts in Bavaria. Archaeologists attribute the Hamer culture to the late Copper Age.

During the Bronze Age, Germany was inhabited by peoples speaking Indo-European languages. The culture of Corded Ware and Bell Beakers dominated during this period. The era of hunters, forced to obtain food for themselves with the help of primitive weapons, is being replaced by the era of shepherds. They have livestock that move from one pasture to another, followed by their families. We know of a major battle that took place near the Tollensee River around 1250 BC. e., in which several thousand well-organized and armed warriors took part. In general, we know of few historical monuments from this period. For the most part, these are mounds containing jewelry in the form of necklaces or bracelets, dishes made of clay or copper. These burial mounds suggest that people were already thinking about the future afterlife, leaving various objects in burials.

In the process of the continuous formation of an ethnic community, which lasted throughout the Bronze Age in Germany, the following ethnic groups appeared: the Celts, who inhabited from the 13th century BC. e. before the Roman invasion, most of Europe; the Veneti, who settled east of the Germans (they completely disappeared from the map of Europe after the Great Migration of Peoples, which began in the 4th century AD); northwestern block - peoples who lived in the territory of modern Netherlands, Belgium, Northern France and Western Germany, speaking languages ​​other than Celtic or Germanic and assimilated by these ethnic groups in the future.

Scientists attribute the formation of the Proto-Germanic ethnic and linguistic community to the 1st millennium BC. e. and is associated with the Jastorf culture, which bordered on the Celtic La Tène culture. The ancient Germans lived in the north of Germany, their closest neighbors were the Celts, who settled in the south. Gradually, starting from the Iron Age, the Germans displaced or assimilated them. By the 1st century BC. e. The Germans settled in lands approximately coinciding with the territory of present-day Germany.

3. Germanic tribes within the Roman Empire.

The ancient Germans, as a single ethnic group, were formed in the northern part of Europe from various tribes who were carriers of the Indo-European language. They led a sedentary life in the lands of Jutland, Scandinavia and in the lower Elbe region. From about the 2nd century BC. e. The Germans begin to move south, displacing the Celts. The Germanic tribes were numerous, but there was no unity among them. They can be divided into groups based on geography. The Batavians, Bructeri, Hamavians, Chatti and Ubii lived between the Rhine, Main and Weser. The Hawks, Angles, Warins, and Frisians settled on the North Sea coast. The Marcomanni, Quadi, Lombards and Semnones inhabited the lands from the Elbe to the Oder. The Vandals, Burgundians and Goths lived between the Oder and the Vistula. The Swions and Gauts established themselves in Scandinavia.

The ancient Germans had a tribal system. The council of warriors at a special meeting chose a leader, after which he was raised on a shield. The ruler was only the first of equals and did not have absolute power; his decrees and decisions could be criticized and challenged. During the war, the tribe is led by a military leader - the duke. The main type of occupation is cattle breeding and internecine wars. The land was collectively owned. The migration of many tribes is very difficult to trace; they often mixed and even changed names. So the Suevi suddenly became Alemanni, Franks and Saxons, the Bavarians will begin their origins from the Bohemian Marcomanni, etc. Over time, they will have common gods and beliefs. They are not afraid of death, because they know that after dying in battle they will go to Valhalla, where Wotan is waiting for them.

The ancient world first learned about the Germans from the writings of the Greek navigator Pytheas from Massalia, who traveled to the shores of the North and Baltic seas. Later, Caesar and Tacitus wrote about the life of the Germanic tribes. The strength and power of Rome's military machine for a long time frightened and instilled fear in the Germans, who were in constant search of new lands, but their collision was only a matter of time. From 58 BC e. to 455 AD e. the territories west of the Rhine and south of the Danube were under the control of the Roman Empire. Moreover, from 80 to 260. n. e. it included part of present-day Hesse and part of modern Baden-Württemberg. Roman possessions on the site of modern Germany were divided into a number of provinces: Upper Germany, Lower Germany and Raetia. During the period of Roman rule, cities such as Trier, Cologne, Bonn, Worms and Augsburg appeared.

Rome first encountered military conflict with the Germans during the invasion of the Cimbri and Teutons in the 2nd century BC. e. (113-101 BC). They moved from Jutland in search of new lands. In 113 BC. e. The Cimbri defeated the Romans in the Danube Alpine province of Noricum. Later, united with the Teutons, they defeated the Romans at the Battle of Arausion. In 102-101 BC. e. Gaius Marius defeated the barbarians, throwing them over the Alps. The second contact occurred already in the 1st century BC. e., after Gaius Julius Caesar subjugated Gaul and went to the Rhine. In 72 BC. e. The Suevi under the command of Ariovistus invade Gaul to support the Celtic tribes in the war against the Aedui allies of the Romans. After Ariovistus defeated them, other Germanic tribes headed to Gaul. In 58 BC. e. Julius Caesar opposed the barbarians and, having defeated them, drove the Germans back across the Rhine. Three years later, Caesar destroyed the Usipete and Tencteri tribes and crossed the Rhine for the first time, after which this river became the natural northwestern border of the Roman Empire for four centuries.

In the second half of the 1st century BC. e. Rebellions often broke out in Gaul, supported by Germanic tribes. The Romans had to invade German lands in order to conduct punitive expeditions against the Germans. The second Roman commander to cross the Rhine was Marcus Agrippa, who founded a fortress on the left bank of the Rhine. In 29 BC e. Guy Carrina fought against the Sueves, who were helping the Gauls, and in 25 BC. e. Marcus Vinicius had already tried to punish the Germans for robbing Roman traders. At 17 or 16 BC. e., Sugambri, Usipetes and Tencteri, again entered the borders of Gaul. It became clear that without decisive action the Germans simply could not be pacified. Octavian Augustus began preparing for a major anti-German campaign, which resulted in a series of operations from 12 BC. e. to 12 n. e., which will be headed by Drusus the Elder and Tiberius. Some tribes were exterminated, their lands were devastated. Drusus advanced to the Elbe, but then died, and Tiberius took his place. However, Rome did not want to annex the poor lands, at the cost of such efforts, and it was decided to create a German kingdom under the protectorate of Rome, which was destined to exist for a short time until Arminius, the Cheruscan leader, rebelled, during which the Romans suffered a crushing defeat in the Teutoburg Forest. The rebels were defeated only in 16 AD. e. after which Arminius was killed by his closest circle. As a result, only Upper and Lower Germany remained under Roman rule. In 69, the Batavians, led by Julius Civilis, rebelled. They captured a number of fortresses along the Rhine. In 70, the rebels were pacified. The new emperor Domitian finally decided not to conquer the poor and inaccessible lands of the Germans. He decided to protect himself from barbarian raids by the Rhine-Danube defensive line, stretching for more than five hundred kilometers. This stopped the migration of unconquered Germanic tribes for a long time and isolated them. In the second half of the 2nd century AD. e. The barbarians crossed the Rhine-Danube border and invaded Italy. In 180, Emperor Commodus managed to make peace with them and agree on the restoration of previous borders. In the 3rd century, Germanic raids on the eastern provinces of the empire resumed, which escalated into the Gothic wars. Emperor Aurelian managed to stop and defeat the Goths on their own lands. On the western border, the Romans were threatened by the Alamanni, who were only held back with the help of the loyal Marcomanni. In the 270s, part of Gaul was captured by the Franks, whom Emperor Probus managed to push out.

In the 4th century, the appearance of the Huns in the steppes of the northern Black Sea region set in motion the Germanic tribes, pressed by the hordes of these nomads. Throughout this century, the Romans held back pressure from the Goths, Alamanni, Franks, and others in the Rhine and Danube region. In some places the Romans were successful, in others they had to cede lands to the barbarians on which they settled, as for example in Thrace. But oppressed by the imperial authorities, they often rebelled. One of the largest happened in 395, under the leadership of the Visigothic leader Alaric, in 410 he even ravaged Rome.

Relations between the Germans and Rome consisted not only of a series of endless wars, but also of mutually beneficial treaties. Rome saw that the Germans were not united and took advantage of this. The Romans realized that it was better to have loyal tribes than to constantly keep legions in the provinces. With the help of the allied Germans, it was possible to restrain other barbarian tribes. Many Germans enlisted in the Roman troops and served in border garrisons, for which they received land. Over time, the Germans appeared among the military elite officers. Some, before becoming leaders of their tribe, managed to succeed in the service of the Romans. Among the first to choose friendship with the Romans were the Frisians and Suevi-Nicretians. Communication was not limited only to military alliances; trade was also carried out. Many items of Roman production: wine, jewelry, silverware, were found by archaeologists in the tombs of German leaders. In turn, Roman merchants imported fish, furs, skins, and amber. Diplomacy did not lag behind; for the loyalty and obedience of this or that leader, Rome paid in gold and silver. Therefore, before the empire fell under their onslaught, which, by the way, was never organized and spontaneous, it had close relations with the Germanic tribes.

V century AD e. became the last in the history of the Roman Empire, which was in a stage of decay and decline. And the main role in this was to be played by the Germanic tribes. The Goths were the first to rush into the empire en masse back in the 4th century, followed by the Franks, Burgundians, and Suevi. Rome could no longer hold many provinces; as soon as the legions left Gaul, the Vandals, Suevi, Alans, and later the Burgundians and Franks came there. In 409 they invaded Spain. The first prototypes of German states began to appear on the fragments of the Roman empire. The Kingdom of the Sueves was located over most of the Iberian Peninsula and lasted until 585. The Visigoths formed their own state in Aquitaine in 418. The Burgundians founded their kingdom in Gaul, which fell in 437 at the hands of the Huns. The Vandals settled on the shores of North Africa, founding the kingdom of the Vandals and Alans. In 455 they temporarily captured Rome. In 451, on the Catalaunian fields in Gaul, the Germans managed to defeat Attila, the leader of the Huns. The Roman emperor became very dependent on the Germanic tribes and in the period from 460 to 470. He even appointed Germans to the post of his military commanders. In 476, Germanic soldiers serving in the Roman army under Odoacer overthrew the last Roman emperor, Romulus Augustus, without installing anyone in his place, marking the end of the Western Roman Empire.

4. History of the German lands until the beginning of the 10th century.

After the Western Roman Empire fell, the Frankish tribes became the strongest and most important among all the Germans. The Kingdom of the Franks was founded by Clovis I of the Merovingian dynasty. He, as the first king of the Franks, began his conquests from Gaul. In the course of further campaigns, the lands of the Alemanni on the Rhine in 496, the possessions of the Visigoths in Aquitaine in 507, and the Franks living along the middle reaches of the Rhine were subjugated. The sons of Clovis defeated the Burgundian leader Godomara in 534, and his kingdom was included in the kingdom of the Franks. In 536, the Ostrogoth leader Witigis ceded Provence to them. Further, the Franks extended their influence to the Alpine territories of the Alemanni and Thuringians between the Weser and the Elbe, as well as the possessions of the Bavarians on the Danube.

The Merovingian state was a loose political entity that did not have economic and ethnic unity. After Clovis's death, his heirs divided the empires, occasionally joining forces for joint military campaigns. There were continuous internecine conflicts, during which power fell into the hands of senior dignitaries of the royal court - the mayordomos. In the middle of the 8th century, Major Pepin the Short, son of the famous Charles Martel, deposed the last ruler of the Merovingian family and himself became a monarch, thus founding the Carolingian dynasty. In 800, Charlemagne, son of Pepin the Short, assumed the title of Roman Emperor. The capital of the empire was the German city of Aachen. At this time, the peak of the power of the Frankish power came. Louis the Pious became the last king of the united Frankish state. He waged endless wars that led the country to crisis. After his death, the empire split into several independent states.

In 843, the grandchildren of Card the Great signed the Treaty of Verdun, according to which the West Frankish kingdom was assigned to Charles the Bald, the Middle Kingdom went to Lothair, and the German part went to Louis the German. It is the East Frankish Kingdom that is considered by scientists to be the first full-fledged German state. It controlled the lands east of the Rhine and north of the Alps. The East Frankish state showed stable development, which led in 870 to the expansion of its borders. The eastern part of Lorraine, including the Netherlands, Alsace and Lorraine proper, were included in its composition. The process of Germans developing the territory along the Elbe, where the Slavs had previously lived, began. Louis the German chose Regensburg as his capital. The German state consisted of five semi-independent duchies: Saxony, Bavaria, Franconia, Swabia and Thuringia (later Lorraine was added). The king did not have absolute power and was dependent on large feudal lords. The peasants still had a number of personal and property freedoms; the process of enslavement began a little later. By the end of the 9th century, the principle of the indivisibility of the power had developed, the throne of which was to be inherited from father to eldest son. In 911, the German Carolingian line ceased to exist, but this did not lead to the transfer of power to the French Carolingians. The East Frankish aristocracy elected the Franconian Duke Conrad I as their king. This secured the rights of the German princes to appoint a successor in the event that the deceased ruler did not have sons to whom the throne could pass. Conrad turned out to be a weak monarch, having practically lost influence on the duchies. After his death in 918, Duke of Saxony Henry I the Birdcatcher (918-936) became king. He led several successful military campaigns against the Hungarians and Danes and erected defensive fortifications to protect Saxony from invading Slavs and Hungarians. Thus, by the 10th century, all the conditions had developed for the creation of a full-fledged German statehood and the formation of its own ruling dynasty, independent of the French Carolingian line.

5. Conclusion.

In this work we examined the early history of Germanic lands and tribes. As we can see, the territory of modern Germany has been the site of ancient man sites since prehistoric times, where traces of various cultures have been found. In the 1st millennium BC. e. Germanic tribes begin to penetrate into central Europe, from Scandinavia, gradually developing these lands and squeezing out the Celts. At the turn of the II-I centuries. BC e. The Germans encounter the Romans for the first time. This confrontation will last for several centuries. The disunity of the Germans will benefit the Romans, who will use this to their advantage. By fighting with some, they will be able to form alliances with others. The beginning of the Huns' invasion of Europe in the 4th century will set in motion the Goths, who will begin to move en masse to the lands of the empire, followed by other tribes. As a result, in the 5th century, the Germans formed their first kingdoms on the fragments of Ancient Rome, which would finally fall at the hands of the same Germans who removed the last emperor. In the future, the leading German tribe would be the Franks, who formed the Frankish state, subjugating other tribes and even Gaul. According to scientists, it will become, in fact, the first full-fledged German state.

6. List of references.

1. A Brief History of Germany / Schulze Hagen - Publisher: Ves Mir, 2004. - 256 p.

2. History of Germany. Volume 1. From ancient times to the creation of the German Empire / Bonwech Bernd - Publisher: Publisher: KDU, 2008. - 644 p.

3. History of Germany / Andre Maurois - Publisher: Azbuka-Atticus, 2017. - 320 p.

4. A Brief History of Germany / James Howes - Publisher: Azbuka-Atticus, 2017. - 370 p.

5. German history. Through the thorns of two millennia / Alexander Patrushev - Publishing house: Publishing House of the International University in Moscow, 2007. - 708 p.

6. German tribes in the wars against the Roman Empire / S. Evseenkov, V. Mityukov, A. Kozlenko - Publisher: Reitar, 2007. - 60 p.

Before considering the very essence of the history of the ancient Germans, it is necessary to define this section of historical science.
The history of the ancient Germans is a section of historical science that studies and tells the history of the Germanic tribes. This section covers the period from the creation of the first German states to the fall of the Western Roman Empire.

History of the ancient Germans
Origin of the ancient Germans

The ancient Germanic peoples as an ethnic group formed on the territory of Northern Europe. Their ancestors are considered to be Indo-European tribes who settled in Jutland, southern Scandinavia and in the Elbe River basin.
Roman historians began to identify them as an independent ethnic group; the first mentions of the Germans as an independent ethnic group date back to monuments of the first century BC. From the second century BC, the tribes of the ancient Germans began to move south. Already in the third century AD, the Germans began to actively attack the borders of the Western Roman Empire.
Having first met the Germans, the Romans wrote about them as northern tribes distinguished by their warlike disposition. Much information about the Germanic tribes can be found in the works of Julius Caesar. The great Roman commander, having captured Gaul, moved west, where he had to engage in battle with the Germanic tribes. Already in the first century AD, the Romans collected information about the settlement of the ancient Germans, about their structure and morals.
During the first centuries of our era, the Romans waged constant wars with the Germans, but they were never completely conquered. After unsuccessful attempts to completely capture their lands, the Romans went on the defensive and carried out only punitive raids.
In the third century, the ancient Germans were already threatening the existence of the empire itself. Rome gave some of its territories to the Germans, and went on the defensive in more successful territories. But a new, even greater threat from the Germans arose during the great migration of peoples, as a result of which hordes of Germans settled on the territory of the empire. The Germans never stopped raiding Roman villages, despite all the measures taken.
At the beginning of the fifth century, the Germans, under the command of King Alaric, captured and plundered Rome. Following this, other Germanic tribes began to move, they fiercely attacked the provinces, and Rome could not protect them, all forces were thrown into the defense of Italy. Taking advantage of this, the Germans captured Gaul, and then Spain, where they founded their first kingdom.
The ancient Germans also performed well in alliance with the Romans, defeating Attila’s army on the Catalaunian fields. After this victory, the Roman emperors began to appoint German leaders as their military leaders.
It was the Germanic tribes led by King Odoacer who destroyed the Roman Empire, deposing the last emperor, Romulus Augustus. On the territory of the captured empire, the Germans began to create their own kingdoms - the first early feudal monarchies of Europe.

Religion of the ancient Germans

All Germans were pagans, and their paganism was different, in different regions, it was very different from each other. However, most of the pagan deities of the ancient Germans were common, they were only called by different names. So, for example, the Scandinavians had a god Odin, and to the West Germans this deity was represented by the name Wotan.
The priests of the Germans were women, as Roman sources say, they were gray-haired. The Romans say that the pagan rituals of the Germans were extremely cruel. The throats of prisoners of war were cut, and predictions were made on the decomposed entrails of prisoners.
The ancient Germans saw a special gift in women and also worshiped them. In their sources, the Romans confirm that each Germanic tribe could have its own unique rituals and its own gods. The Germans did not build temples for the gods, but dedicated any land to them (groves, fields, etc.).

Activities of the ancient Germans

Roman sources say that the Germans were mainly engaged in cattle breeding. They mainly raised cows and sheep. Their craft was only slightly developed. But they had high quality stoves, spears, and shields. Only selected Germans, that is, the nobility, could wear armor.
The clothing of the Germans was mainly made from animal skins. Both men and women wore capes; the richest Germans could afford pants.
To a lesser extent, the Germans were engaged in agriculture, but they had fairly high-quality tools, they were made of iron. The Germans lived in large long houses (from 10 to 30 m), next to the house there were stalls for domestic animals.
Before the great migration of peoples, the Germans led a sedentary way of life and cultivated the land. The Germanic tribes never immigrated of their own free will. On their lands they grew grain crops: oats, rye, wheat, barley.
The migration of peoples forced them to flee their native territories and try their luck in the ruins of the Roman Empire.

In ancient times, the Germans lived on the coast of the Baltic Sea. Scandinavian and Jutland peninsulas. But then, due to the deterioration of the climate, they began to move south. In the first centuries AD, the Germans occupied the lands between the Rhine, Oder and Danube rivers. From the writings of the Roman historian Tacitus we learn about how they lived.
The Germans settled at the edges of forests and along river banks. Over time, they began to surround their villages with a rampart and a ditch. The Germans raised livestock, and later mastered agriculture. They also hunted, fished and gathered. The Germans knew how to smelt iron and forge tools and weapons from it. Craftsmen made carts, boats and ships. Potters made dishes. The Germans have long traded with the Romans.

The Germans lived in families. Families formed a clan. Several clans united into a tribe, and tribes into tribal unions. All members of the tribe were free people, equal to each other. During the war, all the men of the tribe capable of fighting formed the people's militia.

The tribe was initially governed by a popular assembly, which included all adult men of the tribe. At the call of the elders, they gathered to decide whether to declare war, whether to make peace, who to choose as a military leader, how to resolve a dispute between relatives. But then the Germans developed nobility - dukes: elders of clans and military leaders, who began to play the main role at public meetings. They lived in fortified estates, had more livestock and arable land, and took most of the military booty for themselves.

Noble people recruited permanent military detachments - squads. The warriors swore an oath of allegiance to the leader and were obliged to fight for him without sparing their lives. Experienced and skilled warriors, the Germans often raided the Roman Empire. War booty increased the wealth of the nobility, who used the labor of captive slaves. The slave had his own plot of land, from which he gave part of the harvest to his master.

From the end of the 4th century. The Great Migration began. Entire Germanic tribes were removed from their homes and set off to conquer new lands. The impetus for the resettlement was the invasion of the nomadic Huns from the depths of Asia. Under the leadership of the leader Attila, the Huns in the middle of the 5th century. devastated Europe and moved towards Gaul.
In 378, near the city of Adrianople, the Roman army, led by Emperor Valens himself, was completely destroyed by the Visigoths, one of the Germanic tribes. The Empire was never able to recover from this defeat.

It became increasingly difficult for a weakened Rome to restrain the onslaught of the barbarians: the population of the empire was depleted by the exactions of officials and state taxes. Crafts, trade, and the entire economy of the Roman Empire gradually fell into decline. To protect their borders, the Romans began to resort
at the service of mercenaries - the same Germans. But there was little hope for them. In 410, Rome was taken by the Visigoth leader Alaric. True, in 451, in the battle on the Catalaunian fields, the Romans and their allies managed to defeat the army of the Hunnic leader Attila. However, this could no longer save the empire. In 476, as a result of a rebellion raised by the Roman barbarian commander Odoacer, the Western Roman Empire fell.

By the beginning of the 6th century. The Germans settled throughout the Western Roman Empire: in North Africa - the Vandals, in Spain - the Visigoths, in Italy - the Ostrogoths, in Gaul - the Franks, in Britain - the Angles and Saxons and founded their states on these lands.

Etymology of the ethnonym Germans

“The word Germany is new and has recently come into use, for those who were the first to cross the Rhine and drive out the Gauls, now known as the Tungrians, were then called Germans. Thus, the name of the tribe gradually prevailed and spread to the entire people; At first everyone, out of fear, referred to him by the name of the victors, and then, after this name took root, he himself began to call himself Germans.”

According to known data, the term Germans was first used by Posidonius in the 1st half of the 1st century. BC e. for the name of a people who had the custom of washing down fried meat with a mixture of milk and undiluted wine. Modern historians suggest that the use of the word in earlier times was the result of later interpolations. Greek authors, who were little interested in the ethnic and linguistic differences of the “barbarians,” did not distinguish between the Germans and the Celts. Thus, Diodorus Siculus, who wrote his work in the middle of the 1st century. BC e. , refers to the Celts as tribes that already in his time the Romans (Julius Caesar, Sallust) called Germanic.

Truly an ethnonym " Germans"came into circulation in the 2nd half of the 1st century. BC e. after the Gallic wars of Julius Caesar to designate the peoples living east of the Rhine to the Oder, that is, for the Romans it was not only an ethnic, but also a geographical concept.

Origin of the Germans

Indo-Europeans. 4-2 thousand BC e.

According to modern ideas, 5-6 thousand years ago, in the strip from Central Europe and the Northern Balkans to the northern Black Sea region, there was a single ethnolinguistic formation - tribes of Indo-Europeans who spoke a single or at least close dialects of a language, called the Indo-European base language, from which All modern languages ​​of the Indo-European family then developed. According to another hypothesis, the Indo-European proto-language originated in the Middle East and was carried throughout Europe by migrations of related tribes.

Archaeologists identify several early cultures at the turn of the Stone and Bronze Ages, associated with the spread of Indo-Europeans and with which different anthropological types of Caucasians are associated:

By the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC. e. From the ethnolinguistic community of Indo-Europeans, tribes of Anatolians (peoples of Asia Minor), Aryans of India, Iranians, Armenians, Greeks, Thracians and the most eastern branch - the Tocharians, emerged and developed independently. North of the Alps in central Europe, the ethnolinguistic community of ancient Europeans continued to exist, which corresponds to the archaeological culture of burial mounds (XV-XIII centuries BC), which passed into the culture of the fields of burial urns (XIII-VII centuries BC) .

The separation of ethnic groups from the ancient European community can be chronologically traced through the development of individual archaeological cultures.

The south of Scandinavia represents a region where, unlike other parts of Europe, there is a unity of place names belonging only to the Germanic language. However, it is here that a gap is revealed in archaeological development between the relatively prosperous culture of the Bronze Age and the more primitive culture of the Iron Age that replaced it, which does not allow us to draw an unambiguous conclusion about the origin of the Germanic ethnos in this region.

Jastorf culture. 1st millennium BC e.

Direction of migration of Germanic tribes (750 BC - 1st century AD)

In the 2nd half of the 1st millennium BC. e. throughout the entire coastal zone between the mouths of the Rhine and Elbe, and especially in Friesland and Lower Saxony (traditionally classified as primordially Germanic lands), a single culture was widespread, which differed from both the contemporaneous La Tène (Celts) and Jastfor (Germans). The ethnicity of its Indo-European population, which became Germanic in our era, cannot be classified:

“The language of the local population, judging by toponymy, was neither Celtic nor German. Archaeological finds and toponymy indicate that the Rhine was not a tribal border before the arrival of the Romans, and related tribes lived on both sides.”

Linguists made the assumption that the Proto-Germanic language was separated from Proto-Indo-European at the very beginning of the Iron Age, that is, at the beginning of the 1st millennium BC. e., versions also appear about its formation much later, until the beginning of our era:

“It was in recent decades, in the light of the comprehension of new data coming to the disposal of the researcher - material from ancient Germanic toponymy and onomastics, as well as runology, ancient Germanic dialectology, ethnology and history - in a number of works it was clearly emphasized that the isolation of the Germanic linguistic community from the Western the area of ​​the Indo-European languages ​​took place at a relatively late time and that the formation of separate areas of the Germanic linguistic community dates back only to the last centuries before and the first centuries after our era.”

Thus, according to linguists and archaeologists, the formation of the Germanic ethnic group on the basis of Indo-European tribes dates back approximately to the period of the 6th-1st centuries. BC e. and occurred in areas adjacent to the lower Elbe, Jutland and southern Scandinavia. The formation of a specifically Germanic anthropological type began much earlier, in the early Bronze Age, and continued in the first centuries of our era as a result of the migrations of the Great Migration and the assimilation of non-Germanic tribes related to the Germans within the framework of the ancient European community of the Bronze Age.

In the peat bogs of Denmark, well-preserved mummies of people are found, the appearance of which does not always coincide with the classical description by ancient authors of the tall race of Germans. See articles about the man from Tollund and the woman from Elling, who lived on Jutland in the 4th-3rd centuries. BC e.

Genotype of the Germans

Modern ethnic groups are characterized not so much by the predominance of one or another haplogroup (that is, a certain structure of mutation clusters in the male Y chromosome), but rather by a certain proportion of the set of haplogroups among the population. Because of this, the presence of a haplogroup in a person does not determine his genetic affiliation with a particular ethnic group, but indicates the degree of probability of such affiliation, and the probability can be the same for completely different ethnic groups.

Although in Germanic lands it is possible to classify weapons, brooches and other things by style as Germanic, according to archaeologists they go back to Celtic examples of the La Tène period.

Nevertheless, the differences between the settlement areas of the Germanic and Celtic tribes can be traced archaeologically, primarily by the higher level of material culture of the Celts, the spread of oppidums (fortified Celtic settlements), and burial methods. The fact that the Celts and Germans were similar, but not related, peoples is confirmed by their different anthropological structure and genotype. In terms of anthropology, the Celts were characterized by a diverse build, from which it is difficult to choose a typically Celtic one, while the ancient Germans were predominantly dolichocephalic in their skull structure. The genotype of the Celts is clearly limited to haplogroup R1b, and the genotype of the population in the area of ​​origin of the Germanic ethnic group (Jutland and southern Scandinavia) is represented mainly by haplogroups I1a and R1a.

Classification of Germanic tribes

Separately, Pliny also mentions the Gillevions living in Scandinavia and other Germanic tribes (Batavians, Canninephates, Frisians, Frisiavones, Ubii, Sturii, Marsacians), without classifying them.

According to Tacitus the names " ingevons, hermions, istevons"Derived from the names of the sons of the god Mann, the progenitor of the Germanic tribes. After the 1st century, these names are not used; many names of Germanic tribes disappear, but new ones appear.

History of the Germans

Ancient Germans until the 4th century.

The ancient world for a long time knew nothing about the Germans, separated from them by the Celtic and Scythian-Sarmatian tribes. The Germanic tribes were first mentioned by the Greek navigator Pytheas from Massalia (modern Marseille), who during the time of Alexander the Great (2nd half of the 4th century BC) traveled to the shores of the North Sea, and even presumably the Baltic.

The Romans encountered the Germans during the formidable invasion of the Cimbri and Teutones (113-101 BC), who, during the resettlement from Jutland, devastated Alpine Italy and Gaul. Contemporaries perceived these Germanic tribes as hordes of northern barbarians from unknown distant lands. In the descriptions of their morals made by later authors, it is difficult to separate fiction from reality.

The earliest ethnographic information about the Germans was reported by Julius Caesar, who conquered by the middle of the 1st century. BC e. Gaul, as a result of which he reached the Rhine and clashed with the Germans in battles. Roman legions by the end of the 1st century. BC e. advanced to the Elbe, and in the 1st century works appeared that described in detail the settlement of the Germanic tribes, their social structure and customs.

The wars of the Roman Empire with the Germanic tribes began from their earliest contact and continued with varying intensity throughout the first centuries AD. e. The most famous battle was the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in AD 9, when rebel tribes destroyed 3 Roman legions in central Germany. Rome failed to gain a foothold on the Rhine; in the 2nd half of the 1st century, the empire went on the defensive along the Rhine and Danube rivers, repelling German raids and carrying out punitive campaigns into their lands. Raids were carried out along the entire border, but the most threatening direction was the Danube, where the Germans settled along its entire length on its left bank during their expansion to the south and east.

In the 250-270s, the Roman-German wars called into question the very existence of the empire. In 251, Emperor Decius died in a battle with the Goths, who settled in the northern Black Sea region, followed by their devastating land and sea raids into Greece, Thrace, and Asia Minor. In the 270s, the empire was forced to abandon Dacia (the only Roman province on the left bank of the Danube) due to the increased pressure of Germanic and Sarmatian tribes. The empire held out, consistently repelling the attacks of the barbarians, but in the 370s the Great Migration began, during which Germanic tribes penetrated and gained a foothold in the lands of the Roman Empire.

The Great Migration of Peoples. IV-VI centuries

The Germanic kingdoms in Gaul demonstrated their strength in the war against the Huns. Thanks to them, Attila was stopped on the Catalaunian fields in Gaul, and soon the Hunnic empire, which included a number of East German tribes, collapsed. Emperors in Rome itself in 460-470. the commanders were appointed from the Germans, first the Suevian Ricimer, then the Burgundian Gundobad. In fact, they ruled on behalf of their proteges, overthrowing those if the emperors tried to act independently. In 476, German mercenaries, who made up the army of the Western Empire led by Odoacer, deposed the last Roman emperor, Romulus Augustus. This event is formally considered the end of the Roman Empire.

Social structure of the ancient Germans

Social system

According to ancient historians, ancient Germanic society consisted of the following social groups: military leaders, elders, priests, warriors, free members of the tribe, freedmen, slaves. The highest power belonged to the people's assembly, to which all the men of the tribe appeared in military weapons. In the first centuries A.D. e. The Germans had a tribal system at its late stage of development.

“When a tribe wages an offensive or defensive war, then officials are elected who bear the responsibilities of military leaders and have the right to dispose of life and death [members of the tribe] ... When one of the leading persons in the tribe declares in the national assembly his intention to lead [in a military enterprise ] and calls on those who want to follow him to express their readiness for this - then those who approve of both the enterprise and the leader rise up, and, welcomed by those gathered, promise him their help.”

The leaders were supported by voluntary donations from tribe members. In the 1st century, the Germans began to have kings who differed from leaders only in the possibility of inheriting power, which was very limited in times of peace. As Tacitus noted: " They choose kings from the most noble, leaders from the most valiant. But even their kings do not have unlimited and undivided power.»

Economic relations

Language and writing

It is believed that these magical signs became the letters of the runic script. The name of the rune signs is derived from the word secret(Gothic runa: secret), and the English verb read(read) comes from the word guess. The Futhark alphabet, the so-called “senior runes,” consisted of 24 characters, which were a combination of vertical and inclined lines, convenient for cutting. Each rune not only conveyed a separate sound, but was also a symbolic sign carrying semantic meaning.

There is no single point of view on the origin of Germanic runes. The most popular version is that of the runologist Marstrander (1928), who suggested that the runes developed on the basis of an unidentified Northern Italic alphabet, which became known to the Germans through the Celts.

In total, about 150 items are known (weapon parts, amulets, tombstones) with early runic inscriptions of the 3rd-8th centuries. One of the earliest inscriptions ( raunijaz: "tester") on a spearhead from Norway dates back to ca. 200 year. , an even earlier runic inscription is considered to be an inscription on a bone comb preserved in a swamp on the Danish island of Funen. The inscription translates as harja(name or epithet) and dates from the 2nd half of the 2nd century.

Most inscriptions consist of a single word, usually a name, which, in addition to the magical use of runes, results in the inability to decipher about a third of the inscriptions. The language of the oldest runic inscriptions is closest to the Proto-Germanic language and more archaic than Gothic, the earliest Germanic language recorded in written monuments.

Due to its predominantly cultic purpose, runic writing fell out of use in continental Europe by the 9th century, supplanted first by Latin, and then by writing based on the Latin alphabet. However, runes were used until the 16th century in Denmark and Scandinavia.

Religion and Beliefs

see also

• Slavic peoples

Notes

1. Strabo, 7.1.2
2. Tacitus, "On the Origin of the Germans and the Location of Germany"
3. Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, 1966
4. Posidonius (135-51 BC): his fragment (fr. 22) about the Germans from the book. 13 is known in a quotation from Athenaeus (Deipnosophists, 4.153).
5. Schlette F. Frühe Völker in Mitteleuropa. Archäologische Kulturen und ethnische Gemeinschaften des I. Jahrtausends v.u.Z. // Frühe Volker m Mitteleuropa. - Berlin. - 1988.
6. Diodorus in the book. 5.2 mentions the Cimbri tribe, tribes beyond the Rhine, tribes collecting amber. He classifies them all as Celts and Gauls.
7. V. N. Toporov. Indo-European languages. Linguistic encyclopedic dictionary. - M., 1990. - P. 186-189
8. T. I. Alekseeva, Slavs and Germans in the light of anthropological data. VI, 1974, No. 3; V. P. Alekseev, Yu. V. Bromley, On the question of the role of the autochthonous population in the ethnogenesis of the South Slavs. VII International Congress of Slavists. M., 1973
9. The theory of the ancient European linguistic community was formulated in the mid-20th century by the German linguist G. Krahe based on an analysis of ancient European hydronyms (river names).
10. Pure toponomics characterizes both the autochthony of the population in a given territory and the seizure of this territory by force, associated with the destruction or expulsion of the indigenous population.
11. A. L. Mongait. Archeology of Western Europe. Bronze and Iron Ages. Ch. Germans. Ed. "Science", 1974
12. Periodization of the Early Iron Age of Germany based on materials from excavations in Lower Saxony: Belldorf, Wessenstaedt (800-700 BC), Tremsbüttel (700-600 BC), Jastorf (600-300 BC) AD), Ripdorf (300-150 BC), Seedorf (150-0 BC).
13. A. L. Mongait. Archeology of Western Europe. Bronze and Iron Ages. Ed. "Science", 1974, p. 331
14. G. Schwantes. Die Jastorf-Zivilisation. - Reinecke-Festschnft. Mainz, 1950: the emergence of the linguistic community of the Germans dates back to no earlier than the middle of the 1st millennium BC. e.
15. A. L. Mongait. Archeology of Western Europe. Bronze and Iron Ages. Ed. "Science", 1974, p. 325
16. " Family Tree DNA R1a Project

THE WORLD OF THE ANCIENT GERMANS

Settlement scheme of Germanic tribes

The Germans, a motley mixture of different tribes, received their name, the meaning of which remains unclear, from the Romans, who in turn probably took it from the language of the Celts. The Germans came to Europe from Central Asia and in the second millennium BC. e. settled between the Vistula and Elbe, in Scandinavia, Jutland and Lower Saxony. They almost did not engage in agriculture, but mainly carried out military campaigns and predatory raids, during which they gradually settled over increasingly vast territories. At the end of the 2nd century. BC e. The Cimbri and Teutones appeared on the borders of the Roman Empire. The Romans at first mistook them for Gauls, that is, Celts, but quickly noticed that they were dealing with a new and hitherto unknown people. Already half a century later, Caesar in his Notes definitely distinguished between the Celts and the Germans.

But while most Celts were largely assimilated into the Greco-Roman civilization, the situation was different with the Germans. When the ancient Roman historian Tacitus, after many unsuccessful campaigns of the Roman legions across the Rhine, wrote his famous book about the Germans, he depicted an alien barbarian world, from which, however, emanated the charm of simplicity of morals and high morality, in contrast to the licentiousness of the Romans. However, Tacitus, who condemned the vices of the Romans, most likely exaggerated the virtues of the Germans, arguing that they were “a special people who retained their original purity and were only similar to themselves.”

According to Tacitus, the Germans lived in small settlements scattered among dense forests, swamps and sandy wastelands overgrown with heather. Their society was built on a hierarchical principle and consisted of nobility, free commoners, semi-free litas and unfree shawls. Only the last two groups, which included previously captured captives and their offspring, were engaged in agriculture. Some of the larger tribes began to have elected kings who claimed that their ancestors were descended from the gods. Other tribes were led by military leaders or dukes, whose power did not claim divine origin.

The Germans revered gods, ideas about which underwent changes. Often, as a result of inter-tribal clashes, the victors appropriated the gods of the defeated tribe, as if capturing them. The Germanic gods surprisingly resembled mere mortals. They were not alien to such feelings as anger and rage; they were distinguished by a warlike spirit, experienced passions and even died. The main one is the warrior god Wotan, who reigns in the afterlife Valhalla, where warriors killed in battle end up. Among other gods, the lord of thunder and lightning Thor (Donar) with his terrible hammer, the cunning and insidious god of fire Loki, the beautiful god of spring and fertility Balder, stood out. They all live in a world of blood and fire, rage and revenge, fury and horror, in a world where everyone is controlled by an inevitable fate. The gods of the Germans plotted and committed crimes, suffered defeats and won victories. The gloomy poetry of the first song of the ancient German epic “Edda” depicts the invasion of dark forces, in the fight against which gods and people die. Everything disappears in an all-consuming great fire. But then the renewed world will be reborn, the bright Balder will return from the kingdom of the dead, and a time of peace and abundance will come.

The picture, created by the Germans themselves, reflects the difficulties they encountered on the path of their Christianization. It took a powerful external and internal revolution before the idea of ​​a loving and compassionate God, the idea of ​​mercy and forgiveness, replaced the old world of cruel struggle, in which only honor or shame were known.

German mythology tells us about a people who lived in conditions of harsh and poor nature. It was a world ruled by spirits and hidden forces, where evil and good dwarfs and giants lived, but there were no muses and sylphs. However, the role of women both in society and in religion among the Germans was much more significant than in the ancient world. For the Germans, there was something prophetic and sacred hidden in a woman. It is impossible to imagine the warlike and powerful German Brünnhilde locked in the gyneceum. Only supernatural forces and Siegfried's magic belt were able to pacify her.

The Germans entered the scene of history when they left their northern settlements and began to move south. They not only displaced or assimilated the local Celtic-Illyrian population, but also adopted their higher culture. By the time of Caesar's reign, the Germans in the west reached the banks of the Rhine, in the south they broke through the Thuringian mountains and descended into Bohemia, in the east they stopped before the impassable swamps between the Vistula and Pripyat.

What reasons prompted the Germans to migrate? This question can only be answered tentatively. First of all, we must take into account climate changes associated with a sharp cooling in southern Scandinavia. A decrease in temperature by an average of one or two degrees over the course of one century leads to such a change in flora and fauna that people’s life, already difficult, becomes unbearable. Subjective motives also played a role - the thirst for conquest, the extraction of wealth and warlike inclinations, which were also mixed with religious ideas.

The advance of the Germans to the south was not straightforward and steady. Between the time when the Cimbri and Teutones appeared on the Roman border, and the era during which the ancestors of the German people - the tribes of the Franks, Saxons, Thuringians, Swabians, Bavarians - settled their territories, seven centuries of wars and conflicts lay. Most of the tribes disappeared into the darkness of the past. Usually these were temporary associations for military campaigns, which arose as quickly as they disintegrated. Since there was not enough food, nomadic tribes and groups remained small. The largest ethnic groups of the era of resettlement usually numbered several tens of thousands of warriors, and together with women, children, old people and slaves, their number fluctuated between 100–120 thousand people.

The Cherusci tribe, which settled Westphalia, was widely known. One of their leaders was the famous Herman (the Latinized form of the name is Arminius), who led the fight against Rome. In his youth, he was brought up in this city, participated in the campaigns of the Roman legions and even received Roman citizenship under the name Gaius Julius Arminius. In 9 AD e. he completely defeated three legions of the proconsul Publius Varus in the Teutoburg Forest. This is generally believed to have put an end to Emperor Augustus' plans to push the Roman frontier to the Elbe. Strictly speaking, the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest was just one of countless border clashes. And subsequently, the Romans repeatedly tried to reach the banks of the Elbe, but all their campaigns were unsuccessful. Rome eventually ended the unsuccessful and costly war and began to fortify the border along the Danube and Rhine. The southwestern part of Germany from Koblenz to Regensburg, still inhabited by wild Celts, and mainly by bears, wild boars and deer, remained in his power. Along the entire border, the Romans built a limes - a fortified rampart with ditches and watchtowers, which took more than a hundred years to build.

It was not the Romans who succeeded in conquering the Germanic tribes, but the creator of a new empire that stretched from Spanish Barcelona to Magdeburg, from the mouth of the Rhine to Central Italy, the Frankish king, and then Emperor Charlemagne (747–814). In Carolingian Germany, a class-status system gradually developed, in which a person’s position was determined by his origin and occupation. The majority of peasants slowly but steadily turned into semi-dependent, and then personally unfree people. In those troubled times, the institution of “guardianship” became widespread, when peasants voluntarily came under the authority of a master who promised them protection and patronage.

Division of Charlemagne's empire by the Treaty of Verdun in 843

Charlemagne's empire collapsed after the death of his successor Louis the Pious in 840. Charles's grandchildren, according to the Treaty of Verdun in 843, divided the empire into three parts.

For a long time, in historical literature there was no clear distinction between the concepts of “Germanic”, “Frankish” and “German”. Even today in popular works there is a statement that the “first German emperor” was Charlemagne. However, the Carolingian Empire was, as it were, the common ancestor of modern France and Germany. But even today it has not been possible to determine a generally accepted date from which “German history” can be traced. Some scientists, as before, take the Treaty of Verdun as a starting point; in the latest works, the formation of the German state dates back to the 11th and even 12th centuries. It is probably impossible to determine the exact date at all, since the transition from the Carolingian East Frankish state to the medieval German empire was not a one-time event, but a long process.