; 1. Herminones, termed Hermiones by Pliny, comprehended among them four tribes or races: the Suevi, including probably the Quadi and the Marcomann, joined in the Suevic kingdom of Maroboduus; the Hermunduri, ancestors of the Thuringithe Chatti; and the Cherusci. To these tribes mentioned by authors among the Herminones some others are added, supposed to have belonged with them to the same Upper German stock or to the class of nations by whom the High German dialects were spoken. The principal of these are the Sigambri, the Batavi, the Tubantes, the Lygian nations in the eastern part of Germany, to whom the Vandals were allied, and the Bastarnians, still further eastward than the Lygians. The countries inhabited by all these nations are situated inland or towards the centre of Germany, in their relative position compared with the remaining tribes, who are either nearer to the German Ocean and the Baltic, or in remote parts towards the north-east, in the territories lately belonging to Poland and Old Prussia. 2. The Ingævones are placed by Tacitus near the ocean. They were the inhabitants of the west and north-west of Germany. Pliny enumerated among these tribes the Cimbri; the Teutones, supposed to be the Jutes, to the eastward of the Oder; and the "Chaucorum gentes," further westward, on the coast of the German Ocean towards the Ems. These are the people to whom the Low German dialects belonged; but the enumeration of the tribes is, as we shall find, very defective. 3. The Istævones of Tacitus are supposed by M. Zeuss to be the tribes comprehended in the class of German nations termed by Pliny "Vindili," whose name probably meant people of the sea-coast. The Vindili are nations inhabiting the coast near the mouth of the Vistula and the eastern part of the Baltic countries, which were afterwards occupied by Slavic and other races foreign to the Teutonic blood. They were the Guttones, Gothones, whose language is preserved in the MosoGothic version, for there is scarcely a doubt that the Gothones are the people who, having migrated to the southward, were afterwards known as Goths. The Burgundiones were ancient neighbours of the Goths; they were on this side of the Vistula: the abode of the Varini and Carini is not ascertained. 4. The Hilleviones or Scandinavian nations, of whom the different tribes are enumerated by Ptolemy, claim the fourth German language, or the Old Norse. The outline thus sketched may suffice for showing that the principal divisions of the Germanic nations as marked out by the ancient traditions of the people, and handed down to us by Roman writers, coincide in a general point of view with the distribution of races which the German dialects display. I shall now attempt to give a more particular account of the several groupes of nations, and of the geographical positions of each tribe. In this I must incur the risk of furnishing a somewhat tedious catalogue of names, which, however, is necessary for elucidating the history of ancient Germany, and for laying a groundwork for further researches into the origin and connection of the nations of modern Europe. SECTION II. Of the early Abodes and History of the Tribes belonging to each of the great Branches of the German Race. Modern writers who have treated on the geographical divisions of Germany and the position of the different German tribes, such as Cluverius, D'Anville, Mascou, Mannert, Luden, and Reichard, have collected and compared the notices regarding their history left by ancient authors. A later and more successful attempt to elucidate this subject is to be found in the work of M. Zeuss, who seems to have exhausted all the resources that can be brought to bear upon it. In the following enumeration I shall nearly follow his arrangement. Paragraph 1.-Nations of the Oberland or Highland of ancient Germany. The following German nations mentioned by the ancient writers inhabited the inland and higher countries. They appear, as far as can be collected from relics of their idioms, and from the orthographical construction of proper names belonging to them, to have spoken High-German dialects. They are supposed to have been comprehended in the division of Ger man tribes termed by Pliny and Tacitus Hermiones and Herminones. M. Zeuss has enumerated these tribes under the following divisions: 1. The Sigambri and some other tribes who inhabited the high country on the Rhine from the neighbourhood of Neuwied upwards. 2. The Chatti and Hermunduri in Hessia and Thuringia. 3. The Cherusci and other neighbouring tribes in the country between the Upper Weser and the Elbe, occupying the territories of Brunswick Luneburg, and the adjoining tracts, in the southern part of Lower Saxony. 4. The Marcomanni and other nations in Bohemia and its borders. 5. The Lygian tribes, between Bohemia and the Vistula, in the modern Silesia and the Duchy of Posen. 6. The Bastarnian tribes beyond the Vistula and near the Carpathian mountains. A. Of the Sigambri and the neighbouring tribes. 1. The Sigambri, a powerful German tribe in the time of Cæsar, are placed by that writer "proximi Rheno."* They are supposed to be the Gambrivii of Tacitus,† and the Gama briuni of Strabo, and occupied the first hill country on the right bank of the Rhine near Neuwied.§ Subdued by the Romans they were transplanted to the left bank of the Rhine, where they occur under the name of Guberni, between the Ubii and Batavi, opposite the mouth of the Ruhr, in the neighbourhood of Meurs. 2. The Marsi, a tribe of obscure history, hardly distinguishable from the Sigambri, are mentioned by Tacitus with the Gambrivii.¶ Neither of these tribes is mentioned after the time of Ptolemy by their old names : under those of Franci and Salii, they became formidable to the Romans. 3. Ubii, to the southward of the Sigambri, before the time of Cæsar "civitas ampla atque florens."** They were removed by the Romans to the country about Cologn.++ 4. Usipii, Tencteri, Tubantes, inhabited, after the defeat of Varus, the country on both sides of the Lippe.‡‡ Ptolemy * Cæsar, Bell. Gall. vi. 35. ‡ Taμabpiovvoi, Strab. vii. p. 291. See M. Zuess, p. 83. Strabo generally terms them Σούγαμβροι, Sugambri; and Ptolemy Σύγαμβροι. Late writers term them Sicambri. Tacit. Germ. ii. § Zeuss, p. 83. || Strabon, lib. vii. p. 290. Tacit. Ann. lib. i. c. 56. ¶ Strabo expressly terms them a part or section of the Sugambri. ** Bell. Gall. iv. c. 3. †† Tacit. Ann. 12. 27. Germ. 28. ‡‡ Tacit. Ann. i. 60. places the Tencteri near the Sieg, and the Tubantes southward further from the Rhine. All these three tribes seem to have been absorbed into the mass of people who appear under the later name of Alemanni.* 5. Ampsivarii, driven by the Chauci from territories on the Lower Rhine, sought the refuge of many other expelled tribes on the bank of the Rhine to the northward of the Lippe.† They appear in later times, in conjunction with the Chatti, as forming a considerable portion of the Franks. 6. Chamavi in earlier times occupied the same region as the Usipii and Tubantes ;+ placed by Tacitus to the southward of the Frisii; by Ptolemy in a later time, joined with the powerful tribe of Cherusci in the country reaching towards the Hartz mountains. They were joined afterwards to the Franks. 7. Bructeri, divided into Greater and Less by the river Ems, on the banks of which they are placed by Tacitus and by Ptolemy.§ B. Chatti and Hermunduri, and the neighbouring Tribes. To the eastward of the Sigambri Cæsar mentions only Suevi. The Suevi of Cæsar are soon afterwards termed Chatti and Hermunduri. Cæsar describes an extensive desert to the southward of the Suevi: thence the old Celtic inhabitants had been expelled; this was the country settled by the Romans under the name of the Agri Decumates. Beyond the latter Tacitus places the Chatti.¶ The Chatti occupied an extensive country of triangular form, one corner reaching to Mount Taunus on the Rhine, one to the Upper Werra, and the third below the Diemel.** The Mattiaci ++ were a small tribe near Mount Taunus,+ at the "Heissen Brunnen," Hot Springs. The Chattuarii, indicated by their name to be a section of the Chatti, as well as the Batavi and Caninefates, who are declared by Tacitus§§ to have been descended from the same people, inhabited, as it appears, the islands of the Rhine. * Zeuss, p. 90. Tac. ibid. Germ. 34. || Bell. Gall. vi. 10. Tacit. Ann. B. c. 55, 56. § Ann. i. 60. Strabo, vii. p. 291. ++ Mattiacum, with a Celtic termination, was a name originating probably, as Zeuss conjectures, with the neighbouring Celts, calidi trans Rhenum." (Plin. 31, 2.) Plin. N. H. li. 2. "Mattiaci in Germania, fontes §§ Tac. Hist. iv. 12. 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.tt 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 |