Drinkwater J.F. The Alamanni and Rome 213-496 (Caracalla to Clovis)
Подождите немного. Документ загружается.
Burgundians. The Burgundians occur much earlier than the
Alamanni in the Greco-Roman sources, and played a much more
direct role in European history.153 To deal w ith their later develop-
ment Wrst, in 411, in the chaos which followed the Vandal/Alan/
Suebian invasion of 406/7, a number of Burgundians crossed the
Rhine and supported the elevation of the ephemeral Gallo-Roman
usurper, Jovinus, at Mainz.154 In 413, following the fall of Jovinus,
they were granted territory across the middle Rhine in Gaul, prob-
ably in the vicinity of Mainz.155 This Wrst Burgundian kingdom lasted
until 436, when it was destroyed by the imperial general Ae
¨
tius
and his Hunnic allies.156 Around 443, the sur viving Burgundians
were resettled by Ae
¨
tius in Savoy, nor th of Geneva.157 The second
Burgundian kingdom went on to become a major force in Wfth-
century Gaul, being the only countervailing force to the Visigoths
who were threatening to take over the country. Like the Alamanni
from 496/7, and the Visigoths in 507, in 534 the Burgundians fell
victim to the late expansion of Frankish power.158
We Wnd Burgundians mentioned for the Wrst time in the Wrst
century ad, when Pliny the Elder described them as being part of
the Vandal nation. A century or so later, Ptolemy located them east of
the Semnones, between the middle Oder and the Vistula159 (Fig . 5).
In the later third century, Probus is reported as having fought with
Burgundians and Vandals, probably on the river Lech (running
north, past Augsburg, into the Danube).160 An imperial panegyric
of 289 describes Burgundians, alongside Alamanni and others, raiding
into Gaul. However, a similar speech of 291 tells of deep hostilities
153 Indispensable for what follows is Anton (1981). See now also Favrod (1997)
and Wood (2003).
154 For full discussion of these events, see below 321, 324.
155 Anton (1981: 239–40); Pohl (2002a: 156): near, but not at, Mainz, since there
remained a regular Roman military presence on the Rhine (below 327), and deWnitely
not in Worms.
156 Anton (1981: 231–5).
157 Anton (1981: 241); Wood (1994: 8); Pohl (2002a: 157–8).
158 Anton (1981: 245–6).
159 Pliny, Nat. Hist. 4.99; Ptolemy, Geog. 2.11.8. Goetz and Welwei (1995: 1.108–9,
180–3); Anton (1981: 235–6); Germanen (1986: 361).
160 Zosimus 1.68.1–2. Cf. above 79; Paschoud (1971: 175); Germanen (1986:
371–2); Pohl (2002a: 155).
108 Settlement
between Burgundians and Alamanni over territory, the former
provoking Werce reprisals by the latter.161 By the later fourth century,
indeed, according to Ammianus Marcellinus, the Burgundians
had become the permanent neighbours of the Alamanni, and
intractable enemies, as a result of their laying claim to salt springs
and other territory.162 It was this animosity that, in 370, enabled
Valentinian I to recruit the Burgundians as allies in his vendetta
against Macrianus.163
Though he mentions the Burgundians only in passing, Ammianus
may be taken as suggesting that Burgundian identity was built
around a ‘kernel of tradition’, manifested in the institutions of a
temporary sacred king (hendinos) and a permanent chief priest
(sinistus).164 This, together with their early appearance in the sources,
hints that, unlike the Alamanni, the Burgundians were a true ‘people’,
a discrete gens, and that their appearance near the Rhine was
the result of authentic migration. However, there are indications
that this is not the case. ‘Burgundian’ appears to have been a general
description of a varied and Wssile set of groupings of which the
‘western’ Burgundians were only a part.165 Indeed, there are signs
in Ammianus that by the mid-fourth century the identity of this
western group was being manipulated by Rome for the Empire’s own
ends. Ammianus tells us that the prime reason why the Burgundians
helped Valentinian against Macrianus was that they were convinced
that they were sprung from ancient Roman stock.166 As most scholars
now agree, this descent is likely to have been an invention of
Roman diplomacy.167 Their use of a sacred kingship has also been
questioned.168
161 Pan. Lat. 2[Galletier](10).5.1; 3(11).17.3. Cf. below 190.
162 AM 28.5.11: salinarum Wniumque causa Alamannis saepe iurgabant.
163 AM 28.5.8–11. Cf. below 305–6.
164 AM 28.5.14; cf. above 45. Anton (1981: 240–1).
165 Anton (1981: 236–7). Cf. Haberstroh (2000a: 130); Favrod (1997: 39, 44).
166 AM 28.5.11: pr ima quod iam inde a temporibus priscis subolem se esse
Romanam.
167 Anton (1981: 238); Matthews (1989: 310); Wood (1990: 58). Matthews notes
how this story was taken to fanciful etymological extremes by Orosius (Hist.
7.32.11–12), ‘perhaps making the best of a bad job’.
168 Pohl (2002a: 155–6); Wood (2003: 244). Cf. GoVart (2002: 64).
Settlement 109
Overall, the evidence suggests that the western Burgundians were
not a full tribe but rather, at best, a splinter of a tribe. This had
managed to preserve its name and something of its culture, but
found itself adrift in a sea of wider ethnogenesis. In other words,
‘the Burgundians’ consisted of a group of warrior-bands among
other warrior-bands.169 However, while most of these others were
Elbgermanic in culture, the Burgundians were eastern Germani and
so harder to absorb. This made them dangerous to Alamanni
and Romans alike, but also, because they were diVerent, accessible
and useful to Rome as a counterweight to the Alamanni. This
would explain the ‘special relationship’ between Romans and
Burgundians. (The survivors of Probus’ victory over the Burgundians
and Vandals were sent to Britain, presumably as troops, and these
and their descendants may have acted as useful contacts with ‘free’
Burgundians.170)
Probus faced the western Burgundians in Raetia. Ammianus’
Burgundians are, however, further north. There is general agreement
as to where they were to be found, based on two passages in Ammianus.
The Wrst concerns the dispute between Alamanni and Burgundians
over salt springs. This would put the area of contention in the
Kocher valley, the site of a Xourishing medieval salt industry, with its
centre at Schwa
¨
bisch-Hall171 (Fig. 4). The second is to do with Julian’s
campaign of 359. Having marched across Alamannia, Julian’s forces
reached an area where ‘boundary stones’ (terminales lapides) marked
the borders of ‘Romans’ and ‘Burgundians’.172 These boundary stones
are currently usually associated with the old limes, which crossed
the Kocher between the forts of Jagsthausen and O
¨
hringen. It is
assumed that the Burgundians were settled just to the east of its line,
north of Schwa
¨
bisch-Hall, between the Kocher and the Main.173 Such
an interpretation is debatable. Support for the association of the
boundary stones with the limes has been sought in the name that
169 ‘Group’ because Ammianus speciWcally mentions ‘kings’, in the plural
(e.g. 28.5.10).
170 Zosimus 1.68.3; for possible fourth-century Alamannic links, see below 206.
171 Anton (1981: 287); cf. below 134.
172 AM 18.2.15.
173 Anton (1981: 237–8); Germanen (1986: 372–3); Matthews (1989: 307–10);
Lorenz, S. (1997: 60–1).
110 Settlement
Ammianus gives the region: ‘Palas or Capellatii’. It has been proposed
that the former was derived from palus, ‘stake’ or ‘paling’.174 But the
argument is tenuous and unable to explain Ammianus’ reference to
‘boundary stones’ which, whatever these were, cannot mean any sort of
wall. There is also the question as to whom the boundary stones
separated. The manuscript tradition has ‘Romans and Burgundians’,
but this is odd of a region deep in Alamannia a century after Roman
withdrawal. Since the sixteenth century, some have preferred to read
‘Alamanni and Burgundians’.175 However, the use of ar tiWcial markers
was infrequent between Germani. When such demarcation occurs, it is
based on linear earthworks;176 boundary stones (horoi/termini) were a
feature of Mediterranean society. The current trend is to revert to
‘Romans’.177 But who were these? One answer is that they were a
residual Roman population.178 However, the Celto-Roman popula-
tion of the area was probably very quickly expelled or absorbed; and
coin-Wnds are rare along the southern stretch of the old limes, which
suggests only a few visitors from the imperial population exploiting the
area’s resources.179 The alternative is that ‘Romans’ is a reference not to
a particular set of people but to the totality of the Empire, which still
saw itself and was still recognized by Germani as exercising nominal
sovereignty over the region.180
Interaction between Romans and Burgundians therefore probably
took place somewhat further north than is usually accepted. Julian’s
march of 359 is likely to have taken him north-eastwards, reaching
the Burgundians on the middle Main, between the old Roman forts
of Großkrotzenburg and Miltenberg, which in their day had policed a
river, not an artiWcial, frontier181 (Fig. 21). Such a point of contact is
more suited to Ammianus’ narrative. His terminales lapides do not
conjure up a picture of a palisaded limes but one of an open area in
174 Matthews (1989: 309–10 and n.9); Lorenz, S. (1997: 60 and n.227).
175 Matthews (1989: 308 and n.8); cf. Lorenz, S. (1997: 61 and n.229).
176 e.g. Tacitus, Annales 2.19.3 (the agger separating Angrivarii and Cherusci).
177 Anton (1981: 237); Lorenz (1997: 61 n.228).
178 Anton (1981: 237).
179 Below 127, 129–30, 136.
180 Witschel (1999: 212 and n.159). Cf. below 132, 190, 299. Since, as Isaac (1992:
396) points out, imperial boundary markers are otherwise unknown, these are best
seen as demarcating ‘provincial’ and ‘client’ territory.
181 Below 249.
Settlement 111
which people were warned oV, not fenced oV, from each other. This
puts the western edge of main Burgundian settlement on the Main,
between the line of the old limes and the Tauber, in a region which
had been occupied by Germani until the disruption of the third
century.182 Burgundians settled on the middle Main might expand
downriver to Mainz, a possibility of concern to local Alamanni
and Romans in Gaul, and the more so for the latter because of
their continuing presence east of the Rhine. I propose that the
boundary stones were set up by the Empire across the Main corridor
as a means of controlling the area.183
To what degree is this mainly historical reconstruction supported
by the archaeological evidence? If early Alamannic archaeology is
diYcult, Burgundian is worse. In the one place that we can be fairly
sure from the literary sources that the Burgundians were present at
some stage in the fourth century, the Kocher valley, no artefacts or
sites have been identiWed as belonging to them.184 Most of the little
material we have comes from funerar y deposits and presents the
usual diYculties of interpretation. However, it is suggestive.
There is a small number of burials characterized by weapon-
deposits, including swords, in the case of males, and by jewellery and
toilet articles, in the case of females, and dated to the period from the
later third to the early Wfth century. These are found from the middle
Main down to the Rhine conXuence, up the Rhine to the Neckar, and
acrossthe Rhine into northern Gaul. Apartfrom the factthat those who
made them practised inhumation as opposed to cremation, they show
close aYnities to grave-clusters between the Elbe and the Vistula.185
(The deposition of useable weaponry was, in this period, not part of
Alamannic funerary rites. Instead, we Wnd two or three token arrow-
heads, in bronze or silver (Fig. 15).186) The idea that weapon-burials
resulted from Roman practices moving eastwards appears to have been
abandoned.187 Currently, thereseems to bea reversionto the older view
182 Schach-Do
¨
rges (1997: 96 and Fig. 81); Steidl (1997), (2000).
183 Cf. below 190 for the proposal that such stones were originally set up by
Maximian; cf. Ho
¨
ckmann (1986: 379).
184 Cf. Steidl (1997: 76).
185 Schulze-Do
¨
rrlamm (1985: 548–9, 552–6 and Figs 1, 32–4); Schach-Do
¨
rges
(1997: 88, 94 and Fig. 78); Martin (1997b: 163–4 and Fig. 163).
186 Quast (1997: 186–7); cf. below 341–2.
187 Schulze-Do
¨
rrlamm (1985: 509–10, 549, 555).
112 Settlement
that these graves reXect Eastgermanic customs spreading westwards,
but responding to Roman in Xuence by substituting inhumation for
cremation.188 However, there is debate over the mechanisms of such
movement. Steuer proposes that all we can see is a new form of funeral
rite travelling westwards along an ancient line of communication.189
Schulze-Do
¨
rrlamm, on the other hand, concludes that the graves
reXect some movement of individuals or groups—in particular,
Burgundians, but sometimes Vandals—along an established
east–west route.190 Given what the literary sources say about the
presence of Burgundians near or in the Rhine–Main area from the
late third to the early Wfth century, the latter explanation is preferable.
More recent work has revealed the introduction of artefacts
of an Eastgermanic character in the middle and upper Main
188 Schulze-Do
¨
rrlamm (1985: 509–10, 549–51).
189 Steuer (1998: 286–7 and Fig. 1).
190 Schulze-Do
¨
rrlamm (1985: 509–10, 549, 555–6, 561).
Fig. 15 Elbgermanic and Eastgermanic grave-goods c.300–400 [from
Schach-Do
¨
rges (1997: 94 Fig. 78); ß Archa
¨
ologisches Landesmuseum
Baden-Wu
¨
rttemberg].
Settlement 113
valley, between the old limes and the Regnitz region, from the late
third century. These have been identiWed as Burgundian, and used to
locate the heartland of the Burgundian presence on the middle
Main.191 The small hill-site at Wettenburg, Mainschleife-bei-Urphar
(3), founded in the later fourth century on the Main beyond the old
limes line, has been interpreted as an important Burgundian
‘Herrschaftszentrum’.192 Roman, or Roman-style, artefacts (in par-
ticular, terra nigra pottery) found here and throughout the area
reXect signiWcant contact with the Empire.193 The spread of East-
germanic artefacts deep into the upper Main–Regnitz region during
the fourth century has been interpreted as reXecting the expansion of
Burgundian inXuence (though not Burgundian conquest) upstream
into Elbgermanic areas.194
The archaeology of the Main–Regnitz region appears to support
the hypothesis that the heartland of western Burgundian settlement
was on the middle Main, and conWrms the idea of the Main corridor
as an artery of communication.195 The artefacts indicate the ability of
the Burgundians to extend their military and political inXuence
eastwards; and some burials are suYciently late to conWrm the
impression given by the literary sources of Burgundian movement
westwards, as far as the Mainz bridgehead, in the late fourth and early
Wfth century.196 A thinning-out of settlement in the upper Main–
Regnitz area has been associated with this movement, though other
late Wnds suggest that not all were involved. Some may have remained
on the middle Main into the Wfth century, while the region reverted
to Elbgermanic control.197
The presence of ambitious Burgundians must have unsettled local
Alamanni. No wonder there was friction. Disputes over salt were
probably the manifestation, not the direct cause, of mutual suspicion.
191 See the works cited by Haberstroh (2000a: 29). Haberstroh (132) himself
prefers the neutral ‘Eastgermanic’ to ‘Burgundian’ (while not expressly ruling out
the latter), and a slightly later date—from c.300.
192 Steuer (1990: 150), (1997: 158); Haberstroh (2000a: 133), citing Rosenstock.
Cf. above 94.
193 Haberstroh (2000a: 131–2).
194 Ibid.
195 Haberstroh (2000a: 13, 131–2).
196 Martin (1997b: 164). Cf. below 174, 324.
197 Haberstroh (2000a: 133); Steuer (1990: 150), (1997: 158).
114 Settlement
Burgundians may also have disrupted Alamannic life along the
Main by inviting further Roman interference. From the Roman
viewpoint, the lower Main had to be guarded as an important
transverse route to and from the Empire.198 To manage the area
Rome relied mainly on agreements with incoming Elbe- Germani,
but this was not entirely suYcient. In addition, therefore, Rome
sent regular patrols into the region, indicated by coin-Wnds on the
main routes; and, as in the case of boundary markers, in certain areas
made deals with neighbouring Burgundian communities. Funerary
archaeology suggests that individual Eastgermanic warriors were also
brought in.
The dangers of identifying the ethnicity of the occupant of a single
burial site are increasingly being recognized. ‘Diagnostic’ artefacts
might just as easily be objects of desire, acquired through travel or by
purchase.199 Again, however, one must be pragmatic. The graves
concerned are very distinctive, and can be related to the wider
Burgundian settlement pattern. As Schulze-Do
¨
rrlamm and Stribrny
propose, they probably indicate the movement of East-Germani who
came to serve in the Roman army.200 For burials west of the Rhine,
this is unexceptionable. The regular use of Germanic troops by Rome
began in the third century and continued well into the Wfth.201 A
complication is that certain patterns of grave-goods suggest that
some individuals may have served in the Roman army on the Danube
before being posted to the Rhine/Main area,202 which suggests that
they did not come down the Main corridor into Gaul. This need not
detain us here; the phenomenon may result from individuals’
acquiring ‘exotic’ possessions b y trav el or purchase, as noted. The main
puzzle springs from weapon-burials found east of the Rhine, in
Alamannia, which amount to just over half (10/19) of pertinent
sites. These could belong to men who had died on active service or
while returning home after retirement, but this is unlikely. In
this respect, the most suggestive site is that of Ebel-bei-Praunheim/
Frankfurt, with its native farm and associated Eastgermanic grave of
198 Cf. above 51, below 190.
199 Cf. Bowlus (2002: 253); Brather (2002: 173); Pohl (2002b: 236).
200 Schulze-Do
¨
rrlamm (1985: 561); Stribrny (1989: 432).
201 See above 73–4; below 327.
202 Schulze-Do
¨
rrlamm (1985: 553–5, 561).
Settlement 115
a man, probably a Burgundian, who had served in Gaul before dying
and being buried in Alamannia.203 This has a look of permanence: of
being the last resting place of a warrior who had chosen to live where
he died, and who had decided to be buried there in a particular
fashion. The Ebel-bei-Praunheim grave was dug in the second half of
the four th century, but the pattern of which it is part began much
earlier: the earliest known weapon-burial, Stockstadt I, near a former
limes fort on the Main frontier, dates from the late third/early fourth
century.204 Who were these people? I am reluctant to accept
Stribrny’s proposal that they were part of a regular transrhenish
militia.205 I prefer to see them as veterans who were allowed, and,
perhaps, through the promise of protection, encouraged, by Rome to
settle in the Main area as a further means of controlling the region.
The Ebel-bei-Praunheim villa lies not far from the Main and the
Nidda, and so in an emergency could have received naval support.206
In the three-sided relationship between Romans, Alamanni and
Burgundians, it was the Alamanni who tended to come oV worst.
Instructive are Julian’s actions during his Alamannic campaign of 359.
It is clear from Ammianus that even Julian, renowned for his merciless
treatment of barbarians, took care that his troops, eagerly terrorizing
Alamanni, did not extend their bloodlust into Burgundian terri-
tory.207 Such cooperation puts into perspective the invention of
the myth of a common origin which was probably a creation of the
early fourth century.208 It also explains the inscription commemorat-
ing Hariulfus, son of a Burgundian king, Hanhavaldus, who died
while serving as protector domesticus in the imperial court at Trier,
probably under Valentinian I: ‘probably the Wnest epigraphic monu-
ment to integration between Roman and German in the late imperial
army’.209 In the Main valley, the Alamanni, facing both Romans and
Burgundians, found themselves between a rock and a hard place.
203 Schulze-Do
¨
rrlamm (1985: 555–61, Fig. 39 and list 5 (556)); cf. above 85.
204 Schulze-Do
¨
rrlamm (1985: 537–46, esp. 545).
205 Below 130–3.
206 Cf. below 241, 297–8.
207 AM 28.2.15. Cf. below 249.
208 Anton (1981: 238).
209 CIL 13.3682 (ILS 2813). HoVmann (1978: 317, quotation). For protector
(oYcer cadet), see below 147.
116 Settlement
4
Society
This chapter oVers no complete ‘Life and Times’ of the Alamanni.
There is simply not enough material, textual or archaeological, with
which to construct a solid ethnographic account.1 Other than that
their warriors had long hair, dyed red, and liked strong drink we
know little about them.2 As far as, for example, the lives of women
are concerned, we know nothing; and all that can safely be said of
Alamannic religion is, as Agathias remarked in the sixth century, that
it was solidly and unsophisticatedly pagan.3 (Christianity did not
penetrate Alamannic society to a signiWcant degree until the seventh
century.4) This is despite the fact that, though Ammianus says more
about the social organization of Alamanni than that of any other
barbarians, unlike the rest he passes no comment on their sexual
mores, dress, general diet etc.5 What follows, therefore, is mainly,
though not exclusively, a review of political and military aspects of
the life of the various Elbgermanic communities living in Alamannia.
The feature of Alamannic political life most frequently mentioned in
the sources is the presence of ‘kings’: reges/basileis. Of these, Crocus
Wgures in the Epitome in an early-fourth-century context,6 and many
others are prominent in the accounts of Julian, Libanius and, of course,
Ammianus Marcellinus. Their names (Chnodomarius, Fraomarius,
Gundomadus, Hariobaudes, Hortarius, Macrianus, Priarius, Serapio,
Suomarius, Urius, Ursicinus, Vadomarius, Vestralpus, Vithicabius)
1 Cf. Pohl (2000: 7) on such diYculties in respect of Germanic society in general.
2 AM 16.12.36; 27.2.2; Matthews (1989: 313).
3 Agathias, Hist. 1.7.1 (¼Quellen 2, 80).
4 Lorenz, So
¨
nke (1997: 442).
5 Cf. Guzma
´
n Armario (2002: 216, 135–60).
6 Epitome 41.3. Below 146.