Barbarian Kingdoms: Medieval Europe
041852
HTA256/356
Barbarian Kingdoms: Medieval Europe
AD 300-700
Major Assignment
Q.6 " 'The only thing we can truly know about early medieval barbarians is their sense of ethnicity.' Critically asses with reference to both primary sources and the arguments of modern secondary scholars."
There has always been, and will most likely continue to be, great debate as to what we can or cant truly known about the "Barbarians". To the peoples of ancient Greece, and later, Rome, a barbarian was 'anyone who was not of their extraction or culture. Because most of these "strangers" regularly practiced raids upon these civilizations, the term "barbarian" gradually evolved into a perjorative term: a person who was sub-human, uncivilized, and regularly practiced the most vile and inhuman acts imaginable'. 1 In a good overall summary of the barbarians, it has been stated that these 'Barbarians' were 'a tall, fierce, fair- haired and fair-skinned people, in contrast to their swarthy counterparts from whence they had traveled. Quickly displacing or assimilating the indigenous people of the regions they entered, they (the barbarians) never truly settled anywhere, ever-moving as their needs and resources changed. Eventually they did settle and create homes and lifestyles for themselves, yet their culture was never elaborate. Those who they came in contact with considered them uncivilized, and yet were fascinated by their strength, stamina, force of will, charisma, and versatility. They were respected by those they befriended, and feared by those who opposed them. Even within their own society, they fought amongst themselves, seeking supremacy of power and controllership of the lands they acquired.
Their fierce, warlike nature and coarse behaviors earned them the name "barbarians", meaning both "illiterates" and "wanderers".'2
There is a small selection of primary written evidence about the barbarians, sources that were written in the middle ages. However it often suggested that these sources may not be completely accurate due to the personal biases and agendas that may have existed, because many of the authors were Romans. There has also been a vast array of archeological evidence that has been discovered that may or may not give us more insight into the lives of the mysterious middle aged warriors, however this type of evidence does not give historians solid facts, but rather evidence upon which an opinion may be formed. It has been stated that 'the only thing we can truly know about early medieval barbarians is their sense of ethnicity'.
The oxford English dictionary defines ethnicity as 'pertaining to race; peculiar to a race or nation; ethnological. Also, pertaining to or having common racial, cultural, religious, or linguistic characteristics, esp. designating a racial or other group within a larger system; hence (U.S. colloq.), foreign, exotic'.3
Research however has shown that the in some cases Barbarians did not have such an extreme sense of 'ethnicity', or unique 'otherness', that has previously been suggested.
In today's age, our common preconception of somebody who is 'ethnic' is more than often a negative perception. There are many reasons for this, but the most common explanation may simply lay with the fact that just because we may not understand enough about a different groups culture or way of life, or we have different ideologies as this group, they are seen as inferior. This same thing was occurring in the Middle Ages. The roman's, who believed heavily in their own superiority, held an attitude towards the barbarians that was commonly a belief that the barbarians were an inhumane, illiterate, and inferior race. There are many historical sources that support this statement, agreeing with the idea that the barbarians were a group of people who had a somewhat extreme sense of ethnicity.
Although it appears to be quite obvious that the barbarians had a great sense of ethnicity, through the analysis of historical evidence, it is evident that there are also many other things that we can know for certain, that gives us a greater understanding and help us put together a realistic image of life as a barbarian in the middle ages.
The most common description of the Barbarians was that of a group of warmongers that thrived on violence. Through the examination of a variety of primary and secondary sources, although mostly written with a strong pro-roman ...
This is a preview of the whole essay
Although it appears to be quite obvious that the barbarians had a great sense of ethnicity, through the analysis of historical evidence, it is evident that there are also many other things that we can know for certain, that gives us a greater understanding and help us put together a realistic image of life as a barbarian in the middle ages.
The most common description of the Barbarians was that of a group of warmongers that thrived on violence. Through the examination of a variety of primary and secondary sources, although mostly written with a strong pro-roman bias which begs the question of the accurateness of this evidence, these sources reinforce this idea that the barbarians were involved in a great deal of warfare and bloodshed during the middle ages. It has been stated that:
'In the era 446, the vandals, the Alani and the sueri occupied spain, did much killing and ravaging in their bloody raids'.4 And also 'Finding a province which was at peace and enjoying quiet, the whole land beautiful and flowering on all sides, they (barbaric group, The Vandals) set to work on it with wicked forces, laying it to waste by devastation & bringing everything to with fires and murder.5
Finally, 'Their savage eyes make them fearful objects; they are eager to quarrel and are excessively truculent.6
Many secondary sources also support this idea of an extremely violent and undeniably unintelligent group. 'Cold, poverty, and a life of danger and fatigue, fortify the strength and courage of Barbarians. In every age they have oppressed the polite and peaceful nations of Chine, India and Persia'.7
One of the many barbarian groups, The Huns, have also often been described as a group that has a 'primitive social structure, a society without classes, without a hereditary aristocracy; the Huns were amorphous bands of marauders'.8 Of their intelligence, or lack thereof, it has also been said that 'when the Huns first crossed over the straight of Kerch into the Crimea and into the stream of European history they were illiterate. When they finally vanished in the turmoil of the fifth and sixth centuries, They were illiterate still'.9
This evidence, although it may be biased and not completely accurate, it allows us to see that this violent and warrior like nature was a significant trait of the barbarians, this is an idea that is still conceptualised in today's age. It could also be argued that this common notion that the barbarians were a viscous group of people that were constantly reeking havoc across the Roman Empire, in essence could be an important characteristic that attributes to the unique barbarian ethnic identity.
Research has also proven that another fact that we can know for certain that the barbarians were a group that had a distinct physical appearance and distinct social customs. We can also know that society in which the barbarian's formed had an extreme lack of stability. Many sources agree with the idea that the central cultural characteristics of the Barbarians seemed to have been 'clothing, styles of hair, ornamentation, types of weapons, material culture, religious cult and a shared oral history'.10
On their instability and constantly changing nature, It has been stated that the Barbarians had 'no fixed abode, no home or law or settled manner of life, but wander like refugees with the wagons in which they live...They are entirely at the mercy of the maddest impulses'.11 This too could also be viewed as being an important part of the unique barbarian identity or ethnicity, an identity constructed through what was though to be radical social difference.
Another important feature of Barbarian culture that can be gathered from research was the apparent lack of a Royal hierarchy. Unlike their neighbours, the Romans, Barbarian groups were 'not subject to the authority of any king, but break through any obstacle in their path under the improvised command of their chief men'.12
It is also stated that 'Hunnic tribes did not form a unified body with a coherent set of aims. Rather, there appear in the sources a whole series of Hunnic raiding parties, all pursuing independent aims'.13
However although this unusual social system helps to reinforce the barbarian's sense of difference, and was an important part of barbarian culture, it was believed that this lack of general stability within the tribes and the fact that the barbarians were under constant change, could ultimately jeopardise the general notion that the barbarians were a group who held a unique an distinct sense of ethnicity. Due to the fact that the barbarians were constantly on the move 'from location to location ever in search of a better home. Eventually, some of these (barbarians) settled in Byzentium and became known as Ostrogoths. Having little or no recorded history or culture, they would adapt the culture of the people in whose lands they settled'.14
Patrick Geary states that because the barbarian tribes were 'inherently unstable, these units constantly underwent transformation as kindreds feuded and split apart, warrior bands struck out to establish themselves as new tribes, and as tribes weakened by internal divisions were conquered and absorbed into other tribes. Still so long as this process took place among Germanic, Celtic and Slavic peoples all at rightly the same level of material and social organization, this instability remained in a state of equilibrium. But this equilibrium would be destroyed by contact with Rome'.15
Roman influence upon the barbarians is commonly seen as a contributing factor to the decline of a genuine barbarian ethnicity. It is conceivable that the barbarians, who were constantly in contact with and invading Rome, they were likely to adopt different cultures and practices that derived directly from the influential Roman Culture.
Historian, Herwig Wolfram suggests that 'Both the Visigothic and the Ostrogothic regna did have their roots in barbarian tradition, but they were Roman institutions linked to the highest Roman magisteries with vice-imperial powers'16
It was also believed that 'The ostrogoths never developed a refined sense of ethnicity or territoriality despite their history of warfare...however were identifiable to roman authors as a discrete assemblage of Germanic peoples'.17
.
Another major explanation for the Roman influence upon the ostrogoths was the influence of their leader, Theoderic the Great, the Ostrogothic king of Italy. As a child In his childhood, Theoderic was sent as a hostage to the Imperial Court in Byzantines. Theoderic remained here for a decade, and it was there that he absorbed many different Roman cultural values. However, Theoderic still remained a barbarian at hearth, still in tune with the warlike ways of his people. Wolfram goes on to state that 'As a Roman high magistrate and high king of his Goths, he (Theoderic) was actually in the best position to turn his army into a Gothic people, but the ethnogenesis itself involved non-Gothic elements'.18
Another form of Roman influence that detracts from the notion of a unique barbarian ethnicity is found within archeological and literary evidence that has been discovered. This evidence is said to be various objects and symbols that were relevant in the Middle ages. In particular, historian Peter Heather looks at the symbols of elite status amongst the Ostrogoths, particularly Eagle brooches that were discovered in burial grounds of the Ostrogoths. Heather believes that these highly valuable emblems that were 'made of gold and inlaid with semi precious stones surely would have been used to express elite status'.19
It appears that these eagle brooches are another good example of the Roman influence on the barbarians. Heather states that 'The eagle was a symbol of power among both Romans and Huns, but there is no sign that it had ever previously been an important symbol to Goths. Hence, the emergence of such brooches as a symbol of power among the Goths, it has been argued, may reflect the influence upon them of Huns and Romans.'20 Heather also addresses the issue of distribution of these symbols of ethnicity. Due to the fact that in most cases precious emblems were given as a reward to warriors by royalty this 'royal or communal control of important symbolic items would imply very different pictures of the dynamics of ethnicity. Could kings, for instance, influence ethnicity by picking and choosing who was to receive the crucial items?' 21 This provides another good reason why the barbarian's ethnicity may not have been as original and unique as suggested.
To suggest that the only thing that we can know about the barbarians and their way of life is their ethnicity is a largely problematic statement due to the lack of barbarian sources. Heather writes that 'in the absence of properly Gothic sources, we have no means of charting: moral norms, social values, clothing colours or even hairstyles'.22
Heather is basically proclaiming that because we do not have any proper primary sources written by barbarians, on their culture, available for reference, the archeological evidence that has been discovered carries little weight in the quest of historians in attempting to understand the barbarian's culture.
Religion was a crucial social element of the people who lived during the middle ages. It is said that the barbarians and Goths practiced a 'so-called Arian form of Christianity which was characteristic of Goths'.23 Although it could be argued that this alternative and unique form of Christianity was yet another characteristic of the barbarian's 'social difference' or ethnicity, Peter Heather proclaims that 'the Goths' brand of religion was in origin an entirely Roman phenomenon, and, by its nature, could never separate itself completely from the Roman culture in which it had been born'.24
Another factor that also greatly contributes towards the lack of overall barbarian ethnicity lies in the fact that the barbarians could hardly be described as a homogenous group. As Patrick Geary believes 'these groups (barbarian tribes) should not be thought of as social, ethnic, or political entities. The actual structure of Germanic society was far too fluid and complex for that'.25 He also says that 'the various groups we have just described never though of themselves as one "people" who could be assigned a collective name.26 Due to the fact that there were so many different barbaric tribes, all of which were diverse and have different goals and aims, it is absurd to suggest that the barbarians had a singular ethnic identity.
Through analysis of a variety of primary and secondary historical sources, it is plain to see that the barbarians were a group of warriors that did have a very important sense of ethnicity. It is this ethnic identity that has made the barbarians an integral part of world history. However a problem that will always be concerned with learning about the barbarians is the significant lack of primary sources that were written by barbarians or Goths. It can also be said that there were contributing factors that undermined this sense of a unique ethnicity, mainly a result of the inescapable roman influence upon the barbarians. Despite this, Peter Heather sums up the Barbarians identity very well. Heather believed that there was 'no unchanging mark of barbarianism, but, in different contexts, different customs, outward features or beliefs became emblematic. The constant was an underlying sense of difference'.27
Reference List:
Primary Sources:
Top of Form 1
Isidore of Sevilles, 'History of the Goths, Vandals, and Suevi', (Leiden, 1970).
Jordanes, 'The origin and deeds of the Goths', <http://www.ucalgary.ca/~vandersp/Courses/texts/jordgeti.html>, 20th April 2005.
Marcellinus, Ammianus, 'The later Roman Empire, A.D. 353-378', (Harmondsworth, 1986).
Bottom of Form 1
Top of Form 1
Victor of Vita, 'History of the Vandal persecution', (Liverpool, 1992).
Bottom of Form 1
Secondary Sources:
Burns, Thomas, 'A history of the Ostro-Goths', (Bloomington, 1984).
Crystal, Ellie. 'Barbarians', <http://www.crystalinks.com/barbarians.html>, 21st April 2005.
Geary, Patrick, 'Before France and Germany : the creation and transformation of the Merovingian world', (New York, 1988).
Gibbon, Edward, 'The decline and fall of the Roman Empire', (London, 1960).
Heather, Peter, 'The Goths', (oxford and Cambrdige, 1996).
Heather, Peter, 'The Huns and the End of the Roman Empire in Western Europe', English Historical Review 110 (1995), 1-41.
Joil, Genry. 'Barbarians.Celts', < http://www.lost-civilizations.net/celts-barbarians.html>, 21st April 2005.
Otto Manchen- Helfen, 'The World of the huns: studies in their history and culture', (Berkely and Los Angeles, 1973).
Oxford English Dictionary online, <www.oed.com>, 20th April 2005.
Thompson, E.A, 'The Huns', (oxford, 1996).
Wolfram, Herwig, 'History of the Goths', (Berkeley, 1988).
Top of Form 1
Bottom of Form 1
Joil, Genry. 'Barbarians.Celts' < http://www.lost-civilizations.net/celts-barbarians.html>,
2 Crystal, Ellie. 'Barbarians', <http://www.crystalinks.com/barbarians.html>
3 Oxford English Dictionary, <http://www.oed.com>
4 Isidore of Sevilles, 'History of the Goths, Vandals, and Suevi', (Leiden, 1970), p.33.
5 Victor of Vita, 'History of the Vandal persecution', (Liverpool, 1992),p.3.
6 Marcellinus, Ammianus, 'The later Roman Empire, A.D. 353-378', (Harmondsworth, 1986),p.85.
7 Gibbon, Edward, 'The decline and fall of the Roman Empire', (London, 1960),p.4
8 Otto Manchen- Helfen, 'The World of the huns: studies in their history and culture', (Berkely and Los Angeles, 1973),p.12.
9 Thompson, E.A, 'The Huns', (oxford, 1996),p.1
0 Geary, Patrick, 'Before France and Germany : the creation and transformation of the Merovingian world', (New York, 1988),p.54.
1 Marcellinus, Ammianus, op. Cit., p.414.
2 Heather, Peter, 'The Huns and the End of the Roman Empire in Western Europe',p.11
3 Ibid., p.10.
4 Crystal, Ellie, , op. Cit.
5 Geary, Patrick, op. Cit., p.57.
6 Wolfram, Herwig, 'History of the Goths', (Berkeley, 1988), p.11.
7 Burns, Thomas, 'A history of the Ostro-Goths', (Bloomington, 1984), p.xiii.
8 Wolfram, Herwig, op. Cit., p.7.
9 Heather, Peter, 'The Goths', (oxford and Cambrdige, 1996),p. 311.
20 Ibid.,p.312.
21 Ibid.
22 Ibid., p.317.
23 Ibid., p.314.
24 Ibid.
25 Geary, Patrick, op. Cit., p.51.
26 Geary, Patrick, op. Cit., p.50.
27 Heather, Peter, op. Cit., p.317.
