A trader/traveller would probably not be buried with enough honors to allow us to find their tomb 2000 years later. Neither would a presumably poor, singular migrant. There is a reason we almost only find high status burials from this period in these areas, as low status burials only carry perishable items.
What I meant is that there's still a chance you'd find one and could technically do DNA and Strontium analyses to determine his/her origin. When I said off-chance, I meant extremely low, because you'd need to find it outside of a cemetry. Germanic cultures are known for their "egalitarian" burials before the turn of the eras.
Scandinavian influence left stone circles as has already been proven, we have bear claw capes that came from Scandinavia even earlier, there is also a change in burial customs and items buried, for instance new stirrup styles (I have already linked to all of these sources in the past). This is all Wielbark of the 1st century AD. To claim that no change occurred is simply not true. I thought we had established this many posts ago.
That's your assumption that I did that, but what I said is that the Guthones appear in written sources over 70 years BEFORE one can find any stone circles there. The late 1st century AD is still the 1st century AD, and that's what I meant. Up to then, there was no change that would indicate a Scandinavian migration into the Wielbark territory (don't read this as there were no changes at all). There are other reasons why archeologists make the distinction Oskywie-Wielbark, but the stone circles aren't important for the transition period, because you only find them after the transition had been finished for decades.
From the source I quoted earlier on:
The mainland roots of Wielbark culture no longer raise any doubt today, especially as the funeral rite and the furnishing of graves deposited in sites with stone circles and burial mounds do not diverge from the local burial customs known from cemeteries with flat graves. At the same time, the relatively sudden appearance of complex stone structures in the Wielbark culture environment as an already fully formed and, at the same time, diverse phenomenon that may actually confirm the migration of small human groups from Scandinavia which, however, probably quite soon adopted the spiritual and material culture of the local people (Bierbrauer 1994: 85–87, fig. 14). But were these Goths, who brought the name of the tribe and its tradition from the Scandinavian Peninsula?
Apparently not, since the references to the Goths on the southern coast of the Baltic found in the written sources are almost half a century earlier (second decade of the 1st c.) than the emergence of the cemeteries with burial mounds and stone circles in Pomerania. Although the information recorded by Cassiodorus/Jordanes about the northern European origin of the whole Gothic nation seems to be a literary topos, perhaps it does concern a smaller group of people which sometime later entered into a tribal alliance with the Goths and their oral tradition of this people as well. At the present level of research this problem cannot be resolved conclusively. Advances in archaeological research, including progress in analysis of ancient DNA and the study of strontium isotope content, do give hope that the question of the possible presence of ‘Scandinavians’, and at the same time, the role they might have played within Wielbark culture societies, may be understood better in the years to come.
I do not wish to apply modern nation state logic, and neither did I.
The Suebi confederation which we know of under Ariovistus controlled roughly the lands from the Baltic and Oder down towards the Rhine. They achieved this either by conquest or diplomacy. Already by this time all these tribes share an origin on the Elbe in the Jastorf/Ripdorf core. Religious practices, use of the Suebian knot and other cultural traits likely started already there. The tribes were all Germanic (aka Suebic) and at this one point in time seemed united in their push towards Gaul, or at least enough of them were united that Caesar would not be able to tell the difference.
After the turn of the millennium, perhaps due to Roman invasions, this confederation must have broken up as the Marcomanni went on their own to conquer/displace the Boii in Bohemia and create their own confederation. A friendly or allied tribe called the Quadi settled further east in Moravia. About 400 years later when these tribes came under the Huns, they are referred to as Danubian Suebi, apparently having forsaken their tribal names. Even after the Huns were defeated at Nadao they are recorded to be around, as Suebi, fighting the Ostrogoths in 469.
The more famous group of Suebi we know of was on the eastern bank of the Rhine before crossing it in 406 AD and eventually ending up in Spain. But many remained in the shape of the Alemanni tribe (which was sometimes called Suebi by contemporaries), and even today that same area occupied by the Alemanni is called Swabia in modern Germany - not Alemannia. All the tribes that could have called themselves Suebi or part of the Suebi in 50 BC, could do so 500 years later. Hence, the name Suebi was to the Suebi themselves a collective name on the same level as the Romans' Germani. "Germanic Tribes".
Late Antiquity. Harvard University Press. 1999. p. 467.
ISBN 9780674511736.
No "modern nation state logic" is required.
Quoting Strabo:
"Here, too, is the Hercynian Forest,
and also the tribes of the Suevi, some of which dwell inside the forest, as, for instance, the tribes of the Coldui, in whose territory is Boihaemum, the domain of Marabodus, the place whither he caused to migrate, not only several other peoples, but in particular the Marcomanni, his fellow-tribesmen; for after his return from Rome this man, who before had been only a private citizen, was placed in charge of the affairs of state, for, as a youth he had been at Rome and had enjoyed the favor of Augustus, and on his return he took the rulership and acquired, in addition to the peoples aforementioned, the Lugii (a large tribe), the Zumi, the Butones, the Mugilones, the Sibini, and also the Semnones,
a large tribe of the Suevi themselves."
Ptolemaios, a hundred years later than Strabo, uses the same way to define Suebi tribes, f.e. Suebi Langobardi and Suebi Anglii.
It was meant as a general remark and not directed at you; I'm sorry for the misunderstanding. The reason why I repeated it, is that a German changing his allegiance isn't something unheard of (following and imitating the strongest).
I find it unlikely that any people would ultimately call themselves what their neighbours called them, I can't think of any occurrence in history. It is much more likely that the names are derived from the same source, as linguists have already established. I do not mean that the Goths originate in "Sweden", just that there is a relation in the origin between Geats (Ptolemaios' Goutii) and Goths (Tacitus' Gutones). I strongly doubt that Geats in Scandinavia would suddenly change the name of their tribe and people once they heard of the exploits of the Goths down on the continent and wished to emulate them. The above explanation of the Suebi should suffice for how those people could name themselves; the same logic can be applied to the peoples around the Baltic at this time and later.
We're running in the same problem again, as you assume that a tribe would never change its name, under all circumstances. What I proposed was a possible explanation for how the Geats got their name, but I've never claimed it is the sole explanation. You don't think that there's a chance that a tribe would rename itself to have a quite prestigious one if they had been called like that by their neighbours for years? I don't think that's out of question at all.
I've also written quite intensively about the problem we run into if we use Ptolemaios without critically discussing him. Among those are name corruption, unknown source and also cherry picking. The latter because we just take the "Goutii" (as they seem familar to us) and neglect the 6 other tribes Ptolemaios mentioned.
I just want to ask you personally why you relate the Goutii with the Geats? I'd say we both do that because of the "G". Now immagine that Ptolemaios didn't have that tribe with a G, but suddenly everything would change, and that's sadly not out of question.
Now tell me which kind of relation do you think they had? I told you about all the scenarios I can think of; some might be more likelier, some less.
If we assume Ptolemaios didn't make a mistake when he wrote Goutii, we'll get three possibilities:
- Goths influenced Geats
- Geats influenced Goths
- They didn't influence each other and acted independently
If we do assume he made a mistake, we'll get some other additional possibilities and the chances of the aforementioned change, too.
Just want to point out that settlement continuity does not explain everything. It only means that not entire populations were displaced. If a new tribe conquers the people who live there and move in they don't have to tear everything down and start over unless everybody fled when they came or there is a strong cultural reason why they would prefer different types of settlements (as when Pomeranian was gradually replaced by Przeworsk).
It obviously depends on what kind of tribe conquered/subjugated another region. If we're talking about a tribe of the same cultural sphere (e.g. Semnones conquering parts of the Hermunduri, as both are Suebians), we'll most likely not see that in archeological findings. The settlement continuity wouldn't be broken but the land changed the hands of its owner, however we can't really depict that at all in the game. That's because we lack written sources, so I think we just have to accept the situation of the 1st century BC to 1st century AD.
If we now talk about a "foreign warrior elite" that subjugates a tribe and becomes its new overlord and renames it, I find it unlikely that there would be no material change at all. Such a warrior elite would certainly deem its own customs as superior because they had won against the old tribe. It'd be also possible that such a warrior elite would completely integrate itself, but I doubt that they'd change the tribes name in such a case, as they adopted everything else like customs, lifestyle, etc pp.
A larger foreign population would very likely lead to material changes.
Now don't get me wrong, but we have to make a cut somewhere and discard such doubts, because you could argue for every tribe being everywhere.
We don't need to speculate on the origin of the two names either, it is derived from proto-Germanic "to pour". I hate to do it, but I'll quote Wikipedia:
"The etymology of the name
Geat (Old English
Geatas, from a
Proto-Germanic *
Gautaz, plural *
Gautōz) is similar,
[5] although not identical, to that of
Goths and
Gutar (*
Gutô, plural *
Gutaniz). The names derive from different
ablaut grades of the Proto-Germanic word *
geutaną, meaning "to pour".
[6] They are generally accepted[
by whom?] as having originated as
heiti for "men (of the tribe)", with the literal meaning "they who pour their seed".
[7] (For more information see
Goths § Etymology.) The names could also allude to watercourses in the land where they were living,
[8] but this is not generally accepted to be the case, partly because that would mean that the names' similarity would be coincidental.
[5]"
That wasn't really my point. My point was that we don't know which tribe was the chicken and which one the egg.
I have mentioned that parallel development of two/three extremely similar names is very unlikely, and scholars seem to agree. It is not the same name, but so similar that the root of the word is the same. I am all for an origin of the Geats on the coasts of Pomerania if there is evidence for it, but I am yet to find it. Must be some truly mad people who decided to go north towards the cold when all their kin went south looking for sandy beaches and pina coladas.
I haven't said that was the case, only that it was a possibility. Now if I had given you chances for every of the many scenarios I mentiond, you could've slapped me. I haven't, though.
I have to say that I find it tedious to repeat the archeological evidence combined with the written sources, but I'll try my best, so that this becomes the last repetition.
(mostly related to another thread)
According
to this source and the book I mentioned before, the archeological evidence for stone circles first appears 70 years after the Guthones are first mentioned for Pommerania. Because of the settlement continuity of earlier periods (from 300 BC onwards) and the lack of evidence of a significant and traceable Scandinavian migration from 300 BC up to 70 years after the first written source (last few decades of the 1st century AD), there's no reason to doubt that (most of) the Goths' predecessors didn't live in Pommerania in 300 BC.
The only account of the Goths having originated in Scandinavia is given by Jordanes. Jordanes who wrote that, after the Goths left Scandinavia, they among other things decisively defeated an Egypthian Pharaoh and sacked Troy shortly after the Troyan War. According to Jordanes, the Goths couldn't have lived in Scandinavia in 300 BC anymore, as the Troyan War and Homer were far earlier than that. You (not necessarily you vanin) could certainly reply that Jordanes made up those events, as they aren't really credible, but I could return the favour and say that his Scandinavian origin might not be credible either.
Then we have the same etymology, but there we neither know whether or not it happend, when it happened nor how it happened. Even if we found a migration back (of only Scandinavians), you could always argue that there's no necessity. That's why I suggested to place the Guthones (Goths) in Pommerania and the Geats in peninsular Scandinavia.
. So the reason for people presuming a Scandinavian origin of the Herulians are a few words written by Jordanes (Getica, 23): However, the Dani, who trace their origin to the same stock, drove from their homes the Heruli, who lay claim to preëminence among all the nations of Scandza for their tallness.
