In the fourth century, the regions across the Rhine cannot be considered other than as an integral part of the Roman world, saturated by influences from the empire. It is difficult to see how this could have been otherwise after its inhabitants had been neighbors of an imperial superpower for several centuries. Archaeology shows regional differences in access to Roman goods. Close to the frontier, Roman material dominates find assemblages. At the site of Oespeler Bach near Dortmund, e. g., although this site was itself engaged in pottery production, Roman artifacts - finewares as well as jewelry, glass, and bronze vessels and weaponry - are found in great numbers (Brink-Kloke and Meurers-Balke 2003). Further into the heartland of Germania, however, access to Roman material was much more restricted so that in the third century, when society in some parts of the region had undergone some stress and reorganization, Roman wares were displayed in the lavish funeral rites of the elite (Todd 1987: 46-7, 49-52, 57, 71). The control of the trade routes between the empire and the Baltic - the amber routes - appears to have been important in the spread of political authority. If there was any third - and early fourth-century Gothic expansion up the Vistula and its tributaries and thence down the waterways to the Black Sea, though archaeology provides no prima facie support for the notion (Halsall 1999, 2007; Kulikowski 2007; contra, Heather 1996), then it was probably in a fashion reminiscent of the foundation of the Kievan Rus principality in the same region somewhat later. Political and military control of the waterways and the traffic moving along them, bearing goods that were important to the underpinning of prestige and authority, brought about the subscription of other local groups to a new regional hegemony. The Elbe formed another such economic artery, along which a number of groups moved, and acted in a similar fashion. A possible fourth-century expansion of the Saxon confederacy might have been made possible by the control of the lower Elbe. This would be particularly important in the fifth century.
Around the Baltic we can trace similar importance attached to the distribution of Roman material. Here the existence of a shorter sea route around the coast of northern Germany perhaps made access slightly easier than in the center of Germania. Some sites come into existence that graphically reveal the importance of controlling the supply of Roman material. These are, on the whole, little different, in terms of their scale, from other rural settlements, but distinguished by large quantities of imports. The most famous such site is that at Lundeborg on the island of Fyn, associated with a high-status inland site at Gudme (Nielsen et al. 1994), but an analogous site has also been located on the west of the Jutland peninsula at Dankirke (Hansen 1989). In these regions, study of the settlement patterns shows that access to Roman material was closely regulated by the elite occupants of these sites.
It is vital to stress that the impact of the empire upon Germania during the late Roman period far outweighed any influences in the other direction. Traditional historiographical perspectives have envisaged a deepening frontier zone, spreading further into Gaul from the limes (e. g., Whittaker 1994; Miller 1996), but this view is hard to sustain. If anything, the reverse is the case. Roman influences within Germania were strengthening all the time. The traditional view is essentially based upon a reading of a particular type of furnished burial that appears in northern Gaul in the late fourth century (for data see, classically, Bohme 1974). These burials are still frequently read as those of immigrant Germani, and the material culture found in them is therefore assumed to be ‘‘Germanic’’ (a hugely problematic term that I shall endeavor to avoid: Goffart 1980: 3-39 for justification). This reading is, however, riddled with empirical and logical flaws (Halsall 1992, 2000; Fehr 2002; Brather 2004). The burial rite itself and the material employed in the graves are overwhelmingly Roman in origin, refer to traditional Roman idioms of aristocratic power and, furthermore, have no precursors in barbaricum itself. Once this underpinning is removed, we can see that, rather than being evidence of influence spreading from barbaricum into Roman Germania and Gaul, this material further underlines the dominance of Roman Gaul over the lands east of the Rhine. Supposedly ‘‘Elbe-germanisch’’ items of jewellery are provincial Gallic productions exported into and later copied in barbaricum (Halsall 2000). This pattern of northern Gallic manufacture and export, as has long been known, can be seen in many other items. Argonne Ware ceramics are exported to Germania, as are bronze bowls from the Meuse valley, Rhineland glass, and so on. The north of Gaul was an economic unit largely separated from the more Mediterranean long-distance trade networks of the south, but it had its own hinterland beyond the Rhine (prefiguring by 300 years Pirenne’s separation of northern Europe from the Mediterranean in the seventh century).
There is little or no other evidence of anything moving in the opposite direction, but that results at least partly from the nature of the archaeological record. There must have been perishable material - foodstuffs, raw materials, wool and cloth, and of course slaves - being traded with the Romans in return for their pottery, glass, and metalwork. Some settlements, and perhaps some barbarian rulers, prospered on the basis of the supply of, and exchange with, the armed forces on the Roman frontier. Nevertheless, in terms of the material culture used to create social identities and power, nothing - or very nearly so - was being used in northwestern provincial society that came from east of the Rhine. Given the Roman attitudes to barbarians, this is hardly surprising. Even in the military, where a case can be made that increasing importance was attached to ‘‘barbarian chic’’ ( Cod. Theod. 14. 10. 1-2), it is hard to prove that the origins of supposedly barbarian items lay in trans-Rhenan reality rather than in Greco-Roman ethnography (Amory 1997: 27-32; Halsall 2007, ch. 3).
The empire’s economic domination of barbaricum was part and parcel of its military and political hegemony. A standard means of hurting the people across the frontier was, after all, the restriction of markets. One reason for the attractiveness of Roman items among the peoples of Germania was precisely that it demonstrated a link with the mighty power to the south, where so many of them took service. Contexts of ritual display support this conclusion. In northwestern Germany, around the lower Elbe in the region dominated by the Saxon confederacy, Roman official belt-sets were much employed in cremation rituals (Bohme 1974). These were surely, as has long been supposed, brought back by Saxons who had served in the empire. At their funerals, public display was made of their links with Rome and the emperor. Slightly further north, inhumation began to be used by the local elites, probably, as has again been known for some time, because it made a conspicuous display of Romanness (Bemmann 1999; Kleemann 1999). At Fallward in lower Saxony, a lavish burial from the end of the fourth or the start of the fifth century has been found containing, as well as lavish goods and a boat, an intricately carved chair (Schcin 1999). If this is not itself an import, its interest is only increased by the fact that it is decorated in the ‘‘chip-carved’’ technique associated primarily with official imperial belt-sets and other metalwork. Just beyond the Rhine frontier, in Alamannic territory, on the defended hill-forts that symbolized their power, local rulers had metalwork made to distribute to their followers (Steuer 1994). Interestingly, these were copies of Roman official metalwork. From the Rhine to the Baltic, social and political power was expressed in entirely Roman terms.
Two important points emerge from this discussion. The first is that there had clearly been much change in politics and society in Germania Magna since the days of Caesar and Tacitus, although the writings of these sources are still sometimes pressed into service in studying the fourth-century Germani (Wolfram 1997), in spite of the enormous problems of accepting them as accurate reportage even in their own day. Any similarities between Ammianus’ brief accounts of the trans-Rhenan barbarians and those of Tacitus must be seen in the context of the former’s desire to be seen as the latter’s continuator. Some superficial similarities, such as Ammianus’ account of bipartite kingship among the Burgundians, have been shown to result from his use, at that point, of an earlier source (Wood 1977). The second point, following on from the first, is that it is difficult to find in the fourth century anything that might look like a distinct, indigenous form of rulership between the Rhine and the Baltic. The empire was the fount of all ideas of political legitimacy, one of many reasons why postimperial western kingship should not be viewed as a ‘‘Germanic’’ barbarian introduction. One fourth-century Alamannic king even changed his son’s name to Serapio, such was his infatuation with the empire (Amm. Marc. 16. 12. 25). More to the point, perhaps, Serapio himself does not appear to have minded being saddled with this unusual name. This might mean that there was less difficulty for Ammianus in translating non-Roman political terms and structures into Roman vocabulary than there had been for late republican and early imperial writers. Nevertheless, one must bear in mind that the gap between Roman model and the barbarian perception of it probably allowed for significant variation and creativity.
Survey of social and economic structures between the Rhine and the Baltic shows that there was diversity but also that the fourth century was, on the whole, a period of stability and increasing sociopolitical complexity. Throughout Germania settlements were growing and revealing more signs of central planning and of the fencing-off of individual properties. This can be seen at Wijster (Van Es 1967) and at Feddersen Wierde (Haarnagel 1979) as well as at rural settlements in Denmark and elsewhere in Scandinavia. The demarcation of individual plots has plausibly been read as evidence of a growing notion of private property. The sites at Wijster and Vorbasse (Hvass 1983) have suggested populations of about 200 people in their fourth-century phases. While minuscule compared with the great urban centers of the Mediterranean, there are signs that they were on a trend of development that might in time have led them to match the shrinking towns of the northwestern provinces.
The cemetery evidence also suggests stability, after a burst of lavish inhumations, generally taken to imply a brief moment of instability at the start of the fourth century. In most of this region, burials are fairly nondescript. In areas like lower Saxony, the norm is for large communal cremation cemeteries, which do not involve particularly lavish, competitive ritual displays. In the area inhabited by the Franks, the burial ritual is archaeologically invisible, presumably un-urned cremation burial or the ashes of the dead being scattered. In Denmark, although rites differed, the same picture emerges. Less attention was lavished upon burials of the fourth century than upon those of previous periods. Throughout Germania, the deaths of individuals within communities do not appear to have produced the stress within social relations that needed smoothing over by expensive funerary displays and gift-giving. This contrasts with evidence from periods before and, especially, immediately afterward (for the interpretation of burial ritual followed in this chapter, see Halsall 1995, 2003). The cemetery data thus accords well with that from the excavated settlements in suggesting social stability.
So too, perhaps, does the evidence from the votive bog deposits in Denmark and the far north of Germany at sites like Nydam, Ejsb0l and Illerup (J0rgensen et al. 2003), representing the ‘‘sacrifice’’ of materiel from defeated armies. The lavishness of these deposits increases during this period, as the wealth invested in burials diminishes. Whereas the display of grave goods was a mechanism for the creation or maintenance of individual families’ status, these deposits were more of a communal rite. This did not make them egalitarian. The finds themselves suggest central organization. The objects disposed of were precisely those things that would normally have become booty, for the distribution of which war leaders were responsible. By disposing of large quantities of potential loot, presumably in a gift to the gods, the leader simultaneously demonstrated authority, removed from circulation objects that might have been used as gifts by others, and enhanced the value of those items that he did bestow upon his followers. The fourth-century bog-finds illustrate graphically the northern barbarian leaders’ ability to raise substantial armed forces.
Other evidence points the same way. Just across the upper Rhine and Danube frontiers, Alamannic leaders demonstrated their power by constructing impressive hill-forts, the so-called Hohensiedlungen. The best-known of these is at the Runde Berg near Urach, a defended ‘‘princely’’ settlement occupied in the late Roman period. Although well known, we should not generalize from this site (Hoeper 1998). Others might have been simple refuges or cult centers. The Geisskopf near Freiburg im Breisgau, in addition to important terracing works that must have involved considerable labor and organization, yields evidence of the manufacture of Roman-influenced metalwork, presumably as badges of office, as noted earlier (Hoeper and Steuer 1999). Whatever their precise function, these sites made visible and permanent marks on the landscape, proclaiming a leader’s control over manpower and other resources. New high-status sites, if not atop hills, are found in the Frankish territories. One, at Gennep (Heidinga 1994), lies just inside imperial territory and might represent the seat of a chieftain in some sort of treaty relationship with the empire. Another, at Heeten, has revealed organized iron working controlled by a fortified settlement (Groenewoudt and van Nie 1995; Verlinde and Erdrich 1998). It is unclear whether this iron working was geared toward exchange with the Roman frontier or reflected the manufacture of weapons and other goods, the distribution of which could be controlled by the local ruler. In addition to the high-status sites at Gudme and Dankirke mentioned above, elite settlements, sometimes fortified, are increasingly known in Scandinavia in the late Roman period.
While the absolute dominance of the region by Rome - by her ideas and her products - is manifest, archaeological data nevertheless make clear the gradually increasing social, economic, and political complexity of the fourth-century barbar-icum. There was, however, crucial regional variation. The most impressive displays of regional power are found, first, in the geographic band closest to the frontier and, second, in that furthest away, in Scandinavia.
In the former region, the empire could and did maintain equilibrium among lesser leaders, through military and other direct action but also through the payment of diplomatic and other gifts. Nevertheless, one effect of those policies appears to have been to raise the stakes in barbarian politics: as is well known, over-kings rapidly acquired power when the Romans were distracted from their frontier policy (Heather 1994b). Such rulers could be and were employed in Roman civil wars, again increasing their power. As a result, the kings on the frontier appear to have established bases of power, which, though still insecure, could be built upon to create more impressive and lasting authority. By the late fourth century, some such frontier rulers, most notably the Alaman Macrianus, were proving difficult for the empire to deal with (Drinkwater 1997). In the more distant region, the Baltic, Rome had by contrast little ability to intervene actively in regional politics, and it was the much sought-after amber of the region that provided a valuable trading commodity, the control of which could bolster local authority.
In many ways the key area lay in between these two zones, where leaders appear to have been more dependent upon links with the Roman Empire. Roman artifacts were clearly very prestigious and their distribution an important means of cementing authority. Yet they could not be acquired as readily through exchange as in the frontier territories or those on the Baltic coast. They had to be acquired either through raiding or, more frequently, through the payment of diplomatic gifts by the Romans, who used these peoples, like the Burgundians, as a means of keeping the frontier rulers in check (Amm. Marc. 28. 5. 11). In these central areas, politics appear to have been much more fluid. The Romans were not aware of any large new confederacies in this area to match the Franks, Alamans, Saxons, or Goths that appeared on their frontiers in the third century. (The Saxons represent something of a special case, lying in many ways in this ‘‘middle band’’ of Germania yet also being located on one, albeit broad, frontier of the empire: the North Sea.) Instead, in the crucial intermediate band of barbaricum we continue to encounter the, probably smaller, groupings that had existed since the early Roman period, such as the Vandals, Longobards, and Burgundians.
These regional differences are of vital importance when we consider the dramas of the fifth century. These three bands of territory demonstrate (broadly) three trajectories of development and change. Closest to the frontier, the critical period around ad 400, which produced crisis in the northwestern provinces (see, e. g., Esmonde Cleary 1989), seems to have made little immediate difference. Change there comes in the mid fifth century and is especially associated with the growth of the Frankish kingdom in the sixth. By contrast, in the center of Germania, the events around ad 400 produced very important transformations. Some stability appears to have been created in the later fifth century, before the establishment of Merovingian hegemony brought more changes in the sixth. Finally, furthest away from the frontier, around the Baltic, a more gradual trajectory of change can be detected, though there are some interesting developments.
In the Alamannic and Frankish territories just across the Rhine frontier, settlements on the whole continued the trends discussed earlier. Indeed, in the Frankish areas on the lower Rhine, rural settlements experienced something of a boom at the end of the fourth century. The site at Gennep certainly underwent no decline. One type of change can be associated with the appearance of lavishly furnished inhumations, similar to those that appeared slightly earlier in northern Gaul (see above). These probably argue for some renegotiation of power in the area, but it is important to note again that the material and symbols deployed remain Roman in origin. Across the upper Rhine, Alamannic Hohensiedlungen continued to be occupied. Change here took place in the middle of the fifth century. A number of the hill-forts were abandoned and change took place in the region’s burials, with the appearance, again, of more lavishly furnished inhumations. It is difficult to know how to read this data. One possibility is increasing political authority in Alamannia. The rulers, with power based in the remaining Hohensiedlungen, may have eroded the authority of more local leaders, producing competition within the latter’s communities. This is suggested in the furnished burials. Alternatively, there might have been more widespread political crisis within the Alamannic territory, causing the abandonment of elite sites and general competition for local power. The former explanation is preferred here, mainly on the grounds of scattered evidence for expanding Alamannic power in the period, reaching into Noricum and even Champagne (Eugippius, Life of Severinus of Noricum 19. 1; 25. 3; 27. 1-2; 31. 4; Life of Lupus of Troyes 10: the similarity between these texts may stem from one author’s dependence upon the other), and also because of Cassiodorus’ reference to Clovis’ troops having killed the king of the Alamans, the implication being that there was only one (Cassiod. Var. 2. 41).
Significant change took place in Alamannia in the early sixth century, plausibly associated with the Frankish king Clovis’ subjugation of the area (though see Samson 1994). The Hohensiedlungen were abandoned and the furnished inhumation ritual was now employed by whole communities (rather than just by individual families, as had tended to be the case earlier) and in large cemeteries (many of which were founded at this time). Burials in this region are very lavish - much more so than in contemporary northern France or England. The death of local community members produced great tension in social relations, necessitating extreme displays of a family’s ability to furnish a burial with the appropriate items. As elsewhere in the Frankish kingdoms (Halsall 1995: 262-70), there was significant change around ad 600. Local aristocratic families began to remove themselves from the large communal cemeteries for their burials. These took place in separate cemeteries, with the burials sometimes placed under mounds (a very similar phenomenon to that taking place in England at the same time and given particular expression in the famous burials at Sutton Hoo and at Prittlewell in Essex). These changes are most plausibly to be linked to an increase in the security of the elites’ local preeminence (Halsall 1995: 262-70). Rural settlements also show more evidence of social stratification at this time (Damminger 1998).
The Frankish areas beyond the lower Rhine show similar developments, with the abandonment of earlier elite settlements, like Gennep, in the early sixth century (after late fifth-century decline), the introduction of furnished burial in communal cemeteries, more lavish burials than in the Merovingian heartlands, and similar transformations around the year ad 600. An interesting development is the introduction around ad 475 of metalwork decorated in a new polychrome style (sometimes referred to as the Flonheim-Gultlingen horizon), seen most famously in the burial of Childeric I in Tournai (Brulet 1997). The introduction of this style at precisely the time of the western empire’s political demise must be important. It shows that people realized that a new political order was emerging, necessitating a new artistic vocabulary to display power (see Theuws and Alkemade 2000 for discussion).
In the intermediate band of trans-Rhenan barbaricum, change was much more dramatic around ad 400. It is significant that the invaders of ad 406/7 were largely from this region (especially if we add the Burgundians, who founded a kingdom on the middle Rhine in the great invasion’s wake). The reasons for their irruption at this time have been variously explained. Heather (1995; now, at length, 2005) associates it with the ‘‘exogenous’’ impact of the Huns. It might be better understood in the context of the collapse of the important relationships between the empire and the heart of barbaricum. When the emperors retreated from the frontiers to Italy at the end of the fourth century, a close eye could no longer be kept upon frontier policy and the balancing of barbarian groups, as it had been in the fourth century. This caused political instability, in which emerging Hunnic power could furnish an alternative to the traditional backing of Rome, now no longer provided (Halsall 2007). It is unlikely that the Huns could have had the effects that they did have if this political context, within the empire and outside, had not existed. Be that as it may, the dramas of the period are manifest in bursts of lavishly furnished burials, such as the Niemberger Group in Thuringia, and a marked decline in the quality of local craftsmanship in that area (Schmidt 1983: 536).
In the Saxon regions, the early fifth century saw dramatic change. Many sites - settlements and cemeteries - were abandoned, and those that remained changed in nature. The last phase at Feddersen Wierde lacks the earlier period’s planning, for example. The long WohnstallhHuser (long houses incorporating byres for cattle as well as human living quarters) were replaced by smaller halls and ancillary Grubenhduser (small tent-like huts built over a pit, sometimes floored over). Furnished inhumations were introduced. The interpretation of these changes, clearly indicating dramatic transformations in Saxon society, has not generally been sophisticated, tending to concentrate upon migration to England at the expense of other factors (abandonment may have been overestimated: Siegmund 2003: 81-3). They are better understood in a broader North Sea context. Settlement abandonment and change took place in a number of regions bordering that sea - the British lowlands, northern Gaul, and northern Germany (remember that fairly close links between northern Gaul and lower Saxony had existed in the fourth century) - yet migration cannot explain all of these changes. In all areas, new material culture and similar architectural repertoires appear in response. Although a role was surely played by the indisputable migration from Saxony to England, we would be better advised to see the exchange of ideas and influences as a two-way process across the North Sea. Another issue that needs to be considered is the break-up of the Saxon confederacy, possibly linked with the turmoil in barbaricum mentioned above. A number of peoples, not heard of since the early imperial period, reappear in our sources from the sixth century: Angles, Jutes, and Frisians. It seems likely that these levels of ethnicity, previously subsumed (as far as the Romans cared) within a confederate Saxon identity, came to the fore during the fifth-century changes.
Stability was apparently restored by the later fifth century. One reason was the emergence of a new power in the heart of Germania: the Thuringian kingdom. The Thuringians seem to have been one of those groups that prospered with Hunnic backing. They are recorded on Attila’s side at the battle of Campus Mauriacus (ad 451), and the archaeological material that appears in the middle of the fifth century (which seems to be associated with their kingdom) shows some Hunnish influence (Schmidt 1983: 541). Not the least of these is the practice of skull deformation, whereby the skulls of small children were bound in order artificially to change their shape. Thuringian power seemingly spread along the trade artery of the Elbe valley. Thuringian material is found in lower Saxony and as far as the Rhine and upper Danube (matching the reference in the Life of Severinus to Thuringian warlords in that area: 27. 3; 31. 4), suggesting that people were subscribing to Thuringian lordship over much of the former trans-Rhenan barbaricum. Gregory of Tours believed that the Thuringian kingdom marched with those of the Franks on the lower and middle Rhine (Gregory of Tours, Hist. 2. 9 and 12). The Thuringian kingdom was destroyed by the Franks in the ad 530 s and their territories incorporated in the Merovingian hegemony, apparently under the rule of a duke. At about the same time, Slavic settlement in the area underlined the changes taking place.
Around the Baltic, the trajectory of development visible in the fourth century continues. The picture is of steadily increasing social stratification and political authority (Hedeager 1992). Some renegotiation of the bases of political power was apparently made necessary because of the breakdown of earlier patterns of trade with the western empire around ad 400. The Gudme site complex shows a change from the importance of control over imports through the port at Lundeborg to the manufacture of gold objects with religious significance. Again, the distribution of the latter was doubtless controlled by the rulers and provided them with a major means of underpinning their authority. Nevertheless, the settlement and cemetery evidence shows that this change was negotiated without undue stress. Trading links may have changed in emphasis, with greater importance given to the doubtless more sporadic links (both easier to control, perhaps, and more prestigious) down the amber routes to the eastern empire (Nasman 1998). The bog deposits become more token in character and die out completely by around ad 500. Clearly, there was no further need for this public, ritual underpinning of rulership. In the earlier sixth century, the trading station at Lundeborg was finally abandoned; the trading contacts of Denmark possibly switched back to the west. It has been suggested that some material culture, such as swastika brooches, is linked with the emergence of the Danes as the dominant group in the region (Hines 1998). This is also marked by the appearance of King Chlochilaich, who raided northern Francia in the early sixth century (Gregory of Tours, Hist. 3. 3). As well as possibly manifesting the change from eastern to western trading contacts mentioned above, it has been suggested that Chlochilaich’s rivalry with the Merovingians might have been a component of the Italian Theoderic’s foreign policy (Storms 1970 and Wood 1983 for different but compatible interpretations). Through our period, Denmark continued to develop toward the impressive royal power visible in the eighth century (ofwhich the collapse around ad 800 was surely a key to the origins of the Viking age).
Similar changes to those taking place in Denmark can be seen in southern Sweden, and Norway also shows evidence of significant local political power in the form of a series of boathouses: the ships housed in them would require the manpower resources of a larger area to crew (Myrhe 1997). Changes took place in the mid sixth century, however, as artifacts take on different forms and designs, bringing in the ‘‘Vendel’’ period in Sweden (Lamm and Nordstrom 1983) and what has been known since the end of the nineteenth century, curiously, as the Merovingian period in Norway. The precise chronology of these changes is still debated, but it seems to have taken place in the middle quarters of the century. At the same time, a decorative style known as Style II appeared, which, it has been argued, relates to a new warrior elite (H0ilund Nielsen 1997). In some areas, such as the island of Gotland off Sweden, these changes involved new local social structures (Rundqvist 2003). From the sixth century, Norway saw a significant expansion of the settlement pattern (Myhre 1992: 308). These sixth-century changes seem to make a suitable end point for this survey. The end of the Roman Empire did not produce dramatic transformations in Scandinavia, and does not seem to have affected drastically the general trajectory of social change; but it had some significant and interesting results nevertheless.
East of the Rhine, therefore, we encounter considerable variety in social, economic, and political developments. The impact of the collapse of the long-standing relationships with the empire differed between regions, but there were, regularly, other points at which significant restructuring of society and politics took place. There was too much regular change for one to be able to claim that, even in Scandinavia, Late Antiquity was a period characterized by long, fundamental continuities.
World History
