Many of the German codes of law annex
penalties
to those of both sexes who marry persons of inferior rank.
Tacitus
In these assemblies are seen the origin of those which, under the Merovingian race of French kings, were called the Fields of March; under the Carlovingian, the Fields of May; then, the Plenary Courts of Christmas and Easter; and lastly, the States General.
]
75 (return)
[ The speech of Civilis was received with this expression of applause. Tacitus, Hist. iv. 15. ]
76 (return)
[ Gibbeted alive. Heavy penalties were denounced against those who should take them down, alive or dead. These are particularized in the Salic law. ]
77 (return)
[ By cowards and dastards, in this passage, are probably meant those who, being summoned to war, refused or neglected to go. Caesar (Bell. Gall. vi. 22) mentions, that those who refused to follow their chiefs to war were considered as deserters and traitors. And, afterwards, the emperor Clothaire made the following edict, preserved in the Lombard law: "Whatever freeman, summoned to the defence of his country by his Count, or his officers, shall neglect to go, and the enemy enter the country to lay it waste, or otherwise damage our liege subjects, he shall incur a capital punishment. " As the crimes of cowardice, treachery, and desertion were so odious and ignominious among the Germans, we find by the Salic law, that penalties were annexed to the unjust imputation of them. ]
78 (return)
[ These were so rare and so infamous among the Germans, that barely calling a person by a name significant of them was severely punished. ]
79 (return)
[ Incestuous people were buried alive in bogs in Scotland. Pennant's Tour in Scotland, 1772; part i. p. 351; and part ii. p. 421. ]
80 (return)
[ Among these slighter offences, however, were reckoned homicide, adultery, theft, and many others of a similar kind. This appears from the laws of the Germans, and from a subsequent passage of Tacitus himself. ]
81 (return)
[ These were at that time the only riches of the country, as was already observed in this treatise. Afterwards gold and silver became plentiful: hence all the mulcts required by the Salic law are pecuniary. Money, however, still bore a fixed proportion to cattle; as appears from the Saxon law (Tit. xviii. ): "The Solidus is of two kinds; one contains two tremisses, that is, a beeve of twelve months, or a sheep with its lamb; the other, three tremisses, or a beeve of sixteen months. Homicide is compounded for by the lesser solidus; other crimes by the greater. " The Saxons had their Weregeld,—the Scotch their Cro, Galnes, and Kelchin,—and the Welsh their Gwerth, and Galanus, or compensations for injuries; and cattle were likewise the usual fine. Vide Pennant's Tour in Wales of 1773, pp. 273, 274. ]
82 (return)
[ This mulct is frequently in the Salic law called "fred," that is, peace; because it was paid to the king or state, as guardians of the public peace. ]
83 (return)
[ A brief account of the civil economy of the Germans will here be useful. They were divided into nations; of which some were under a regal government, others a republican. The former had kings, the latter chiefs. Both in kingdoms and republics, military affairs were under the conduct of the generals. The nations were divided into cantons; each of which was superintended by a chief, or count, who administered justice in it. The cantons were divided into districts or hundreds, so called because they contained a hundred vills or townships. In each hundred was a companion, or centenary, chosen from the people, before whom small causes were tried. Before the count, all causes, as well great as small, were amenable. The centenaries are called companions by Tacitus, after the custom of the Romans; among whom the titles of honor were, Caesar, the Legatus or Lieutenant of Caesar, and his comites, or companions. The courts of justice were held in the open air, on a rising ground, beneath the shade of an oak, elm, or some other large tree. ]
84 (return)
[ Even judges were armed on the seat of justice. The Romans, on the contrary, never went armed but when actually engaged in military service. ]
85 (return)
[ These are the rudiments of the famous institution of chivalry. The sons of kings appear to have received arms from foreign princes. Hence, when Audoin, after overcoming the Gepidae, was requested by the Lombards to dine with his son Alboin, his partner in the victory, he refused; for, says he, "you know it is not customary with us for a king's son to dine with his father, until he has received arms from the king of another country. "—Warnefrid, De gestis Langobardorum, i. 23. ]
86 (return)
[ An allusion to the toga virilis of the Romans. The German youth were presented with the shield and spear probably at twelve or fifteen years of age. This early initiation into the business of arms gave them that warlike character for which they were so celebrated. Thus, Seneca (Epist. 46) says, "A native of Germany brandishes, while yet a boy, his slender javelin. " And again (in his book on Anger, i. 11), "Who are braver than the Germans? —who more impetuous in the charge? —who fonder of arms, in the use of which they are born and nourished, which are their only care? —who more inured to hardships, insomuch that for the most part they provide no covering for their bodies, no retreat against the perpetual severity of the climate? "]
87 (return)
[ Hence it seems that these noble lads were deemed principes in rank, yet had their position among the comites only. The German word Gesell is peculiarly appropriated to these comrades in arms. So highly were they esteemed in Germany, that for killing or hurting them a fine was exacted treble to that for other freemen. ]
88 (return)
[ Hence, when Chonodomarus, king of the Alamanni, was taken prisoner by the Romans, "his companions, two hundred in number, and three friends peculiarly attached to him, thinking it infamous to survive their prince, or not to die for him, surrendered themselves to be put in bonds. "—Ammianus Marcellinus, xvi. 13. ]
89 (return)
[ Hence Montesquieu (Spirit of Laws, xxx, 3) justly derives the origin of vassalage. At first, the prince gave to his nobles arms and provision: as avarice advanced, money, and then lands, were required, which from benefices became at length hereditary possessions, and were called fiefs. Hence the establishment of the feudal system. ]
90 (return)
[ Caesar, with less precision, says, "The Germans pass their whole lives in hunting and military exercises. " (Bell. Gall, vi. 21. ) The picture drawn by Tacitus is more consonant to the genius of a barbarous people: besides that, hunting being the employment but of a few months of the year, a greater part must necessarily be passed in indolence by those who had no other occupation. In this circumstance, and those afterwards related, the North American savages exactly agree with the ancient Germans. ]
91 (return)
[ This apparent contradiction is, however, perfectly agreeable to the principles of human nature. Among people governed by impulse more than reason, everything is in the extreme: war and peace; motion and rest; love and hatred; none are pursued with moderation. ]
92 (return)
[ These are the rudiments of tributes; though the contributions here spoken of were voluntary, and without compulsion. The origin of exchequers is pointed out above, where "part of the mulct" is said to be "paid to the king or state. " Taxation was taught the Germans by the Romans, who levied taxes upon them. ]
93 (return)
[ So, in after-times, when tributes were customary, 500 oxen or cows were required annually from the Saxons by the French kings Clothaire I. and Pepin. (See Eccard, tom. i. pp. 84, 480. ) Honey, corn, and other products of the earth, were likewise received in tribute. (Ibid. p. 392. )]
94 (return)
[ For the expenses of war, and other necessities of state, and particularly the public entertainments. Hence, besides the Steora, or annual tribute, the Osterstuopha, or Easter cup, previous to the public assembly of the Field of March, was paid to the French kings. ]
95 (return)
[ This was a dangerous lesson, and in the end proved ruinous to the Roman empire. Herodian says of the Germans in his time, "They are chiefly to be prevailed upon by bribes; being fond of money, and continually selling peace to the Romans for gold. "—Lib. vi. 139. ]
96 (return)
[ This custom was of long duration; for there is not the mention of a single city in Ammianus Marcellinus, who wrote on the wars of the Romans in Germany. The names of places in Ptolemy (ii. 11) are not, therefore, those of cities, but of scattered villages. The Germans had not even what we should call towns, notwithstanding Caesar asserts the contrary. ]
97 (return)
[ The space surrounding the house, and fenced in by hedges, was that celebrated Salic land, which descended to the male line, exclusively of the female. ]
98 (return)
[ The danger of fire was particularly urgent in time of war; for, as Caesar informs us, these people were acquainted with a method of throwing red-hot clay bullets from slings, and burning javelins, on the thatch of houses. (Bell. Gall. v. 42. )]
99 (return)
[ Thus likewise Mela (ii. 1), concerning the Sarmatians: "On account of the length and severity of their winters, they dwell under ground, either in natural or artificial caverns. " At the time that Germany was laid waste by a forty years' war, Kircher saw many of the natives who, with their flocks, herds, and other possessions, took refuge in the caverns of the highest mountains. For many other curious particulars concerning these and other subterranean caves, see his Mundus Subterraneus, viii. 3, p. 100. In Hungary, at this day, corn is commonly stored in subterranean chambers. ]
100 (return)
[ Near Newbottle, the seat of the Marquis of Lothian, are some subterraneous apartments and passages cut out of the live rock, which had probably served for the same purposes of winter-retreats and granaries as those dug by the ancient Germans. Pennant's Tour in 1769, 4to, p. 63. ]
101 (return)
[ This was a kind of mantle of a square form, called also rheno. Thus Caesar (Bell. Gall. vi. 21): "They use skins for clothing, or the short rhenones, and leave the greatest part of the body naked. " Isidore (xix. 23) describes the rhenones as "garments covering the shoulders and breast, as low as the navel, so rough and shaggy that they are impenetrable to rain. " Mela (iii. 3), speaking of the Germans, says, "The men are clothed only with the sagum, or the bark of trees, even in the depth of winter. "]
102 (return)
[ All savages are fond of variety of colors; hence the Germans spotted their furs with the skins of other animals, of which those here mentioned were probably of the seal kind. This practice is still continued with regard to the ermine, which is spotted with black lamb's-skin. ]
103 (return)
[ The Northern Sea, and Frozen Ocean. ]
104 (return)
[ Pliny testifies the same thing; and adds, that "the women beyond the Rhine are not acquainted with any more elegant kind of clothing. "—xix. 1. ]
105 (return)
[ Not that rich and costly purple in which the Roman nobility shone, but some ordinary material, such as the vaccinium, which Pliny says was used by the Gauls as a purple dye for the garments of the slaves, (xvi. 18. )]
106 (return)
[ The chastity of the Germans, and their strict regard to the laws of marriage, are witnessed by all their ancient codes of law. The purity of their manners in this respect afforded a striking contrast to the licentiousness of the Romans in the decline of the empire, and is exhibited in this light by Salvian, in his treatise De Gubernatione Dei, lib. vii. ]
107 (return)
[ Thus we find in Caesar (Bell. Gall. i. 53) that Ariovistus had two wives. Others had more. This indulgence proved more difficult to abolish, as it was considered as a mark of opulence, and an appendage of nobility. ]
108 (return)
[ The Germans purchased their wives, as appears from the following clauses in the Saxon law concerning marriage: "A person who espouses a wife shall pay to her parents 300 solidi (about 180l. sterling); but if the marriage be without the consent of the parents, the damsel, however, consenting, he shall pay 600 solidi. If neither the parents nor damsel consent, that is, if she be carried off by violence, he shall pay 300 solidi to the parents, and 340 to the damsel, and restore her to her parents. "]
109 (return)
[ Thus in the Saxon law, concerning dowries, it is said: "The Ostfalii and Angrarii determine, that if a woman have male issue, she is to possess the dower she received in marriage during her life, and transmit it to her sons. "]
110 (return)
[ Ergo septae pudicitiâ agunt. Some editions have septâ pudicitiâ. This would imply, however, rather the result of the care and watchfulness of their husbands; whereas it seems the object of Tacitus to show that this their chastity was the effect of innate virtue, and this is rather expressed by septae pudicitiâ, which is the reading of the Arundelian MS. ]
111 (return)
[ Seneca speaks with great force and warmth on this subject: "Nothing is so destructive to morals as loitering at public entertainments; for vice more easily insinuates itself into the heart when softened by pleasure. What shall I say! I return from them more covetous ambitious, and luxurious. "—Epist. vii. ]
112 (return)
[ The Germans had a great regard for the hair, and looked upon cutting it off as a heavy disgrace; so that this was made a punishment for certain crimes, and was resented as an injury if practised upon an innocent person. ]
113 (return)
[ From an epistle of St. Boniface, archbishop of Mentz, to Ethelbald, king of England, we learn that among the Saxons the women themselves inflicted the punishment for violated chastity; "In ancient Saxony (now Westphalia), if a virgin pollute her father's house, or a married woman prove false to her vows, sometimes she is forced to put an end to her own life by the halter, and over the ashes of her burned body her seducer is hanged: sometimes a troop of females assembling lead her through the circumjacent villages, lacerating her body, stripped to the girdle, with rods and knives; and thus, bloody and full of minute wounds, she is continually met by new tormenters, who in their zeal for chastity do not quit her till she is dead, or scarcely alive, in order to inspire a dread of such offences. " See Michael Alford's Annales Ecclesiae Anglo-Saxon. , and Eccard. ]
114 (return)
[ A passage in Valerius Maximus renders it probable that the Cimbrian states were of this number: "The wives of the Teutones besought Marius, after his victory, that he would deliver them as a present to the Vestal virgins; affirming that they should henceforth, equally with themselves, abstain from the embraces of the other sex. This request not being granted, they all strangled themselves the ensuing night. "—Lib. vi. 1. 3. ]
115 (return)
[ Among the Heruli, the wife was expected to hang herself at once at the grave of her husband, if she would not live in perpetual infamy. ]
116 (return)
[ This expression may signify as well the murder of young children, as the procurement of abortion; both which crimes were severely punished by the German laws. ]
117 (return)
[ Quemquam ex agnatis. By agnati generally in Roman law were meant relations by the father's side; here it signifies children born after there was already an heir to the name and property of the father. ]
118 (return)
[ Justin has a similar thought concerning the Scythians: "Justice is cultivated by the dispositions of the people, not by the laws. " (ii. 2. ) How inefficacious the good laws here alluded to by Tacitus were in preventing enormities among the Romans, appears from the frequent complaints of the senators, and particularly of Minucius Felix; "I behold you, exposing your babes to the wild beasts and birds, or strangling the unhappy wretches with your own hands. Some of you, by means of drugs, extinguish the newly-formed man within your bowels, and thus commit parricide on your offspring before you bring them into the world. " (Octavius, c. 30. ) So familiar was this practice grown at Rome, that the virtuous Pliny apologises for it, alleging that "the great fertility of some women may require such a licence. "—xxix. 4, 37. ]
119 (return)
[ Nudi ac sordidi does not mean "in nakedness and filth," as most translators have supposed. Personal filth is inconsistent with the daily practice of bathing mentioned c. 22; and nudus does not necessarily imply absolute nakedness (see note 4, p. 293). ]
120 (return)
[ This age appears at first to have been twelve years; for then a youth became liable to the penalties of law. Thus in the Salic law it is said, "If a child under twelve commit a fault, 'fred,' or a mulct, shall not be required of him. " Afterwards the term was fifteen years of age. Thus in the Ripuary law, "A child under fifteen shall not be responsible. " Again, "If a man die, or be killed, and leave a son; before he have completed his fifteenth year, he shall neither prosecute a cause, nor be called upon to answer in a suit: but at this term, he must either answer himself, or choose an advocate. In like manner with regard to the female sex. " The Burgundian law provides to the same effect. This then was the term of majority, which in later times, when heavier armor was used, was still longer delayed. ]
121 (return)
[ This is illustrated by a passage in Caesar (Bell. Gall. vi. 21): "They who are the latest in proving their virility are most commended. By this delay they imagine the stature is increased, the strength improved, and the nerves fortified. To have knowledge of the other sex before twenty years of age, is accounted in the highest degree scandalous. "]
122 (return)
[ Equal not only in age and constitution, but in condition.
Many of the German codes of law annex penalties to those of both sexes who marry persons of inferior rank. ]
123 (return)
[ Hence, in the history of the Merovingian kings of France, so many instances of regard to sisters and their children appear, and so many wars undertaken on their account. ]
124 (return)
[ The court paid at Rome to rich persons without children, by the Haeredipetae, or legacy-hunters, is a frequent subject of censure and ridicule with the Roman writers. ]
125 (return)
[ Avengers of blood are mentioned in the law of Moses, Numb. xxxv. 19. In the Roman law also, under the head of "those who on account of unworthiness are deprived of their inheritance," it is pronounced, that "such heirs as are proved to have neglected revenging the testator's death, shall be obliged to restore the entire profits. "]
126 (return)
[ It was a wise provision, that among this fierce and warlike people, revenge should be commuted for a payment. That this intention might not be frustrated by the poverty of the offender, his whole family were conjointly bound to make compensation. ]
127 (return)
[ All uncivilized nations agree in this property, which becomes less necessary as a nation improves in the arts of civil life. ]
128 (return)
[ Convictibus et hospitiis. "Festivities and entertainments. " The former word applies to friends and fellow-countrymen; the latter, to those not of the same tribe, and foreigners. Caesar (Bell. Gall. vi. 23) says, "They think it unlawful to offer violence to their guests, who, on whatever occasion they come to them, are protected from injury, and considered as sacred. Every house is open to them, and provision everywhere set before them. " Mela (iii. 3) says of the Germans, "They make right consist in force, so that they are not ashamed of robbery: they are only kind to their guests, and merciful to suppliants. The Burgundian law lays a fine of three solidi on every man who refuses his roof or hearth to the coming guest. " The Salic law, however, rightly forbids the exercise of hospitality to atrocious criminals; laying a penalty on the person who shall harbor one who has dug up or despoiled the dead? till he has made satisfaction to the relations. ]
129 (return)
[ The clause here put within brackets is probably misplaced; since it does not connect well either with what goes before or what follows.
130(return)
[The Russians are at present the most remarkable among the northern nations for the use of warm bathing. Some of the North American tribes also have their hypocausts, or stoves. ]
131 (return)
[ Eating at separate tables is generally an indication of voracity. Traces of it may be found in Homer, and other writers who have described ancient manners. The same practice has also been observed among the people of Otaheite; who occasionally devour vast quantities of food. ]
132 (return)
[ The following article in the Salic law shows at once the frequency of these bloody quarrels, and the laudable endeavors of the legislature to restrain them;—"If at a feast where there are four or five men in company, one of them be killed, the rest shall either convict one as the offender, or shall jointly pay the composition for his death. And this law shall extend to seven persons present at an entertainment. "]
133 (return)
[ The same custom is related by Herodotus, i. p. 66, as prevailing among the Persians. ]
134 (return)
[ Of this liquor, beer or ale, Pliny speaks in the following passage: "The western nations have their intoxicating liquor, made of steeped grain. The Egyptians also invented drinks of the same kind. Thus drunkenness is a stranger in no part of the world; for these liquors are taken pure, and not diluted as wine is. Yet, surely, the Earth thought she was producing corn. Oh, the wonderful sagacity of our vices! we have discovered how to render even water intoxicating. "—xiv. 22. ]
135 (return)
[ Mela says, "Their manner of living is so rude and savage, that they eat even raw flesh; either fresh killed, or softened by working with their hands and feet, after it has grown stiff in the hides of tame or wild animals. " (iii. 3. ) Florus relates that the ferocity of the Cimbri was mitigated by their feeding on bread and dressed meat, and drinking wine, in the softest tract of Italy. —iii. 3. ]
136 (return)
[ This must not be understood to have been cheese; although Caesar says of the Germans, "Their diet chiefly consists of milk, cheese and flesh. " (Bell. Gall. vi. 22. ) Pliny, who was thoroughly acquainted with the German manners, says more accurately, "It is surprising that the barbarous nations who live on milk should for so many ages have been ignorant of, or have rejected, the preparation of cheese; especially since they thicken their milk into a pleasant tart substance, and a fat butter: this is the scum of milk, of a thicker consistence than what is called the whey. It must not be omitted that it has the properties of oil, and is used as an unguent by all the barbarians, and by us for children. "—xi. 41. ]
137 (return)
[ This policy has been practised by the Europeans with regard to the North American savages, some tribes of which have been almost totally extirpated by it. ]
138 (return)
[ St. Ambrose has a remarkable passage concerning this spirit of gaming among a barbarous people:—"It is said that the Huns, who continually make war upon other nations, are themselves subject to usurers, with whom they run in debt at play; and that, while they live without laws, they obey the laws of the dice alone; playing when drawn up in line of battle; carrying dice along with their arms, and perishing more by each others' hands than by the enemy. In the midst of victory they submit to become captives, and suffer plunder from their own countrymen, which they know not how to bear from the foe. On this account they never lay aside the business of war, because, when they have lost all their booty by the dice, they have no means of acquiring fresh supplies for play, but by the sword. They are frequently borne away with such a desperate ardor, that, when the loser has given up his arms, the only part of his property which he greatly values, he sets the power over his life at a single cast to the winner or usurer. It is a fact, that a person, known to the Roman emperor, paid the price of a servitude which he had by this means brought upon himself, by suffering death at the command of his master. "]
139 (return)
[ The condition of these slaves was the same as that of the vassals, or serfs, who a few centuries ago made the great body of the people in every country in Europe. The Germans, in after times, imitating the Romans, had slaves of inferior condition, to whom the name of slave became appropriated; while those in the state of rural vassalage were called lidi. ]
140 (return)
[ A private enemy could not be slain with impunity, since a fine was affixed to homicide; but a man might kill his own slave without any punishment. If, however, he killed another person's slave, he was obliged to pay his price to the owner. ]
141 (return)
[ The amazing height of power and insolence to which freedmen arrived by making themselves subservient to the vices of the prince, is a striking characteristic of the reigns of some of the worst of the Roman emperors. ]
142 (return)
[ In Rome, on the other hand, the practice of usury was, as our author terms it, "an ancient evil, and a perpetual source of sedition and discord. "—Annals, vi. 16. ]
143 (return)
[ All the copies read per vices, "by turns," or alternately; but the connection seems evidently to require the easy alteration of per vicos, which has been approved by many learned commentators, and is therefore adopted in this translation. ]
144 (return)
[ Caesar has several particulars concerning this part of German polity. "They are not studious of agriculture, the greater part of their diet consisting of milk, cheese, and flesh; nor has any one a determinate portion of land, his own peculiar property; but the magistrates and chiefs allot every year to tribes and clanships forming communities, as much land, and in such situations, as they think proper, and oblige them to remove the succeeding year. For this practice they assign several reasons: as, lest they should be led, by being accustomed to one spot, to exchange the toils of war for the business of agriculture; lest they should acquire a passion for possessing extensive domains, and the more powerful should be tempted to dispossess the weaker; lest they should construct buildings with more art than was necessary to protect them from the inclemencies of the weather; lest the love of money should arise amongst them, the source of faction and dissensions; and in order that the people, beholding their own possessions equal to those of the most powerful, might be retained by the bonds of equity and moderation. "—Bell. Gall. vi. 21. ]
145 (return)
[ The Germans, not planting fruit-trees, were ignorant of the proper products of autumn. They have now all the autumnal fruits of their climate; yet their language still retains a memorial of their ancient deficiencies, in having no term for this season of the year, but one denoting the gathering in of corn alone—Herbst, Harvest. ]
146 (return)
[ In this respect, as well as many others, the manners of the Germans were a direct contrast to those of the Romans. Pliny mentions a private person, C. Caecilius Claudius Isidorus, who ordered the sum of about 10,000l. sterling to be expended in his funeral: and in another place he says, "Intelligent persons asserted that Arabia did not produce such a quantity of spices in a year as Nero burned at the obsequies of his Poppaea. "—xxxiii. 10, and xii. 18. ]
147 (return)
[ The following lines of Lucan, describing the last honors paid by Cornelia to the body of Pompey the Great, happily illustrate the customs here referred to:—
Collegit vestes, miserique insignia Magni.
Armaque, et impressas auro, quas gesserat olim
Exuvias, pictasque togas, velamina summo
Ter conspecta Jovi, funestoque intulit igni. —Lib. ix. 175.
"There shone his arms, with antique gold inlaid,
There the rich robes which she herself had made,
Robes to imperial Jove in triumph thrice display'd:
The relics of his past victorious days,
Now this his latest trophy serve to raise,
And in one common flame together blaze. "—ROWE. ]
148 (return)
[ Thus in the tomb of Childeric, king of the Franks, were found his spear and sword, and also his horse's head, with a shoe, and gold buckles and housings. A human skull was likewise discovered, which, perhaps, was that of his groom. ]
149 (return)
[ Caesar's account is as follows:—"There was formerly a time when the Gauls surpassed the Germans in bravery, and made war upon them; and, on account of their multitude of people and scarcity of land, sent colonies beyond the Rhine. The most fertile parts of Germany, adjoining to the Hercynian forest, (which, I observe, was known by report to Eratosthenes and others of the Greeks, and called by them Orcinia,) were accordingly occupied by the Volcae and Tectosages, who settled there. These people still continue in the same settlements, and have a high character as well for the administration of justice as military prowess: and they now remain in the same state of penury and content as the Germans, whose manner of life they have adopted. "—Bell. Gall. vi. 24. ]
150 (return)
[ The inhabitants of Switzerland, then extending further than at present, towards Lyons. ]
151 (return)
[ A nation of Gauls, bordering on the Helvetii, as appears from Strabo and Caesar. After being conquered by Caesar, the Aedui gave them a settlement in the country now called the Bourbonnois. The name of their German colony, Boiemum, is still extant in Bohemia. The aera at which the Helvetii and Boii penetrated into Germany is not ascertained. It seems probable, however, that it was in the reign of Tarquinius Priscus; for at that time, as we are told by Livy, Ambigatus, king of the Bituriges (people of Berry), sent his sister's son Sigovesus into the Hercynian forest, with a colony, in order to exonerate his kingdom which was overpeopled. (Livy, v. 33; et seq. )]
152 (return)
[ In the time of Augustus, the Boii, driven from Boiemum by the Marcomanni, retired to Noricum, which from them was called Boioaria, now Bavaria. ]
153 (return)
[ This people inhabited that part of Lower Hungary now called the Palatinate of Pilis. ]
154 (return)
[ Towards the end of this treatise, Tacitus seems himself to decide this point, observing that their use of the Pannonian language, and acquiescence in paying tribute, prove the Osi not to be a German nation. They were settled beyond the Marcomanni and Quadi, and occupied the northern part of Transdanubian Hungary; perhaps extending to Silesia, where is a place called Ossen in the duchy of Oels, famous for salt and glass works. The learned Pelloutier, however, contends that the Osi were Germans; but with less probability. ]
155 (return)
[ The inhabitants of the modern diocese of Treves. ]
156 (return)
[ Those of Cambresis and Hainault. ]
157 (return)
[ Those of the dioceses of Worms, Strasburg, and Spires. ]
158 (return)
[ Those of the diocese of Cologne. The Ubii, migrating from Germany to Gaul, on account of the enmity of the Catti, and their own attachment to the Roman interest, were received under the protection of Marcus Agrippa, in the year of Rome 717. (Strabo, iv. p. 194. ) Agrippina, the wife of Claudius and mother of Nero, who was born among them, obtained the settlement of a colony there, which was called after her name. ]
159 (return)
[ Now the Betuwe, part of the provinces of Holland and Guelderland. ]
160 (return)
[ Hence the Batavi are termed, in an ancient inscription, "the brothers and friends of the Roman people. "]
161 (return)
[ This nation inhabited part of the countries now called the Weteraw, Hesse, Isenburg and Fulda. In this territory was Mattium, now Marpurg, and the Fontes Mattiaci, now Wisbaden, near Mentz. ]
162 (return)
[ The several people of Germany had their respective borders, called marks or marches, which they defended by preserving them in a desert and uncultivated state. Thus Caesar, Bell. Gall. iv 3:—"They think it the greatest honor to a nation, to have as wide an extent of vacant land around their dominions as possible; by which it is indicated, that a great number of neighboring communities are unable to withstand them. On this account, the Suevi are said to have, on one side, a tract of 600 (some learned men think we should read 60) miles desert for their boundaries. " In another place Caesar mentions, as an additional reason for this policy, that they think themselves thereby rendered secure from the danger of sudden incursions. (Bell. Gall. vi. 13. )]
163 (return)
[ The difference between the low situation and moist air of Batavia, and the high and dry country of the Mattiaci, will sufficiently justify this remark, in the opinion of those who allow anything to the influence of climate. ]
164 (return)
[ Now Swabia. When the Marcommanni, towards the end of the reign of Augustus, quitting their settlements near the Rhine, migrated to Bohemia, the lands they left vacant were occupied by some unsettled Gauls among the Rauraci and Sequani. They seem to have been called Decumates (Decimated), because the inhabitants, liable to the incursions of the Germans, paid a tithe of their products to be received under the protection of the Romans. Adrian defended them by a rampart, which extended from Neustadt, a town on the Danube near the mouth of the river Altmühl, to the Neckar near Wimpfen; a space of sixty French leagues. ]
165 (return)
[ Of Upper Germany. ]
166 (return)
[ The Catti possessed a large territory between the Rhine, Mayne and Sala, and the Hartz forest on this side of the Weser; where are now the countries of Hesse, Thuringia, part of Paderborn, of Fulda, and of Franconia. Learned writers have frequently noted, that what Caesar, Florus and Ptolemy have said of the Suevi, is to be understood of the Catti. Leibnitz supposes the Catti were so called from the active animal which they resemble in name, the German for cat being Catte, or Hessen. ]
167 (return)
[ Pliny, who was well acquainted with Germany, gives a very striking description of the Hercynian forest:—"The vast trees of the Hercynian forest, untouched for ages, and as old as the world, by their almost immortal destiny exceed common wonders. Not to mention circumstances which would not be credited, it is certain that hills are raised by the repercussion of their meeting roots; and where the earth does not follow them, arches are formed as high as the branches, which, struggling, as it were, with each other, are bent into the form of open gates, so wide, that troops of horse may ride under them. "—xvi. 2. ]
168 (return)
[ Duriora corpora. "Hardier frames;" i. e. than the rest of the Germans. At Hist. ii 32. the Germans, in general, are said to have fluxa corpora; while in c. 4 of this treatise they are described as tantùm ad impetum valida. ]
169 (return)
[ Floras, ii. 18, well expresses this thought by the sentence "Tanti exercitus, quanti imperator. " "An army is worth so much as its general is. "]
170 (return)
[ Thus Civilis is said by our author (Hist. iv. 61), to have let his hair and beard grow in consequence of a private vow. Thus too, in Paul Warnefrid's "History of the Lombards," iii. 7, it is related, that "six thousand Saxons who survived the war, vowed that they would never cut their hair, nor shave their beards, till they had been revenged of their enemies, the Suevi. " A later instance of this custom is mentioned by Strada (Bell. Belg. vii. p. 344), of William Lume, one of the Counts of Mark, "who bound himself by a vow not to cut his hair till he had revenged the deaths of Egmont and Horn. "]
171 (return)
[ The iron ring seems to have been a badge of slavery. This custom was revived in later times, but rather with a gallant than a military intention. Thus, in the year 1414, John duke of Bourbon, in order to ingratiate himself with his mistress, vowed, together with sixteen knights and gentlemen, that they would wear, he and the knights a gold ring, the gentlemen a silver one, round their left legs, every Sunday for two years, till they had met with an equal number of knights and gentlemen to contend with them in a tournament. (Vertot, Mém. de l'Acad. des Inscr. tom. ii. p. 596. )]
172 (return)
[ It was this nation of Catti, which, about 150 years afterwards, uniting with the remains of the Cherusci on this side the Weser, the Attuarii, Sicambri, Chamavi, Bructeri, and Chauci, entered into the Francic league, and, conquering the Romans, seized upon Gaul. From them are derived the name, manners, and laws of the French. ]
173 (return)
[ These two tribes, united by a community of wars and misfortunes, had formerly been driven from the settlements on the Rhine a little below Mentz. They then, according to Caesar (Bell. Gall. iv. 1, et seq. ), occupied the territories of the Menapii on both sides the Rhine. Still proving unfortunate, they obtained the lands of the Sicambri, who, in the reign of Augustus, were removed on this side the Rhine by Tiberius: these were the present counties of Berg, Mark, Lippe, and Waldeck; and the bishopric of Paderborn. ]
174 (return)
[ Their settlements were between the rivers Rhine, Lippe (Luppia), and Ems (Amisia), and the province of Friesland; now the countries of Westphalia and Over-Issel. Alting (Notit. German. Infer, p. 20) supposes they derived their name from Broeken, or Bruchen, marshes, on account of their frequency in that tract of country. ]
175 (return)
[ Before this migration, the Chamavi were settled on the Ems, where at present are Lingen and Osnaburg; the Angrivarii, on the Weser (Visurgis), where are Minden and Schawenburg. A more ancient migration of the Chamavi to the banks of the Rhine is cursorily mentioned by Tacitus, Annal.
75 (return)
[ The speech of Civilis was received with this expression of applause. Tacitus, Hist. iv. 15. ]
76 (return)
[ Gibbeted alive. Heavy penalties were denounced against those who should take them down, alive or dead. These are particularized in the Salic law. ]
77 (return)
[ By cowards and dastards, in this passage, are probably meant those who, being summoned to war, refused or neglected to go. Caesar (Bell. Gall. vi. 22) mentions, that those who refused to follow their chiefs to war were considered as deserters and traitors. And, afterwards, the emperor Clothaire made the following edict, preserved in the Lombard law: "Whatever freeman, summoned to the defence of his country by his Count, or his officers, shall neglect to go, and the enemy enter the country to lay it waste, or otherwise damage our liege subjects, he shall incur a capital punishment. " As the crimes of cowardice, treachery, and desertion were so odious and ignominious among the Germans, we find by the Salic law, that penalties were annexed to the unjust imputation of them. ]
78 (return)
[ These were so rare and so infamous among the Germans, that barely calling a person by a name significant of them was severely punished. ]
79 (return)
[ Incestuous people were buried alive in bogs in Scotland. Pennant's Tour in Scotland, 1772; part i. p. 351; and part ii. p. 421. ]
80 (return)
[ Among these slighter offences, however, were reckoned homicide, adultery, theft, and many others of a similar kind. This appears from the laws of the Germans, and from a subsequent passage of Tacitus himself. ]
81 (return)
[ These were at that time the only riches of the country, as was already observed in this treatise. Afterwards gold and silver became plentiful: hence all the mulcts required by the Salic law are pecuniary. Money, however, still bore a fixed proportion to cattle; as appears from the Saxon law (Tit. xviii. ): "The Solidus is of two kinds; one contains two tremisses, that is, a beeve of twelve months, or a sheep with its lamb; the other, three tremisses, or a beeve of sixteen months. Homicide is compounded for by the lesser solidus; other crimes by the greater. " The Saxons had their Weregeld,—the Scotch their Cro, Galnes, and Kelchin,—and the Welsh their Gwerth, and Galanus, or compensations for injuries; and cattle were likewise the usual fine. Vide Pennant's Tour in Wales of 1773, pp. 273, 274. ]
82 (return)
[ This mulct is frequently in the Salic law called "fred," that is, peace; because it was paid to the king or state, as guardians of the public peace. ]
83 (return)
[ A brief account of the civil economy of the Germans will here be useful. They were divided into nations; of which some were under a regal government, others a republican. The former had kings, the latter chiefs. Both in kingdoms and republics, military affairs were under the conduct of the generals. The nations were divided into cantons; each of which was superintended by a chief, or count, who administered justice in it. The cantons were divided into districts or hundreds, so called because they contained a hundred vills or townships. In each hundred was a companion, or centenary, chosen from the people, before whom small causes were tried. Before the count, all causes, as well great as small, were amenable. The centenaries are called companions by Tacitus, after the custom of the Romans; among whom the titles of honor were, Caesar, the Legatus or Lieutenant of Caesar, and his comites, or companions. The courts of justice were held in the open air, on a rising ground, beneath the shade of an oak, elm, or some other large tree. ]
84 (return)
[ Even judges were armed on the seat of justice. The Romans, on the contrary, never went armed but when actually engaged in military service. ]
85 (return)
[ These are the rudiments of the famous institution of chivalry. The sons of kings appear to have received arms from foreign princes. Hence, when Audoin, after overcoming the Gepidae, was requested by the Lombards to dine with his son Alboin, his partner in the victory, he refused; for, says he, "you know it is not customary with us for a king's son to dine with his father, until he has received arms from the king of another country. "—Warnefrid, De gestis Langobardorum, i. 23. ]
86 (return)
[ An allusion to the toga virilis of the Romans. The German youth were presented with the shield and spear probably at twelve or fifteen years of age. This early initiation into the business of arms gave them that warlike character for which they were so celebrated. Thus, Seneca (Epist. 46) says, "A native of Germany brandishes, while yet a boy, his slender javelin. " And again (in his book on Anger, i. 11), "Who are braver than the Germans? —who more impetuous in the charge? —who fonder of arms, in the use of which they are born and nourished, which are their only care? —who more inured to hardships, insomuch that for the most part they provide no covering for their bodies, no retreat against the perpetual severity of the climate? "]
87 (return)
[ Hence it seems that these noble lads were deemed principes in rank, yet had their position among the comites only. The German word Gesell is peculiarly appropriated to these comrades in arms. So highly were they esteemed in Germany, that for killing or hurting them a fine was exacted treble to that for other freemen. ]
88 (return)
[ Hence, when Chonodomarus, king of the Alamanni, was taken prisoner by the Romans, "his companions, two hundred in number, and three friends peculiarly attached to him, thinking it infamous to survive their prince, or not to die for him, surrendered themselves to be put in bonds. "—Ammianus Marcellinus, xvi. 13. ]
89 (return)
[ Hence Montesquieu (Spirit of Laws, xxx, 3) justly derives the origin of vassalage. At first, the prince gave to his nobles arms and provision: as avarice advanced, money, and then lands, were required, which from benefices became at length hereditary possessions, and were called fiefs. Hence the establishment of the feudal system. ]
90 (return)
[ Caesar, with less precision, says, "The Germans pass their whole lives in hunting and military exercises. " (Bell. Gall, vi. 21. ) The picture drawn by Tacitus is more consonant to the genius of a barbarous people: besides that, hunting being the employment but of a few months of the year, a greater part must necessarily be passed in indolence by those who had no other occupation. In this circumstance, and those afterwards related, the North American savages exactly agree with the ancient Germans. ]
91 (return)
[ This apparent contradiction is, however, perfectly agreeable to the principles of human nature. Among people governed by impulse more than reason, everything is in the extreme: war and peace; motion and rest; love and hatred; none are pursued with moderation. ]
92 (return)
[ These are the rudiments of tributes; though the contributions here spoken of were voluntary, and without compulsion. The origin of exchequers is pointed out above, where "part of the mulct" is said to be "paid to the king or state. " Taxation was taught the Germans by the Romans, who levied taxes upon them. ]
93 (return)
[ So, in after-times, when tributes were customary, 500 oxen or cows were required annually from the Saxons by the French kings Clothaire I. and Pepin. (See Eccard, tom. i. pp. 84, 480. ) Honey, corn, and other products of the earth, were likewise received in tribute. (Ibid. p. 392. )]
94 (return)
[ For the expenses of war, and other necessities of state, and particularly the public entertainments. Hence, besides the Steora, or annual tribute, the Osterstuopha, or Easter cup, previous to the public assembly of the Field of March, was paid to the French kings. ]
95 (return)
[ This was a dangerous lesson, and in the end proved ruinous to the Roman empire. Herodian says of the Germans in his time, "They are chiefly to be prevailed upon by bribes; being fond of money, and continually selling peace to the Romans for gold. "—Lib. vi. 139. ]
96 (return)
[ This custom was of long duration; for there is not the mention of a single city in Ammianus Marcellinus, who wrote on the wars of the Romans in Germany. The names of places in Ptolemy (ii. 11) are not, therefore, those of cities, but of scattered villages. The Germans had not even what we should call towns, notwithstanding Caesar asserts the contrary. ]
97 (return)
[ The space surrounding the house, and fenced in by hedges, was that celebrated Salic land, which descended to the male line, exclusively of the female. ]
98 (return)
[ The danger of fire was particularly urgent in time of war; for, as Caesar informs us, these people were acquainted with a method of throwing red-hot clay bullets from slings, and burning javelins, on the thatch of houses. (Bell. Gall. v. 42. )]
99 (return)
[ Thus likewise Mela (ii. 1), concerning the Sarmatians: "On account of the length and severity of their winters, they dwell under ground, either in natural or artificial caverns. " At the time that Germany was laid waste by a forty years' war, Kircher saw many of the natives who, with their flocks, herds, and other possessions, took refuge in the caverns of the highest mountains. For many other curious particulars concerning these and other subterranean caves, see his Mundus Subterraneus, viii. 3, p. 100. In Hungary, at this day, corn is commonly stored in subterranean chambers. ]
100 (return)
[ Near Newbottle, the seat of the Marquis of Lothian, are some subterraneous apartments and passages cut out of the live rock, which had probably served for the same purposes of winter-retreats and granaries as those dug by the ancient Germans. Pennant's Tour in 1769, 4to, p. 63. ]
101 (return)
[ This was a kind of mantle of a square form, called also rheno. Thus Caesar (Bell. Gall. vi. 21): "They use skins for clothing, or the short rhenones, and leave the greatest part of the body naked. " Isidore (xix. 23) describes the rhenones as "garments covering the shoulders and breast, as low as the navel, so rough and shaggy that they are impenetrable to rain. " Mela (iii. 3), speaking of the Germans, says, "The men are clothed only with the sagum, or the bark of trees, even in the depth of winter. "]
102 (return)
[ All savages are fond of variety of colors; hence the Germans spotted their furs with the skins of other animals, of which those here mentioned were probably of the seal kind. This practice is still continued with regard to the ermine, which is spotted with black lamb's-skin. ]
103 (return)
[ The Northern Sea, and Frozen Ocean. ]
104 (return)
[ Pliny testifies the same thing; and adds, that "the women beyond the Rhine are not acquainted with any more elegant kind of clothing. "—xix. 1. ]
105 (return)
[ Not that rich and costly purple in which the Roman nobility shone, but some ordinary material, such as the vaccinium, which Pliny says was used by the Gauls as a purple dye for the garments of the slaves, (xvi. 18. )]
106 (return)
[ The chastity of the Germans, and their strict regard to the laws of marriage, are witnessed by all their ancient codes of law. The purity of their manners in this respect afforded a striking contrast to the licentiousness of the Romans in the decline of the empire, and is exhibited in this light by Salvian, in his treatise De Gubernatione Dei, lib. vii. ]
107 (return)
[ Thus we find in Caesar (Bell. Gall. i. 53) that Ariovistus had two wives. Others had more. This indulgence proved more difficult to abolish, as it was considered as a mark of opulence, and an appendage of nobility. ]
108 (return)
[ The Germans purchased their wives, as appears from the following clauses in the Saxon law concerning marriage: "A person who espouses a wife shall pay to her parents 300 solidi (about 180l. sterling); but if the marriage be without the consent of the parents, the damsel, however, consenting, he shall pay 600 solidi. If neither the parents nor damsel consent, that is, if she be carried off by violence, he shall pay 300 solidi to the parents, and 340 to the damsel, and restore her to her parents. "]
109 (return)
[ Thus in the Saxon law, concerning dowries, it is said: "The Ostfalii and Angrarii determine, that if a woman have male issue, she is to possess the dower she received in marriage during her life, and transmit it to her sons. "]
110 (return)
[ Ergo septae pudicitiâ agunt. Some editions have septâ pudicitiâ. This would imply, however, rather the result of the care and watchfulness of their husbands; whereas it seems the object of Tacitus to show that this their chastity was the effect of innate virtue, and this is rather expressed by septae pudicitiâ, which is the reading of the Arundelian MS. ]
111 (return)
[ Seneca speaks with great force and warmth on this subject: "Nothing is so destructive to morals as loitering at public entertainments; for vice more easily insinuates itself into the heart when softened by pleasure. What shall I say! I return from them more covetous ambitious, and luxurious. "—Epist. vii. ]
112 (return)
[ The Germans had a great regard for the hair, and looked upon cutting it off as a heavy disgrace; so that this was made a punishment for certain crimes, and was resented as an injury if practised upon an innocent person. ]
113 (return)
[ From an epistle of St. Boniface, archbishop of Mentz, to Ethelbald, king of England, we learn that among the Saxons the women themselves inflicted the punishment for violated chastity; "In ancient Saxony (now Westphalia), if a virgin pollute her father's house, or a married woman prove false to her vows, sometimes she is forced to put an end to her own life by the halter, and over the ashes of her burned body her seducer is hanged: sometimes a troop of females assembling lead her through the circumjacent villages, lacerating her body, stripped to the girdle, with rods and knives; and thus, bloody and full of minute wounds, she is continually met by new tormenters, who in their zeal for chastity do not quit her till she is dead, or scarcely alive, in order to inspire a dread of such offences. " See Michael Alford's Annales Ecclesiae Anglo-Saxon. , and Eccard. ]
114 (return)
[ A passage in Valerius Maximus renders it probable that the Cimbrian states were of this number: "The wives of the Teutones besought Marius, after his victory, that he would deliver them as a present to the Vestal virgins; affirming that they should henceforth, equally with themselves, abstain from the embraces of the other sex. This request not being granted, they all strangled themselves the ensuing night. "—Lib. vi. 1. 3. ]
115 (return)
[ Among the Heruli, the wife was expected to hang herself at once at the grave of her husband, if she would not live in perpetual infamy. ]
116 (return)
[ This expression may signify as well the murder of young children, as the procurement of abortion; both which crimes were severely punished by the German laws. ]
117 (return)
[ Quemquam ex agnatis. By agnati generally in Roman law were meant relations by the father's side; here it signifies children born after there was already an heir to the name and property of the father. ]
118 (return)
[ Justin has a similar thought concerning the Scythians: "Justice is cultivated by the dispositions of the people, not by the laws. " (ii. 2. ) How inefficacious the good laws here alluded to by Tacitus were in preventing enormities among the Romans, appears from the frequent complaints of the senators, and particularly of Minucius Felix; "I behold you, exposing your babes to the wild beasts and birds, or strangling the unhappy wretches with your own hands. Some of you, by means of drugs, extinguish the newly-formed man within your bowels, and thus commit parricide on your offspring before you bring them into the world. " (Octavius, c. 30. ) So familiar was this practice grown at Rome, that the virtuous Pliny apologises for it, alleging that "the great fertility of some women may require such a licence. "—xxix. 4, 37. ]
119 (return)
[ Nudi ac sordidi does not mean "in nakedness and filth," as most translators have supposed. Personal filth is inconsistent with the daily practice of bathing mentioned c. 22; and nudus does not necessarily imply absolute nakedness (see note 4, p. 293). ]
120 (return)
[ This age appears at first to have been twelve years; for then a youth became liable to the penalties of law. Thus in the Salic law it is said, "If a child under twelve commit a fault, 'fred,' or a mulct, shall not be required of him. " Afterwards the term was fifteen years of age. Thus in the Ripuary law, "A child under fifteen shall not be responsible. " Again, "If a man die, or be killed, and leave a son; before he have completed his fifteenth year, he shall neither prosecute a cause, nor be called upon to answer in a suit: but at this term, he must either answer himself, or choose an advocate. In like manner with regard to the female sex. " The Burgundian law provides to the same effect. This then was the term of majority, which in later times, when heavier armor was used, was still longer delayed. ]
121 (return)
[ This is illustrated by a passage in Caesar (Bell. Gall. vi. 21): "They who are the latest in proving their virility are most commended. By this delay they imagine the stature is increased, the strength improved, and the nerves fortified. To have knowledge of the other sex before twenty years of age, is accounted in the highest degree scandalous. "]
122 (return)
[ Equal not only in age and constitution, but in condition.
Many of the German codes of law annex penalties to those of both sexes who marry persons of inferior rank. ]
123 (return)
[ Hence, in the history of the Merovingian kings of France, so many instances of regard to sisters and their children appear, and so many wars undertaken on their account. ]
124 (return)
[ The court paid at Rome to rich persons without children, by the Haeredipetae, or legacy-hunters, is a frequent subject of censure and ridicule with the Roman writers. ]
125 (return)
[ Avengers of blood are mentioned in the law of Moses, Numb. xxxv. 19. In the Roman law also, under the head of "those who on account of unworthiness are deprived of their inheritance," it is pronounced, that "such heirs as are proved to have neglected revenging the testator's death, shall be obliged to restore the entire profits. "]
126 (return)
[ It was a wise provision, that among this fierce and warlike people, revenge should be commuted for a payment. That this intention might not be frustrated by the poverty of the offender, his whole family were conjointly bound to make compensation. ]
127 (return)
[ All uncivilized nations agree in this property, which becomes less necessary as a nation improves in the arts of civil life. ]
128 (return)
[ Convictibus et hospitiis. "Festivities and entertainments. " The former word applies to friends and fellow-countrymen; the latter, to those not of the same tribe, and foreigners. Caesar (Bell. Gall. vi. 23) says, "They think it unlawful to offer violence to their guests, who, on whatever occasion they come to them, are protected from injury, and considered as sacred. Every house is open to them, and provision everywhere set before them. " Mela (iii. 3) says of the Germans, "They make right consist in force, so that they are not ashamed of robbery: they are only kind to their guests, and merciful to suppliants. The Burgundian law lays a fine of three solidi on every man who refuses his roof or hearth to the coming guest. " The Salic law, however, rightly forbids the exercise of hospitality to atrocious criminals; laying a penalty on the person who shall harbor one who has dug up or despoiled the dead? till he has made satisfaction to the relations. ]
129 (return)
[ The clause here put within brackets is probably misplaced; since it does not connect well either with what goes before or what follows.
130(return)
[The Russians are at present the most remarkable among the northern nations for the use of warm bathing. Some of the North American tribes also have their hypocausts, or stoves. ]
131 (return)
[ Eating at separate tables is generally an indication of voracity. Traces of it may be found in Homer, and other writers who have described ancient manners. The same practice has also been observed among the people of Otaheite; who occasionally devour vast quantities of food. ]
132 (return)
[ The following article in the Salic law shows at once the frequency of these bloody quarrels, and the laudable endeavors of the legislature to restrain them;—"If at a feast where there are four or five men in company, one of them be killed, the rest shall either convict one as the offender, or shall jointly pay the composition for his death. And this law shall extend to seven persons present at an entertainment. "]
133 (return)
[ The same custom is related by Herodotus, i. p. 66, as prevailing among the Persians. ]
134 (return)
[ Of this liquor, beer or ale, Pliny speaks in the following passage: "The western nations have their intoxicating liquor, made of steeped grain. The Egyptians also invented drinks of the same kind. Thus drunkenness is a stranger in no part of the world; for these liquors are taken pure, and not diluted as wine is. Yet, surely, the Earth thought she was producing corn. Oh, the wonderful sagacity of our vices! we have discovered how to render even water intoxicating. "—xiv. 22. ]
135 (return)
[ Mela says, "Their manner of living is so rude and savage, that they eat even raw flesh; either fresh killed, or softened by working with their hands and feet, after it has grown stiff in the hides of tame or wild animals. " (iii. 3. ) Florus relates that the ferocity of the Cimbri was mitigated by their feeding on bread and dressed meat, and drinking wine, in the softest tract of Italy. —iii. 3. ]
136 (return)
[ This must not be understood to have been cheese; although Caesar says of the Germans, "Their diet chiefly consists of milk, cheese and flesh. " (Bell. Gall. vi. 22. ) Pliny, who was thoroughly acquainted with the German manners, says more accurately, "It is surprising that the barbarous nations who live on milk should for so many ages have been ignorant of, or have rejected, the preparation of cheese; especially since they thicken their milk into a pleasant tart substance, and a fat butter: this is the scum of milk, of a thicker consistence than what is called the whey. It must not be omitted that it has the properties of oil, and is used as an unguent by all the barbarians, and by us for children. "—xi. 41. ]
137 (return)
[ This policy has been practised by the Europeans with regard to the North American savages, some tribes of which have been almost totally extirpated by it. ]
138 (return)
[ St. Ambrose has a remarkable passage concerning this spirit of gaming among a barbarous people:—"It is said that the Huns, who continually make war upon other nations, are themselves subject to usurers, with whom they run in debt at play; and that, while they live without laws, they obey the laws of the dice alone; playing when drawn up in line of battle; carrying dice along with their arms, and perishing more by each others' hands than by the enemy. In the midst of victory they submit to become captives, and suffer plunder from their own countrymen, which they know not how to bear from the foe. On this account they never lay aside the business of war, because, when they have lost all their booty by the dice, they have no means of acquiring fresh supplies for play, but by the sword. They are frequently borne away with such a desperate ardor, that, when the loser has given up his arms, the only part of his property which he greatly values, he sets the power over his life at a single cast to the winner or usurer. It is a fact, that a person, known to the Roman emperor, paid the price of a servitude which he had by this means brought upon himself, by suffering death at the command of his master. "]
139 (return)
[ The condition of these slaves was the same as that of the vassals, or serfs, who a few centuries ago made the great body of the people in every country in Europe. The Germans, in after times, imitating the Romans, had slaves of inferior condition, to whom the name of slave became appropriated; while those in the state of rural vassalage were called lidi. ]
140 (return)
[ A private enemy could not be slain with impunity, since a fine was affixed to homicide; but a man might kill his own slave without any punishment. If, however, he killed another person's slave, he was obliged to pay his price to the owner. ]
141 (return)
[ The amazing height of power and insolence to which freedmen arrived by making themselves subservient to the vices of the prince, is a striking characteristic of the reigns of some of the worst of the Roman emperors. ]
142 (return)
[ In Rome, on the other hand, the practice of usury was, as our author terms it, "an ancient evil, and a perpetual source of sedition and discord. "—Annals, vi. 16. ]
143 (return)
[ All the copies read per vices, "by turns," or alternately; but the connection seems evidently to require the easy alteration of per vicos, which has been approved by many learned commentators, and is therefore adopted in this translation. ]
144 (return)
[ Caesar has several particulars concerning this part of German polity. "They are not studious of agriculture, the greater part of their diet consisting of milk, cheese, and flesh; nor has any one a determinate portion of land, his own peculiar property; but the magistrates and chiefs allot every year to tribes and clanships forming communities, as much land, and in such situations, as they think proper, and oblige them to remove the succeeding year. For this practice they assign several reasons: as, lest they should be led, by being accustomed to one spot, to exchange the toils of war for the business of agriculture; lest they should acquire a passion for possessing extensive domains, and the more powerful should be tempted to dispossess the weaker; lest they should construct buildings with more art than was necessary to protect them from the inclemencies of the weather; lest the love of money should arise amongst them, the source of faction and dissensions; and in order that the people, beholding their own possessions equal to those of the most powerful, might be retained by the bonds of equity and moderation. "—Bell. Gall. vi. 21. ]
145 (return)
[ The Germans, not planting fruit-trees, were ignorant of the proper products of autumn. They have now all the autumnal fruits of their climate; yet their language still retains a memorial of their ancient deficiencies, in having no term for this season of the year, but one denoting the gathering in of corn alone—Herbst, Harvest. ]
146 (return)
[ In this respect, as well as many others, the manners of the Germans were a direct contrast to those of the Romans. Pliny mentions a private person, C. Caecilius Claudius Isidorus, who ordered the sum of about 10,000l. sterling to be expended in his funeral: and in another place he says, "Intelligent persons asserted that Arabia did not produce such a quantity of spices in a year as Nero burned at the obsequies of his Poppaea. "—xxxiii. 10, and xii. 18. ]
147 (return)
[ The following lines of Lucan, describing the last honors paid by Cornelia to the body of Pompey the Great, happily illustrate the customs here referred to:—
Collegit vestes, miserique insignia Magni.
Armaque, et impressas auro, quas gesserat olim
Exuvias, pictasque togas, velamina summo
Ter conspecta Jovi, funestoque intulit igni. —Lib. ix. 175.
"There shone his arms, with antique gold inlaid,
There the rich robes which she herself had made,
Robes to imperial Jove in triumph thrice display'd:
The relics of his past victorious days,
Now this his latest trophy serve to raise,
And in one common flame together blaze. "—ROWE. ]
148 (return)
[ Thus in the tomb of Childeric, king of the Franks, were found his spear and sword, and also his horse's head, with a shoe, and gold buckles and housings. A human skull was likewise discovered, which, perhaps, was that of his groom. ]
149 (return)
[ Caesar's account is as follows:—"There was formerly a time when the Gauls surpassed the Germans in bravery, and made war upon them; and, on account of their multitude of people and scarcity of land, sent colonies beyond the Rhine. The most fertile parts of Germany, adjoining to the Hercynian forest, (which, I observe, was known by report to Eratosthenes and others of the Greeks, and called by them Orcinia,) were accordingly occupied by the Volcae and Tectosages, who settled there. These people still continue in the same settlements, and have a high character as well for the administration of justice as military prowess: and they now remain in the same state of penury and content as the Germans, whose manner of life they have adopted. "—Bell. Gall. vi. 24. ]
150 (return)
[ The inhabitants of Switzerland, then extending further than at present, towards Lyons. ]
151 (return)
[ A nation of Gauls, bordering on the Helvetii, as appears from Strabo and Caesar. After being conquered by Caesar, the Aedui gave them a settlement in the country now called the Bourbonnois. The name of their German colony, Boiemum, is still extant in Bohemia. The aera at which the Helvetii and Boii penetrated into Germany is not ascertained. It seems probable, however, that it was in the reign of Tarquinius Priscus; for at that time, as we are told by Livy, Ambigatus, king of the Bituriges (people of Berry), sent his sister's son Sigovesus into the Hercynian forest, with a colony, in order to exonerate his kingdom which was overpeopled. (Livy, v. 33; et seq. )]
152 (return)
[ In the time of Augustus, the Boii, driven from Boiemum by the Marcomanni, retired to Noricum, which from them was called Boioaria, now Bavaria. ]
153 (return)
[ This people inhabited that part of Lower Hungary now called the Palatinate of Pilis. ]
154 (return)
[ Towards the end of this treatise, Tacitus seems himself to decide this point, observing that their use of the Pannonian language, and acquiescence in paying tribute, prove the Osi not to be a German nation. They were settled beyond the Marcomanni and Quadi, and occupied the northern part of Transdanubian Hungary; perhaps extending to Silesia, where is a place called Ossen in the duchy of Oels, famous for salt and glass works. The learned Pelloutier, however, contends that the Osi were Germans; but with less probability. ]
155 (return)
[ The inhabitants of the modern diocese of Treves. ]
156 (return)
[ Those of Cambresis and Hainault. ]
157 (return)
[ Those of the dioceses of Worms, Strasburg, and Spires. ]
158 (return)
[ Those of the diocese of Cologne. The Ubii, migrating from Germany to Gaul, on account of the enmity of the Catti, and their own attachment to the Roman interest, were received under the protection of Marcus Agrippa, in the year of Rome 717. (Strabo, iv. p. 194. ) Agrippina, the wife of Claudius and mother of Nero, who was born among them, obtained the settlement of a colony there, which was called after her name. ]
159 (return)
[ Now the Betuwe, part of the provinces of Holland and Guelderland. ]
160 (return)
[ Hence the Batavi are termed, in an ancient inscription, "the brothers and friends of the Roman people. "]
161 (return)
[ This nation inhabited part of the countries now called the Weteraw, Hesse, Isenburg and Fulda. In this territory was Mattium, now Marpurg, and the Fontes Mattiaci, now Wisbaden, near Mentz. ]
162 (return)
[ The several people of Germany had their respective borders, called marks or marches, which they defended by preserving them in a desert and uncultivated state. Thus Caesar, Bell. Gall. iv 3:—"They think it the greatest honor to a nation, to have as wide an extent of vacant land around their dominions as possible; by which it is indicated, that a great number of neighboring communities are unable to withstand them. On this account, the Suevi are said to have, on one side, a tract of 600 (some learned men think we should read 60) miles desert for their boundaries. " In another place Caesar mentions, as an additional reason for this policy, that they think themselves thereby rendered secure from the danger of sudden incursions. (Bell. Gall. vi. 13. )]
163 (return)
[ The difference between the low situation and moist air of Batavia, and the high and dry country of the Mattiaci, will sufficiently justify this remark, in the opinion of those who allow anything to the influence of climate. ]
164 (return)
[ Now Swabia. When the Marcommanni, towards the end of the reign of Augustus, quitting their settlements near the Rhine, migrated to Bohemia, the lands they left vacant were occupied by some unsettled Gauls among the Rauraci and Sequani. They seem to have been called Decumates (Decimated), because the inhabitants, liable to the incursions of the Germans, paid a tithe of their products to be received under the protection of the Romans. Adrian defended them by a rampart, which extended from Neustadt, a town on the Danube near the mouth of the river Altmühl, to the Neckar near Wimpfen; a space of sixty French leagues. ]
165 (return)
[ Of Upper Germany. ]
166 (return)
[ The Catti possessed a large territory between the Rhine, Mayne and Sala, and the Hartz forest on this side of the Weser; where are now the countries of Hesse, Thuringia, part of Paderborn, of Fulda, and of Franconia. Learned writers have frequently noted, that what Caesar, Florus and Ptolemy have said of the Suevi, is to be understood of the Catti. Leibnitz supposes the Catti were so called from the active animal which they resemble in name, the German for cat being Catte, or Hessen. ]
167 (return)
[ Pliny, who was well acquainted with Germany, gives a very striking description of the Hercynian forest:—"The vast trees of the Hercynian forest, untouched for ages, and as old as the world, by their almost immortal destiny exceed common wonders. Not to mention circumstances which would not be credited, it is certain that hills are raised by the repercussion of their meeting roots; and where the earth does not follow them, arches are formed as high as the branches, which, struggling, as it were, with each other, are bent into the form of open gates, so wide, that troops of horse may ride under them. "—xvi. 2. ]
168 (return)
[ Duriora corpora. "Hardier frames;" i. e. than the rest of the Germans. At Hist. ii 32. the Germans, in general, are said to have fluxa corpora; while in c. 4 of this treatise they are described as tantùm ad impetum valida. ]
169 (return)
[ Floras, ii. 18, well expresses this thought by the sentence "Tanti exercitus, quanti imperator. " "An army is worth so much as its general is. "]
170 (return)
[ Thus Civilis is said by our author (Hist. iv. 61), to have let his hair and beard grow in consequence of a private vow. Thus too, in Paul Warnefrid's "History of the Lombards," iii. 7, it is related, that "six thousand Saxons who survived the war, vowed that they would never cut their hair, nor shave their beards, till they had been revenged of their enemies, the Suevi. " A later instance of this custom is mentioned by Strada (Bell. Belg. vii. p. 344), of William Lume, one of the Counts of Mark, "who bound himself by a vow not to cut his hair till he had revenged the deaths of Egmont and Horn. "]
171 (return)
[ The iron ring seems to have been a badge of slavery. This custom was revived in later times, but rather with a gallant than a military intention. Thus, in the year 1414, John duke of Bourbon, in order to ingratiate himself with his mistress, vowed, together with sixteen knights and gentlemen, that they would wear, he and the knights a gold ring, the gentlemen a silver one, round their left legs, every Sunday for two years, till they had met with an equal number of knights and gentlemen to contend with them in a tournament. (Vertot, Mém. de l'Acad. des Inscr. tom. ii. p. 596. )]
172 (return)
[ It was this nation of Catti, which, about 150 years afterwards, uniting with the remains of the Cherusci on this side the Weser, the Attuarii, Sicambri, Chamavi, Bructeri, and Chauci, entered into the Francic league, and, conquering the Romans, seized upon Gaul. From them are derived the name, manners, and laws of the French. ]
173 (return)
[ These two tribes, united by a community of wars and misfortunes, had formerly been driven from the settlements on the Rhine a little below Mentz. They then, according to Caesar (Bell. Gall. iv. 1, et seq. ), occupied the territories of the Menapii on both sides the Rhine. Still proving unfortunate, they obtained the lands of the Sicambri, who, in the reign of Augustus, were removed on this side the Rhine by Tiberius: these were the present counties of Berg, Mark, Lippe, and Waldeck; and the bishopric of Paderborn. ]
174 (return)
[ Their settlements were between the rivers Rhine, Lippe (Luppia), and Ems (Amisia), and the province of Friesland; now the countries of Westphalia and Over-Issel. Alting (Notit. German. Infer, p. 20) supposes they derived their name from Broeken, or Bruchen, marshes, on account of their frequency in that tract of country. ]
175 (return)
[ Before this migration, the Chamavi were settled on the Ems, where at present are Lingen and Osnaburg; the Angrivarii, on the Weser (Visurgis), where are Minden and Schawenburg. A more ancient migration of the Chamavi to the banks of the Rhine is cursorily mentioned by Tacitus, Annal.
