Volkerwanderung = migration of (barbarian) peoples
- the term implies that this was a period of invasions par excellence, i.e. that the 4th and the 5th C. invasions were like no other
- the German word is applied because of the assumption that the migrations were an invasion of primarily "Germanic" people
    >> historians still believe that all the peoples pressing on the Rhine and Danube frontiers of the Empire spoke similar, if not identical, languages, had similar political and social custom, and their attacks were somehow coordinated attacks on the Roman world
- this is a consequence of the modern linguistic research, which is based on the assumption that, as Indo-Europeans languages, all Germanic languages were related to each other

BUT: the Goths, the Vandals, the Burgundians, and the Gepids, never called themselves Germans, nor were they regarded as such by outsiders (i.e., Roman authors writing in Latin)
- following the unexplicit assumptions of linguists, historians assume that Tacitus' Germania was also the world of the fourth century inhabited by various groups, none of which called itself Germani
    - the idea of an affinity among Germanic peoples, based on their similar languages, originated in the 9th C. scholars in what is today Germany, but no sense of community among Germans is attested before that
- very few modern accounts of the Volkerwanderung would acknowledge the existance, during that period, of non-Germanic groups playing a crucial role in Late Antiquity, such as tha Huns or the Avars
- another problem is that of opposing the German barbarians to civilized Romans; many still believe that the health, robust, and democratic Germans of the North destroyed the corrupted world of slave-owners and tyrants we now call the Roman Empire
- the classic account of the migration of a Germanic group is Jordanes' Getica, a history of the Goths written in the mid 6th C.
    a. Jordanes attributed a distant origin to the Goths, an island called Scandza, which many belive today to be Scandinavia
    b. he is also responsible for the idea that the Goths left Scandza because of overpopulation, an idea well attuned to the modern concept of migration => historians believe that Volkerwanderung had economic causes
    - other talk about climatic changes

- Jordanes' explanation is based on ancient medical theories, ultimately deriving from the corpus of medical writings attributed to Hippocrates; one of the basic tenets of those theories was the so called "climate thesis" (particular climates would have specific influences on the peoples living in those respective regions, depending on the distribution of moisture and/or heat => cold weather encourages fecundity => peoples of the North are more inclined to reproduce on a higher rate than people from the South
    c. because of higher demographic rates, the barbarians are usually viewed as large groups coming in waves and invading the empire

The Goths

- early history known from Jordanes (wrote in the mid 6th C.)
- allegedly of Scandinavian origin; BUT: no archaeological proof
- first appear in Roman sources after 200 (236: first attack on Roman teritory)
- based in Moldova and Southern Ukraine => land raids (250: defeated and killed emperor Decius) but also sea - borne expeditions (reached Greace)
- contact with the Roman world => increasing social differentiation => rise of kings
- divided in several groups - Visigoths
                                           - Ostrogoths
- 376: Ostrogoths defeated by Huns => Visigothic groups crossed the Danube into the Empire
    * they asked for permission to enter the Empire (Valens) => they were starving
-378: defeated and killed emperor Valens at Adrianople => wide spread plundering of the Balkans
- 410: sacked Rome
- early 5th C. - Visigoths established the first succesor state in Spain
- 486: under Theodoric the Great the Ostrogoths established a succesor state in Italy

Vandals

- mentioned on the borders of Dacia in the early 200s
- moved westwords in the wake of the Hunic invasion
- established another succesor state in Northen Africa

Burgundians

- originated in central Europe
- established a succesor state in Eastern Gaul (neighbors of the Franks)

Franks

- first mentioned on the Northen borders of Gaul
- early 5th C. established a succesor state in Gaul => the Merovingian dynasty
- 504: under king Clovis converted to Catholic Christianity (first barbarians to do so)

Anglo - Saxons

- 3 groups (Angles, Saxons, and Jutes) from Northwestern Germany and Denmark established 7 kingdoms in Britain after the withdrawal of the Roman armies (406)

Lombards

- disputed with the Gepids (Germanic group in the area) the area of present day Hungary (early 500s)
- 586: moved into Northen Italy and established a kingdom that lasted until the Carolingian conquest of the late 700s

Huns

- long believed to be an European offshoot of the Hsiung - Nu mentioned in Chinese annals

BUT: no historical evidence of any connection
- Roman historians place them beyond the river Don => steppe nomads moving out of their original habitat for a variety of reasons (population pressure, drought on the steppes, social conflict etc.)
- remained in the stepps after defeating the Ostrogoths (395: attacked Persia and the Roman provinces in the Middle East across the Caucasus Mountins)
- by 400: strong presence on the Danube => by 420 moved into Hungary
- reached the greatest power under Attila (ca. 440-453): brought under their domination non - Hunic groups (Ostrogoths and Gepids) => exploited the agricultural surplus of the subject peoples
- turned raiding (common with all nomadic societies) into permanent warfare (esp. against the Roman Empire) as a means to extract tribute not just to plunder (e.g., in 447: Attila was paid 6,000 lb. of gold)
- archaeology proves that the Hunic invasion triggered a remarckable unity of culture within barbarian Europe from Hungary to England => Hunic society was multiethnic => model for other barbarian societies (Attila - major charachter in the Nibelungenlied)
- 451: Attila defeated by a Roman general in Gaul => 453: at his death the Hunic Empire collapses => subject peoples (Ostrogoths and Gepids) took over the central area of the Hunic Empire