Heruler

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The Heruli (Latin Eruli or etymologically incorrect Heruli ) were a (east) Germanic tribe that in the 60 years of the 3rd century. Chr. On the Black Sea appeared for the first time in history in appearance and to the 6th century the sources are attested.

history

Origin: legends and historical reality

The older research assumed that the Heruli came from Scandinavia . However, this assumption was probably based on an incorrect reading of a passage in the Getica (published around 551/52) by the Romanized Goths Jordanes , which tells a story of the origin of the Heruli ( Origo gentis ). According to this, the Danes drove them out of their ancestral homes, but this story is hardly historically credible. The ethnogenesis of Herulians was rather very likely on the continent instead, possibly even they perceived only in the region where the Romans first time, on the north coast of the Black Sea.

In addition to the legend about the origin of the Heruli, there was also one about their end. The late antique historian Prokop reports in the 6th book of his histories (published around 550) that the Heruli (see below), who finally converted to Eastern Roman services, split again before they crossed the Danube and a contingent turned north to turn into Thule , the fabulous end of the world , as Procopius calls it, to seek refuge. What exactly is the core of this message is unclear. It is possible that Prokop is making a literary allusion to how to deal with the Goths (against whom the Eastern Romans were still at war in Italy at that time) after their defeat, and for this purpose he converted Gothic narratives in his sense. The similarity of the finds from the Sösdala group in southern Sweden, where broken saddles and bridles were found buried flat under the earth near burial sites, with corresponding finds in Untersiebenbrunn and Pannonhalma was taken by some researchers as evidence for Prokop's report, but this is controversial.

The origin from Scandinavia, which is also often claimed for other Germanic gentes , is therefore regarded as a topos ; The same applies to the above-mentioned assumption of a return to the "original home".

From the imperial crisis to the end of the Herul empire in the 6th century

Attacks by the Goths and Heruli in the Black Sea and Aegean Sea in the 3rd century

From the Black Sea region, Heruler took part in the sea expeditions of the Goths in the second half of the 3rd century, at the time of the so-called imperial crisis of the 3rd century , and thus reached Greece. The contemporary historian Dexippos reported in his (only fragmentarily preserved) Scythica of the raids of these Germanic invaders, which he referred to as Scythai based on the “classical” oriented Greek authors and with recourse to traditional ethnography .

Dexippos describes how Scythai invaded the Aegean Sea from the Black Sea in 267/68 and attacked several islands. There is also evidence of a Heruler attack on the strategically important Thermopylae Pass during this period. The invaders then landed on the Peloponnese and pushed further inland. Among other things, they attacked and sacked Dexippus' hometown Athens , but suffered defeat shortly afterwards. For a long time it was assumed in research that Dexippus was perhaps himself involved in the successful defensive battles of an Athenian “militia”, which had acted against the attackers without the support of imperial troops. In more recent research this is considered refuted due to recent sources; although one of the Greek commanders was called Dexippos, this is not identical with the historian of the same name. Traditionally, however, Athens' attackers are identified with the Herulians, and Jordanes later equated the Erouloi mentioned by Dexippus with the Herulians of the 6th century. The retreating attackers were defeated in the spring of 268 by Emperor Gallienus on the Nestos River in Thrace ; their leader Naulobatus received the insignia of a Roman consul after the deditio had been completed , and Heruli may also have been accepted into the Roman army. The incursions of the Scythai from the Black Sea region, who profited from the weak phase of the empire at the time, lasted until 275/76.

Around the middle of the 4th century, the Heruli who settled on the Sea of ​​Azov were subjugated by the Goths. The sources report hardly anything about the following years. When the empire of the Greutungian-Gothic king Ermanarich was conquered by the Huns around 375 AD , who advanced westwards during this time and thus triggered the " migration of peoples ", the "Gothic" Heruli also became Hunnic vassals. Only after the fall of the Hunnic empire around the year 454 did Herulers manage to establish their own empire in the area of ​​what is now southern Slovakia and the eastern Weinviertel . In the following period, scattered statements from sources also deal with the Heruli, who among other things attacked the region around Batavia ( Passau ) around 480 . Heruli in the service of the (dissolving) Western Roman Empire took part in Odoacer's uprising in 476 in Italy and apparently served him until his defeat against the Gothic king Theodoric, who invaded Italy in 489 (with Eastern Roman approval) .

Around 508 the kingdom of the Heruli ruled by King Rudolf (Rodulf), which had good relations with Theodoric, was destroyed by the Lombards . The remaining Heruli divided into several groups, one of which joined the Lombards and was absorbed in them, another found refuge with the Ostrogoths in Italy and a third fled after a long migration first to the Gepids , but then finally admitted in 512 in the year Eastern Roman Empire found. In what is now Belgrade , they were allowed to set up a small federal empire . These Heruli played a not insignificant role in the restauratio imperii of the Eastern Roman emperor Justinian I , as they often served in Roman armies, but enjoyed a bad reputation. They are said to have converted to Christianity, but this may only have been true of some of the Heruli. Soon after the middle of the sixth century these Heruli also disappeared from the sources; however, at the beginning of his reign, Emperor Maurikios (582–602) took the triumphal name Herulicus as the first Roman emperor .

The "Western Heruli"

In addition to the Herulians just mentioned, who settled on the north coast of the Black Sea and later in Pannonia, other Heruli are mentioned in the sources, often referred to in research as "West Heruli". These are considered an independent group although no such separation is made in the sources. One should therefore not necessarily imagine these Heruli as a group that was settled somewhere in the northwestern Barbaricum (as sometimes assumed). In any case, Heruli are mentioned in western sources in connection with incursions into Gaul in 286, when they were intercepted by Emperor Maximian and then probably served as Roman auxiliary troops. Herulian auxiliaries are also mentioned in the subsequent period, as well as Herulian sea raids in the west on the Spanish coast in the early 5th century; Herulers may also have been involved in the 406 Rhine crossing .

literature

  • Arne Søby Christensen: Cassiodorus, Jordanes and the History of the Goths. Studies in a Migration Myth. Museum Tusculanum Press, Copenhagen 2002, ISBN 87-7289-710-4 .
  • Alvar Ellegård: Who were the Eruli? In: Scandia. Volume 53, 1987, pp. 5ff.
  • Walter A. Goffart : The narrators of barbarian history (AD 550-800). Jordanes, Gregory of Tours, Bede, and Paul the Deacon. Princeton University Press, Princeton 1988, ISBN 0-691-05514-9 .
  • Erich Kettenhofen : The incursions of the Heruler into the Roman Empire in the 3rd century AD In: Klio . Volume 74, 1992, pp. 291-313.
  • Pál Lakatos: Source book on the history of the Heruli. Csukás István a Jate BTK dékánja, Szeged 1978 ( Acta Antiqua et Archaeologica. Volume 21; Opuscula Byzantina. Volume 6).
  • Stephan Lehmann: The 'Herulersturm' and the art production in the province of Achaia. In: E. Walde, B. Kainrath (ed.): The self-portrayal of Roman society in the provinces in the mirror of the stone monuments. Conference files of the IX. International Colloquium on Provincial Roman Art. Innsbruck 2007, pp. 45-54.
  • Günter Neumann , Matthew Taylor:  Heruler. In: Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde (RGA). 2nd Edition. Volume 14, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1999, ISBN 3-11-016423-X , pp. 468-474.
  • Walter Pohl : The Gepids and the Gentes on the central Danube after the collapse of the Attila Empire. In: Herwig Wolfram , Falko Daim (ed.): The peoples on the middle and lower Danube in the fifth and sixth centuries. Publishing house of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna 1980, ISBN 3-7001-0353-0 , pp. 239–305.
  • Bruno Rappaport : Heruli . In: Paulys Realencyclopadie der classischen Antiquity Science (RE). Volume VIII, 1, Stuttgart 1912, Col. 1150-1167.
  • Alexander Sarantis: The Justinianic Herules. From Allied Barbarians to Roman Provincials. In: Florin Curta (Ed.): Neglected Barbarians. Brepols, Turnhout 2010, pp. 365-408 ( Studies in the Early Middle Ages. Volume 32).
  • Roland Steinacher : The Heruls. Fragments of a History. In: Florin Curta (Ed.): Neglected Barbarians. Brepols, Turnhout 2010, pp. 321-364 ( Studies in the Early Middle Ages. Volume 32).
  • Roland Steinacher: Rome and the barbarians. Peoples in the Alpine and Danube region (300-600). Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2017.

Remarks

  1. ↑ For the various forms of names see the overview in Rappaport, Heruli (1912), Col. 1150. For the meaning of the name cf. Neumann, Heruler § 1a (1999), p. 468.
  2. ↑ Jordanes, Getica 23.
  3. ↑ See Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 359. On the problem of the statements made by Jordanes in general and his reliability cf. now especially Sǿby Christensen, Cassiodorus, Jordanes and the History of the Goths (2002).
  4. ↑ See also Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 321.
  5. ^ Prokop, Historien , 6, 14f. See also Sǿby Christensen, Cassiodorus, Jordanes and the History of the Goths (2002), pp. 293f.
  6. ↑ Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 358.
  7. ↑ On this problematic thesis see Charlotte Fabech: Offerfundene fra Sösdala, Fulltofta og Vennebo. Eksempler på rytternomadiske riter and ceremonier udført i sydskandinaviske jernaldersamfund. (The sacrificial finds from Sösdala, Fultofta and Vennebo. Examples of rider-nomadic rites and ceremonies in the southern Scandinavian Iron Age society). In: Nordisk Hedendom. Et symposium. Odense 1991, pp. 103-112.
  8. ^ For a summary, see Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 356ff.
  9. ↑ See also Andreas Schwarcz: The Heruler on the Black Sea. In: Bulgaria Pontica Medii Aevi 4-5 / 2. Sofia 2006, pp. 199-210; Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 322ff.
  10. ↑ See David Potter: The Roman Empire at Bay . London u. a. 2004, p. 241ff. For Dexippos see above all Gunther Martin: Dexipp von Athen. Edition, translation and accompanying studies . Tuebingen 2006.
  11. ↑ General Kettenhofen, Heruler (1992), who dates the beginning of the campaign to the year 267 (ibid., P. 304).
  12. ↑ Gunther Martin, Jana Grusková: “Dexippus Vindobonensis” (?) A new manuscript fragment for the so-called Heruleinfall of the years 267/268 , in: Wiener Studien 127 (2014), pp. 101–120.
  13. ↑ Cf. Dexippos, fragment 25 in Martin's edition (fragment 28a in the edition by Felix Jacoby ).
  14. ↑ Christopher Mallan, Caillan Davenport: Dexippus and the Gothic invasions: interpreting the new Vienna Fragment (Codex Vindobonensis Hist. Gr. 73, ff. 192v-193r). In: The Journal of Roman Studies 105, 2015, pp. 203–226.
  15. ↑ See, inter alia, Rappaport, Heruli (1912), col. 1155; Kettenhofen, Heruler (1992); Martin, Dexipp von Athen (2006), p. 18.
  16. ↑ Jordanes, Getica 117, cf. on this, however, Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 322. On the possibility of using Dexippos by Jordanes (whether directly or indirectly) see Martin, Dexipp von Athen (2006), p. 63.
  17. ↑ See Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 324.
  18. ↑ Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 330ff.
  19. ↑ For localization cf. Pohl, The Gepiden and the Gentes on the Middle Danube (1980), p. 277; general on the Heruler empire see Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 337ff.
  20. ↑ Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 341ff.
  21. ↑ Dating from Taylor, Heruler § 2b (1999), p. 471.
  22. ↑ Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 345ff.
  23. ↑ Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 349ff.
  24. ↑ See Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 326ff .; Taylor, Heruler § 2a (1999), p. 470f.
  25. ↑ See Steinacher, The Herules (2010), p. 327f.