Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
  1. Home
  2. Search

Refine search

Refine search

Access:
Content type:
Publication date:
Apply   From and To filters
Subject: Show more
Journals Show more
Publishers: Show more
Societies Show more
Series: Show more
Collections: Show more

Actions for selected content:

Select all | Deselect all
  • View selected items
  • Export citations
  • Download PDF (zip)
  • Save to Kindle
  • Save to Dropbox
  • Save to Google Drive

Save Search

You can save your searches here and later view and run them again in "My saved searches".

Please provide a title, maximum of 40 characters.
Cancel
×

1 results

  • 15 - The Germanic peoples

  • from PART IV - FOREIGN RELATIONS AND THE BARBARIAN WORLD
    • By Malcolm Todd, Principal of Trevelyan College and Professor of Archaeology at the University of Durham
  • Edited by Averil Cameron, University of Oxford, Peter Garnsey, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Ancient History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    11 December 1997, pp 461-486

  • Summary

    Roman written sources suggest little change within the social order of the Germanic peoples from the first contacts to the migrations. The impact of environmental change in the later Roman Iron Age must also be allowed for, in certain areas at least, most notably in the northern coastlands. From some areas of northern Gaul, however, there have come clear signs of German settlement dating from the late fourth and early fifth centuries. The peoples of the northern German coastlands who posed an increasing threat to the security of the frontier on the lower Rhine and to the coasts of northern Gaul and Britain in the fourth century were lumped together by Roman sources as 'Saxons', though that name embraced wide ethnic variety. By the early fifth century, whether in Gaul, the Danube lands or Scandinavia, Germanic leaders could express a growing confidence that their place in a changed world was assured as never before.