According to the subject, being conspiracy, the investigation of Germany by Tacitus, as a place he saw as the enemy of the empire he served, is important in light of how the Germans succeeded where the Gauls, Iberians, Britons, Ligurians, Picts, Thracians, Dacians, and other barbarian peoples, failed to resist Civilization. Most German tribes would remain free and eventually take over the empire. Then, they were swallowed by civilization as the Romans had been, as its eager functionaries.

Racially, the Germans were not blond, but red of hair. The blonds were their Sarmation cousins, and the German kings of the Nordic faith, the Swedes, who seem to have been the remnants of the Scythians who vanished form history in about 100 B.C.. Tacitus never used the Latin term for “white” to describe the Germans, but named them “ruddy.” Where he mentioned mixed folk, they will be a mix of redhead and blond.

Two more lies by modern fantasists have been shelved by the old soldier scholar.

Germans were thought by him to have had pure blood for ages. The name Germani was originally the name of the Tungri and was adopted by all the tribes, as the Germani were the first to cross the Rhine and take land from the Gauls. It was kind of a term that meant enemy of civilization.

An earth-born god named Tuisto fathered a son, Mannus, who was the father of the three major Germanic races: Ingaevones, near the sea, Herminones in the interior and Istaevones who comprise the rest, in the mountains and the east. The Germans did not believe in making images of the higher powers, had outlawed money, making this a reactionary meta-culture, do not build temples but keep groves, and only conduct political business [like 1700s pirates who were also reacting against merchant society abuses] while drinking, ‘When They Are Incapable of Pretense’.

Decisions arrived at in the open emotion of drink, were ratified the next day while sober, probably with a hangover! The Germans seemed to agree with this process with the ancient Persians, early modern pirates, the heroes of the Iliad and the Founding Fathers of the U.S. and modern Socialists who conducted business in taverns. The Persians also agreed that no temples should be kept, that the higher powers were accessed in nature, and that images of God were taboo. Tribes corrupted by Romans would use money and might have queens. While Tacitus praised these methods for dealing with Germans, he regarded rule by queens as a doom and did encourage giving strong drink to Germans in hopes that they would make rash decisions!

The Germans were not farmers, but herdsmen of the forest, who had slaves cultivate just enough grain to make booze. The cattle and horses grazed in the forest, as do modern cattle and wild horses in the American west.

Herakles and Odysseus were recognized as heroes who had anciently visited the Germans.

“I accept the view that the peoples of Germany have never contaminated themselves by intermarriage with foreigners and are of pure blood, distinct and unlike any other nation.”

In the roster of tribes, Tacitus will cite some few tribes of dubious race claiming to be Germans who might be mixed with Celtic, Sarmation or other arctic races.

“Traitors and deserters are hanged on trees.”

“Cowards, shirkers and sodomites are pressed down under a wicker hurdle into the slimy mud of the bog.”

Capital punishment and flogging are only permitted by priests.

Other crimes are settled by fines and damages.

Business is transacted while armed.

Hero chiefs have strong bands of warriors as depicted in Beowulf. Such chiefs taking a side in a feud, might decide the issue without violence.

Chiefs lead, they do not direct. The women encourage men in battle and are chaste to the point of killing themselves rather than accepting rape. As with most Arуan cultures, bands of 100 are the ideal body.

The chief god, is Mercury/Hermes/Odin who accepts human sacrifice.

Herakles and War are appeased by animal sacrifice.

Women and white horses have sacred aspects. Shields and weapons are passed down by the wife and mother.

Gambling, to the point of being bundled into slavery on a bet, is a big problem.

Lots are used for divination.

There is a type of agricultural slave who works the land and is not required to be a warrior. Serfdom is the main form of slavery. Slaves are given important duties in some tribes, but are not encouraged within the household, in contrast to the Roman way, in which each household has slaves within it. Freedmen are not given tribal status.

The men hate peace and love war, and Tacitus crows, “We have now taught them to accept gifts of money also.”

Houses are not crowded together and feature root cellars also used for hiding during winter invasions.

A wife gets but one husband and these women, according to their enemy, Tacitus, are the most virtuous in the world. There is no infanticide. If their are too many people to feed, bands of young men are sent out as invasion forces to conquer or perish. Gift giving, feasting and hospitality are highly valued, ‘It Is Accounted a Sin to Turn Away Men’.

Funeral observances are similar to that in the Iliad, but secluded and quite, only involving a pyre heaped with the dead man’s arms. “Stone would only lie heavily on the dead.” The men are supposed to nurse grief in their heart and women express it outright.

The tribes known as the Alamani [Allmen] and Franks [Freemen] do not yet exist, as those were caused by the destruction and motion of tribes under the pressure of the Romans, Alans, Sarmations and Huns.

Chapters 28 thru 46 constitute a cultural atlas, taking one from the Rhine, Alps and Elbe to the North Sea, Baltic and Danube frontiers, down to the mountains of the upper Balkans, in a great crescent. I will include only a few ethnographic notes of his, that might bear on the unique Germanic ability to resist financial civilization and its very quick acceptance of Christianity, as well as the notion of Reformation. Note that Prussians, were Balt peoples, not Germans. It was the Baltic folk that resisted Christianity longer than any others.

Tribes are:

(1-5) Marsi, Gambrivii, Suebi, Vandilii, Tungri

(6-9) Aravisci, Osi, Treviri, Nervii, folk of doubtful racial origin within Germania, who claim to not be Celtic, but seem of Celtic descent.

(10-13) Vangiones, Triboci, Nemetes, Ubii, are sell-out tribes who crossed the Rhine and live under Roman protection.

(14-15) Batavia, bravest of the Germans, who broke away from the Chatti. The Chatti were a great tribe who were led into battle by “iron ring” wearing berserkers. The Batavian legion was one of the three best for 400 years.

(16-21) Mattiaci, Uisipi, Tencteri, Bructeri, Chamavi, Angrivarii, the latter recent arrivals, possibly Agrianes.

(22-25) Dulgubnii, Chasuarii, Frisii, Chauci, the latter being the “noblest people in Germany.”

(26-28) Cherusci, Fosi, Cimbri, the latter possibly the Saxons.

(29-30) Suebi, Semnones, the latter Wodenists who practiced human sacrifice and believed they guard the grove of the race.

(31-38) Langobardi famously few, Reudigni, Aviones, Anglii or Angles = English, Varini, Eudoses, Suarines and Nuitines are weak tribes who share a common worship of Nerthus or Mother Earth. Her grove is on an island in the [Baltic] sea and slaves are sacrificed to her by downing in the lake after they wash her body. [1]

(40-43) Hermundury [Heruli?], Naristi, Marcomanni & Quadi, the latter formerly Celtic according to Arуan.

(44-46) Marsigni, Cotini and Buri. The Cotini have a Balkan language.

(47-52) Lugii, Harii, Helvecones, Manimi, Helisii and Naharvali, the Lugi being widespread and the last tribe worshiping Castor and Pollux, the Divine Twins. These tribes are beginning to fall under Sarmation influence in eastern Germany and might include Balkan refugees like the Cotini who mine for the Sarmations. The Harii paint their bodies and faces black, as well as their shields, and prefer to wage war at night

(53-55) Gothones, Rugii and Lemovii [Goths, Prussians and Livonians?] on the sea. The Goths use short swords and shields, suggesting a Back Sea origin.

(56) The Suiones or Swedes “right out in the sea” Gotland and Sweden have ships that can be rowed in either direction.

(57) The Aestii are like the Suiones, their neighbors, but speak like the Britons. They live so far north one can hear the Sun rising from the midnight sea. They collect amber and may be Estonians.

(58) The Sitones border the Suiones. “They resemble them in all respects but one—woman is the ruling sex. That is the measure of their decline, I will not say below freedom, but even below decent slavery.”

(59) The Peucini or Bastarnae are “like” Germans in all things.

(60-61) The Venedi and Fenni are mixed race, resemble the Sarmatians have strange habits, the Fenni, possibly Finns, being disturbingly poor, “But on the whole are to be classed with the Germans, for they have settled homes, carry shields and are fond of traveling—and traveling fast—on foot… What comes after them is the stuff of fables… On such unverifiable stories I will express no opinion.”

Yet he did venture an offhand opinion, “I imagine that in the islands and continents of the west, just as in the secret chambers of the east, where the trees exude frankincense and balm, there must be woods and groves of unusual productivity.”

His idea was that since the sun slept in the far east, far west, and far north, that there he melted elements such as sap that turned into amber and such. It is interesting that his pre-scientific thinking, who believed in a sleeping sun god, is superior to the thinking of our day, which denies the possibility of any conspiracy, and that any man might have known about the lands where so many ships had to have been blown.

Notes

-1.See the novel Incidents in the Life of Orion, JL