Toward the end of the first century, the Roman historian Tacitus wrote an account of Germanic society based on the works of earlier authors and most likely interviews with Romans who had traveled beyond the northern borders of the empire. His descriptions are not accurate in all respects, but evidence from other written sources and from archaeological excavations has supported a number of them.

Honor in battle; love of war and dislike of peace. When they have come into battle, it is shameful for the chieftain to be excelled in valor, shameful for the entourage not to match the valor of the chieftain. Furthermore, it is shocking and disgraceful for all of one’s life to have survived one’s chieftain and left the battle….

The absence of cities; the German dwellings. It is common knowledge that the peoples of the Germans do not live in cities, and they do not even like their homes to be joined together. They live separated and scattered, as a spring or a field or a grove has attracted them. They do not plan their villages in our manner with buildings joined together and next to one another: each one has an open area around his home, whether as a protection against the disasters of fire or because of a lack of skill in building. They make no use at all of stones or tiles: they use unshaped timber for everything without regard to appearance or aesthetic pleasure. Certain parts they coat with greater care with an earth so pure and gleaming that it looks like painting and colored drawings. They are also accustomed to dig underground chambers and they cover them with a great deal of dung; these serve as a retreat against winter and a storage area for crops….

The upbringing of the young. In every home the young, naked and dirty, grow to possess these limbs, these bodies, which we admire. His own mother nurses each one, and the children are not handed over to servants or nursemaids. You would not distinguish master and slave by any niceties of upbringing: they live amidst the same animals and on the same ground until age sets the freeborn apart and valor recognizes them as her own. The young men experience love late, and for this reason their strength is not exhausted. Nor are the girls hurried into marriage; they have the same youthful vigor and similar stature: they are well matched in age and strength when they enter upon marriage, and the children reproduce the strength of the parents….

Food and drink. The Germans’ drunkenness. They have a beverage made from barley or wheat, fermented into something like wine [that is, beer]; those nearest the frontier also purchase wine. Their foods are simple, wild fruits, fresh game, or curdled milk: they satisfy their hunger without fancy preparation and without seasonings. They do not have the same moderation regarding thirst. If one would indulge their intoxication by furnishing as much drink as they long for, they will be conquered no less easily by their vices than by arms.

Source: Tacitus’ Agricola, Germany, and Dialogue on Orators, rev. ed., trans. Herbert W. Benario (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1991), pp. 70, 71, 73, 75. Copyright © 1967 by the Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc. New edition copyright © 1991 by the University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Publishing Division of the University. Reprinted by permission of Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. All rights reserved.

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