Evaluating the Evidence 7.1: Tacitus on Germanic Society

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Tacitus on Germanic Society

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.

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Warlike Ardour of the People. When they go into battle, it is a disgrace for the chief to be surpassed in valour, a disgrace for his followers not to equal the valour of the chief. And it is an infamy and a reproach for life to have survived the chief, and returned from the field. . . .

Arrangement of their towns, subterranean dwellings. It is well known that the nations of Germany have not cities, and that they do not even tolerate closely contiguous dwellings. They live scattered and apart, just as a spring, a meadow, or a wood has attracted them. Their village they do not arrange in our fashion, with the buildings connected and joined together, but every person surrounds his dwelling with an open space, either as a precaution against the disasters of fire, or because they do not know how to build. No use is made by them of stone or tile; they employ timber for all purposes, rude masses without ornament or attractiveness. Some parts of their buildings they stain more carefully with a clay so clear and bright that it resembles painting, or a coloured design. They are wont also to dig out subterranean caves, and pile on them great heaps of dung as shelter from winter and as a receptacle for the year’s produce. . . .

Their children. In every household the children, naked and filthy, grow up with those stout frames and limbs which we so much admire. Every mother suckles her own offspring and never entrusts it to servants and nurses. The master is not distinguished from the slave by being brought up with greater delicacy. Both live amid the same flocks and lie on the same ground till the freeborn are distinguished by age and recognised by merit. The young men marry late, and their vigour is thus unimpaired. Nor are the maidens hurried into marriage; the same age and a similar stature is required; well-matched and vigorous they wed, and the offspring reproduce the strength of the parents. . . .

Food. A liquor for drinking is made of barley or other grain, and fermented into a certain resemblance to wine. The dwellers on the river-bank also buy wine. Their food is of a simple kind, consisting of wild fruit, fresh game, and curdled milk. They satisfy their hunger without elaborate preparation and without delicacies. In quenching their thirst they are equally moderate. If you indulge their love of drinking by supplying them with as much as they desire, they will be overcome by their own vices as easily as by the arms of an enemy.

EVALUATE THE EVIDENCE

  1. hat does Tacitus praise, and what does he criticize, about Germanic warriors, food, houses, and child rearing?
  2. Tacitus’s work was written in part to criticize his fellow Romans, whom he saw as becoming weak from the influx of wealth into the empire. How does this perspective inform his description of Germanic customs? How might such attitudes shape the way Romans responded to the barbarian migrations?

Source: Tacitus, The Agricola and Germania, trans. A. J. Church and W. J. Brodribb (London: Macmillan, 1877), pp. 87ff.