Getae and Dacians? Are they the same? Or is this unknowable?

[Alanus]

Hailog, Rumo

Actually I said that the "dominent factor in Gothic society was Germanic." I didn't say the Goths were Germanic, since they were a polyethnic people. I had already mentioned (in a previous post) the various tribes-cultures that eventually compised the Gutilda, ie Sarmatians, Alans, Gepids, Dacians, etc., that you quoted from Wolfram. I agree with Haskall. A perfect example would be Bishop Ulfilas himself-- the man who evidently wrote the Gothic Bible in a Germanic language so that all the Goths couldn't understand it. He came from a group of Cappodocians who had infused with the Goths (first as the unfree) in the 3rd century.

You must know what I meant when I said the names of individuals within the high/ruling familes were Germanic. In the Amals we see Achiulf, Oduulf, Valamir, Vidimir, Thiudigotho, Amaliasuintha, Atahalaric, etc. until the end of the Ostrogothos. In the other ruling family (Balths) we find Alaviv, Fritigern, Athaulf, Walia, Theodoric, Frideric, Euric, etc. They all had Germanic names, and these two families can be traced back to the beginning. They were hereditary leaders, and they accepted any person from any ethnic background into their evolving society-- as long as he fought for the gens.

Your long list of non-Gotic names is interesting, and it shows some of the cultures attached or connected to the Goths. However, Safrax was an Alan. And we see the "Romanization" of nomens, a standard social practice and also the method in which names were perceived and recorded by historians of the period.

However, there is little doubt to the origins of the Gothic culture. It came from Scanzia, just as the Tyrfingi Goths worshiped a Scandinavian god in the form of Tyrfing, the "hand of Tyr." Again Tyrfing shows up in the Icelandic "Old Edda," the poetic Edda. Here the sword Tyrfing has reached mystical proportions. In the Gutsaga, we find the tale of overpopulation, when people draw straws, the losers migrating through southern Russia as far as Greece. All of this lines up correctly with the Origo Gothica of Jordanes. The Goths were not liars.

Your asked what "sociology" had to do with it? An old axiom, still used by sociologists, states that when a lesser culture/tribe infuses into a more dominent culture/tribe, the lesser culture adopts the language of the greater culture. This was/is done for social and economic reasons; and it only takes three generations. In this fashion, the dominent warrior society of the Goths-- the Amals and Balths-- retained their Germanic names, heritage, and language until the end of the Gothic polyethnos. I said "heritage," and that was the whole reason the Origo Gothica was written.

This view may not be popular today, in an age where history is rewritten to accomodate the slighted. Yet the pop history of today will fall to someone else's idea of what is "correct" fifty years from now. I took a cheap shot at Peter Heather, a "revisionist" historian who stands on camera, center stage, in socalled "documetaries" on the History Channel. Again, this is pop "history" which isn't history at all. It's "get the viewer's money." In a recent book, Professor Heather pontificates that the one factor in the Huns incredible success (at whatever) was their "asymmetrical bow." He spends three pages, including mathamatical formulae, on just why their bow was (1) extra long, (2) extra powerful, and (3) could shoot to great distances. He doesn't mention that one of three longest shots ever recorded (almost 1,500 feet) came from the Crimea in the 4th century BC, a feat accomplished with a short Scythian bow. He compares the Hun bow with a Turkish bow (used a millenium later), and specifically states that horsemen held their bow "upright in front of them." I would suggest that Prof. Heather might watch something as inane as his mind, like perhaps (duhh) U-Tube and "horse archery." What he failed to realize was the Hunnic bow had "ears" (siyahs) which effectively lengthened the bow and also gave it more leverage. But the crucial factor in any bow is "draw-weight," not length; and all bows in the Hunnic period had ears, including those of the Sarmatians and even the Romans. I know, because I'm an archer-instructor who uses steppe bows several times a week. If he got something as simple as a bow wrong, well what else?

Have a nice day,