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

[Rumo]

Alan,

We already discussed about names and Christianity. While you repeat the claims, I'll try not to repeat the arguments.

I already quoted from Otto Mänchen-Helfen's World of the Huns , you can check also his study published in Oriens (1957), "Germanic and Hunnic Names of Iranian Origin". One of the groups of Goths crossing the Danube was led by Alatheus and Saphrax. You already admitted Saphrax is of Iranian origin. Alatheus is somewhat controversial, as some scholars find it Germanic, some find it Iranian (for instance John Matthews in The Roman empire of Ammianus, 1989, p. 326). Other Gothic leaders from the same period with apparently non Germanic names are Farnobius (Pharn(a)- is an onomastic root of Iranian origin, widespread in the Greek epigraphy of the north-Pontic coast in names like Pharnakês, Pharnabazos, Pharnagos or Pharnoxarthos) and Colias (see Mänchen-Helfen's study).

Ulfilas preached to some communities on the Danube. How can their language be relevant for the entire Gothia?

• That the Goths as a nation were still heathen up to the time of their entry to the Roman empire in 376 is widely accepted, nor does Ammianus imply otherwise. It is evident that they contained some Christians, the missionary work of Ulfila, especially among prisoners of war and other Roman expatriates among them, having produced a considerable number of converts and Christian communities; but one would not imagine that these formed more than a minority of the population at large, nor that they penetrated to any great extent the higher echelons of Gothic society. (Matthews, 1989, 331)

By mentioning how Latinized/Romanized the Goths were by 460, you have given credence to the Three Generation Principle that you refuted earlier. Thanks. It only took three generations, and even the clothing changed.

It may look like a semantic nit-pick to you, but a refuted axiom cannot be reused. Axioms by definition must hold true in all cases and this one doesn't. It doesn't even hold true for Goths, as one small group of Crimean Goths preserved their language until the modern era.

I'm glad you agree that Dacian influence on the Cernjachov Culture was minimal. Therefore Dacians had a very minor influence on the Gothic culture as a whole, which is understandable. In this period-- late 3rd century to mid 4th century-- the Dacians weren't influencing anybody and were themselves being Latinized to the extent that the present language of Rumania still remains a strong and lyric "romance" tongue.

I didn't say "minimal", I said "limited". Many Dacians lived outside the Roman province of Dacia, so these people weren't speaking Latin (excepting some bilingual traders, mercenaries, etc.). In Brigetio (Pannonia) we have an early 3rd century inscription of one interprex Dacorum from legio I Adiutrix, evidence the language was still actively spoken so that the empire still needed translators.

• It would not be surprising if the Gothic federations, like their settlements, were more varied in composition than first impresions might suggest. According to Ammianus, the Huns killed and despoiled many of their Alan rivals and took the rest into alliance (31.3.1) - a pattern of warfare and accomodation among the barbarian peoples that must have been very frequent in the turmoil of this unsettled period. (Matthews, 1989, 326)

• Even when a culture group can be linked with a historically defined confederacy, as it can in the case of the Sîntana de Mure?-?ernjachov culture and the Goths, it would not tell us whether a user of this material culture was a Tervingian or Greuthungian Goth or whether s/he was not also a Sarmatian, a Dacian or a Taifal (or which of these s/he was). (Halsall, 2007, 61)

The last paragraph has a footnote referring to Linda Ellis, "Dacians, Sarmatians and Goths on the Roman-Carpathian frontier, 2nd-4th centuries" in Shifting Frontiers in Late Antiquity (eds. R. Mathisen and H. Sivan, 1996), 105-25. This study is mostly from archaeological perspective, and the conclusion is:

• Regrettably, very little is known about most of the peoples of post-Roman Eastern Europe. It is clear that several cultures were present east of the Carpathians from pre-Roman to post-Roman times. The archaeological evidence suggests that this region, and many of its settlements, were polyethnic and incorporated an effective presence and continuation of the native population. Answers to questions regarding the extent to which settlements and burial grounds were polyethnic, the nature and degree of co-existence, the processes of acculturation, or even the existence of social institutions to incorporate individuals through sanguine relationships, must await further archaeological excavations.