[gothic-l] Digest Number 534

[Ingemar Nordgren]

Dear Dirk,


Yes I have read works of Bierbrauer (of some reason I always think of
another Bierbrauer by name Cromwell. How comes!?)and I also have works
of Godlovski.

I also know  these guys claim Wielbark developed from Okcyvie.

They probably are right  to a great extent but I do not buy it quite through as do you.

Bierbrauer undervaluate external renewals in the Wielbark area and also
refuses to accept certain traits  as anything but  genuine Wielbark
habits when they indeed are comparable with Scandinavian.

You write:"The Wielbark culture probably did comprise of people with a distinct
	form of believe, which was among others expressed by the fact that a
	Gothic warrior needed no weapons in the after life. A fact that
	separates the Wielbark-'religion' from that of Przeworsk and of
	course Scandinavian groups."


In that both you and Bierbrauer are out sailing. That is exactly the
Westscandinavian burial-custom appearing in the 1th c.AD and a
generation earlier a number of grave-fields of that type in Western
Scandinavia are closed down indicating an possible emigration. I am
talking about flat-ground graves with  cremations in 'brandgruben' and
'urnenbrandgruben' with no weapons or other expensive gifts for men, but
rich gifts including knives for women. He claims it is originally
developed in Wielbark. Still there are great similarities even in the
grave ceramics  with both Western and Eastern Gautland. It is of course
not identical which have made Bierbrauer reject it, but it is definitely
very similar. So all your comments about   great differences in religion
and  pottery in Scandinavia and Wielbark comes down to Bierbrauers
refusal to see those similarities because they are not identical as
regards pottery, and he means the burial custom is not important or
special.I think otherwise and so did many archaeologists.


If you doubt it was a Gepidic culture Okulicz is talking about and if you believe

it's multiochtonousness depended on spreading of the original culture it just shows

you have not read Okulicz or considered what he writes.

About your remark that the Burgundians are not part of the Wielbark culture you are quite right.

I understand that you did not know that the Wielbark culture originally was mentioned 'the Burgundian

culture' in archaeological works.And, of course you are right the
Wielbark culture did not exist  300 BC - it just started after WWII
and before that it was called the Goto-Gepidic and earlier the
Burgundian and the culture itself started around BC. The
Weichsel/Vistula area however existed all the time and I should of
course have referred to that for early contacts and I think, indeed,
that I did so - at least some times. About archaeology and Scandinavian
contacts you have my book. Concerning the Gothic language it  never went
trough the first shift as far as I know but it differed of course from
Protogermanic if that is what you mean. You can stay in contact with a
lot of peoples without the same language so yours is not an argument.
All languages and dialects develope locally of course and so did Gothic
and Scandinavian after splitting. The Goths were indeed as you point out
a polyethnical group what concerns biology and  original languages and
this already from the beginning I mean. Only the religious ancestry
created the Goths as just Goths. I strongly doubt the original Oksywie
and Przeworsk was Gothic in any way. This starts with new religious
ideas following the decline of the fertility league in Scandinavia and
Northern Germania.Also Ernst Schwarz has got some interesting points
with his Goto-Nordic area which I do not regard as definitely obsolete.

Best wishes
Ingemar





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