[gothic-l] Re: Ostrogoths in Italy, Britain or China (or on the moon?)

[dirk at SMRA.CO.UK]

(snip)

 No one went to Britain (or
to
> China or the moon, all equally improbable), because there was no
> need to emigrate.
> Regards
>           Andreas Schwarcz


Hello Andreas,

I certainly don't want to reopen the thread and I also agree that the
Goths did not migrate to Britain. However, to give Tore's proposal
some background one can refere to Procopius, who relates a negotiation
between Belisarius and the Goths during the siege of Rome in 538AD. On
this occasion, the Gothic proposal to have only Sicily as their home
was countered by an offer of Britain, "which is far greater than
Sicily, and was formerly subject to the Romans." The talks broke down
and the idea of Goths going to Britain never surfaced again.

While, Procopius is a notoriously unreliable informant and we don't
know if this negotiations ever took place, the fact that it is
reported in his "Wars"6.6, 27-36, puplished in 551AD, seems to give
some credibility to the proposition that some people at this time may
have thought about this alternative for the Goths. Unless of course,
Belisarius used Britain figuratively in place of any 'unreachable
land'.

Or, more likely the 'Britain-story' was invented as part of Procopius'
argument in favour of returing all barbarians to their homelands (and
we know from Jordanes that many people at this time thought that the
Goths came from Britian).

Similarly, Procopius'- most likely invented - story of a Herulic
migration to Thule belongs to the same category, as A. Cameron
(Procopius and the Sixth Century) shows. Britain, Thule and Scandza
were the islands in the Northern Ocean were all northern barbarians
came from according to the Roman mental map and where all barbarians
should return to according to Procopius.

This argument was meant to oppose Jordanes, who had argued that the
Goths should stay where they are, in Italy. Jordanes argued that they
could not go to Britain because they did not come from there, but from
Scandza. But he also introduced the scene of the broken bridge during
the migration from  Gothiscandza to Scythia to demonstrate that there
was no going back to Scandza and to account for the 'collective memory
loss' which had caused his fellow Goths to never having heard of
Scandza as their home, as Goffard shows.  Jordanes also described
Scandza as repulsive and inhabitable (he even has a Scandzan King
Roduulf leaving his Rani kingdom because Italy was so much more
attractive). Jordanes also excludes Scythia, which was pleasant but
over-crowded with Sclaveni, Antes and Bulgari. All this was
intended to show that the Goths could neither go to Scythia, nor to
Scandza let alone to Britain, but that they had to stay were they
were, in Italy.



cheers
Dirk

PS: Goffart, "Narrators of Barbarian History"












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