[gothic-l] Re: Tracing the Eruli

[Troels Brandt <trbrandt@post9.tele.dk>]

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, george knysh <gknysh at y...> wrote:
>
> *****GK: I differentiate the "staging area" of Erulian
> (and other) raiders against the south in the 260's and
> 270's from the area of their permanent settlements as
> a community (with wives, children, old people). I
> agree that these staging areas were, for a time,
> within the boundaries of the invaded Bosporan Kingdom
> (with the consent of a usurping dynasty at
> Panticapaeum and the collaboration of the Tanaitae,
> who probably collaborated with the Germanics in the
> destruction of Tanais in the mid-3rd c. I continue to
> associate the permanent settlements with the area of
> the expanding Cc*****
> >
> > How far against southeast do we find the Chernyakhiv
> > settlements west
> > of Dnepr and northwest of the steppes? The region of
> > Krivoy Rog or of
> > Kirovograd to mention some examples?
>
> *****GK: According to the useful map provided by
> Mahomedov (p. 288) there are only FOUR known
> settlements of the Cc east of the Dnipro in the period
> prior to ca. 330: at Pereyaslav-Khmel'nyts'kyj and
> Sosnova (just across the river) in the contemporary
> oblast' of Kyiv, at Kompanijtsi (cont. Poltava oblast)
> also just across  the river, and at
> Kamyanka-Dniprovs'ka (Zaporizhja obl.) again just
> across the river. Interestingly, the areas you've
> mentioned (Kirovohrad and Kryvyj Rih) are empty of Cc
> at that time.


I remembered something about a settlement near Zaporizhja and the
emptiness in the other areas confirms as far as I can see at my maps
that these Eastgermanic people tried to avoid the steppes as
livingplaces following in such areas instead rivers like the Dnepr,
while the nomads lived at the steppes behind. But I look forward to
get Mahomedovs book from the library.

The people who suddenly sent a big army far away with the Bosporanian
navy were not nomads from the steppes, but people knowing boats -
being newcomers or people without access to the Black Sea and
seagoing vessels themselves from their settlements. Starting such
raids they probably already knew the possibilities and the
Bosporanians - making the most likely possibility to be a people at
the Cc-river-outposts at the Dnepr just having to cross 150 km of
steppe before reaching the sea of Asov.

If the Heruls lived east of Dniestr in 268 AD as proposed by
Mahomedov, it is difficult to explain why they went 500 km against
east along the Black Sea crossing several rivers to reach the
Bosporanian navy and then sailing back again along the coast to
Byzans - unless they ordered a navy to pick them up.

In the last case the cooperation should rather be due to an alliance
between Goths, Heruls and Bosporanians. The attacks in 267-68 AD
could be a part of the war between Goths and Romans ending up with
the victorious Aurelean giving up Dacia in 271 AD. In this connection
it should be noticed that the emperor (Gallienus) himself commanded
the Roman army in the battle against the Herulian group of
Naulobates.

I suspect the Scandinavians in the Gothic area to be Goths or Eudosi -
 the latter maybe leaving Jutland around 200 AD during the wars there
(a.o. Illerup) - or earlier - and going southeast again along the
Black Sea when the Huns arrived around 360-370.

Would these Eudosi speak a Westgermanic or a Northgermanic language?

Troels


> This is explained due to their being the
> preserve of associated Sarmatians, whose integration
> into Cc occurs in the next phase. The boundaries of
> the Cc spread eastward in the period 330-375.
> Mahomedov's map (p. 289)extends them as far as the
> headwaters of the Psiol and Donets, into the
> contemporary oblast of Belgorod (Russia). The area of
> today's Kharkiv is included, but not the large steppe
> area north of the Sea of Azov (most of today's
> Zaporizhja, Donetsk and Luhans'k obls. of Ukraine, and
> the Rostov obl. of Russia).******
>



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