[gothic-l] Re: Jordanes and the Scandinavian Eruli

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

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, Tore Gannholm <tore.gannholm at s...> 
wrote:
> >
> >
> >You just have to consider, that they according to Procopius passed
> >the Danes (who also lived in Scania) and settled at/beside the
> >Goetes, making Scania/Halland improbable. Smaaland or Blekinge are
> >the most probable regions for an interim settlement being attacked 
by
> >the Danes, and you can discuss Blekinge as neighbour to the Goetes.
> 
> Yes, they passed the Danes.
> However do we know where the Danes lived before Jordanes mentioned 
> expulsion of the Herulis?
> 
> In Sealand I agree and probably on the west coast of Skåne.
> 
> Couldn't it be that the Danes took your above mentioned areas after 
> possible  expulsion of the Heruls?

Of course this is possible, but if they first settled in the fertile 
Scania they had to expell another people - unless other Heruls 
already lived around Ringsjoen/Soesdala - and nothing is mentioned 
about that. The Danes were mentioned by Jordanes to be of the same 
stock as the Suetidi making a Danish expansion against west more 
plausible. 
 
> Jordanes doesn't mention that the Heruls settled next to the 
Gautoi!!
> Jordanes source must therefore be earlier.
> 
> That is Procopius that mentions the Gautoi and he has his 
information 
> from a later source, the new king brought down from Thule

I agree, but Procopius wrote "one of the most numerous nations there 
are the Gauti [Gautoi], and it was next [para=at/beside/by] to them 
that the incoming Eruli settled at the time of question" in the 
Dewing translation. The interpretation has been discussed earlier and 
as far as I can see this position of arrival must be the same as the 
position of the Jordanes-event, if the two authors mentioned the same 
group of Heruls.

This makes enclaves in the forests of Smaaland the most probable 
choise in my opinion. Here the Dani had a reason to expell them and 
they would live "para" the Gautoi. 

Troels  



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