[gothic-l] Re: Analogy between fate of Eruli and Burgundians?

[Dr. Dirk Faltin <dirk@smra.co.uk>]

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, george knysh <gknysh at y...> wrote:
>
> --- "Dr. Dirk Faltin <dirk at s...>"
> <dirk at s...> wrote:
> > > > Procopius tells us that the Illyrian Heruls
> > > > harrassed the local Roman
> > > > provincials. This alone could have been enought
> > for
> > > > slaves and minor
> > > > peasants to join the marauding groups of Heruls.
> > >
> > > GK: A comment in passing. The "joiners"
> > would
> > > have been very few indeed, since otherwise this
> > would
> > > have precipitated a social crisis. So in a very
> > real
> > > sense this red herring by Dirk doesn't matter in
> > the
> > > least, and does not influence retroactive
> > computation
> > > of Illyrian-Erulian strength on the basis of
> > > Procopius' figures of 3000+1500.
> >
> >
> >
> > George,
> >
> > this is a completely empty argument it seems to me.
> > Just because you
> > assume that this would cause a 'social crisis' you
> > reject the
> > possibility of Roman slaves and disgruntled tax
> > payers to join the
> > remaining Heruls. Large numbers of slaves, mine
> > workers and
> > agricultural labourers have joined Visigoths and of
> > the Sueves of
> > Spain we hear that they once even joined forces with
> > very large
> > groups of Bacaudae, yet we never hear that his has
> > caused any 'social
> > crisis'. You cannot reject an argument just because
> > assume that
> > something might have happened, for which you have no
> > basis
> > whatsoever. Hence, mine is a perfectly valid
> > argument and it does
> > matter for any attemt to extrapolate tribal
> > strength.
> >
> > Dirk
>
>
> ******GK: No, Dirk. it is your argument which is both
> empty and a red herring. It is obviously intended to
> question retroactive computations of Erulian military
> strength on the basis of the figures given by
> Procopius (1500+3000), which you initially had no
> means of dealing with other than by asserting
> (arbitrarily) that they were inflated.
When that
> didn't work you tried the route of large "local"
> additions to the original Eruli. But as you like to
> say whenever you are displeased with someone else's
> somewhat more probable speculative reconstructions
> (more probable than yours), there is not a shred of
> evidence either in Procopius or anywhere else that
> this actually happened. In fact, given his nasty
> descriptions of the Eruli, it is precisely the reverse
> which is the more arguable, and your references to
> different situations elsewhere are quite irrelevant to
> the issue at hand. *****


We are spinning in circles I'm afraid. Ok, one final time:
Procopius writes that the Illyrian Heruls harassed the Roman
provincials. In other situations this kind of activity has caused
local slaves, surpressed agricultural labourers and others to join
the tormentors of their 'former' masters. I think you will have to
agree to this; it is both plausible and in several other events well
attested in the sources. Whether this happened or not is impossible
to say. Yet, any attempt to extrapolate from the military strength of
1500+3000 will at least have to take this problem into account.

Also, I have shown that using your own assumptions (factors) that the
strenght which you had calculated for the Heruls was indeed
completely implausible. This in turn makes this kind of
supplementation from disgruntled local slaves even the more
plausible. Yet, you choose to dismiss your own factors and
(arbitrarily) made the claim that Procopius' statement that 'most'
Heruls were killed in the battles with Langobards and Roman were pure
fantasies.

Also, I have not arbitrarily argued that Procopius' numbers are
inflated, but just pointed to the fact that many of the troop
strength which he gives in this writing is indeed inflated, which in
turn should make us wary about the numbers at hand.

Finally, I don't even see what we are arguing about. The discussion
started when you stated that 'tens of thousands of Heruls' migrated
to Thule. You have since revised this number to 'a few thousand',
which, given the great uncertainty surrounding the whole event, is
close enough to my own initial estimates. Unless you are also
supporting Troels' theory that other pagan Germanic groups like
Western Heruls from the Rhine, Varnians and Thuringians joined the
remaining eastern Heruls on their trek to Thule, we really have
nothing to discuss.

Dirk




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