[gothic-l] Re: Goths as more than barbarians

[faltin2001]

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, "allyn5157" <allyn5157 at h...> wrote:
>
>
> The History Channel did a story on Goths based on Professor Peter
> Heather's book about the same subject. The story on TV was more
> interesting than the professor's book (a bit too dry and academic).






Hi,

Peter Heather's books is one of the best on Gothic history. If in
doubt I would rely on the information provided in the book rather
than the TV programme.








> Both confirm what you are looking for: Goths, though led by a king,
> voted for said king so they used democracy of sorts.






I think that is really streching it a bit. If anything this voting
right rested only with very few members of the highest elite and the
circle of possible candidates was also limited to only a few members
of the leading families. The 'demos' i.e. the people had no voting
right. This form of Wahlkoenigtum was practiced in Germany until the
late middle ages, but nobody would speak of Democracy in this
respect.






 They also had a
> rudimentary concept of Christianity though they were converts when
> they joined the Roman empire.





The Goths were the first Germanic people to adopt Christianity, with
first individual conversions taking place in the last decades of the
3rd century. At the end of the 4th century when the Tervingi
(Visigoths) fled from the Huns and sought refuge on Roman territory
they adopted the Arian form of Christianity in greater numbers.








> They adopted land ownership at an
> early stage so they were early capitalists.



The term 'capitalist' really means nothing in the 3r or 4th century,
as there is nothing really to contrast it with. I suppose you mean
that the Goths dropped the Germanic Allmende form of ownership for a
more feudal form early on. I suppose that might be correct.




> Many of the architecture
> still standing today was developed by the Goths, such as using the
> arch instead of flying buttresses.



The Goths have nothing to do with flying buttresses and there is no
evidence that any architecture was developed by the Goths. You
confuse the Gothique period of architecture (ca. 12th - 15th century)
with the Goths who had seized to exist as distinguishable ethnos some
500 to 600 years earlier.

Cheers

Dirk






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