Tribes, peoples and their leaders

[ualarauans]

Hails Iggwimer!

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, "Ingemar Nordgren" <ingemar at ...> 
wrote:
>
> Your analysis suggests as well some alternate explanations. Since 
the
> Goths were moving en masse down to the Cerniachov-Sintana-de- Mûres
> area they evidently needed a wartime leader for all the people, 
i.e.
> þiuðans and maybe the *_xarjanaz_ was equal with Wolframs 'kings of
> the army' during the expansion. After settling down and splitting 
in
> two (or more) groups I can not see the need of o þiuðans but 
instead
> we get a kindins with the Vesigoths which seems to keep also the
> functions of a sacral king and hence probably is a more normal
> leaderfunction.

Sorry for re-asking again, Ingemar. So you suggest the split took 
place roughly along the lines between old component tribes 
(*kindeis) of a people (thiuda), right? That, for instance, the best-
known *Tairwiggos and *Grutiggos had been *kindeis of a federative 
Gut-thiuda when it was migrating southeastwards. But in the new 
home, they decided to get separated under the leadership of their 
kindinos which now took with the functions of their gone overlord 
(thiudans). In which case we may only talk of a kindins *Tairwigge, 
never a thiudans *Tairwigge, for *Tairwiggos were not a thiuda, but 
only a *kinds. Why am I syllabling it over and over again? I just 
want to know which Gothic words to use when writing about something 
from the Migration period. Do you think some kindinos after the 
separation did desire to title themselves thiudanos in order to 
stress their independence? Were the later larger coalitions of small 
*kindeis known as Ostrogoths (*Austragutans) and Visigoths 
(*Wisugutans) properly called thiudos or still *kindeis? On which 
depends how their kings were called.

> He has just the limitations in power that a sacral
> king had but on the kind-level and he is elected.

I noticed you make a difference between the cult performed by a 
sacral king of old and the Odinistic religion of later rulers like 
*Airminareiks. What was in your opinion the core of that sacral 
king's worship? Was it the fertility cult known from later 
Scandinavian sources and grouping around the mythological character 
of *Ingwaz, later Yngvi-Freyr? It bears a lot of archaic stuff as we 
know, a ritual love for peace and relics of a matriarchate rule 
among other, things not much favored by Odinists as we may guess. 
Trying to join it up with David's stratification of the Germanic 
kingship terms, may we suggest that this was the religion 
personified by the "peace chieftain" (*kuningaz -?, cf. later 
Svíakonungr) while the Odinistic motives which probably emerged 
first as a secret cult of *xarjaz (orig. "host of raiders") became 
dominant since the *xarjanaz took the power as *þeuðanaz? Are there 
firm reasons to postulate that, say, *Baireiks (champion of the 
Gothic Trek, mentioned by Jordanes as Berig), *Gadareiks, his son 
*Filumers were *iggwiblostrjos ("worshippers of *Iggws)? That they 
were thiudanos as well? Can we settle a precise date when this 
tradition stopped? In particular, if you associate the change of 
faith (*Iggwiblostr > Odinism) with the splitting of the thiuda in 
*kindeis, how could it be that thiudans had had another religion 
than his kindinos? I'm sorry if I misunderstood something of what 
you wrote on this. It's an unfamiliar area where I can easily lose 
the bearings.

> His council of reiks
> should be equivalent to tribal kings/kuningas or, if you prefer the
> clan-association, clan chiefs recognising a clan leader. 
Accordingly
> there should have been several different kinds making up the þioð 
and
> they temporarily gave power to a þiuðans. At this time they also 
had
> borrowed the Celtic reiks and it became associated with the king 
title
> through Roman contacts and, I suggest, that this title was used by
> Wulfila, and later Cassiodorus, just to simplify the description of
> the kingship.

I'm not sure Wulfila used reiks in the strict sense "king" when 
translating the Bible, but only "ruler", "powerful 
person", "authority", also with comparative meaning. But of course 
Latin rex could have influenced the later Gothic usage of reiks in 
Italy and Spain. Unfortunately we don't have Gothic-written sources 
on Gothic history which would finally settle the matter which word 
was used and maybe when. Until some lucky bookworm has discovered 
Ablavius' "Bi Urruns jah Gadedins Gutane" in library archives we are 
left with mere speculations.

>Still I think they were called kuningas if you take the
> finnish and other old loanwords into consideration. The later 
Gothic
> kings from Alarik and Teoderik were definitely regarded as reiks,or
> rex,in the scriptures.I claim the þiuðans disappeared with att 
latest
> Ostrogotha and that Ermanarik was not a þiuðans because he insted 
was
> an Odinistic king. Later as you say the Germanic title was to be
> kuningas/king as well for a sacral king like Svákonungr.

Wulfila was making his translation in the second half of the 4th 
century. It's the time of *Airminareiks (died before 375) ruling the 
East. Wulfila consistently uses thiudans as a translation of Greek 
BASILEUS "king". He never uses another term. If he was in intent to 
get correctly understood by his auditory, and we probably can be 
pretty sure he was, he had to use the words in the meaning they had 
at that time. As no other word is used in this meaning (and we know 
that, when there are several synonyms for one and the same Greek 
item, they are most often used interchangeably varying the style), 
the easiest conclusion that we may draw is that in fact there was no 
other currently used word to precisely refer to the king. Ergo, that 
the contemporary Gothic kings – *Airminareiks and *Athanareiks - 
were called thiudanos. Unless they were called kindinos being 
regarded not kings but rulers of separate tribes (*kindeis), the 
word which Wulfila calls Roman governors such as Pontius Pilatus. 
But they definitely weren't called reiks in the meaning "king", for 
there's nothing of a king in Wulfila's usage of this word which had 
to reflect the language of the epoch. Reiks could evolve to "king" 
under Latin influence first after settling down in former West-Roman 
provinces, in new-established Gothic kingdoms where all 
chancelleries were run by Roman intellectuals like Cassiodorus and 
where Latin was from the beginning the second language, soon to 
become the first.

I hope I haven't still more muddled up the matter. It seems to me 
that I have...

Ualarauans






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