Who Do You Root For: Barbarians or Romans?

[Martinus]

And just to add insult to injury after the Slavs rolled in nobody ever invaded Europe again.  The Romans just needed to hold out for two hundred more years.

Eh? The Muslims held Spain, Sicily and the Balkans at various times for hundreds of years. And the Mongols conquered Russia(though not sure if that counts).

And the Turks that came off the steppes of Asia at the time...  Europe didn't really settle down until the High Middle Ages and then it was narrowly spared the Mongol Hordes.

Not to mention, afterwards Turks made pretty succesful inroads into the Balkans too, and even almost conquered Vienna.

[The Minsky Moment]

The examples you are citing are from the time when the Western Empire had been reduced to a rump state.  Up until that time it was clear who was who.  When the Visigoths attacked the Vandals and Alans that didn't make them Roman, that made them temporary allies of Rome.

I don't know what the rump state comment means in this context.  The first reference was to the Franks under Childeric in the 460s when the Western Empire was still quite live and kicking as a de jure state (albeit sans Africa).  The second reference referred to a time when there no Western Empire at all; the point is that nonetheless there is a clearly identifiable Roman society and state covering Italy and the Balkans that is just as "Roman" as any other imperial regime of the 5th century.

When we talk about "Visigoths" and "Vandals" etc during this period we aren't really talking about clearly defined nations in the modern sense but rather warbands and hangers-on of varied and shifting compositions held together by a leader.  The distinction between a "Visigothic" warlord like Atulf and a "Roman" warlord like the Romano-British legionnaire turned imperial pretender Constitine III is not that sharp - both used their command over armed men to carve out domains of territorial control and build alliances with other players, and from the point of view of the de jure emperor in Ravenna, the opportunities and threats they posed were similar.

[Sheilbh]

That was before the Angles and Saxons came over.

The Romano-Britains weren't exterminated.

It's interesting that Squeeze self-identifies with the Anglo-Saxons.  Given his birth place and class origin I'm willing to bet he has more Romano-British blood than Anglo-Saxon.

No-one identifies with the Romano-British

[citizen k]

That was before the Angles and Saxons came over.

The Romano-Britains weren't exterminated.

It's interesting that Squeeze self-identifies with the Anglo-Saxons.  Given his birth place and class origin I'm willing to bet he has more Romano-British blood than Anglo-Saxon.

No-one identifies with the Romano-British

King Arthur? DNA? Archeological record?

[Josquius]

That was before the Angles and Saxons came over.

The Romano-Britains weren't exterminated.

It's interesting that Squeeze self-identifies with the Anglo-Saxons.  Given his birth place and class origin I'm willing to bet he has more Romano-British blood than Anglo-Saxon.

The north east is the truest English area of England (bloody southern Saxons stealing our lovely Angle name!) :p

My family name is Cumbric and thats where that line comes from so I probally do have a larger than normal amount of Welsh blood. Then of course I am quarter Irish so...yeah.
But screw blood, that isn't important, its culture that matters and my ancestral culture is Germanic.

[Admiral Yi]

But screw blood, that isn't important, its culture that matters and my ancestral culture is Germanic.

Your blood determines your ancestral culture.

[Josquius]

Your blood determines your ancestral culture.

Not the culture of my ancestors, the ancestors of my culture.

[Admiral Yi]

Not the culture of my ancestors, the ancestors of my culture.

I suppose that makes more sense.

What aspects of current English culture do you ascribe to the Anglo-Saxons?  Apart from the soccer hooliganism of course.

[Josquius]

I suppose that makes more sense.

What aspects of current English culture do you ascribe to the Anglo-Saxons?  Apart from the soccer hooliganism of course.

Most of it.
Beer, democracy, individualism, language, etc...
We have more in common with the other north European nations than we do the Latin nations. Much of this will of course be down to geography moulding culture but there is a lot of it which has routes in our heritage.

[Valmy]

Aeitus was raised by Huns.  Stilicho's father was a Vandal.  Aegidius led predominantly Frankish armies.  Majorian's forces were a veritable rainbow coalition of the barbarian world.

So I guess you are voting Barbarian?

I call foul.  The Roman Empire from the very beginning was assimilationist.  Romanness was a function of shared cultural values, not of belonging to the proper gene pool.

It was but for some reason, and a huge reason for the fall of the West IMO, the Western Empire suddenly began to be quite bigoted towards the Germans.  Barbarians also served in the East but they continued to be assimilated in the old fashion.  It was fatal that Stilicho and Alaric could not be Emperors like the Illyrians in the 3rd century.  Ridiculous really.

[Valmy]

Beer, democracy, individualism, language, etc...

English has far more latin words than Germanic ones. It is just that the words we use most often are Germanic.

Are individualism and Democracy really Northern European Germanic values?  That is sort of mindblowing I have never associated that with Germans or Dutch or Scandies before.  I mean no more than i would with Italians and Frenchmen.

[Valmy]

No-one identifies with the Romano-British

Not even the Welsh and the Bretons?  That is odd...why wouldn't they?

[The Brain]

Are individualism and Democracy really Northern European Germanic values?  That is sort of mindblowing I have never associated that with Germans or Dutch or Scandies before.  I mean no more than i would with Italians and Frenchmen.

[Admiral Yi]

Germanic tribes were more "democratic" at the time of the invasions because they were at a more primitive level of political organization than the Romans.  Tribal organizations always include a consultative aspect, and have lower powers of coercion.

It's also true that northern European states developed democratic accountability earlier than southern European states.  But I don't see how you can argue that this is a function of their German-ness.  By the time accountability had been established the states in northern Europe had evolved for centuries and had virtually no recognizable relationship to the early Germanic proto-states.

Individualism I see no support for whatsoever.

[PDH]

Spoken like a fucking anthropologist.