The Goths are a very recent people who were unknown in the Antiquity. The Greeks, the Jews, the early Romans, the Partians, and even the Germans and the French (Gaul) never suspected their existence. Who are the Goths (not the fashion Goths of the pic) and how they became illegal immigrants in Europe?
Jordanes explains that the Goths lived in Crimea till the Huns expulsed them. Jordanes, who was a Goth and felt no sympathy for the Huns, describes them as "a savage race which dwelt in the swamps, a stunted, foul and puny tribe, scarcely human, and having no language save one which bore but slight resemblance to human speech." As a native speaker of Hungarian, hereby I register here my formal protest. Hungarian is a very expressive language. But let us continue with Jordanes.
"This cruel tribe lived on the farther bank of the Maeotic swamp...(The Sea of Azov, see pic. j). Like a whirlwind they swept across the great swamp and at once fell upon Scythia. The Alani who were their equals in battle, they exhausted by their incessant attacks and subdued. For by the terror of their features they inspired great fear in those whom perhaps they did not really surpass in war. They made their foes flee in horror because their swarthy aspect was fearful, and they had, if I may call it so, a sort of shapeless lump, not a head, with pin-holes rather than eyes. They are short in stature, quick in bodily movement, alert horsemen, broad shouldered, ready in the use of bow and arrow, and have firm-set necks which are ever erect in pride. Though they live in the form of men, they have the cruelty of wild beasts.""When the Goths had to face his active race that had invaded many nations, they took fright and consulted with their king how they might escape from such a foe. While Hermanaric, king of the Goths, was deliberating, the Huns moved in with their army into the country of the Ostrogoths (Eastern Goths)."
To make it short, the Goths received such a beating from the Huns that they did not stop till Sweden (the Eastern Goths) and Morocco and Spain (the Western Goths). The Huns settled in Hungary and continued sacking the Roman Empire till it colapsed.
The Huns, so historians say, left nothing but desolation after them. The Goths, I imagine, left us the Haagen Dazs ice cream, which is good but fattening.
8 comments:
Apropos of nothing, a truck passed me on the highway recently , flying a flag (I think a Hungarian flag), with a large sign that said "Magyar Freedom"; it then listed a whole lot of European countries (including "Czechoslovakia") that had been "stolen by the French" from the Hungarians.
Is this a cause that we should all be willing to lay down our lives for?
Anon.
Well, Hungarians feel (as many others) that they have been wronged by the world. After siding with the losing coalition in the First World War, the winners (Those arrogant French!) cut up and gave large chunks of Hungary to their own allies. In fact, the very heart of historical Hungary which is Transylvania (Erdely), become part of Romania. Upper Hungary went to Ucraine, the South was given to the Croats and Kassa (Kosice) became Slovak. There are large ethnic Hungarian minorities in all the surrounding countries. They are not opressed as individuals, but they are forced to give up their nationality and assimilate.
I visited Hungary two years ago and I was surprised by the inflow of ethnic Hungarians from the neighboring countries. Hungary in 2009 is a country of immigration and its population is getting younger and is growing (which is a paradox because Hungarians are rather melancholic, standing for hours in front of a bottle of Tokay, singing that life ("kurva elet") is worth nothing and they tend to kill themselves).
I visited Hungary two years ago and I was surprised by the inflow of ethnic Hungarians from the neighboring countries.
It is good that the population is sorting itself out peacefully, with the Hungarians moving to their national homeland.
Hungarians are everything but peaceful. Their motto is:
"NEM NEM SOHA"
meaning:
NO NO NEVER
It is called irredentism. They mean it.
The Goths in Spain, the Visigoths, left traces in the culture. The name Gonzalez is from "Gundisalvus" and Alvarez is (I believe) cognate with the Swedish Halvorssen.
Dennis, correct. Goths have had a very large impact on Spain, and in Latin America it is common to call all Spaniards, Godos, that is, Goths. Hidalgo, the Spanish word for gentleman, is in fact "Hijo de Godo", that is, a descendant of Goths. Most of the traditional Spanish family names are of Goth origin. I was always wondering the ethnic background of Don Quijote de la Mancha. Don Quijote, tall and slim, full of idealism, seems to me a typical Goth while Sancho Panza, short and fat, materialistic and earthy, seems to me a typical Mediterranean native. Maybe I am reading too much into it.
This covers the racial history of Spain.
But not the racial future of Spain, which will soon be entirely different.
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