Alemanni

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Author:Laxman Burdak, IFS (R)
Kingdom of the Burgundians in around 500

Alemanni were a confederation of Germanic tribes[1] on the Upper Rhine River.

Variants

Jat clans

Name

According to Gaius Asinius Quadratus (quoted in the mid-sixth century by Byzantine historian Agathias), the name Alamanni (Ἀλαμανοι) means "all men". It indicates that they were a conglomeration drawn from various Germanic tribes.[5] The Romans and the Greeks called them as such (Alamanni, all men, in the sense of a group composed of men of all groups in the region). This derivation was accepted by Edward Gibbon, in his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire[6] and by the anonymous contributor of notes assembled from the papers of Nicolas Fréret, published in 1753.[7] This etymology has remained the standard derivation of the name.[8] An alternative suggestion proposes derivation from *alah "sanctuary".[9]

Walafrid Strabo in the ninth century remarked, in discussing the people of Switzerland and the surrounding regions, that only foreigners called them the Alemanni, but that they gave themselves the name of Suebi.[10] The Suebi are given the alternative name of Ziuwari (as Cyuuari) in an Old High German gloss, interpreted by Jacob Grimm as Martem colentes ("worshippers of Mars").[11]

History

First mentioned by Cassius Dio in the context of the campaign of Caracalla of 213, the Alemanni captured the Agri Decumates in 260, and later expanded into present-day Alsace, and northern Switzerland, leading to the establishment of the Old High German language in those regions, by the eighth century named Alamannia.[12]

In 496, the Alemanni were conquered by Frankish leader Clovis and incorporated into his dominions. Mentioned as still pagan allies of the Christian Franks, the Alemanni were gradually Christianized during the seventh century. The Lex Alamannorum is a record of their customary law during this period. Until the eighth century, Frankish suzerainty over Alemannia was mostly nominal. After an uprising by Theudebald, Duke of Alamannia, though, Carloman executed the Alamannic nobility and installed Frankish dukes. During the later and weaker years of the Carolingian Empire, the Alemannic counts became almost independent, and a struggle for supremacy took place between them and the Bishopric of Constance. The chief family in Alamannia was that of the counts of Raetia Curiensis, who were sometimes called margraves, and one of whom, Burchard II, established the Duchy of Swabia, which was recognized by Henry the Fowler in 919 and became a stem duchy of the Holy Roman Empire.

The area settled by the Alemanni corresponds roughly to the area where Alemannic German dialects remain spoken, including German Swabia and Baden, French Alsace, German-speaking Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Austrian Vorarlberg.

The French language name of Germany, Allemagne, is derived from their name, from Old French aleman(t),[13] from French loaned into a number of other languages, including Middle English which commonly used the term Almains for Germans.[14] Likewise, the Arabic name for Germany is ألمانيا (Almania), the Turkish is Almanya, the Spanish is Alemania, the Portuguese is Alemanha, Welsh is Yr Almaen and Persian is آلمان (Alman).

See also

References

  1. ↑ Drinkwater, John Frederick (2012). "Alamanni". In Hornblower, Simon; Spawforth, Antony; Eidinow, Esther (eds.). The Oxford Classical Dictionary (4 ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780191735257. Retrieved January 26, 2020. "Alamanni (Alemanni), a loose concentration of Germanic communities..." Hitchner, R. Bruce (2005). "Goths". In Kazhdan, Alexander P. (ed.). The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780195187922. Retrieved January 26, 2020. "Alemanni... the Latin term for an amalgamation of a number of smaller Germanic tribes, including a segment of the Suevi." Darvill, Timothy, ed. (2009). "Alamanni". The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology (3 ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780191727139. Retrieved January 25, 2020. "Alamanni. A confederation of several Germanic tribes who amalgamated in the third century AD"
  2. ↑ The spelling with "e" is used in Encyc. Brit. 9th. ed., (c. 1880), Everyman's Encyc. 1967, Everyman's Smaller Classical Dictionary, 1910. The current edition of Britannica spells with "e", as does Columbia and Edward Gibbon, Vol. 3, Chapter XXXVIII. The Latinized spelling with a is current in older literature (so in the 1911 Britannica), but remains in use e.g. in Wood (2003), Drinkwater (2007).
  3. ↑ The Alemanni were alternatively known as Suebi from about the fifth century, and that name became prevalent in the high medieval period, eponymous of the Duchy of Swabia. The name is taken from that of the Suebi mentioned by Julius Caesar, and although these older Suebi did likely contribute to the ethnogenesis of the Alemanni, there is no direct connection to the contemporary Kingdom of the Suebi in Galicia.
  4. ↑ Inglis Palgrave (ed.), The Collected Historical Works of Sir Francis Palgrave, K.H. (1919), p. 443 (citing: "Bury's ed. of Gibbon (Methuen), vol. I [1902], p. 278 note; H. M. Chadwick, Origin of the English Nation [1907]").
  5. ↑ Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Alamanni". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 1 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 468.
  6. ↑ Edward Gibbon. "Chapter 10". Ccel.org. Retrieved 2012-01-02.
  7. ↑ Histoire de l'Académie It is cited in most etymological dictionaries, such as the American Heritage Dictionary (large edition) under the root, *man-des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, avec les Mémoires de Littérature tirés des Registres de cette Académie, depuis l'année MDCCXLIV jusques et compris l'année MDCCXLVI, vol. XVIII, (Paris 1753) pp. 49–71. Excerpts are on-line at ELIOHS.
  8. ↑ It is cited in most etymological dictionaries, such as the American Heritage Dictionary (large edition) under the root, *man-
  9. ↑ "the name is possibly Alahmannen, 'men of the sanctuary'" Inglis Palgrave (ed.), The Collected Historical Works of Sir Francis Palgrave, K.H. (1919), p. 443 (citing: "Bury's ed. of Gibbon (Methuen), vol. I [1902], p. 278 note; H. M. Chadwick, Origin of the English Nation [1907]").
  10. ↑ Walafrid Strabo, Proleg. ad Vit. S. Galli (833/4) ed. Migne (1852); Thomas Greenwood, The First Book of the History of the Germans: Barbaric Period (1836), p. 498.
  11. ↑ Rudolf Much, Der germanische Himmelsgott (1898), p. 192.
  12. ↑ in pago Almanniae 762, in pago Alemannorum 797, urbs Constantia in ducatu Alemanniae 797; in ducatu Alemannico, in pago Linzgowe 873. From the ninth century, Alamannia is increasingly used of the Alsace specifically, while the Alamannic territory in generally is increasingly called Suebia; by the 12th century, the name Suebia had mostly replaced Alamannia. S. Hirzel, Forschungen zur Deutschen Landeskunde 6 (1888), p. 299.
  13. ↑ recorded as aleman in c. 1100, and with final dental, alemant or alemand, from c. 1160. Trésor de la Langue Française informatisé s.v. allemand.
  14. ↑ F.C. and J. Rivington, T. Payne, Wilkie and Robinson: The Chronicle of Iohn Hardyng, 1812, p. 99. H. Kurath: Middle English Dictionary, part 14, University of Michigan Press, 1952, 1345.
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