Germanische Altertumskunde Online, formerly called Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde, is a German encyclopedia of the study of Germanic history and cultures, as well as the cultures that were in close contact with them.
The first edition of the Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde appeared in four volumes between 1911 and 1919, edited by Johannes Hoops. The second edition, under the auspices of the Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities, was edited by Heinrich Beck (from vol 1, 1968/72), Heiko Steuer (from vol. 8, 1991/94), Rosemarie Müller (from 1992), and Dieter Geuenich (from vol. 13, 1999), and was published by Walter de Gruyter in 35 volumes between 1968 and 2008. [1]
In 2010, the most recent version was published, now renamed Germanische Altertumskunde Online. Edited by Heinrich Beck, Heiko Steuer, Dieter Geuenich, Wilhelm Heizmann, Sebastian Brather, Steffen Patzold and Sigmund Oehrl, it is published online by De Gruyter, accessible via subscription. [2]
Gundaharius or Gundahar, better known by his legendary names Gunther or Gunnar, was a historical king of Burgundy in the early 5th century. Gundahar is attested as ruling his people shortly after they crossed the Rhine into Roman Gaul. He was involved in the campaigns of the failed Roman usurper Jovinus before the latter's defeat, after which he was settled on the left bank of the Rhine as a Roman ally. In 436, Gundahar launched an attack from his kingdom on the Roman province of Belgica Prima. He was defeated by the Roman general Flavius Aetius, who destroyed Gundahar's kingdom with the help of Hunnish mercenaries the following year, resulting in Gundahar's death.
The Lemovii were a Germanic tribe, only once named by Tacitus in the late 1st century. He noted that they lived near the Rugii and Goths and that they had short swords and round shields.
Johann Georg Turmair, known by the pen name Johannes Aventinus or Aventin, was a Bavarian Renaissance humanist historian and philologist. He authored the 1523 Annals of Bavaria, a valuable record of the early history of Germany.
The Dębczyn culture is an archeological culture in Pomerania from the third to sixth centuries. It was derived from the neighboring Wielbark culture with influences from the Elbe region. The culture was superseded as the result of the later migrations of West Slavs, in particular of the Pomeranians.
Elbe Germanic, also called Irminonic or Erminonic, is a term introduced by the German linguist Friedrich Maurer (1898–1984) in his book, Nordgermanen und Alemanen, to describe the unattested proto-language, or dialectal grouping, ancestral to the later Lombardic, Alemannic, Bavarian and Thuringian dialects. During late antiquity and the Middle Ages, its supposed descendants had a profound influence on the neighboring West Central German dialects and, later, in the form of Standard German, on the German language as a whole.
Weser–Rhine Germanic is a proposed group of prehistoric West Germanic dialects, which includes both Central German dialects and Low Franconian, the ancestor of Dutch. The term was introduced by the German linguist Friedrich Maurer as a replacement for the older term Istvaeonic, with which it is essentially synonymous. The term Rhine–Weser Germanic is sometimes preferred.
Kurt Ranke was a German ethnologist who specialized in the study of fairy tales.
After the glaciers of the Ice Age in the Early Stone Age withdrew from the area, which since about 1000 AD is called Pomerania, in what are now northern Germany and Poland, they left a tundra. First humans appeared, hunting reindeer in the summer. A climate change in 8000 BC allowed hunters and foragers of the Ertebølle-Ellerbek culture to continuously inhabit the area. These people became influenced by farmers of the Linear Pottery culture who settled in southern Pomerania. The hunters of the Ertebølle-Ellerbek culture became farmers of the Funnelbeaker culture in 3000 BC. The Havelland culture dominated in the Uckermark from 2500 to 2000 BC. In 2400 BC, the Corded Ware culture reached Pomerania and introduced the domestic horse. Both Linear Pottery and Corded Ware culture have been associated with Indo-Europeans. Except for Western Pomerania, the Funnelbeaker culture was replaced by the Globular Amphora culture a thousand years later.
The Rugini were a tribe in Pomerania. They were only mentioned once, in a list of yet to be converted tribes drawn up by the English monk Bede in his Historia ecclesiastica of the early 8th century:
Sunt autem Fresones, Rugini, Danai, Hunni, Antiqui Saxones, Boructuari; sunt alii perplures hisdem in partibus populi paganis adhuc ritibus servientis.
Herbert Jankuhn was a German archaeologist who specialized in the archaeology of Germanic peoples. He is best known for his excavations at the Viking Age site of Hedeby, and for his instrumental role in the publishing of the second edition of the Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde.
The Indiculus superstitionum et paganiarum is a Latin collection of capitularies identifying and condemning superstitious and pagan beliefs found in the north of Gaul and among the Saxons during the time of their subjugation and conversion by Charlemagne.
Ernst Sprockhoff was a German prehistorian and inventor of the Sprockhoff numbering system for megalithic monuments in Germany.
Karl Helm was a German philologist who specialized in Germanic studies
Heiko Steuer is a German archaeologist, notable for his research into social and economic history in early Europe. He serves as co-editor of Germanische Altertumskunde Online.
The Elbe Germans or Elbe Germanic peoples were Germanic tribes whose settlement area, based on archaeological finds, lay either side of the Elbe estuary on both sides of the river and which extended as far as Bohemia and Moravia, clearly the result of a migration up the Elbe river from the northwest in advance of the main Migration Period until the individual groups ran into the Roman Danube Limes around 200 AD.
Gundomad or Gundomar, was an Alemannic petty king in the area around Breisgau, Germany in the 4th century. The Roman historian Ammianus Marcellinus reports that Gundomad, together with his brother Vadomarius, in 354 concluded a peace treaty at Augst after having been defeated in battle by emperor Constantius II. In 357, Gundomad was killed by his own people for having been to loyal to the Romans. They then made an uprising against emperor Julian.
Sebastian Brather is a German medieval archaeologist and co-editor of Germanische Altertumskunde Online.
Heinrich Beck was a German philologist who specialized in Germanic studies. A Professor of Ancient German and Nordic Studies at Saarland University and later the University of Bonn, Beck was a co-editor of the second edition of Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde and one of the world's leading experts on early Germanic culture.
Franz Rolf Schröder, often referred to as F. R. Schröder, was a German philologist who was Professor and Chair of German Philology at the University of Würzburg. He specialized in the study German and early Germanic literature, and Germanic and Indo-European religion. He was for many decades editor of the Germanisch-Romanische Monatsschrift.
Reinhard Wenskus was a German historian who was Professor of Medieval History at the University of Göttingen. His theories on the identity of Germanic peoples have had a major influence on contemporary research by historians of late antiquity.