Pleumoxii

The Pleumoxii or Pleumosii were a small Belgic tribe living in Gallia Belgica during the Iron Age. They were clients of the most powerful Nervii.

Name

They are attested as Pleumoxii by Caesar (mid-1st c. BC). ^{[1] [2]}

Early modern humanists used Pleumosia and Pleumosii to refer respectively to Flanders and the Flemish. ^[3] The poem Pleumosia, composed in 1620 by Elias Gifford about the Battle of Nieuwpoort (1600), applies the name Pleumosia to the region in which the battle was fought. ^[3] The Greek form Pleumósioi (Πλευμοσίοι) appears in the Greek translation of De Bello Gallico, first printed alongside the Latin text in 1606. ^[4] This usage persisted into the 19th century, when some translations, such as that of William Duncan, rendered Pleumoxii as "Pleumosians". ^[5]

Geography

Based on Caesar's account, their territory was located somewhere in the vicinity of Nervian territory. ^[2]

History

During the Gallic Wars (58–50 BC), they are cited by Caesar as clients of the Nervii. ^[2]

They therefore immediately sent messengers to the Ceutrones, Grudii, Levaci, Pleumoxii, Geidumni, all of whom were held under their control, then collected the largest contingents they could and swooped unexpectedly on Cicero’s winter quarters

— Caesar, Gallic Wars, V 39

References

1. Caesar, V 39.
2. Kruta 2000, p. 777.
3. Lamers 2023, p. 328.
4. Lamers 2023, p. 329.
5. Duncan, William (1856). The Commentaries of Caesar. Edwards & Bushnell.

Primary sources

• Caesar (1917). The Gallic War. Loeb Classical Library. Translated by Edwards, H. J. Harvard University Press. ISBN   978-0-674-99080-7.

Secondary sources

• Kruta, Venceslas (2000). Les Celtes, histoire et dictionnaire : des origines à la romanisation et au christianisme. Robert Laffont. ISBN   2-221-05690-6.
• Lamers, Han (2023). "A Homeric Epic for Frederick Henry of Orange: The Cultural Affordances of Ancient Greek in the Early Modern Low Countries". Humanistica Lovaniensia. 72: 323–348. ISSN   0774-2908. JSTOR   27295451.