The Tubantes were a Germanic tribe, living in the eastern part of the Netherlands, north of the Rhine river. They are often equated to the Tuihanti, who are known from two inscriptions found near Hadrian's Wall. The modern name Twente derives from the word Tuihanti.
Little is known about the Tubantes. They are first mentioned in a description of the first expedition of Germanicus against the Marsi in 14 AD, [1] when they, in coalition with the Bructeri and Usipetes, ambushed the Roman forces returning to their winter-quarters, probably somewhere in the Münsterland.
In 17 AD, the Tubantes are apparently referred to as the Tubattii, in Strabo's in a list of Germanic peoples defeated by Rome under Germanicus. [2] [3] After being vanquished by the Romans, some Tubantes were prisoners of Germanicus' triumphal procession. [2]
In 58 AD, Tacitus reports in his Annals that the Ampsivarii, in their plea to the Romans concerning some land north of the Rhine reserved by the Roman military, that it had belonged in sequence to the Chamavi, Tubantes, and then the Usipii. [4] (The Usipii are known to have moved into the Rhine region around the time of Caesar (55 BC), but not yet to have found permanent settlement in that time, and to have been resident at the afore-mentioned northern bank of the Rhine by the time of Drusus around 11 AD.)
In 69 AD, they provided a cohort during the Batavian Revolt, which was destroyed by the Ubii.
Claudius Ptolemy in his Geographia (2.10), appears to describe a north to south series starting with the Chamavi "under" whom are the Chatti and Tubanti, and then between these and the Sudetes mountains, thought to be the Erzgebirge, the Teuriochaemae (an otherwise unknown name, but in the place previously inhabited by the Hermanduri and later by the Thuringii, with these three names often thought to be equivalent). [5] But the position of the Chamavi and Tubantes so far to the southeast does not match other sources, and Chamavi also seem to be mentioned under another name in a more expected place, south of the coastal Chauci, and north of the Bructeri, in between Ems and Weser. Confusingly, other tribes normally from the region of the Tubantes, the Chattuari and Chasuarii, are also described as if they are in southern Germany in this passage. [6]
Two third-century sacral inscriptions found near Hadrian's Wall make mention of Tuihanti serving in an auxiliary unit of the Roman army, the Cuneus Frisiorum . [3] (The Frisii was a name applied to all or most tribes north of the Rhine in Roman times, in the same general area of the Tubantes.) The inscriptions say:
"Mars Thingsus" is understood as referring to the Germanic God "Tyr", who was often considered equivalent to Roman Mars, and was associated with the Germanic traditions of assemblies called "Things".
In 308 AD the Tubantes joined the alliance against Constantine the Great during his campaign against the Bructeri. [8]
The name reappears as Tuianti and Tueanti in two acts from 797 and 799 AD concerning the donation of some farms in Twente and Salland to the church of Wichmond, Gelderland. [3]
Archaeology shows that the region associated with the Tubantes was inhabited more or less continuously since the last ice-age. The region is very fertile and will support agriculture and cattle. The countryside is marked by artificial hills, called es or esch, which were formed by depositing dung mixed with dirt. Prime examples include the Fleringer Esch, near Fleringen and the Usseler Es, also known as the Usseler Esch, near Usselo.
There is archaeological evidence of (relatively) large scale iron production in the region, specifically near Heeten, indicating that the locals understood the process of producing steel, with a carbon content of 2% [1]. The ore used was the abundant bog iron. The production sites can be dated to 280-350 AD. [9] [10]
Germanicus Julius Caesar was a popular and prominent Roman general, known for his campaigns in Germania. The son of Nero Claudius Drusus and Antonia the Younger, Germanicus was born into an influential branch of the patrician gens Claudia. The agnomen Germanicus was added to his full name in 9 BC when it was posthumously awarded to his father in honour of his victories in Germania. In AD 4, he was adopted by his paternal uncle Tiberius, who succeeded Augustus as Roman emperor a decade later. As a result, Germanicus became an official member of the gens Julia, another prominent family, to which he was related on his mother's side. His connection to the Julii was further consolidated through a marriage between himself and Agrippina the Elder, a granddaughter of Augustus. He was also the father of Caligula, the maternal grandfather of Nero, and the older brother of Claudius.
The Suebi were a large group of Germanic peoples originally from the Elbe river region in what is now Germany and the Czech Republic. In the early Roman era they included many peoples with their own names such as the Marcomanni, Quadi, Hermunduri, Semnones, and Lombards. New groupings formed later such as the Alamanni and Bavarians and two kingdoms in the Migration Period were simply referred to as Suebian.
The Chatti were an ancient Germanic tribe whose homeland was near the upper Weser (Visurgis). They lived in central and northern Hesse and southern Lower Saxony, along the upper reaches of that river and in the valleys and mountains of the Eder and Fulda regions, a district approximately corresponding to Hesse-Kassel, though probably somewhat more extensive. They settled within the region in the first century B.C. According to Tacitus, the Batavians and Cananefates of his time, tribes living within the Roman Empire, were descended from part of the Chatti, who left their homeland after an internal quarrel drove them out, to take up new lands at the mouth of the Rhine.
The Cherusci were an early Germanic people that inhabited parts of the plains and forests of northwestern Germany, in the area possibly near present-day Hanover, during the first centuries BC and AD. Ethnically, Pliny the Elder groups them with their neighbours, the Suebi and Chatti, as well as the Hermunduri, as Hermiones, one of the Germanic groupings said to descend from an ancestor named Mannus. They led an important war against the Roman Empire. Subsequently, they were probably absorbed into the late classical Germanic tribal groups such as the Saxons, Thuringians, Franks, Bavarians and Allemanni.
In Romano-British culture and Germanic polytheism, the Alaisiagae were a quartet of Celtic and Germanic goddesses deifying victory.
The Bructeri were a Germanic tribe in Roman imperial times, located in northwestern Germany, in present-day North Rhine-Westphalia. Their territory included both sides of the upper Ems and Lippe rivers. At its greatest extent, their territory apparently stretched between the vicinities of the Rhine in the west and the Teutoburg Forest and Weser river in the east. In late Roman times they moved south to settle upon the east bank of the Rhine facing Cologne, an area later associated with the Ripuarian Franks.
The Usipetes or Usipii were an ancient tribe who moved into the area on the right bank of the lower Rhine in the first century BC, putting them in contact with Gaul and the Roman empire. They are known first from the surviving works of ancient authors such as Julius Caesar and Tacitus. They appear to have moved position several times before disappearing from the historical record.
The Battle of Idistaviso, sometimes known as the First Battle of Minden or Battle of the Weser River, was fought in 16 AD between Roman legions commanded by Roman Emperor Tiberius's heir and adopted son, Germanicus, and an alliance of Germanic peoples, commanded by Arminius. The battle marked the end of a three-year series of campaigns by Germanicus in Germania.
The Istaevones were a Germanic group of tribes living near the banks of the Rhine during the Roman Empire which reportedly shared a common culture and origin. The Istaevones were contrasted to neighbouring groups, the Ingaevones on the North Sea coast, and the Herminones, living inland of these groups.
The Salian Franks, also called the Salians, were a northwestern subgroup of the early Franks who appear in the historical record in the fourth and fifth centuries. They lived west of the Lower Rhine in what was then the Roman Empire and today the Netherlands and Belgium.
The Chamavi, Chamãves or Chamaboe (Χᾳμαβοί) were a Germanic tribe of Roman imperial times whose name survived into the Early Middle Ages. They first appear under that name in the 1st century AD Germania of Tacitus as a Germanic tribe that lived to the north of the Lower Rhine. Their name probably survives in the region today called Hamaland, which is in the Gelderland province of the Netherlands, between the IJssel and Ems rivers.
The Chasuarii were an ancient Germanic tribe known from the reports of authors writing in the time of the Roman Empire. They lived somewhere to the east and north of the Rhine, near the modern river Hase, which feeds into the Ems. This means they lived near modern Osnabrück.
The Marsi were a small Germanic tribe settled between the Rhine, Ruhr and Lippe rivers in northwest Germany. It has been suggested that they were a part of the Sugambri who managed to stay east of the Rhine after most Sugambri had been moved from this area. Strabo describes the Marsi as an example of a Germanic tribe who were originally from the Rhine area, now the war-torn Roman frontier, but had migrated deep into Germania.
The Angrivarii were a Germanic people of the early Roman Empire, who lived in what is now northwest Germany near the middle of the Weser river. They were mentioned by the Roman authors Tacitus and Ptolemy.
The Chattuarii, also spelled Attoarii, were a Germanic tribe of the Franks. They lived originally north of the Rhine in the area of the modern border between Germany and the Netherlands, but then moved southwards in the 4th century, as a Frankish tribe living on both sides of the Rhine.
The Dulgubnii are a Germanic tribe mentioned in Tacitus' Germania as living in what is today northwest Germany. Tacitus describes them being to the north of the Angrivarii and Chamavi, and as having moved from the north into the area once belonging to the Bructeri, between Ems, Lippe, and Weser. In this same area as the Dulgubnii, north of the Chamavi and Angrivarii, were the Chasuarii, and north of these, on the North Sea coast, where the Chauci. The Chasuarii's name is thought to derive from the River Hase which feeds into the middle of the Ems from the east, just northwest of the area associated with the Angrivarii, on the Weser. So from Tacitus, it appears that the Dulgubnii probably lived near the Weser.
The Tencteri or Tenchteri or Tenctheri were an ancient tribe, who moved into the area on the right bank of the lower Rhine in the 1st century BC. They are known first from the surviving works of ancient authors such as Julius Caesar and Tacitus. In December 2015, archaeologists found remains of the Tencteri in The Netherlands.
For around 450 years, from around 55 BC to around 410 AD, the southern part of the Netherlands was integrated into the Roman Empire. During this time the Romans in the Netherlands had an enormous influence on the lives and culture of the people who lived in the Netherlands at the time and (indirectly) on the generations that followed.
The Marsaci or Marsacii were a tribe in Roman imperial times, who lived within the area of the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta, under Roman domination.
Cuneus Frisionum or Frisiorum cuneus are the names of units of Frisian auxiliaries in the Roman army.
