Agri Decumates.
—Influence of Roman Civilization.
—Commerce.
—Changes among the Germans.
—War against Marcus Aurelius.
—Decline of the Roman Power.
—Union of the Germans in Separate Nationalities.
—The Alemanni.
—The Franks.
—The Saxons.
—The Goths.
—The Thuringians.
—The Burgundians.
—Wars with Rome in the Third Century.
—The Emperor Probus and his Policy.
—Constantine.
—Relative Position of the two Races.
50.
After the campaigns of Germanicus and the death of Hermann, a long time elapsed during which the relation of Germany to the Roman Empire might be called a truce. No serious attempt was made by the unworthy successors of Augustus to extend their sway beyond the banks of the Rhine and the Danube; and, as Tiberius had predicted, the German tribes were so weakened by their own civil wars that they were unable to cope with such a power as Rome. Even the Cherusci, Hermann's own people, became so diminished in numbers that, before the end of the first century, they ceased to exist as a separate tribe: their fragments were divided and incorporated with their neighbors on either side. Another tribe, the Ampsivarii, was destroyed in a war with the Chauci, and even the power of the fierce Chatti was broken by a great victory of the Hermunduri over them, in a quarrel concerning the possession of a sacred salt-spring.
About the middle of the first century, however, an event is mentioned which shows that the Germans were beginning to appreciate and imitate the superior civilization of Rome. The Chauci, dwelling on the shores of the North Sea, built a fleet and sailed along the coast to the mouth of the Rhine, which they entered in the hope of exciting the Batavi and Frisii to rebellion. A few years afterwards the Chatti, probably for the sake of plunder, crossed the Rhine and invaded part of Gaul. Both attempts failed entirely; and the only serious movement of the Germans against Rome, during the century, took place while Vitellius and Vespasian were contending for the possession of the imperial throne. A German prophetess, of the name of Velleda, whose influence seems to have extended over all the tribes, promised them victory: they united, organized their forces, crossed the Rhine, and even laid siege to Mayence, the principal Roman city.
70. THE INVASION OF CEREALIS.
The success of Vespasian over his rival left him free to meet this new danger. But in the meantime the Batavi, under their chief, Claudius Civilis, who had been previously fighting on the new Emperor's side, joined the Gauls in a general insurrection. This was so successful that all northern Gaul, from the Atlantic to the Rhine, threw off the Roman yoke. A convention of the chiefs was held at Rheims, in order to found a Gallic kingdom; but instead of adopting measures of defence, they quarrelled about the selection of a ruling family, the future capital of the kingdom, and other matters of small comparative importance.
The approach of Cerealis, the Roman general sent by Vespasian with a powerful army in the year 70, put an end to the Gallic insurrection. Most of the Gallic tribes submitted without resistance: the Treviri, on the Moselle, were defeated in battle, the cities and fortresses on the western bank of the Rhine were retaken, and the Roman frontier was re-established. Nevertheless, the German tribes which had been allied with the Gauls—among them the Batavi—refused to submit, and they were strong enough to fight two bloody battles, in which Cerealis was only saved from defeat by what the Romans considered to be the direct interposition of the gods. The Batavi, although finally subdued in their home in Holland, succeeded in getting possession of the Roman admiral's vessel, by a night attack on his fleet on the Rhine. This trophy they sent by way of the river Lippe, an eastern branch of the Rhine, as a present to the great prophetess, Velleda.
The defeat of the German tribes by Cerealis was not followed by a new Roman invasion of their territory. The Rhine remained the boundary, although the Romans crossed the river at various points and built fortresses upon the eastern bank. They appear, in like manner, to have crossed the Danube, and they also gradually acquired possession of the south-western corner of Germany, lying between the head-waters of that river and the Rhine. This region (now occupied by Baden and part of Würtemberg) had been deserted by the Marcomanni when they marched to Bohemia, and it does not appear that any other German tribe attempted to take permanent possession of it. Its first occupants, the Helvetians, were now settled in Switzerland.
100.
The enlisting of Germans to serve as soldiers in the Roman army, begun by Julius Cæsar, was continued by the Emperors. The proofs of their heroism, which the Germans had given in resisting Germanicus, made them desirable as troops; and, since they were accustomed to fight with their neighbors at home, they had no scruples in fighting them under the banner of Rome. Thus one German legion after another was formed, taken to Rome, Spain, Greece or the East, and its veterans, if they returned home when disabled by age or wounds, carried with them stories of the civilized world, of cities, palaces and temples, of agriculture and the arts, of a civil and political system far wiser and stronger than their own.
The series of good Emperors, from Vespasian to Marcus Aurelius (A. D. 70 to 181) formed military colonies of their veteran soldiers, whether German, Gallic or Roman, in the region originally inhabited by the Marcomanni. They were governed by Roman laws, and they paid a tithe, or tenth part, of their revenues to the Empire, whence this district was called the Agri Decumates, or Tithe-Lands. As it had no definite boundary towards the north and north-east, the settlements gradually extended to the Main, and at last included a triangular strip of territory extending from that river to the Rhine at Cologne. By this time the Romans had built, in their provinces of Rhætia, Noricum and Pannonia, south of the Danube, the cities of Augusta Vindelicorum, now Augsburg, and Vindobona, now Vienna, with another on the north bank of the Danube, where Ratisbon stands at present.
From the last-named point to the Rhine at Cologne they built a stockade, protected by a deep ditch, to keep off the independent German tribes, even as they had built a wall across the north of England, to keep off the Picts and Scots. Traces of this line of defence are still to be seen. Another and shorter line, connecting the head-waters of the Main with the Lake of Constance, protected the territory on the east. Their frontier remained thus clearly defined for nearly two hundred years. On their side of the line they built fortresses and cities, which they connected by good highways, they introduced a better system of agriculture, established commercial intercourse, not only between their own provinces but also with the independent tribes, and thus extended the influence of their civilization. For the first time, fruit-trees were planted on German soil: the rich cloths and ornaments of Italy and the East, the arms and armor, the gold and silver, and the wines of the South, soon found a market within the German territory; while the horses and cattle, furs and down, smoked beef and honey of the Germans, the fish of their streams, and the radishes and asparagus raised on the Rhine, were sent to Rome in exchange for those luxuries. Wherever the Romans discovered a healing spring, as at Baden-Baden, Aix-la-Chapelle and Spa, they built splendid baths; where they found ores or marble in the mountains, they established mines or hewed columns for their temples, and the native tribes were thus taught the unsuspected riches of their own land.
150. THE ROMAN FRONTIER.
