The Suebic Kingdom of Galicia was the first independent barbarian Christian kingdom of Western Europe and the first to separate from the Roman Empire, as well as the first one to mint coins. Based in Gallaecia, it was established in 410 and lasted as independent state until 584, after a century of slow decline. It reached political relevance, even after the fall of the visigothic kingdom -a century after the last Suebic king was deposed-, as last administrative and religious ditch against the Muslim invasion.
The history and importance of Suebic Galicia was long marginalised and obscured mainly by political reasons; it was left to a German scholar to write the first connected history of the Suebi in Galicia, as writer-historian Xoán Bernárdez Vilar has pointed out.[1]
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Little is known about the Suevi before they crossed the Rhine on the night of 31 December 406 A.D. and entered the Roman Empire. It is speculated that the Suevi are the same group as the Quadi, who are mentioned in early writings, and lived north of the middle Danube located today in lower Austria and western Slovakia.[2] The reasoning behind the belief that the Suevi and Quadi are the same, or at least related groups comes from a letter written by St. Jerome to Ageruchia, listing the invaders of the 406 crossing into Gaul, in which the Quadi are listed and the Suevi are not.[2] The argument for this theory, however, is based solely on the disappearance of mention of the Quadi in Gaul and the emergence of the Suevi. Additionally the lack of mention of the Suevi could mean that they are not a distinct ethnic group. Perhaps the Suevi were the result of many smaller groups who banded together during the migration from central Europe to the Iberian Peninsula.[3]
Although there is no clearly documented reason behind the migration of 406, a widely accepted theory is that the migration of the various Germanic peoples west of the Rhine is due to the westward push of the Huns during the late 4th century. The reasoning being that the activities of the Huns disrupted and threatened the existing peoples of the region forcing them to uproot.[4] It should be noted that this theory has created controversy within the academic community, because of the lack of convincing evidence.
Whether displaced by the Huns or not the Suevi along with the Vandals and Alans crossed the Rhine on the night of 31 December 405.[2][5] Their entrance into the Roman Empire could not have been at a more opportune time. At the moment, the Roman West was experiencing a series of invasions and civil wars beginning in 405. Between 405 and 406, the Western regions of the empire saw the invasion of Italy by Goths under Radagaisus, as well as a steady stream of usurpers. This allowed the invading barbarians to enter Gaul with little resistance, consequently allowing for the barbarians to cause considerable damage to the northern provinces of Germania Prima, Belgica Prima, and Belgica Secunda before the empire saw them as a threat. In response to the barbarian invasion of Gaul, the usurper Constantine III, halted the masses of Vandals, Alans, and Suevi, who remained confined to northern Gaul.[6] But in the spring of 409, Gerontius led a revolt in Hispania and set up his own emperor, Maximus. Constantine, who had recently been elevated to the title of Augustus, set off to Hispania to deal with the rebellion. Gerontius responded by stirring up the barbarians in Gaul against Constantine, convincing them to mobilize again, and, in the summer of 409, the Vandals, Alans, and Suevi began pushing south towards Hispania.[7][8]
The civil war that erupted in the Iberian Peninsula between the forces of Constantine and Gerontius had left the passes through the Pyrenees either purposely or consequently neglected, making southern Gaul and the Iberian Peninsula susceptible to barbarian attack. Hydatius documents that the crossing into the Iberian Peninsula by the Vandals, Alans, and Suevi took place on either the 28 September or the 12 October 409.[9] Some scholars take the two dates as the beginning and the end to the crossing of the Pyrenees mountain range into the Iberian Peninsula, since the crossing over of such a formidable barrier by scores of thousands could not have possibly been done in a twenty-four hour time frame.[10] Hydatius writes that upon entering of Hispania the barbarian peoples spent two years 409–410 in a frenzy, plundering food and goods from the cities and countryside causing a famine in the process that, according to Hydatius, forced cannibalism amongst the locals, “[driven] by hunger human beings devoured human flesh; mothers too feasted upon the bodies of their own children whom they had killed and cooked with their own hands.”[11] In 411 the various barbarian groups decided on the establishment of a peace and divided the provinces of Hispania among themselves sorte, “by lot”. Many scholars believe that the reference to “lot” may be to the sortes, “allotments,” which barbarian federates received by the Roman government, which suggests that the Suevi and the other invaders were under a treaty with Maximus’s government. There is, however, no concrete evidence of any treaties between the Romans and the barbarians. Hydatius never mentions any treaty, and states that the peace in 411 was brought about by the compassion of the Lord.[12][13] The division of the land between the four barbarian groups went as such: the Siling Vandals settled in Hispania Baetica, the Alans were allotted the provinces of Lusitania and Hispania Carthaginensis, and the Hasding Vandals and the Suevi shared the far northwestern province of Galicia.[13]
The division of Galicia between the Suevi and the Hasding Vandals placed the Suevi in the far northwestern corner of the province, which they took by force. They settled in the cities of Braga (which would become the Suevic capital until 439), Astorga, and Lugo, with no evidence suggesting that the Suevi inhabited any other cities residing in the province from 411–438.[14] The relationship between the Galicians and the Suevi was an opportunistic one for the Suevi, who, under their king, Hermeric, would spend the next 27 years (411–438) plundering the Galicians of food and valuables.[15]
Another Germanic group that accompanied the Suebi and settled in Galicia were the Buri. They settled in the region between the rivers Cávado and Homem, in the area known as Terras de Bouro (Lands of the Buri).[16]
As the Suebi quickly adopted the local Hispano-Roman language, few traces were left of their Germanic tongue, but some examples in the Galician language and Portuguese language remained, like laverca in Portuguese and Galician (synonyms of cotovia – lark).
In 416, the Visigoths entered the Iberian Peninsula, sent from Gallia Aquitania by the Emperor of the West to fight off the barbarians from the 409 invasion. The Visigoths led by their king, Wallia, devastated both the Siling Vandals and Alans. By 418, both the Siling Vandals and Alans were practically exterminated, leaving the Hasding Vandals and the Suevi, who had remained undisturbed by Wallia’s campaign as the two remaining forces in the Iberian Peninsula.[17] After the departure of Willia in 418 the Hasding Vandals and the Suevi seemed to have occupied themselves as they had done sinse they began the sharing of Galicia, with the starting of a war in 419. In 420, however, the comes Hispaniarum Asterius attacked the Hasding Vandals, forcing them to break off their conflict with the Suevi, moving out of Galicia in pursuit of Asterius.[18] In 429, the Hasding Vandals would leave to Africa and the Suevi would be the only barbarian entity on Hispania. King Hermeric would spend the remainder of his able years solidifying Suevic rule over the entire province of Galicia.
In 438, Hermeric became ill. Having annexed the entirety of Galicia, he made peace with the local Hispano-Roman population.[15] Hermeric’s illness made him unable to rule, and in 438, his son Rechila became king. Rechila saw an opportunity for expansion and began pushing to other areas of the Iberian Peninsula. The same year, Rechila campaigned in Baetica. A year later, in 429, the Suevi invaded Lusitania and took Mérida, making it the new capital of the Suevi kingdom. Rechila would continue the expansion of the kingdom and by 441, the Suevi controlled Galicia, Baetica, Lusitania, and Carthaginensis. However, the Suevi conquest of Baetica and Carthaginensis was limited to raids, and Suevi presence, if any, was minute.[19]
In 446, the Romans would dispatch Vitus, a magister militum with a mixed army of Romans and Goths, to the provinces of Baetica and Carthaginensis in an attempt to subdue the Suevi and restore imperial administration in Hispania. Rechila defeated Vitus and the Goths, and no more imperial attempts would be made to retake Hispania.[20][21]
In 448, Rechila died, leaving the crown to his son, Rechiar. Rechiar would become the first Germanic king to become a Catholic Christian, as well as the first barbarian king to mint coins in his own name. Some believe minting the coins was a sign of Suevi autonomy, due to the use of minting in the late empire as a declaration of independence.[22] Rechiar would make a series of bold political moves throughout his reign. The first was his marriage to the daughter of the Gothic king Theodoric I in 448, in an attempt to improve the relationship between the two peoples. Rechiar would then go on to make a treaty with Rome in 452, which was renewing in 454. During the first seven years under Rechiar, the Sueves seem to have been content as major raids and conflicts were recorded during this time. In 455, Rechiar invaded Hispania Tarraconensis, which was the last portion of the Iberia still under Roman rule. The emperor, Avitus, would respond, sending Theodoric I to repel the invasion. In autumn of 456, Theodoric led an army of Goths into northern Hispania and marched on Galicia, and on 5 October, Theodoric defeated and captured Rechiar near the river Urbicus. After the execution of Rechiar, Theodoric continued his war on the Suevi and, in less than a year, the Goths had removed and occupied Lusitania, Baetica, Carthaginensis, and parts of southern Galicia, thus confining the Suevi back in the far northwestern corner of Galicia.[20][23]
When the Visigoths disposed of Rechiar, the royal bloodline of Hermeric vanished and the conventional mechanism for Suevi leadership died with it. In 456, Aioulf took over the leadership of the Sueves. The origins behind Aioulf’s ascension are not clear Hydatius wrote that Aioulf was a Goth deserter, while the historian Jordanes wrote that he was a Warni appointed by Theodoric to govern Galicia.[24] In that same year, Hydatius stated that, in response to the situation, “the Sueves set up Maldras as their king.”[25] This statement suggests that the Suevi as a people may have had a voice in the selection of a new ruler.[26] The election of Maldras would lead to a schism among the Suevi, with some choosing to follow Framtane.[27] The Suevi would continue to be split, and from 460–464, neither Suevi faction appeared to have recognized a king. In 464, Remismund, an ambassador who traveled between Galicia and Gaul, became King of the Suevi. Remismund was able to unite the factions of the Suevi under his rule. He was also recognized, perhaps even approved of, by Theodoric, who sent him gifts and weapons along with a wife.[28] Under the leadership of Remismund, the Suevi would again raid the surrounding country, plundering even the walled cities of Astorga, Lisbon, and Coimbra, which they did so twice, once in 465 and again in 468.[29] After the death of Remismund in 469, and throughout the remainder of the 5th century, the Suevic Kingdom would continue to flounder as its neighbors continued to expand.[30]
The Suebi remained mostly pagan and their subjects Priscillianist until an Arian missionary named Ajax, sent by the Visigothic king Theodoric II at the request of the Suebic unifier Remismund, converted them in 466 and established a lasting Arian church which dominated the people until their conversion to Catholicism in the 560s.
The conversion of the Suebi to Catholicism is presented very differently in the primary records. The only contemporary record, the minutes of the First Council of Braga—which met on 1 May 561—state explicitly that the synod was held at the orders of a king named Ariamir. While his Catholicism is not in doubt, that he was the first Catholic monarch of the Suebes since Rechiar has been contested on the grounds that he is not explicitly stated to have been.[31] He was, however, the first to hold a Catholic synod. The Historia Suevorum of Isidore of Seville states that a king named Theodemar brought about the conversion of his people from Arianism with the help of the missionary Martin of Braga.[32] According to the Frankish historian Gregory of Tours on the other hand, an otherwise unknown sovereign named Chararic, having heard of Martin of Tours, promised to accept the beliefs of the saint if only his son were cured of leprosy. Through the relics and intercession of Saint Martin the son was healed; Chararic and the entire royal household converted to the Nicene faith.[33] Finally, the Suebic conversion is ascribed, not to a Suebe, but to a Visigoth by the name of John of Biclarum, which puts their conversion alongside that of the Goths, occurring under Reccared I in 587–589.
Most scholars have attempted to meld these stories. It has been alleged that Chararic and Theodemir must have been successors of Ariamir, since Ariamir was the first Suebic monarch to lift the ban on Catholic synods; Isidore therefore gets the chronology wrong.[34][35] Reinhart suggested that Chararic was converted first through the relics of Saint Martin and that Theodemir was converted later through the preaching of Martin of Braga.[31] Dahn equated Chararic with Theodemir, even saying that the latter was the name he took upon baptism.[31] It has also been suggested that Theodemir and Ariamir were the same person and the son of Chararic.[31] In the opinion of some historians, Chararic is nothing more than an error on the part of Gregory of Tours and never existed.[36] If, as Gregory relates, Martin of Braga died about the year 580 and had been bishop for about thirty years, then the conversion of Chararic must have occurred around 550 at the latest.[33] Finally, Ferreiro believes the conversion of the Suevi was progressive and stepwise and that Chararic's public conversion was only followed by the lifting of a ban on Catholic synods in the reign of his successor, which would have been Ariamir; Thoedemir was responsible for beginning a persecution of the Arians in his kingdom to root out their heresy.[37]
Late in the fifth century and early in the sixth century, immigrants from Britannia and Brittany settled in the north of Galicia, which thus acquired the name Britonia.[38] Most of what is known about the settlement comes from ecclesiastical sources; records from the 572 Second Council of Braga refer to a diocese called the Britonensis ecclesia ("British church") and an episcopal see called the sedes Britonarum ("See of the Britons"), which was likely the monastery of Santa Maria de Bretoña.[38] The bishop representing this diocese at the council bore the clearly Brythonic name of Mailoc.[38] The see continued to be represented at councils through the 7th century. Britonia evidently covered a substantial area; parishes of the Britonensis ecclesia extended from the coast of the Bay of Biscay southwards to near the town of Mondoñedo, and eastwards into Asturias.[38]
In 569 Theodemir called the First Council of Lugo,[39] which dealt with Arianism and established a bishopric of Britonia, whereas the council of Braga in 561 had dealt with Priscillianism.
In 570, Miro succeeded Theodemir as the Suevic king.[40] During this time, the Suevic kingdom was still overshadowed by the Visigoths who, under their king, Leovigild, still controlled the majority of the Iberian Peninsula. In 575, Miro made a peace treaty with Leovigild, who was waging a war against his rebelling Catholic son, Prince Hermenigild. Miro died aiding king Leovigild in 583, and his son, Eboric, was set to become the Sueves next king. But while Eboric was still young, a usurper named Audeca seized power and declared himself king of the Suevi. Audeca would then make the young Eboric become a monk, and force him to reside in a monastery.[41] After hearing of the events, Leovigild declared war on the Suevi, and in 585 the Visigoths invaded the Suevic kingdom. That same year, Leovigild defeated the Sueves, and their kingdom was transferred to the Goths as one of their three administrative regions -Gallaecia, Hispania and Galia Narboniensis-.[42][43] The Suevian dynasty was never re-established, but the administrative infrastructure of the Galician church remained intact, allowing to re-emerge as independent entity after the fall of the Visigothic empire, playing a key role as last shelter for Christianity in the Iberian Peninsula.
Unlike barbarian peoples, such as the Vandals, Visigoths, and Huns the Suevi never posed much of a threat to the Romans, or even to other barbarian groups, and were confined to a relatively small and removed geographic region throughout their recorded existence as a people. Because of this, sources about the Suevi people are limited, with the number either written in or translated into English even fewer.
The vast majority of information and reference to the Suevi is drawn from the bishop Hydatius. A Native to the region Hydatious was born in Lemica ciuitas straddling the southern borders of southern Galicia in 400 A.D. and witnessed the 409 settlement of the Suevi peoples in the Iberian Peninsula.[44] Although young, Hydatius’s life would be greatly affected by the settlement of the various Germanic peoples. Through much of his life he was forced to stay in isolated Roman communities constantly threatened by the Suevi and Vandals.[45] The threat culminated in his capture by the Suevic warlord Frumarius in 460, He was held captive for three months as Seuvi ravaged the region.[46] Hydatius documented these accounts in The Chronicle of Hydatius, a history of the region that plays on the fears of the barbarian settlements, the fall of Roman power in Hispania, and his own interactions with barbarian groups. The Suevi are portrayed as obscure, without any real reason or direction given to their decisions or movement by mentioning what the Suevi did to the Romans, but rarely what they said. Hydatius’s image of the Suevi is from the outside, even going as far as to call them cannibals, “killed all the braver individuals and feasting on their flesh.”[13] This description of the Suevi has bled into secondary sources, E.A. Thomson, an expert who has written many pieces on the subject, stated, “they just lash out blindly from year to year at any place that they suspected would supply them with food, valuables or money.”[47]
The ending of the Chronicle of Hydatius in 428 marks the beginning of a period of obscurity in the history of the Suevi who don’t reemerge into historical light until the mid-sixth century. From this point on what we do know about the Seuvi during this time period is from Saint Isidore of Seville.[48] Isidore would use Haydatius’s earlier accounts to form the most complete account/record of the Suevi in Hispania. The controversy around Isidorus’s historiography is not on the accounts from the sixth century, but rather his omissions and addition, which many historians and scholars feel are to numerous for them all to be simple mistakes. Throughout St. Isidore’s, History of the Kings of the Goths, Vandals, and Suevi, certain details from Hydatius are altered, e.g. According to Isidore says that, Ajax, was the man who converted the Suevi from paganism to Arianism, when in according to Hydiatus, he converted them from Catholicism to Arianism.[49] Many scholars attribute these changes to the fact that Isidore may have had sources other than Hydatius at his request.[50]