Irminones

Irminones
Geographic
distribution		 Originally the North Sea coast from Friesland to Jutland
Linguistic classification

Indo-European

Subdivisions
Glottolog high1286  (High German)[1]
high1287  (High Franconian)[2]

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The distribution of the primary Germanic dialect groups in Europe in around AD 1:
  North Germanic
  North Sea Germanic, or Ingvaeonic
  Weser-Rhine Germanic, or Istvaeonic
  Elbe Germanic, or Irminonic
  East Germanic

The Irminones, also referred to as Herminones or Hermiones (Ancient Greek: Ἑρμίονες), were a group of early Germanic tribes settling in the Elbe watershed and by the 1st century AD expanding into Bavaria, Swabia and Bohemia. Irminonic or Elbe Germanic is a conventional term grouping early West Germanic dialects ancestral to High German,[3] which would include modern Standard German.

History

The name Irminones or Hermiones comes from Tacitus's Germania (AD 98), where he categorized them as one of the tribes of descended from Mannus, and noted that they lived in the interior of Germany. Other Germanic groups of tribes were the Ingvaeones, living on the coast, and Istvaeones, who accounted for the rest.[4] Tacitus also mentioned the Suebi as a large grouping who included the Semnones, the Quadi and the Marcomanni, but he did not say precisely to which (if any) of the three nations they belonged.

Pomponius Mela wrote in his Description of the World (III.3.31) in reference to the Kattegat and the waters surrounding the Danish isles (see the Codanus sinus): "On the bay are the Cimbri and the Teutoni; farther on, the farthest people of Germania, the Hermiones." Mela then begins to speak of the Scythians.

Pliny's Natural History (4.100) claimed that the Irminones included the Suebi, Hermunduri, Chatti, and Cherusci.

In Nennius, the name Mannus and his three sons appear in corrupted form, the ancestor of the Irminones appearing as Armenon. His sons here are Gothus, Valagothus/Balagothus, Cibidus, Burgundus, and Longobardus, whence come the Goths (and Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Crimean Goths), Valagoths/Balagoths, Cibidi, Burgundians, and Langobards.

They may have differentiated into the tribes Alamanni, Hermunduri, Marcomanni, Quadi, Suebi by the first century AD. By that time the Suebi, Marcomanni and Quadi had moved southwest into the area of modern-day Bavaria and Swabia. In 8 BC, the Marcomanni and Quadi drove the Boii out of Bohemia.

The term Suebi is usually applied to all the groups that moved into this area, though later in history (around 200 AD) the term Alamanni (meaning "all-men") became more commonly applied to the group.

Jǫrmun, the Viking Age Norse form of the name Irmin, can be found in a number of places in the Poetic Edda as a by-name for Odin. Some aspects of the Irminones' culture and beliefs may be inferred from their relationships with the Roman Empire, from Widukind's confusion over whether Irmin was comparable to Mars or Hermes, and from Snorri Sturluson's allusions, at the beginning of the Prose Edda, to Odin's cult having appeared first in Germany, and then having spread up into the Ingvaeonic North.

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2016). "High German". Glottolog 2.7. Jena: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
  2. ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin; Bank, Sebastian, eds. (2016). "High Franconian". Glottolog 2.7. Jena: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History.
  3. ↑ Friedrich Maurer (1942), Nordgermanen und Alemannen: Studien zur Sprachgeschichte, Stammes- und Volkskunde, Strasbourg: Hünenburg.
  4. ↑ http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.02.0083:chapter=2&highlight=

References

Further reading

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