Part 12

_b._ The latter alternative isolates the _Jazyges_, and adds to the difficulties created by their ethnological position, under the supposition that they are the only Slavonians of the parts in question; since if out-lyers to the area (_exceptional_, so to say), they must be either invaders from without, or else relics of an earlier and more extended population. If they be the former, we can only bring them from the north of the Carpathian mountains (a fact not in itself improbable, but not to be assumed, except for the sake of avoiding greater difficulties); if the latter, they prove the original Slavonic character of the area.

The present writer considers the Daci then (western and eastern) as Slavonic, and the following passage brings them as far west as the _Maros_ or _Morawe_, which gives the name to the present Moravians, a population at once Slavonic and Bohemian:--"Campos et plana Jazyges Sarmatæ, montes vero et saltus pulsi ab his Daci ad Pathissum amnem a Maro sive Duria ... tenent."--_Plin._ iv. 12.

The evidence as to the population of Moravia and North-eastern Hungary being Dacian, is Strabo's Γέγονε ... τῆς χόρας μερισμὸς συμμένων παλαιοῦ· τοὺς μὲν γὰρ Δάκους προσαγορεύουσι, τοὺς δὲ Γέτας, Γέτας μὲν πρὸς τὸν Πόντον κεκλιμένους, καὶ πρὸς τὲν ἕω, Δάκους δὲ τοὺς εἰς τἀνάντια πρὸς Γερμανίαν καὶ τὰς τοῦ Ἴστρου πήγας.--From Zeuss, in _vv. Getæ, Daci_.

In Moravia we have as the basis of argument, an _existing_ Slavonic population, speaking a language identical with the Bohemian, but different from the other Slavonic languages, and (as such) requiring a considerable period for the evolution of its differential characters. This brings us to Bohemia. At present it is Slavonic. When did it begin to be otherwise? No one informs us on this point. Why should it not have been so _ab initio_, or at least at the beginning of the historical period for these parts? The necessity of an answer to this question is admitted; and it consists chiefly (if not wholly) in the following arguments;--_a._ those connected with the term _Marcomanni_; _b._ those connected with the term _Boiohemum_.

_a._ _Marcomanni._--This word is so truly Germanic, and so truly capable of being translated into English, that those who believe in no other etymology whatever may believe that _Marc-o-manni_, or _Marchmen_, means the _men of the (boundaries) marches_; and without overlooking either the remarks of Mr. Kemble on the limited nature of the word _mearc_, when applied to the smaller divisions of land, or the doctrine of Grimm, that its primary signification is _wood_ or _forest_, it would be an over-refinement to adopt any other meaning for it in the present question than that which it has in its undoubted combinations, _Markgrave_, _Altmark_, _Mittelmark_, _Ukermark_, and the _Marches of Wales and Scotland_. If so, it was the name of a line of _enclosing frontier_ rather than of an _area enclosed_; so that to call a country like the _whole_ of Bohemia, _Marcomannic_, would be like calling _all_ Scotland or _all_ Wales _the Marches_.

Again, as the name arose on the western, Germanic or Gallic side of the _March_, it must have been the name of an _eastern_ frontier in respect to Gaul and Germany; so that to suppose that there were Germans on the Bohemian line of the _Marcomanni_, is to suppose that the _march_ was no _mark_ (or boundary) at all, at least in an _ethnological_ sense. This qualification involves a difficulty which the writer has no wish to conceal; a _march_ may be other than an _ethnological_ division. It may be a _political_ one. In other words, it may be like the Scottish Border, rather than like the Welsh and the Slavono-Germanic marches of Altmark, Mittelmark and Ukermark. At any rate, the necessity for a _march_ being a line of frontier rather than a large compact kingdom, is conclusive against the whole of Bohemia having been Germanic _because it was Marcomannic_.

_b._ The arguments founded on the name _Boiohemum_ are best met by showing that the so-called _country (home) of the Boii_ was not _Bohemia_ but _Bavaria_. This will be better done in the sequel than now. At present, however, it may be as well to state that so strong are the facts in favour of _Boiohemum_ and _Baiovarii_ meaning, not the one Bohemia and the other Bavaria, but _one of the two countries_, that Zeuss, one of the strongest supporters of the doctrine of an originally Germanic population in Bohemia, applies both of them to the firstnamed kingdom; a circumstance which prepares us for expecting, that if the names fit the countries to which they apply thus loosely, _Boiohemum_ may as easily be _Bavaria_, as the country of the _Baiovarii_ be _Bohemia_; in other words, that we have a _convertible form_ of argument.

ADDENDA (1859).

(1)

Too much stress is, perhaps, laid on the name Jazyges. The fact of the word Jaszag in Magyar meaning a _bowman_ complicates it. The probability, too, of the word for _Language_ being the name of a nation is less than it is ought to be, considering the great extent to which it is admitted.

(2)

The statements respecting Bohemia are over-strong. _Some_ portion of it was, probably, Marcomannic and German. The greater part, however, of the original Boio-_hem_-um, or _home_ of the _Boii_, I still continue to give to the country of the _Boian occupants_--Baio-_var_-ii = _Bavaria_; the word itself being a compound of the same kind as Cant-_wære_ = _inhabitants of Kent_. (See Zeuss in _v. Baiovarii_).

ON THE ORIGINAL EXTENT OF THE SLAVONIC AREA.

READ BEFORE THE PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY.

MARCH 8, 1850.

The portion of the Slavonic frontier which will be considered this evening is the north-western, beginning with the parts about the Cimbric peninsula, and ending at the point of contact between the present kingdoms of Saxony and Bohemia; the leading physical link between the two extreme populations being the Elbe.

For this tract, the historical period begins in the ninth century. The classification which best shows the really westerly disposition of the Slavonians of this period, and which gives us the fullest measure of the extent to which, _at that time at least_, they limited the easterly extension of the Germans, is to divide them into--_a._ the Slavonians of the Cimbric peninsula; _b._ the Slavonians of the right bank of the Elbe; _c._ the Slavonians of the _left_ bank of the Elbe; the first and last being the most important, as best showing the amount of what may be called the _Slavonic protrusion into the accredited Germanic area_.

_a._ _The Slavonians of the Cimbric Peninsula._--Like the Slavonians that constitute the next section, these are on the right bank of the Elbe; but as they are _north_ of that river rather than east of it, the division is natural.

_The Wagrians._--Occupants of the country between the Trave and the upper portion of the southern branch of the Eyder.

_The Polabi._--Conterminous with the Wagrians and the Saxons of Sturmar, from whom they were separated by the river Bille.

_b._ _Slavonians of the right bank of the Elbe._--_The Obodriti._--This is a generic rather than a specific term; so that it is probable that several of the Slavonic populations about to be noticed may be but subdivisions of the great Obotrit section. The same applies to the divisions already noticed--the Wagri and Polabi: indeed the classification is so uncertain, that we have, for these parts and times, no accurate means of ascertaining whether we are dealing with _sub_-divisions or _cross_-divisions of the Slavonians. At any rate the word _Obotriti_ was one of the best-known of the whole list; so much so, that it is likely, in some cases, to have equalled in import the more general term _Wend_. The varieties of orthography and pronunciation may be collected from Zeuss (_in voce_), where we find _Obotriti_, _Obotritæ_, _Abotriti_, _Abotridi_, _Apodritæ_, _Abatareni_, _Apdrede_, _Abdrede_, _Abtrezi_. Furthermore, as evidence of the generic character of the word, we find certain _East-Obotrits_ (_Oster-Abtrezi_), conterminous with the Bulgarians, as well as the _North-Obotrits_ (_Nort-Abtrezi_), for the parts in question. These are the northern districts of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, from the Trave to the Warnow, chiefly along the coast. Zeuss makes Schwerin their most inland locality. The _Descriptio Civitatum_ gives them fifty-three towns.

In the more limited sense of the term, the Obotrits are not conterminous with any German tribe, being separated by the Wagri and Polabi. Hence when Alfred writes _Norðan Eald-Seaxum is Apdrede_, he probably merges the two sections last-named in the Obotritic.

Although not a frontier population, the Obotrits find place in the present paper. They show that the Wagri and Polabi were not mere isolated and outlying portions of the great family to which they belonged, but that they were in due continuity with the main branches of it.

_Varnahi._--This is the form which the name takes in Adam of Bremen. It is also that of the Varni, Varini, and Viruni of the classical writers; as well as of the Werini of the Introduction to the _Leges Angliorum et Werinorum, hoc est Thuringorum_. Now whatever the Varini of Tacitus may have been, and however much the affinities of the Werini were with the Angli, the Varnahi of Adam of Bremen are Slavonic.

_c._ _Cis-Albian Slavonians._--Beyond the boundaries of the Duchies of Holstein and Lauenburg, the existence of Germans on the right bank of the Elbe is _nil_.

With Altmark the evidence of a Slavonic population changes, and takes strength. The present Altmark is not German, as Kent is Saxon, but only as Cornwall is, _i. e._ the traces of the previous Slavonic population are like the traces of the Celtic occupants of Cornwall, the rule rather than the exception. Most of the geographical names in Altmark are Slavonic, the remarkable exception being the name of the _Old March_ itself.

The Slavono-German frontier for the parts south of Altmark becomes so complex as to require to stand over for future consideration. All that will be done at present is to indicate the train of reasoning applicable here, and applicable along the line of frontier. If such was the state of things in the eighth and ninth centuries, what reason is there for believing it to have been otherwise in the previous ones? The answer is the testimony of Tacitus and others in the way of external, and certain etymologies, &c. in the way of internal, evidence. Without at present saying anything in the way of disparagement to either of these series of proofs, the present writer, who considers that the inferences which have generally been drawn from them are illegitimate, is satisfied with exhibiting the amount of _à priori_ improbability which they have to neutralize. If, when Tacitus wrote, the area between the Elbe and Vistula was not Slavonic, but Gothic, the Slavonians of the time of Charlemagne must have immigrated between the second and eighth centuries; must have done so, not in parts, but for the whole frontier; must have, for the first and last time, displaced a population which has generally been the conqueror rather than the conquered; must have displaced it during one of the strongest periods of its history; must have displaced it everywhere, and wholly; and (what is stranger still) that not permanently--since from the time in question, those same Germans, who between A.D. 200 and A.D. 800 are supposed to have always retreated before the Slavonians, have from A.D. 800 to A.D. 1800 always reversed the process and encroached upon their former dispossessors.

ADDENDA (1859).

(1)

The details of the Slavonic area to the south of Altmark are as follows.

_Brandenburg_, at the beginning of the historical period, was Slavonic, and one portion of it, the Circle of Cotbus, is so at the present moment. It is full of geographical names significant in the Slavonic languages. Of Germans to the East of the Elbe there are no signs until after the time of Charlemagne. But the Elbe is not even their eastern boundary. The Saale is the river which divides the Slavonians from the Thuringians--not only at the time when its drainage first comes to be known, but long afterwards. More than this, there were, in the 11th and 12th centuries, Slavonians in Thuringia, Slavonians in Franconia--facts which can be found in full in Zeuss _vv. Fränkische und Thüringische Slawen_--(_Die Deutschen und die Nachbarstämme_).

_Saxony_ brings us down to the point with which the preceding paper concluded viz: the frontier of Bohemia. This was in the same category with Brandenburg. In Leipzig Slavonic was spoken A. D. 1327. In Lusatia it is spoken at the present moment. When were the hypothetical Germans of all these parts eliminated, or (if not eliminated) amalgamated with a population of intruders who displaced their language, not on one spot or on two, but every where?

If the Slavonians of the time of Charlemagne were indigenous to the western portion of their area, they were, _a fortiori_, indigenous to the eastern. At any rate, few who hold that the German populations of Bohemia, Mecklenburg, Luneburg, Altmark, Brandenburg, Saxony, Silesia, and Lusatia are recent, will doubt their being so in Pomerania.

In his Edition of the Germania of Tacitus the only Germans east of the Elbe, Saale and the Fichtel Gebirge, recognised by the present writer are certain intrusive Marcomanni; who (by hypothesis) derived from Thuringia, reached the Danube by way of the valley of Naab, and pressed eastward to some point unknown--but beyond the southern frontier of Moravia. Here they skirted the Slavonic populations of the north, and formed to their several areas the several Marches from which they took their name.

As far as we have gone hitherto we have gone in the direction of the doctrine that the Slavonians of Franconia, Thuringia, Saxony, Altmark, Luneburg, Mecklenburg, Holstein, and Brandenburg &c. were all old occupants of the districts in which they were found in the 8th, 9th, 10th, and 11th centuries; also that the present Czekhs of Bohemia and Moravia, the present Serbs of Lusatia and Brandenburg, the present Kassubs of Pomerania, and the present Slovaks of Hungary represent aboriginal populations. We now ask how far this was the case with the frontagers of North-eastern Italy, and the Slavonians of Carinthia and Carniola. The conclusion to which we arrive in respect to these will apply to those of Bosnia, Servia, and Dalmatia.

That the Carinthians and Carniolans were the descendants of the Carni of the Alpes Carnicæ would never have been doubted but for the following statements--"The Krobati who now occupy the parts in the direction of Delmatia are derived from the Unbaptized Krobati, the Krovati Aspri so-called; who dwelt on the otherside of Turkey, and near France, conterminous with the Unbaptized Slaves--_i. e._ the Serbi. The word Krobati is explained by the dialect of the Slaves. It means the possessors of a large country"--_Constantinus Porphyrogeneta_--_De Adm. Imp._ 31. _ed. Par._ _p._ 97.

Again--"But the Krobati dwelt then in the direction of Bagivareia" (Bavaria) "where the Belokrobati are now. One tribe (γενεὰ) separated. Five brothers led them. Clukas, and Lobelos, and Kosentes, and Muklô, and Krobatos, and two sisters, Tuga and Buga. These with their people came to Delmatia--The other Krobati stayed about France, and are called Belokrobati, _i. e._ Aspri Krobati, having their own leader. They are subject to Otho the great king of France and Saxony. They continue Unbaptized, intermarrying" (συμπενθερίας καὶ ἀγάπας ἔχοντες) "with the Turks"--_c._ 30. _p._ 95.--The statement that the Kroatians of Dalmatia came from the Asprocroatians is repeated. The evidence, however, lies in the preceding passages; upon which it is scarcely necessary to remark that _bel_ = _white_ in Slavonic, and _aspro_ = _white_ in Romaic.

So much for the Croatians. The evidence that the Servians were in the same category, is also Constantine's.--"It must be understood that the Servians are from the Unbaptized Servians, called also Aspri, beyond Turkey, near a place called Boiki, near France--just like the Great Crobatia, also Unbaptized and White. Thence, originally, came the Servians"--_c._ 32. _p._ 99.

In the following passages the evidence improves--"The same Krobati came as suppliants to the Emperor Heraclius, before the Servians did the same, at the time of the inroads of the Avars--By his order these same Krobati having conquered the Avars, expelled them, occupied the country they occupied, and do so now"--_c._ 31. _p._ 97.

Their country extended from the River Zentina to the frontier of Istria and, thence, to Tzentina and Chlebena in Servia. Their towns were Nona, Belogradon, Belitzein, Scordona, Chlebena, Stolpon, Tenen, Kori, Klaboca--(_c._ 31. _p._ 97. 98). Their country was divided into 11. _Supan-rics_ (Ζουπανιας).

They extended themselves. From the Krobati "who came into Dalmatia a portion detached themselves, and conquered the Illyrian country and Pannonia" (_c._ 30 _p._ 95).

The further notices of the Servians are of the same kind. Two brothers succeeded to the kingdom, of which one offered his men and services to Heraclius, who placed them at first in the Theme Thessalonica, where they grew homesick, crossed the Danube about Belgrade, repented, turned back, were placed in Servia, in the parts occupied by the Avars, and, finally, were baptized. (_c._ 32. _p._ 99.)

It is clear that all this applies to the Slavonians of Croatia, Bosnia, Servia, and Slavonia--_i. e._ the triangle at the junction of the Save and Danube. It has no application to Istria, Carniola, Carinthia, and Styria. Have any writers so applied it? Some have, some have not. More than this, many who have never applied it argue just as if they had. Zeuss, especially stating that the Slavonic population of the parts in question was earlier than that of Croatia, still, makes it recent. Why? This will soon be seen. At present, it is enough to state that it is not by the _direct_ application of the passage in Porphyrogeneta that the antiquity of the Slavonic character of the Carinthians, Carniolans, and Istrians is impugned.

The real reason lies in the fact of the two populations being alike in other respects. What is this worth? Something--perhaps, much. Which way, however, does it tell? That depends on circumstances. If the Croatians be recent, the Carinthians should be so too. But what if the evidence make the Carinthians old? Then, the recency of the Croatians is impugned. Now Zeuss (_vv. Alpenslawen, Carantani, and Creinarii_) distinctly shews that there were Slavonians in the present districts before the time of Heraclius--not much before, but still before. Why not much? "They came only a little before", inasmuch as Procopius "gives us nothing but the old names Carni, and Norici". But what if these were Slavonic?

The present meaning of the root _Carn-_ is _March_, just as it is in U-_krain_. In a notice of the year A. D. 974 we find "quod _Carn_-iola vocatur, et quod vulgo vocatur _Creina marcha_", the Slavonic word being translated into German. Such a fact, under ordinary circumstances would make the _Carn-_ in Alpes _Carn_-icæ, a Slavonic gloss; as it almost certainly is. I do not, however, know the etymologist who has claimed it. Zeuss does not--though it is from his pages that I get the chief evidence of its being one.

Croatia, Bosnia, and Servia now come under the application of the Constantine text.

Let it pass for historical; notwithstanding the length of time between its author and the events which it records.

Let it pass for historical, notwithstanding the high probability of _Crobyzi_, a word used in Servia before the Christian æra, being the same as _Krobati_.

Let it pass for historical, notwithstanding the chances that it is only an inference from the presence of an allied population on both sides of Pannonia.

Let it pass for historical, notwithstanding the leadership of the five brothers (one the eponymus _Krobatos_) and the two sisters.

Let it do this, and then let us ask how it is to be interpreted. Widely or strictly? We see what stands against it viz: the existing conditions of three mountainous regions exhibiting the signs of being the occupancies of an aboriginal population as much as any countries on the face of the earth.

What then is the strict interpretation? Even this--that Heraclius introduced certain Croatians from the north into the occupancies of the dispossessed Avars apparently as military colonies. Does this mean that they were the first of their lineage? By no means. The late emperor of Russian planted Slavonic colonies of Servians in Slavonic Russia. Metal upon metal is false heraldry; but it does not follow that Slave upon Slave is bad ethnology.

With such a full realization of the insufficiency of the evidence which makes Bohemia, Carinthia, Servia &c. other than Slavonic _ab initio_, we may proceed to the ethnology of the parts to the west, and southwest--the Tyrol, Northern Italy, Switzerland, Bavaria, and Wurtemberg. In respect to these, we may either distribute them among the populations of the frontier, or imagine for them some fresh division of the population of Europe, once existent, but now extinct. We shall not, however, choose this latter alternative unless we forget the wholesome rule which forbids us to multiply causes unnecessarily.

Let us say, then, that the southern frontier of the division represented by the Slavonians of Carniola was originally prolonged until it touched that of the northernmost Italians. In like manner, let the Styrian and Bohemian Slaves extend till they meet the Kelts of Gaul. With this general expression I take leave of this part of the subject--a subject worked out in detail elsewhere (_Edition of Prichard's Eastern origin of the Celtic Nation, and The Germania of Tacitus with Ethnological Notes_,--_Native Races of the Russian Empire_ &c.).

The _northern_ and _eastern_ frontiers of the Slavonians involve those of (1) Ugrians, (2) the Lithuanians.