Chapter 2
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Norway. (1) The most surprising thing about Ptolemy's account is that there is no mention of the Swedes (Suiones), so that it is reasonable to suppose that one of the names he gives must be the distorted title of these already famous people, and it now seems that the central Leuonoi are the most likely folk to be the inhabitants of Svitjod. (2)
There is a long interval of four centuries between Ptolemy Geography and a further mention of the people of Scandinavia by a writer of the outside world. For Jordanes is the next author to speak of the Scandinavians, and his Getica, or History of the Goths, was written in the middle of the sixth century. The new evidence is not really that of Jordanes, who was a native of the Eastern Balkans, but that of the distinguished Roman statesman Cassiodorus who, some thirty years earlier, had written a work, now lost, called The Origin and Exploits of the Goths; this was a big book in twelve
1. But if this identification be correct, it is astonishing that Ptolemy should know of these dwellers in the remote inland, and yet have nothing to say about the busier coastal folk. It is true that the Hedemark, as Dr. A. W. Brųgger has observed (Kulturgeschichte des Norwegischen Alteriums, Oslo, 1926, p. 198), affords some archaeological evidence of a high prosperity before and just about the time of Ptolemy, but there is also evidence of a larger population living around the mouth of the Oslo Fjord, and the absence of their name from Ptolemy's list cannot fail to arouse some misgivings about this common belief that the Chaideinoi were a people of interior Norway.
2. For apart from their stated geographical position, from ta d mes A/CYIONOI by misreading ĮC as LE and IO as W LEUWNOI is produced at once, and this without exaggerating the ordinary chances of such textual error if the archetype manuscript were written, as is almost certain, in uncials. This is the ingenious suggestion of J. V. Svensson, Namn och Bygd, 1919, p. 12, in a paper that must be read without fail by all interested in the Ptolemaic Scandinavian tribe-names. The author urges that Ptolemy's sources must surely have been the same as those used by Tacitus, namely the Roman amber-merchants who traded with the Prussian coast and the south Baltic districts, and the information given to him would accordingly concern the eastern Scandinavian folk; if the Leuonoi be taken for the Swedes, it is possible to identify the Fauonai and Firaisoi as the inhabitants of the south-west and west coasts of Finland, a district that would easily be confused at this early time with Scandinavia itself. The Chaideinoi, to the west of the Swedes, may then legitimately be placed not in Norway, but in the Dalarne and Gestrikland districts of Sweden, where indeed there are plenty of place-names containing the hed (heath) element to justify the shift from Hedemark in Norway. Further, the Daukiones are not necessarily the Danes (Dankiones--Daneiones), but, by abandoning D as a foreshortened enclitic, the Aviones (meaning islanders, cf. Germanic awi), well-known in the Germania, and perhaps a name borne by the inhabitants of Öland at this time. As a complement to this it is simple to accept the Goutai as the people of the island Gotland.
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volumes, and the Getica of Jordanes is simply an abridgement of it. Cassiodorus himself derived much of his information from a still earlier work by an unknown writer Ablabius, but in the passage describing Scandinavia he doubtless repeats much that was told him by the various northerners who had travelled to Italy and whom he had met. One of these must have been the Scandinavian king Rodvulf, who, not liking his own kingdom, transferred himself with a band of his followers to the court of Theodoric the Great, the very court where Cassiodorus was a much-honoured man.
The description of Scandinavia, the large island Scandza, (1) begins with the remark that it contains 'many and diverse nations', the term nationes referring, of course, to small independent peoples with a king or chieftain at their head. In the northernmost part were the Adogit, perhaps the folk of Halogaland (Oat. 68°, Nordland, Norway), who enjoy forty twentyfour-hour days of unbroken daylight in the summer and a like period of unbroken darkness in the winter. The account then names another northern people, the Screrefennae (Lapps), who were content to live without corn, eating only animal flesh and birds' eggs. The next folk to be mentioned are the Suehans (Swedes); they were famous for their fine horses, and it was they who supplied the black fox skins that came eventually to the Roman markets. They were a poor people, but nevertheless they wore fine clothes. Then comes a group of peoples who dwelt in a great and fertile plain where they suffered much from the constant attacks of their enemies. They are the Theustes (perhaps from the Tjust district near Kalmar), (2) the Vagoth, the Bergio, the Hallin (dwelling in Halland), and the Liothida (perhaps from Lödde near Lund, or Luggude, Hälsingborg). The next group of people mentioned are the Ahelmil, the Finnaithae (from Finnveden in Småland), the Fervir (from Fjäre, North Halland), and the Gautigoth (inhabitants of
1. Jordanes, Getica, ed. Mommsen, Mon. Germanae historica, V, Berlin, 1882, p. 58.
2. On the difficult subject of the tribe-names of Jordanes, see Von Grienberger , Die nordischm Völker bei Jordanes, Zeit. f. deutsches Alterium, 45 (1901), 128; J. V. Svensson, De "Nordiska folknamen hos Jordanes, Namn och Bygd, 1917, pp. 109-157; B. Nerman, Det svenska rikets uppkomst, Stockholm, 1925, pp. 33-52, and Lauritz Weibull, Arkiv f. nordisk Filologi, 41 (1925), p. 213, a most interesting and important paper. I have given here, in brackets, some of the suggestions of these writers in the instances where there is a general agreement, but I ought to say that Weibull's views diverge considerably from those of the other authors. He believes, for instance, that the whole of the Theustes-Liothida group is to be located in a small area in north-west Scania.
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Vāstergötland), all brave and warlike folk; with them are named the Evagreotingi. (1) The folk of this group dwelt (like animals, says Jordanes) in rock-hewn fortresses. (2) Beyond them were the Ostrogoths (inhabitants of Östergötland) and the Suetidi, who are the Suehans, or Swedes, again, though now they are given another form of the name. They are said, at this second reference to them, to excel all other folks in stature, yet, the account goes on to say, the Danes, who are sprung of the same stock as the Swedes and now occupied the lands of the Heruls whom they had driven from their home, also boasted that they were the tallest of the Scandinavians. In this group with the Ostrogoths and the Swedes Jordanes names the Raumariciae (from Romerike in South-east Norway), the Ragnaricii (3) (from the ancient Ranrike, now the Bohuslān), the peace-loving Finni, (4) and the Vinoviloth. Finally, there comes a group of Norwegian peoples, the Granni (of Grenland), the Augandzi (of Agder), the Eunixi, the Taetel, the Rugi (of Rogaland), the Archi, and the Ranii. It was over these folk that the Rodvulf, who subsequently lived at the court of Theodoric the Great, was king.
The double mention of the Swedes is not, of course, a proof either of the importance or large dominions of these people, being merely a consequences of the mishandling by the author of information derived from more than one source. Yet it is clear that the Swedes were still a powerful folk ruling big territories. The existence of the skin-trade suggest that their dominion extended over a large part of Norrland, and it may also be inferred from the manner of their mention that their lands considerably exceeded the modern Uppland, probably extending both westwards to Vermland and in the south-east into Östergötland. The reference to the Danes who were of the same race as the Swedes, and yet were compelled to emigrate, suggest the vigour of the parent stock. Again, although by the Roman standard the Swedes were judged a poor folk, yet they were noticeable for their rich dress, and this in itself
1. The next (Mommsen) reads dehinc mixi evage otingis; this is emended dehinc mixti evagreotingis.
2. Excisis rupibus quasi castellis; this must refer to the hill-forts of fourth to sixth century dates that are common in Central Sweden, especially in Bohuslān and Östergötland. See B. Schnittger, Die vorgeschichtliche Burgwālle in Schweden, Opuscula arch. O. Montelio sept. dicata, Stockholm, 1913, p. 335.
3. The text (Mommsen) reads raumarici, aeragnaricii.
4. Probably a folk of the boundary lands between Sweden and Norway, and neither the Finns of history nor the Lapps. 'Finn' may be a descriptive term meaning seeker, collector, gatherer.
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is a striking testimony that they possessed much wealth according to the humbler standards of the north.
But they must by this time have had serious rivals in their struggle for supremacy in central Sweden. The warlike Gautigoth of Vāstergötland are now in the picture, and it is worth noting that the Swedes and the Vinoviloth are expressly said (1) to be on an equal footing with the Ostrogothae and the other peoples of the same group. Furthermore, there can be little doubt of the notable increase in political importance of the tribes of south-east Norway. It is not surprising, therefore, that another, and contemporary author, should make no mention of the Swedes at all.
This was Procopius of Caesarea, who lived in the reign of Justinian (A.D. 527-565). He was the legal adviser and secretary of the general Belisarius and was an experienced man of affairs who had travelled in Africa and Italy and in the East. He accompanied Belisarius in the wars against the Vandals and the Ostrogoths, so that he knew something of the German peoples, and, in fact, it is in connexion with a German folk, the Heruls (see p. 65), that he finds occasion to mention the dwellers in the north. (2) The Heruls, about A.D. 505, had been defeated in battle by the Lombards, and in their retreat from their territory in Hungary they had divided into two parties, the one settling across the Danube in Illyricum and the other journeying northwards through the lands of the Slavs into the country of the Danes. There they reached the sea, and then, sailing over to Thule, they established themselves on that 'island'. Thule, said Procopius, is very large, being more than ten times the size of Britain, and was situated a long way to the north of the last-mentioned island. Most of the land of Thule was barren, but in the inhabited districts there lived thirteen nations (qnh), each comprising a very large population and having a king at its head. After describing the midnight sun, Procopius goes on to say that among the inhabitants of Thule were the Scrithiphinoi, a people whose primitive manner of life was akin to that of beasts. They lived by hunting, and knew nothing of agriculture nor of wine; they did not wear shoes, and their dress was simply the skins of the animals they had slain; moreover their infants were not breast-fed as among other nations, but were nourished from birth onwards by marrow from animal bones. Nevertheless the other inhabitants of
1. Though this, a matter of punctuation, could be challenged. See, however, Von Grienberger, Zeitschr. f. deutches Altertum, 46, pp. 137, 138.
2. History of the Wars, VI, xv.
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