Migration Period ca. 400-650 AD (or 350-700 AD): Archaeological Maps and Discussion

[Peterski]

During the Migration Period (ca. 400-600s AD) large areas of Europe became depopulated or population sharply declined there. This includes Poland, there are theories about either depopulation or sharp decline but continuity in Poland in period 400-600s AD. This period is kind of a "black whole" in history and archeology.

Only in recent years, new discoveries revealed that some parts of Poland continued to be inhabited during the 500s.

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These maps are from a book published in 1998, before discoveries from the last two decades mentioned above:

1. Archaeological cultures in early 200s:



2. Archaeological cultures in late 300s:



Next two maps don't show archaeological cultures (because no "cultures" survived, only some scattered evidence of human activity), but just single findings:

3. Archaeological situation in late 400s:



4. Archaeological situation in early 600s:



Are there similar maps from other countries as well? AFAIK, East Germany (Elbe-Oder area) was depopulated even more than Poland during that period.

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Edit:

This map shows, more or less, the areas where new settlements radiocarbon-dated to the 500s have been discovered in recent years (after year 2000):

[Dna8]

Nice thread topic, OP

[Peterski]

Map, first phase of MP: http://www.mpov.uw.edu.pl/en/thesaur...ration-period-



Map, second phase of MP: http://www.mpov.uw.edu.pl/en/thesaur...peoples/slavs-

Nice thread topic, OP

These are also times of huge transformations in Britain.

Britain 425 AD: http://www.earlybritishkingdoms.com/..._kingdoms.html



Britain 625 AD: http://www.earlybritishkingdoms.com/..._kingdoms.html



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Britain 450 AD: https://www.historyfiles.co.uk/Featu...pAD450-700.htm



Britain 700 AD: https://www.historyfiles.co.uk/Featu...pAD450-700.htm

[Peterski]

Slavs (and later also Avars) started attacking the Roman Empire in the 500s, from their abodes north of the Danube River.

Balkans ca. 600 AD: http://history-world.org/e600.jpg



Balkans ca. 700 AD: http://history-world.org/e700.jpg

[Peterski]

Finno-Ugric Tribes of Russia, year 900 AD: http://uralica.com/kuvat/900.jpg



Legend (according to Uralica website):

Liiviläisiä = Livonians
Vepsäl. = Vepsäläisiä = Veps
Virol. = Eests
Suur-Perma = Great-Perm = Permland
Syrjäänejä = Zyrians
Votjak = Votyaks
Jugralaisia = Jugrians
Tseremis. = Cheremisians
Muromil. = Muroms
Mordval. = Mordovians
Hämäl. = Hämäläisiä = Tavastians
Vatjal. = Vatjalaisia = Vatja people
Unkarilaisia = Hungarians = Magyars
Lappalaisia = Lapps = Saamis

Diagonal slash markings on these maps indicate the areas where the Finno-Ugric people used to travel in search of game. When the fur trade was introduced into the North, this had the effect of spreading the people even further into the wilderness in search of skins. Therefore, these people were more or less itinerant in the sense that there was no evidence of any long-term residence in any one area. They controlled vast areas, and the people who used these lands, considered them to be theirs for hunting, fishing and trapping - their livelihood.

Areas with slash-marks are the areas where Finnic people have evidently resided and controlled for their own wilderness trips. Maps I-III are slashed in green and starting from Map IV the areas are indicated by red slashes.

Solid Red indicateareas where stable, long term resident areas are established. (Maps II--III thin vertical lines) Farming, trade, forest work etc. are the basis of these settlements. Circles indicate Lapp and Samoyed areas.

A = Arkangeli, Ast. = Astrakan, H = Helsinki, I = Isborsk, Isk. = Isker, J = Jaroslavl, Jek. = Jekaterinburg, K = Kostroma, Kal. = Kaluga, Kas. = Kasani, M = Muroma, Moh. = Mohilev, Mos. = Moscow, N = Narva, NN = Nišni-Novgorod, Nov. = Novgorod, O = Odessa, Or. = Orenburg, P = Pietari (Leningrad), Pe = Perre, Pih. = Pihkova (Pskov), R = Riiga, Ry = Rybinsk, Rä = Räsan, Sar. = Saratoy, Sam. = Samara, Sm.= Smolensk, Sol. = Solikamsk, T = Tver, Ta = Tallinna, Tamb. = Tamboy, Tu = Tula, Tsh. = Tšerdyn, U = Ufa, V = Vladimir, Var. = Varsova, Vit. = Vitebsk, Vj. = Vjatka, Vol. = Vologda, Vor. = Voroneš.

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Maps of Finno-Ugric placenames (toponyms) in Russia:

https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/vi...8.15198905&z=4

https://www.v-stetsyuk.name/ru/Topo/Finno-Ugric.html

[Peterski]

What do we know about the territory of Poland before the Migration Period?

Here is a map I made with locations of various tribes (many locations are speculative or based on my interpretation, but the map is mostly based on book "Vistula Amne Discreta, Greek and Latin sources to the oldest history of Poland", as well as other sources):



Some explanations about this map:

Special attention was paid to the Lugian Federation (later known as the Vandal Federation - probably due to change of hegemony within the union, rather than ethnic transformations), which is commonly associated with Przeworsk culture. That federation was multi-ethnic and it was formed by peoples/tribes who wanted to control Amber Road trade together (that included towns located on Przeworsk territory such as Arsonium, Kalisia, Setidava - the northernmost Dacian/Thracian toponym, maybe it was a town established by Burebista during his 1st century BC expansion in all direction - and Askaukalis). Przeworsk culture was not just a cluster of tribes, but it was close to being a full-blown state.

Claudius Ptolemy mentions Lugi Omani, Lugi Diduni and Lugi Buri - I think that those tribes were "Lugians proper" (parts of "great Lugian nation" - as Strabo describes it). Apart from these "Lugians proper" (who were leading the whole union during the 1st century AD), also other tribes belonged to the Lugian Federation.

As for Lugi Buri - I think a conjecture Lugi et Buri (Lugians and Burs) should be applied (the same was the case with Rutikleiovi, who in other sources are mentioned as Rugii et Lemovii - Rugians and Lemovians). Another possibility is that those were tribes with dual names, formed due to unions between two previously separate tribes. Question is, whether those particular Burs allied with Lugi were Germanic Burs, or Dacian Burs:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burs_(Dacia)#Name

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buri_tribe

I think that it was a group of Dacian Buri, who were forced to abandon their homeland after Sarmatian (Iazyges) and Roman invasions of Dacia, and fled to the north to Poland, where Lugi absorbed them.

Tacitus also mentions the Lugian Federation (Lugiorum nomen) and lists five of its tribes - adding, that the list is incomplete - Harii, Helvecones, Manimi, Helisii and Nahanarvali. I assume that he did not mention "Lugians proper" (as Ptolemy did), but instead only other tribes belonging to that union under Lugian hegemony.

Pliny the Elder doesn't write anything about Lugians, but in his division of Germanic peoples into main meta-groups, he mentions Vandilian peoples (Vandalic peoples), counting among them the Charini (probably identical with Tacitus' Harii), Varini, Gutones (Goths) and Burgundians. Counting Goths as part of the Vandili is most likely a mistake - especially considering that he did not do the same with other tribes from Pomerania.

Vandals were south-western neighbours of Goths (and southern neighbours of Ulmerugians - island Rugians), as we learn from Jordanes. Pliny's Varini likely lived in mainland Mecklenburg (perhaps at the Warnow river?) so it seems that they were the most north-western of all Vandili peoples. Perhaps Avarini - mentioned by Ptolemy 100 years near the eastern source of the Vistula - were a subgroup of Varini who migrated to Poland. It is also possible that Varini originally lived in Hinterpommern but were pushed west & south by Gothic expansion.

There were Ulmerugians (= Insular Rugians) and "normal" (coastal, mainland) Rugians. Ulmerugians (Hulmarugeis) probably lived in the Islands of Usedom, Wolin and Rügen.

Avarini probably played a very active role in the Marcomannic Wars.

Burgundians (mentioned also by Ptolemy) should be placed to the east of Semnones (who lived in present-day northern and southern Brandenburg, at the Havel and Spree rivers and around Berlin, from the middle Elbe in the west up to Lebus at the Oder in the east). So Burgundians lived to the east of the middle Oder river valley, and to the south of tribes living in present-day Polish Pomerania (those were: Ulmerugians - island Rugians, who occupied Usedom and Wolin - Sidenians, who were mentioned also by Strabo as Sibinians, near the mouth of the Oder; furher east Rugians and Lemovians, as well as Goths and Hirrians - near the mouth of the Vistula lived also Gepids and Skirians).

Between Rugii et Lemovii (Rutikleiovii) and Burgiands, lived also Elvaiones. Although some scholars claim that it was just another name for Helvecones, who lived south of the Noteć River and were part of Lugiorum nomen.

Burgundians should be placed in Luboszyce culture area, which existed in the 2nd century AD in north-western part of Greater Poland, northern part of Lower Silesia, in the Land of Lubusz, in Lusatia (which had been uninhabited before, during the 1st century AD), as well as maybe in southern part of Brandenburg too. Another possibility (but less likely) is that they were also part of Przeworsk culture, which extended in the north up to Noteć river.

To the south of Burgundians, Ptolemy locates Lugi Omani. Silingians on the other hand lived to the south of Semnones, in parts of Lower Silesia, Sachsen, and maybe eastern part of Sachsen-Anhalt.

In Polish-Czech-German borderlands we can also place Strabo's Mugilones and Zumoi.

To the south of Goths (and to the north of Boulanes) sources mention Phinnoi:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenni#Ancient_accounts

They were probably descended from Finnaithae (a tribe from Finnveden in Central Sweden) transpored by Goths to Pomerania in order to use them as military settlers in borderland areas (something like Burgenland Croats, who were also settled there by the Habsburgs in order to provide border security against the Ottomans).

Frugundians were probably a subdivision of Burgundians who migrated south (just like Avarini and Varini, or Anartes and Anartofraktes - which literally means a branch which "fractured/split from Anartes").

It seems that in its western part, Przeworsk culture was a mainly Lugian-Vandalian creation, with participation of some other tribes as well (which were not counted as either "Lugians proper" or "Vandals proper"). Lugians lived in the southern part of that area and Vandals in the northern part. We cannot equate Vandals with Lugians, those were two totally different peoples, speaking unrelated languages (Vandals were probably Germanic-speakers and Lugians probably Celtic-speakers. The change of name from Lugian Federation (1st century AD) to Vandal (2nd century AD) was most likely not caused by ethnic processes, but by change of hegemony within the union.

Lugians are considered as a Celtic ethnos (at least the name itself is of etymologically Celtic origin), the ethnogenesis of which should be connected with Celtic (La Tene culture) settlement in central and south-eastern parts of Silesia, in Lesser Poland, and in Subcarpathia (Podkarpacie) during the 4th-3rd centuries BC. Anartes, one branch of which lived in South-Eastern Poland (upper San river valley), were also Celts. As were the Cotini.

Perhaps Lugians later mixed with Vandalic groups migrating south (such as Frugundians or Avarini - assuming that they were really Vandalic subdivisions of Burgiands and Varini), under Gothic pressure? In 1st century AD in Western Małopolska, local variant of Przeworsk culture had very strong La Tene influences.

I think that Lugians and Vandals formed a similar multi-ethnic union as Peucyni and Bastarnae, or as Teutones, Ambrones and Cimbri. In this last case, the Cimbri were most likely Celtic:

http://www.davidkfaux.org/Cimbri-Chronology.pdf

Cimbri were a Celtic enclave in Non-Celtic lands, just like Galatians in Anatolia.

I think that the Lugian Federation (and the Przeworsk culture) included also - in its eastern parts - the Vistula Veneti mentioned by Tacitus. Tacitus wrote that they lived between Phinnoi in the north and Peucini in the south (the latter cannot be seen in my map posted above - they lived to the south-east of Costoboci). And it most likely also included the Veltae, who lived to the south of Aestii (Balts). So we should associate these two tribes with the so called Eastern Zone of Przeworsk culture (link below), and locate the Stavanoi (occupying vast expanses of land between Galindians and the steppe of Ukraine) to the east of Vistula Veneti.

Eastern Zone of Przeworsk culture:

http://cejsh.icm.edu.pl/cejsh/elemen...e-320d51c9a4bd

"Archaeologically confirmed areas of Celtic settlement in Poland":

https://balkancelts.wordpress.com/tag/bastarnae-poland/



https://balkancelts.wordpress.com/ta...ements-poland/



https://balkancelts.wordpress.com/20...lts-in-poland/



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This game has the Lugian Federation (Luguwa / the Lugiones) as one of its factions:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...w-The-Lugiones





Extent of Przeworsk culture in 1st century AD according to Kokowski:



Extent of Przeworsk culture in 4th century AD according to Kokowski:

[Peterski]

A few years ago I first suggested that East Germanic and Elbe Germanic tribes had more of I1-M253 than R1b-U106, after reading this:

(see Table 3. on page 6 out of 7):

https://www.researchgate.net/publica...wanderungszeit

12 samples from Görzig in Saxony-Anhalt dated to the 300s-400s AD, of whom as many as 7 or 8 were I1-M253:

I1-M253 ---------------------------------------------- 7 (~58%)
I (likely I2 but can be some Russian clade of I1) ----- 1 (~8%)
R1b ------------------------------------------------------- 1 (~8%)
R1 (most likely R1a, or some eastern R1b) ----------- 1 (~8%)
R1 (likely R1b but can be R1a-Z284 or L664) -------- 2 (~17%)

Location of Görzig:



So in 300s-400s AD, Saxony-Anhalt probably had Y-DNA frequencies more similar to modern Sweden than to modern Western Germany.

Also if you look at Y-DNA of Slavic populations living in areas where East Germanic tribes used to live, they have more I1 than R1b-U106:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kashubians#Genetics

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorbs#Genetics

First published news about Y-DNA of Wielbark culture (associated with Goths and Gepids) also suggest domination of I1-M253:

https://www.academia.edu/33791135/20..._DNA_libraries



And autosomally similar to Jutland Iron Age (so ancestors of Jutes and Angles as well as partially ancestors of modern Danes):

http://www.actabp.pl/#Archiwum?./supl/2_2018.html



Explains why I score Belarus (= Proto-Slavs and some West Balts?) + Denmark (= Goths and maybe Vandals?) in DNA Tribes:



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I suggested that R1b-U106 expanded from more western areas into what is now Central and East Germany after 800 AD.

My prediction about Elbe-Oder area Y-DNA over time:

300s-400s AD = I1-M253 dominant
600s-1000s AD = R1a-M458 dominant
1100s-present = R1b-U106 dominant

Modern frequencies in Central (today Eastern, between Elbe and Oder) Germany: