Germania and Agricola

by Cornelius Tacitus

3. OTHER AUTHORITIES.

H. Harkness' Latin Grammar.
Beck. Gall. Becker's Gallus.
Böt. Lex. Tac. Bötticher's Lexicon Taciteun.
For. and Fac. Forcellini and Facciolati's Latin Lexicon.
Tur. His. Ang. Sax. Turner's History of the Anglo-Saxons.
Z. Zumpt's Latin Grammar.

GERMANIA.

The Treatise DE SITU, MORIBUS ET POPULIS GERMANIAE, was written (as appears from the treatise itself see § 37) in the second consulship of the Emperor Trajan, A.U.C. 851, A.D. 98. The design of the author in its publication has been variously interpreted. From the censure which it frequently passes upon the corruption and degeneracy of the times, it has been considered as a mere satire upon Roman manners, in the age of Tacitus. But to say nothing of the ill adaptation of the whole plan to a satirical work, there are large parts of the treatise, which must have been prepared with great labor, and yet can have no possible bearing on such a design. Satires are not wont to abound in historical notices and geographical details, especially touching a foreign and distant land.

The same objection lies against the political ends, which have been imputed to the author, such as the persuading of Trajan to engage, or not to engage, in a war with the Germans, as the most potent and dangerous enemy of Rome. For both these aims have been alleged, and we might content ourselves with placing the one as an offset against the other. But aside from the neutralizing force of such contradictions, wherefore such an imposing array of geographical research, of historical lore, of political and moral philosophy, for the accomplishment of so simple a purpose? And why is the purpose so scrupulously concealed, that confessedly it can be gathered only from obscure intimations, and those of ambiguous import? Besides, there are passages whose tendency must have been directly counter to either of these alleged aims (cf. note § 33). The author does indeed, in the passage just cited, seem to appreciate with almost prophetic accuracy, those dangers to the Roman Empire, which were so fearfully illustrated in its subsequent fall beneath the power of the German Tribes; and he utters, as what true Roman would not in such forebodings, the warnings and the prayers of a patriot sage. But he does this only in episodes, which are so manifestly incidental, and yet arise so naturally out of the narrative or description, that it is truly surprising it should ever have occurred to any reader, to seek in them the key to the whole treatise.

The entire warp and woof of the work is obviously historical and geographical. The satire, the political maxims, the moral sentiments, and all the rest, are merely incidental, interwoven for the sake of instruction and embellishment, inwrought because a mind so thoughtful and so acute as that of Tacitus, could not leave them out. Tacitus had long been collecting the materials for his Roman Histories. In so doing, his attention was necessarily drawn often and with special interest to a people, who, for two centuries and more, had been the most formidable enemy of the Roman State. In introducing them into his history, he would naturally wish to give some preliminary account of their origin, manners, and institutions, as he does in introducing the Jews in the Fifth Book of his Histories, which happens to be, in part, preserved. Nor would it be strange, if he should, with this view, collect a mass of materials, which he could not incorporate entire into a work of such compass, and which any slight occasion might induce him to publish in a separate form, perhaps as a sort of forerunner to his Histories. [It has even been argued by highly respectable scholars, that the Germania of Tacitus is itself only such a collection of materials, not published by the Author, and never intended for publication in that form. But it is quite too methodical, too studied, and too finished a work to admit of that supposition (cf. Prolegom. of K.).] Such an occasion now was furnished in the campaigns and victories of Trajan, who, at the time of his elevation to the imperial power, was at the head of the Roman armies in Germany, where he also remained for a year or more after his accession to the throne, till he had received the submission of the hostile tribes and wiped away the disgrace which the Germans, beyond any other nation of that age, had brought upon the Roman arms. Such a people, at such a time, could not fail to be an object of deep interest at Rome. This was the time when Tacitus published his work on Germany; and such are believed to have been the motives and the circumstances, which led to the undertaking. His grand object was not to point a satire or to compass a political end, but as he himself informs us (§ 27), to treat of the origin and manners, the geography and history, of the German Tribes.

The same candor and sincerity, the same correctness and truthfulness, which characterize the Histories, mark also the work on Germany. The author certainly aimed to speak the truth, and nothing but the truth, on the subject of which he treats. Moreover, he had abundant means of knowing the truth, on all the main points, in the character and history of the Germans. It has even been argued from such expression as vidimus (§ 8), that Tacitus had himself been in Germany, and could, therefore, write from personal observation. Bnt the argument proceeds on a misinterpretation of his language (cf. note in loc. cit.). And the use of accepimus (as in § 27), shows that he derived his information from others. But the Romans had been in constant intercourse and connection, civil or military, with the Germans, for two hundred years. Germany furnished a wide theatre for their greatest commanders, and a fruitful theme for their best authors, some of whom, as Julius Caesar (to whom Tacitus particularly refers, 28), were themselves the chief actors in what they relate. These authors, some of whose contributions to the history of Germany are now lost (e.g. the elder Pliny, who wrote twenty books on the German wars), must have all been in the hands of Tacitus, and were, doubtless, consulted by him; not, however, as a servile copyist, or mere compiler (for he sometimes differs from his authorities, from Caesar even, whom he declares to be the best of them), but as a discriminating and judicious inquirer. The account of German customs and institutions may, therefore, be relied on, from the intrinsic credibility of the author. It receives confirmation, also, from its general accordance with other early accounts of the Germans, and with their better known subsequent history, as well as from its strong analogy to the well-known habits of our American aborigines, and other tribes in a like stage of civilization (cf. note, § 15). The geographical details are composed with all the accuracy which the ever-shifting positions and relations of warring and wandering tribes rendered possible in the nature of the case (cf. note, § 28). In sentiment, the treatise is surpassingly rich and instructive, like all the works of this prince of philosophical historians. In style, it is concise and nervous, yet quite rhetorical, and in parts, even poetical to a fault (see notes passim, cf. also, Monboddo's critique on the style of Tacitus). "The work," says La Bletterie, "is brief without being superficial. Within the compass of a few pages, it comprises more of ethics and politics, more fine delineations of character, more substance and pith (suc), than can be collected from many a ponderous volume. It is not one of those barely agreeable descriptions, which gradually diffuse their influence over the soul, and leave it in undisturbed tranquillity. It is a picture in strong light, like the subject itself, full of fire, of sentiment, of lightning-flashes, that go at once to the heart. We imagine ourselves in Germany; we become familiar with these so-called barbarians; we pardon their faults, and almost their vices, out of regard to their virtues; and in our moments of enthusiasm, we even wish we were Germans."

The following remarks of Murphy will illustrate the value of the treatise, to modern Europeans and their descendants. "It is a draught of savage manners, delineated by a masterly hand; the more interesting, as the part of the world which it describes was the seminary of the modern European nations, the VAGINA GENTIUM, as historians have emphatically called it. The work is short but, as Montesquieu observes, it is the work of a man who abridged every thing, because he knew every thing. A thorough knowledge of the transactions of barbarous ages, will throw more light than is generally imagined on the laws of modern times. Wherever the barbarians, who issued from their northern hive, settled in new habitations, they carried with them their native genius, their original manners, and the first rudiments of the political system which has prevailed in different parts of Europe. They established monarchy and liberty, subordination and freedom, the prerogative of the prince and the rights of the subject, all united in so bold a combination, that the fabric, in some places, stands to this hour the wonder of mankind. The British constitution, says Montesquieu, came out of the woods of Germany. What the state of this country (Britain) was before the arrival of our Saxon ancestors, Tacitus has shown in the life of Agricola. If we add to his account of the Germans and Britons, what has been transmitted to us, concerning them, by Julius Caesar, we shall see the origin of the Anglo-Saxon government, the great outline of that Gothic constitution under which the people enjoy their rights and liberties at this hour. Montesquieu, speaking of his own country, declares it impossible to form an adequate notion of the French monarchy, and the changes of their government, without a previous inquiry into the manners, genius, and spirit of the German nations. Much of what was incorporated with the institutions of those fierce invaders, has flowed down in the stream of time, and still mingles with our modern jurisprudence. The subject, it is conceived, is interesting to every Briton. In the manners of the Germans, the reader will see our present frame of government, as it were, in its cradle, gentis cunabula nostrae! in the Germans themselves, a fierce and warlike people, to whom this country owes that spirit of liberty, which, through so many centuries, has preserved our excellent form of government, and raised the glory of the British nation:

———Genus unde Latinum, Albanique patres, atque altae moenia Romae."

CHAP. I. Germania stands first as the emphatic word, and is followed by omnis for explanation. Germania omnis here does not include Germania Prima and Secunda, which were Roman provinces on the left bank of the Rhine (so called because settled by Germans). It denotes Germany proper, as a whole, in distinction from the provinces just mentioned and from the several tribes, of which Tacitus treats in the latter part of the work. So Caesar (B.G. 1,1) uses Gallia omnis, as exclusive of the Roman provinces called Gaul and inclusive of the three parts, which he proceeds to specify.