The Gothic monk (or priest) Jordanes lived in the sixth century, and wrote about 551 or 552 a book on “The Origin and Deeds of the Goths” (“De origine actibusque Getarum”), which for the most part is certainly a poor repetition of the substance of Cassiodorus’s great work on the same subject; and in fact he tells us this himself, with the modest addition that “his breath is too weak to fill the trumpet of such a man’s mighty speech.” It is true that Jordanes asserts in his preface that he has only had the loan of the work to read for three days, for which reason he cannot give the words but only the sense, and thereto, he says, he has added what was suitable “from certain histories in the Greek [which he did not understand] and Latin tongues,” and he has mixed it with his own words. But this is only said to hide his lack of originality; for the book evidently contains long literal excerpts from the work of Cassiodorus, while Jordanes’ Latin becomes markedly worse when he tries to walk alone. Not even the preface to the work is original; this is copied from Rufinus’s translation of Origines’ commentary on the Epistle to the Romans.

Of the uttermost ocean we read in Jordanes:

“Not only has no one undertaken to describe the impenetrable uttermost bounds of the ocean, but it has not even been vouchsafed to any one to explore them, since it has been experienced that on account of the resistance of the seaweed and because the winds cease to blow there, the ocean is impenetrable and is known to none but Him who created it.” This conception has a striking resemblance to Avienus’s “Ora Maritima” (see above, [pp. 37-40]), and may very probably be derived from it.

Of the western ocean he says, amongst other things:

“But it has also other islands farther out in the midst of its waves, which are called the Balearic Isles, and another Mevania; likewise the Orcades, thirty-three in number, and yet not all of them are cultivated [inhabited]. It has also in its most western part another island, called Thyle, of which the Mantuan [i.e., Virgil] says: ‘May the uttermost Thule be subject to thee.’ This immense ocean has also in its arctic, that is to say, northern, part, a great island called Scandza, concerning which our narrative with God’s help shall begin; for the nation [the Goths] of whose origin you inquired, burst forth like a swarm of bees from the lap of this island, and came to the land of Europe.”

After having spoken of Ptolemy’s (also Mela’s) mention of this island, which according to his version of the former had the shape of “a citron leaf, with curved edges and very long in proportion to its breadth” (this cannot be found in Ptolemy), and lay opposite the three mouths of the Vistula, he continues:

“This [island] consequently has on its east the greatest inland sea in the world, from which the River Vagi discharges itself, as from a belly, profusely into the Ocean.[128] On the western side it [the island of Scandza] is surrounded by an immense ocean and on the north it is bounded by the before-mentioned unnavigable enormous ocean, from which an arm extends to form the Germanic Ocean (‘Germanicum mare’), by widening out a bay. There are said to be many more islands in it, but they are small,[129] and when the wolves on account of the severe cold cross over after the sea is frozen, they are reported to lose their eyes, so that the country is not only inhospitable to men but cruel to animals. But in the island of Scandza, of which we are speaking, although there are many different peoples, Ptolemy nevertheless only gives the names of seven of them. But the honey-making swarms of bees are nowhere found on account of the too severe cold. In its northern part live the people Adogit, who, it is said, in the middle of the summer have continuous light for forty days and nights, and likewise at the time of the winter solstice do not see the light for the same number of days and nights; sorrow thus alternating with joy, so are they unlike others in benevolence and injury; and why? Because on the longer days they see the sun return to the east along the edge of the axis [i.e., the edge of the pole, that is to say, along the northern horizon], but on the shorter days it is not thus seen with them, but in another way, because it passes through the southern signs, and when the sun appears to us to rise from the deep, with them it goes along the horizon. But there are other people there, and they are called Screrefennæ, who do not seek a subsistence in corn, but live on the flesh of wild beasts and the eggs of birds,[130] and such an enormous number of eggs [lit., spawn] is laid in the marshes that it serves both for the increase of their kind [i.e., of the birds] and for a plentiful supply for the people.”

Screrefennæ or Skridfinns

The “Screrefennæ” of Jordanes (in other MSS. “Crefenne,” “Rerefennæ,” etc.) are certainly a corruption of the same word as Procopius’s “Scrithifini” (Skridfinns), and were a non-Germanic race inhabiting the northern regions (see later). The mention of these people, together with their neighbours the “Adogit,” who had the midnight sun and a winter night of forty days (cf. also Procopius), shows without a doubt that Jordanes’, or rather Cassiodorus’s, authority had received fresh information from the most northern part of Scandinavia, possibly through the Norwegian king Rodulf and his men.

Adogit