We have seen above that the characteristics of Heroic Ages in general are those neither of infancy nor of maturity—that the typical man of the Heroic Age is to be compared rather with a youth. The characteristics which we are now discussing are by no means inconsistent with such a view, though clearly they will not hold good for adolescence in general. For a true analogy we must turn to the case of a youth who has outgrown both the ideas and the control of his parents—such a case as may be found among the sons of unsophisticated parents, who through outside influence, at school or elsewhere, have acquired knowledge which places them in a position of superiority to their surroundings.
If we examine the history of the Teutonic Heroic Age we shall see that this analogy holds good both for individual princes and for the class as a whole. From the first century to the fifth—we may take the cases of Italicus the son of Flavus and of Theodric the Ostrogoth—it was customary for the Romans to demand the youthful sons of Teutonic kings as hostages. That the accession of such persons to power in later life would open up a channel for the introduction of foreign ideas needs probably no demonstration. But this was doubtless only one of a number of such channels. There is scarcely a single considerable deposit of antiquities dating from the first four centuries, not only in the south and west of Germany but even in Denmark and other Baltic lands, which does not contain a large proportion of Roman[647] articles. Among such articles we may mention coins, works of art (glass vases, statuettes, etc.) and, perhaps above all, armour and weapons. We may refer in particular to the Roman helmets and the large number of Roman swords and shield-bosses found in deposits on the east side of the province of Slesvig—a district remote from the Roman frontiers. The linguistic evidence too is in full agreement with that of the antiquities. Of the immense number of Latin loan-words which found their way into the Teutonic languages it is probable that quite a considerable proportion were borrowed in or before the Heroic Age.
Among the various channels through which Roman goods and Roman influence found entry into the Teutonic world we may mention trade, presents and subsidies, and booty gained by wars and piratical raids. But the most potent influence of all perhaps was the Roman practice of employing Teutonic mercenary soldiers—of which we hear both from inscriptions and literary works. This practice had begun as early as the first century, and it is noteworthy that those German princes who gave the Romans most trouble, such as Arminius and Civilis, were men who had previously served with their own armies. In the early part of the Heroic Age it appears that a very considerable proportion not only of the troops but also of the generals in the imperial service were of Teutonic nationality. Such forces were contributed largely by communities which had settled within the boundaries of the empire, such as the Goths and Vandals in the basin of the Danube and those smaller communities that we hear of incidentally in the east of Gaul. But it was by no means only from these dependent or semi-dependent principalities that the auxiliary troops were drawn. In the reigns of Constantius and Valentinian I the Roman army in Britain contained troops of Heruli—a nation which probably occupied the basin of the Elbe and had never been under Roman sovereignty, although a portion of it submitted to Justinian long afterwards. We have reason for believing that in the sixth century persons from the farthest parts of the Teutonic world were fighting in Italy. Otherwise it is difficult to account for the knowledge of Norway and Sweden shown by both Jordanes and Procopius.
It would be a mistake no doubt to suppose that the comitatus owes its origin to this mercenary service. The evidence for its existence goes back so far that a Gaulish derivation would be more probable, if it is not of native origin. But there can scarcely be any question that this form of service tended to promote its development. Here too we find a satisfactory explanation of other phenomena noticeable in the Heroic Age, in particular of that military type of kingship which rests on no national basis. Further, it needs no demonstration that such service would contribute very largely to sweep away tribal prejudices and national patriotism.
On the whole then the conclusion to which we are brought is that the characteristics of the Heroic Age owe their origin not so much to the national movements which brought about the destruction of the Western Empire as to the long-standing relations between the two peoples, and perhaps more especially to the influence exercised by mercenary service. Now we obtain a more satisfactory explanation of the effects produced on the more northern peoples. It is by no means improbable that warriors even from Denmark fought in the Roman armies, while others again may have entered the service of Eormenric, Attila or Theodric. At all events we can hardly doubt that, directly or indirectly, the northern peoples were affected to no small degree by the influence of Roman civilisation and the Roman army.
I do not suppose that anyone will be inclined to question the influence of the same civilisation upon the Welsh Heroic Age. The greater part of Britain had been under the Romans for more than three centuries, though some considerable time elapsed between their retirement and the beginning of the Heroic Age. But it is to be noted that the characters who figure in heroic poetry belong partly to the west but chiefly to the north, i.e. to those parts of the country which had been less Romanised than the rest. Moreover Welsh tradition traced the ancestry of the most important western families to a certain Cunedda who, according to a statement in the Historia Brittonum which most historians seem disposed to accept, had come from a region in the north beyond the Wall about—or very shortly before—the time when the Romans evacuated Britain. The chief northern families also belonged, at least mainly, to districts which appear to have been abandoned by the Romans early in the third century, and which had probably never been effectively occupied. Dumbarton, their principal stronghold, lay far from the frontier of the later province—indeed on the extreme edge of the earlier frontier. All the evidence at our disposal therefore indicates that the Heroic Age was not a product of the Romanised part of Britain but of those communities which remained more or less independent, more especially in the region beyond the northern frontier. At the same time it cannot be denied that even these districts must have been greatly affected by Roman influence—probably in much the same way and to at least the same degree as the Teutonic peoples adjacent to the Roman frontiers on the Continent. There is little doubt too that the inhabitants of these districts served as mercenary soldiers[648]. The conditions then appear to have been very similar to those of the Teutonic Heroic Age. First we find Roman influence, doubtless both civil and military, affecting the communities beyond the frontier. Then, on the fall of the Roman power, these communities, or rather their princes, step in and take possession of part of the province. The chief difference between the two cases is that here the new rulers were of the same nationality and spoke the same language as the previous inhabitants.
The origin of the earlier Servian Heroic Age presents in some respects rather an interesting parallel to the case we have just been considering. Like the northern Britons the Servians occupied territories which had formerly been within the frontiers of the Roman Empire. Their possession of these territories was recognised by the emperor Heraclius (610-640) not long after their settlement; and from this time onwards they were governed by a number of petty princes of their own in a state of semi-dependence, often merely nominal, on the Greek Empire for about six centuries. During the whole of this period, except perhaps for a few short intervals, when they were subject to the Bulgarians, they were constantly exposed to the influence of Greek civilisation. It is probable too that they were frequently employed in war by the Greek emperors, first against the Avars and later against the Magyars. On the death of Manuel I (1180), when the Empire rapidly went to ruin, Stefan Nemanja united the various principalities and formed a powerful Servian state. His work was continued and extended by several of his successors, especially by Uroš I (1242-1276) and Dušan (1331-1356), the latter of whom brought nearly the whole of the Balkan peninsula under his rule. Here again therefore, as in the Teutonic and Cumbrian Heroic Ages, we have the case of a semi-civilised and 'juvenile' nation exposed for a long period to the influence of a civilised but decaying empire. Again too, when the older power gives way, the younger nation asserts itself and takes possession of its neighbour's territories. In this respect however the affinities of the Servian state are rather with the kingdoms of the Ostrogoths in Italy or the Franks in Gaul than with the Cumbrian Welsh; for the latter apparently never succeeded in establishing a united state—at least not until their territories had been greatly diminished.
The history of the later Servian (Bosnian) Heroic Age was of a very different kind. After the Turkish conquest (1459 in Servia proper, somewhat later in the west) a large proportion of the inhabitants embraced Islam. From this time onwards their condition was somewhat comparable with that of their ancestors under the Greeks, though they were in much closer subjection to the suzerain power than the latter had ever been. Moreover, though they enjoyed a certain amount of prosperity during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries when the Turkish empire was at the height of its power, they never again formed an independent state. There can be no question that during the whole of this period the Mohammedan Servians were exposed to foreign influence, probably to a greater extent than any of the cases with which we have dealt above. But this influence was of a very different character from the others and little calculated to produce emancipation, whether intellectual or otherwise. In estimating the value of the resemblances which their heroic poetry shows to the types discussed above account must be taken of the consideration that much has doubtless been inherited—not merely in metre and phraseology—from that of the earlier period.
In dealing with the Gauls we are placed at a disadvantage through not knowing when the Heroic Age began. But all that we do know of their early history bears a most striking resemblance to the Heroic Age of the Teutonic peoples. Our first trustworthy references to the Gauls (Κελτοί) go back to the fifth century, at which time they appear to have occupied France and some parts at least of western Germany. It is commonly held also that they had already penetrated into Spain; and there can be no doubt that by this time a considerable part of the British Isles was in the possession of Celtic peoples. By the beginning of the fourth century, if not earlier, they had effected settlements in the plain of northern Italy, from whence military expeditions frequently made their way far into the peninsula. In the latter part of the same century we hear of Gauls in the Eastern Alps, probably in the basin of the Danube. Early in the following century Gaulish armies were making expeditions throughout the greater part of the Balkan peninsula and even into Greece, while one force effected a settlement in Asia Minor.
There is no evidence that any civilised power had acquired even a nominal authority over the Gauls before their subjugation by the Romans. But it is quite clear that for many centuries they had felt the influence of the Etruscan and Greek civilisations, more especially the former. Linguistic evidence is not available here, since we know nothing of the Etruscan language and little of the Gaulish. But the fact is placed beyond doubt by the large variety of articles of Etruscan origin or Etruscan types, which have been found throughout the territories of the Gauls and even in more northern regions. The evidence seems to indicate that the influence of this civilisation was comparable with that exercised in later times by Roman civilisation on the Teutonic peoples. Unfortunately however we have no historical record of those movements which first brought the Gauls into southern Europe. All that can be said with certainty is that in the earliest times for which we have trustworthy evidence they appear usually as auxiliaries or mercenaries in the service of the Etruscans. Sometimes also they were employed by the Greeks, Carthaginians and Samnites. And it was not only the Gauls settled in Italy who were used in this way. Occasionally we hear also of Transalpine Gauls or 'Gaisatoi,' who came to their assistance. Polybius (II 22) states that the latter name means 'mercenaries' (διὰ τὸ μισθοῦ στρατεύειν); and even if his interpretation is incorrect, it is significant enough of the opinion generally entertained as to the character of these warriors. Evidence to the same effect is afforded by the consideration that in the fourth and third centuries at least half of Europe (exclusive of Russia) appears to have been under Celtic rule, while some five or six centuries later Celtic nationality had vanished almost everywhere. Such phenomena are scarcely explicable unless the Celtic conquests were largely in the nature of military occupations, like those of the Goths, Visigoths and Vandals in later times.