Vandals, Suebes and Alans in Vandalic North-Africa


It is beyond any doubt that the Vandals have the worst reputation of all Migration-Period tribes, even if the term “vandalism” itself dates from the French Revolution. There are several contemporary sources relating to this Germanic tribe, but concerning the early period especially they are often contradictory. Thus some mention the “Vandali” as inhabitants of today’s southern and central Poland; others name “Lugi” instead for the same region and don’t refer to the Vandals at all.

It is not until the 4 th century that the sources become any clearer. Asding Vandals in Transylvania (now central Rumania) are known to have collided with invading Goths in the 330s. Shortly before the year 400 a coalition of Asding and Siling Vandals, Alans and Suevs started moving westward. On New Year’s Eve of 406, the Vandals crossed the frozen river Rhine at Mainz, after which in the course of two years they made their way across Roman Gaul (France). It is possible roughly to reconstruct their route, because the contemporary scholar St. Jerome describes the towns pillaged by the Vandals. In the autumn of 409 they crossed the Pyrenees, after which they divided the Roman provinces of today’s Spain amongst themselves. Combats against the Visigoths – who acted on Roman instruction – resulted in great losses. In the year 429, groups of Vandals, Alans and Suevs under the leadership of the Asdingian king Geiserich crossed the Strait of Gibraltar and arrived in Africa . They established a powerful kingdom and with their swift fleet brought large parts of the western Mediterranean under their control. The Vandal kingdom was brought down in 533 by the Byzantine Empire; its warriors were incorporated into the Byzantine army and sent east.

Archaeologically it is not easy to find evidence of the Vandals, because they very rapidly adapted to their Roman surroundings. Furthermore there is no sign of “vandalism”. Indeed, the coming of the Vandals appears barely to have affected the continuity of daily life. In terms of urban development, there is a decline in certain districts, but this seems to have been due not so much to the Vandals as to the transformation of a Roman city into a medieval town dominated by churches and defences. Archaeological research has provided evidence of continuity and new development, as for instance at Carthage. In rural areas, pre-Vandal churches were enlarged, for example at Henchir-el-Gousset. Here an inscription in an extension mentions king Thrasamund (496–523). New analyses of famous mosaics, which where considered “classical in style and iconography” and for which the year of the Vandal invasion was considered the terminus ante quem (last possible date), now plausibly suggest that these were produced during the Vandal kingdom in Africa . Only in religious matters do the written records show a difference between Vandals and the Roman population. Both were Christians, but the Vandals followed the Arian doctrine (denying Christ’s divinity) while the Romans were Catholics.

In certain cases is possible to recognize Vandal, Alan and Suev immigrants by their graves. Some bear inscriptions with Germanic names, so the foreign origin of the deceased is certain. Furthermore there are graves with rich grave goods, dating to the first and maybe the second Vandal generation (up until ca. 480). The custom of including grave goods, rich in quantity and quality, was unusual for the local Roman population. Above all, the costume of the dead shows links to the Middle Danube, even if the actual ornaments were produced in Mediterranean workshops. The adaptation to Roman customs is clearly recognizable in the form of the graves. All burials attributed to Vandals were in Roman-style sarcophagi or brick vaults. The rarity of Vandal graves in North Africa is also due to the fact that only the burials of the upper strata of society are known. Their social position is attested not only by the grave goods but also by the location of their graves within churches and by the epitaphs and funerary mosaics. The people and the elite no longer buried their dead in communal cemeteries. Lower-ranking Vandals will probably remain ‘archaeologically invisible’ because like the Roman population they buried their dead without grave goods.

There are two alternative explanations why such rich graves appear only during a very short period of the Vandal kingdom. If the rich grave goods are regarded as a conservative feature, linked to customs of the Roman Empire and the Migration Period, the reason for the decline of the rich graves will be the progressive acculturation of the immigrants to their Late-Roman environment.

But these graves of the upper class – and this they are without any doubt – can also be seen as a completely new phenomenon. The location of the graves within Christian sacral buildings demonstrates the high position of the deceased within their society. But the rich grave goods and the burial customs may have served to emphasise people’s position within the Vandal-Alan-Suev coalition. After the landing in Africa – described by the historians as the seminal event in the ethnogenesis of the Vandals – the claims of individual families within the immigrant community would have had to be enforced. To underline one’s ancient family traditions definitely was a means to this end. The epitaph of Ermengon in the Great Basilica at Hippo Regius is to be read in this context, because it explicitly mentions her Suev origin. Presumably the rich graves containing Vandal ladies buried in traditional costume show something similar. It is the habitus Vandalorum (Vandal costume), referred to in the writings of Victor Vitensis (II,8.9), which was characteristic of the ruling Vandal elite.

In the following generation, this kind of profiling was no longer necessary. Instead of rich grave goods, mosaics and epitaphs now had to provide appropriate memorials. The use of writing in itself would show that the deceased belonged to the cultured upper class.

 

Literature:
Chr. Courtois, Les Vandales et l'Afrique (Paris 1955) 163f.- M.E.Gil Egea, África en tiempos de los Vándalos : Continuidad y Mutaciones de las Estructuras socio-políticas romanas. Mem. Seminario Hist. Antigua 7 (Alcalá de Henares 1998) – A. Hettinger, Migration und Integration. Zu den Beziehungen von Vandalen und Romanen im Norden Afrikas. Frühmittelalterl. Stud. 35, 2001, 121ff. - J.H.W.G. Liebeschuetz, Gens into regnum: the Vandals. In: H.-W. Goetz/J. Jarnut/W. Pohl (Hrsg.), Regna and Gentes. Transformation of the Roman World 13 (Leiden, Boston 2003) 55ff. - Ph. von Rummel, Der Forschungsstand zum afrikanischen Vandalenreich nach den internationalen Kolloquien „L’Afrique vandale et byzantine“ in Tunis und Paris 2001/02. Ethnogr.-arch. Zeitschr. 2004/1, 85-97.- L’Afrique Vandale et Byzantine. Antiquité Tardive 10, 2002 & 11, 2003.

 

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