Great Migration of Nations. The first stage is German

Great Migration of Nations - code name the era of mass migrations of the Hunnic, Germanic, Alanian and other tribes in Europe between the 2nd and 7th centuries, which captured almost the entire continent and radically changed its ethnic, cultural and political appearance. The period of the Great Migration of Nations consists of three main stages.

The first stage, called the Germanic, began in the 2nd century BC. from the resettlement of the Goths, who migrated from the territory of Central Sweden along the Vistula to the Black Sea coast. In 238, the Goths crossed the border of the Roman Empire on the Lower Danube, and their squads raided the Black Sea coast. Around 269, the Goths divided into the Ostrogoths, who occupied vast areas in the Northern Black Sea region, and the Visigoths, most of whom moved to the Balkans. In addition, in the III century. various Germanic - Alemanni, Vandals, Saxons, Franks - and other tribes invaded the boundaries of the Roman Empire. The end of the first stage dates back to 378 - the Battle of Adrianople.

The second stage began in 378 with the invasion of Europe by the Huns - nomads from the steppes of Central Asia of Turkic or Mongolian origin. At the beginning of the migration, the Huns subjugated the Alans, then they defeated the Ostrogoths, and the Visigoths were pushed back to the west. And although the Romans managed to stop the expansion of the Huns in 451 on the territory of modern France, this invasion set in motion the tribes that bordered the Roman Empire, accelerated its conquest and collapse. The Huns themselves "dissolved" among the later migrating tribes. The Visigoths in 400 migrated to Greece, and then moved to Italy and in 410 captured Rome. After that, the Huns settled in the south of Gaul and penetrated the Iberian Peninsula, where they created their kingdom. The Romans were forced to withdraw their troops from Gaul to fight the Visigoths, which was used by the Vandals and Suebi, who migrated initially to Gaul, and then (in 409) to Spain. The Sueves formed their own kingdom in the west of the Iberian Peninsula. The Vandals first settled in Andalusia in the south of the Iberian Peninsula, and in 429 crossed over to North Africa and created a German kingdom with its capital in Carthage. The Alemannic tribes crossed the Rhine and occupied the southwest of Germany, Alsace, most of Switzerland, but they were later subdued by the Franks. The Ostrogoths crossed into Italy in 488, taking possession of the entire Alpine region and the northeastern part of the Roman province of Illyria on the Balkan Peninsula. Ravenna became the capital of the Ostrogothic kingdom, which included Italy, Pannonia and Illyria. In 555, the kingdom fell under the blows of Byzantium. In III-IV centuries. Franks ("brave") from the right bank of the Rhine gradually migrated to Gaul. In the 5th century King Clovis expanded the possessions of the Franks up to the Pyrenees. In 486, the Frankish kingdom was formed on the territory of Gaul, the main ethnic groups in which were the Franks and the Gallo-Romans. Gradually, the Franks seized almost all the possessions of the Visigoths and Burgundians, subjugated the Germans who lived beyond the Rhine - the Thuringians, Alemanni, Bavarians. Initially, the Franks settled in isolation from the Gallo-Roman population, but gradually a process of ethnic mixing took place, the pace of which varied greatly in different parts of the country. Saxons, Angles and Jutes began to migrate from the Jutland peninsula. Part of the Saxons penetrated far south to lower Saxony, Westphalia and Thuringia. Another part of the Saxons, together with the Angles and Jutes, migrated in the 5th-6th centuries. to the British Isles, where several Germanic state formations, in the IX century. became a single kingdom. German settlers pushed the Celtic tribes of the Picts and Scots into the highlands in the west of the island (Wales and Cornwall), and some moved to the continent - to the Brittany peninsula. Anglo-Saxon migration to Britain basically ended in the 7th century. The final event of the second stage is the invasion of the Lombards into the territory of modern Italy. As a result of intensive migrations in Europe, a synthesis of ancient and barbarian cultures began. It was most active in northeastern Gaul. The process of ethnic and cultural mixing depended on several factors: 1) the synthesis proceeded faster in areas where the Romans were numerically superior to the Germans; 2) on the nature of the settlement of barbarians on the territory of the empire, i.e. if they settled in isolation from the Romans, then this slowed down the rate of mixing; 3) the cultural level of the alien and local population played a significant role; 4) the adoption of Christianity by some Germans and the possibility of marriage with the Romans significantly accelerated the process of their cultural assimilation; 5) severe climatic conditions (for example, in Scandinavia) had a certain effect on slowing down the pace of cultural synthesis.

The third stage of the Great Migration of Nations is associated with the invasion of the Slavic tribes on the Balkan Peninsula and the territory of Byzantium. The ancestral home of the Slavs stretched from the Carpathians to the area between the Vistula and the Dnieper. In the north, it bordered on the territory occupied by the Baltic tribes; in the southeast, in Lower Volga, the neighbors of the Slavs in ancient times were the nomadic tribes of the Iranian group - the Scythians, Sarmatians and Alans. From the 5th century began the movement of individual Slavic tribes to the West, beyond the Vistula. Another stream of migrants moved to the lower reaches of the Danube and Byzantium, in 636 the Slavs reached the coast of the Adriatic Sea. Somewhat later, under the onslaught of the Avars, the Slavs continued to migrate to the eastern part of Europe. Some of them settled Pannonia, others - Moravia and the Czech Republic, others moved to the Balkan Peninsula, and then even to Asia Minor. In the Balkans, the Slavs assimilated the local tribes, while further south the Slavs themselves merged with the indigenous population. As a result of these migrations, the Slavs occupied vast territories in Eastern Europe. Sometimes the Arab conquests of the 7th-11th centuries, the campaigns of the Normans at the end of the 8th-11th centuries, the settlement of Pannonia by the Hungarians at the end of the 9th century are sometimes attributed to the third stage of the Great Migration of Peoples.

Estimates of the number of peoples participating in the resettlement are difficult. According to some sources, the Visigoths, who occupied the Roman province of Moesia in 376, numbered 15 thousand people; vandals who moved to Italy in 406 - presumably from 200 to 400 thousand people; There were up to 100 thousand Slavs who crossed the Danube to the Balkans in 557.

Source: Yudina T.N. Sociology of migration: towards the formation of a new scientific direction. M., 2003. S. 309-311.

Migration: a dictionary of basic terms: a study guide. - M.: Publishing house RGSU; Academic Project. T. N. Yudina. 2007 .

See what the "Great Migration of Nations" is in other dictionaries:

THE GREAT MIGRATION OF PEOPLES- THE GREAT MIGRATION OF PEOPLES, the conventional name for the totality of ethnic movements in Europe in the 4th and 7th centuries of the Germans, Slavs, Sarmatians and other tribes on the territory of the Roman Empire. The immediate impetus for the Great Migration of Nations was ... ... Modern Encyclopedia

THE GREAT MIGRATION OF PEOPLES- the conditional name of the totality of ethnic movements in Europe in the 4th 7th centuries. Germans, Slavs, Sarmatians and other tribes on the territory of the Roman Empire. The immediate impetus for the Great Migration of Nations was the mass movement of the Huns (since the 70s ... ... Big encyclopedic Dictionary

Great Migration- the conditional name of the totality of ethnic movements in Europe in the 4th-7th centuries (Germans, Slavs, Sarmatian tribes). The Great Migration of Nations contributed to the collapse of the Roman Empire. The active movement of tribes began in the 370s, when from ... ... Political science. Dictionary.

THE GREAT MIGRATION OF PEOPLES- the conditional name of the mass invasions in the IV-VII centuries. Germanic, Sarmatian and other tribes into the territory of the Roman Empire, which contributed to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire; accompanied by the formation of large tribal unions, the emergence of classes and ... Legal Encyclopedia

Great Migration- Map of the migration of peoples. The Great Migration of Peoples is the conventional name for the totality of ethnic movements in Europe in the 4th–7th centuries, mainly from ... Wikipedia

Great Migration- the conditional name of the totality of ethnic movements in Europe in the IV-VII centuries. Germans, Slavs, Sarmatians and other tribes on the territory of the Roman Empire. The immediate impetus for the Great Migration of Nations was the mass movement of the Huns ... ... encyclopedic Dictionary

THE GREAT MIGRATION OF PEOPLES- the conditional name of the mass invasions of the territory. Rome. empires in the 4th-7th centuries. germ., Slav., Sarmatian and other tribes that contributed to the collapse of the Zap. Rome. empire and the change of slave owners. building feudal on the territory. throughout Rome. empire. Ch. the cause of V. p. was… … Soviet historical encyclopedia

Great Migration- its beginning is usually attributed to the time of the invasion (about 372) of the Huns into Europe. But the movements of the Germanic tribes and the attempts of some of them to acquire land for settlement in the Roman provinces began much earlier (the movement of the Celts ... ... Encyclopedic Dictionary F.A. Brockhaus and I.A. Efron

THE GREAT MIGRATION OF PEOPLES- the continuous movement of nomadic peoples from east to west, which began ca. 375 with the arrival of the Huns from Asia and ended after the formation of the kingdom of the Golden Horde in the Black Sea steppes (1240) ... Cossack dictionary-reference book

Great Migration- the conventional name for the totality of ethnic movements in Europe in the 4th-7th centuries, mainly from the periphery of the Roman Empire to its territory (and within it). The invasions of the barbarian (Germanic, Sarmatian, etc.) tribes that lived in the first centuries AD. uh... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Books

• Russian historical encyclopedia. Volume 4. The Great Migration of Peoples - Germany, Golosovskaya A. (ed.). The Russian Historical Encyclopedia is offered to your attention. Volume 4. The Great Migration of Nations - Germany ...

Great Migration- a unique historical phenomenon of the transitional era. This is a special period of historical development, when in a significant historical space (no longer Antiquity, but not yet the Middle Ages), limited by specific chronological frameworks (II-VII centuries) and a certain territory (Europe, Asia, Africa), the interaction of barbarism and civilization reached its greatest intensive phase. The result was the birth of a new type of civilization. Seven centuries of resettlement determined the trends in the further development of Europe, gave a powerful impetus to the birth of new peoples, new states, new languages, a new socio-psychological and spiritual atmosphere, morality and morality.

The first millennium of European history is full of important events connected with the crisis of the Roman state and the progressive movement of the Barbaricum. A significant part of the Old World experienced the era of the Great Migration of Nations. By the beginning of the resettlement of the western and southern part The European continent was occupied by ancient civilization that existed within the state framework of the Roman Empire. In Central and Eastern Europe, Germanic, Slavic, Baltic, Finno-Ugric, Iranian, and other tribes lived in the pre-state system. On the European continent, the Great Migration was marked by the movement of the Germans. Almost simultaneously with them, numerous nomadic tribes and tribal associations poured from Asia to Europe, causing significant movements among the local peoples.

Many peoples, in search of new habitats and easy money, left their homes and "set off on those great and fabulous wanderings that marked the beginning of the formation of peoples in ancient and new Europe". The Roman Empire, torn apart by internal contradictions, became the object of the aspirations of the barbarian tribes. First it was the Germans, who were replaced by the Huns, and later the Avars and Slavs. During the Great Migration of Peoples, the death of ancient civilization and the fall of the Roman Empire took place. In its western part formed " barbarian kingdoms "created by the Germans. In the eastern Byzantine Empire, resigned to the loss of a significant part of its territory south of the Danube, occupied by the Slavs (and part of the Turkic-speaking Bulgarians). The Germans and Slavs during the Migration settled in a vast territory from Britain, Gaul and Spain to the Gulf of Finland, the Upper Volga and the Don. A new medieval civilization was formed. As a result of the mixing of the Latinized population of the former Roman provinces with the barbarians, the Romanesque peoples were formed. All this had a significant impact on the ethnic map of Europe: many peoples disappeared from the face of the earth. The political and ethnic map of Europe, which took shape after the Great Migration of Peoples, basically continues to exist to this day, because the history of Europe has no longer known ethno-political metamorphoses like the Great Migration of Peoples.

The Great Migration of Peoples as a temporary "gap" between Antiquity and the Middle Ages is divided into three stages. The first (II-IV centuries) - "German", covers the time from the Marcomannic wars to the battle of Adrianople. The second (IV-V centuries) - "Hunnic", between the battle of Adrianople and the battle on the Catalaunian fields. The third stage (VI-VII centuries) - "Slavic", is associated with the movement of Slavic tribes in Eastern, South-Eastern and Central Europe. The stages of the Migration differ in the nature of the ethnic composition of the Migration participants, the position of the migrating tribes, the main accents of confrontation and interaction, the direction of migrations and their results.

Among the inert participants in the Great Migration can be attributed mainly to the inhabitants of the Roman world, all the peoples that inhabited the Roman Empire and its provinces. So, the inhabitants of Italy, practically without changing their habitats, experienced the powerful pressure of the Barbaricum and withstood more than one wave of migrations. A specific feature of the ethnic space of this region was already formed on the eve of the Great Migration. It consisted in the readiness of numerous peoples inhabiting the Apennine Peninsula for military and trade contacts with the Barbaricum tribes. This should also include the increased "internal", within the boundaries of the Roman state, the mobility of the population, associated with the seizure by Rome of a vast territory from the banks of the Rhine, from the Alpine mountains to the ocean coast, including the regions of the Iberian Peninsula. The organization of these territories into Roman provinces and their gradual Romanization led to the destruction of the ethnic isolation of Gaul and Spain. Here the ethnic space was eroded by the socializing orientation of Roman civilization.

Fragments of the disappeared Celtic world as a whole turned out to be aloof from active participation in the migration processes of the Great Migration. It is known that the Celts stubbornly resisted the Romans. However, they failed to resist the Germans. After a series of military failures, having lost part of the conquered lands, the Celtic population is concentrated in Central Europe from Britain to the Carpathians. It is possible that some Celtic tribes were involved in campaigns, invasions and predatory expeditions of the Barbaricum tribes, especially at the first stage of the Migration of Peoples. The long raids of the Scots on the western shores of Britain, the gradual and methodical development of most of Caledonia by them is not a typical example of the migration activity of the Celts in the Migration era.

Part of the ethnic space of the Great Migration of Peoples was the world of the Thracian, Illyrian and Greek tribes. They can also be attributed to the block of inert participants in the resettlement. The Thracians, Illyrians and Greeks were between the Celtic world in the west, the Germanic world in the north, and the Scythian-Sarmatian world in the east. Repeatedly, the areas inhabited by these tribes before and especially during the Great Migration period were the epicenter of many migrations. The main events of the first stage of the Migration (the Marcomannic wars in the 2nd century, the Gothic invasions of the Balkans in the 3rd century, the struggle of the tribes for Dacia after 270, the Sarmatian wars of the middle of the 4th century on the Middle Danube) were accompanied by the resettlement of migrating tribes in the Illyrian and Thracian world . Through the provinces of Noricum and Pannonia inhabited by Illyrians and Celts, rapid multi-ethnic migration flows moved to Italy for four centuries.

The population of Asia Minor and the Middle East also fit into the context of the ethnic space of the Migration era. Sea raids of the Black Sea tribes shook Cappadocia, Galatia, Bithynia, Pontus, Asia, Kios, Rhodes, Crete, and Cyprus to their foundations. The tribes of the European Barbaricum penetrate deep into Asia Minor and come into close contact (not only hostile, but also peaceful) with the other ethnic world of local tribes. There is a clear unconditional connection between the first steps in the spread of Christianity among the Germans as a result of contacts with the inhabitants of Cappadocia. The role of the Asia Minor and Middle Eastern ethnic component in the Great Migration of Peoples can be defined as passive in relation to migration processes. But these tribes, being mainly "spectators" of the Migration, nevertheless gave it an additional impetus, contributing to the spread of Christianity in the barbarian world.

The aggressive, offensive position of the Barbaricum was not shared by all the tribes inhabiting it. The world of the Baltic tribes remained inert, indifferent to migrations. At the first stage of the Migration, the calm, measured life of these tribes, their closed, unpretentious way of life, were disturbed by the movements of the Goths to the south and the migration wave of the Sarmatian tribes to the region of the Middle Danube. There were no internal incentives for resettlement among the Balts. Only the migrations of neighboring peoples pushed them to minor movements. Being inert in the opposition "barbarian world - Roman civilization", the Balts played a significant role in stabilizing a special life cycle individual regions of the Barbaricum.

Like the Balts, the Finno-Ugric tribes did not show migratory activity until the 6th century. Occupying large territories from the current regions of Western Belarus to the foothills of the Urals, they were not homogeneous. Miscellaneous groups tribes of this ethnic space intersected and interacted with the leaders

Great Migration of Peoples - Germans and Huns. Some tribes became part of the "state of Ermanaric", others played a significant role in the process of ethnogenesis of the Western Huns. It should be noted that at the time when the Marcomannic Wars (166-180), which marked the beginning of the first stage of Migration, were raging in Central Europe, in the steppes Southern Urals in the Iranian-speaking and Finno-Ugric ethnic space, the leader of the next stage of Migration, the Huns, has already begun to form.

During the era of the Great Migration of Peoples, various Turkic tribes were concentrated in the vast expanses of the Great Belt of the Steppes, stretching from Pannonia to Transbaikalia. They created a special ethnic space. The territories over which the control of one or another nomadic community was established and with which these nomads identified themselves, were a kind of area of ​​nomadic tribes. Unlike other barbarian worlds, the border of this area was not the border of the Turkic ethnic space. This boundary was the circle of people that made up this nomadic community, belonging to which was determined by polished norms of kinship. The Turkic barbarian world is a scattered spatial structure. The Eurasian steppe corridor is only one of the most important intercontinental arteries, along which various Hunnic tribes migrated to Europe, and later Avars and Bulgars. In the era of the Great Migration of Peoples, there was an idea that waves of nomads hostile to Roman civilization splashed out Meotida and Tanais. Ideas about the invasion of "barbarians" from the east dominated until the Renaissance. The nomads of the Turkic ethnic space in the era of the Great Migration mastered various means adaptation to the settled agricultural tribal worlds encountered on their way: periodic raids, regular robberies, imposed "vassalage", tributary.

A distinctive feature of the Slavic tribal space is its relative remoteness from the Roman world. Being on the periphery of the Barbaricum, the Slavic tribes nevertheless actively joined in the migration processes. It can be assumed that the migration processes among the Slavic tribes were a kind of adaptation to the previous migrations of other tribes and their results. Approaching the borders of Roman civilization, the Slavic tribes, not at first, did not strive, however, for interaction and extended contacts with this world. The subsequent activity of the Slavs in relation to the empire was largely provoked by the empire itself, as well as the emergence of the Avar tribes. Slavic tribes, starting to move south and completing the settlement on the Balkan Peninsula in the VI-VII centuries, merged with the Thracians, Illyrians and Celts. They dissolved the Turkic-speaking Bulgars in their environment, made contacts with the Epirotes, Greeks and laid the foundation for the South Slavic ethnic groups.

And, finally, what are the reasons for the phenomenon called the Great Migration of Nations? Qualitative changes in the economic life of the Germanic and Slavic tribes on the eve of the Great Migration led to the growth of social wealth and a large number people who are not engaged in productive work. The tribal elite felt the need to accumulate wealth, the means of obtaining which became campaigns in the Empire. These campaigns prepared the ground for subsequent migrations to the lands of the Roman state. At the same time, the Roman Empire played an active role, often stimulating the barbarians to migrate. The appearance of the Huns in Central Europe dramatically accelerated migration processes. The reasons for their resettlement are somewhat different than those of settled peoples. To a greater extent, they are associated with natural factors, whose influence on nomadic societies is stronger than on agricultural ones.

eastern slavic rus old russian

Reasons for the movement is ready

The great migration of peoples, contrary to popular belief, did not begin with the invasion of the Huns, but with the movement of the Goths, who migrated from the territory of Central Sweden, which was then called "Gothia" to the Black Sea coast in the II-III century AD. In the process of migration, more and more new tribes joined them: Gepids, Borans, Taifals, Heruls, Vandals, Skirs. They left only destruction in their path, and were the first to capture and ravage Rome under the leadership of King Alaric.

The Roman-German wars for the first time cast doubt on the continued existence of the empire. Having firmly established themselves in the Middle Danubian lowland, which from now on became the center of the barbarian world, they regularly set out on new military campaigns against their powerful neighbor. One of the most successful conquests was the strategically important province of Dacia, between the rivers Danube, Tisza, Prut and Carpathians, which later became one of the main springboards for German invasions of the Empire.
But what was the very reason that gave rise to this bloody migration, which lasted, de facto, half a millennium: from the 2nd to the 7th centuries AD.

In fact, among historians there is still no consensus on this matter, therefore it is customary to single out a combination of factors.

First, according to the Gothic historian Jordanes, in the second century the Goths living in Scandinavia faced the problem of overpopulation. According to legend, the Gothic king Filimer decided to move to another area with his families: “When a great many people grew up there, and only the fifth king Filimir ruled after Berig, he decided that the army was ready to move from there with their families. In search of the most convenient areas and suitable places for settlement, he came to the lands of Scythia, which in their language were called Oyum.

Obviously, overpopulation alone could not raise such a powerful horde of barbarians, consisting not only of the Goths, but of many other tribes. According to the researchers, an important role was played by the general cooling or the “climatic pessimum of the early Middle Ages”, which was gaining momentum just at that time. The temperature dropped and the climate remained excessively humid. Worse than that, glaciers increased - there were fewer forests, less game. The people were threatened with starvation, and infant mortality increased.

Change weather conditions quite often is the root cause of important historical events. A climate pessimism early medieval just accompanied the whole history of the great migration, reaching its peak in 535-536.

And, of course, do not forget about human factor. On the eve of the great migration, significant changes took place in the economic life of the Germans and Slavs. As a result, the stratification of society intensified. From the middle class stood out the top, not involved in productive labor. They were a tribal elite who needed prey to maintain their status, a role that the Roman Empire was ideally suited for.

The resettlement of man on the planet is one of the most exciting detective stories in history. Deciphering migrations is one of the keys to understanding historical processes. By the way, you can see the main routes on this interactive map. Recently, many discoveries have been madeScientists have learned how to read genetic mutations; in linguistics, methods have been found in accordance with which it is possible to restore proto-languages ​​and the relationships between them. There are new ways of dating archaeological finds. The history of climate change explains many routes - man went on a great journey around the Earth in search of a better life and this process is still going on.

The ability to move was determined by the level of the seas and the melting of glaciers, which closed or opened up opportunities for further advancement. Sometimes people have had to adapt to climate change, and sometimes it seems to have worked out well. In a word, here I reinvented the wheel a little and sketched brief summary on the settlement of the earth, although I am most interested in Eurasia, in general.

This is what the first migrants looked like

The fact that Homo sapiens came out of Africa is now recognized by most scientists. This event happened plus or minus 70 thousand years ago, according to the latest data, it is from 62 to 130 thousand years ago. The figures more or less coincide with the determination of the age of skeletons in Israeli caves at 100,000 years. That is, this event still took place over a decent period of time, but let's not pay attention to the little things.

So, a man came out of southern Africa, settled on the continent, crossed into the narrow part of the Red Sea to the Arabian Peninsula - the modern width of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait is 20 km, and in the Ice Age the sea level was much lower - perhaps it could be crossed almost ford. The level of the world's oceans rose as the glaciers melted.

From there, part of the people went to the Persian Gulf and into the territory of approximately Mesopotamia,part further to Europe,part along the coast to India and further - to Indonesia and Australia. Another part - approximately in the direction of China, settled Siberia, partly also moved to Europe, another part - through the Bering Strait to America. So Homo sapiens basically settled around the world, and in Eurasia there were several large and very ancient centers of human settlements.Africa, where it all began, is by far the least explored, it is assumed that archaeological sites can be well preserved in the sand, so interesting discoveries are also possible there.

The origin of Homo sapiens from Africa is also confirmed by the data of geneticists, who discovered that all people on earth have the same first gene (marker) (African). Even earlier, there were migrations of homoerectus from the same Africa (2 million years ago), which reached China, Eurasia and other parts of the planet, but then died out. Neanderthals most likely got into Eurasia by approximately the same routes as homo sapiens, 200 thousand years ago, they died out relatively recently, about 20 thousand years ago. Apparently, the territory approximately in the region of Mesopotamia is generally a passage yard for all migrants.

In Europe the age of the oldest Homo sapiens skull is determined at 40 thousand years (found in a Romanian cave). Apparently, people climbed here for animals, moving along the Dnieper. Approximately the same age as the Cro-Magnon man from the French caves, who is considered in all respects the same person as we are, only he did not have a washing machine.

The lion man is the oldest figurine in the world, 40 thousand years old. Restored from micro parts over 70 years, finally restored in 2012, kept in the British Museum. Found in an ancient settlement in southern Germany, where the first flute of the same age was found. True, the figurine does not fit into my understanding of the processes. In theory, it should be at least female.

Kostenki - a large archaeological site 400 km south of Moscow in the Voronezh region, whose age was previously determined at 35 thousand years, also belongs to the same time period. However, there are reasons to make the time of the appearance of man in these places ancient. For example, archaeologists have found layers of ash there -trail of volcanic eruptions in Italy 40 thousand years ago. Numerous traces of human activity were found under this layer, so the man in Kostenki is more than 40 thousand years old, at least.

Kostenki were very densely populated, the remains of more than 60 ancient settlements were preserved there, and people lived here for a long time, without leaving it even in ice Age, for tens of thousands of years. In Kostenki, they find tools made of stone, which could be taken no closer than 150 km, and shells for beads had to be brought from the sea coasts. This is at least 500 km. There are figurines made of mammoth tusk.

Diadem with mammoth tusk ornament. Kostenki-1, 22-23 thousand years old, size 20x3.7 cm

It is possible that people left at about the same time from the common transit ancestral home along the Danube and along the Don (and other rivers, of course).Homo sapiens in Eurasia collided with long-lived here local population- Neanderthals, who decently ruined their lives, and then died out.

Most likely, the process of resettlement to one degree or another continued constantly. For example, one of the monuments of this period is Dolni Vestonica (South Moravia, Mikulov, the nearest Big City- Brno), the age of the settlement is 25 and a half thousand years.

Vestonica Venus (Paleolithic Venus), found in Moravia in 1925, 25 thousand years old, but some scientists consider it older. Height 111 cm, kept in the Moravian Museum in Brno (Czech Republic).

Most of the Neolithic monuments of Europe are sometimes combined with the term "Old Europe". These include Trypillya, Vinca, Lendel, the culture of funnel-shaped goblets. Minoans, Sikans, Iberians, Basques, Lelegs, Pelasgians are considered pre-Indo-European European peoples. Unlike the Indo-Europeans who came later, who settled in fortified cities on the hills, the old Europeans lived on the plains in small settlements and did not have defensive fortifications. They did not know the potter's wheel and wheel. On the Balkan Peninsula there were settlements of up to 3-4 thousand inhabitants. The Basque Country is considered to be a relic old European region.

In the Neolithic, which begins about 10 thousand years ago, migrations begin to take place more actively. The development of transport played an important role. Migrations of peoples take place both by sea and with the help of a new revolutionary vehicle- horse and cart. The largest migrations of the Indo-Europeans belong to the Neolithic. Regarding the Indo-European ancestral home, almost unanimously they name the same area in the territory around the Persian Gulf, Asia Minor (Turkey), etc. Actually, it has always been known that the next resettlement of people occurs from the territory near Mount Ararat after a catastrophic flood. Now this theory is increasingly being confirmed by science. The version needs proof, so the study of the Black Sea is of particular importance now - it is known that it was a small freshwater lake, and as a result of an ancient catastrophe, water from the Mediterranean Sea flooded nearby areas, possibly actively inhabited by Proto-Indo-Europeans. People from the flooded area rushed in different directions - theoretically, this could serve as an impetus for a new wave of migrations.

Linguists confirm that a single linguistic Proto-Indo-European ancestor came from the same place where migrations to Europe and more early times- approximately from the north of Mesopotamia, that is, roughly speaking, all from the same area near Ararat. A large migration wave went from about the 6th millennium almost in all directions, moving in the directions of India, China and Europe. In earlier times, migrations also took place from the same places, in any case, it is logical, as in earlier times, the penetration of people into Europe along the rivers approximately from the territory of the modern Black Sea region. Also, people actively populate Europe from the Mediterranean, including by sea.

During the Neolithic, several types of archaeological cultures developed. Among them a large number of megalithic monuments(megaliths are large stones). In Europe, they are distributed mostly in coastal areas and belong to the Eneolithic and Bronze Age - 3 - 2 thousand BC. To more early period, Neolithic - in the British Isles, in Portugal and France. They are found in Brittany, the Mediterranean coast of Spain, Portugal, France, as well as in the west of England, in Ireland, Denmark, Sweden. The most common are dolmens - in Wales they are called cromlech, in Portugal anta, in Sardinia stazzone, in the Caucasus ispun. Another common type of them is corridor tombs (Ireland, Wales, Brittany, etc.). Another type is galleries. Menhirs (separate large stones), groups of menhirs and stone circles, which include Stonehenge, are also common. It is assumed that the latter were astronomical devices and are not as ancient as megalithic burials, such monuments are associated with migrations by sea. The complex and intricate relationships between settled and nomadic peoples are a separate story; by the year zero, a quite definite picture of the world is taking shape.

Quite a lot is known about the great migration of peoples in the 1st millennium AD thanks to literary sources - these processes were complex and diverse. Finally, over the course of the second millennium, a modern map of the world is gradually taking shape. However, the history of migrations does not end there, and today it takes on no less global scale than in antiquity. By the way, there is an interesting BBC series "The Great Settlement of Nations".

In general, the conclusion and the bottom line is this - the resettlement of people is a living and natural process that has never stopped. Migrations occur for certain and understandable reasons - it's good where we are not. Most often, a person is forced to move on by worsening climatic conditions, hunger, in a word, the desire to survive.

Passionarity - a term introduced by N. Gumilyov, means the ability of peoples to move and characterize their "age". A high level of passionarity is a property of young nations. Passionarity, in general, was good for the peoples, although this path has never been easy. It seems to me that it would be better for a single person to be smarter and not sit still :))) Willingness to travel is one of two things: either complete hopelessness and compulsion, or youth of the soul .... Do you agree with me?

THE GREAT MIGRATION OF PEOPLES, the designation of mass migrations in Europe at the end of the 4th-7th centuries, which was one of the main reasons for the fall of the Western Roman Empire (see Ancient Rome) and the basis for the formation of a modern ethno-cultural map of Europe, is accepted in historical science. The term "Great Migration of Nations" (French les Grandes invasions, German Völkerwanderung) entered scientific circulation in the 1st half of the 19th century, primarily thanks to French and German researchers who were searching for the historical roots of their nations. Since then, the study of the Great Migration of Nations has been studied by various scientific schools historians, archaeologists, linguists, ethnologists and scientists of other specialties. But many problems associated with the study of the phenomenon of the Great Migration of Nations remain debatable.

Among the reasons for the Great Migration of Peoples, socio-economic and socio-psychological changes in the Eurasian barbarian world are usually attributed, which was no longer able to meet the needs of the growing population and the emerging elite, affected by the influence of civilization and striving for rapid enrichment through robbery. Also important are the processes that took place within the Roman Empire and made it more and more vulnerable to the barbarians. Specific explanations for the causes of the Great Migration of Nations are also offered, such as the impact on the socio-ethnic sphere of climate change, cycles of solar activity or outbursts of passionarity.

One of the most controversial is the problem of the space-time continuum of the Great Migration of Nations. The main tradition was laid down in the works of Western European historians of the 19th century, who studied the circumstances of the collapse of Rome, the origins of modern European peoples and states. Many of them considered the year 375 to be the starting point of the Great Migration; Around this time, the Huns defeated the Ostrogoths (Ostrogoths), causing the migration of the Visigoths (Visigoths) and other barbarians who flooded the provinces of the Roman Empire. They attributed the completion of the Great Migration of Nations to the middle of the 6th century, when the formation of the Frankish state was completed. Later, some historians began to include in the Great Migration of Peoples the migration of the Slavs and Turks, which ended by the end of the 7th century with the formation Khazar Khaganate and the First Bulgarian Empire. In modern historiography, there is a tendency to expand chronological boundaries both in the depths of centuries and in later times. Some researchers attribute the beginning of the Great Migration to the 2nd half of the 2nd century (see Marcomannic wars, Velbar culture, Alemanni, Goths). Some historiographic schools consider the end of the Great Migration of Nations to be the resettlement of the Hungarians in the Carpathian Basin at the end of the 10th century and the last period of the Viking era. Attempts have also been made to consider the Great Migration of Peoples in a global context, including, in addition to Europe, Central Asia, the Asia-Pacific region, North Africa and the Middle East and covering a huge time period from the 3rd millennium BC to the 1st millennium AD .

According to the composition of the most important participants and the nature of their actions, the direction of migrations (see maps) and their results in the Great Migration of Peoples, several periods can be distinguished: “prologue” (2nd half of the 2nd - middle of the 3rd century), “Hunno-East Germanic” (late 4th - the middle of the 5th century), "Ostgothic-West Germanic" (2nd half of the 5th - 1st third of the 6th century) and "Slavic Turkic" (6th-7th centuries). In turn, within these periods, there are stages associated with key events in European history of the 1st millennium AD.

The "prologue" of the Great Migration of Peoples, which is not included by all historians in the Great Migration itself, was the Marcomannic wars, when the Germans (Marcomanni, Quadi, Lombards, etc.), representatives of the Sarmatian and other tribes invaded the territory of Pannonia, Rezia, Noric and other Roman provinces. The barbarians were rebuffed, but they received the right to settle on the land of the Roman Empire along its borders. These wars provoked migratory waves of tribal unions of the Alemanni and Franks, who lived between the Rhine and the Elbe. In the middle of the 3rd century, tribal unions of Borans, Costoboks, Goths, Gepids allied with them and other tribes moved to the Balkan and Asia Minor provinces. Rome had to cede to the barbarians a small part of its lands (Dacia and some others), but on the whole it managed to stop the threat with the help of military force and skillful diplomacy.

The existing system of the Roman Empire - the barbarian world - for decades was in a situation of mobile equilibrium, from which it was brought out by a powerful external factor. Around 375, the Huns appeared in the Northern Black Sea region from the east. They defeated the Goths led by Ermanaric, which prompted some other Gothic and related groups to move to the territory of the Roman Empire, which granted the newcomers the rights of federates (see also Untersiebenbrunn). Soon a conflict broke out between the Romans and the Visigoths, which ended with the defeat of the army of Rome and the death of Emperor Valens in the battle of Adrianople on 9.8.378.

At the end of the 4th - beginning of the 5th century, the tribes of Sarmatians, Saxons, Burgundians, Vandals, Sueves, Gepids, etc. came into motion. In 404-406, their hordes, led by Radagaisus, invaded Italy, but were defeated by Stilicho. In 406, the Vandals, Alans and Suebi, breaking the resistance of the Frankish federates, broke into Gaul, but by 409 they were driven out to Spain, where they captured most of the country. A huge moral shock to the ancient world was the capture (24.8.410) and sack of Rome by the Visigoths of Alaric I. After a series of agreements and clashes in 416, the Visigoths again became federates and received the southwestern part of modern France for settlement.

In the 420-450s, the barbarians of Eastern and Central Europe consolidated under the rule of the Huns. The formation of their power from the Volga to the Danube was completed under Bled and Attila. However, the onslaught of the Huns and their allies to the west was stopped by Aetius in the "battle of the peoples" on the Catalaunian fields in 451. After the campaign in Italy (452) and the death of Attila (453), the Huns and their allies were defeated by the tribal groups that rebelled against them in the “battle of the tribes” on the Nedao River; their empire collapsed. After the battle on the Nedao River and a number of other clashes, the Gepids, who led the uprising against the Huns, founded a kingdom in Potissia (see Apahida), the Ostrogoths began to control Pannonia, the Rugs - Coastal Noric, the Heruli - lands in modern South Moravia and Western Slovakia. Groups with a significant East Germanic component in the 2nd half of the 5th century are known in the Eastern Carpathian region, Upper Potissia, Central Poland, and the lower reaches of the Vistula (vidivaria).

During the 1st half of the 5th century, new migration waves reached the Atlantic. In Britain, abandoned by the Roman troops (end of the 4th - beginning of the 5th century), which was attacked by the Picts and Scots, around the 420s, detachments of the Saxons appeared (see Anglo-Saxons). From the middle of the 5th century, new waves of Angles, Saxons, Jutes, and Frisians began to arrive here. Seeking salvation from this invasion, part of the Britons moved to Brittany (in 441 and others).

In 422, having defeated the Romans, the Vandals and Alans seized the coastal cities and fleet in Spain, which allowed them in 429 under the leadership of Gaiseric (428-477) to cross into North-West Africa. Under the treaty of 442, the kingdom of the Vandals and Alans becomes the first legally recognized independent state on the territory of the Roman Empire.

In the 2nd half of the 5th century, the weakening of Rome and the expansion of the Germanic tribes reach their climax. In 455, the Vandals terminated the treaty with the Western Roman Empire and sacked Rome again. The Western Roman Empire (actually Italy), relying on squads of barbarians, in 456-472 was actually ruled by Ricimer (half Sveb and Visigoth), from 474 by Orestes ( former secretary Attila), from 476 - skyr Odoacer, who deposed the last Western Roman emperor Romulus Augustulus.

In 489, the Ostrogoths and other factions, led by Theodoric the Great, invaded Italy and by 493 captured it. Founded by Theodoric the Great, the Ostrogothic kingdom for several decades turned into the most powerful force in Western and Central Europe. Thus, at the end of the 5th - the middle of the 6th century, the transition from the stage of resettlement of Germanic tribes to the stage of their establishment in new lands and the formation of "barbarian kingdoms" was completed. As a result, on the territory of the former Western Roman Empire, the state of the Burgundians in South-East Gaul (see Burgundy, Arelat), the Toledo kingdom of the Visigoths - in Spain (see the Visigothic kingdom), the Ostrogoths, and then the Lombards - in Italy (see the Lombard kingdom), the Franks in Gaul. "Barbarian kingdoms" also formed in Britain after its conquest in the middle of the 5th century by the Anglo-Saxons (see Anglo-Saxon conquest). A new ethnopolitical map of Western Europe is taking shape.

However, the idea of ​​restoring the Roman Empire, which the emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire Justinian I tried to implement, also remained. By 555, Constantinople had achieved complete control of Italy and Dalmatia. The year before, the Byzantines had landed in Spain, beginning the capture of its southeastern part, where they held out until 626.

In the 6th century, a new wave of migration of the peoples of Central and Eastern Europe gained momentum. By the end of the 5th century, the Lombards mastered the upper reaches of the Elbe, in 526/527 they occupied the lands from Vienna to Aquinas, from 546 - the territory of modern southwestern Hungary. In 558, the Avars appeared in the steppes of South-Eastern Europe. In 568, having defeated the Gepids in alliance with the Lombards and after the latter left for Italy (a new kingdom of the Lombards with a center in Pavia formed in its northern and central parts), they became masters of the entire Middle Danube region, establishing the Avar Khaganate here. In the steppes of Eastern Europe, after the Avars, the Turks appear, who until 630 included the lands east of the Don in the Turkic Khaganate.

The process of the Great Migration of Peoples was completed by the migration of Slavic and Turkic tribes, including to part of the territory of the Eastern Roman Empire. Already in the 5th century, the Slavs proper (Sklavins according to Latin and Greek sources) mastered the territory from the Dnieper to the Oder and from Polissya to the Eastern Carpathian region (see Prague culture). Groups close to them (see Zaozerye) from the Upper Dnieper region settled to the territory of modern southeastern Estonia, the Pskov region and the Upper Volga (long mounds of culture). Other groups of Slavs occupied the basin of the Desna and the Seim (Kolochinskaya culture), and also spread through the Ukrainian forest-steppe to modern central Moldavia (Antes). Until the middle of the 6th century, the Slavs advanced beyond the Oder (then gradually mastering the lands to the Elbe) and in Pomorie (see Sukov - Dziedzitsy), to the northeast of the Carpathian basin (probably by agreement with the Lombards), the Lower Danube (see Ipotesti - Kyndeshti - Churel ). Since the 520s, raids of the Sklavians and Antes on the Balkans have been known. Especially massive were the campaigns of the Sklavinian groups in 540-542, 548-551, in the late 570s - 580s. Together with them or separately, raids on the Balkans were also carried out by Eastern European nomads, among whom Western Turkic groups dominated from the 5th century (see Proto-Bulgarians). Not later than the 580s, groups of Slavs already lived in Thessaly, by the 1st third of the 7th century - in the Western Balkans, in the Southern and Eastern Alps (see Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, etc.). The counter-offensive of the Byzantines against the Slavs and Avars, which began after the conclusion of peace with the Persians (591), ended with the uprising of Phocas (602) and the fall of the border of the Eastern Roman Empire on the Danube.

In the 7th century, the Slavs settled throughout the Balkan Peninsula up to the Peloponnese, forming tribal principalities - "Sclavinia", some groups moved to Asia Minor, raided as far as Crete and Southern Italy. Although the huge forces of Byzantium were taken away by the opposition to the Arab conquests, already from the 2nd half of the 7th century, the restoration of the power of Constantinople in the south of the Balkans began.

From the middle of the 7th century, new early political entities in the steppes of Eastern Europe (see Great Bulgaria, Pereshchepinsky treasure, Voznesenka). The result of the expansion of the Khazars in the 660-680s was the departure of part of the Bulgars to the Balkans, where the First Bulgarian Kingdom was formed and the Khazar Khaganate was formed in the south of Eastern Europe.

With the completion of the Great Migration of Peoples, migration processes in Europe, Asia, North Africa, in the Near and Middle East have not stopped, but their role in world history was already different.

The Great Migration of Nations had enormous historical consequences. The civilization associated with the Roman Empire experienced tremendous upheaval and destruction. From now on, the main carrier of ancient traditions was the Eastern Roman Empire, in which they underwent a profound transformation (see Byzantium). In place of the Western Roman Empire, absorbing elements of its culture, new political formations arose - "barbarian kingdoms", which were destined to become the prototype European states Middle Ages and Modern Times. The ethnolinguistic map of Europe began to be largely determined by the Germanic and Slavic peoples. The habitats and the ratio of the Turkic, Finno-Ugric, Iranian, Celtic and other peoples of Eurasia have changed significantly. European civilization parted with the era of antiquity in order to enter the era of the Middle Ages.

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