Barbarians- Secrets of the Dark Ages

by Richard Rudgley

  This discovery at Pannonhalma is rare but not unique. A handful of other finds of these small gold-covered bows shows them to be the clear insignia of rank in Hun society. It is no coincidence that the eastern emperor Marcian had a dream shortly before the actual death of Attila in which the demise of the enemy he feared so much was announced by an angel who showed him Attila's bow broken. The bow was the emblem par excellence of the military and political elite of Hun society.

  The history books had conjured up scenes of the daily and court life of the Huns and had given them names. The deformed skulls and golden hoards provided a more tangible link to these most enigmatic of barbarian peoples but I still felt that I needed another way into their world. Tomka had a suggestion. If I really wanted to know more about the role of the bow in the culture of the Huns, then I should go to see the most accomplished horse archer in Hungary, a man as enigmatic and reticent as the Huns themselves.

  A Meeting with a Centaur

  The keys to the military power of the Huns were their horsemanship and their prodigious development of the bow as a weapon of war. The composite bow they used was very similar to that used by the Syrian forces whom the Romans employed far and wide in the empire (and, as recorded in Chapter 2, remnants of such bows have been excavated from the foot of Hadrian's Wall). The Huns were so close to their horses that they were likened to centaurs, man and beast seemingly one creature. The horses of the Huns were different to those of other contemporary armies in Europe. Stocky, incredibly strong and surprisingly fast, these steppe-bred horses were able to transport the Hun warriors over 100 kilometres per day.

  The horse archery techniques of the Huns involved shooting a host of arrows in swift succession. The rider had to be able to manoeuvre the horse without the use of reins while accurately firing at a target, shooting backwards, sideways and forwards in a single manoeuvre. A Hun force of even a few hundred such archers would have been hard for any army – Roman or barbarian – to resist. The elite scouts of the Hunnic army were known as the Eagle Archers and were the Dark Ages equivalent of today's special forces: deadly, effective and widely feared.

  Kassai Lajos is one of a very small group of practitioners of this little-known oriental martial art – the way of the horse archer. When I arrived at his home and headquarters in Kaposmero, a quiet backwater in southern Hungary, he was sitting on a bench by the side of a large pond drinking wine with a small group of friends and followers. After a rather stilted and awkward conversation designed to break the ice, his friends went on their way and then he simply got up from the bench and wandered off in the direction of his stables without a word. A short while later he reappeared in his austere black riding gear on one of his horses, carrying a Hunnic bow and quiver of arrows. He rode down to his target practice area and began his second training session of the day – another two hours of uninterrupted firing of arrows into the target. Manoeuvring his mount solely with his feet and legs, he fired eight arrows at the target on each ride: three arrows as he approached the target, two while he was level with it and three over his shoulder after he had passed it. He hit the target almost every time, seven out of eight being a poor score by his own standards and almost impossible by anyone else's.

  The archer who uses the bow on foot can use a stronger, heavier bow but his horseback counterpart needs a lighter bow. My host estimated that in battle an adept Hun archer could shoot and kill either a man or a horse up to 300 metres away. It is hardly surprising that they put the fear of God into their enemies and victims.

  The centaur description is apt: the grace displayed by Kassai Lajos on horseback echoed this symbiotic relationship that was at once practical and cultural – man and horse were two parts of a whole. Lajos explained that the horse was crucially important in a number of ways: it was not only the means by which the Huns moved from place to place and fought, it was essential to keep their herds of other animals under control. The horse was also eaten, or even shot and buried with its master.

  Kassai Lajos is a man of action rather than a man of words and this demonstration of his mastery of the ancient art of horse archery certainly spoke louder than any words could. Later in the day when he had finished his training he seemed more relaxed and explained why he had dedicated his life to what to most people is an anachronistic and rigorous lifestyle. For him, identity can be realised only through contact with one's ancestors who, for him, are the Huns: to make contact with them, to share in their understanding of the world, means to do what they did, follow as literally as possible in their footsteps. His approach is Zen-like, and he was able to explain the core of his practice to me in English.

  There are two worlds: the microcosm (or little world), the inner world or oneself; and the macrocosm (or great world), the outside world. The archer is the microcosm and the horse represents the macrocosm. When the two work in harmony, the arrows will hit their target; if they do not work in tandem, then they will miss. Successfully hitting the target is the proof of the attainment of harmony. The proof of the alignment of man and horse, microcosm and macrocosm, is in the archer's success.

  Boiled down to its essence, Lajos's way is direct, simple and unequivocal. I asked him how he made connection with the past. He replied that the past makes the connection and not him, and he doesn't understand how it works. Isn't the connection made through the daily discipline of horse archery? In his words:

  Yes… yes because have to do something and every day a step closer and closer and if… started do something what your ancestors did you can come closer, closer and closer. I think this is the point. If I don't use a bow and not sit on a horse, no contact… but I do every day, two times a day, it's a little bit closer and closer and I can thinking about the past. Make a fire, the same. Two thousand years ago, the people the same, shoot from the horse.

  Lajos completes his reconstruction of the ancient way of the Hun with an authentic yurt (a type of tent used by the Central Asian nomads) that he has set up on a hillside on his land. He told me that he bought it from the estate of a Hungarian anthropologist who had brought it back from Kazakhstan in the 1960s. He, along with his pupils and his followers, often spend evenings gathered round the fire in the yurt reciting ancient stories, talking over the finer points of horse archery and conducting shamanic rituals. Outside the yurt stands a kind of Hunnic totem pole – a high wooden stake topped with a horse's skull and a mane of hair blowing in the wind.

  Lajos is able to devote himself so wholeheartedly to his martial art by a mixture of selling bows made under his supervision and teaching pupils. In addition to his hardcore following of Hungarian students he has also taught others from further afield, including some Native Americans who came to Kaposmero to relearn the skills of their own ancestors. Public events that include spectacles such as archery competitions (which he invariably wins), horseback drumming and other traditional musical renditions help bring his passions to a wider public.

  Like those few others who dedicate their lives to rekindling the skills of ancient times, Kassai Lajos provides a way into the culture of the Huns that could never be attained through the written historical sources nor the artefacts of this lost civilisation of the steppes. Most professional historians and other academics may find little of use to them in the rigorous daily routine of training he undertakes. But can such scholars really say that the partial, incomplete and often incoherent texts and archaeological remains associated with the Huns can nullify the visceral impact of being able to witness living proof that man, horse and bow can be so intertwined? The legend of the centaur lives on in the fields of Kaposmero.

  Part Two

  SHADOWS ON THE LAND

  Chapter Eight

  THE BARBARIAN HYDRA

  Mournful news arrived from Germany; that Varus was killed, three legions cut to pieces, as many troop of cavalry, and six cohorts…

  Gaius Velleus Paterculus, on the battle of Teutoburger Forest (translated by John Selby Watson)

  Leaving the centaur-like Huns
, we can now turn to what may be described as another mythical beast: the many-headed hydra that was the Germanic people. Just as the east Germanic Goths and Vandals played a major role in the history of what were eventually to become Italy and Spain, so the various west Germanic peoples played an equally important role in north-western Europe. Their story takes them from the time they first appeared at the fringes of the Roman world, through to their settlements on both sides of the North Sea.

  The Romans referred to these Germanic tribes as barbarians, and so they have been called in this book until now. The later Christian chroniclers more usually called them pagans. Both terms denote exclusion: a barbarian is non-Roman and uncivilised; a pagan is non-Christian and ungodly. We will trace these people from their barbarian roots on the mainland to their encounter as pagans with a new God.

  The Germanic Tribes

  From the beginning of their interaction with the Roman world, the Germanic people were a force to be reckoned with. The southward migration of two Germanic tribes, the Teutoni (from which comes the word Teutonic, another epithet for the Germanic people) and the Cimbri, led in 113 BC to their sudden incursion into Italy. This rude awakening resulted in a number of serious conflicts between Roman and barbarian forces over the course of the next few years. Both these tribes were effectively kept at bay by the Romans.

  Yet the Germanic peoples could be compared to the hydra of legend – cut the head off one tribe and another two grew up in its place. Julius Caesar was to come into conflict with the head of the Suevi tribe, a king named Ariovistus. The king already had an existing relationship with Rome and was considered a friend rather than a foe. This meant little to Caesar, who had to deal with him directly in the field. His forces drove the Suevi back across the Rhine from whence they came.

  During the reign of the first emperor Augustus (27 BC to AD 14), plans were drawn up to expand the sphere of Roman influence. Augustus wanted to press beyond the existing frontier of the Rhine and secure the region beyond it, up to the river Elbe. A series of successful Roman campaigns seemed on the verge of adding Germanic lands to the list of imperial provinces, but an uprising on the south-east borders of the empire was sufficiently worrying to put the German question aside. A man whose name will always be linked to military disaster was left in charge of the Roman army in Germany – Publius Quinctilius Varus.

  In AD 9 the barbarian hydra reared up again, this time in the form of the Germanic Cherusci under the leadership of Arminius (Hermann), also known as 'Hermann the German'. In a truly devastating ambush, the three legions under Varus's command were massacred in the Teutoburger Forest. Augustus never got over the defeat and it is said that he would shout at the dead Varus to give him back his lost legions. The defeat was heavy enough to keep the German homelands outside the empire for ever. The German people were to suffer defeats but they were never to be subordinated.

  In various parts of this book I have had occasion to remark on the fact that the historical and ethnographic accounts of ancient authors need to be taken with large pinches of salt. Their reports concerning barbarian behaviour and beliefs are rarely their own observations. They are not even, as a rule, first-hand accounts told to the authors by third parties. Second-hand or third-hand information, rumour, tall travellers' tales and the like make up much of this ancient anthropology. We should not, however, dismiss it all as hearsay and nonsense for there are genuine observations alongside the more dubious anecdotes. It would be fair to say that we learn at least as much about the Romans from their biased accounts of other people as we do about the barbarians themselves.

  Julius Caesar gives us a few interesting snippets of information concerning the Germanic people in The Gallic Wars. He notes among other things that they are not ruled by a priesthood like the Celts are ruled by their Druids. Neither are they particularly enthusiastic about observing sacrifices to the gods. This, along with the assertion that they have not even heard of any gods but the sun, moon and fire, cannot be accepted as a realistic portrayal. It was simply that the Romans were largely ignorant of the religious beliefs of Germanic people and so could say very little about them.

  Caesar also tells us that they do not undertake much agriculture, preferring to tend their livestock, make cheese and hunt. Training to be warriors from a young age, they endure privation and hardship to toughen them up. They also say that it is a good thing for the young to avoid sexual relations for as long as possible. This practice is not based on prudery but on the belief that physical growth and power as well as the strength of one's sinews are increased through sexual abstinence. To have sex before the age of twenty is considered a despicable sign of weakness. Despite these restrictive recommendations concerning the health of young people, they nevertheless go in for mixed-sex bathing in the river with only the scantiest of skins or deerhide cloaks to hide their modesty. Caesar notes that such clothing still leaves them half-naked.

  He also has something very interesting to say about the way that they order their society. The magistrates and headmen of the community have annual meetings at which each family and tribal division is allotted a tract of land that they are obliged to work on during the forthcoming year. The following year they are moved to another piece of land. There is a rationale behind this communal rotation: knowing that you will be moved on the next year prevents you from building your house too well – keeping out the cold and the heat is considered a sign of effeminacy. Similarly, the regular tilling of the same fields year after year may be habit-forming, and turn men into avid farmers and away from their desire for conflict and war. It may make them greedy too and encourage them to forsake fighting for riches. The accumulation of individual wealth is seen as a threat not just to the warrior ethos but also to the cohesion of society itself. Wealth creates inequality, inequality creates discord and envy, and these inevitably lead to civil strife.

  There is a strange kind of logic to this way of running society, but how accurate a picture this is of ancient Germanic practices is hard to say.

  The Tribes of Mannus

  Julius Caesar's brief descriptions are intriguing, but the main account of the Germanic people was written somewhat later. Cornelius Tacitus wrote the Germania (or 'On the Origin and Geography of Germany' as it is sometimes called) in AD 98. It gives a wide-ranging picture of German life at that time, which is generally recognised as largely accurate. He was certainly an author with an agenda. He does not try to denigrate the barbarians (although he is scathing about them on occasions) – if anything, he does the reverse, for he uses the Germanic people as moral exemplars for the degenerate Romans of his day who have forgotten their own era of virtue. Tacitus does not let his moral message distract him from his central purpose, though: to provide a full and coherent portrait of a barbarian people. He does not simply provide a general overview, but names and describes the various Germanic tribes and their attributes to the best of his knowledge.

  Tacitus begins his account by delineating the limits of the Germanic lands, which are separated from Gaul by the Rhine, and from Pannonia by the Danube; to the east they are divided from the Iranian Sarmatians by mountains – or, in regions where there are no mountains, by mutual fear! To the north they are surrounded by the ocean (in ancient geography the Baltic and the North Sea were believed to be part of the same expanse of water).

  As to their origins and connections with other peoples, Tacitus remarks that they are indigenous and pure bred, having little to do with other races. Such comments were to be seized upon during the Nazi era to provide historical 'proof' of German racial purity and superiority. It is quite clear when reading Tacitus that such a view was not in his mind. For him, there were good reasons for this 'purity'. He goes on to ask the rhetorical question: who would want to leave the warmth of Asia Minor (present-day Turkey), North Africa or Italy to live in the inhospitable landscapes of Germany with its bad weather?

  The Germanic people of Tacitus' time were not literate, but they passed down their traditions through songs.
They worshipped a god of earth named Tuisto. The son of this god, called Mannus, they considered to be the ancestor of all the Germanic people. Mannus in his turn had three sons after whom three clusters of tribes were named: the Ingaevones, who lived near the sea (according to another source, the writings of Pliny, this group includes the Chauci, the Cimbri and the Teutoni); the Herminones, the interior or central tribes (which, says Pliny, include the Suevi, Hermunduri, Cherusci and Chatti); and the Istaevones, who consist of the rest of the tribes, especially those near the Rhine in Pliny's account.

  Such is, according to Tacitus, the main Germanic myth of their origins and the relationships between the tribes. Other versions known to him claimed that other tribes also had a genuine and ancient heritage that could be traced back to the primordial ancestor Tuisto, among them the Vandilii (the Vandals). He also provides us with an explanation of how this group of tribes become collectively known as the Germani. Originally there was a single tribe known as the Germani (whose name had changed by the time of Tacitus to the Tungri), who were said to be the first of the Germanic tribes to cross the Rhine and invade the territory of the Gauls. In order to intimidate the Gauls, the Germani tribe began to call their fellow tribes Germani too. Soon other tribes began to accept this new title themselves, and diverse Germanic peoples had a name that unified them.

  The stereotype of the physical appearance of a Germanic barbarian can be found in Tacitus. They are, he tells us, usually red-haired, well built and have fierce blue eyes. Although they are strong and can exert enormous energy on occasions, they are said not to be good at hard work and continuous labour. Due to the climate of their homeland and the poor soils, they can endure cold and hunger but not heat and thirst. Their clothing is simple, the standard dress code being a cloak fastened with a clasp or brooch (or failing that simply a thorn). Only the rich among them have the luxury of wearing underclothes; the rest have to make do with the cloak and furs and sealskins. Women wear basically the same as the men but might sometimes also be seen in linen garments with purple patterns.