Origins
Little is known about the Suevi who crossed the Rhine on the night of 31 December 406 AD and entered the Roman Empire. It is speculated that these Suevi are the same group as the Quadi, who are mentioned in early writings as living north of the middle Danube, in what is now lower Austria and western Slovakia, and who played an important part in the Germanic Wars of the 2nd century, when together with the Marcomanni fought fiercely against the Romans commanded by emperor Marcus Aurelius. The main reason behind the identification of the Suevi and Quadi as the same group comes from a letter written by St. Jerome to Ageruchia, listing the invaders of the 406 crossing into Gaul, in which the Quadi are listed and the Suevi are not. The argument for this theory, however, is based solely on the disappearance of mention of the Quadi and the emergence of the Suevi, and contrast with the testimony of other contemporary authors, as Orosius who did cite indeed the Suevi among the peoples traversing the Rhine in 406, and who cite them side by side with Quadi, Marcomanni, Vandals and Sarmatians in another passage. Sixth century authors identified the Sueves of Galicia with the Alamanni, or simply with Germans, whilst the 4th century Laterculus Veronensis mentions some Suevi side by side with Alamanni, Quadi, Marcomanni and other Germanic peoples.
Additionally it has been pointed out that the lack of mention of the Suevi could mean that they were not per se an older distinct ethnic group, but the result of a recent ethnogenesis, with many smaller groups -among them also part of the Quadi and Marcomanni- coming together during the migration from the Danube valley to the Iberian Peninsula. Other groups of Sueves are mentioned by Jordanes and other historians as residing by the Danube regions during the 5th and 6th centuries.
Read more about this topic: Suebic Kingdom Of Galicia
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