Ethnogenesis and Religious Revitalization beyond the Roman Frontier: The Case of FrankishOriginsAuthor(s): David Harry MillerReviewed work(s):Source: Journal of World History, Vol. 4, No. 2 (Fall, 1993), pp. 277-285Published by: University of Hawai'i PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20078564 .Accessed: 20/03/2012 16:42
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Ethnogenesis and Religious Revitalization
beyond the Roman Frontier: The Case of Frankish Origins
DAVID HARRY MILLER
University of Oklahoma
It
has long been understood that the Franks were not one of the so-called tribes of the Transrhenish region at the time of the
first Roman presence in the region about 240 C.E.1 Indeed, some
standard authorities provide lists of earlier ethnicities involved in the confederation that resulted in the Frankish entity.2 Clearly, the Frankish confederation emerged in a process of frontier
ethnogenesis; that is, it emerged under the circumstances created
by the presence of the Roman army and the creation of the prov ince of Germania Inferior.3
The effect of the Roman intrusion into the lower Rhineland was profound. The intrusion discredited traditional cultures that
1 Scriptores historiae Augustae, Vita Divi Aureliani, 7.1-2.
2 Paulys Realencyclopaedie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft, new ed. by
G. Wissowa, 15 vols. (Stuttgart, 1894-1972), s.v. Salii (2), 2.1.2.1894-99; Johannes
Hoops, Reallexikon der germanishen Altertumskunde (Strassburg: Teubner, 1913), s.v. Franken, 2.82; Walter Schlesinger, "?ber germanisches Heerk?nigtum," in Das
K?nigtum: Seine geistigen und rechtlichen Grundlagen (Constance: Thorbeke
Verlag, 1956), p. 123; Reinhard Wenskus, Stammesbildung und Verfassung: Das Wer den der fr?hmittelalterlichen Gentes (Cologne: B?hlau, 1961), pp. 430-58; Friedrich
Schlette, "Zur Bildung germanischer Stammesverb?nde im dritten und vierten
Jahrhunderte," in H. Gr?nert and H. -J. D?lle, eds., R?mer und Germanen in
Mitteleuropa (Berlin: Akademische Verlag, 1975), p. 219; and Patrick Perin and Laure-Charlotte Feffer, Les Francs, 2 vols. (Paris: Armand Colin, 1987), 1:25-26.
3 Peter M?nz, "Early European History and African Anthropology," New Zealand Journal of History 10 (1976): 38-39.
Journal of World History, Vol. 4, No. 2 ? 1993 hy University of Hawaii Press
277
278 JOURNAL OF WORLD HISTORY, FALL 1993
had proven unable to prevent humiliations, injuries, and subjuga tion. Societies confronted with the creation of such a frontier
were faced also by a limited number of options. They could not
withdraw, so they had a choice of either submission or transfor
mation4?hence the destabilization of the local societies and their
eventual modification. The period from the middle of the first
century to the end of the second was a period of the emergence of
warlords, or "big men/'5 The rise of the warlords resulted in part from the practical necessity of coping with Roman military opera tions and in part from the novel and, by traditional standards, immoral activity of raiding other communities to capture slaves
to pay for luxury imports.6 Eventually the traditional social struc
tures were sufficiently destabilized that they were eclipsed in sig nificance by the warlords, who took over the major functions of
society as providers of status and protection. It is not accidental
that the bond between a man and his lord was, in legal terms, a
variety of fictive kinship. The power of the lords came from the
retinues based on such bonds. The significance of the retinues is
that they were social organizations that existed, according to
their own overt rationale, solely for the waging of war.7
The frontier was an acculturative factor. But one must remem
4 See the particularly perceptive remarks of Andrew Bard Schmookler, The
Parable of the Tribes: The Problem of Power in Social Evolution (Boston:
Houghton-Mifflin, 1984), pp. 40-42 and passim. 5 On the concept of the "big man" stage of social evolution, see D. Blair Gibson
and Michael N. Geselowitz, "The Evolution of Complex Society in Late Prehistoric
Europe: Towards a Paradigm," in D. B. Gibson and M. N. Geselowitz, eds., Tribe
and Polity in Late Prehistoric Europe: Demography, Production and Exchange in
the Evolution of Complex Social Systems (New York: Plenum, 1988), pp. 23-24. 6 On imports, see the following: Hermann Aubin, "Der Rheinhandel in r?mi
scher Zeit," Bonner Jahrb?cher 130 (1925): 33; Hans Norling-Christensen, "Danish
Imports of Roman and Roman Provincial Objects in Bronze and Glass," in E. Bir
ley, ed., First Congress of Roman Frontier Studies 1949 (Durham: Duke University
Press, 1952); Edward Arthur Thompson, The Early Germans (Oxford: Oxford Uni
versity Press, 1965), p. 24; Horst Geisler, "Der r?mische Import auf dem kaiserzeitli
chen Urnengr?berfeld von Kemnitz, Kreis Potsdam-Land," in Gr?nert and D?lle,
eds., R?mer und Germanen in Mitteleuropa, pp. 131-38; Heinz Gr?nert, "Zusam
menstoss und Auseinandersetzung zwischen r?mischer Sklavenhaltergesellschaft und germanischer Gentilgesellschaft in Mitteleuropa vom ersten Jahrhundert
unserer Zeit bis zweiten Jahrhundert unserer Zeit," in Gr?nert and D?lle, eds.,
R?mer und Germanen in Mitteleuropa, pp. 12-15; Friedrich Schlette, "Formen des
r?misch-germanischen Handels," in Gr?nert and D?lle, eds., R?mer und Ger
manen in Mitteleuropa, pp. 124-26; and Jerzy Kolendo, "Les influences de Rome sur
les peuples de l'Europe central habitant loin des fronti?res de l'empire: L'example du territoire de la Pologne," Klio 63 (1981): 454-59.
7 See David Harry Miller and William W. Savage, Jr., "Editors' Introduction,"
in Frederick Jackson Turner, The Indian Trade in Wisconsin: A Study of the Trad
Miller: Ethnogenesis and Frankish Origins 279
ber that in the process of acculturation the features selected for
imitation did not wholly reproduce the total culture of the intru
sive society. Moreover, the culture presented to the Transrhenish
populations was not Roman culture, but the limited culture of the
Roman army.8 Hence, the economy degenerated to a raiding econ
omy of war bands. Male roles became specialized on economically wasteful and socially destructive lines. The retinue warriors were
not the traditional type of northern Transrhenish male, for they did not work: they were supported by plunder and the profits of
slaving. Basic subsistence depended increasingly upon the work
of women and slaves.
This organizational change was fraught with consequence; when war became the chief activity of free men, a new set of
behavior patterns and therefore a new set of cultural sanctions
had to become paramount. The new value system inculcated the
kind of behavior needed for a man to exist in a fundamentally vio
lent society. The warrior culture that developed emphasized a life of violence, indolence, and intoxication.9 Settlement sites indicate the disappearance of free villages and the appearance of village types dominated by the long hall of the lord.10
Meanwhile, demographic changes were also taking place. The
population groups closest to the frontier, and therefore least able to evade direct military confrontation with the Romans, were suf
fering demographic disaster. Mortality owing to war and loss of
individuals through enslavement, auxiliary recruitment, and de
ing Post as an Institution, ed. D. H. Miller and W. W. Savage, Jr. (Norman: Univer
sity of Oklahoma Press, 1977), pp. xviii-xix. 8 Compare Leonard Broom, Bernard J. Siegel, Evon Z. Vogt, and James B. Wat
son, "Acculturation: An Exploratory Formulation," in P. Bohannan and F. Plog, eds., Beyond the Frontier: Social Process and Cultural Change (Garden City, N.Y.: Natural History Press, 1967), p. 266.
9 Tacitus, Germania, 13-15, 22, 24. See also Thompson, The Early Germans, pp.
29> 49-53; and Bruno Kr?ger, "Zusammenstoss und Auseinandersetzung zwischen r?mischer Sklavenhaltergesellschaft und germanischer Gentilgesellschaft in Mit
teleuropa vom Ende des zweiten Jahrhunderts bis zur Mitte des vierten Jahrhun
derts," in Gr?nert and D?lle, eds., R?mer und Germanen in Mitteleuropa, p. 23. 10
Tacitus, Germania, 25. Edward Arthur Thompson, "Slavery in Early Ger
many," in M. I. Finley, ed., Slavery in Classical Antiquity: Views and Controversies
(New York: Barnes and Noble, i960), pp. 191-93; Malcolm Todd, The Northern Bar
barians, 100 B.C.-A.D. 300 (London: Hutchinson, 1975), pp. 100-104, 114; Achim
Leube, "Probleme germanischer Adelsentwicklung im ersten und zweiten Jahr
hunderte unter dem Aspekt der r?mischen Beeinflussung," in Gr?nert and D?lle, eds., R?mer und Germanen in Mitteleuropa, p. 190; and Christoph Reichman,
"Siedlungsreste der vorr?mischen Eisenzeit, j?nggermanischen r?mischen Kai
serzeit, und Merowingerzeit aus Soest-Ardey," Germania 59 (1981): 74-75.
28o JOURNAL OF WORLD HISTORY, FALL 1993
portations11 undermined the viability of some traditional group
ings as stable formations. The absorption of smaller and harder
hit groups by larger and more stable groupings began early. Many groups seem to have disappeared altogether as discrete units.12
This is the context of Frankish ethnogenesis, but the formation
of the Frankish confederation was an event on a totally different
order of both meaning and magnitude than previous social shuf
flings. It was a deliberate act on the part of men previously asso
ciated with diverse groups, and it resulted in the creation, not of a
slightly augmented community, but of a clearly regional conglom eration for specialized purposes. Survival required the cultivation
of power, and power was best cultivated by larger consortia of war retinues.13 The frontier intrusion dictated that the capacity for effective aggression was indispensable for survival and there
fore required the creation of an enhanced warrior spirit among some of society's members.14 In the context of increased inter
group conflicts and competition with both Romans and other
Transrhenish populations, the notion of this emerging identity was a strong one. It was a case of degenerative change leading to a
functional adaptation.15 How and why did the warlords adhere to a specific formation
and leadership? In other words, what was the basis, ideological or
otherwise, for confederation?16 There were, at any one time, sev
eral geographic subunits capable of independent action. The total
number of those who came to call themselves Franks would have
been too large for the whole to move or act entirely in concert. As
has been suggested by others, the confederation of the Franks was
a "swarm" of associated war bands rather than anything more
highly organized. What was the principle of this association?
11 Gr?nert, "Zusammenstoss und Auseinandersetzung," p. 12; and Kr?ger,
"Zusammenstoss und Auseinandersetzung," p. 34. Compare M?nz, "Early Euro
pean History and African Anthropology," p. 40. 12 Friedrich Schlette, "Werden und Wesen fr?hegeschichtlicher Stammes
verb?nde," Zeitschrift f?r Archaeologie 5 (1971): 22; and Schlette, "Zur Bildung ger manischer Stammesverb?nde," p. 219.
13 Compare Schmookler, The Parable of the Tribes, pp. 81-87.
14 Compare R. Brian Ferguson, "Tribal Warfare," Scientific American 266 (Jan
uary 1992): 108-13; ana< Schmookler, The Parable of the Tribes, p. 160. 15 See Eugeen E. Roosens, Creating Ethnicity: The Process of Ethnogenesis
(Newberry Park: Sage Publications, 1989), pp. 12-13; and George Dalton, "Theoreti
cal Issues in Economic Anthropology," in Dalton, ed., Economic Development and
Social Change (Garden City: Natural History Press, 1971), pp. 216-17. 16
Schlesinger, "?ber germanisches Heerk?nigtum," p. 123; and Schlette, "Wer
den und Wesen," p. 24. Compare Broom, Siegel, Vogt, and Watson, "Acculturation,"
PP. 273-74
Miller: Ethnogenesis and Frankish Origins 281
The Rhine frontier during the second and third centuries was a
focal point for a religious movement that might be considered a
type of revitalization movement: the cult of Odin.17 This move
ment was clearly a reaction of the peoples involved to the trauma
of destabilization owing to the Roman intrusion in their space and
their lives. Odin was a preexisting local persona of a type of minor
god. He may originally have been a wind god or the psychompo
mpos. Or he may have been associated with commerce.18 When
the Romans first encountered his cult, they identified him with
Mercury19 and therefore associated him with all of these func
tions.
Sometime in the period between c. 50 and 200 CE.,20 Odin was
becoming a major, and polyvalent, deity: the local persona of the
All-Father.21 This development was associated with the advent of a
new mythology according to which Odin became a sacrificial vic
tim to himself. During the course of his passion on the World-Tree
(Yggdrasil, meaning "Odin's steed") he acquired knowledge of all
that had been, was, and would be, and he discovered the magical runic letters.22 More important, he came down from the gallows tree a new being. Henceforth he was the king of the gods, patron of magic,23 war, and violent death: the Germanic Mars in the
Roman interpretation.24 The cult of Odin was a pessimistic cult.
Odin was a dour, violent, and deceitful god. He received sacrifice
17 Compare Anthony F. C. Wallace, "New Religious Beliefs among the Dela
ware Indians, 1600-1900," Southwestern Journal of Anthropology 12 (1956): 1-21; Wal
lace, "Revitalization Movements: Some Theoretical Considerations for Their Com
parative Study," American Anthropologist 58 (1956): 264-82; and Wallace, Religion: An Anthropological View (New York: Random House, 1966).
18 Gr?mnism?l, 49, and Harbardzliod, both in P. Terry, ed., Poems of the Vikings
(New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1969). See also Jan de Vries, Alt germanische Reli
gionsgeschichte, 2 vols. (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1935-37), 1:82, 2:187; and Bruce Lincoln, "The Ferryman of the Dead," Journal of Indo-European Studies 8 (1980): 42-51.
19 Tacitus, Germania, 9. See also Georg Wissowa, "Interpretatio romana:
R?mische G?tter im Barbarenl?nde," Archiv f?r Religionswissenschaf119 (1918): 40; and Sigmund Feist, Germanen und Kelten (Strassburg: Verlag f?r Kunst und Wiss
enschaft, 1948), p. 39. 20
Tacitus, Histories, 13.57. 21 Snorri Sturluson, Gylfaginning, in The Prose Edda, trans. J. Young (Berke
ley: University of California Press, 1954), pp. 30-49. 22
H?vam?l, 138-39, in Terry, ed., Poems of the Vikings; and G. Vigfusson and F. Powell, eds. and trans., Corpus poeticum bor?ale, 2 vols. (New York: Russell and
Russell, 1965), 1:29-30. 23 Consider the importance of the hope that by magic, the power of the aggres
sor may be destroyed: Baldrs Draumr, 3, and H?vam?l, 6, both in Terry, ed., Poems
of the Vikings. 24 For example, Corpus inscriptionum latinarum (Berlin: Reimer, 1907), 13.8707.
282 JOURNAL OF WORLD HISTORY, FALL 1993
of prisoners of war, and he was lord of the carrion eaters that haunted the battlefield. He was a god who would deliberately cause war where none existed in order to claim for himself the
souls of the slain.25
There was a reason why Odin was such a grim figure: He pre
pared for Ragnarok, the hopeless last battle before World's End, in which the gods would meet their own doom in battle against the demonic elements of the world.26 He prepared for this doom
by recruiting his army from the ghosts of the heroes slain in bat
tle, who would fight at his side at the end. His great hall, situated
in the sky, where a growing army of the dead awaited the final
muster, was the mirror image of the beer-hall society of the
warlords and their retainers that was becoming dominant among the Transrhenish peoples. According to the new mythology, the
end of the world would be preceded by certain specific conditions
similar to those that then existed in the Rhineland: war, murder,
violence, adultery, treachery, and falsehood.27
The frontier intrusion had created a violent, dangerous, and
treacherous world. Roman military supremacy deprived men of
any expectation but that of eventual destruction. Therefore, reli
gion reoriented itself to represent the condition in which the fron
tier world then existed as the normal condition of the world, and
to inculcate behavior consistent with life in such a world.28 It did not cause the type of social conditions that gave rise to formations
such as that of the Franks, but it did sanctify them.
Associated with the emergence of the Odin cult was the
appearance of a form of war kingship, or the king as supreme warlord. Hence the new bond between men that became basic to a
new form of social organization was allegiance to such a king.29
25 Brot at Sugurtharkvitho, 16; Ynglingasaga, 6, and Harbardzliod, 24, all in
Terry, ed., Poems of the Vikings; and Vigfusson and Powell, eds., Corpus poeticum
bor?ale, 1:141-42,145,158. 26
Volosp?, 39-56, in Terry, ed., Poems of the Vikings. 27
Mary R. Gerstein, "Germanic Warg: The Outlaw as Werewolf," in G. Larson,
ed., Myth in Indo-European Antiquity (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1974)? P-133 28
H?vam?l, 1-4, 7, 34, and passim, in Terry, ed., Poems of the Vikings; and
Vigfusson and Powell, eds., Corpus poeticum bor?ale, 1:41-44. See also Leube, "Pro
bleme germanischer Adelsentwicklung," p. 191; and Alois Closs, "Neue Problems
stellungen in der germanischen Religionsgeschichte," Anthropos 29 (1934): 493. 29 Wilhelm Sickel, "Die Entstehung der fr?nkischen Monarchie," Westdeutsche
Zeitschrift f?r Geschichte 4 (1888): 318-19; G. Franz Petri, "Stamm und Land im fr?h
emittelalterlichen Nordwesten nach neuere historischer Forschungen," Westf? lische Forschungen 8 (1955): 7; Otto H?fler, "Der Sakralcharakter des germanischen
Miller: Ethnogenesis and Frankish Origins 283
These kings were regarded, not surprisingly, as descended from
Odin.30 Among the peoples who came to call themselves Franks, these kings were of the line of long-haired kings known as the
Merovings.31 To owe allegiance to a Meroving king was to be a
Frank.32 Therefore, to be a Frank was to be one of Odin's follow
ers, and the name Frank, meaning either "ferocious" or "bold,"33 was indicative of that status.34
It is probable that the early Franks, like the later Franks, adhered to the dictum that every adult male member of the regal
family was a king, so that the dynasty might produce several
reigning members in each generation. These related kings might compete with each other at some times and cooperate with each other at other times. Certainly some of them took service with the
imperial regime from the fourth century.35 As a consequence, sub swarms based on individual kings might appear from time to
time, and later disintegrate into the larger swarm, as the kings around whom they gathered came and went.
K?nigtums," in Das K?nigtum: Seine geistigen und rechtlichen Grundlagen, p. 101;
Schlesinger, "?ber germanisches Heerk?nigtum," p. 123; and Wenskus, Stammes
bildung und Verfassung, pp. 519-31. 30 Hermann Leo Moisl, "Anglo-Saxon Royal Genealogies and Germanic Oral
Tradition," Journal of Medieval History 7 (1981): 214-19. 31 David Harry Miller, "The Merovingians and the Origins of Frankish King
ship," paper delivered at the Ninth Annual Meeting of the Mid-American Medieval
Association, Kansas City, March 1985. 32
Compare Patrick J. Geary, Before France and Germany: The Creation and
Transformation of the Merovingian World (New York: Oxford University Press,
1988), p. 62. 33 Goesta Langenfelt, "On the Origin of Tribal Names," Anthropos 14 (1919): 309;
Wenskus, Stammesbildung und Verfassung, pp. 513-14; Roger Grand, Recherches sur l'origine des Francs, ed. S. du Parc (Paris: Picard, 1965), p. 21; Erich Z?llner, Ge schichte der Franken bis zur Mitte des sechsten Jahrhunderts (Munich: Beck
Verlag, 1970), p. 1; and Schlette, "Werden und Wesen," p. 222. The argument that the word meant "free"?as advanced, for example, by Moritz Sch?nfeld, W?rterbuch der altgermanischen Personnen- und V?lkernamen (Heidelberg: Winter Verlag, 1911), pp. 89-91?has been generally rejected.
34 Compare Kr?ger, "Zusammenstoss und Auseinandersetzung," p. 29.
35 Karl Friedrich Stroheker, "Zur Rolle der Heermeister fr?nkischer Abstam
mung im sp?ten vierten Jahrhundert," Historia 4 (1955): 313; Rigobert G?nther, "Zusammenstoss und Auseinandersetzung zwischen r?mischer Sklavenhalterge sellschaft und germanischer Gentilgesellschaft in Mitteleuropa von der Mitte des vierten Jahrhunderts bis zum Ende des f?nften Jahrhunderts," in Gr?nert and
D?lle, eds., R?mer und Germanen in Mitteleuropa, p. 46; Wolfgang Seyfarth, "Ger manen in r?mischen Diensten im vierten Jahrhundert," in Gr?nert and D?lle, eds., R?mer und Germanen in Mitteleuropa, pp. 244-51; Brian Croke, "Arbogast and the Death of Valentinian II," Historia 25 (1976): 236; and Barbara Saylor Rodgers, "Merobaudes and Maximus in Gaul," Historia 30 (1981): 82-105.
284 JOURNAL OF WORLD HISTORY, FALL 1993
There is, however, a problem of nomenclature to be consid
ered. The designation Frank was clearly a word of Germanic ori
gin and the name of the confederation for itself. Roman observers
of Frankish activity in the late imperial period, however, referred
to some Frankish groups as Salii. This designation was clearly later adopted by the Franks to apply to themselves, but there is no
indication that it had its origin as a Frankish term for either the
whole group or any subgroup. Indeed, the word is clearly Lati
nate. The suggestion has been made that the name Salii was
derived from "salt" and referred to a maritime orientation,36 but
this cannot be sustained.37 The term is used in a passage of the
late imperial historian Zosimus, where it clearly indicates a cultic
identity. Zosimus refers to "the Salian ethnicity, a portion of the
Franks dedicated to [a] god."38 The most obvious origin of the name is as a nickname applied
to the Franks by Roman observers in analogy to the coll?gial
priesthoods of Rome dedicated to Mars and Quirinus: the Salii
palatini and the Salii colini, respectively.39 The ritual of the
Roman Salii involved a processional war dance, during which the
priests clashed their spears, symbolic of the god, against their
shields.40 It is clear that the Romans saw Odin, to whom the spear was also sacred, as the Germanic Mars from at least the second
century; devotion to Odin involved an ecstatic, possibly intoxi
cated, Waffentanz.41 The Romans perceived at least some of the
Franks, then, as members of a warrior sodality dedicated to Odin,
leaping about with their weapons, probably clashing spears
against shields.
The question at this point, then, is how the Salii related to the
larger group of the Franks. Recently, discussion of the Franks has
tended to see the Salii as a so-called tribal group, one of many that
contributed to the formation of the larger confederation.42 This
interpretation attempts to locate other constituent tribal groups with respect to geographical position and refers to various Franks
36 Pauly-Wissowa, s.v. Salii (2), 2.1.2.1894-99.
37 Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm, Deutsches W?rterbuch (Leipzig: Hirzel, 1893), s.v.
sal, etc., pp. 1678-97; and Hoops, Reallexikon, s.v. Franken, 2:82.
38 Zosimus, 3.6.2. (author's translation).
39 Pauly-Wissowa, s.v. Salii (1), 2.1.2.1874-94.
40 Georg Wissowa, Religion und Kultus der R?mer, 2nd ed. (Munich: Beck
Verlag, 1912), p. 558. 41 De Vries, Altgermanische Religionsgeschichte, 2:135. 42
Geary, Before France and Germany, p. 78.
Miller: Ethnogenesis and Frankish Origins 285
as Chamavi, Brukteri, Sigambri, and the like.43 To be sure, late
ancient sources refer to various groups of Franks using these old
"tribal" names, but it has been suggested that these names, where
they occur, are merely literary archaisms.44 For example, the con
sensus is that although Bishop Remigius of Rheims, at the bap tism of King Clovis, called him "Sicamber,"45 we need not con
clude therefore that Clovis was of Sicambric origin. Indeed, had
the Salii been a so-called tribe, it is clear that Clovis would have
claimed Salian rather than Sicambrian identity. I believe that the
so-called tribal names sometimes used in reference to groups of
Franks are meaningless anachronisms. That the Salii should have
been a tribe is unlikely, in any case, since the earliest mention of them is in reference to events in the year 358 CE., whereas all the
other "tribal" names mentioned in this context were known from
the first century B.C.E.
If the Salii were a religiously dedicated group of Franks, they would almost certainly not have been regionally specific. The nature of such a religious group would have been transtribal and
confederation-wide. The only question remaining, it seems to me, would be whether this sodality was exclusive or all-inclusive of
the warriors within the confederation. At this stage the question seems to be unanswerable. A passage in Ammianus Marcellinus
does not clarify the issue: he refers to "the Franks, those namely whom custom calls the Salii."46 This passage might support either
of the above-stated possibilities. In any case, the sacral kings of
the confederation would stand at the head of the sodality, as they did at the head of the confederation.
In sum, then, the Franks constituted a warrior confederation based on the allegiance of individual warlords, and of their war
rior followers, to sacral kings dedicated to Odin. The confedera tion involved a hard core, at least, of specifically dedicated war
riors called Salii by the Romans. These warriors, whether earlier or later, gave their name by extension to the whole confederation.
43 Edward James, The Franks (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1988), p. 35.
44 Rigobert G?nther and Alexander R. Korsunskij, Germanen erobern Rom,
2nd ed. (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1988), p. 143. 45
Gregory of Tours, Historia francorum, 2.31, Monumenta Germaniae His t?rica. Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, ed. by B. Krusch and W Levison (Han
nover: Hahn, 1951), vol. 1. 46 Ammianus Marcellinus, 17.8.3.