Lombards Survive as a Distinct People?

Looking at the old Migration period Germanic peoples that streamed into Western Europe of them really only the Franks have more or less 'survived' with a second running to the Angle/Saxons. Those groups like Lombards became absorbed into much larger states or assimilated to the point where they were not the distinct group in Europe.

So how can we have the Lombards survive as a distinct group from the Italians (maybe even absorb some Italians)?
 
There's a theory they did, and that one of Bolzano's Germanic languages is a descendant of Lombardic, but it's probably not true.

I can see them survive to s longer degree and thus assimilating a few areas if they all become Chalcedonian early on and strike a deal with the Byzantines.
 
The Franks didn't really survive, did they? They were assimilated into the Romance-speaking peoples of France, aside from those who stayed closer to their originally homeland where modern Franconian dialects are spoken. In the latter case, few Franconian speakers maintain a Franconian identity, while one could argue continuity between the early Saxons and modern Saxony, or the Bavarii and Bavaria, the Suebi and Swabia, or the Thuringii and Thuringia. The Frisians, Danes, and Swedes all survived, too, of course.
 
What needs to happen is for the Lombards to have an area where there are more Lombards that Italians, an area where one need to be able to speak Lombardish. Then have that area slowly grow.
 
The Franks didn't really survive, did they? They were assimilated into the Romance-speaking peoples of France, aside from those who stayed closer to their originally homeland where modern Franconian dialects are spoken. In the latter case, few Franconian speakers maintain a Franconian identity, while one could argue continuity between the early Saxons and modern Saxony, or the Bavarii and Bavaria, the Suebi and Swabia, or the Thuringii and Thuringia. The Frisians, Danes, and Swedes all survived, too, of course.

You partially answered it, however Dutch is descended from (Germanic) Frankish too. Ironically, the fact that those other tribes didn't initially become dominant might have helped too preserve their identity. Frankish culture might have at some point have become the norm in certain areas and after that the fact that the Franks were split politically and also culturally (Germanic-Romance split) didn't help either. Still the Franks left their mark on France, Germany and the Low Countries.

Saxony is interesting though, the early Saxons and modern Lower Saxony might share something, but modern Saxony originally had a Thuringian heritage.

Still apart from nearby border and/or thinly populated provinces, all the Germanic tribes (many started out as federations of smaller tribes), which settled the more developed and densely populated regions didn't eventually survive; however that process often took centuries.
 
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