Question: What Germanic/Nordic Tribes would need to be destroyed...

Art

Monthly Donor
For the Roman Empire to survive? I've been thinking on a alt plot-line, but it's rather obsure. I'm getting a lot the information about the period from Historical Fiction, specifically three books/book series. Breen's "Eagle in the Snow" , Poul Anderson's "the King of Ys", and Jack Whyte's "Camulod Chronicles". I was just reading Eagle in the Snow, and it was talking about the Germanic Tribes crossing the Rhine, and I was thinking "what could stop them?" And then I got an idea... What if they were hit by diseases? Enough so that the couldn't overcome Roman resistance. I had in mind not a totally healthy surviving Roman Empire, but the tribes really coming to terms with the Romans, and peoples like the Romanized Gauls Britons and other people having their own states. One group that kept coming up was the Vandals. I wanted to get rid of them, since they did nothing worthwhile. But what happended to the Marcomanni, and the Quadi?
 
To stop them for a time at least get rid of the Huns. If only the Germanic tribes then get rid of the Goths and Vandals if possible. These were the two most responsible for the Roman collapse since the Vandals took the Western breadbasket in North Africa and the Goths established what was basically the first independent kingdom in either southern Gaul or Spain, can't remember which.
 
None of them.
Or all of them.

"Goths" were those making more damage, triggering Adrianople and then spearheading the advance to Spain, but the problems that "Goths" were not Goths at all.
Barbarian groups entering in the Roman Empire had not ethnical-based boundaries, but were rather a salad bowl of very different tribes (german, danubian, and even roman fugitives) following a charismatic (and lucky) leader.
Thus the "Goth" horde was actually composed by Goths, Erules, Batavi, Tifali, Alani, some Huns and roman slaves/brigands.
Similarly the "Hun" horde was composed by Huns, Goths, Gepids, Franks, Alamans and roman discontents (bagaudes).

Also notice that removing those tribe would do much harm than good, since it would delete a recruit supply which the empire badly needed.
Goths were routinely recruited, both in the regular army and as independent allies; Huns were to become the major source of recruits of the Eastern roman empire until the Pecenegs arrived, Franks and Alaman recruits composed the bulk of the western army, Erules and Batavi were considered between the most trustable troops and had their own legions -Eruli seniores and Juniores and Batavi- (and they were roman-styled legions, not barbarian hordes)
 
Virtually all of them. The tribes were mostly migratory, so if one is wiped out, another just moves into the vacant space. And even if the Germanics are totally wiped ou, you probably just get Slav tribes in their place.
 
Virtually all of them. The tribes were mostly migratory, so if one is wiped out, another just moves into the vacant space. And even if the Germanics are totally wiped ou, you probably just get Slav tribes in their place.

Absolutely.

Rather than wiping them out, write a POD that makes them stay in place and thus butterflying away migration. If you, just to give an example, introduce the heavy plough early, agriculture is improved and the local land may feed more people, hence there's no need to migrate. Another possibility is a climate change which makes Northern Europe more hospital.
 
What if the Goths were treated well instead of being cheated? They become loyal and remain a bulwark where they originally settled. Maybe this just makes the Eastern Empire better off instead of preventing a collapse.
 
Virtually all of them. The tribes were mostly migratory, so if one is wiped out, another just moves into the vacant space. And even if the Germanics are totally wiped ou, you probably just get Slav tribes in their place.

.....hmmm. I like that idea. What if Roman was overrun by Slavs, not Germanics? More butterflys then you could shake a stick at!
 
Guys

Isn't want's needed to get rid of the disease rather than the symptom? Have reforms that make Rome strong enough and organised enough that bands of wandering refugees can't provide a more attractive option to the bulk of their own population that continued imperial rule.

Steve
 
What if they migrated east instead?

East? The bigger threat for them was the Huns, which came from the east...
Or did you mean as "East" was Eastern Roman Empire...? In that case, the Romans would get a worse condition than in OTL, as their richest and most populous provinces would be occupied by "barbarians"...
 
I wouldn't overemphasise the Huns.

The Goths had appeared on the Danube, and forced the evacuation of Dacia, long before the Huns appeared on the scene. I would say the Huns rather "pushed at an open door" giving events an added nudge in the direction they were going already.
 

Art

Monthly Donor
The Huns and the Bacaudae? WHAT?

Are you serious? I kind of think of the Bacaudae as good guys, certainly not as people who would make an Alliance with HUNS, for god's sake! Maybe I should have the Huns never get any strong kings, that is Rugila/Attila, who could unite all the Hunnic Tribes and conquer other tribal peoples. There's this scene in Eagle in the Snow where Maximus, the Roman general, has to meet with the kings of the two Vandal tribes, the Marcomanni, the Quadi, the Alemanni, the Alans, and later the Burgundian's/Franks. He has ONE Legion to take on upwards of 100,000 warriors at least. He asks them why they don't unite against the Huns. They reply that it's easier to fight the Romans than the Huns.
 
The Germanic tribes being destroyed isn't going to change the Crisis of the Third Century, which was due to one of the big inherent weaknesses of the Roman system. Nor can I see it averting the rise of the Sassanians, which did more to destroy the Romans than the Germanic invasions did. If the Crisis of the Third Century and the Sassanians happen at the same time, history will unfold much the same and confederations of tribal peoples will be able to move in regardless.
 
If the Crisis of the Third Century and the Sassanians happen at the same time

Actually they DID happen at the same time.
Btw I recall that Edward Gibbon once said: "Even if all of Germanic tribes were annihilated at the same hour, the Romans were still doomed".
But, if I have to choose one...I will pick the Goths.
 
Actually they DID happen at the same time.
Btw I recall that Edward Gibbon once said: "Even if all of Germanic tribes were annihilated at the same hour, the Romans were still doomed".
But, if I have to choose one...I will pick the Goths.

That's my point. Removing the Germanics won't change anything unless those are also removed.
 

Art

Monthly Donor
But the effectiveness of the infantry Legion...

versus the system of "Knights"/Persian Dehgans/Byzantine Cataphracts/ Medieval Heavy Cavalry is adopted everywhere the terrain is suited for it, or can support it. Infantry are still used, but not diciplined heavy cavalry except among the Byzantines, except on a huscarl warband level, and that's never enough to conquer much and keep in conquered, and the feudal system weakened kings and strengthened barons and other feudal lords, great and small. It wasn't until gunpowder and cannon that kings really started to break the power of the feudal lords, by having forces that could take the castles and fortresses of the lords in weeks, not months or years. Disiplined heavy infantry dies out for the most part in Western Europe between 500-1500, really. Only Edward the IIIrd's army was a combined arms army, and that was in the 1300's! I guess I'm wondering how disiplined heavy infantry, in any form, could continue to exist.
 

Art

Monthly Donor
According to Who?

Exactly? Where did you get this information? In what history book?
 
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