Frisii

Germanic tribe
the ancient tribe that lived in Frisia until the 4th century BC

The Frisii were an ancient tribe, living in the low lying region between the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta and the River Ems, sharing some cultural and linguistic elements with the neighbouring Celts. The newly formed marshlands were largely uninhabitated until the 6th or 5th centuries BC, when inland settlers started to colonize the area. As sea levels rose and flooding risks increased, the inhabitants learned to build their houses on village mounds or terps. The way of life and material culture of the Frisii hardly distinguished itself from the customs of the Chaucian tribes living farther east. The latter, however, were considered to be part of the Germanic tribal confederation. During the 1st century BC, Romans took control of the Rhine delta but Frisii to the north of the river managed to maintain some level of independence. There was a lot of interaction, however, as Frisian and Chaucian mercenary bands enlisted in the Roman army and Roman traders established themselves north of the limes. There may have been Roman military outposts on Frisian territory. Some or all of the Frisii may have merged with Frankish and Saxon migrants in late Roman times, but they would retain a separate identity in Roman eyes until at least 296, when Frisian, Frankisch and Chamavi groups were forcibly resettled as laeti. Archaeological findings suggest that they may have been transported to Flanders and Southwestern England. The area where the original Frisii lived, was largely deserted during the Migration Period, probably due to political instability and piracy, as well as climatic deterioration and frequent flooding caused by sea level rise. When changing environmental and political conditions made the region attractive again it was repopulated in the 5th century by Anglo Saxon settlers from Northwestern Germany and Southwestern Denmark, who adopted the old name Frisii. These new 'Frisians' lived in the coastal fringe stretching roughly from present day Bruges to Bremen, including many of the smaller offshore islands. They incorporated the remainer of indigenous groups that lived in the area and successfully conquered what would become their new homelands. Medieval and later accounts of 'Frisians' refer to these 'new Frisians' rather than to the ancient Frisii.

What little is known of the Frisii is provided by a few Roman accounts, most of them military. Pliny the Elder (AD 23–79) said their lands were forest covered with tall trees growing up to the edge of the lakes. They lived by agriculture and raising cattle. In the late 1st century the Romans referred to the 'Greater Frisii' as living to the east of the Lake Flevo, and the 'Lesser Frisii' to the west of it, so called for their proportional power, and with the settlements of both stretching along the border of the Rhine to the ocean. In his Germania Tacitus would describe all the Germanic peoples of the region as having elected kings with limited powers and influential military leaders who led by example rather than by authority. The people lived in spread out settlements. He specifically noted the weakness of Germanic political hierarchies in reference to the Frisii, when he mentioned the (apparently Celtic) names of two kings of the 1st century Frisii and added that they were kings "as far as the Germans are under kings". Early Roman accounts of war and raiding do not mention the Frisii as participants, though the neighboring Canninefates (to the west and southwest, in the delta) and Chauci (to the east) are named in that regard. The earliest mention of the Frisii tells of Drusus' 12 BC war against the Rhine Germans and the Chauci. The Romans did not attack them after devastating the lands of the Rhine Germans, but merely passed through their territory and along their coast in order to attack the Chauci. The account says that the Frisii were "won over", suggesting a Roman suzerainty was imposed, although the Romans never outright took over the lands of the Frisii. After their experiences with the predatory Roman governor and Lucius Apronius, the Frisii became disaffected towards Rome. In AD 47, a certain Gannascus of the Canninefates led the Frisii and the Chauci to rebel. They raided along the then wealthy coast of Gallia Belgica. The Roman military commander, Corbulo, campaigned successfully against the Germanic tribes, For the Chauci and for the Frisii this meant Roman occupation, with the Romans specifying where they must live, with a fort built among them, and forcing a Roman style senate, magistrates, and constitution upon them. The Frisii are next mentioned in 54, when they occupied empty, Roman controlled land near the Rhine, settling into houses and sowing and plowing fields. The Romans attempted to persuade them to leave, and even invited two Frisii kings to Rome to meet Nero, who ordered them to leave. The Frisii refused, whereupon a Roman military force coerced them, killing any who resisted. In AD 69 the Batavi and other tribes rose against Roman rule in the Revolt of the Batavi, becoming a general uprising by all the Germans in the region, including the Frisii. Things went well for the Germans at first. One of the early leaders, Brinno of the Canninefates tribe, quickly defeated a Roman force of two cohorts and took their camp. The capable Civilis ultimately succeeded to leadership of the Germanic side and inflicted heavy casualties on the Romans, even besieging Roman strongholds such as Vetera. On the sea, a Roman flotilla was captured by a Germanic one. However, the war did not end well for the Germans. Led by Cerialis, the Romans ultimately forced a humiliating peace on the Batavi and stationed a legion on their territory. In the course of the war, both the Frisii and the Chauci had auxiliaries serving under the Romans. In an assault by Civilis at Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensis (at modern Cologne), a cohort of Chauci and Frisii had been trapped and burned.

The emperor Constantius Chlorus campaigned successfully against several Germanic peoples during the internecine civil wars that brought him to sole power over the Roman Empire. Among them were the Frisii and Chamavi, who were described in the Panegyrici Latini (Manuscript VIII) as being forced to resettle within Roman territory as laeti (i. e., Roman era serfs) in c. 296. This is the last reference to the ancient Frisii in the historical record. However, they appear once more, now in the archaeological record. The discovery of a type of pottery unique to 4th century Frisia known as Tritzum earthenware shows that an unknown number of them were resettled in Flanders and Kent under the aforementioned Roman coercion. If there were any Frisii left in Frisia, they fell victim to the whims of nature, civil strife and piracy. After several hundred years of favorable conditions, the natural environment in the low lying coastal regions of northwestern Europe began to deteriorate c. 250 AD and gradually worsened over the next 200 years. Rising sea levels and storm surges combined to flood some areas. Many deserted village sites were silted over. The situation was probably aggravated by a shift to a cooler, wetter climate in the region as well as by the introduction of malaria and other epidemic diseases. In the 3rd and 4th centuries the population of Frisia steadily decreased, and by the 5th century it dropped dramatically. Archaeological surveys indicate that only small pockets of the original population stayed behind (e. g. in the Groningen coastal marshes). The coastal lands remained largely unpopulated for the next one or two centuries. As soon as conditions improved, Frisia received an influx of new settlers, mostly from regions later characterized as Saxon, and these would eventually be referred to as 'Frisians', though they were not necessarily descended from the ancient Frisii. It is these 'new Frisians' who are largely the ancestors of the medieval and modern Frisians.

One of the entries of the Notitia Dignitatum reads "Tribunus cohortis primae Frixagorum Vindobala", referring to the office of a tribune of the first cohort of the 'Frixagi', once stationed at Vindobala (at modern Rudchester) on Hadrian's Wall. Efforts have sometimes been made to connect this auxiliary unit with the Frisii by supposing that the original document must have said "Frisiavonum" and a later copyist mistakenly wrote "Frixagorum". Some works make the claim in passing, perhaps citing someone else's claim of a copyist's error as justification.

The Panegyrici Latini in c. 297 is the last mention of the Frisii by that name. There is no mention of them by any other name for nearly three centuries, when the name re emerges as 'Frisians'. These later references are all connected to the ascendancy of the Franks under the Merovingians, who referred to the people who had resettled the lands of the ancient Frisii as 'Frisians'. The interpretation of these references to 'Frisians' as references to the ancient Frisii has occasionally been made. The Byzantine scholar Procopius, writing c. 565 in his Gothic Wars (Bk IV, Ch 20), said that "Brittia" in his time (a different word from his more usual "Bretannia") was occupied by three peoples: Angles, Frisians (Φρἰσσονες) and Britons. Procopius said that he was relating information from an informant, likely a member of a Frankish delegation to the court at Byzantium, and did not assert the information as fact. Other information that he related included the assertion that there were no horses in Britain, that Hadrian's Wall separated the temperate parts of the island from the uninhabitable parts, and that 'countless people' had attested that Britain was the home of dead souls. His information about Britain, while occasionally useful, is not considered authoritative. The Frisians are unlike the Saxons not mentioned in the 6th century Frankish Table of Nations, nor in the Etymologiae of Isidore of Seville. Venantius Fortunatus was a poet to the Frankish Merovingian court and wrote a eulogy to the Merovingian king Chilperic, who had died in 584. A list of peoples who were said to fear Chilperic's power is given and includes the Frisians, as well as the Suebi, Goths, Basques, Danes, Jutes, Saxons, and Britons. The eulogies of this age were intended to praise the high status of the subject, and the sudden reappearance of a list of old tribal names fitted into poetic meters is given little historical value.

Frisia appears in the Old English heroic poem Beowulf, which tells a story of events of the early 6th century, as well as in the Widsith and several other poems. In Beowulf, the Geatish king Hygelac is killed while raiding Frisia. It has been noted that Gregory of Tours (c. 538–594) mentioned a Danish king Chlochilaichus who was killed while invading Frankish territory in the early 6th century, suggesting that, in this instance, Beowulf might have a basis in historical facts. However, Gregory was writing little more than fifty years after the events and may have based his story on eyewitness accounts, yet he makes no mention of Frisia or the Frisians. The poems are not considered by scholars to give a reliable account of historical events, as they largely rely on literary conventions, lore and tradition. As a reflection of these conventions and as a mirror of the society in which they emerged, they are, nevertheless, an important source. The Historia Brittonum by Nennius gives a list of 33 ancient cities of Britain, among them 'Cair Peris', its location unspecified. It also contains a reference to the Picts and Orkney and a place 'ultra mare Frenessicum'. The 'Cair' in 'Cair Peris' is reasonably taken to be Welsh 'Caer' (fort), while 'Peris' is a matter of speculation and conjecture, including the supposition that it is a reference to 'Frisians'. In the context of the Historia, the 'mare Frenessicum' coincides nicely with the Firth of Forth. While the Historia is often useful to scholars, it is also the source of storyline details that have no discernible provenance. It was written more than 500 years after the last unambiguous reference to the ancient Frisii (the Panegyrici Latini in c. 297), and at a time when medieval Frisia and the Frisians were playing a dominant role in North Sea trade. The idea that the Frisians might have settled in Scotland and Ireland has triggered several imaginative histories. Some 19th century writers even suggested that the Fomorians actually may have been Frisians, based on the disputed etymology of Fomorians as 'the underseas ones'. These suggestions, however, have not been followed up by subsequent research and their conclusions are not supported by modern scholership.