Of Rugians and Rani

The name of the Rani tribe has given people headaches for many years.  The Greater Poland Chronicle derived it as follows:

“The Rani are called so for when fighting enemies they had the custom to yell ‘rani!’ ‘rani!’ that is, wound ’em!, wound ’em!”

GPC

Item Rani seu Rana dicuntur ex eo, quia semper in conflictu hostium vociferare solebant rani! rani! id est vulnera, vulnera.

Here’s Brueckner on rana (wound):

rana

Widukind writes of the Ruani.  In the Life of Otto we hear of the Rutheni (terra barbarorum, qui Rutheni dicuntur; also Ruthi sive Rutheni, de Rutzen; and Brutenis; also Ruthos sive Ruthenos de Rutzen; but Pomerania post se in Oceano Daciam habet et Rugiam insulam).  Adam of Bremen spoke of “Rani or Runi… a might Slavic peoples” (Rani vel Runi… fortissima Slavorum gens).  Some years later Helmold of Bosau wrote of “Rani called Rugiani” (Rani qui et Rugiani [or Rani sive Rugiani]).  Wibald of Corvey said in 1149: “which [island] is called Ruyana by the Germans, Rana by the Slavs.” (pro recipienda regione, quae a Teutonicis Rujana, a Slavis Rana dicitur).  Saxo Grammaticus has the name as Rugiani.

Now let’s look at something else: the etymology of the name and the origin of the tribe.

The predominant theories provide two postulates:

  • that the name Rani is derived from the Germanic Rugians, and
  • that the Slavs arrived on the island of Ruegen sometime in the second half of the 8th century.

As we can show, one of these is likely false.

The conversion of the Rugians to the name Rani is supposed to have happened approximately as follows:

Rugii > Rugiani > Rujani > Rani

As an aside, we are told that it was the Germans who called the island of Ruegen Rujana whereas the Slavs called it Rana (a Teutonicis Rujana, a Slavis Rana).  If this is true then it seems that it was the German name that changed demonstrably whereas we see no proven changes in the Slavic name.

As another aside, the Germanic etymology of Ruegen and the Germanic tribe of the Rugii seems as uncertain as the Slavic one.

Be that as it may, the suggestion is that the Rugii lived on the island of Ruegen and then some or all of them headed out to conquer the Roman Empire, etc.  In their place there appeared the Slavs who eventually settled on the island of Ruegen (in the 8th century or so), overtook the remnants of the Rugii along with their name and changed the latter to Rujani and then shortened it to Rani.

Can all this be true?

As regards the etymological derivation of Rani we can say only that it seems improbable but not impossible.

As regards, the arrival of the “Rani” Slavs on Ruegen in the 8th century this too is theoretically possible.

The problem arises when we ask what the name of the Slavic tribe which “took over” Ruegen before it did so?  One might say what does that matter?  And yet it does.

The reason for this is that the name Rani (as well as Granii) appears well before the 8th century in a famous passage in Getica (chapter 3) wherein Jordanes writes (in the 6th century although it is not clear whether this description does not refer to an even earlier time):

“Furthermore there are in the same neighborhood the Grannii, Augandzi, [Eunixi, Taetel, Rugi,]* Arochi and Ranii, over whom Roduulf was king not many years ago. But he despised his own kingdom and fled to the embrace of Theodoric, king of the Goths, finding there what he desired. All these nations surpassed the Germans in size and spirit, and fought with the cruelty of wild beasts.”

Getica

(Sunt quamquam et horum positura Grannii, Augandzi, [Eunixi, Taetel, Rugi,]* Arochi, Ranii, quibus non ante multos annos Roduulf rex fuit, qui contempto proprio regno ad Theodorici Gothorum regis gremio convolavit et, ut desiderabat, invenit. Hae itaque gentes, Germanis corpore et animo grandiores, pugnabant beluina saevitia.)

* we have followed the translators here; while the manuscript above shows zieunixitae and telrugi or, if you will, zieunixi taetel rugi, this seems to be a result of carrying over the “zi” – see here from the MGH (the above is P):

mghhPutting aside the fact that Jordanes clearly distinguishes between these [Scandinavian?] nations and the Germans and distinguishes the Rugii from the Ranii (and the Granii whoever they were), we are confronted with the question:

How could there be Rani in the 6th century if the Slavs had not reached Ruegen until 200 years later?

As we said, one of the above statements is likely false.  Either the name Rani is not derived from the name Rugii/Ruegen or the Slavic Rani arrived (or were) on Ruegen much earlier than the 8th century.

Of course, it IS possible to solve this conundrum and still preserve both propositions but doing so requires some rather precarious  footwork… The Rugii may have ran (no pun intended) into some Slavs on the former’s excursions all over Europe during the Voelkerwanderung times.  The name may have then transferred to the Slavs.  The Slavs may have subsequently altered it to Rani and so forth…

Even so, how did these Rani then find their way to the island of Ruegen?  Did they find out about it from the Germanic Rugii and headed for it afterwards arriving around the turn of the 9th century?

Or maybe the island was not even called Ruegen in the 6th century and only the Slavs brought the name?  But if the Slavs were already called Rani, then why did the island ever become known as Ruegen?

(Bede in Book 5, chapter 9 of his Ecclesiastical History of England discusses Bishop Egbert (circa year 688) and his ambitions to convert some continental Europeans listing “the Frisians, the Rugini, the Danes, the Huns, the Old Saxons, and the Boructuari.” lt is unclear who these Rugini are at this point.  They could be Germanic Rugini or they could be Slavs.  Certainly, the Huns were not (at least originally) Germanic).

Something is not right here.

Of course, it is also true that rano refers to the “morning.”  Back to Brueckner:

pren

It is also noteworthy that the word świt means “dawn” whereas Svantovit/Sventovit or Świętowit was a Deity worshipped among the Rani on Arkona.  The name of that Deity is usually translated as Strong Master or Strong Lord.  But maybe it meant the Dawn Lord?

swit

If so He would be celebrated in the morning, i.e., in the ранок or rano. Note that in most Slavic languages “morning” is jutro.  Regarding the possibility of connections of that word with yester-day and the Goddess Eostre of Easter (as well more Bede) see here.

Post Scriptum

Incidentally, the Germanic Rugii is supposedly derived from the word for rye (rugr), i.e., rye people.  They have been posited to have migrated from Norway to Ruegen at the beginning of the Christian Era.  They may have from Rogaland in Southwest of the country (though whether that was a major rye growing area is a question).  If so, then they made it just in time to be mentioned by Tacitus in Germania.

All of this is uncertain. For one thing, a similar word for rye may have existed in Slavic languages.  For another, a similar name was born by the Slavic Reregi or (?) Rarogi.  Rügen in German means as much as “reprimand” (therefrom, supposedly, the Polish rugować).  Ruga itself also means “wrinkle” in some Latin languages.

Finally, we should mention that Rugila (in the form Ρούγας (Rougas), Ρουας (Rouas), and ΄Ρωίλας (Roilas)) was a Hun leader before Bleda and Attila (who were probably his nephews) in the 420s and 430s.

As for rana, curiously, Rana is also the name of a Norwegian municipality – rana – perhaps – meaning “fast” in Old Norwegian.  There is also a mountain in Norway named Råna.  On the other side of the world, we have a Nepali dynasty by the same name (now well remembered) and the name rana signifies too a “ruler” in Rajput.  Also Rana is a rather popular name from Iran to India.  Moving further afield, Ra’na was a village in Palestine (now Gal On) and is a town in Burkina Faso.  Coming back towards Slavic lands, two villages bear the name in the Czech Republic.

Of course, there is also the matter of the spear from Dahmsdorf-Müncheberg (in Brandenburg so relatively close to Arkona) inscribed with, supposedly, the following text:  ᚱᚨᚾᛃᚨ (ranja). Not rugia but ranja.

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November 23, 2016

5 thoughts on “Of Rugians and Rani

  1. Marek

    Rujen to pażdziernik, Rujewit więc jest Dionizosem, bogiem Wagi, a rugia jego wyspą, w wersii żeńskiej wenus, jutrzenka, venera czciciel (dzidziela), ruja to płodność

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  2. Tom

    Good summary of the Rani and Rugi. It is important to note that Rugi would be pronounced in Latin with a soft “g” (as in Italian today and in the English word “German”). So “Rugi” would be translated as “red headed people” in Polish. Similarly the Lugi of southern Poland would be translated as “the people” in Polish. A major male DNA line in Rogaland is R1a-Z284 a branch of R1a that dominates the Slavic and Baltic peoples of central and Eastern Europe. R1a-z284 is found in all areas of Europe invaded by the Norsemen, Scotland, eastern England, Ireland etc. This male line would have to have originated in northeastern Germany or northwestern Poland (possibly Rugen) where there is a small number of males descended from this DNA line. So who were the early Rugi and Rani? Probably a people dominated by proto- Slavs and/or proto-Balts mixed with some Old Europeans (I male DNA lines) and possibly some Italo-Celts (R1b male DNA lines). They were on the coast of the Baltic Sea and, similar to the Mediterranean Sea coasts, would have a mixture of the various peoples who sailed there. The city of Jumne (today’s Wolin Poland not far from Rugen) was said in the early Middle Ages to be a large multi-ethnic city consisting mainly of Slavs but also Saxons, Romans and Greeks who were allowed to settle there as long as they didn’t push the Christian religion. Jumne would have been the terminus of the amber trail which ran from the Baltic Sea to Rome and thus known by the Romans and Greeks. Why were the Rugi called Germans and also Goths? There was no ethnicity test at the time so people were grouped by lifestyle, appearance, types of weapons, etc and the people in the area of Germania were generally a settled people as opposed to the Sarmatians who were raiding horsemen from east of the Vistula. The name German seems to come from the Celtic name for the people across the Rhine. In the early Middle Ages this people didn’t call themselves Germans but Saxons, Westphalians, Bardi, Swabians, Thuringians, etc.. For example, Ptolemy has Sarmatia ranging from north of the Black Sea to the Baltic Sea (referred to one time as the Sarmatian Lake) but it is clear that there were multiple ethnic groups and languages in this area at the time.

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