A question has come up as to what did Wersebe actually write. We’ve included the text below in the original German but provide here the English version of the relevant portion.
“I can’t help but make an observation which, I hope, even if new, after review will not be found without basis. I believe namely that Tacitus’ Suevi are to be understood as Slavs. The Thuringians who he counts among the Suevi, were, it is true, as far as the subsequent oldest sources can tell, not Slavs; though the Slavs could have during the times of Tacitus had the Thuringians amongst themselves and thereafter pushed [them] back across the Saale, or perhaps the Thurigians could have also been only in league with them [the Slavs]. Aside from these Thuringians, Tacitus does not count among the Suevi the inhabitants of any region that did not [also] later belong to the Slavic peoples; for even in a part of the Lüneburg region, where the Langobards had their seats, there live even now the Wends [i.e., Slavs]. Every Slavic province of Germany is to be understood among his Suevic lands. In fact, the ancient [authors] counted many of the Slavic nations among the Deutschen/Germans; [Pomponius] Mela names the River Vistula [but which is that?] as the boundary between Germany and Sarmatia; but Tacitus goes even further and mentions among the German/Deutsche peoples even the Aesti in Estonia and the Finns; only the Sarmatians or the actual Poles, does he exclude from Germany. But since he very much distinguishes the Suevi in their customs, their clothes and so forth from the other Germans/Deutschen, this agrees with the national differences between the Slavs and the actual Germans, which subsequently became even more visible because the latter [Germans] accepted Christianity so much earlier [than the Slavs].”
[Note that Wersebe excludes Poles from Germans but also from “Slavs” – by assigning them to the “Sarmatians”. This is presumably based on his being aware of the Polish nobility’s penchant for identifying with the ancient Sarmatians.]
[Note also that Tacitus does not use the word Deutsche anywhere – the only possibly similar name is that of Tuisco – the Germanic deity; Wersebe assumes that these Germans all were in fact Deutsche – it is for that reason that he states his belief that Tacitus counts Slavs and Aesti and Finns among Deutsche – but Tacitus does no such thing, he counts all these peoples – depending on your reading – as peoples of Germania, arguably, as Germani – not as Deutsche]
Note that this view was held by a number of German historians in the beginning of the 19th century. Later, as time passed, people like Theodor Pösche became rather the exceptions. One can explain this by clinging to the perception that our knowledge of the past grew substantially over the course of the 19th century… but one can’t help to notice that German historiography became a lot more assertive about claiming the Suevi once the “unification” of Germany occurred and, what previously were merely academic debates, took on a politicized and nationalized aura. This is because the Suevi were the key people of Tacitus’ Germania. If the Suevi – the quintessential Germans of Tacitus – were not, in the modern sense of the word, Germans – but someone else, then Germany as one unified country would become a bit of a myth. In historical terms it would have to be seen as partitioned, with the East as well as significant portions of the South and West being assigned to a people with whose descendants (or at least relatives) Bismarckian Germany was in a Kulturkampf. In a word, the “true” – Nordic – Germany would – true to the Nordic name – have been reduced to portions of the North abutting Denmark. And if one were to believe that the Vandals were Germanized or, really, Nordicized Slavs then even that would be questionable.
The question of the Suevi – whatever its ultimate resolution – was thus critical to the continued existence of the “new” German state – at least within the ethnic parameters that that state set out for itself as defining its national identity. Without the Suevi what was the raison d’être of the German state? Without them it would merely be an artificial administrative construction of the Hohenzollerns set up for their amusement. One has to wonder whether the not infrequently demonstrated desire of some German authors to view some Balts as descendants of “Germanic”, i.e., Nordic tribes was also rooted in the conundrum of having the German Reich be realized in the name of Prussians – a people at once not Nordic and who could not be easily relabeled as such for the simple reason that – unlike the Suevi – they chanced to live in a period when ethnographic historical records clearly established them as Balts.
None of the above, of course, means that the Suevi (which Suevi?) were Slavic (whatever that means) but it does mean that there were plenty of interests who did not want any Suevi to be anything but Ur-Deutsche.
But, of course, this von Wersebe fellow is a suspicious one. We already noted that Pösche may have had Sorb ancestors… But maybe Wersebe or (as earlier) Wersabe has something to do with Warszawa? The name comes from the town of Wersabe – near Bremen. On the Veleti in the North we wrote here as well as here – mostly about the Netherlands – but who knows (for Belgium see here).
And the Veleti, well, they seem relevant:
“Among the different peoples who make up this pagan race, there is one that in ancient times held sovereign power. Their king was called Majik and they themselves were known as Walitaba. In the past, all the Saqaliba recognized their superiority, because it was from among them that they chose the paramount ruler, and all the other chieftains considered themselves his vassals.”
That would explain a lot, of course.
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