Eburones - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Eburones were a Belgic

Belgae

The Belgae were a group of tribes living in northern Gaul, on the west bank of the Rhine, in the 3rd century BC, and later also in Britain, and possibly even Ireland...

people who lived in the northeast of Gaul

Gaul

Gaul was a region of Western Europe during the Iron Age and Roman era, encompassing present day France, Luxembourg and Belgium, most of Switzerland, the western part of Northern Italy, as well as the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the left bank of the Rhine. The Gauls were the speakers of...

, near the river Meuse

Meuse

Meuse is a department in northeast France, named after the River Meuse.-History:Meuse is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on March 4, 1790...

and the modern provinces of Belgian

Limburg (Belgium)

Limburg is the easternmost province of modern Flanders, which is one of the three main political and cultural sub-divisions of modern Belgium. It is located west of the river Meuse . It borders on the Dutch provinces of North Brabant and Limburg and the Belgian provinces of Liège, Flemish Brabant...

and Dutch Limburg

Limburg (Netherlands)

Limburg is the southernmost of the twelve provinces of the Netherlands. It is located in the southeastern part of the country and bordered by the province of Gelderland to the north, Germany to the east, Belgium to the south and part of the west, andthe Dutch province of North Brabant partly to...

, in the period immediately before it was conquered by Rome. They played a major role in Julius Caesar

Julius Caesar

Gaius Julius Caesar was a Roman general and statesman and a distinguished writer of Latin prose. He played a critical role in the gradual transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire....

's account of his "Gallic Wars"

Commentarii de Bello Gallico

Commentarii de Bello Gallico is Julius Caesar's firsthand account of the Gallic Wars, written as a third-person narrative. In it Caesar describes the battles and intrigues that took place in the nine years he spent fighting local armies in Gaul that opposed Roman domination.The "Gaul" that Caesar...

, as the most important tribe within the Germani group of tribes east of the Rhine. The name of the Eburones was wiped out after their failed revolt against Caesar's forces during the Gallic Wars, and whether any significant part of the population lived on in the area as Tungri

Tungri

The Tungri were a tribe, or group of tribes, who lived in the Belgic part Gaul, during the times of the Roman empire. They were described by Tacitus as being the same people who were first called "Germani" , meaning that all other tribes who were later referred to this way, including those in...

, the tribal name found here later, is uncertain.

Location

Caesar is the primary source for the Eburones' location at Roman

Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....

contact. The exact borders are difficult to be certain about, but the region corresponds to some extent with the later Roman district of civitas Tungrorum on the middle of the Meuse

Meuse

Meuse is a department in northeast France, named after the River Meuse.-History:Meuse is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on March 4, 1790...

(Dutch: Maas) river north of the Ardennes

Ardennes

The Ardennes is a region of extensive forests, rolling hills and ridges formed within the Givetian Ardennes mountain range, primarily in Belgium and Luxembourg, but stretching into France , and geologically into the Eifel...

, and including all or most of the region of Limburg (now divided between a Dutch

Limburg (Netherlands)

and Belgian

Limburg (Belgium)

province), plus the area around modern Aachen

Aachen

Aachen has historically been a spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Aachen was a favoured residence of Charlemagne, and the place of coronation of the Kings of Germany. Geographically, Aachen is the westernmost town of Germany, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands, ...

, and probably more of the German Rhineland west of the Rhine.

Linguist Maurits Gysseling proposed that placenames such as Avendoren (Tienen), Averdoingt

Averdoingt

Averdoingt is a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department in northern France.-Geography:A small farming village located 19 miles west of Arras at the junction of the D81 and D81E roads.-Population:-Places of interest:...

(Arras

Arras

Arras is the capital of the Pas-de-Calais department in northern France. The historic centre of the Artois region, its local speech is characterized as a Picard dialect...

), Averbode

Averbode

Averbode may refer to:* Averbode , a village in Belgium* Averbode Abbey, an abbey in the village* Averbode , the publishing company owned by the abbey...

, and Avernas (Hannut

Hannut

Hannut is a municipality of Belgium. It lies in the country's Walloon Region and Province of Liege. On January 1, 2006 Hannut had a total population of 14,291...

) may be derived from the Eburones.

At one point Caesar says that the chief part of the territory of the Eburones was between the Mosa (Maas

Maas

Maas is the name, in English borrowed from the Dutch language, of a river that is also named Meuse , in English borrowed from French language. The practical use in English may be influenced by the context at a lower or upper stream location....

or Meuse

Meuse

Meuse is a department in northeast France, named after the River Meuse.-History:Meuse is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on March 4, 1790...

) and the Rhine. And "on this basis German scholars place them in the northern Eifel".

On the other hand, Caesar places Atuatuca

Atuatuca

Atuatuca was the name of one or more fortified settlements in the region between the Scheldt and Rhine rivers, during the "Gallic wars" of Julius Caesar. The word itself possibly meant "fortress". The pronuciation "Atuatuca" with a "t" is considered to be the original, despite many Latin documents...

, the fort of the Eburones, about the middle of the territory of the Eburones; and it is possible this was Tongeren, which had the ancient name of Aduatuca Tungrorum. But Atuatuca might have been a word for fortress, and so Spa

Spa

The term spa is associated with water treatment which is also known as balneotherapy. Spa towns or spa resorts typically offer various health treatments. The belief in the curative powers of mineral waters goes back to prehistoric times. Such practices have been popular worldwide, but are...

, or somewhere similar in the Ardennes, has also been proposed, because it had a narrow defile to its west, suitable for ambush, a type of landscape less common as one goes north in this region, towards the Campine

Campine

The Campine is a natural region situated chiefly in north-eastern Belgium and parts of the south-western Netherlands which once consisted mainly of extensive moors, tracts of sandy heath, and wetlands...

. And in the same passage, Caesar describes the Segni

Segni (tribe)

The Segni were a tribe living in Belgic Gaul when Julius Caesar's Roman forces entered the area in 57 BCE. They are know from his account of the Gallic War. They were one of a group of tribes listed by his local informants as the Germani of Belgian Gaul, along with the Eburones, Condrusi, Paemani ,...

and Condrusi as being south of the Eburones, between them and the Treviri, who lived near the Moselle

Moselle

Moselle is a department in the east of France named after the river Moselle.- History :Moselle is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on March 4, 1790...

. This is difficult to reconcile with a territory near the Eiffel

Eiffel

-Engineering:* Eiffel Tower in Paris, designed by Gustave Eiffel in motif as twin to the Eifel ridge, re-dubbed Maria Pia Bridge, previously built in o Porto, Portugal - The Twin Towers of Eiffel...

because the Condrusi

Condrusi

The Condrusi were a Germanic tribe of ancient Belgium, which takes its name from the political and ethnic group known to the Romans as the Belgae. The Condrusi were probably located in the region now known as Condroz, named after them, between Liège and Namur...

are the origin of the name of the Condroz

Condroz

The Condroz is a region in the center of Wallonia and in the south of Belgium. Its unofficial capital is Ciney....

region in the Ardennes, south of the Meuse, and west of the Eiffel. "No cultural groupings can be isolated to suit the Eburones in the north Eifel" according to Wightman. In contrast, she also writes that:-

Belgian archaeologists identify them with the cultural group in northern Limburg and Kempen (Campine
Campine
The Campine is a natural region situated chiefly in north-eastern Belgium and parts of the south-western Netherlands which once consisted mainly of extensive moors, tracts of sandy heath, and wetlands...

) which showed such strong continuity in Urnfield times. This would certainly account for the propinquity of Eburones and Menapii mentioned by Caesar; the distriution of war-time stater
Stater
The stater was an ancient coin used in various regions of Greece.-History:The stater is mostly of Macedonian origin. Celtic tribes brought it in to Europe after using it as mercenaries in north Greece. It circulated from the 8th century BC to 50 AD...

s attributed to the Eburones (a mixture of tranrhenine and Treveran elements) also corresponds with this group."

Furthermore, to the north and northwest, the Eburones bordered on the Menapii

Menapii

The Menapii were a Belgic tribe of northern Gaul in pre-Roman and Roman times. Their territory according to Strabo, Caesar and Ptolemy stretched from the mouth of the Rhine in the north, and southwards along the west of the Schelde. Their civitas under the Roman empire was Cassel , near Thérouanne...

, who lived near the mouth of the Rhine river, though "protected by one continued extent of morasses and woods", and had ties of hospitality with them. And at one point Caesar indicates that when the Eburones went into hiding, they not only dispersed into the Ardennes and morasses, but "those who were nearest the ocean concealed themselves in the islands which the tides usually form". This is also seen to indicate that at least part of the Eburones lived west of the Maas. Nico Roymans has argued, based on concentrations of coin finds, that there were Eburones as far north as the eastern part of the Dutch river-area, an area later inhabited by Batavians, a new Germanic group who may have included remnants of the older Eburone population.

When the Tencteri and Usipetes

Tencteri and Usipetes

The Tencteri and Usipetes were an ancient Germanic tribe, or tribes, located on the eastern bank of the lower Rhine in the 1st century BC. They are known primarily from Julius Caesar's account of his campaigns against them in his Commentarii de Bello Gallico.Tacitus mentions the Tencteri and...

, who were Germanic tribes, crossed the Rhine from Germania

Germania

Germania was the Greek and Roman geographical term for the geographical regions inhabited by mainly by peoples considered to be Germani. It was most often used to refer especially to the east of the Rhine and north of the Danube...

(55 BC

55 BC

Year 55 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Crassus and Pompey...

E), they first fell on the Menapii

Menapii

, and then advanced into the territories of the Eburones and Condrusi

Condrusi

, who were both "under the protection of" the Treveri

Treveri

The Treveri or Treviri were a tribe of Gauls who inhabited the lower valley of the Moselle from around 150 BCE, at the latest, until their eventual absorption into the Franks...

to the south.

Apart from being under the protection of the Treveri, the Eburones also had close dealings with the Nervii, a large Belgic (but possibly not Germanic, or less Germanic) tribe to the southwest of them, with their later Roman capital in Bavay

Bavay

Bavay is a commune in the Nord department in northern France.It lies 15 m. ESE of Valenciennes by railway.-History:Under the name of Bagacum or Bavacum, the town was the capital of the Nervii and, under the Roman Empire, an important center of roads, the meeting-place of which was marked by a...

. Neighbouring both the Nervii and the Eburones, probably between them, were also the Aduatuci

Aduatuci

The Aduatuci or Atuatuci were, according to Caesar, a Germanic tribe formed in east Belgium descended from the Cimbri and Teutones, who are tribes thought to have originated in the area of Denmark. They were allowed to settle in the region by local tribes...

(or Atuatuci). Caesar reported that Ambiorix had been forced to pay tribute to them before the Romans came, and that his own son and nephew had been kept by them as hostages in slavery and chains. It was with these two tribes, that the Eburones could quickly form a military alliance against Caesar's forces. The location of the Aduatuci is not clear, but their name appears to be related to the names of both the capital of the Eburones "Aduatuca" and the capital of the later Tungri "Aduatuca Tungrorum" (modern Tongeren) which may have been the same place.

Caesar reports that during his conflict with them, the Eburones had some sort of alliance, organized via their allies the Treveri, with the Germanic tribes over the Rhine.

Involvement in Caesar's Gallic Wars

Caesar's forces clashed with an alliance of Belgic tribes in 57 BC in the Battle of the Sabis

Battle of the Sabis

The Battle of the Sabis, also known as the Battle of the Sambre or the Battle against the Nervians , was fought in 57 BC in the area known today as Wallonia, between the legions of the Roman Republic and an association of Belgic tribes, principally the Nervii...

. Before that battle, information from the Remi

Remi

The Remi were a Belgic tribe of north-eastern Gaul in the 1st century BC. They occupied the northern Champagne plain, on the southern fringes of the Forest of Ardennes, between the rivers Mosa and Matrona , and along the river valleys of the Aisne and its tributaries the Aire and the Vesle.Their...

, a tribe allied with Rome, stated that the Germani (the Condrusi, the Eburones, the Caeraesi, and the Paemani) had collectively promised, they thought, about 40,000 men. These joined 60,000 Bellovaci

Bellovaci

The Bellovaci were among the most powerful and numerous of the Belgic tribes of north-eastern Gaul conquered by Julius Caesar in 57 BC. The name survives today in the French city of Beauvais, called by the Romans Caesaromagus.- Geography :...

, 50,000 Suessiones

Suessiones

The Suessiones were a Belgic tribe of Western Belgium in the 1st century BC, inhabiting the region between the Oise and the Marne, based around the present-day city of Soissons...

, 50,000 Nervii

Nervii

The Nervii were an ancient Germanic tribe, and one of the most powerful Belgic tribes; living in the northeastern hinterlands of Gaul, they were known to trek long distances to engage in various wars and functions...

, 15,000 Atrebates

Atrebates

The Atrebates were a Belgic tribe of Gaul and Britain before the Roman conquests.- Name of the tribe :Cognate with Old Irish aittrebaid meaning 'inhabitant', Atrebates comes from proto-Celtic *ad-treb-a-t-es, 'inhabitants'. The Celtic root is treb- 'building', 'home' The Atrebates (singular...

, 10,000 Ambiani

Ambiani

The Ambiani were a Belgic people of Celtic language, who were said to be able to muster 10,000 armed men, in 57 BC, the year of Julius Caesar's Belgic campaign. They submitted to Caesar. Their country lay in the valley of the Samara ; and their chief town Samarobriva, afterwards called Ambiani and...

, 25,000 Morini

Morini

The Morini were a Belgic tribe in the time of the Roman Empire. We know little about their language but one of their cities, Boulogne-sur-Mer was called Bononia by Zosimus and Bonen in the Middle Ages. Zosimus mentioned the Low Germanic character of the city...

, 9,000 Menapii, 10,000 Caleti, 10,000 Velocasses, 10,000 Viromandui, and 19,000 Aduatuci. The whole force was led by Galba

Galba

Galba , was Roman Emperor for seven months from 68 to 69. Galba was the governor of Hispania Tarraconensis, and made a bid for the throne during the rebellion of Julius Vindex...

, king of the Suessiones. However, the alliance did not work. The Suessiones and Bellovaci surrendered after the Romans defended the Remi and then moved towards their lands. And after this the Ambiani offered no further resistance and the Nervii, along with the Atrebates and Viromandui, formed the most important force on the day of the battle. The Eburones are not mentioned specifically in the description of the battle itself, but after the defeat the Eburones became important as one of the tribes continuing to resist Roman overlordship.

In 54 BC, Caesar's forces were still in Belgic territory, having just returned from their second expedition to Britain

Caesar's invasions of Britain

In his Gallic Wars, Julius Caesar invaded Britain twice, in 55 and 54 BC. The first invasion, made late in summer, was either intended as a full invasion or a reconnaissance-in-force expedition...

, and needed to be wintered. Crops had not been good, due to a drought, and this imposition upon the communities led to new conflict. This insurrection started only 15 days after a legion and five cohorts (one and a half legions) under the command of Caesar's legates, Quintus Titurius Sabinus

Quintus Titurius Sabinus

Quintus Titurius Sabinus, one of Caesar's legates during the Gallic Wars. He is first mentioned in Caesar's campaign against the Remi, in 57 BC, and in the following year he was sent by Caesar with three legions against the Venelli, Curiosolitae, and Lexovii , who were led by Viridovix...

and Lucius Aurunculeius Cotta

Lucius Aurunculeius Cotta

Lucius Aurunculeius Cotta – officer in the Gallic army of Gaius Julius Caesar. The little we know of Cotta is found in Book V of Caesar's De Bello Gallico...

arrived in their winter quarters in the country of the Eburones. The Eburones, encouraged by messages from the Treveri

Treveri

The Treveri or Treviri were a tribe of Gauls who inhabited the lower valley of the Moselle from around 150 BCE, at the latest, until their eventual absorption into the Franks...

king Indutiomarus

Indutiomarus

Indutiomarus was a leading aristocrat of the Treveri at the time of Caesar's conquest of Gaul...

, and headed by their two kings, Ambiorix

Ambiorix

Ambiorix was, together with Catuvolcus, prince of the Eburones, leader of a Belgic tribe of north-eastern Gaul , where modern Belgium is located...

and Cativolcus

Cativolcus

Cativolcus or Catuvolcus was king of half of the country of the Eburones, a people between the Meuse and Rhine rivers, united with Ambiorix, the other king, in the insurrection against the Romans in 54 BC; but when Julius Caesar in the next year proceeded to devastate the territories of the...

, attacked the Roman camp; and after inducing the Romans to leave their stronghold on the promise of a safe passage, massacred nearly all of them (approximately 6000 men). Encouraged by this victory, Ambiorix rode personally first to the Aduatuci and then to the Nervi, arguing for a new attack on the Roman wintering in Nervian territory under the command by Quintus Tullius Cicero

Quintus Tullius Cicero

Quintus Tullius Cicero was the younger brother of the celebrated orator, philosopher and statesman Marcus Tullius Cicero. He was born into a family of the equestrian order, as the son of a wealthy landowner in Arpinum, some 100 kilometres south-east of Rome.- Biography :Cicero's well-to-do father...

, brother of the famous orator

Cicero

Marcus Tullius Cicero , was a Roman philosopher, statesman, lawyer, political theorist, and Roman constitutionalist. He came from a wealthy municipal family of the equestrian order, and is widely considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists.He introduced the Romans to the chief...

. The Nervii agreed and summoned forces quickly from several tribes under their government, Centrones

Centrones

The Ceutrones were a pre-Roman Celtic tribe of ancient Gaul that controlled regions of the Graian Alps....

, Grudii, Levaci, Pleumoxii, and Geiduni. This was thwarted by timely intervention of Caesar, and the Belgic allies dispersed, Caesar "fearing to pursue them very far, because woods and morasses intervened, and also [because] he saw that they suffered no small loss in abandoning their position".

In the meantime Labienus, one of Caesar's most trusted generals, was wintering in the territory of the Treveri, and also came under threat when news of the Eburones rebellion spread. Eventually, he killed the king of the Treveri, Indutiomarus. "This affair having been known, all the forces of the Eburones and the Nervii which had assembled, depart; and for a short time after this action, Caesar was less harassed in the government of Gaul."

In the following year Caesar entered the country of the Eburones, and Ambiorix fled before him. Cativolcus poisoned himself with a concoction from a yew tree

Yew Tree

Yew Tree may refer to:*Yew, any of various coniferous plants *Yew Tree, West Bromwich, West Midlands, England...

. The country of the Eburones was difficult for the Romans, being woody and swampy in parts. Caesar invited the neighboring people to come and plunder the Eburones, "in order that the life of the Gauls might be hazarded in the woods rather than the legionary soldiers; at the same time, in order that a large force being drawn around them, the race and name of that state may be annihilated for such a crime". The Sicambri

Sicambri

The Sicambri were a Germanic people living on the right bank of the Rhine river, near where it passes out of Germany and enters what is now called the Netherlands at the turn of the first millennium....

were one of the main raiders. While Caesar was ravaging the country of the Eburones, he left Quintus Tulius Cicero with a legion to protect the baggage and stores, at a place called Aduatuca, which he tells us, though he had not mentioned the name of the place before, was the place where Sabinus and Cotta had been killed. The plan to take advantage of the Sicambri back-fired when the Eburones explained to the Sicambri that the Roman supplies and booty, not the refugees, were the most attractive target for plundering.

Survival?

Caesar reports that he burnt every village and building that he could find in the territory of the Eburones, drove off all the cattle, and his men and beasts consumed all the corn that the weather of the autumnal season did not destroy. He left those who had hid themselves, if there were any, with the hope that they would all die of hunger in the winter. Caesar says that he wanted to annihilate the Eburones and their name, and indeed we hear no more of the Eburones. Their country was soon occupied by a Germanic tribe with a different name, the Tungri

Tungri

. However, as discussed further below, the report of Tacitus that the Tungri were the original "Germani" that came earliest over the Rhine, and the way this matches the description by Caesar of the Eburones and their neighbours, leads to the possibility that they survived under a new name.

One of the tribes associated with the Tungri, and apparently living in the north of their area, in the modern Campine

Campine

, were the Toxandrians. Like the Condrusi, one of the Germani tribes mentioned by Caesar, the Texuandri or Toxandrians were recognized as a distinct grouping for the administrative purpose of mustering troops. The etymology of this name is uncertain, but it has been proposed that it may be a translations of the original Gaulish name of the Eburones, referring to the yew tree (taxus
Taxus
Taxus is a genus of yews, small coniferous trees or shrubs in the yew family Taxaceae. They are relatively slow-growing and can be very long-lived, and reach heights of 1-40 m, with trunk diameters of up to 4 m...

in Latin

Latin

Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

).

As mentioned above, in the extreme north of the possible Eburone range, the area where the Maas and Rhine enter Holland today, it has been proposed that some Eburones, together with Germanic immigrants from further east, joined the new Batavian tribal grouping who contributed an important fighting force to the Roman military.

Germans or Celts or something else?

Despite being regarded as Belgae

Belgae

The Belgae were a group of tribes living in northern Gaul, on the west bank of the Rhine, in the 3rd century BC, and later also in Britain, and possibly even Ireland...

, a type of Gaul

Gaul

, Julius Caesar

Julius Caesar

says that the Condrusi

Condrusi

, Eburones, Caeraesi, Paemani

Paemani

The Paemani were a tribe of Gallia Belgica, mentioned by Julius Caesar in his commentary of his Gallic Wars. They were one of a group of tribes listed by his local Remi informants as the Germani, along with the Eburones, Condrusi, Caeraesi , and Segni...

, and Segni

Segni (tribe)

were called by the one name of Germani and had settled there some generations ago having come from the other side of the Rhine. The Eburones are therefore amongst the so-called Germani cisrhenani
Germani cisrhenani
Germani Cisrhenani is a Latin term which refers to that part of the tribal people known as Germani who lived to the west of the Rhine river. Cisrhenane, the English form of the word, means "this side of the Rhine"...

'Germans on this side of the Rhine', i.e. Germanic peoples

Germanic peoples

The Germanic peoples are an Indo-European ethno-linguistic group of Northern European origin, identified by their use of the Indo-European Germanic languages which diversified out of Proto-Germanic during the Pre-Roman Iron Age.Originating about 1800 BCE from the Corded Ware Culture on the North...

who lived south and west of the Rhine and may have been distinct from the Belgae. It is clear that the Belgic tribes of Gaul were culturally influenced by both Gaulish and Germanic neighbours, but the details, for example which languages they spoke, remains uncertain.

Tacitus

Tacitus

Publius Cornelius Tacitus was a senator and a historian of the Roman Empire. The surviving portions of his two major works—the Annals and the Histories—examine the reigns of the Roman Emperors Tiberius, Claudius, Nero and those who reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors...

suggests that it was in this very region that the term Germani started to be used, even though he mentions a tribe Caesar did not mention, the Tungri

Tungri

The name Germany, on the other hand, they say, is modern and newly introduced, from the fact that the tribes which first crossed the Rhine and drove out the Gauls, and are now called Tungrians, were then called Germans [Germani]. Thus what was the name of a tribe, and not of a race, gradually prevailed, till all called themselves by this self-invented name of Germans, which the conquerors had first employed to inspire terror.

This is often interpreted as implying that the Tungri, a name later used to refer to all the tribes of this area, were descendants of several tribes including the ones Caesar said were called Germani collectively. The name may even be an artificial name meaning "the sworn ones" or confederates.

There is still discussion about the possibility of these Germani not being "German" in terms of language and ancestry. A number of arguments have been proposed in favour of them having spoken a Celtic language.

Although the term Germanic has a linguistic definition today, Roman authors such as Caesar and Tacitus did not clearly divide the Celts from what they called the Germans based on languages. On the contrary, both authors tended to emphasize, partly for political reasons, the differences in terms of the levels of civilization which had been attained, with Germanic peoples being wilder and less civilized peoples, requiring military and political considerations.
The names of their kings, such as Ambiorix
Ambiorix
Ambiorix was, together with Catuvolcus, prince of the Eburones, leader of a Belgic tribe of north-eastern Gaul , where modern Belgium is located...

and Catuvolcus, are undoubtedly Celtic. Also the material culture
Material culture
In the social sciences, material culture is a term that refers to the relationship between artifacts and social relations. Studying a culture's relationship to materiality is a lens through which social and cultural attitudes can be discussed...

of the region, has been found by archaeologists to be highly Celtised, clearly in contact with the Celts of central Gaul, though far less rich in terms of Mediterranean luxury goods. They were not so strongly linked to the east of the Rhine. This would at the very least seem to suggest that at least the upper echelons were Celtic or had adopted a Celtic language and culture.
The tribal name has also been explained as being Celtic, *eburo- meaning 'yew
Taxus
Taxus is a genus of yews, small coniferous trees or shrubs in the yew family Taxaceae. They are relatively slow-growing and can be very long-lived, and reach heights of 1-40 m, with trunk diameters of up to 4 m...

(-tree)', which is also attested in personal names and place-names such as Eboracum (York
York
York is a walled city, situated at the confluence of the Rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. The city has a rich heritage and has provided the backdrop to major political events throughout much of its two millennia of existence...

) and Eburobrittium. This etymological derivation would give Caesar's story in which King Catuvolcus committed suicide by taking in the poisonous juice from the yew-tree an extra layer of meaning. The etymology is rendered somewhat less certain by the existence of Germanic *ebura 'boar', although this element is not as well represented in the contemporary onomastic record.
There are clues which are sometimes taken to indicate that the local peoples in former Eburonic territories spoke or adopted Gaulish
Gaulish language
The Gaulish language is an extinct Celtic language that was spoken by the Gauls, a people who inhabited the region known as Gaul from the Iron Age through the Roman period...

, or some form of it. One of the basic influences on the pronunciation of Dutch is a Gallo-Romance accent. This means that in the Gallo-Roman period
Gallo-Roman culture
The term Gallo-Roman describes the Romanized culture of Gaul under the rule of the Roman Empire. This was characterized by the Gaulish adoption or adaptation of Roman mores and way of life in a uniquely Gaulish context...

, when the Eburones had officially ceased to exist, the Latin which was then spoken was strongly influenced by a Gaulish substrate.

On the other hand, studies of placenames such as those of Maurits Gysseling, have been argued to show evidence of the very early presence of early Germanic languages throughout the area north of the Ardennes. The sound changes described by "Grimm's Law

Grimm's law

Grimm's law , named for Jacob Grimm, is a set of statements describing the inherited Proto-Indo-European stops as they developed in Proto-Germanic in the 1st millennium BC...

" appear to have affected names with older forms, apparently already in the 2nd century BCE. It is argued furthermore that the older language of the area, though apparently Indoeuropean was not Celtic (see Nordwestblock

Nordwestblock

The Nordwestblock , is a hypothetical cultural region, that several 20th century scholars propose as a prehistoric culture, thought to be roughly bounded by the rivers Meuse, Elbe, Somme and Oise and possibly the eastern part of England during the Bronze and Iron Ages The Nordwestblock (English:...

) and therefore that Celtic, though influential amongst the elite, might never have been the language of the area where the Eburones lived.

A further complication is that the population of the Eburones may have been made up of different components. As mentioned above, archaeological evidence implies continuity going back to Urnfield times, but with signs that militarized elites had moved in more than once, bringing forms of the Celtic-associated cultures known as Hallstatt

Hallstatt

Hallstatt, Upper Austria is a village in the Salzkammergut, a region in Austria. It is located near the Hallstätter See . At the 2001 census it had 946 inhabitants...

and later La Tène. No clear archaeological evidence has been found to confirm Caesar's account that the Eburones came from over the Rhine. And in the period when Caesar supposes that they arrived, it is also sometimes pointed out, the peoples immediately over the Rhine were most likely not speakers of a Germanic language.

External links

A website on the Eburones (largely in German)
Coin cache discovered in Maastricht, 13 Nov 2008 (The Associated Press), or read article in Dutch: 'Keltische goudschat ontdekt bij Maastricht', 13 Nov 2008 (Volkskrant).

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Location

Involvement in Caesar's Gallic Wars

Survival?

Germans or Celts or something else?

See also

External links