degenerate Romans continued to serve the empire,
whose allegiance they had renounced, by introducing
among their conquerors the first notions of agriculture,
the useful arts, and the conveniencies of civilized life.
An intercourse of commerce and language was gradually established between the opposite banks of the
Danube; and after Dacia became an independent state,
it often proved the firmest barrier of the empire against
the invasions of the savages of the north. A sense of
interest attached these more settled barbarians to the
alliance of Rome, and a permanent interest very frequently ripens into sincere and useful friendship. This
various colony, which filled the ancient province, and
was insensibly blended into one great people, still acknowledged the superior renown and authority of the
Gothic tribe, and claimed the fancied honour of a
Scandinavian origin. At the same time the lucky,
though accidental resemblance of the name of Getæ,
infused among the credulous Goths a vain persuasion,
that, in a remote age, their own ancestors, already
seated in the Dacian provinces, had received the in-
structions of Zamolxis, and checked the victorious arms
of Sesostris and Darius[1].
The Alemannic war. While the vigorous and moderate conduct of Aure- lian restored the Illyrian frontier, the nation of the Alemanni[2] violated the conditions of peace, which either Gallienus had purchased, or Claudius had imposed, and, inflamed by their impatient youth, suddenly flew to arms. Forty thousand horse appeared in the field[3], and the numbers of the infantry doubled those
- ↑ See the first chapter of Jornandes. The Vandals, however, (c. 22.) maintained a short independence between the rivers Marisia and Crissia, (Maros and Keres,) which fell into the Teiss.
- ↑ Dexippus, p. 7—12; Zosimus, 1. i. p. 43; Vopiscus in Aurelian. in Hist. August. However these historians differ in names, (Alemanni, Juthungi, and Marcomanni,) it is evident that they mean the same people, and the same war; but it requires some care to conciliate and explain them.
- ↑ Cantoclarus, with his usual accuracy, chooses to translate three hundred thousand: his version is equally repugnant to sense and to grammar.
have boasted in every age of their Roman descent. They are surrounded by, but not mixed with, the barbarians. See a memoir of M. d'Anville on ancient Dacia, in the Academy of Inscriptions, tom. xxx.
