chapter 4._
See, also, CUMBRIA.
ALCMÆONIDS, The curse and banishment of the.
See ATHENS: B. C. 612-595.
ALCOLEA, Battle of (1868).
See SPAIN: A. D. 1866-1873.
ALDIE, Battle of.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1863 (JUNE-JULY: PENNSYLVANIA).
ALDINE PRESS, The.
See PRINTING AND THE PRESS: A. D. 1469-1515.
ALEMANNIA: The Mediæval Duchy.
See GERMANY: A. D. 843-962.
ALEMANNI, ALAMANNI: A. D. 213. Origin and first appearance.
"Under Antoninus, the Son of Severus, a new and more severe war once more (A. D. 213) broke out in Raetia. This also was waged against the Chatti; but by their side a second people is named, which we here meet for the first time—the Alamanni. Whence they came, we known not. According to a Roman writing a little later, they were a conflux of mixed elements; the appellation also seems to point to a league of communities, as well as the fact that, afterwards, the different tribes comprehended under this name stand forth—more than is the case among the other great Germanic peoples—in their separate character, and the Juthungi, the Lentienses, and other Alamannic peoples not seldom act independently. But that it is not the Germans of this region who here emerge, allied under the new name and strengthened by the alliance, is shown as well by the naming of the Alamanni along side of the Chatti, as by the mention of the unwonted skilfulness of the Alamanni in equestrian combat. On the contrary, it was certainly, in the main, hordes coming on from the East that lent new strength to the almost extinguished German resistance on the Rhine; it is not improbable that the powerful Semnones, in earlier times dwelling on the middle Elbe, of whom there is no further mention after the end of the second century, furnished a strong contingent to the Alamanni."
_T. Mommsen, History of Rome, book 8, chapter 4._
"The standard quotation respecting the derivation of the name from 'al'='all' and m-n= man', so that the word (somewhat exceptionably) denotes 'men of all sorts,' is from Agathias, who quotes Asinius Quadratus. … Notwithstanding this, I think it is an open question, whether the name may not have been applied by the truer and more unequivocal Germans of Suabia and Franconia, to certain less definitely Germanic allies from Wurtemberg and Baden,—parts of the Decumates Agri—parts which may have supplied a Gallic, a Gallo-Roman, or even a Slavonic element to the confederacy; in which case, a name so German as to have given the present French and Italian name for Germany, may, originally, have applied to a population other than Germanic. I know the apparently paradoxical elements in this view; but I also know that, in the way of etymology, it is quite as safe to translate 'all' by 'alii' as by 'omnes': and I cannot help thinking that the 'al-' in Ale-manni is the 'al-' in 'alir-arto' (a foreigner or man of another sort), 'eli-benzo' (an alien), and 'ali-land' (captivity in foreign land).—Grimm, ii. 628.—Rechsalterth, page 359. And still more satisfied am I that the 'al-' in Al-emanni is the 'al-' in Alsatia='el-sass'='ali-satz'='foreign settlement.' In other words, the prefix in question is more probably the 'al-' in 'el-se', than the 'al-' in 'all.' Little, however, of importance turns on this. The locality of the Alemanni was the parts about the Limes Romanus, a boundary which, in the time of Alexander Severus, Niebuhr thinks they first broke through. Hence they were the Marchmen of the frontier, whoever those Marchmen were. Other such Marchmen were the Suevi; unless, indeed, we consider the two names as synonymous. Zeuss admits that, between the Suevi of Suabia, and the Alemanni, no tangible difference can be found."
_R. G. Lathan, The Germania of Tacitus; Epilegomena, section 11._
ALSO IN _T. Smith, Arminius, part 2, chapter 1._
See also, SUEVI, and BAVARIANS.
ALEMANNI: A. D. 259. Invasion of Gaul and Italy.
The Alemanni, "hovering on the frontiers of the Empire … increased the general disorder that ensued after the death of Decius. They inflicted severe wounds on the rich provinces of Gaul; they were the first who removed the veil that covered the feeble majesty of Italy. A numerous body of the Alemanni penetrated across the Danube and through the Rhætian Alps into the plains of Lombardy, advanced as far as Ravenna and displayed the victorious banners of barbarians almost in sight of Rome [A. D. 259]. The insult and the danger rekindled in the senate some sparks of their ancient virtue. Both the Emperors were engaged in far distant wars—Valerian in the East and Galienus on the Rhine." The senators, however, succeeded in confronting the audacious invaders with a force which checked their advance, and they "retired into Germany laden with spoil."
_E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,