Volume Iii Part 11 (2/2)

”He is going to Rome!” exclaimed the Prefect, and pulled his horse round so suddenly that it reared. ”Follow me!--to the coast!”

”And the routed army? without leaders!” cried Lucius Licinius. ”See how they fly!”

”Let them fly! Ravenna is strong. It will hold out. Do you not hear?

The Goth is going to _Rome_! We must get there before him. Follow me to the coast--the way by sea is open. To Rome!”

CHAPTER III.

Lovely--famed far and wide for its beauty--is the valley in which the Pa.s.sara flows from the north into the rapid Athesis, which hurries from the west to the south-east.

Like a bending figure, which leans longingly towards the beautiful Southland, the lofty Mendola rises at a distance from the right bank of the river.

Here, above the junction of the two streams, once lay the Roman settlement of Mansio Majae.

A little farther up the river, on a dominating rock, stood the Castle of Teriolis.

Now--from a mountain-”muhr” or ”mar” (landslip)--the town is called Meran.

The Castle has given its name to the Tyrol.

”Mansio Majae” is heard even now in the name of the place ”Mais,” rich in pleasant villas.

But at the time of which we speak an East Gothic garrison lay in the Castle of Teriolis, as was the case in all the old Rhaetian rock-nests on the Athesis, the Isarcus, and the [OE]nus, in order to keep down the only half-subjected Suevi, Alamanni, and Markomanni, or, as they were already named, the Bajuvars, who dwelt in Rhaetia, on the Licus, and on the lower course of the [OE]nus.

But, besides the garrisons of the castles, East-Gothic families had settled in larger numbers in the mild and fruitful valley and on the willow-covered slopes of the mountains.

Even now a singular, n.o.ble, and grave beauty distinguishes the peasants of the valleys of Meran, Ultner, and Sarn. These reticent people are much more refined, pensive, and aristocratic than the Bajuvar type on the Inn, the Lech, and the Isar.

Their dialect and legends support the supposition that here some few remains of the Goths continued to flourish; for the legends of the Amelungs, Dietrich of Bern, and the Rose-garden, still live in the names of the places and the traditions of the people.

Upon one of the highest mountains on the left sh.o.r.e of the Athesis, a Goth named Iffa had before-times settled; his descendants continued the settlement.

The mountain is named the ”Iffinger” to this day. Upon the southern slope, half-way up, the simple settlement was fixed. The Gothic emigrants had found it already cultivated. The Rhaetian alpine-house, which Druses had met with when he conquered the Rasenian mountain-people, had suffered no change in its characteristic and commodious form through the Roman conquerors, who built their villas in the valley, and their watch-towers on dominating rocks.

All the Romanised inhabitants of the Eltsch valley had, after the East-Gothic invasion, remained in quiet possession of their property.

For not here, but farther east, from the Save and over the Isonzo, had the Goths pressed forward into the peninsula; and only when Ravenna and Odoacer had fallen, did Theodoric spread his hosts in a peaceful and regular manner over North Italy and the Etschland.

Thus Iffa and his people had peacefully shared the soil with the Roman settlers whom they found upon the mountain, which at that time still possessed its Rasenian name.

A third of the arable land, the meadows and woods; a third part of the house, slaves, and animals, was, here as everywhere, claimed by the Gothic settler from the Roman farmer.

In the course of years, however, the Roman _hospes_ had found this close and involuntary vicinity to the barbarians inconvenient. He therefore left the rest of his property on the mountains to the Goths, in exchange for thirty yoke of the splendid oxen which the Germans had brought with them from Pannonia--and which they so well understood how to breed--and went southwards, where the Romans dwelt in greater numbers.

And so the ”Iffinger” had become completely Germanic, for the present master had suddenly sold the few Roman slaves which he possessed, and had replaced them by men and maids of Germanic race: Gepidians taken in war. This master was again named ”Iffa,” like his ancestor.

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