Category:Sclaveni

English: Sclave, esclave c. 1290. "After the slaughter of the Heruli, Ermanaric also took arms against the Venethi. This people, though despised in war, was strong in numbers and tried at first to resist. But a host of unskillful warriors is of no avail, especially when God permits an armed host to attack them. These people, [...] though they all come from one stock, now go by three names: Venethi, Antes and Sclaveni. Though they now rage in war everywhere, in punishment for our sins, yet at that time they were all obedient to the commands of Ermanaric." [Getica, 119, by C.C. Mierow]; In Book IV of the Cosmographia, the Anonymous of Ravenna situates Scythia in the vicinity of the "Northern Ocean," within segments corresponding to the symbolic hours of the night. The author explicitly states that numerous peoples originate from this vast Northern Scythia, specifically identifying the Sclaveni (Slavs) and the Antes. By the 7th century, the term "Scythians" no longer referred to the specific nomadic group of antiquity; instead, it had evolved into a collective ethnonym for the diverse inhabitants of Eastern Europe. For the Ravenna Cosmographer, the Slavs were essentially "New Scythians." He characterized Scythia as the "officina gentium" (the mother of nations or "womb of peoples"), from which successive tribes poured forth like a river onto the territories of the Roman Empire.