German Memories - Roman Rule in Germania

During the year 7 B.C., the Romans had to put down only smaller unrest in some places and they didn't need to engage in any major combat operations, since the exhausted Germanic tribes mostly respected the peace and recognized the Roman rule.
The newly-conquered area was secured with army routes and camps. In the winter, the Roman army retreated into the camps along the left bank of the Rhine. But during the entire summer, all strategically important parts of Germania were occupied by Roman soldier camps.

Apart from this military presence, the Romans also set up numerous markets and founded trading posts: Slowly an extensive peaceful exchange of goods began between the Roman Empire and the Germanic tribes, who formerly had to purchase all Roman products indirectly over Gaul. These trading posts probably contributed much to make Germanic people familiar with the Roman way of life, language, laws and customs.

Besides, countless Germanic men served in Roman auxiliary troops. In return, they received generous payment and valuable weapons. Apart from Roman military know-how, they inevitably learned the Roman language, Roman customs, and often even got to know other countries of the Roman world empire: Many Germanic noblemen came to Rome; some even acquired Roman citizenship. A loyal and brave squad of Germanic warriors served at the Emperor's palace in Rome as bodyguards. Other Germanic warriors came as far as Palestine, where they served as bodyguards for the tetrarch Herodes, whom the Romans had installed as king of the Jews.

A few years later, probably many Germanic men had to fight for the Romans in Pannonia (today's southern Hungary), when an uprising against the Roman rule broke out there. All of these men inevitably acquired the Roman way of life and mentality, and after their return to their tribes, they passed some of that on to their families and friends.

The Roman commander-in-chief still marched through the tribal areas of Germania with his army every summer - not with the purpose of conquering anymore, but rather to speak Roman law, mediate in tribal disputes, and to remind the allies and subdued tribes of the lasting power of Rome.

In Rome, Emperor Augustus contented himself with the title 'first citizen', but in the provinces he let himself be worshipped as a god. He was indeed mighty like a god, whose every wish was law for over a third of the world's population, and who could order hundreds of thousands of soldiers to crush every resistance to his will.

A temple was dedicated to him in Germania too - in the newly founded Roman City of Cologne, where the Ubians had been settled. Some of the Germanic aristocrats became priests of the divine emperor.

There were uprisings but they had remained regionally confined - no other tribes had dared to join the rebels. Roman rule seemed to be generally secure, and now, after the last resistance had been broken, Germania could be declared a province of the Roman Empire. Its center probably was what later became the City of Cologne; or perhaps the administrative and trading city which was recently discovered close to Waldgirmes near the river Lahn.

After the soldiers came the officials: A Roman governor had a staff of approximately thousands of men, hundreds of officials, countless assistants, and a mounted guard of several hundreds of men. This province administration was supposed to raise taxes and draft men as soldiers, depending on whether a tribe was subdued or an ally, or liable to military service, or exempt from dues.

Only the Germanic Marcomanians could have become dangerous for the Romans: Some years earlier (9 B.C.) they had fled from the army of Drusus, and now they were residing on the other side of the Elbe and Danube rivers, as neighbors of the Roman-controlled Germania. Their king Marbod had set up an enormous army of allegedly 70,000 men and had subdued several neighboring tribes. He kept peace with the Romans, but to them his kingdom appeared as a continuous threat.

Therefore, in 6 A.D., Rome set out up to 100,000 legionaries in order to conquer and break up Maroboduus's empire. But the attack had to be aborted. The reason was that the peoples of today's South Hungary and Yugoslavia rose against the Roman rule: Up to 200,000 enemies of the Romans were under arms - an enormous danger even for Italy and the capital Rome itself. Augustus ordered a hasty peace with Maroboduus and sent all available legions into the rebellious provinces, where it took several years to strike down the rebellion.

Despite the favorable opportunity for a rebellion on their own, the weakened Germanic tribes kept quiet. The Roman rule between the Rhine and Elbe continued to exist undisturbed. Also the neighboring Marcomanian kingdom of Maroboduus continued to keep peace. Germania really seemed on its way to develop into a peaceful Roman province like Gaul.