Invasions of the Roman Empire | |
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Invasions
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Time | AD 21–700 |
Place | Europe and Northern Africa |
Event | Tribes invading the declining Roman Empire |
The Migration Period was a time of widespread migrations within or into Europe in the middle of the first millennium AD. It has also been termed the Völkerwanderung (German) and, from the Roman and Greek perspective the Barbarian Invasions. Many of the migrations were movements of Germanic, Slavic, and other peoples into the territory of the then Roman Empire, with or without accompanying invasions or war.
The migrants comprised war bands or tribes of 10,000 to 20,000 people, but in the course of 100 years, they numbered not more than 750,000 in total, compared to an average 39.9 million population of the Roman Empire at that time. Although immigration was common throughout the time of the Roman Empire, the period in question was, in the 19th century, often defined as running from about the 5th to 8th centuries AD. The first migrations of peoples were made by Germanic tribes such as the Goths (including the Visigoths and the Ostrogoths), the Vandals, the Anglo-Saxons, the Lombards, the Suebi, the Frisii, the Jutes, the Burgundians, the Alamanni, the Scirii and Franks; they were later pushed westwards by the Huns, the Avars, the Slavs and the Bulgars.
Later invasions (such as the Viking, the Norman, the Hungarian, the Moorish, the Turkic, and the Mongol), also had significant effects (especially in North Africa, the Iberian Peninsula, Anatolia and Central and Eastern Europe); however, they are outside the scope of the Migration Period.