Germanic tribes in the context of "Dialects of Old English"

Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, of which the capital Vienna is the most populous city and state. Austria is bordered by Germany to the northwest, the Czech Republic to the north, Slovakia to the northeast, Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the west. The country occupies an area of 83,879 km (32,386 sq mi) and has a population of around 9 million.

The area of today's Austria has been inhabited since at least the Paleolithic period. Around 400 BC, it was inhabited by the Celts and then annexed by the Romans in the late 1st century BC. Christianization in the region began in the 4th and 5th centuries, during the late Roman period, followed by the arrival of numerous Germanic tribes during the Migration Period.

The Limes Germanicus (Latin for Germanic frontier), or 'Germanic Limes', is the name given in modern times to a line of frontier (limes) fortifications that bounded the ancient Roman provinces of Germania Inferior, Germania Superior and Raetia, dividing the Roman Empire and the unsubdued Germanic tribes from the years 83 to about 260 AD. The frontier used either a natural boundary such as a river or typically an earth bank and ditch with a wooden palisade and watchtowers at intervals, and a system of linked forts was built behind them.

The path of the limes changed over time following advances and retreats due to pressure from external threats. At its height, the Limes Germanicus stretched from the North Sea outlet of the Rhine to near Regensburg (Castra Regina) on the Danube. These two major rivers afforded natural protection from mass incursions into imperial territory, with the exception of a gap stretching roughly from Mogontiacum (now Mainz) on the Rhine to Castra Regina.

Maximian (Latin: Marcus Aurelius Valerius Maximianus; c. 250 – c. July 310), nicknamed Herculius, was Roman emperor from 286 to 305. He was Caesar from 285 to 286, then Augustus from 286 to 305. He shared the latter title with his co-emperor and superior, Diocletian, whose political brain complemented Maximian's military brawn. Maximian established his residence at Trier but spent most of his time on campaign. In late 285, he suppressed rebels in Gaul known as the Bagaudae. From 285 to 288, he fought against Germanic tribes along the Rhine frontier. Together with Diocletian, he launched a scorched earth campaign deep into Alamannic territory in 288, refortifying the frontier.

The man he appointed to police the Channel shores, Carausius, rebelled in 286, causing the secession of Britain and northwestern Gaul. Maximian failed to oust Carausius, and his invasion fleet was destroyed by storms in 289 or 290. Maximian's subordinate Constantius campaigned against Carausius' successor, Allectus, while Maximian held the Rhine frontier. The rebel leader was ousted in 296, and Maximian moved south to combat piracy near Hispania and Berber incursions in Mauretania. When these campaigns concluded in 298, he departed for Italy, where he lived in comfort until 305. At Diocletian's behest, Maximian abdicated on 1 May 305, gave the Augustan office to Constantius, and retired to southern Italy.

Old English (Englisc or Ænglisc, pronounced [ˈeŋɡliʃ] or [ˈæŋɡliʃ]), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers in the mid-5th century, and the first Old English literature dates from the mid-7th century. After the Norman Conquest of 1066, English was replaced for several centuries by Anglo-Norman (a type of French) as the language of the upper classes. This is regarded as marking the end of the Old English era, since during the subsequent period the English language was heavily influenced by Anglo-Norman, developing into what is now known as Middle English in England and Early Scots in Scotland.

Old English developed from a set of Anglo-Frisian or Ingvaeonic dialects originally spoken by Germanic tribes traditionally known as the Angles, Saxons and Jutes. As the Germanic settlers became dominant in England, their language replaced the languages of Roman Britain: Common Brittonic, a Celtic language; and Latin, brought to Britain by the Roman conquest. Old English had four main dialects, associated with particular Anglo-Saxon kingdoms: Kentish, Mercian, Northumbrian, and West Saxon. It was West Saxon that formed the basis for the literary standard of the later Old English period, although the dominant forms of Middle and Modern English would develop mainly from Mercian, and Scots from Northumbrian. The speech of eastern and northern parts of England was subject to strong Old Norse influence due to Scandinavian rule and settlement beginning in the 9th century.

Longships (Old Norse: langskip) were long clinker-built warships (Old Norse: herskip, Old Swedish: hærskip) propelled by oars, and later also by sail, used by the Norse and surrounding Germanic tribes from at least the 4th century AD and throughout the Viking Age, being part of the Nordic ship building tradition. As the name suggests, they were long slender ships, intended for speed, with the ability to carry a large crew of warriors. They are sometimes called "dragonships" (Old Norse: drekaskip) due to a tradition of the fore and aft ends being decorated with a raised dragonhead (Old Norse: drekahofud) and tail respectively, with the sail making up the "wing" of the dragon. The largest types were thus called "dragons" (dreki), while smaller types had names such as karve (karfi), snekke (snekkja), and skeid (skeið).

Archaeological finds have been made of longships from the 9th, 10th and 11th centuries in Denmark, Norway and Germany, with motifs on Gotlandic picture stones dating to the 8th century or earlier. It is thought that the Norse specifically invented the design for Viking usage, which included raiding and warfare, exploration and commerce. The longship is a rather distinctly Norse (Scandinavian) construction, with bronze age petroglyphs in Sweden indicating a long tradition of building long animal-headed naval ships in Scandinavia. Equivalent clinker-built naval ships by the Wends (a South Baltic Slavic people) were much smaller and shorter in comparison.

The 0s began on January 1, AD 1 and ended on December 31, AD 9, covering the first nine years of the Common Era.

In Europe, the 0s saw the continuation of conflict between the Roman Empire and Germanic tribes in the Early Imperial campaigns in Germania. Vinicius, Tiberius and Varus led Roman forces in multiple punitive campaigns, before sustaining a major defeat at the hands of Arminius in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest. Concurrently, the Roman Empire fought the Bellum Batonianum against a rebelling alliance of native peoples led by Bato the Daesitiate in Illyricum, which was suppressed in AD 9. A conflict also took place in Korea, where Daeso, King of Dongbuyeo invaded Goguryeo with a 50,000-man army in AD 6. He was forced to retreat when heavy snow began to fall, stopping the conflict until the next decade. In China, the last ruler of the Chinese Western Han dynasty (Ruzi Ying) was deposed, allowing Wang Mang to establish the Xin dynasty.

Marcus Aurelius Carus (c. 222 – July or August 283) was Roman emperor from 282 to 283. During his short reign, Carus fought the Germanic tribes and Sarmatians along the Danube frontier with success.

He died while campaigning against the Sassanid Empire and is believed to have died of unnatural causes. It was reported that he had been struck by lightning. He was succeeded by his sons Carinus and Numerian, creating a dynasty which, though short-lived, provided further stability to the resurgent empire.

The history of Spain dates to contact between the pre-Roman peoples of the Mediterranean coast of the Iberian Peninsula with the Greeks and Phoenicians. During Classical Antiquity, the peninsula was the site of multiple successive colonizations of Greeks, Carthaginians, and Romans. Native peoples of the peninsula, such as the Tartessos, intermingled with the colonizers to create a uniquely Iberian culture. The Romans referred to the entire peninsula as Hispania, from which the name "Spain" originates. As was the rest of the Western Roman Empire, Spain was subject to numerous invasions of Germanic tribes during the 4th and 5th centuries AD, resulting in the end of Roman rule and the establishment of Germanic kingdoms, marking the beginning of the Middle Ages in Spain.

Germanic control lasted until the Umayyad conquest of Hispania began in 711. The region became known as Al-Andalus, and except for the small Kingdom of Asturias, the region remained under the control of Muslim-led states for much of the Early Middle Ages, a period known as the Islamic Golden Age. By the time of the High Middle Ages, Christians from the north gradually expanded their control over Iberia, a period known as the Reconquista. As they expanded southward, a number of Christian kingdoms were formed, including the Kingdom of Navarre, the Kingdom of León, the Kingdom of Castile, and the Kingdom of Aragon. They eventually consolidated into two roughly equivalent polities, the Crown of Castile and the Crown of Aragon. The early modern period is generally dated from the union of the Crowns of Castile and Aragon by royal marriage in 1469.