Lombards

The Peoples of Europe

by Neil Christie

This book offers a survey of the history and archaeology of the Longobards (known until recently as the Lombards), one of the many barbarian tribes who exploited the collapse of the Roman Empire.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Medieval, Medieval History, European History, Archaeology, Ancient

288 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1995

Reviews

[Lauren Albert · Rating 3 out of 5]

I seem to be picking books (accidentally) with heavy archaeological content. I guess I’ve been landing in “dark age” topics where resources are limited. This makes the conclusion of Decker’s book on the Byzantine dark ages more notable

[Rindis · Rating 3 out of 5]

This would be much more appropriately titled The Longobards, but it would unnecessarily further reduce sales on what is already a niche book. Lombardy is a modern region of Italy, and the people living there are Lombards. This is an evolution of the term "Longobard" (long-beard), which was a Germanic tribe that arrived in Italy in the 6th Century. English usually uses Lombard for both, but this is far from the first place I've run into Longobard, and I'm quite happy with with Christie's decision to avoid confusion with more recent people by using Longobard throughout the book (other than the title...) for the medieval kingdom and earlier.

This is the second Peoples of Europe title I've gotten that is a current POD copy of a book otherwise out of print. The first one (The Etruscans) had some trouble with the binding giving way for a couple of loose pages; this one has severe binding problems throughout. Any further books I get in the series will need to be electronic, old, used, copies, or try out one of the few books republished by Wiley (with a new cover style) after they bought Blackwell.

Like with most Germanic tribes, their history before entering Roman territory proper is extremely murky. Christie traces what is known/guessed of earlier history in a single chapter before going through what is known of their time in Pannonia. Which isn't much. Most of the chapter naturally deals with the archaeological record, which is a bit sparse. There's a lot of work to be done in that area, and the post-Roman period has not been a priority, but that means there's a lot to be learned about the Longobard presence there.

This leaves the bulk of the book for the Longobard kingdom in Italy. There is a good amount of info here about them. Of course, this is 'the peoples of Europe', so I would still like a good history of this period. There's info here, but its not a main focus compared to talking about settlement patterns and the such. In fact, there's not as much detailed info there as I'd like, with no diagrams of Longobard-derived place names and the like. In fact, the overall number of illustrations seems low compared to other volumes, which made me think of Osprey books with the profuse number of black-and-white photos. What pictures are here are good, but there's not quite as many as I'd expect.

Overall, this volume is a bit disappointing compared to the others I've read. It's still a good book, and good reference, but not quite as informative as other books in the line.

[Nicolas · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is an interesting narrative about the ancient people known as the Langobards, a western Germanic people who, during the tumultuous times of the fall of the western roman empire and the age of migration, abandoned their ancestral lands in northern Germany and moved along the Elbe river southwards and eastwards into Bohemia, Moravia and, at the depart of the Goths from the area, into Pannonia; finally taking advantage of the ravaged Italian peninsula after Justinian wars of restauration against the goths, taking control of most of the northern peninsula and some parts of the south. After years of alliances and feuds with the other post roman kingdoms in Europe and of internal strife, the Langobards rose to power in most of the peninsula buy by the end of the VII Century, the northern realm was conquered by the Carolingians while the Langobards maintained southern principalities up to the Norman Conquests in the XI Century.

Although the chronology and the kings/dukes are mostly known, the history passages are too narrow and one cannot really understand the events happening, ending with a feeling that way more depth would have been necessary to make it more interesting, leaving a lot of the history to be just some names, years and big changes in a span of 400 years, with hardly any name of the Langobards easy to remember. Of course, this is not to blame to the author, but to our sources.

Christie uses all written contemporary sources as well as the latest archeological finds, in Italy and along their route of migration, to write a fluid narration of the history of the Langobards, being the reconstruction of their origins and migration from northern Germany into Italy one of the most interesting parts of the book. Moreover, he attempts to describe their culture; their political organization, both before and after their entrance into Italy; their relationship with the roman native populations and with its neighbors and most interesting; a review of their settlements, religion, arts and defenses, based primarily on different archeological reviews.

One can easily see how the “dark ages” left many empty spaces in time and as Italy became more and more illiterate and the written records concentrated on the church and on the monasteries, just a few passages from “Langobardia” did come into our days and sadly, the few that did, concentrated only on kings, dukes and princes, more than the people, the economy or the landscape, leaving most of the chapters of the book to be augmented mostly on archeological records.

[Birgitta Hoffmann · Rating 3 out of 5]

Neil Christie offers an overview of the Longobards/Lombards and unlike Menghin, his interest is their impact on Italy, especially from an archaeological perspective. A pity then that he is so sparing with illustrations. The book discusses some of the most amazing evidence (such as the wall paintings at Castelseprio), but unless you know about the site, you may be left with the impression that we are talking about foundations, rather than a near complete church. On the other hand, when Menghin uses Paulus Diaconus to gloss over the lack of accessible (to Menghin leastways)evidence, Neil Christie offers discussions about the problems of the archaeological evidence for the period. I think for best effect these two books should be read together - and then add some of the Italian exhibition catalogues into the equation.

[Michael Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Lombards (whom Christie insists on calling “Longobards” for obscure reasons) are up with the Huns and the Vandals in terms of largely unwarranted bad press -- but they’re also second only to the Franks in their long-term success. The author is a recognized expert in medieval Italy, especially its archaeology, and this study, organized both chronologically and thematically, is of a high standard. He traces the Lombards from their hazy origins to their sojourn in trans-Danube Pannonia, through their carefully considered invasion of northern Italy and their consolidation of power there. Along the way, he discusses the Lombard legal system, their trade and economics, and the roles of religion and the arts, and he ends with a consideration of the Lombard heritage in Italy. A very good entry in a very useful series.

[WarpDrive · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very interesting and well-researched book. It covers a "people" and a period not well studied and explored, but which are very important to the overall history of Early Medieval Italy.
Christie writes well, the narrative is interesting, and the work is well footnoted. I would have preferred some more detail in some areas, but overall this is a really good book.
The book is very extensively based on Paul The Deacon's Historia Langobardorum, as unfortunately this period is notoriously not well supported by primary sources, and even from an archeological standpoint the amount of available material is pretty discouraging.

[Anatolikon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Questionable uses of literary and archaeological evidence make this disappointing and less informative than it claims to be.