JerseyPerson14

When the germanic barbarians invaded the former lands of Rome did they kill off all of the romanized people that lived there?

Belisarius

No. The "Romanized" people just learned to do things differently. Even local Roman landowners participated in the "regime change". Remember most of the Germans that occupied Gaul, Spain, etc. were Christians themselves, and had been to some extent Romanized before they took over.

heikstheo

Moreover, once the barbarians overran the empire, they would need a bunch of little serfs to work their farms for them and pay taxes. So, of course, you're not going to kill off all of the old inhabitants.

Nikd

No, their need where more the "Roman Gold" they needed people to work for them and people to tax them and use them as soldiers.
Wherever did not killed was or sold as slave or vassal.

Sure is one thing that intercourse is happened.
In a documentary from National Geographic that i see recent they try to reconstruct the "ideal Mediterranean" type : you want believe it but it looked same as Lothar Matheus (German soccer player).

Brutus

No, and that would be illogical to think. Actually those "Romanized" populations gave the structure and made the bulk of the administrations built by "barbarian" kings like Theodoricus, based on Roman law and administration.

Edgewaters

The Germans did not kill and enslave everyone they met. In some cases, the Germans ended up being the serfs.

And a vassal was not a bad thing to be. A vassal was a lord. Peasants were never vassals.

Nikd

^^Do you consider the Germans as the only barbarians?
And to sell slaves from the conquered population was profit and sure the Vandals and the other tribes did not go to the Roman Empire as "liberators".

Edgewaters

The vast majority of the barbarians who overran the Empire in its final days were Germanic. Even the western armies of the Huns mostly consisted of Germanic allies.

Oh sure. Everybody practiced slavery and the Germanics were hardly above it. But the Germans weren't, in all cases, invaders - oftentimes they were just masses of people moving into the Empire and wanting to settle down and enjoy a Roman-style life. In many cases, the Empire couldn't support the additional population and that's when you got wars with groups like the Visigoths and the Vandals. In other cases, the Germans just settled in as servi (serfs) on the latifundia.

Nikd

I know. The main goal was to get a territory and to leave peaceful, more was Roman abuse and stupid emperors that forced them to take arms, think that if in the throne was sitting a Konstantine or Augustus rather than Arcadius and Onorius or Zenon then this people would be assimilated.
But when they decide to took arms they simply reacted as an army in war and simply followed the customs of the time.

Edgewaters

Well, that might be stretching it a bit. They definately weren't all Christian (that sort of came slowly, in stages); adoptation of Roman law and customs was also partial. One of the chief reasons Rome collapsed was its inability to fully assimilate these groups.