Migration

The people of Allfather lived in the Middle Enclosure by the waters of the Black Sea. They had a common language and symbols, called runes, by which they represented the sun and the earth and the mysteries of life and what lies beyond it. Those mystical and secret shapes were used to invoke the forces of nature and the gods who controlled them.
With the passing of time the people divided into many tribes, each of which developed small differences in custom and dialect. As the tribes moved into new lands, some to the east and some to the west, they came to form two main language groups each of which spoke a slightly different tongue. We call one of these groups the Centum and the other Satem. From the Centum came the Germans, Greeks, Latins[Romans], Celts, Tocharians, Hittites and Albanians. From the Satem came the Balts, Indics, Iranians, Armenians and Slavs. They came to call the Gods by different names and worship them in different ways but they all gave praise to Sun and Moon, and the Sky Father and the Earth Mother.
One of the tribes, the Aesir, migrated to the north-west and followed great rivers and passed through vast forests and marshes. They travelled for many generations and faced great challenges and dangers together, and in doing so their sense of community and common purpose was strengthened. In the North they came to the land of the Vanir, a people who worshipped gods of the sea and of the earth. The Aesir found land for themselves and built houses, grew crops and raised cattle.
The Aesir were named after their Gods who were Gods of the sky, wisdom and war. The Vanir likewise shared the name of their Gods who were great workers of fetility and magic. Much blood was spilt in the long conflict and the people, and their gods, became weary of war. A truce was called and the two sides met to discuss the causes of the conflict and to see if a peaceful settlement could be reached. They could not agree about the cause of the war but they decided to live together in peace, and as proof of their good faith they agreed to an exchange of leaders. The Vanir sent the Daughter of the Sea to teach her hosts skills of magic, and the Aesir sent Mimir, the guardian of the well of wisdom and understanding, to provide wise counsel for the Vanir. The gods sealed the agreement by spitting into a communal bowl, and from the spittle they made a being blessed with great wisdom and powers of magic.
After many generations of living in isolation in the land called Scania, the two peoples became one. All the people prospered and there were many tribes, and many children: Scania became the womb of nations.

Over three thousand years ago some of the tribes moved south across the sea to Jutland and then further south to the great northern plain that stretches from beyond the Rhine in the west to beyond the Vistula in the east. Some turned west and followed the flat, low-lying North Sea coast where they found a mixture of bog, marshland, heath and moorland. There were also some areas of fertile land and in those places the people settled, and grew crops, and grazed cattle. Land at the mouth of the Weser and the Ems was particularly good and many settlements sprang up there. The population grew, and as it did so people moved up the rivers seeking new lands.

Some tribes, on reaching the northern plain, turned east and passed along the fertile coastal plain to the river Oder. As in the west, some tribes settled when they found suitable land while others moved on. Some reached the Oder and followed that river south, and settled to the east of it. Many turned neither east nor west but headed south, and settled on the banks of the lower Elbe, where they made their home. That river was to become an important route into the central uplands, and beyond to the River Danube.

As the tribes spread out they adapted their way of life so as to survive and prosper in the various lands and climates they found. The conditions they experienced gave rise to changes in the way they built their houses, grew their crops and kept their animals. That in turn influenced the way their communities and language evolved. At first the differences from tribe to tribe were small but as they spread out across the great plain the communities became more distinctive. Like all peoples, they had to solve the problems of feeding, housing and defending themselves. Different surroundings and climate gave rise to various solutions to basically the same problems. Societies, like other living things, must adapt to their environment or perish.

Although the tribes developed different skills, customs and dialects, the sense of being one people was preserved by the gleemen and other story tellers who travelled widely and spread news about the goings on in far off places. In those oral societies history was recorded in poems, many of which were about battles and the deeds of famous warriors. Group identity was also strengthened by the contact they had, during the push south, with peoples who were different from them in appearance, culture and religion.

As periodic waves of migration brought more tribes south from Scania the fertile lands near to the northern seas became heavilly settled. Areas of forest started to be cleared and there was an increase in movement along the river valleys towards the south-west.The great advance of the Northern people towars the central uplands took many generations to complete and as they pushed others before them. On reaching the higher ground they came into contact with Celtic societies who were unable to halt the advance or to prevent the people of Scania settling the land. The Celts had been a powerful military force in Europe and were responsible for many artistic and technological innovations. However, they were comparatively few in number and when they took control of large territories they could only do so as ruling elites. Eventually the ethnic Celts were lost in the vast populations they ruled.

Around 250 B.C.E., after a long period of consolidation and a growth in population, many of the Northern tribes renewed their advance into the Central Uplands and a new wave of migration began. The early movement was, as before, mostly south east along rivers that flowed from the uplands to the northern seas. When the tribes crossed the watershed, they travelled down the rivers flowing south-east to the Danube and the Black Sea. During the following 200 years the Northern peoples occupied, and took control of, most of the land between the Rhine and the Vistula, and the Danube and the Baltic. As they spread out across this vast territory they came to be described as Germans of the Sea, Germans of the Forest, and Germans of the Steppes. The Germans of the Sea gave praise to Ing, from whom they were descended, and among their number were the Engle, Friese, Eote and Seaxe[English Frisians, Jutes and Saxons].

Taken from Tony Linsell`s Anglo-Saxon Mythology, Migration & Magic