Simmer, Alain: Population and Languages in the Moselle Area from the end of Antiquity to Carolingian Times
Simmer, Alain: Population and Languages in the Moselle Area from the end of Antiquity to Carolingian Times
The Moselle area is mainly Germanic, seen as taking its roots in the Great Invasions which originated a Lorraine divided into two parts, a Germanic one -so to say Frankish- on one hand and a Roman one on the other, both parts having kept their traditions since the Late Antiquity, the whole being separated by a linguistic frontier. This picture is the product of the XXth century German historiography and is still commonly taken for granted, in Lorraine and everywhere else in spite of the improvements of research.
The purpose of my thesis is to show that these theories, based almost essentially on toponymic criteria, have no real scientific grounds and cannot resist in front of the modern research, especially in archaeology.
It hinges on three points:
1: to adapt the Moselle area to the general panorama of modern historiography. To study the area from the inside, as a whole entity, no longer depending on pseudo-invasions. To approach the linguistic frontier on unbiased and non-theoretical criteria. To let down the ?Frankish? myth for the benefit of the ethnogenesis reality. To survey the archaeology of Gallia Belgica in Low Antiquity;
2: to give up traditional historiography for the benefit of archaeological reality. To study the settlements in the Early Middle Ages based on Merovingian cemeteries; to examine the latest discoveries about the languages of the Franks and about the Moselle country toponymy. We then discover a total inadequacy between the classical theories and the reality imbued with romanity;
3: to give back an historical coherence to the Moselle area. In such a context of antique duration, the organization of the territory could do nothing but live on thanks to the cadastres and the fiscal system automatically taken over by toponymy which was deeply reorganized by the territorial reforms of the Late Antiquity. This could still be seen in the regional landscape until the Revolution through the structures of the Metz diocese, the direct heir of the Mediomatric city, whose layout was exactly the same A bilingual area reveals itself and the regional toponymy clearly appears as the heritage of the Gallo-Roman administration and can no more be considered as a consequence of migrations.
It was set up into German and Roman sectors long before the disruptions of the Vth century. Putting together archaeology and toponymy lead to confirm the existence of a lot of romanized centres surrounded by more little settlements; all this is a mirror of an ancient Germanity, which was included in a Gallo-Roman administrative structure. The Early Middle Ages hardly changed anything as can be shown by the implantation of the Merovingian cemeteries. Then we can rediscover an ancestral landscape with a continuity of an endemic germanism, without any connection with the so-called external invasions. At last the Moselle area recovers its historical individuality and its specific culture.
Moyen Âge tardif / Bas Moyen Âge, Caroligien, Lorraine, langue, toponymie, Mérovingien, archéologie
