The Caerosi (or Caeroesi) were a small

Belgic Belgic may refer to: * an adjective referring to the Belgae, an ancient confederation of tribes * a rarer adjective referring to the Low Countries or to Belgium * , several ships with the name * Belgic ware Aylesford-Swarling pottery is part of a ...

- Germanic tribe dwelling in

Gallia Belgica Gallia Belgica ("Belgic Gaul") was a province of the Roman Empire located in the north-eastern part of Roman Gaul, in what is today primarily northern France, Belgium, and Luxembourg, along with parts of the Netherlands and Germany. In 50 BC, af ...

during the

Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...

and the

Roman period The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Roman Republic, Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings aro ...

. Their ethnic identity remains uncertain.

Caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman people, Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in Caes ...

described them as part of the

Germani Cisrhenani The ''Germani cisrhenani'' (Latin '' cis- rhenanus'' "on this side of the Rhine", referring to the Roman or western side), or "Left bank ''Germani''", were a group of Germanic peoples who lived west of the Lower Rhine at the time of the Gallic W ...

, but their tribal name is probably of Celtic origin. Like other Germani Cisrhenani tribes, it is possible that their old Germanic

endonym An endonym (from Greek: , 'inner' + , 'name'; also known as autonym) is a common, ''native'' name for a geographical place, group of people, individual person, language or dialect, meaning that it is used inside that particular place, group, ...

came to be abandoned after a tribal reorganization, that they received their names from their Celtic neighbours, or else that they were fully or partially assimilated into Celtic culture at the time of the Roman invasion of the region in 57 BC.

Name

They are mentioned as ''Caerosos'' (var. ''ceroesos'', ''caeroesos'', ''cerosos'') by

(mid-1st c. BC), and as ''Caerosi'' by

Orosius Paulus Orosius (; born 375/385 – 420 AD), less often Paul Orosius in English, was a Roman priest, historian and theologian, and a student of Augustine of Hippo. It is possible that he was born in '' Bracara Augusta'' (now Braga, Portugal), t ...

(early 5th c. AD)., s.v. ''Caerosi''. The

ethnonym An ethnonym () is a name applied to a given ethnic group. Ethnonyms can be divided into two categories: exonyms (whose name of the ethnic group has been created by another group of people) and autonyms, or endonyms (whose name is created and used ...

''Caerosi'' probably derives from a

Proto-Celtic Proto-Celtic, or Common Celtic, is the ancestral proto-language of all known Celtic languages, and a descendant of Proto-Indo-European. It is not attested in writing but has been partly Linguistic reconstruction, reconstructed through the compar ...

root reconstructed as ''*caer-'' ('sheep'; cf.

Old Irish Old Irish, also called Old Gaelic ( sga, Goídelc, Ogham script: ᚌᚑᚔᚇᚓᚂᚉ; ga, Sean-Ghaeilge; gd, Seann-Ghàidhlig; gv, Shenn Yernish or ), is the oldest form of the Goidelic/Gaelic language for which there are extensive writt ...

''caera''), itself from an earlier ''*caper-'' (cf.

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

''caper'',

Old Norse Old Norse, Old Nordic, or Old Scandinavian, is a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and t ...

''hafr'', 'billy goat', Greek ''kápros'' 'boar'). The variant ''Caeroesi'' has an unexplained suffix (), which is not found in either Celtic or Germanic languages, although ''-oso-'' is a known suffix in Gaulish (e.g. ''Laudosa'', ''Iboso''). It may be translated as 'the sheep', 'the rams', or else 'rich in sheep', although its exact meaning remains uncertain. It is linguistically related to other Celtic ethnonyms such as ''

Caeracates The Caeracates (Gaulish: *''Caeracatis'', 'the shepherds' or 'sheep-folk') were small tribe dwelling in Gallia Belgica during the Roman period. Like the Aresaces, they were probably a sub-tribe (''pagus'') of the larger Treveri, since they were too ...

'', ''

Caereni The Caereni were a people of ancient Britain, known only from a single mention of them by the geographer Ptolemy c. 150. From his general description and the approximate locations of their neighbours, their territory was along the western coast of ...

'' or ''Kairènoi'' (Καιρηνοί). 180px, Boundary marker of the ''Pagus Carucum''.Alternative relations with the

''cáera'' ('berry'), the

Middle Irish Middle Irish, sometimes called Middle Gaelic ( ga, An Mheán-Ghaeilge, gd, Meadhan-Ghàidhlig), is the Goidelic language which was spoken in Ireland, most of Scotland and the Isle of Man from AD; it is therefore a contemporary of late Old Engli ...

''céar'' ('dark brown'), or else to the

Proto-Germanic Proto-Germanic (abbreviated PGmc; also called Common Germanic) is the reconstructed proto-language of the Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages. Proto-Germanic eventually developed from pre-Proto-Germanic into three Germanic branc ...

*''haira''- ('worthy, exalted, *grey-haired’; cf. Mod. High German ''hehr'' 'noble') have also been proposed by some scholars.

Geography

The Caerosi dwelled in the

Ardennes and Eifel {{Infobox mountain range , name=Ardennes and Eifel , photo=Weiswampach.jpg , photo_caption=A view at the Luxembourg commune of Weiswampach , country_type= Countries , country= {{enum, Belgium (east), France (north), Germany (west), Luxembourg ...

region, between the

Rhône The Rhône ( , ; wae, Rotten ; frp, Rôno ; oc, Ròse ) is a major river in France and Switzerland, rising in the Alps and flowing west and south through Lake Geneva and southeastern France before discharging into the Mediterranean Sea. At Ar ...

and the

Meuse The Meuse ( , , , ; wa, Moûze ) or Maas ( , ; li, Maos or ) is a major European river, rising in France and flowing through Belgium and the Netherlands before draining into the North Sea from the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta. It has a t ...

river, near the

Treverii The Trēverī (Gaulish: *''Trēueroi'') were a Celtic tribe of the Belgae group who inhabited the lower valley of the Moselle from around 150 BCE, if not earlier, until their displacement by the Franks. Their domain lay within the southern fringes ...

in the south, the

Condrusi The Condrusi were an ancient Belgic- Germanic tribe dwelling in what is now eastern Belgium during the Gallic Wars (58–50 BC) and the Roman period. Their ethnic identity remains uncertain. Caesar described them as part of the Germani Cisrhenani, ...

in the west, the

Paemani The Paemani (also Poemani or Caemani) were a small Belgic- Germanic tribe dwelling in Gallia Belgica during the Iron Age. Their ethnic identity remains uncertain. Caesar described them as part of the Germani Cisrhenani, but a number of scholars ...

and

Eburones The Eburones (Greek: ) were a Gallic- Germanic tribe dwelling in the northeast of Gaul, in what is now the southern Netherlands, eastern Belgium and the German Rhineland, in the period immediately preceding the Roman conquest of the region. Thou ...

in the north, and the

Ubii 350px, The Ubii around AD 30 The Ubii were a Germanic tribe first encountered dwelling on the east bank of the Rhine in the time of Julius Caesar, who formed an alliance with them in 55 BC in order to launch attacks across the river. They were ...

on the opposite bank of the Rhône in the east. The region of ''pagus Carucum'', a Roman-era subdivision of the

Treveri The Trēverī (Gaulish: *''Trēueroi'') were a Celtic tribe of the Belgae group who inhabited the lower valley of the Moselle from around 150 BCE, if not earlier, until their displacement by the Franks. Their domain lay within the southern fringe ...

later known under the

Franks The Franks ( la, Franci or ) were a group of Germanic peoples whose name was first mentioned in 3rd-century Roman sources, and associated with tribes between the Lower Rhine and the Ems River, on the edge of the Roman Empire.H. Schutz: Tools, ...

as ''Pagus Coroascus'', may be named after the tribe, although the linguistic connection remains uncertain. The name has been discovered on a Roman era boundary marker carved with the inscription 'FINIS PAGI CARV CVM' ('boundary or end of the pagus Carucum'), located in a wooded area near

Neidenbach Neidenbach is a municipality in the district of Bitburg-Prüm, in Rhineland-Palatinate, western Germany. Geography Neidenbach lies about 45 km north of the city of Trier in the Kyllburger Waldeifel The Waldeifel or Kyllburger Waldeifel i ...

and

Kyllburg Kyllburg () is a town in the Waldeifel region in the district of Bitburg-Prüm, in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is situated in the Eifel mountains, on the river Kyll, approx. 10 km north-east of Bitburg. Kyllburg was the seat of the for ...

. To the east of Neidenbach, the

Vinxtbach The Vinxtbach is a stream of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is around long, rises south-southwest of Schalkenbach-Obervinxt and east of the ''Adert'' and discharges into the River Rhine near Rheineck Castle between Bad Breisig and Brohl-Lüt ...

, a small river flowing eastwards to the Rhine, marked the boundary between the

Roman provinces The Roman provinces (Latin: ''provincia'', pl. ''provinciae'') were the administrative regions of Ancient Rome In modern historiography, ancient Rome refers to Roman civilisation from the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th centur ...

Germania Superior Germania Superior ("Upper Germania") was an imperial province of the Roman Empire. It comprised an area of today's western Switzerland, the French Jura and Alsace regions, and southwestern Germany. Important cities were Besançon ('' Vesontio' ...

and

Germania Inferior Germania Inferior ("Lower Germania") was a Roman province from AD 85 until the province was renamed Germania Secunda in the fourth century, on the west bank of the Rhine bordering the North Sea. The capital of the province was Colonia Agrippin ...

. The name ''Vinxtbach'' is in fact thought to derive from the Latin word ''finis'', meaning an end or boundary. Today, the place is still a boundary between modern German dialects, with Ripuarian to the north, and

Moselle Frankish __NOTOC__ Moselle Franconian (german: Moselfränkisch, lb, Muselfränkesch) is a West Central German language, part of the Central Franconian dialects, Central Franconian languages area, that includes Luxembourgish. It is spoken in the southe ...

to the south. Also located nearby is the modern boundary of the modern German ''

Länder Länder (singular Land) or Bundesländer (singular Bundesland) is the name for (federal) states in two German-speaking countries. It may more specifically refer to: * States of Austria, the nine federal subdivisions of Austria * States of Germany ...

'' of

Rheinland-Pfalz Rhineland-Palatinate ( , ; german: link=no, Rheinland-Pfalz ; lb, Rheinland-Pfalz ; pfl, Rhoilond-Palz) is a western state of Germany. It covers and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the ...

and

Nordrhein-Westfalen North Rhine-Westphalia (german: Nordrhein-Westfalen, ; li, Noordrien-Wesfale ; nds, Noordrhien-Westfalen; ksh, Noodrhing-Wäßßfaale), commonly shortened to NRW (), is a state (''Land'') in Western Germany. With more than 18 million inhabi ...

References

Primary sources

Bibliography

* * * * * * * * *

External links

Ad fines (Vinxtbach)
{{Germanic peoples Early Germanic peoples Tribes of pre-Roman Gaul Tribes involved in the Gallic Wars Belgae Historical Celtic peoples Gauls