This great expansion was due to the increasing weakness of the Romans, to pressure of population in Germany, and, specially, to the military strength of the Teutonic nations now far more formidable than in the time of the early empire. They were better armed and their power was more concentrated. Thus a dozen different tribes in and around the lower part of the basin of the Rhine in the 1st century, by the end of the 5th century had become subject to one king. This concentration of power provided the kings with greater wealth and with larger permanent bodies of armed men. The motive force towards extension of territories was supplied by military ambition ; the growth of a warlike spirit in the North was constantly driving young warriors to seek their fortunes in the service of continental princes.
The first half of the 6th century saw the subjugation of the Burgundian and Visigothic portions of Gaul by the Franks and the recovery of Africa by the Romans, which was soon followed by the overthrow of the Ostrogothic kingdom ; but some years later Italy was again invaded by the Langobardi (Lombards), the last of the great Teutonic migrations. By this time the old Teutonic lands in eastern Germany, including even the basin of the Elbe had been occupied by Slavonic peoples. Before the end of the century Bohemia and Lower Austria, the basins of the Drave and the Save, had become Slavonic.
The succeeding centuries witness a return to the ethnographical conditions which prevailed before the migration period. The Franks and the Langobardi remained in Gaul and Italy, were gradually denationalized and absorbed in the native populations. In Spain Teutonic nationality came to an end with the overthrow of the Visigothic kingdom by the Moors, if not before. Yet throughout the west and south-west the Teutonic frontier re mained from fifty to two hundred miles in advance of its position in Roman times. In south-eastern Europe the Teutonic elements were swallowed up by the native and Slavonic populations, a small remnant lingering in the Crimea until probably the i 7th century. The political consolidation of the various continental Teutonic peoples (apart from the Danes) in the 8th century led to the gradual recovery of eastern Germany, Lower Austria and • the greater part of Styria and Carinthia, though Bohemia, Moravia and the basins of the Vistula and the Warthe have remained mainly Slavonic. In the British Isles the Teutonic element, in spite of temporary checks, eventually became dom inant everywhere. Lastly, from the beginning of the 9th century bodies of Scandinavian warriors began to found kingdoms and principalities in all parts of Europe. The settlers, however, did not preserve their nationality, and in almost all cases they were soon absorbed by the populations (Teutonic, Celtic, Latin or Slavonic) which they had conquered. Their settlements in Green
land and America came to an end, but Iceland, which was formerly uninhabited, remained a Scandinavian colony.
Form of Government.—Tacitus speaks of tribes which had kings and tribes which had not, the latter apparently being under a number of principes, and represents the power of Teutonic kings in general, with reference no doubt primarily to the western tribes, as being of the slightest, while among the Goths, an eastern people, they had somewhat more authority, and for the Swedes he gives a picture of absolutism. In harmony with these statements many Northern and probably all the Anglo-Saxon kingly families traced their origin to the gods. The Swedes, indeed, and some of the eastern peoples seem to have regarded their kings themselves as at least semi-divine. As the west was most open to foreign influence during the Roman period, the form of government which prevailed here was less primitive, especially as kingship had by this time died out among the Gauls. In later times a number of "kings," generally belonging to one family, are fre quently found within the same tribe; and the early principes were probably persons of similar position.
The concilium or tribal assembly figures largely in Tacitus's account of the Germani as the final authority on all matters of first-rate importance. Here the principes were chosen, serious charges brought against members of the tribe and youths ad mitted to the rights of warriors. The duties of opening the pro ceedings and maintaining order belonged to the priests, so that probably the gathering itself was primarily of a religious char acter and met, as among the Swedes in later times, in the im mediate neighbourhood of the tribal sanctuary. Such religious gatherings were no doubt common to all Teutonic peoples in early times, but it is not certain that among the eastern and northern tribes they were invested with all the powers ascribed to them by Tacitus. After his time tribal assemblies are seldom mentioned, and though we hear occasionally, both in England and elsewhere, of a concourse of people being present when a king holds court on high days or religious festivals, there is no evidence that such concourses took part in the discussion of state affairs. Indeed, considering the greatly increased size of the kingdoms in later times, it is improbable that they were drawn from any except the immediately adjacent districts. When we hear of deliberations now they are those of the king's council or court, a body consisting partly of members of the royal family and partly of warriors old and young in the personal service of the king. Such bodies of course had always existed (see below) and exercised at all times a powerful influence upon the kings, frequently even forcing them into war against their own wishes.