He was a leader of the Suebii (mentioned in TFA), who extended German rule into Gaul around the same time as Julius Caesar launched his invasion. The two men met right before an ultimate battle between the Suebii and Rome.

Ariovistus's message was simple: while they are both invading Gaul, Caesar is doing so under the pretence of protecting states that are friendly to Rome, but ultimately he wants all of the Gaul to be Roman anyway, because the Romans see all of Gaul and Germany as "barbarians". So basically, he called out the Romans on what he rightfully recognised to be hypocrisy based in a false feeling of cultural superiority.

Caesar beat Ariovistus the day after and proceeded to put all of Gaul under the Roman rule.

And we know all this from Caesar himself: http://classics.mit.edu/Caesar/gallic.1.1.html

There are also [animals], which are called moose. The shape of these, and the varied color of their skins, is much like roes, but in size they surpass them a little and are destitute of horns, and have legs without joints and ligatures; nor do they lie down for the purpose of rest, nor, if they have been thrown down by any accident, can they raise or lift themselves up. Trees serve as beds to them; they lean themselves against them, and thus reclining only slightly, they take their rest; when the huntsmen have discovered from the footsteps of these animals whither they are accustomed to betake themselves, they either undermine all the trees at the roots, or cut into them so far that the upper part of the trees may appear to be left standing. When they have leant upon them, according to their habit, they knock down by their weight the unsupported trees, and fall down themselves along with them.

http://www.dancarlin.com/product/hardcore-history-60-the-cel...

I'm sketchier on where the Angles/Saxons/Jutes came from before they emerged into the historical record in modern-day northwestern Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands. Whether they were a reconfiguration of the tribes that had been there since time immemorial, or were groups previously to the east, displaced westward as a ripple effect of the great migrations out of central Asia.

I am not a historian of course. Would love to hear counterpoints; I'm interested in historical facts not propaganda :) .

Caesar is known to exaggerate and make things up to make his story interesting. Caesar is one of the world's great self-promoters and self-propagandists. He knew the power of propaganda and historical legacy. So I'd take what he wrote with a grain of salt.

"Germanicus" became an honorary title given to (a lot) of Romans who fought at beat Germans over the centuries...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germanicus_(disambiguation)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alesia_(city)

I guess the English equivalent would be Bodicea/Boudicca.

"To robbery, slaughter, plunder, they give the lying name of empire; they make a solitude and call it peace."

Shame that Calgacus and his speech were almost certainly invented by Tacitus.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calgacus

If you check where Roman culture really made a large impacts its mostly in Mediterranean climates and cultures.

The less excess-able inland areas in many places have much lesser cultural impact, think of Northern Britain for example.

Just in terms of impact these areas actually had lots of trade with the Romans and the people living on both sides of this 'line' were very similar.

The title, I think, only refers to the latter.

I had to learn about it in art school. Specifically, about a German artist who criticised how eagerly post-war Germany was to forget it altogether, pretending the monuments raised for it and the operas written about it didn't exist. As if pretending it never happened is somehow better than remembering that what happened was wrong.

That doesn't sound like a very informed comparison at all.

https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2013/07/afghanistan-in-the...

Even in this story, as the article notes, after having lost three legions in an utterly decisive battle in the wilds of Germania, Emperor Tiberius' son Germanicus decided he would go back and wage more war to recover the standards. That is not the sort of political will we are used to.

- Modern Germans don't really see themselves as descendants of those Germans, in the German language both are named differently. Modern Germans are 'Deutsche' - ancient Germans are 'Germanen'. English does not make this distinction. There are more annoying confusions like this, for example, the Germanic tribe of the Saxons has nothing to do with the modern state of Saxony, as the ancestors of modern Saxons spoke a different dialect. There are several breaks like this in between modern Germany and Germanic tribes which are masked by nomenclature.

- German (Deutsche) Catholics distanced themselves from the 'barbaric', non-Christian Germanic tribes.

- As usual, the Nazis ruined it. The battle was sometimes used for propaganda reasons by the Nazis, replacing Romans with Jews. Modern Nazis are also using it for their own purposes (replacing Romans with immigrants and the US)

Edit: the battle itself isn't silenced or anything, I do remember quite a few events when the 2000 year anniversary happened, including the cover of the SPIEGEL having it (IIRC?)

People who want to identify with victory over Romans to fuel a nationalistic mindset won't stop at Arminius, they also claim the legacy of various gothic etc tribes who troubled and/or continued thedying western empire.

If you look at central Europe in the last 2000 year it isn't surprising I think, most of the time it looks like a giant disaster.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Also German TV is full of historic documentaries about that time - at lest the public service broadcasters (phoenix, zdf info, arte, etc). Of course you will not notice that if you only follow the private channels.

However I would guess, that your colleagues just forgot about the 'Schlacht im Teuteborger Wald', because it definitely visit part of the history curriculum.

In modern days the French Revolution as a well as Bismarcks doing have the focus for the 'identity' of Germany.

Here there are some good recaps of the battle:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmF3VBA_RcM&t=42s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3jSjknuUG0

From there, Louis the German received East Francia, which in many ways formed the core of what would later be Germany. From there, we certainly took a long and winding road. (The reformation settlement is probably another point worth touching upon, though)

1871 is merely the point where there was an actual administratively unified nation state called Germany. It's the first time we did that, so in that sense, sure.

(Sorry. I nerd out on history. Really, it's a distraction to your main point - the whole legend of Arminius thing is a German nationalist myth. Tied to 1871 - each nation state needs a founding myth)

Remember that the nation state an accidental invention of the industrial revolution after all; pro-nation state propaganda was happening all over Europe at the time, and a lot of it is quite offensive to our modern eyes.

I find it kind of frustrating that Nazis are mainly depicted as this evil that came into existence in a vacuum, or in the best case solely as a reaction to the situation in Germany after WWI. The seeds of fascism and xenophobia had been shown all over Europe long before that. I suspect Germany just got there first.

(German translation: "Ein gefährliches Buch. Die 'Germania' des Tacitus und die Erfindung der Deutschen"; DVA, München 2012)

Especially interesting for pointing out a rather ambiguous role of early humanism (as related to the reception of the Germania) in German history.