History, archaeology, and human evolutionary genetics provide us with an increasingly detailed view of the origins and development of the peoples that live in Northwestern Europe. This book aims to restore the key position of historical linguistics in this debate by treating the history of the Germanic languages as a history of its speakers. It focuses on the role that language contact has played in creating the Germanic languages, between the first millennium BC and the crucially important early medieval period. Chapters on the origins of English, German, Dutch, and the Germanic language family as a whole illustrate how the history of the sounds of these languages provide a key that unlocks the secret of their genesis: speakers of Latin, Celtic and Balto-Finnic switched to speaking Germanic and in the process introduced a 'foreign accent' that caught on and spread at the expense of types of Germanic that were not affected by foreign influence. The book is aimed at linguists, historians, archaeologists and anyone who is interested in what languages can tell us about the origins of their speakers.

The book is concerned especially with the debate surrounding the grouping of Germanic languages and with the research history of this controversial question. It discusses the methods applied to past attempts and outlines those aplicable to future research in the field.

Scholarly study of the Germanic people from prehistoric times to the Carolingian Empire.

A compelling and evocative history of an ordinary 21st century American family detailing its varied and diverse historical and cultural elements through out history. An enthralling journey through time and culture giving a strong narrative account of the similar Germanic roots of many American families. Using records and tools as varied as archeology, anthropology, ethnology, etymology, geology, mythology, legends and historical documentation, Scales embarks on a fascinating quest to link together the pieces of a vast jigsaw of the forgotten Germanic heritage of many American families while developing a chronological framework to historical events and family bloodlines. With an astonishing insight into the cultural effects of the travels and historical events of our founding fathers, more than a dozen separate family lines are identified with their earliest American ancestors and which part of the ancient Germanic world those families came from. Reaching as far back into the origin of the Cimbrians and Teutanians, early Celtic peoples known as Germanic Tribes coming down from the Alps, where Switzerland is now located, to their arrival in Germany then on to the shores of the American colonies, sets a framework for the detailed history of the Germanic people who’s blood still runs in many American veins.

An account of the Germanic peoples and their kingdom between the 3rd and 8th centuries, as they invaded, settled in and transformed the Roman empire.