Topic: The Germanic Tribes in the Ruins of the Empire

Target group

5th‑grade students of elementary school

Core curriculum

5th‑grade students of elementary school.

II. Historical analysis and interpretation.

1 . Critical analysis of information obtained from various sources (including cartographic), an attempt to draw conclusions from them.

4 . Explanation of cause‑and‑effect relations, analysis of historical phenomena and processes.

5 . Recognizing the need to learn about the past for understanding the processes taking place in the present.

III. Medieval Europe. Pupil:

2 ) places new countries in Europe in time and space.

General aim of education

Students learn about the fate of Western Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire.

Key competences

• communication in foreign languages;

• digital competence;

• learning to learn.

Criteria for success
The student will learn:

• which Germanic tribes formed countries in the former lands of the Roman Empire;

• where did the barbarians come from in the Roman Empire;

• who were the greatest Germanic headmen;

• why the fall of the Roman Empire is the end of antiquity.

Methods/techniques

• activating

  • discussion.

• expository

  • talk.

• exposing

  • film.

• programmed

  • with computer;

  • with e‑textbook.

• practical

  • exercices concerned.

Forms of work

• individual activity;

• activity in pairs;

• activity in groups;

• collective activity.

Teaching aids

• e‑textbook;

• notebook and crayons/felt‑tip pens;

• interactive whiteboard, tablets/computers.

Lesson plan overview

Before classes

1. Students should remember what the migration period was and how the fall of the Roman Empire came about. When preparing for the lesson, they should carefully watch the movie „How Germans changed the West” from the section of the e‑textbook Ruling or cooperating? How the Germans changed the West.

Introduction

1. The teacher states the subject of the lesson, explains the aim of the lesson and together with students determines the success criteria to be achieved.

2. Referring to the homework, he asks students what contributed to the fall of the Roman Empire and when it occurred. And then what heritage Rome left..

Realization

1. The teacher asks students where the barbarians came from in the Roman Empire and who they were. Then he explains to the students that the Romans saw the Germans differently. They were for them both fearless warriors and savages, representatives of the old world. In the last centuries of the empire, Romans were also jealous and envious due to the privileges Germans were granted by last emperors.

2. Then the teacher divides the class into 5 groups and each one is assigned another people inhabiting the lands of the former West Roman Empire: 1 - Visigoths; 2 - Ostrogots; 3 - Vandals; 4 - Franks; 5 - Britons and peoples living in Britain. Then he asks each group to follow the fate of these peoples, deducting where they came from within the empire; where and when they founded their state; what characterized them; who was their greatest leader and what they achieved. Groups can use all available means - the Internet, encyclopedias and other scientific and popular science items.

3. Students present their presentations and then perform tasks. They complete the interactive map of Europe (Exercise 1) and determine the reasons for the synthesis of cultures (Exercise 2). They also indicate the correct answers in Exercise 3 and Exercise 4, and then read the interactive illustration in Task 1 showing the conquest of Rome in 455. The teacher provides feedback to the students during solving exercises and executing tasks. The teacher makes sure that the tasks have been correctly completed and gives feedback.

Summary

1. In conclusion, the teacher asks students what features can be attributed to the Germanic peoples - what they had in common and what divided them (both in comparison with the Romans and among them).

2. Students perform Exercise 5, comparing images on Roman and Visigothic coins.

3. The teacher assesses the students' work during the lesson, taking into account their input and commitment. For this purpose, he may prepare an evaluation questionnaire for self‑assessment and evaluation of the teacher's work and other students.

Homework

1. The teacher sets homework (it is not an obligatory part of the scenario): From this period come one of the most famous European legends telling the fate of King Arthur and his knights. Find out what they tell you about and what events they describe.

The following terms and recordings will be used during this lesson

Terms

Texts and recordings

The Germanic Tribes in the Ruins of the Empire

In 476, the Germanic chief Odoacer forced the Emperor of Rome, Romulus Augustulus, to abdicate. Even though the Roman Emperors were dependent on the Germanic leaders for many years by then, this event marked the end of the Empire’s existence. Centuries later, historians acknowledged this symbolic event as the end of Antiquity and the beginning of the Middle Ages.

The Germanic peoples that entered the territories of the Western Empire did not outnumber the Romans. They were aware that the only way to stay in power was to collaborate with the local populace. Owing to this, the legacy of Antiquity has not gone to waste entirely. With time, almost all of the invading tribes fully assimilated with the Roman populace. The Germanic culture changed as well. From the fifth century onwards, the tribes started to slowly undergo christianization, assuming mainly the Arian variant of the religion.

When deposing the Western Emperor, Odoacer, not wanting to provoke conflict with his Eastern counterpart, Zeno, sent the Imperial insignia to Constantinople, at the same time electing to abstain from requesting to be named the ruler in the West. Zeno, however, did not trust the Germanic leader, and sought to depose him. Thus, he entered into an agreement with the Ostrogoth King, Theodoric, raised at the court of Constantinople. In 493, he managed to defeat Odoacer’s rule, taking over the whole of Italy and, with the Emperor’s approval, founded his own state in Ravenna.

In the second half of the fifth century, the Visigoths, seeing the collapse of the Empire and the weakness of the legal authorities, revolted and took over the territories of Gaul and the Iberian Peninsula. There, they created their own state, seeking to maintain separateness from the Romans. The situation shifted at the beginning of the sixth century, when they were defeated by the Franks during the expansion of the latter. Had it not been for the aid of the Ostrogoth King, Theodoric, the Visigoths’ state would probably have ceased to exist. From then onwards, the subsequent rulers sought to collaborate with the Roman subjects, e.g. by dropping Arianism in favor of Catholicism. The Muslim raids brought an end to their statehood, conquering nearly the entire Iberian Peninsula by 716. The Franks, brought to the left bank of Rhine by Romans, who appreciated their bravery, stayed loyal to the Imperial commanders even after losing touch with Rome itself. The situation changed only after Syagrius, the son of one of the Roman commanders, declared himself King. He did not have sufficient authority among the Franks, and his rule could not bring any order. Thus, Frankish kings of the Merovingian dynasty – Childeric, then Clovis – sought to take over. They collaborated closely with the Roman elites, a testament to which was the baptism of Clovis in 496. Aware of the military potential of the Roman locals, he admitted them to his army, gaining advantage over his competitors. In the end, Clovis managed to create a stable state, whose stability and power was based on strict cooperation and the collaborative rule of the Franks and Gallo‑Romans.

The Vandals were a group of East Germanic tribes originating from Central Europe. At the beginning of the fifth century, led by King Genseric, they invaded the Roman Empire’s African provinces, where they founded their own state (439). Then, they began the conquest of the Mediterranean islands, quickly taking over Corsica, Sardinia, and Sicily. In 455, during one of their raids on Italy, they attacked and looted Rome. They applied the policy of completely isolating the Roman citizens from the Germanic tribesmen. Any attempts to assimilate or step away from the Germanic tradition were severely punished. This policy quickly proved ineffective; in consequence, as early as at the beginning of the sixth century, the Byzantine military invaded the state of the Vandals and caused it to collapse, displacing the defeated into the depths of the Empire.

The last place to be reached by the Germanic tribes was Britain. Deprived of the protection of the Roman legions, the romanized Britons, fearing the attack of the Picts and the Celts, called, according to the tradition, their cousins, the Germanic tribes. The tribes that supposedly responded to the call were the Saxons, the Angles, and the Jutes, who, in the course of the battles, set up their own kingdoms in Britain.