Cherusci
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Cherusci (German: Cherusker) were a Germanic tribe inhabiting parts of the northern Rhine valley and the plains and forests of northwestern Germany (between near modern Osnabrück and Hanover) during the 1st century BC and 1st century AD. The name describes a deer, German: Hirsch.
Their first known documentary mention occurs in Caesar's "De Bello Gallico", Book 6.10, which deals with events in 53 BCE.
As Rome tried to expand its reach in northern Europe beyond the Rhine, it exploited divisions within the tribal leadership of the Cherusci, and for some time the tribe was considered a Roman ally. By about 8 CE, however, the advocates of independence gained the upper hand.
In 9 CE, in the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest, an army of allied Germanic tribes (the Cherusci, Bructeri, Marsi, and Chatti) under the young Cheruscian war leader Arminius (Hermann der Cherusker) annihilated three Roman legions commanded by Publius Quinctilius Varus.
This crushing defeat stopped Rome's advance and compelled the empire, after a few more years of generally indecisive campaigning by Germanicus, to withdraw permanently behind the Rhine and Danube and the Limes fortification which was built in consequence of the loss at Teutoburg Forest to close the gap between the two river borders and prevent Germanic raids into Roman territory.
