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although distinguished from one another by their names, do not differ in anything else at all.
Like Sclavenes and Antes, they all use the same laws and practice a common religion. Similarly,
they all speak one language called Gothic54 . The parallel is too important to be ignored: in
describing the Sclavenes and the Antes including their language Procopius does not look
over his reporter notes of interviews with Sclavene and Antian mercenaries, but applies the same
stereotypes about barbarians that he uses for the description of the Gothic nations. Moreover,
the parallel implies that, like the Gothic nations, the Sclavenes are not one single nation, but
a multitude of tribes, which he specifically mentions as such when narrating the return of the
Heruli to Thule55 . Similarly, the Antes were not a single tribe, but many and countless56 . Far
from boldly affirming their relation to the Sclavenes, as Sergei Ivanov would have us believe,
the Antes had their own country, clearly separate from that of the Sclavenes57 . Were then Procopius
49
Wars VII 14. 27 28; English translation: Procopius of Caesarea. Wars. Vol. 5. P. 271, 273.
50
Wars VII 34.23. A is a trait of the Tetraxite Goths and of the Abasgi (Wars VIII 4.11 and VIII 3.14-15).
Similarly, when Procopius mentions that Sclavenes and Antes do not wear even a shirt or a cloak, but gathering their
trews up as far as their private parts they enter into battle with their opponents, this is by no means a description of
ethnographically specific customs. After all, the same is said about the barbarian soldiers (in general) who fought in
Belisarius army: And not one of them had a cloak or any other outer garment to cover the shoulders, but they were
sauntering about clad in linen tunics and trousers (Wars II 21.6).
51
John the Cappadocian: Wars I 25.9. Justinian: Secret History VIII 22. Tyrants: Wars IV 18.1. For Sclavenes and
Antes as the opposite of tyrants, see also: Revanoglou E. M. Geographika kai ethnographika stoicheia. P. 208.
52
Herodotus IV 108.1. See: Revanoglou E. M. Geographika kai ethnographika stoicheia. P. 206 with n. 1191.
53
Procopius of Caesarea. Wars III 2.4. Stallwart are also the inhabitants of Brittia (Wars VIII 20.28). All those
nations were alike because they lived in the North. For Procopius use of the theory of climes, see: Benedicty R. Die
Milieu-Theorie bei Prokop von Kaisareia // BZ. 1962. Bd 55. S. 1 10.
Wars III 2.2-6; English translation: Procopius of Caesarea. Wars / Ed. by J. Haury; Engl. transl. by H. B. Dewing.
Vol. 3. Cambridge, Mass.; London, 1916. P. 9, 11. It is interesting in this respect to note the similarities in terms of
religion. According to Procopius, the Sclavenes and the Antes sacrifice to rivers and nymphs and some other spirits,
making divinations in connection with such sacrifices ( oo ; Wars VII
14.24). The same is however said about the Franks, who, although Christian, practice human sacrifice, and it is in
connection with these that they make their prophecies ( ooo; Wars VI 25.10). For Procopius
concept of divination, see Revanoglou E. M. Geographika kai ethnographika stoicheia. P. 200 201.
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Commentarii
Antes also Slavs, as claimed by Ivanov? And what exactly is the relation between Procopius
Sclavenes and Ivanov s Slavs?
Ivanov takes issue with my conclusion that the Slavs did not become Slavs because they
spoke Slavic, but because they were called so by others. He states that the Slavs became Slavs,
because they called themselves Slavs. This is to turn again to the realm of linguistic beliefs,
rather than facts, for no evidence exists that any Slavic-speaking people in the early Middle Ages
called themselves Slavs. Nor do we know what was the name which Procopius Sclavenes used
for themselves, although most historians presume that Procopius employed that very name, with
which the Sclavenes called themselves. As I conceded in the Making of the Slavs, it might be that
Sclavene was initially the self-designation of a particular ethnic group (P. 119). It is nonethe-
less significant that in Romanian and Albanian, two languages for which we may safely presume
an early contact with the idiom in use among the Sclavenes, chiau and Shq derive not from
o/Sclavenus, but the shorter form o/Sclavus, which is undoubtedly of Byzantine
origin58 . Be as it may, naming and classifying a group of people as Sclavenes was a Byzantine, not
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