[53] the
Rhone River and made them subject and tributary to themselves. By that
time it so happened that the Arborychi had become soldiers of the
Romans. And the Germans, wishing to make this people subject to
themselves, since their territory adjoined their own and they had
changed the government under which they had lived from of old, began to
plunder their land and, being eager to make war, marched against them
with their whole people. But the Arborychi proved their valour and
loyalty to the Romans and shewed themselves brave men in this war, and
since the Germans were not able to overcome them by force, they wished
to win them over and make the two peoples kin by intermarriage. This
suggestion the Arborychi received not at all unwillingly; for both, as
it happened, were Christians. And in this way they were united into one
people, and came to have great power.

Now other Roman soldiers, also, had been stationed at the frontiers of
Gaul to serve as guards. And these soldiers, having no means of
returning to Rome, and at the same time being unwilling to yield to
their enemy[54] who were Arians, gave themselves, together with their
military standards and the land which they had long been guarding for
the Romans, to the Arborychi and Germans; and they handed down to their
offspring all the customs of their fathers, which were thus preserved,
and this people has held them in sufficient reverence to guard them even
up to my time. For even at the present day they are clearly recognized
as belonging to the legions to which they were assigned when they served
in ancient times, and they always carry their own standards when they
enter battle, and always follow the customs of their fathers. And they
preserve the dress of the Romans in every particular, even as regards
their shoes.

Now as long as the Roman polity remained unchanged,[55] the emperor held
all Gaul as far as the Rhone River; but when Odoacer changed the
government into a tyranny, [N] then, since the tyrant yielded to them,
the Visigoths took possession of all Gaul as far as the alps which mark
the boundary between Gaul and Liguria. [O]But after the fall of Odoacer,
the Thuringians and the Visigoths began to fear the power of the
Germans, which was now growing greater (for their country had become
exceedingly populous and they were forcing into subjection without any
concealment those who from time to time came in their way), and so they
were eager to win the al