gibbon – and tacitus – on the gauls

More talking points for Wednesday:

In our current read, Gibbon in chapter Chapter 38: Barbarian Rule begins with:

The revolution of Gaul
THE Gauls, ⁽¹⁾  who impatiently supported the Roman yoke, received a memorable lesson from one of the lieutenants of Vespasian, whose weighty sense has been refined and expressed by the genius of Tacitus. ⁽²⁾

Footnote (2): "Tacitus, The  Histories, iv. 73, 74. To abridge Tacitus would indeed be presumptuous;  but I may select the general ideas which he applies to the present state and future revolutions of Gaul."

Here is the link to Tacitus Online in general, and Histories Book 4 in particular.  [4.73] and [4.74]  relate the the"speech" of the general Cerialis to an assembly of Treveri and Lingones, during the revolt of Civilis and Classicus.

After partially quoting Tacitus, there follow Gibbon's observations:

This salutary advice was accepted, and this strange prediction was accomplished. In the space of four hundred years the hardy Gauls, who had encountered the arms of Caesar, were imperceptibly melted into the general mass of citizens and subjects: the Western empire was dissolved; and the Germans who had passed the Rhine fiercely contended for the possession of Gaul, and excited the contempt or abhorrence of its peaceful and polished inhabitants. With that conscious pride which the pre-eminence of knowledge and luxury seldom fails to inspire, they derided the hairy and gigantic savages of the North; their rustic manners, dissonant joy, voracious appetite, and their horrid appearance, equally disgusting to the sight and to the smell. The liberal studies were still cultivated in the schools of Autun and Bordeaux, and the language of Cicero and Virgil was familiar to the Gallic youth. Their ears were astonished by the harsh and unknown sounds of the Germanic dialect, and they ingeniously lamented that the trembling muses fled from the harmony of a Burgundian lyre. The Gauls were endowed with all the advantages of art and nature, but, as they wanted courage to defend them, they were justly condemned to obey, and even to flatter, the victorious barbarians by whose clemency they held their precarious fortunes and their lives. ⁽⁴⁾

This acceptance of the Roman language and culture by the Gauls is frequently commented on as unusual, but is it really?