TRIBOCI or TRIBOCCI
Eth.
TRIBOCI or
TRIBOCCI, a German people in Gallia. Schneider (Caesar,
Caes. Gal. 1.51) has the form “Triboces” in the accusative plural. Pliny has Tribochi, and Strabo Tribocchi (
Τριβόκχοι).
In the passage of Caesar (
Caes. Gal. 4.10) it is said that all the MISS. have “Tribucorum” (Schneider, note).
The Triboci were in the army of the German king Ariovistus in the great battle in which Caesar defeated him; and though Caesar does not say that
[p. 2.1229]they were Germans, his narrative shows that he considered them to be Germans.
In another passage (
B. G. 4.10) Caesar places the Triboci on the Rhine between the Mediomatrici and the Treviri, and he means to place them on the left or Gallic side of the Rhine. Strabo (
iv. p.193), after mentioning the Sequani and Mediomatrici as extending to the Rhine, says, “Among them a German people has settled, the Tribocchi, who have passed over from their native land.” Pliny also (4.17) and Tacitus (
German. 100.28) say that the Tribocci are Germans.
The true conclusion from Caesar is that lie supposed the Tribocci to be settled in Gallia before B.C. 58.
Ptolemy (
2.9.17) places the Tribocci in Upper Germania, but he incorrectly places the Vangiones between the Nemetes and the Tribocci, for the Nemetes bordered on the Tribocci. However he places the Tribocci next to the Rauraci, and he names Breucomagus (Brocomagus) and Elcebus (Helcebus) as the two towns of the Tribocci. D'Anville supposes that the territory of the Tribocci corresponded to the diocese of
Strassburg. Saletio (
Seltz or
Setz), we may suppose, belonged to the Nemetes, as in modern times it belonged to the diocese of
Speier; and it is near the northern limits of the diocese of
Strassburg. On the south towards the Rauraci, a place named
Markelsheim, on the southern limit of the diocese of
Strassburg and bordering on that of
Basle, indicates a boundary by a Teutonic name (
mark), as Fines does in those parts of Gallia where the Roman tongue prevailed.
The name of the Tribocci does not appear in the Notit. Provinc., though the names of the Nemetes and Vangiones are there; but instead of the Tribocci we have Civitas Argentoratum (
Strassburg), the chief place of the Tribocci. Ptolemy makes Argentoratum a city of the Vangiones.
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G.L]
