Art of prehistory and early history: Germanic art; the rise of the Lombard kingdom

of the Lombards is already enigmatic: one well-known hypothesis is that they may have been named after their long beards – but these were most likely not a truly unique feature a few centuries before the invention of scissors.

The name could also derive from their halberds, the particularly long battle axes that may have enabled these early Germanic peoples to conquer new habitats.

According to the myth of the gods surrounding Odin = Wodan (for us, since Richard Wagner, Wotan) and his wife Frea (= Frigg, goddess of marriage and motherhood, who, apart from certain overlaps in their spheres of influence, has nothing to do with the fertility and love goddess Freya who were native to a much northern region, Winnili clashed with the Vandals, and during this conflict a complicated story unfolded, at the end of which the Winnili became known as Lombards…

While myths about the gods are essentially gossip stories containing about as much truth as tabloid newspapers or blog posts by uninformed people, one can at least assume that Winnilli and Lombards once roamed the land, and stories were told about them.

The fact is that Winniler can only be admired today at medieval reenactments (www.winniler.net/gallery.html); while the Lombards left us a great deal of amazing art and architecture.

For more secularly minded people, the history of the Lombards can be summarized as follows: The Lombards were actually Elbe Germanic tribes, like the Suebi (= Swabians) and the Semnones (who merged into the Alamanni ), with a confirmed presence on the lower Elbe in the late 1st century BC.

Around 370 AD, it probably became too cold for the Lombards in Germania, so they set off from the lower Elbe (where they had settled the fertile Magdeburg Börde region) heading southeast, always towards the sun. At some point, they probably strayed a bit too far east and therefore decided to turn right shortly before Budapest (likely because it was getting colder again) – which was now possible, as they had previously been marching for a long time towards vertical rock faces known as the "Alps".

Turning right after rounding the Alps was a good idea and finally brought the Lombards to the upper part of the Italian boot; the Po Valley really had something to offer climatically for chilly, poorly dressed settlers on the banks of the Elbe.

The Lombards conquered Turin, Verona, Genoa and also briefly Venice; Pavia, located just below Milan, became the capital of the Lombard kingdom founded by King Albion in the warm south from 568 to 774.

For 206 years, the people in the beautiful, warm Lombard kingdom were able to live, build, and create art largely in peace. Then the next great troublemaker gathered enough fools for a communal mass murder/mass suicide: Charlemagne besieged Pavia for a good nine months in 774 and finally conquered it because a few more people survived on his side.

Charlemagne imprisoned the last Lombard king, Desiderius, and his wife in a Frankish/French monastery (in Corbie on the Somme) in order to crown himself king of the Lombards.

The Lombard kingdom was now part of the Frankish kingdom, a fact that was fairly quickly accepted by everyone. Only Desiderius' son (who had surely sworn eternal revenge for the disgrace inflicted on his parents, which is recounted to us in some myth) still instigated isolated uprisings in Friuli and the surrounding area, and the Duchy of Benevento (in the south, almost at the toe of the boot in present-day Campania) remained so defiant for so long that it was not forcibly incorporated into the Norman kingdom .

Otherwise, life went on; the Lombards gradually adopted Roman traditions and in the 7th century also converted more often to Catholicism (which would not bring them much more peace in the future).

The Lombards: Germanic Tribes (Documentary Radio Play)

Documentary: THE LONGBARDS (DVD / Preview)

The name of the Lombards survived in the name of the northern Italian region of Lombardy (Italian: Lombardia, also Langobardia); the Lombard language, considered extinct since around 1000, is maintained by the “Centro di dialettologia e di etnografia” in Bellinzona/Ticino and sometimes also by Radiotelevisione Svizzera; otherwise, for a long time only a few modern Lombard singers cared about the Lombard heritage of Italy (with moderate success, dialects are considered more of a “proletarian language” in Italy).

Things are changing right now; the referendum of October 22, 2017, already revealed entirely new aspirations for autonomy in Veneto and Lombardy, spurred on by Catalonia's independence referendum. The situation in Italy has not improved since then; overwhelmed Italian politicians are once again caught in an "us against the world" mentality. This insidious manipulation of humanity's innate longing for group affiliation has been used by entrenched systems throughout history as a distraction.

Because it has always worked so well – entrenched systems make life difficult, especially for well-intentioned people, because it's easier and looks like action, while malicious people gain more and more freedom; and the "de-encrustation" can only come from the citizens.

By the time they realize what's happening, they're so scared that they can't think straight anymore, and that leads to disadvantaged people following self-proclaimed saviors who actually only want to save themselves…

In Italy, the initial focus was on "additional forms of autonomy," such as the recognition and preservation of the Lombard dialect; now, there is already talk of "withdrawal from everything." It would hardly surprise any art historian if the xenophobic Lega, which has been part of the governing coalition since June 2018, were to soon resurrect the Lombard crown from obscurity.

The Lega's original and full name is “Lega Nord per l'indipendenza della Padania” (Northern League for the Independence of Padania). This “propaganda state” of Padania has quite a lot in common with the former Lombard kingdom, and the famous Iron Crown of the Lombards has attracted other power-hungry neurotics: Holy Roman Emperors constantly wore it in the Middle Ages to reinforce their claim to “Kingdom of Italy” Lombardy, now called Napoleon Bonaparte , and as Emperor Napoleon I, he brought 23 years of war with 3.5 million war dead.