Germanic Timeline:

3000 BC  Indo-Europeans spread into northwest Europe, where they settle among earlier populations of Neolithic farmers and Old Stone-Age hunters.

2000 BC  Celto-Ligurian tribes are in control of large areas of central and western Europe.  Represented by the 'Bell-Beaker Folk', they begin moving into the British Isles.  Other Indo-Europeans move east, where the Thracians and Iranians form two large groups.  The Balts and Slavs occupy most of what is now Germany.  Illyrian tribes occupy an area of southern Europe between the Italian peninsula and Greece.  (Italic Indo-Europeans had moved into their peninsula, and warlike Greek tribes into the Mediterranean area, from the Danube region.)

    The Teutons of this period are in possessin of most of the Scandinavian peninsula, where a racially distinict Germanic Nordic has developed from a mixture of invading Indo-European Nordics and Old Stone-Age survivors.  Indo-European tribes now possess most of Europe at the expense of the earlier stock who are now either pushed into the more inaccessible parts of the continent, or become the lower strata of society, the untouchables of Europe. 

753 BC  The founding of Rome by Romulus after killing his brother Remus. 

600 BC  The continental Celts begin the Halstatt phase of their magnificent Iron-Age culture; at about this time they over-run central Spain. 

400 BC  The second phase of Celtic Iron-Age culture evolves; known as the La Téne, it represents the flowering of Celtic abstract art, seen, inter alia, in the decoration of weapons.  Halstatt Celts move into Britain.

    La Téne Celts cross the Alps and take control of northern Italy.  Etruscan colonies in the Po valley are obliterated, and Rome is sacked during a protracted Celtic raid down the peninsula.

333-323 BC  Alexander the Great conquers Asia, Egypt, Arabian desert, and parts of India ending with his death.

350 BC  Rome defeats the Celts in Italy.

300 BC  Rome gains full control of Italy.

112 BC  Proto-Germanic tribes from the middle Baltic Sea area, the Cimbri and Teutones invade Gaul; during the extensive raid they attract the Ambrones another Celtic tribe to their ranks, and destroy five Roman armies sent against them before turning towards Italy.  The beginning of relations between the Romans and the Germanic tribes. 

102 BC  The Cimbri, Teutones and Ambrones annihilated by the new model Roman army, which had been created, trained and was now led to victory by Marius, a General of obscure background.

100 BC  The Goths cross the Baltic from the Scandinavian peninsula to northern Germany.

58-51 BC  Julius Caesar conquers most of the Celtic tribes of Gaul and reportedly repulses an attempted invasion by trans-Rhenain tribes.

53 BC  First know documentory of The Cherusci in Caesar's "De Bello Gallico", Book 6.10.

44 BC Julius Caesar is stabbed to death by members of the Senate.  HAH!!!!

27-12 BC  Roman forces advance in central and eastern Europe, to the Danube; the river thus forms, for most of its length, the northern frontier of the Empire.  The expansion of the Frontier to the Elbe in the north is called off after the disaster in the Teutoburg Forest.  At about this time Augustus creates a standing army of 25 legions.

0 CE  Birth of the Jewish Messiah Jesus.

9 AD  The garrison of northern Germany, consisting of the XVII, XVIII and XIX Legions are wiped out in an ambush in the Teutoburg Forest.  These three legions never again appeared on the army list.  The Rhine-Danube nexus now marks the northern limits of the Roman Empire.  Teutoburg Forest

19 AD  Arminius, the leader of the Germanics in the Teutoburg Forest, is killed by his fellow chieftains.   Rome pulls General Germanicus out of Germania stopping any future conquest of Germania.

43 AD  Roman forces invade Britain, speedily overrunning a third of the country, from the southern coast.

69-79 AD  The angle formed by the Rhine and Danube is rounded off.  Roman occupation of the British lowlands is carried up to the highlands.  A further two legions are lost during a revolt of auxiliaries on the Rhine.

81 AD  Several campaigns are mounted by the Roman army on the Danube, particularly against the Thracian kingdom of Dacia.

101 AD  The Emperor Trajan begins a massive invasion of Daceia; in two campaigns the Romans break Dacian resistance.  The conquest creates a trans-Danubian salient of the Empire.  Roman forces on the Danube are reinforced by four legions; Rhine legions are reduces by three.

150 AD  Eastern German tribes begin drifting south; some of them enter into permanent federation.

181 AD  A massive barbarian assault on the Danube provinces led by the Marcomanni and Quadi triggers off a prolonged series of savagely fought compagins during the reign of the philosopher soldier Marcus Aurelius.

251 AD  The Goths invade the Balkans and Anatolia; the Emperor Decius (Hostilianus) is killed.

256 AD  Frankish and Alemannic war bands overrun Gaul and invade Spain and Italy.

275 AD  Roman forces abandon both the Dacian salient and the Rhine-Danube angle in the face of increasing pressure along the northern frontier;  the Gepids and Gothsmove into Dacia; the Alemanni occupy the Rhine-Danube angle and Durgundian tribes the middle Rhine area.

280 AD  The Goths, led by their king Ermanarich, spread into a large area of Eurasia and north to the Baltic.  'Anglo-Saxon' raids increase on the east coast of Britain and northern coast of Gaul.

313 AD  Emperor Constantine the Great makes Christianity the state religion of Rome.

358 AD  The Alemanni and Franks are defeated by the Emperor Julian in Gaul; some Franks remain in northwest Gaul as armed peasant march men (foederates), allies of Rome.

360 AD  The Ostrogoths come into contact with westward moving Huns, a Turco-Mongoloid people.

372 AD  The Huns of the Volga attack the advancing Goths, who are overwhelmed by the nomadic hordes.  The Huns are able to push into Europe, where they settle as the overlords of Slavanic peasants and Gepids on the Hungarian plains.

375 AD  The Goths and Asding Vandals apply for sanctuary within the Empire.  They are settled along the Danube, where they suffer many indignties at the hands of Roman merchants and officals.

378 AD  The Visigoths revolt against Rome.

379 AD  The Emperor of the East is killed, his army annihilated at Adrianople by the largely cavalry army of the Goths.

380 AD  Germans, Sarmatians and Huns are taken into Imperial service; as a consequence, barbarian leaders begin to play an increasingly active role in the life of the Empire.  Can't beat them, recruit them.

402 AD  The Goths Invade Italy, where they suffer defeat at the hands of the Romano-Vandal General Stilicho.

405 AD  Stilicho crushes a mixed army of Ostrogoths, Quadi and Asding Vandals with an army raised from the frontier forces of the Rhine, leaving this sector dangerously weakened.

406 AD  A coalition of Asding Vandals, Siling Vandals, Marcomanni, Quadi and a clan of Sarmatian Alans cross the frozen Rhine near Mainz into Gaul.

407 AD  Britain is denuded of the Roman garrison, which crosses the Channel in force in a sham effort to pacify the German invaders of Gaul.  In fact they declare one of their number to be Emperor and seek recognition from the Franks, Burgundians and Alemanni who have occupied the left bank of the Rhine. 

409 AD  The great barbarian coalition of Vandals, Suevi and Sarmatians which had ravaged Gaul for three years crosses the Pyrenees into Spain. 

410 AD Britain fragments under the local control of petty Romano-Celtic magnates.  The Visigoths, led by Alaric, sack Rome.

412 AD  The Visigoths, in Imperial service, enter Gaul and depose yet another Imperial usurper.

414 AD  The Visigoths cross into Spain, where they exterminate the settled Siling Vandals and Sarmatian Alans (416).  The Asding Vandals, Marcomanni and QUadi are spared, by Roman intervention, in order to prevent the increase of Visigothic power.  As the reward for their exertions the Visigoths are invited by Roman authorities to settle in a large area of south-west Gaul.

428 AD  North Africa is invaded by the Asding Vandals; they build a pirate fleet and hold the Roman corn supply to ransom.

433 AD  Attila the Hun is born.

436 AD  The Huns drive deep into Germanic territory; many tribes become Hunnish vassals.

449 AD  Germanic tribes begin the permanent settlement of Britain.

451 AD  Attila leads the Huns and their German vassals into Gaul; they are met and driven back by Roman troops,  Burgundians, Salian Franks and Visigoths at the Campus Mauriacus.  The Huns withdraw to Hungary.

452 AD  Attila invades Italy, but the Huns are bribed by Roman authorities to retire.

453 AD  Attila dies.  The Vandals sack Rome.

454 AD  German vassals of the Huns overthrow their masters at the battle of Nedao.

469-476 AD  The Visigoths conquer most of Spain.  The German general Odoacer becomes king of Italy and is recognized by the Eastern Roman Empire.

476 AD  September 4, the traditional date for the fall of the Roman Empire with Emperor Romulus Augustus.

493 AD  Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, becomes Regent of Italy.

507 AD  The Franks expand into a large area of Gaul led by their king, Clovis.

526 AD  Theodoric dies.

528 AD  After defeating the Gepids the Lombards, helped by Avar nomads, invade Italy and make a permanent settlement in the north.

2006 AD  Founding of the modern day Cherusci tribe.  After Action Report