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The Marsi were a Germanic tribe in north-western Germany, roughly between the Lippe and the Ruhr – in the wider surroundings of the Cherusci and Bructeri. They were among the tribes involved in the revolt of Arminius against Rome.
The Marsi became famous through a sanctuary: the temple (or sacred precinct) of the goddess Tanfana. Tacitus names it as the most important sanctuary of the region. About the goddess herself we know almost nothing – only her name and that her cult was especially important to the Marsi.
In 14 AD, in the campaign of revenge after the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest, the Roman commander Germanicus fell upon the Marsi in the middle of the night, during a festival. Tacitus reports coolly that the sanctuary of Tanfana was razed to the ground and the region devastated far and wide. It is one of the most brutal scenes of the Roman-Germanic wars – and shows how deliberately Rome struck the sanctuaries of its enemies.
"The sanctuary most famous among those peoples, called that of Tanfana, they levelled to the ground."after Tacitus, Annals I,51 (public domain, own translation)
The Marsi stand for the lost divine world of the West Germanic tribes: an important sanctuary, wiped out in a night – and a goddess of whom only the name remained. More in the overview Germanic Religion.
The Cherusci & Arminius · The Bructeri · Germanic Religion · Veleda · The Chatti.
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