Integrating "Magna Dacia": A Narrative Reappraisal of Jordanes

PhD thesis, University of Leeds, School of History. The aim of this study is to propose a new interpretation of Jordanes’ famous work, "De Origine Actibusque Getarum", commonly known as "Getica". The traditional view concerning the "De Origine" postulates that Jordanes was trying to devise a mythical, glorious history for the Goths, based on Greek and Latin texts, as well as what could have been "real elements of Gothic tradition." A number of scholars have also investigated the dependence of the "De Origine" on the lost "Historia Gothorum", written by Cassiodorus – a high-ranking officer of the Ostrogothic court. Because Jordanes affirms, in the preface of the "De Origine", that he was asked to abridge the Cassiodorian opus, many are led to believe that our author was able to transmit the "Historia Gothorum" to some extent. This thesis will counter those two views by proposing a narrative interpretation of the "De Origine": my analysis is focused on the rhetorical strategies and textual choices of Jordanes. I argue that Jordanes’ usage of the ethnonym 'Geta', usually viewed as a classicising synonym of 'Goth', is, in fact, a way to link a number of different people that inhabited the Balkans throughout history: Dacians, Getae, Scythians, Goths, Gepids, and Huns. The reasoning behind this ethnogeographic constructions is, precisely, the goal of the "De Origine": to devise a historical narrative of the vicissitudes of the Balkans. I chose to single out the narrative conceptualisation of this regions by calling it 'Magna Dacia' – which is the 'Kulturraum' that interests Jordanes and it is where most of the story takes place. My conclusions have incisive implications: we can see the "De Origine" as an independent text, one that does not owe its ideas to Cassiodorus; we can see a new Jordanes emerge, one with a high degree of agency in the composition of the work.