Salve Quinte Mari!
Quintus Marius Primus wrote:I would have thought that there wold have been some contact with the tribes that eventually settled England, as although traditionally people thought that the Anglo-Saxon tribes came from (modern) Denmark and northern Germany, these days it is pretty much well accepted in hostorical circles that there must have been a lot of migration from what is the Low Countries, especially when you consider the geography (Holland is after all a lot closer to England than Denmark and Germany) and linguistics (English's closest linguistic "cousin" is Frisian so the original English settlers must have come from an area very close if not including people from that area).
It seems unlikely to me that the Frisians lived in modern-day northern Netherlands at the time of the Roman Republic or early Empire (or even the later Empire). The Frisian that is spoken today is West-Frisian, but some offshoots of the other variants still exist (although on the verge of extinction) in northern Germany and the North Sea isles of Denmark and Germany (Waddeneilanden in Dutch). This actually seems to support that the Frisians came from northern Germania and Denmark, although it is true that the Franconians pushed the Frisians back north (which also explains why Dutch is 'in between' German and English).
Quintus Marius Primus wrote:Still, your comment about the Romans' attentions in Germania being elsewhere are certainly true, so that they could have had little interest in the tribes further north.
Well, a good reference may be Tacitus' Germania. Tacitus himself is said to have visited Belgica and Germania Inferior (and hence had first-hand knowledge on the Germans). So, I wouldn't say the Romans weren't interested in what was beyond their primary military horizons.
Quintus Marius Primus wrote:I do recall reading somewhere that the Romans had three tribal names for Germanic tribes in that general area, but I can't for the life of me remember what they are or where I read about it!
The problems with these tribal names and tribes is that they are rarely used consistently. For example, the Cimbri and Teutones migrated from north to the south, and after they were defeated, there is little evidence that they continued to exist as a significant tribe or clan, although the name 'Teutones' continues to be used for modern-day Germans until this day. Some tribes also merged. The Quadi and the Marcomanni, for example, iirc, merged to form the Bavarii and the Franconians were a mixture of a lot of tribes on the Rhine.
To get back at the topic of the Anglo-Saxons, it is very likely that not only they (and some Frisians and Jutes) crossed the North Sea, but we have to go by linguistic and cultural evidence we have. This is further complicated by the Danish and Norwegian invasions in Great Britain and Ireland.
Vale optime!
Draco
Gn. Dionysius Draco Invictus