Goths and Suebi

The Goths were primarily a cultural phenomena. Goths adhered to a view of life, law and order that had its most likely origin on Gotland. People who adopted this culture called themselves Goths, even if they had never set foot on Gotland. While migration out of Gotland happened from time to time, this was not the driver of the Goths expansion into Europe. It was their culture that expanded, not their genetic base. Goths in Germany were Germans. Goths in France were French.

However, when the Vandals crossed the Rhine together with Suebi and Alans on the last day of December in year 406, there really was a large movement of civilians. There's genetic evidence for them in Portugal, even today. People coming from Alan territory are generally taller and blonder than other places in Portugal. These people did not only influence the culture of Portugal, they had a certain genetic impact as well.

The Alans seem to have been the most insular of the tribes that crossed the Rhine. Focus seems to have been on family and self sufficiency. The Suebi were more ready to interact locally. They formed a kingdom that eventually morphed into the kingdom of León. The Vandals on the other hand, appear to have been a great pain to everyone. Always intent on domination, they were eventually expelled.

The political success of the Suebi appears to have been due to their reasonable approach to local affairs. They didn't force themselves on people. There's no record of violent conflicts between locals and Suebi. They were by all accounts quite popular. When the Goths took over the east and south of Iberia, the Suebi remained independent. When the locals had to choose side, they sided with the Suebi rather than the Goths.

The decision to stand with the Suebi was almost certainly based on pragmatic considerations of cultural differences between Suebi and Goths, the most prominent being an insistence on loyalty and hierarchy by the Goths. It was the Goths who developed the honor code associated with medieval chivalry. Goth emphasis on honoring contracts morphed into an emphasis on honor towards political figures.

Being less insistent on hierarchy, the Suebi were the natural choice for the locals. They sided with the Suebi over the Goths, and the consequence of this may well be at the heart of the current cultural difference between Portuguese and Spanish people. The Spanish are more intent on hierarchy and loyalty than the Portuguese. Laws are less vigorously observed in Portugal than in Spain. Things are more fluent and open to interpretation.

As far as the locals were concerned, both Goths and Suebi were foreigners. The Goths were French and Suebi were German. However, the Suebi adopted local customs, culture and language from day one. By the time the Goths entered Iberia, physical appearance was the only significant distinction between Suebi royalty and locals, and even that may have been waning due to the Suebi habit of marrying into influential local families.

By the time the Berbers invaded Iberia from the south, a few hundred years after the fall of Rome, Suebi were fully integrated. The Suebi kingdom had morphed into León. However, the Goths to the east and south of León were still culturally segregated from their subjects, and generally despised for this reason. A consequence of this was that the Goths lost all their territory to the invading forces, while León retained its independence.

By વી ફોર વેન્ડેટા - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link