Istvaeones

The Istvaeones were a Germanic group of tribes living near the banks of the Rhine during the Roman Empire which reportedly shared a common culture and origin.

Pseudo-Nennius derives his information from the Frankish Table of Nations (c. 520), which names the Franks, Romans, Bretons and Alamanni as descendants of Istio, one of the three sons of Mannus.

(Other spellings of this name that appear in the manuscripts include Estio, Escio, Hostius, Ostius, Hisisio, Hissitio, Hisitio, Hessitio and Scius.

He also mentions that some Rhine tribes by his time, such as the Batavi, and Cananefates, were in fact recent immigrants, and relatives of the Chatti.

Modern historians attempt to extrapolate their tribal constituents based on later sources, archeological findings and linguistic information.

Other Franks, sometimes called Salii, moved into Roman territory from north of the Rhine and were settled at the delta island of Batavia, and then Toxandria.

At some point in the above sequence, the ethnonyms "Frank" and "Frankish" morphed into a term closer in meaning to a proto-state or political identity, rather than a tribal or ethnic designation and can no longer be considered synonymous with the Istvaeones.

[10] Finds assigned to the Istvaeones are characterized by a greater heterogeneity than can be found in the other Germanic archaeological groupings.