Definitions

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  • noun Plural form of foederatus.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • 'foederati' or allies of the Empire, paid to fight its battles against

    Roman and the Teuton Charles Kingsley 1847

  • Neither Honorius nor his feeble successors ever restored the Rhine and Danube frontiers; the foederati took over direct rule of the territories where they had been stationed, and gradually overran the whole of the West.

    superversive: Gondor, Byzantium, and Feudalism superversive 2010

  • But where the Germans had formerly been incorporated into Roman legions under Roman generals, Valentinian let the Goths keep their own leaders and their own command structure, fighting as foederati — allies rather than citizens.

    superversive: Gondor, Byzantium, and Feudalism superversive 2010

  • The foederati were men of jealously separate nations, never Romanized, and felt no bond of kinship with the peoples of the provinces.

    superversive: Gondor, Byzantium, and Feudalism superversive 2010

  • Some years earlier, Julian the Apostate had recruited Franks as foederati to help defend the Rhine.

    superversive: Gondor, Byzantium, and Feudalism superversive 2010

  • Until the middle of the fifth century, the East, like the West, depended upon barbarian foederati for its defence.

    superversive: Gondor, Byzantium, and Feudalism superversive 2010

  • Anastasius fought the pretender Vitalian, commander of the Bulgarian foederati.

    493, Feb. 27 2001

  • His people were established in Moesia as foederati.

    e. The Later Fifth Century 2001

  • Et venit quidam qui evaserat, et nuntiavit Abram Ebraeo, qui habitabat in quercubus Mamre Emori fratris Eschol, fratris Haner et ipsi erant foederati cum Abram.

    Commentary on Genesis - Volume 1 1509-1564 1996

  • Sidonius and his circle's understanding of the acceptable Roman order was the concept of the foedus (treaty) with the Arian Goths, who as foederati were to serve as military auxiliaries to ensure order and stability in Gaul.

    The End of the Roman Empire Revisited 1995

Comments

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  • "I don't have regrets - yet - about using the word foederati to describe Pakistani troops working with the American security services, in the first sentence of an article for the London Review of Books. It's an archaic term from the Roman Empire, but it is also a precise way to describe the relationship between the US and certain key allies: not colonial, not feudal, not contractual, and not exactly voluntary, either, just an understanding that, in certain circumstances and in exchange for certain favours, troops will be supplied to fight in an American cause. Perhaps it is a word, like albedo, whose time has come again." --"From albedo to zugunruhe" by James Meek

    April 30, 2010