Here is a piece written by Julius Caesar on the Suebi. If it doesn't make you want to take over Canada and destroy all urban areas so that you can live out your skyrim fantasies then you are not a man.
"In the following winter, in which the consulship of Pompey and Crassus began, the Germanic tribes of the Usipetes and Tencteri crossed the Rhine in large numbers not far from its mouth. They were forced to migrate because for several years they had been subjected to harassing attacks by the Suebi and prevented from tillng their lands.
The Suebi are by far the largest and most warlike of the Germanic nations. It is said that they have a hundred cantons, each of which provides annually a thousand armed men for service in foreign wars. Those who are left at home have to support the men in the army as well as themselves, and the next year take their turn of service while the others stay at home.
Thus both agriculture, military instruction and training continue without interruption. No land however is the property of private individuals and no one is allowed to cultivate the same plot for more than one year.
They do not eat much cereal food, but live chiefly on milk and meat, and spend much time in hunting. Their diet, daily exercise and the freedom from restraint that they enjoy, combine to make them strong and as tall as giants. They inure themselves in spite of the very cold climate in which they live, to wear no clothing but skins and these so scanty that a large part of the body is uncovered and to bathe in the rivers.
Traders are admitted into their country more because they want to sell their booty than because they stand in any need of imports. Even horses, which the Gauls are inordinately fond of and purchase at big prices, are not imported by the Germanics. They are content with their home-bred horses, which although undersized and ugly, are rendered capable of very hard work by daily exercise.
In cavalry battles they often dismount and fight on foot, training the horses to stand perfectly still, so that they can quickly get back to them in case of need. In their eyes it is the height of effeminacy and shame to use a saddle and they do not hesitate to engage the largest force of cavalry riding saddled horses, however small their own numbers may be. They absolutely forbid the importation of wine because they think that it makes men soft and incapable of enduring hard toil.
They regard it as the proudest glory of a nation to keep the largest possible area round its frontiers uninhabited, because it shows that many other peoples are inferior to it in military might. It is said for example that on one side of the Suebic territory the country is uninhabited for a distance of more than 885km.
On the other side their nearest neighbours are the Ubii, who were once by Germanic standards, a considerable and prosperous nation. They are somewhat more civilized than the rest of the Germanics, for living on the Rhine so close to the frontier of the Gaul, where traders visit them regulary, they have adopted Gallic customs.
The Suebi, after repeated attempts to oust them from their home by force of arms, found them too numerous and strong to be dispossessed but compelled them to pay tribute and greatly reduced their pride and power."
-Julius Caesar, De Bello Gallico
"In the following winter, in which the consulship of Pompey and Crassus began, the Germanic tribes of the Usipetes and Tencteri crossed the Rhine in large numbers not far from its mouth. They were forced to migrate because for several years they had been subjected to harassing attacks by the Suebi and prevented from tillng their lands.
The Suebi are by far the largest and most warlike of the Germanic nations. It is said that they have a hundred cantons, each of which provides annually a thousand armed men for service in foreign wars. Those who are left at home have to support the men in the army as well as themselves, and the next year take their turn of service while the others stay at home.
Thus both agriculture, military instruction and training continue without interruption. No land however is the property of private individuals and no one is allowed to cultivate the same plot for more than one year.
They do not eat much cereal food, but live chiefly on milk and meat, and spend much time in hunting. Their diet, daily exercise and the freedom from restraint that they enjoy, combine to make them strong and as tall as giants. They inure themselves in spite of the very cold climate in which they live, to wear no clothing but skins and these so scanty that a large part of the body is uncovered and to bathe in the rivers.
Traders are admitted into their country more because they want to sell their booty than because they stand in any need of imports. Even horses, which the Gauls are inordinately fond of and purchase at big prices, are not imported by the Germanics. They are content with their home-bred horses, which although undersized and ugly, are rendered capable of very hard work by daily exercise.
In cavalry battles they often dismount and fight on foot, training the horses to stand perfectly still, so that they can quickly get back to them in case of need. In their eyes it is the height of effeminacy and shame to use a saddle and they do not hesitate to engage the largest force of cavalry riding saddled horses, however small their own numbers may be. They absolutely forbid the importation of wine because they think that it makes men soft and incapable of enduring hard toil.
They regard it as the proudest glory of a nation to keep the largest possible area round its frontiers uninhabited, because it shows that many other peoples are inferior to it in military might. It is said for example that on one side of the Suebic territory the country is uninhabited for a distance of more than 885km.
On the other side their nearest neighbours are the Ubii, who were once by Germanic standards, a considerable and prosperous nation. They are somewhat more civilized than the rest of the Germanics, for living on the Rhine so close to the frontier of the Gaul, where traders visit them regulary, they have adopted Gallic customs.
The Suebi, after repeated attempts to oust them from their home by force of arms, found them too numerous and strong to be dispossessed but compelled them to pay tribute and greatly reduced their pride and power."
-Julius Caesar, De Bello Gallico