The tradition described in the epilogue may be found in the thirteenth-century _Heimskringla_ and, in a different form, in the chronicle of Saxo Grammaticus. Otherwise my sources are the usual ancient and modern ones. I have tried to keep the framework of verifiable historical fact accurate. For whatever brutality, licentiousness and unreasonable prejudice is shown by the people concerned, I apologize, adding only that by the standards of the modern free world the era was a good deal worse than I care to describe explicitly. For the sake of connotation, cities and other political units are generally referred to by their classical rather than contemporary names. It should be obvious from context where any particular spot lies on the map. However, the following list of geographical equivalents may be found interesting. Ancyra: Ankara, Turkey Aquitania: West central France Arausio: Orange, France Asia: In ordinary Roman usage, the modern Asia Minor plus India Byzantium: Istanbul, Turkey Cimberland: Himmerland, northern Jutland, Denmark Cimmerian Bosporus: A Greek kingdom in the Crimea Colchis: Mingrelian Georgia, U.S.S.R. Dacia: Rumania Galatia: Central Turkey Gaul: France Halys River: Kizil River, Turkey Hellas: Greece Hellespont: Dardanelles Helvetia: Switzerland Macedonia: Northern Greece Massilia: Marseilles Narbonensis: Provence, i.e., southern France Noreia: Near Vienna, Austria Parthian Empire: Iran and Iraq Persia: Iran Pontus: Eastern half of northern Turkish coast, and southward Sinope: Sinop, Turkey Tauric Chersonese: The Crimea Trapezus: Trabzon, Turkey (medieval Trebizond) Vercellae: Vercelli, Italy, between Turin and Milan 100 B.C. The Cimbrian hordes galloped across the dawn of history and clashed in screaming battle against the mighty Roman legions. Led by their chief, Boierik, and his son, Eodan, the hungry and homeless pagan tribes hurled back the Romans time after time in their desperate search for land. But for all the burning towns, the new-caught women weeping, the wine drunk, the gold lifted, the Cimbri did not find a home. And now it was over. At Vercellae the Roman armies shattered them completely. Only a few survived--and for them death would have been more merciful. Eodan, the proud young chieftain, had been caught and sold into slavery, his infant son murdered and his beautiful wife, Hwicca, taken as a concubine. But whips and slave chains could not break the spirit of this fiery pagan giant who fought, seduced and connived his way to a perilous freedom to rescue the woman he loved. The Golden Slave I