Roman Britain is invaded by Germanic peoples, including Frisians, Jutes, Saxons and Angles. But, many Germans, especially Frisians, had already settled in Britain during Roman rule as soldiers. Around 500 AD, the final resistance of the Romano-Britons (also called Gaels, the British form of the word "Gauls") is led by the war leader Arthur-- the "king" Arthur of legend. He cannot prevent the permanent settlement of the Germans in south-east Britain, which became known as "Angle-land" or England. The Gaelic people hold out in the mountainous district of the west, which becomes called Gallia, or in the German form of the word, Wales. It should also be said that while there was fighting from time to time, the arrival of the new German settlers was often peaceful.

Celtic raiders from Ireland called "Scotti" arrive in northern Britain. At this time large tribal hill forts are abandoned in favour of smaller, but higher stone fortresses, called "brochs". A broch, which looked like a small tower, could hold an extended family.

The Roman frontier along the Rhine is overrun by German tribes. By this time much of the Roman army was composed of German mercenaries, and sometimes whole clans were settled within the empire to defend the frontier from other hostile tribes. So some of these "invasions" were more like army revolts. Most of Roman Gaul and Spain is divided into a number of small national kingdoms by the invaders. These include: the Franks based in Belgium and the southern Netherlands; the Alamanni on the middle Rhine, the Burgundians (where the French province of Burgundy comes from) and the Visigoths in southern France and Spain. The area around Paris was the centre of a kingdom established by the ex-Roman general Syagrius.

Attila invades Western Europe with a mixed army of Huns and Germans. Although the Huns arrived in eastern Europe as an army of nomadic horse archers, they had become more settled, and most of their forces now fought on foot. In 451 AD, at the battle of Chalons in eastern France, the Roman general Aetius in alliance with the Visigoths and Franks, defeats Attila, who retreats back to Hungary. The stirrup is introduced to Europe by the Huns.

By 540 AD, the Franks had defeated all their rivals and ruled all of the old Roman provinces of Gaul, now called the kingdom of the Franks, or France. The word "Franks" means "free", the "free people", but this term might have been used in the sense of "freebooter" or "free- lance", that is mercenary. We do know the Franks were composed of many different tribes or clans, and it is possible the Franks began as a collection of mercenary bands from different German tribes in the Roman army.

The end of Roman rule in Western Europe saw the loss of some aspects of classical Roman urban culture, but some parts were kept, while the Germans added completely new elements. One example of the blending of the old and new is the Roman villa system of agriculture (large estates or plantations worked by dozens or even hundreds of slaves and labourers, instead of small independent farms) which spread throughout Romanized Europe. It later became mixed with Celtic and German land holding systems to create, in part, the medieval feudal system.

Roman villa