In the 1st century BC, the Lombards (also known as Langobards, literally meaning long-beards,) moved to northern Germany along the lower Elbe River. In the first century AD, they were mentioned by Roman writers as a “very warlike people”. They were allies of Arminius Varus when he destroyed three Roman legions in the Teutoburg Forest in the year 9 AD.

At the beginning of the 6th century, the Lombards crossed the Danube and entered the Roman province of Pannonia, which then encompassed the territory of today’s eastern Austria, Hungary and Slovenia. In 568, due to the Avar threat, the Lombards left Pannonia and, under the leadership of King Alboin, emigrated to Italy. First, they occupied Cividale (Forum Iulii), in 568 they demolished Trieste, then Aquileia, Verona and other cities. In 569, they destroyed Milan and in 572 they conquered Pavia, which became the capital of their kingdom.

From the Po Plain, the Lombards conquered Tuscany, central and southern Italy. In the north of Italy, they established a kingdom that was divided into 36 duchies, governed by Duces – dukes, who were subordinate to the king of Pavia. From the Lombard territories in central and southern Italy, the two Grand Duchies of Spoleto and Benevento arose, which were almost entirely independent of the royal power in Pavia. In between, however, was Byzantine territory. The Lombards therefore failed to conquer the whole of Italy, which remained politically divided until the second half of the 19th century. The first generations of Lombards who moved to Italy still spoke the Germanic language, a kind of Germanic dialect. Later generations had already adopted Latin.

The Lombards were pagans at first, but just before they entered Italy, they converted to Arianism in Pannonia, like many Germanic peoples (Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Vandals, Burgundians). Under King Agilulf (590-616), they began to embrace the Catholic faith. The royal wife, Queen Theodolinda – a Bavarian princess who was Catholic and had good friendly relations with Pope Gregory the Great – took great credit for this. With the conversion to Christianity, literacy spread among the Lombards as well as the rest of the Germans.

The Lombards constantly threatened Rome. The Pope, however, gained a firm ally in the Frankish king Pepin the Short and later in his son Charlemagne. The latter defeated the Lombard king Desiderius in 774 with his powerful army and captured the capital Pavia. After the surrender of Pavia, Charlemagne proclaimed himself king of the Franks and Lombards.

The Duchy of Friuli was the first of the 36 duchies founded by the Lombards in Italy. The first duke was Alboin’s nephew Gisulf. The centre was the old Roman municipium Forum Iulii. Friulian territory up to the Livenza River belonged to the Lombards, while the coastal belt with Grado and the islands in the lagoon and Istria remained Byzantine.

On the eastern edge of Friuli, the border of the Lombard kingdom was established on the territory where the Byzantines had already built their fortifications between 555 and 568. The Lombards fortified the border zone with a kind of limes as a defence against the invasions of the Avars and the Slavs. The main fortifications were located on the line Monfalcone – Potium near Duino, Farra d’Isonzo, Solkan (Castrum Siliganum), Cormons, Cividale, Nimis, Artegna, Gemona, Venzone, Invillino. These castles, tied to the old Roman road crossings, allowed the Lombards to control the main traffic routes. When the Slavs, together with the Avars, invaded Friuli for the first time in 610, it was already protected by a fortified belt – limes. The Slavic ethnic border was thus established precisely on this Lombard defensive line.

The fights between the Slavs and the Lombards are reported in the book History of the Lombards (Historia Langobardorum) by Pavel Dijakon, a Lombard historian born in Cividale. This book is one of the most important sources for early Slovenian history. From his reporting, we learn that during the years 623-626, the Lombards attacked the Carantanians. The Slavs invaded the Vipava Valley and Friuli, among other areas, in the years 663-664. In 705, the Slavs catastrophically defeated the Friulian Lombards and thus conquered Goriška brda and Venetian Slovenia. However, their attempt to conquer the Friuli Plain failed (the Battle of Lavariano in 720).

Solkan was part of the aforementioned limes as an important fortified town with its own castle and a Lombard military crew. The Breg area, where the remains of Lombard graves were later found, was also called “Žegen” by people, because farmers sometimes came across human bones when ploughing.

Avgust Vižin, a local man, is credited with the discovery of Lombard graves. When he was digging as preparation for the construction of a pipeline in 1979, he discovered some metal weapon remnants. He showed them to his son-in-law Kamil Komel, who informed Dr Branko Marušič and the archaeologist Drago Svoljšek from the Goriški Muzej museum.

In 1980, archaeological excavations began and continued up to 2008. The excavations were led by archaeologists from the Goriški Muzej and from the Department of Archaeology of the Faculty of Arts in Ljubljana. These excavations uncovered 53 graves dating back to late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages. The graves, dated to the 7th century, belong to Lombard warriors. At the time of the Lombards, the hill of Sveta Katarina (Saint Catherine) was also supposed to be inhabited, as well as the area around the church.

This was mainly due to the strategic position, since at Solkan, the hilly landscape passes into a plain that extends all the way to the Po River. Today, archaeological remains and typical place names, e.g. Fara (a Lombard community of warriors and their families, linked by wider kinship ties), reflect the Lombard presence in the region.

(Written by: Jernej Vidmar, MSc)