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146 ceed still farther north and to cross over the Kjölen mountains, into Norway. From Halogaland far north, they went down to Tröndelagen, around Drontheim, from whence they spread themselves both along the coasts, and over the Dovre mountains, over the interior, and southern parts of Norway.

About the year 400, or 500, Scandinavia was thus peopled by Norwegians, Swedes, and Goths, who were divided into Göths in Götaland, and Goths in Denmark. It is said that the Swedes and Norwegians now expelled the Göths and Goths, and took possession of their countries. But the Swedes were separated from the Göths in Götaland, by wild mountains and the immense forests Kolmorden and Tiveden, from which Svithiod was called the land north of the wood (Nordenskovs), and Götaland, the land south of the wood (Söndenskovs); this made it, of course, very difficult for the Swedes to attack the Göths. The Göths were first, in a later period, about the eighth or ninth century, under the Swedish kings, but that they were neither expelled, nor completely subdued, appears from the circumstance, that in the middle ages, they still retained their own peculiar laws and customs, and regarded themselves altogether as a distinct people. Until nearly the fifteenth century, the Göths continued to contend with the Swedes, respecting their share in the election of the sovereign, &c.; and to this day, a difference both of dialect and customs, serves to indicate that the Svear and Göths were two nearly related, but, at the same time, two perfectly distinct people. The dialect, however, by no means shews that the Göths spoke a German language; the dialects of Götaland, as well as those of Denmark, were originally as pure Scandinavian, as the Swedish and Norwegian dialects. In the middle ages, only, they were perhaps more intermixed with German than the Swedish and Norwegian, because they had more intercourse with Germany. It will easily be seen, that as the Swedes could not expel the Göths, who were their neighbours, the Swedes and Norwegians could still less expel the Goths in Denmark, who lived south of the Göths. This per-