Kicking Roman Butt

[P. Lilius Frugius Simius]

BTW, while many say Goths were Germanic, some mothern authors are defending the thesis that they were Baltics.

Well, no real surprise there because the Gothic tribes entered the Baltic region from Scandinavia and stayed there for quite a long time. There will have been some influence both ways I guess. But the first groups were Scandinavian, not Baltic. later on in their history, the Goth will have seen an influx of all kinds of groups, such as other germanic tribes, Huns and Romans. I have no doubt that there may have been Baltic influences, but to claim that all the Goths were really Baltic seems a bit over the top. If so, than the Baltic tribes spoke a germanic languange, as Gothis seems to be just that.

I'd say that baltic tribes would have spoken a baltic language. We know that baltic languages are very ancient and distinct from other indoeuropean groups.

I am not pushing in favor of this thesis, but I am aware that there's a strong germanic-phile litherature behind our studies of the area. Modern Lithuanian authors are as likely to be biased as current and traditional German authors. With the difference that we understand proto-Indoeuropean cultures and have lots of archaeology those didn't have in the XIX and XX centuries...

The (in-)famous Ulfila's bible being the only historical source about a supposedly 'Goths' language, it's a very weak position to base a germanic origin of the Goths, despising all other possibilities based on geographical and historical accounts by Jordanes, Orosius, Zosimus or Alphonse X, to mention the most relevant...