Page "Alemanni" Paragraph 3

According to Asinius Quadratus ( quoted in the mid-6th century by Byzantine historian Agathias ) their name means " all men ".

It indicates that they were a conglomeration drawn from various Germanic tribes.

This was the derivation of Alemanni used by Edward Gibbon, in his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire and by the anonymous contributor of notes assembled from the papers of Nicolas Fréret, published in 1753, who noted that it was the name used by outsiders for those who called themselves the Suevi.

This etymology has remained the standard derivation of the term.