a. and sb. [f. L. Suēvus, var. Suēbus (see SUEBIC) + -IAN. Cf. SWABIAN.] A. adj. Of or belonging to a confederation of Germanic tribes called by the Romans Suēvī (Suēbī), which inhabited large territories in Central Europe to the east of the Rhine. B. sb. Any individual of these tribes.
1617. [see SLOVENLINESS].
a. 1727. Newton, Observ. Dan., I. v. (1733), 39. The Quades and Marcomans were Suevian nations; and they and the Suevians came originally from Bohemia.
1845. Encycl. Metrop., XI. 246/1. The mixed host of Vandals, Burgundians, Alans, and Suevians.
1889. J. B. Bury, Hist. Later Rom. Emp., I. 155. The Vandals abandoned their blockade of the Suevians.
So Suevic, † Suevical adjs.
1560. Daus, trans. Sleidane’s Comm., 53 b. George Truckese, chiefe capitaine of the Suevical league.
1776. Gibbon, Decl. & F., x. I. (1782), 315. A king of the Marcomanni, a Suevic tribe.
1861. J. G. Sheppard, Fall Rome, iii. 129. The second great Suevic tribe, or federation of tribes, were the Alemanni.
1909. E. A. Foord, in Contemp. Rev., Sept., 331. It [Visigothic Spain] had absorbed the Suevic kingdom of Galicia.
