Batavi ( Germanic tribe ) The Batavi were an ancient Germanic tribe , that lived around the Rhine delta , in the area that the Romans called Batavia , from the second half of the first century BC to the third century AD . The name is also applied to several military units employed by the Romans that were originally raised among the Batavi . The tribal name , probably a derivation from " batawjō " ( " good island " , from Germanic " bat - " " good , excellent " and " awjō " " island , land near water " ) , refers to the region ' s fertility , today known as the " fruitbasket of the Netherlands " ( the Betuwe ) . Finds of wooden tablets show that at least some were literate . Location . The Batavi , or at least the Batavian island in the Rhine river , were mentioned by Julius Caesar in his commentary " Commentarii de Bello Gallico " . The island ' s easternmost point is at a split in the Rhine , one arm being the Waal the other the Lower Rhine / Old Rhine ( hence the Latin name " Insula Batavorum " , " Island of the Batavi " ) . Much later Tacitus wrote that they had originally been a tribe of the Chatti , a tribe in Germany never mentioned by Caesar , who were forced by internal dissension to move to their new home . Tacitus also reports that before their arrival the area had been " an uninhabited district on the extremity of the coast of Gaul , and also of a neighbouring island , surrounded by the ocean in front , and by the river Rhine in the rear and on either side " . This view , however , is contradicted by the archeological evidence , which shows continuous habitation from at least the third century BC onward . The strategic position , to wit the high bank of the Waal — which offered an unimpeded view far into Germania Transrhenana ( Germania Beyond the Rhine ) — was recognized first by Drusus , who built a massive fortress ( " castra " ) and a headquarters ( " praetorium " ) in imperial style . The latter was in use until the Batavian revolt . Archeological evidence suggests they lived in small villages , composed of six to 12 houses in the very fertile lands between the rivers , and lived by agriculture and cattle - raising . Finds of horse skeletons in graves suggest a strong equestrian preoccupation . On the south bank of the Waal ( in what is now Nijmegen ) a Roman administrative center was built , called " Oppidum Batavorum " . An Oppidum was a fortified warehouse , where a tribe ' s treasures were stored and guarded . This centre was razed during the Batavian Revolt . The Batavi ( the name is believed to derive from a West Germanic root also present in " better " moved into the Betuwe in the late 1st century BC . The names of their chief town built up during Roman times , " Batavodurum " later " Noviomagus " ( Nijmegen , Neth ) , were Celtic , but the main settlers into the area were Germanic . Military units . The first Batavi commander we know of is named Chariovalda , who led a charge across the Visurgin ( Weser ) against the Cherusci led by Arminius during the campaigns of Germanicus in " Germania Transrhenana " . Tacitus ( " De origine et situ Germanorum " XXIX ) described the Batavi as the bravest of the tribes of the area , hardened in the Germanic wars , with cohorts under their own commanders transferred to Britannia . They retained the honour of the ancient association with the Romans , not required to pay tribute or taxes and used by the Romans only for war : " They furnished to the Empire nothing but men and arms " , Tacitus remarked . Well regarded for their skills in horsemanship and swimming — for men and horses could cross the Rhine without losing formation , according to Tacitus . Dio Cassius describes this surprise tactic employed by Aulus Plautius against the " barbarians " — the British Celts — at the battle of the River Medway , 43 : It is uncertain how they were able to accomplish this feat . The late 4th century writer on Roman military affairs Vegetius mentions soldiers using reed rafts , drawn by leather leads , to transport equipment across rivers . But the sources suggest the Batavi were able to swim across rivers actually wearing full armour and weapons . This would only have been possible by the use of some kind of buoyancy device : Ammianus Marcellinus mentions that the " Cornuti " regiment swam across a river floating on their shields " as on a canoe " ( 357 ) . Since the shields were wooden , they may have provided sufficient buoyancy The Batavi were used to form the bulk of the Emperor ' s personal Germanic bodyguard from Augustus to Galba . They also provided a contingent for their indirect successors , the Emperor ' s horse guards , the " Equites singulares Augusti " . A Batavian contingent was used in an amphibious assault on Ynys Mon ( Anglesey ) , taking the assembled Druids by surprise , as they were only expecting Roman ships . Numerous altars and tombstones of the cohorts of Batavi , dating to the 2nd century and 3rd century , have been found along Hadrian ' s Wall , notably at Castlecary and Carrawburgh , Germany , Yugoslavia , Hungary , Romania and Austria . Revolt of the Batavi . Despite the alliance , one of the high - ranking Batavi , Julius Paullus , to give him his Roman name , was executed by Fonteius Capito on a false charge of rebellion . His kinsman Gaius Julius Civilis was paraded in chains in Rome before Nero ; though he was acquitted by Galba , he was retained at Rome , and when he returned to his kin in the year of upheaval in the Roman Empire , 69 , he headed a Batavian rebellion . He managed to capture Castra Vetera , the Romans lost two legions while two others ( I Germanica and XVI Gallica ) were controlled by the rebels . The rebellion became a real threat to the Empire when the conflict escalated to northern Gaul and Germania . The Roman army retaliated and invaded the " insula Batavorum " . A bridge was built over the river Nabalia , where the warring parties approached each other on both sides to negotiate peace . The narrative was told in great detail in Tacitus ' History , book iv , although , unfortunately , the narrative breaks off abruptly at the climax . Following the uprising , Legio X " Gemina " was housed in a stone " castra " to keep an eye on the Batavians . Fate of the Batavi . The Batavi were still mentioned in 355 during the reign of Constantius II ( 317 - 361 ) , when their island was already dominated by the Salii , a Frankish tribe that had sought Roman protection there in 297 after having been expelled from their own country by the Saxons . Constantius Gallus added inhabitants of Batavia to his legions , " of whose discipline we still make use . " It has been assumed they merged with the Salii shortly before or after and , after having been expelled by another tribe ( it has been proposed this was the Chamavi ) , shared their subsequent migration to Toxandria . In the Late Roman army there was a unit called " Batavi " . The name of the Bavarian town of Passau descends from the Roman " Batavis " , which was named after the Batavi . The town ' s name is old as it shows the typical effects of the High German consonant shift ( b > p , t > ss ) . The Batavian myth . In the 16th - century invention of a suitably antique origin myth for the Dutch people that would be expressive of their self - identification as separate from their neighbors in the national struggle with Spain of the Eighty Years War for Dutch independence , the Batavians came to be regarded as their ancestors . The mix of fancy and fact in the " Cronyke van Hollandt , Zeelandt ende Vriesland " ( called the " Divisiekroniek " ) by the Augustinian friar and humanist Cornelius Gerardi Aurelius , first published in 1517 , brought the spare remarks in Tacitus ' newly - rediscovered " Germania " to a popular public ; it was being reprinted as late as 1802 . Contemporary Dutch virtues of independence , fortitude and industry were rendered fully recognizable among the Batavians in more scholarly history represented in Hugo Grotius ' " Liber de Antiquitate Republicae Batavicorum " ( 1610 ) . The myth was perpetuated by Romeyn de Hooghe ' s " Spiegel van Staat der Vereenigden Nederlanden " ( " Mirror of the State of the United Netherlands , " 1706 ) , which also ran to many editions , and it was revived in the atmosphere of Romantic nationalism in the late eighteenth - century reforms that saw a short - lived Batavian Republic and , in the colony of the Dutch East Indies , a capital ( now Jakarta ) that was named Batavia . The success of this legend of origins was partly due to theories in anthropology , which were based on a tribal paradigm . Being politically and geographically inclusive and leaving at the same time space for diversity , this historical vision filled the needs of Dutch nation - building and integration in the 1890 - 1914 era . However , the disadvantages of this historical interpretation soon became apparent . It suggested there were no strong external borders , while allowing for the fairly clear - cut internal borders that were emerging as the society pillarized into three parts . The origins myth appeared , especially during the Second World War , allow the dangers of regional separatism and annexation to Germany . After 1945 the tribal paradigm lost its grip on anthropology ; the " three - tribes - theme " was also fundamentally questioned and slowly faded away . Modern variants of the Batavian founding myth are made more credible by pointing out that the Batavians were only part of the ancestry of the Dutch people , together with the Frisians , Franks and Saxons , and by tracing patterns of DNA . Echoes of this supposed cultural continuity may still be found in popularisations of the history that follows .