People
Venedi
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The Venedi, a people the Roman writer Pliny placed along the Baltic coast and the geographer Ptolemy on the upper Vistula, turn up on the Tabula much farther away, beside the lower Danube. The historian Jordanes later described them as a numerous nation spread between the Baltic and the Black Sea, and their name lived on in the Wends, a name for Slavic peoples. Whether the map records Slavs reaching the Danube in the fifth century is doubtful. The people appear twice on the map, and the entry probably goes back to the second century, perhaps reflecting how vast their lands were thought to be.