the head of the Osterby man
of course not. many roman depictions of germanic people show the suebian knot. this doesn't necessarily means that most of the germanic peoples used it. in fact romans had a very strict image of barbarians (long blond or red hair and beard, tall, athletic, savage and so on) based on the (not always accurate) descriptions given by Caesar, Tacitus and others. once they got used to the peculiarity of "the" germanic peoples, it is very likely that they used the suebian knot in most depictions to characterize these barbarians as germanic people.
on the other hand Tacitus describes in detail which tribes used the suebian knot. the short version: the suebian people
the long version Semnonen, Langobarden, Hermunduren, Markomannen, Quaden and many more.
Do you mean by your statement, that suebian knot is used only for units exclusively to suebian areas?
the interesting thing in his Germania is: he claims that the suebian knot is mark of the suebians. a few lines later, he is contradicting himself by stating that men of other tribes used this hair style too.
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