Nabalia is an ancient

river A river is a natural stream of fresh water that flows on land or inside Subterranean river, caves towards another body of water at a lower elevation, such as an ocean, lake, or another river. A river may run dry before reaching the end of ...

in the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

that has been mentioned once by the Roman historian

Tacitus Publius Cornelius Tacitus, known simply as Tacitus ( , ; – ), was a Roman historian and politician. Tacitus is widely regarded as one of the greatest Roman historians by modern scholars. Tacitus’ two major historical works, ''Annals'' ( ...

, in his ''

Histories Histories or, in Latin, Historiae may refer to: * the plural of history * ''Histories'' (Herodotus), by Herodotus * ''The Histories'', by Timaeus * ''The Histories'' (Polybius), by Polybius * ''Histories'' by Gaius Sallustius Crispus (Sallust) ...

'' (5:26). The river must have had some local, strategic or religious meaning, for in 70 AD

Julius Civilis Gaius Julius Civilis (AD 25 – ) was the leader of the Batavian rebellion against the Romans in 69 AD. His nomen shows that he (or one of his male ancestors) was made a Roman citizen (and thus, the tribe a Roman vassal) by either Augustus or Ca ...

, leader of the

Batavian rebellion The Revolt of the Batavi took place in the Roman province of Germania Inferior ("Lower Germania") between AD 69 and 70. It was an uprising against the Roman Empire started by the Batavi (Germanic tribe), Batavi, a small but militarily powerful G ...

against the Romans, choose this location to negotiate peace. A bridge was built, where the warring parties approached each other from both sides. Although Tacitus attributed a speech made here to the Roman captain ''Ceriales'', he did not include the speech itself, and so the peace treaty's conditions are lost in the fog of time. However, the

Batavians The Batavi were an ancient Germanic tribe that lived around the modern Dutch 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 mil ...

were still thought of as an important tribe to the Romans in Tacitus's later book ''

Germania Germania ( ; ), also more specifically called Magna Germania (English: ''Great Germania''), Germania Libera (English: ''Free Germania''), or Germanic Barbaricum to distinguish it from the Roman provinces of Germania Inferior and Germania Superio ...

'' (98 AD). There are no indications of a harsh retaliation, and the Batavians continued in their privileged position of semi-independence in return for supplying elite troops to the

Roman Empire The Roman Empire ruled the Mediterranean and much of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa. The Roman people, Romans conquered most of this during the Roman Republic, Republic, and it was ruled by emperors following Octavian's assumption of ...

. The identification of this river has not been resolved, also due to considerable changes of the historic watercourses. The name does not give any clue and, obviously cognate with

Dutch Dutch or Nederlands commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands ** Dutch people as an ethnic group () ** Dutch nationality law, history and regulations of Dutch citizenship () ** Dutch language () * In specific terms, i ...

''nevel'' and

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

''Nebel'', both ‘fog’, and derived from

Proto-Indo-European Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. No direct record of Proto-Indo-European exists; its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-Euro ...

''*nebʰ-'' ‘sky, cloud’, would be a trivial synonym for any river. Proposed are the rivers

Utrechtse Vecht The Vecht () is a Rhine branch in the Dutch province of Utrecht. It is sometimes called Utrechtse Vecht to avoid confusion with its Overijssel counterpart. The area along the river is called the Vechtstreek. Geography The Vecht originates fro ...

and

Hollandse IJssel The Hollandse or Hollandsche IJssel (; "Holland IJssel", as opposed to the 'regular' or Gelderland IJssel) is a branch of the Rhine delta that flows westward from Nieuwegein on river Lek through IJsselstein, Gouda and Capelle aan den IJssel ...

External links

Watkin's *nebh-
{{coord missing, Netherlands Rivers of the Netherlands Rivers of the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta Batavi (Germanic tribe) Former rivers 70