equestrian rank". Due to Roman naming conventions of the time, it is likely is an adopted name granted to him upon citizenship or in any case not his Germanic name. The name instead appears to ultimately be of Etruscan origin, appearing as and on inscriptions found at Volaterrae. According to another theory, that name was given to Arminius for his service in Armenia. The German translation of as the name Hermann dates from the 16th century, possibly first by Martin Luther. In German, Arminius was traditionally distinguished as ("Hermann the Cheruscan") or ("Hermann the Cheruscan Prince"). Hermann etymologically means "Man of War", coming from the Old High German meaning "war" and meaning "person" or "man". Biography Born in 18 or 17 BC in Germania, Arminius was the son of the Cheruscan chief Segimerus (German: Segimer; Proto-Germanic: Sigimariz; Old English: Sigemaer), who was allied with Rome. Arminius learned to speak Latin and joined the Roman military alongside his younger brother Flavus. He served in the Roman army between 1 and 6 AD, and received a military education as well as Roman citizenship and the status of equite before returning to Germania. These experiences gave him knowledge of Roman politics and military tactics, which allowed him to successfully anticipate enemy battle maneuvers during his later campaigns against the Roman army. Battle of the Teutoburg Forest Around the year 4 AD, Arminius assumed command of a Cheruscan detachment of Roman auxiliary forces, probably while fighting in the Pannonian wars on the Balkan peninsula. He returned to northern Germania in 7 or 8 AD, where the Roman Empire had established secure control of the territories just east of the Rhine, along the Lippe and Main rivers, and was now seeking to extend its hegemony eastward to the Weser and Elbe rivers, under Publius Quinctilius Varus, a high-ranking administrative official appointed by Augustus as governor. Arminius began plotting to unite various Germanic tribes in order to thwart Roman efforts to incorporate their lands into the empire. This proved a difficult task, as the tribes were strongly independent and many were traditionally enemies of each other. Between 6 and 9 AD, the Romans were forced to move eight of the eleven legions present in Germania east of the Rhine to crush a rebellion in the Balkans, leaving Varus with only three legions to face the Germans, which was still 18,000 troops, or 6,000 men per legion.