The area now constituting Transylvania became part of the Roman
Empire in A.D. 107. After the withdrawal (A.D. 271) of the
Romans from the region it was overrun, between the 3d and 10th
cent., by the Visigoths, the Huns, the Gepidae, the Avars, and
the Slavs. The Magyar tribes first entered the region in the 5th
cent., but they did not fully control it until 1003, when King
Stephen I placed it under the Hungarian crown. The valleys in
the east and southeast were settled by the Székely, a people
akin to the Magyars. It is not known, however, whether they came
into Transylvania with or before the Magyars. In the 12th and
13th cent. the areas in the south and northeast were settled by
German colonists called (then and now) Saxons. Siebenbürgen, the
German name for Transylvania, derives from the seven principal
fortified towns founded there by the Saxons. The German
influence became more marked when, early in the 13th cent., King
Andrew II of Hungary called on the Teutonic Knights to protect
Transylvania from the