Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/962

 942 SCYTHIA. instance, however, the statement of Strabo is very specitic. It is to the cft'ect that the ambassadors to Ali.'xaiuier were KeAroi -repl rhv 'A5pia;'(vii. p. 301), and that Ptolemy was the authority. Nevertheless, Ptolemy may have written raXdrat, and such Galatae may have been the Galatae of the Olbiau Inscription. [See infra and Sciui.] The nest Macedonian who crossed the Danube was Lysimaclms, who crossed it only to re-cross it in liis retreat, and who owed his life to the generosity of a Getic prince Dromichaetes. This was about B.C. 312. Our next authorities (fra<jmentary and insufficient) for the descendants of the Herodotean Scythians are the occupants of the Greek towns of the Euxine. Even those to the south of the Danube, Callatis, Apollonia, &c., had some Scythians in the neigh- hood, sometimes as enemies, sometimes as protec- tors, — sometimes as protectors against other barba- rians, sometimes as protectors of Greeks against Greeks, as was the case during the Scythian and Tiiracian wars of Lysimachus. The chief frontagers, however, were Getae. Between Olbia, to the north of the Danube (=01biopolis of Herodotus), and the native tribes of its neighbourhood, the relations are illustrated by the inscription already noticed. (BUckh, Insc7: Graec. no. 2058.) It records a vote of public gratitude to Protogenes, and indicates the troubles in which he helped his fellow-citizens. The chief of those arose from the pressure of the barbarians around, by name Saudaratae, Thisametae, Sciri [see Sciui], Galatae, and Scythae. The date of this inscription is uncertain; but we may see the import of the observations on the word Galatae when we 6nd the assumption that they were Gauls of Gallia used as an instniment of criticism: — " The date of the above inscription is not spceified; the terror inspired by the Gauls, even to other barba- rians, seems to suit the second century b. c. better than it suits a later period." (Grote, flist. of Greece, vol. xii. p. 644, note.) What, however, if the Galatae of Wallachia were as little Galii as the Cermanians of Persia are Germans, or as Galacz is the same as Calais? The present writer wholly dis- connects them, and ignores the whole system of hypothetical migrations by which the identity is supported. A second Olbia in respect to its Helleno-Scythic relations, was Bosporus, or Panticapaeum, a Greek settlement which lasted from b. c. 480 till the reign of Mithridates. [Panticapaeum.] From Bosporus there was a great trade with Athens in corn, hides, and <Sc?/?/»Vwj slaves, — Scythes, as the name of a slave, occurring as early as the time of Theognis, and earlier in the Athenian di-ama than those of Davus and Geta (Dacian and Getic) which belong to the New Comedy, — Scythes and Scythaena being found in the Old. The political relations were those of independent municipalities; sometimes sovereign, sometimes pro- tected. The archons of Bosporus paid tribute to the Scythian princes of their neighbourhood, when they were powerful and united; took it. when the Scythians were weak and disunited. Under this latter category came the details of the division of the JIaeotae, viz., Sindi, Toraeti, Dandarii, Thetes, &c. Of these, Parysades I. (a Scythic rather than a Greek name) was king, being only archon of his native town. In the civil wars, too, of Bosporus, the Scythians took a part; nor were there wanting ex- amples of Scytiiian manners even in the case of the SCYTHIA. Panticapaean potentates. Eumelus lost his life by being thrown out of a four-wheeled wagon-and-four with a tent on it. Scythians of the Mithkidatic Period, etc. — The Scythians pressed on Parysades IV., who called in Mithridates, who was conquered by Rome. The name now becomes of rare occurrence, subor- dinate to that of the Sannatae, Daci, Thracians, &c. In fact, instead of being the nearest neighbours to Greece, the Scythae were now the most distant enemies of Pome. In the confederacy of the Dacian Boerebistes, in the reign of Augustus, there were Scythian ele- ments. So there were in the wars against the Tiiracian PJiescuporis and the Roxolani. So there were in the war conducted by J. Plautius in the reign of Vespasian, as shown by the following in- scription: REGIBUS BASTERNAEUM ET RHOXOLAN- ORUSI FILIOS DACORUJI. . . EREPTOS KEMISIT. . . SCYTHARUM QUOQUE KEGE A CIIERSONESI QU.E EST ULTIi-V BORY'STIIENEM OBSIDIONE SUJIMOTO. (Grut. p. 4.'53; Biickli, vol. ii. pt. 1. p. 82; Zeuss, s. V. Shjlhen.) Though the history of the Scythians, eo nomine, be fragmentary, the history of more than one Scythian population under a change of name is both prominent and important. In the article Hunni reasons are given for believing that the descendants of the He- rodotean Agathyrsi, of Scythian blood, were no un- important element in the Dacian nationality. After the foundation of Constantinople the Scy- thian nations appear with specific histories and names, Hun, Avar, &c. The continuity of the history of the name of the Herodotean Scythians within the Herodotean area is of great importance; as is the explanation of names like Galatae and Germani; as also is the considera- tion of the sources whence the nomenclature and in- formation of the different authorities is derived. It is important, because, when we find one name disap- pearing from history, and another appearing, there is (according to, at least, the current criticism) a presumption in favour of a change of jiopulation. Sometimes this presumption is heightened into what is called a proof ; yet the presumption itself is un- real. For one real change of name referrible to an actual change of population there are ten where the change has been merely one in respect to the sources whence the information was derived, and the chan- nels through which it came. This is what occurs when the same country of Deutschland is called Germany by an Englishman, AHemagne in France, Lamagna in Italy. This we know to be nominal. We ought at least to ask whether it may not be so in ancient history — and that not once or twice, but always — before we assume hypothetical movements and migrations. Now in the case of Scythia we can see our way to great nominal and but slight real changes. We see the sources of information changed from Greek to Latin, and the channels from Getic and Alacedoniaii to Dacian. If so, the occupants of Eimgai'y, the Principalities, and South-western Russia under the Caesars may be the descendants of the occupants of the same dis- tricts in the time of Herodotus. Tliat there are fome differences is not only likely but admitted, — dif- ferences in the way of admixture of blood, modifica- tion of nationality, changes of frontier, differences of the kind that time always effects, even in a sta- tionary condition of nations. It is only denied that