Page:History of merchant shipping and ancient commerce (Volume 1).djvu/93

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Azov." Again, Phrygia, one of the earliest commercial populations of Asia Minor, was famous for its capital, Celænæ, a great internal entrepôt, and, in a less degree, for the possession of Sinope, itself a colony of Miletus, and a port which until now has attracted to itself a very considerable trade with the populations on the shores of the Black Sea.

The Scythians, with boundaries perfectly undefinable, but who may be roughly described as the inhabitants of the great Steppe country, now known as Little Russia, and of the districts north of Circassia, for centuries played an important part in the commerce of the ancient world. Though chiefly nomads, they were also, to a great extent, carriers by land, while no inconsiderable section of their population devoted itself to agriculture. Strangely, however, they cultivated, not that they might themselves enjoy the produce, but that they might sell it to other nations. From the same districts, embracing Odessa, and from the ports of the Sea of Azov, vast quantities of corn are still annually imported into England.

Nor was this all: like the modern inhabitants of the eastern shores of the Black Sea, the Scythians were also notorious for their extensive traffic in slaves, the countries situated to the north and east of this inland lake affording then, as now, inexhaustible magazines for this lucrative branch of commerce: they at the same time extended thence their trading operations far into the interior of Asia. "As far as the Argyppæi" (the