Page:Outlines of European History.djvu/128

 92 Outlines of European History I, Sanskrit- speaking tribes in India which we call the " Vedas," written in Sanskrit, there are echoes of the days of Aryan unity, and they furnish many a hint of the ancient Aryan home on the east of the Caspian. The other group, whose tribes have kept the name " Aryan " in the form " Iran," ^ also left this home and pushed westward and southwestward into the mountains bordering our fertile crescent (p. 58). Among them were two powerful tribes, the Medes and the Persians. Fig. 50. Fire Altars of Ancient Fire Worshipers still SURVIVING IN Modern Persia 2, Medes and Persians further west toward the fertile crescent About 2100 B.C., in the age of Hammurapi, long before they reached the fertile crescent, their coming was announced in advance by the arrival of the horse in Babylonia (see p. 69). We recall how in the days of Assyria's imperial power, nearly fifteen hundred years later, the Medes descended from the north- ern mountains against Nineveh (p. 79). This southern advance of the Indo-European eastern wing was thus overwhelming the Semitic right wing (Fig. 49), occupying the fertile crescent. 1 They have given their name to the great Iranian plateau, which stretches from the Zagros Mountains eastward to the Indus River. This whole region was known in Greek and Roman days as Ariana, which (like Iran) is, of course, derived from " Aryan."