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The Scythians
did not create a strictly homogeneous state, although when it
comes to some periods it might be said in regard to them about
statehood forms with a provision that frontiers and internal
structure could not be clearly defined. Greek sources use the
name Scythia or Greater Scythia; generally the most
information on Scythia and the Scythians was left by the
Greeks, and in the first place by the "father of the
history", Herodotus, who was also a traveller and had
visited in person the countries he described later. On all
accounts it is worth to mention that the researchers,
including the nowadays ones, confirm a high value of Herodotus'
information, who after all could not know everything. It was
not possible at the time to study the complicated ethnic
composition of the Scythians and that is why the Greeks,
realising essential differences in occupations and forms of
existence, used to divide them according to these criteria: to
Royal Scythians (bellicose pastoral tribes between Dnieper and
Don), wandering Scythians (right bank of Dnieper and Crimea),
"husbandmen" and "ploughmen" - farther to
the west. In this conglomeration of tribes of diverse origins
and employing various occupations occurred however integration
processes; their main manifestation was in emerging of
statehood forms and the royal power, and in the consolidation
of the unity, contributed by military and pillaging
expeditions. Among others there took place a war in the end of
the 6th century BC waged against the Persian king Darius,
while pillaging and abduction of slaves was always possible in
the lands of neighbouring peoples. To the whole
Scythia the 5th and 4th centuries were the period of the
biggest power, wide territorial range, and armed victories.
Their possessions though had later shrunk quickly, as an
outside pressure was growing from one side from the Thracian
tribes, from the other one - from the Sarmatae, a new complex
of tribes incoming from the east. In the 2nd century BC the
Scythian state, substantially reduced, was limited to the
lands between the lower Dnieper and Crimea, where also was
situated their capital, Scythian Neapol, close to nowadays
Simferopol. This small in terms of the area kingdom was
conspicuous by an amazing vitality, used to fight Greek
colonies, conducted wars with various other enemies and
survived until the second half of the 3rd century AD, finally
shattered then by the Goths.
The Scythians
represented a high level of material culture known today, even
very precisely, from many excavations in steppe barrows, which
were the graves of the Scythian aristocracy. Although they
were plundered already in the Dark Ages, archaeologists
managed though to find there a lot of artefacts; the most
precious and most valuable for the science ones were found in
Kul Oba barrow near Kerch, discovered and dug up in 1830, and
in Chertomlyk (nowadays in Dnepropetrovsk district), dug up in
1862 and 1863. Kings were buried with slaves and horses killed
during the funeral ceremony; many precious objects made of the
gold, silver and bronze, weapon, harness, and knives were put
to the graves as well as amphorae and vases with bas-relieves
featuring Scythian warriors or mythological scenes. It makes
evidence that Greek craftsmen also worked for the Scythians.
The wandering
Scythians were a warlike nation, perpetually disposed to raids,
pillages and assassinations. Their habits were very severe,
the mercy - a feeling, which they wished to know nothing about.
They worshipped the sky, sun and moon, they had also some
other gods, for example a god of war, in honour of which they
used to burn stakes, placing iron swords atop; they also
sacrificed domestic animals to their gods. An irresistible
greed for pillage and a particular cult of the god of war is
excellently reflected in a poem of one of the most eminent
Russian poets, Constantine Balmont:
We have no
shrines, no gods, only the sunbeam while
It shines towards the West for us like burning preacher's
word.
And to the God of War alone we bunch the brushwood pile
And then embellish top of it with someone's iron sword.
Like
locust swarms we fly, like locust swarms we harrow.
And we will fearlessly feed up the greedy souls of ours.
The deadly bile of snake will impregnate the arrow.
The strained bowstring will find the foe's cuirass.
(Transl.
Alexei Sitnitsky)
Generally the
Scythians liked to kill and to spill blood. In war clashes the
greatest splendour used to be gained by those, who brought to
the king most heads of killed enemies. They were making
wine-cups of the skulls of the killed enemies - the habit
after all not only a Scythian one. Captives used to become
slaves; sometimes they were killed in sacrifice to gods. Every
king's funeral caused a real massacre - there were killed and
buried wives, servants, horses; the ritual repeated after a
year. Gentler customs prevailed among "husbandmen",
but their life is less known.
The
inclination towards cruelty did not interfere the Scythians to
conduct an animated trade, in the first place with compactly
settled on the Black Sea coasts Greek colonies. They were
founded in various periods, but mainly in the 6th and 5th
centuries BC; each colony was a sort of city-state, very well
organized, maintaining trade with Greece, the Scythians and
even with other tribes, which had their settlements closely to
the coasts. In every Greek town flourished handcrafts,
cultural institutions, theatres, palaces, and stadiums. In the
mouth of Dniester emerged the colony of Tyra, in the mouth of
Southern Bug - Olbia, on the southern coast of Crimea -
Chersonesus and Eupatoria, on the south-eastern - Theodosia,
on the eastern - Panticapaeum (Pantikapaion), on Taman
peninsula - Phanagoria, in the mouth of Don on the Azov Sea -
Tanais, on the Caucasian coasts of the Black Sea - Pityus,
Dioscurias and Phasis. There were also colonies on western and
southern shores. For them Scythia was a source of crops,
cattle and slaves and it used to buy articles of luxury and
wine. Some colonies gained power and sometimes transformed
into somewhat bigger political organisms. Thus emerged in the
5th century BC, in result of unification of several Greek
colonies on Kerch and Taman peninsulas, the Bosporan Kingdom.
It survived several hundred years, not without domestic
conflicts and struggles against various enemies; the end to it
was put in the 4th century AD by the Huns.
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