69. Yet saw I brent the shippes hoppesteres The hunte ystrangled with the wilde beres, &c. But neverthelesse suffiseth to the these trewe conclusyons in Englishe, as well as suffiseth to these noble clerkes Grekes these same conclusions in Greke.-Chaucer. The Conclusions of the Astrolabie. 70. And hou herden we ech man his language in which we ben borunof Parthi and Medi-and comelinges romaines, and iewis, &c.-Wiclif, Dedis of Apostlis. 71. for the woolle of England Susteineth the commons Flemings, I understand. Hachluyt's Voy. England's Policie. 72. Yea thou mayest observe (friendly reader) what privileges the Danish king Canutus obtained at Rome, for our English merchants adventurers of those times.-Hachluyt, Voy. Preface, 2nd Ed. 73. On the left wing likewise there stood fast to the phalangites aforesaid, 1500 horsemen Gallo-Grecians --Holland's Livy, p. 776. Shippes hoppesteres, ex. 69, means the dancing ships-hoppestere, as Tyrwhitt observed, being a female dancer; and comelinges romaines, ex. 70, means Roman strangers. Under this class of idioms must be ranged the phrases Knights-Templars, Knights-Hospitallers, Friars-Minors, &c. Before we close the paper, it may be well to call the reader's attention to a form which is now obsolete, and appears never to have been otherwise than local, but which in a philological point of view is curious and interesting. The North-country relative quhilk generally became quhilkis when it referred to a plural or collective substantive. 74. And bath the eldys has tane end As in all storys welle is kende Contenand hale thre thowsand yhere Nyne scowre and foure ourpassyt clere Intyl his Cornyclis tellys us Nere foryhet ware, &c. Wynt. 2. Prol. 75. Above the commoun nature and conditioun of doggis, quhilkis ar sene in al partis, ar three maner of doggis in Scotland. Bellenden, Descr. of Albion, c. ix. 76. Touching the kyndis of versis, quhilks are not cuttit, or broken, but alyke many feite in everie lyne of the verse, and how they ar commonlie namit.-King James, Reulis and Cautelis of Scott. Poetry. VOL. I. MARCH 24, 1843. (UK! No. 7! T TY Professor WILSON in the Chair. Professor F. Bopp of Berlin, and Professor James Grimm of Berlin, were elected Honorary Members of the Society. G. J. Pennington, Esq., late Fellow of King's College, Cambridge, and the Rev. John E. Kempe, M.A., Fellow of Clare Hall, Cambridge, were elected Members of the Society. A paper was read, contributed by Fras. W. Newman, Esq., “On Scythia and the surrounding Countries, according to Herodotus." The problem is, first, rightly to limit Scythia by the various nations which Herodotus places round it; next, to determine the rivers and other interior divisions marked by him. The nations bounding Scythia are the following:-(1) the Getans, south of the Danube; (2) the Agathyrsans on the river Maris, the modern Marosk, so that they were separated from Scythia by the Carpathian Mountains; (3) the Neurians, divided from Scythia by the " great lake out of which the river Tyras flowed" (Her. iv. 51), probably an overflowing of the Dniester some way below its source, so that the Neurians may be safely placed in Volhynia; (4) the Androphagi, or Cannibals, a word perhaps denoting nothing more than their military prowess, probably between the Pripet and the Dnieper; (5) the Melanchlani, or Black Cloaked Men, due north of the Royal Scythians, and probably in the government of Orlov; (6) east, or south-east of these, the Budinians; (7) south of the Budinians, the Sarmatians, on the eastern side of the Tanais; (8) finally, at the south-eastern side a corner was cut off by the Taurians; this was the Crimea, or a part of it. Herodotus seems not to have known that the Crimea was a peninsula. He describes it as an aкTǹ, a projecting, wedge-shaped piece of land. What he calls "the Rugged Peninsula' (iv. 99), seems to have been the eastern peninsula on which was the city Pantacapæum. "The Moat" (cc. 3 and 20), reaching from the Mæotis to the Tauric Mountains, must have been cut on the Isthmus of the eastern peninsula; for the Tauric Mountains run along the south-eastern coast; and the moat was said to have been dug to stop the Scythians who desired to return from Asia into Europe. The Royal Scythians possessed the north-east coast of the Crimea ; for their territory came down to the moat (c. 20); and we are told also of Scythians who lived" within the moat" (c. 28), i. e. upon I the Rugged Peninsula; who, when the sea was frozen, made war against the Sindians on the opposite shore. Herodotus supposed the north-west coast of the Sea of Azov to run due north from the Bosporus, so that he calls the Sea of Azov "the Eastern Sea" (cc. 99, 100), making it a part of the eastern side of Scythia, which country he describes as a square (ib. and c. 101). He moreover believed that the Sea of Azov was "not much less" than the Black Sea (c. 86). Although he makes the Tanais, after the Sea of Azov, the eastern boundary, we cannot tell precisely what his Tanais meant. We have no security that he did not mistake the lower Donetz for the main stream of the Don. The Sarmatians, who were east of the Tanais, occupied (to speak roughly) the country of the Don Cossacks. To their north lived the Budinians in a thickly-wooded country. In this same country was "the wooden city" of the Gelonians. North-east of the Budinians, but after seven days' journey through an uninhabited country, dwelt the Thyssagetans. The Jurcans and Thyssagetans are said to be "in the same parts;" but, as both were hunters, they must have had separate hunting grounds. Still to the north-east was a tribe of Scythians detached from the main body of the nation (Σkúðaι åñоστávτes). Thus far, says Herodotus, the ground has been a deep mould; but after this it becomes " rough and stony;" and after much of this rough country the traveller reached the Argippæans. Somewhere beyond their country was the region whence gold was brought; the locality of which was represented by the terrible Griffins, a bugbear invented to scare away greedy tribes. To the north of the Griffins were the Hyperboreans, who "reached to the sea" (iv. 13); a fact which is stated so simply and positively, as to appear far more like a real report concerning the sea of Archangel than a speculation of philosophy. South of the Griffins were the one-eyed Arimaspians; south of these the Issedones (cc. 13 and 27), who again were " opposite" to the Massagetans (i. 201), and east of the Argippæans (iv. 25); and these last had steep and impassable mountains to the north of them. We seem now to have the clue to all these nations; for the position of the Massagetans is extremely well ascertained by the description given by Herodotus in his First Book. They dwelt above the Jaxartes, or Sirr Deria, and probably wandered to the north as far as pasturage led them. Opposite" to these were the Issedones, who therefore must be placed on the river Jaik in its upper course, where it runs parallel to the Oural chain. The Argippæans, west of the Issedones, will then lie along the river Jaik, where it runs nearly due west; and they will have to their north, nearly parallel to the river, a chain of formidable mountains, such as Herodotus describes. The Ourals, in fact, here make a right angle, just as the river does; and the mountains run to the west with only one break (at Orenbourg) from the 58th to nearly the 50th degree of longitude. The Western branch is called in our maps the Obchei Siert (in lat. 55°). These nations, as far as the Argippaans, became known from the reports of merchants, who brought accounts of them to Olbia, the Greek city near the confluence of the Hypanis and the Borysthenes (the Boug and the Dnieper). Heeren supposes a caravan to have set out from Olbia, and to have journeyed to the north-east, carrying its wares to exchange for furs and gold. This view seems to be borne out by Herodotus, and has been generally approved. Heeren, however, supposes that the gold came from the mountains of Cobi,a prodigious distance. We now know that gold is found under the Oural mountains, even beneath Mount Kolgan, in latitude 55°. The caravan came successively into contact with seven nations, so that even the Scythians who accompanied it needed seven interpreters. The first nation was possibly the Mæotians. Then came the Sarmatians, whose position has been already noticed. The Budinians seem to have occupied that part of the government of Voronej which is east of the Don. In their country was a lake abounding with otters and beavers, and apparently with seals (iv. 109). Seals are known to exist now, not only in the Caspian and Volga, but in the freshwater lakes of Siberia. The Wooden City of the Gelonians in this region was inhabited by a mixed people, partly Greek, manifestly settlers for purposes of trade. The country to the north-east was wooded, and it abounds with rivers. Travelling through it must have been laborious and circuitous with laden beasts. It appears absurd, therefore, to estimate the seven days' journey through the uninhabited country which separated the Budinians from the Thyssagetans as 140 English miles set off on a map. Consequently there is no reason for supposing the Thyssagetans to have been a very distant nation; and the caravan probably fell in with them not far from Saratov, on the Volga. Through their country flowed four great rivers, Lycus, Oarus, Tanais, and Syrgis (c. 123), all which Herodotus believed to fall into the Mæotis; and the district just named furnishes us with four rivers, which might from their direction have been thus represented, the Volga, the Medievitsa, the Khoper, and the Vorona; of which the last three, by mingling in the Don, do really reach the Sea of Azov. Herodotus does not speak of this Tanais as if he believed it to be the same river as he had named before; but if any one is persuaded that it is, he has only to suppose that the hunting grounds of the Thyssagetans reached westward to the Don, which would then separate them from the Melanchlani. The Jurcans were in the same region with the Thyssagetans. They may have hunted from the Saratov northward into Penza, or further still. The Revolted Scythians seem to have been situated on the Volga, north of Saratov; perhaps near Volsk. Then, after much rough country, came the Argippæans. All this agrees perfectly with our map. From Saratov to Ouralsk on the Jaik, a chain of high hills is marked, between which and the Obchei Siert it appears almost certain that the travellers must have passed. Herodotus describes Scythia as a square, and estimates its depth from north to south as 4000 stadia, or rather more than 400 miles. This must be computed from the Moat on the Rugged Peninsula, which he held to be the southern point of the Royal Scythians' territory. The latitude of this point is about 45°; so that if we were to count his 4000 stadia as six degrees of latitude, we should be carried only to 514° north latitude. In the real journey the traveller would have to deviate greatly from the straight line; so that if we fix the northern frontier between 51° and 52° north latitude, the objection is more to be feared that it is more than Herodotus allows than that it is less. In the latter part of the paper Mr. Newman endeavoured to account for the three rivers which Herodotus describes as east of the Borysthenes, and especially for the Hypacyris and Gerrhus, which are said to join their streams, and flow into the Euxine near the city Carcinitis. He conjectured that the Desna, which flows into the Dnieper, and the Seim which flows into the Desna, were taken to be the upper part of the Borysthenes; and that the Gerrhus, which is said to be parted off from the Borysthenes (åréoxɩOTαι, c. 56), is the Oskol which rises near the Seim, and flows to the south, and the distance between which and the lower Dnieper corresponds to the seventeen days' journey, which Herodotus places between the Borysthenes and the Gerrhus in the lower part of their course. If the Oskol is supposed to be the Gerrhus, the Donetz, into which it flows, is of course the Hypacyris; and the assertion that it entered the Euxine will be an error. But whatever hypothesis be made about the correspondence of modern rivers with those described by Herodotus, this error will remain the same; for no considerable river enters the Black Sea in the Gulf of Perekop; and the structure of the country seems to make it impossible that any should ever have flowed in that direction. The paper was accompanied by two manuscript maps, one of which represented the real features of the country with the ancient names placed according to Mr. Newman's theory; the other was a map according to the idea formed by Herodotus. After the reading of the paper a discussion arose upon the ethnological relations of the Scythians. It was suggested that the distinct testimony of Herodotus, that the language of the Scythians was akin to that of the Sarmatians, and the evidence which tends to show that the Sarmatians are the stock of the Sclavonic nations of modern Europe, are irreconcilable with the opinion deduced by Niebuhr from the description given by Hippocrates of the physical peculiarities of the Scythians, that they were a Mongolian tribe. |