The place of the ancestors of the Slavs among the Indo-Europeans. Part of the 2nd millennium BC. e. formed a special array in Central and Eastern Europe, consisting of the ancestors of the future Germans, the Balts (the descendants of the Balts are now Lithuanians and Latvians), who then spoke the same language.

In the middle of the 2nd millennium BC. e. the ancestors of the Germanic tribes separated themselves, and the ancestors of the Balts and Slavs continued to form a common Balto-Slavic group for some time.

The center of the settlement of the ancestors of the Slavic peoples (Proto-Slavs) was the basin of the Vistula River. From here they moved west to the Oder River, but the ancestors of the Germanic tribes, who had already occupied part of Central and Northern Europe, did not let them go further. The Proto-Slavs also moved to the east, reaching the Dnieper. They also moved south towards the Carpathian Mountains, the Danube and the Balkan Peninsula.

At that time, the Eastern Slavs and the Balts were still close to each other, and only over the centuries did they completely separate themselves and ceased to understand each other. There were close contacts with the northern Iranian Indo-European nomadic tribes, from which subsequently stood out Cimmerians,Scythians and Sarmatians .

First invasions. Already at this time, the Proto-Slavs entered into a confrontation with nomadic tribes. These were the Cimmerians, who occupied the steppe spaces of the Northern Black Sea region and attacked the ancestors of the Eastern Slavs who settled in the Dnieper region. The Slavs on their way poured high ramparts, blocked forest roads with rubble and ditches, built fortified settlements. And yet, the forces of peaceful plowmen, cattle breeders and horse nomad warriors were unequal. Under the onslaught of dangerous neighbors, many Proto-Slavs left the fertile sunny lands and went to the northern forests.

From the 6th to the 4th century BC e. the lands of the ancestors of the Eastern Slavs were subjected to a new invasion. Those were the Scythians. They moved in large horse masses, lived in wagons. For decades, their nomad camps moved from the east to the steppes of the Northern Black Sea region. The Scythians pushed back the Cimmerians and became dangerous neighbors of the Slavs and Balts. Part of their lands was captured by the Scythians, and the local population was forced to flee in the forest thickets.

The Scythians, like the Cimmerians, having captured the space from the Lower Volga region to the mouth of the Danube, stood up as an insurmountable wall between the Balto-Slavic population living in the forest-steppe and forest belt and the rapidly developing peoples who lived on the warm shores of the Mediterranean, Aegean, Black Seas.

Greek colonies and Scythians. By the time the Scythians occupied the Northern Black Sea region, Greek colonies already existed there. These were city-states that were active in trade. Various handicrafts were brought here from Greece, including fabrics, dishes, expensive weapons. And from the shores of the Black Sea, Greek ships left loaded with bread, fish, wax, honey, leather, furs, and wool. Note that bread, wax, honey, furs from time immemorial were just the goods that the Slavic world supplied to the market. It is known that half of the grain consumed in Athens came from the Northern Black Sea region.

The Greeks exported from their colonies and slaves. These were captives captured by the Scythians during raids on their northern neighbors. However, these slaves were not popular in Greece, as they were freedom-loving and obstinate. In addition, unlike the Greeks, they drank undiluted wine, quickly got drunk and therefore could not work well.

All this multilingual, dynamic, trading, rapidly developing world was far from the farmers of the Dnieper region, since the Scythians firmly controlled all the routes to the south and were successful intermediaries in the then international trade.

The Scythians eventually created a powerful state in the Northern Black Sea region, headed by kings. Part of the Proto-Slavic population became part of the Scythian state. The ancestors of the Slavs were still engaged in agriculture and over the years passed on their experience to the Scythians, especially those who lived nearby. So some Scythian tribes switched to a settled way of life. And the Greeks called such Scythians and Proto-Slavs Scythians-plowmen. And later, after the disappearance of the Scythians, the Greeks began to call the Scythians and the Slavs who lived here.

Ancestors of the Eastern Slavs and new enemies. Just in the Scythian time, a population was formed that already spoke Slavonic, and not the Balto-Slavic language.

During archaeological sites settlements of the Dnieper region, it was found out that local farmers began to live in small huts located inside the fortified settlements. The large ancestral homes of the "Trypillians" are a thing of the past. Families are even more isolated. These settlements were placed on hills, where there was a good view, or among swampy lowlands difficult for the enemy to pass. In one such fortress, up to 1000 huts could be placed, where individual families lived. And the hut itself was a wooden chopped structure without partitions. Small outbuildings and a shed adjoined the house. In the center of the house stood a stone or adobe hearth. Often there are also large semi-dugouts with hearths. Such dwellings could withstand severe frosts better.

Starting from the II century. BC e. The Dnieper region experienced a new onslaught of enemies. Because of the Don, nomadic hordes of Sarmatians advanced here.

The Sarmatians launched a series of attacks on Scythian state, captured the lands of the Scythians and penetrated deep into the northern forest-steppe zone. Archaeologists have found traces of the military defeat of a number of settlements and fortresses here. Centuries-old achievements fell to ashes. The Eastern Slavs after the Sarmatian defeat in many ways had to start all over again - to develop the land, build settlements.

Other peoples of Russia in ancient times. In those distant times, not only tribes were formed, which later turned into Eastern Slavs, and later gave rise to three Slavic peoples - Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian. In the second half of the 2nd millennium BC. e. in the vast future Russia at the same time, other ethnic communities continued to take shape. The Balts occupied large areas north of the Slavic communities, settling from the shores of the Baltic to the interfluve of the Oka and Volga.

Since ancient times, the Ugro-Finnish peoples also lived near the Balts and Slavs, who at that time were the rulers of the vast territories of the north-eastern part of Europe - up to the Ural Mountains and the Trans-Urals. In impenetrable forests, along the banks of the Oka, Volga, Kama, Belaya, Chusovaya and other local rivers and lakes, the ancestors of the current Mari, Mordovians, Komi, Zyryans and other Ugro-Finnish peoples lived. The northern inhabitants were mainly hunters and fishermen. Their life, unlike the southerners, changed slowly.

The ancestors of the Circassians, Ossetians (Alans) and other mountain peoples, known according to Greek authors, have lived in the regions of the North Caucasus since ancient times.

The Adygs (the Greeks called them Meots) became the main part of the population of the Bosporus kingdom, which arose on the Taman Peninsula and in the foothills of the Caucasus Mountains. Its center was the Greek city of Panticapaeum, and it included multinational residents of these places: Greeks, Scythians, Circassians also related to Indo-European group peoples.

In the 1st century n. e. Jewish communities also appeared in the cities of the Bosporan kingdom. Since then, Jews - merchants, artisans, usurers - lived in the future South Russian territories. Having come here from the Middle East in search of a better life, they began to speak Greek adopted many of the local orders and customs. In the future, part of the Jewish population will also move to those that arose here, giving rise to the constant presence of Jews in them.

In the foothills of the Caucasus, at about the same time, another powerful tribal union became known - the Alans, the ancestors of the current Ossetians. The Alans were related to the Sarmatians. Already in the 1st century BC e. Alans attacked Armenia and other states, proved to be tireless and brave warriors. Their main occupation was cattle breeding, and the main means of transportation was the horse.

Various Turkic-speaking tribes formed in Southern Siberia. One of them became famous thanks to the ancient Chinese chronicles. This is the people of the Xiongnu, who in the III - II centuries. BC e. conquered many neighboring peoples, in particular the inhabitants of Gorny Altai. A few centuries later, the Xiongnu, or Huns, who became stronger, launched an offensive into Europe.

Great Migration

The Great Migration of Nations and Eastern Europe. From the end of the 4th century n. e. Numerous movements of tribes began, which went down in history under the name of the Great Migration of Peoples.

By this time, many peoples of Eurasia had learned to make iron weapons, mounted horses, and created fighting squads. The tribes were driven forward by the desire to gain prey and new rich, already developed lands of the Roman Empire.

The Germanic tribes of the Goths were the first to move on the territory of Eastern Europe. Previously, they lived in Scandinavia, later settled in the Southern Baltic, but from there they were pushed out by the Slavs. Through the lands of the Balts and Slavs, the Goths came to the Northern Black Sea region and lived there for two centuries. From here they attacked the Roman possessions, fought with the Sarmatians. At the head of the Goths was the leader Germanaric, who, according to some reports, lived for 100 years.

In the 70s. 4th century from the east, the tribes of the Huns advanced on the Goths. Fleeing, part of the Goths moved to the limits of the Roman Empire. The Huns were a Turkic people, and together with their appearance, the domination of the Turko-Mongolian tribes in the steppe expanses of Eurasia begins. They knew iron production, forged swords, arrows, daggers; during the camps, the Huns lived in adobe houses and semi-dugouts, but the basis of their economy was nomadic cattle breeding. All the Huns were excellent riders - men, women, and children. Their main force was the light cavalry. According to Roman historians, the appearance of the Huns was terrible: short, overgrown with hair, dense, with thick necks, crooked legs, dressed in fur malachai and shod in coarse shoes made of goat skins. Legends told about their wild customs and atrocities.

In their movement, the Huns carried away everyone who came across them on the way. Together with them, the Ugro-Finnish tribes, the Altai peoples, were removed from their places. This whole huge horde first fell upon the Alans, threw back some of them to the Caucasus, and also drew the rest into its invasion. Heavy, armored, armed with swords and spears, the Alanian cavalry became an essential part of the Hun army. Having defeated the Goths, they passed with fire and sword through the South Slavic settlements. Once again, fleeing from death, people fled under the shelter of forests, abandoned fertile black soil. Part of the Slavs, as well as ready, together with the Huns also rushed to the west.

The Huns made the lands along the Danube, which had excellent pastures, the center of their power. From here they attacked the Roman possessions and terrified the whole of Europe. Since then, the name of the Huns has become a household name. It denoted rude and merciless barbarians, destroyers of civilization.

The power of the Huns reached its highest power under their leader Attila. He was a talented commander, an experienced diplomat, but a rude and merciless ruler. The fate of Attila once again showed that no matter how great, powerful, terrible the ruler may be, he cannot forever prolong his power, his greatness. Attila's attempt to conquer all Western Europe ended in 451 with a grandiose battle in Northern France on the Catalaunian fields. The Roman army, which included detachments of many peoples of Europe, utterly defeated the equally multinational army of Attila. The leader of the Huns soon died, and strife began between the Hun leaders. The state of the Huns fell apart. But the movement of peoples, foamed by the Hun wave, continued for several centuries.

The Slavs also became participants in the Great Migration of Nations, and it was then that they first appeared in documents under their own names.

A repeat of an old article. For Pretty Bee especially.

The word "Volohi", which the Russian chronicle used to designate the ancient Romans and the ancestors of modern Romanians and Moldovans, is Scythian-Sarmatian.

Let's start with the legend of Andrew the First-Called, given in The Tale of Bygone Years.
One detail is important regarding the chronicle episode about Andrew the First-Called. Byzantine church tradition says that the Apostle Andrew preached Christianity among the inhabitants of the Crimean cities and the Scythians.
The Russian chronicler, having placed this legend in his text, replaces the Scythians with the Dnieper Slavs. Is this replacement accidental, or is there a hint of the relationship of the Slavs and Scythians behind it?
Herodotus cites a legend about the birth of the Scythians from Koloksai, who received a golden plow, an ax and a horse harness as a gift from his father, the god Targetai (symbols of Scythian farmers, Scythian warriors and Scythian cattle breeders). Until the 17th century, Russian people, including princes, wore amulet medallions, on one side of which Christian subjects were depicted, and on the other, a head, less often a figure of a woman, framed by ray-shaped snakes.

Archaeologists have found many such "serpentines". The Scythian depiction of the snake-footed goddess on a golden horse forehead is stylistically a model for ancient Russian serpentine sculptures depicting the goddess in full growth. On some of these serpentines there are inscriptions related to this "Medusa Gorgon": "Dna", similar to a snake or dragon, "puerperant" ("mother"). What kind of "mother of the bottom" is this, capable of protecting the owner of the amulet from misfortunes along with a crucifix? Are the serpentine amulets a reflection of another legend about the origin of the Scythians, given by Herodotus in a clearly Hellenized form? This legend tells about the birth of the Scythians from the snake-footed goddess and Hercules, who once pastured horses either in the Northern Black Sea region, or in the Crimea. Was it not in connection with this legend that the Polish chronicler Gallus Anonymus, who certainly knew the works of Herodotus, "let slip" when he called the pagan Slavs "a kind of serpent"? He knew, therefore, the Scythian version of the genealogy of the Slavs!
In the “Iranian” (Scythian) dialect, the word “Dn” meant a river in general. Hence the names of many rivers of southern Russia - Don, Dnieper, Dniester, etc. The snake-footed goddess of the Bottom is apparently a symbol of one or all of these rivers with numerous tributaries - “snakes”. Hercules (“the father of the Scythians”, of course, had a different name in the Scythian epic) is a mythological symbol of a certain equestrian tribe that gave rise to the Black Sea Scythians.
The Scythians, like the Sarmatians, are anthropologically similar to the ancient Slavs. Already warmer! There is a lot in common in their "characters": unpretentiousness and at the same time cleanliness, love of freedom, desperate courage, peculiar principles of justice, commitment to collectivism, traditions of numerous and long feasts with intoxicating drink, pugnacity, combined with long-suffering and unique fidelity to friendship. The Celts, Scythians and Slavs knew how to make intoxicating honey, unique in its properties, which was fermented in some mysterious way without the participation of yeast. The Slavs and Scythians have much in common in the themes and style of fine arts. One Scythian "animal style" is worth something! It was accepted by the ancient Slavs, and the Celts and Scandinavian Germans in their household items and jewelry. Even warmer!

From the Scythians, many words came into the Russian language: an ax, an ear, milk, a cow, a dog, etc. Please note that these words are used in business activities.
Unlike the southwestern candidates for the "fatherhood" of the Slavs, the Scythian-Sarmatians in the field of material culture are much closer to our ancient ancestors. The Scythians-Skolos lived in the Middle Dnieper region in almost identical economic conditions with the ancient Slavs.
The beliefs of the Scythians and the ancient Slavs have much in common. A striking example is the cult of the sword. The word "God" is "Iranian"!
If the Slavs were only the neighbors of the Scythians, then "those Proto-Slavic tribes who lived close to the population of the forest-steppe zone of the Scythian time would be culturally and, as archaeological material shows, ethnically with the Scythians," as he rightly writes in his book about the Scythians historian A.P. Smirnov. But the Scythian themes and style in fine arts it is especially widespread not in the south, bordering on the forest-steppe, but in the north of Russia (to this day)!
Most historians unanimously call the Scythians, as well as the Aryans, and the Cimmerians nomads. However, archaeologists convincingly prove that before coming to Europe, and after that, the Scythians, along with cattle breeding, developed agriculture (the Saks even had irrigated agriculture!). The same archaeologists provide information that the Scythians from the Dnieper to Altai lived in settlements like Belsky or Nikopol settlements, in adobe or log houses. Crimean and Black Sea Greeks bought BREAD from the Scythians! The highest level handicraft and jewelry is not peculiar to nomads.
An amazing paradox! The large map of Great Scythia in the Scythian hall of the Hermitage shows more than a dozen Scythian settlements found by archaeologists. The guide, talking about the Scythians, calls them nomads. And in response to a simple question (“Why do nomads have dozens of cities and settlements?”) shrugs his shoulders! But what about the description of the life of the Scythians given by Herodotus? From this description it follows that the Scythians lived in wagons, ate mare's milk and the meat of wild and domestic animals. These are typical signs of the life of nomads!
And what else could be the life of a cavalry regiment of warriors and their servants, who spent almost their entire lives on campaigns and "summer camps"? After all, it was with them, with the royal Scythians, that the learned Greek communicated.
Probably, the nomadic way of life was a kind of privilege of the military elite - the Kshatriyas - the royal Scythians, whose life was described by Herodotus and captured by ancient artisans in their precious masterpieces. Academician B.A. Rybakov studied and wonderfully described in his works about Kievan Rus the process of collecting tribute from subject tribesmen by their princes is polyudie. Polyudye consisted in the annual detour of the prince's retinue, led, as a rule, by the prince himself of his lands, along a long-determined route. Polyudia pickers set off at the beginning of winter, went around settlements, where the surrounding population brought the property set for delivery as taxes (tribute). Here, the prince repaired the court and resolved issues "on the ground." By the end of winter, the convoy with tribute returned to the capital (tribal center). In this way, tribute was collected not only by the princes of Kyiv, but also by tribal princes.
It would seem that it would be easier to pay tribute to the established places - graveyards to state officials, under the protection of local garrisons, who would bring the collected to Kyiv. Such an organization was established by Princess Olga, but the reason for changing the existing order was an extraordinary circumstance - the murder of the prince during polyudya. Apparently, polyudya had deep roots that go back to an ancient tradition, when the tribes of the Aryans (Cimmerians, Scythians, Sarmatians) had a Varna structure. "Nomads"-kshatriyas collected tribute, used to maintain the defense capability of the tribe, demonstrated their strength as defenders, and resolved current management issues. Everyday life. This was their service to the tribe and their privilege.

It turns out that the similarity of the Scythians with the ancient Slavs is quite specific. But…
Great Scythia perished in the III century BC under the blows of the Sarmatians.
Where are the Proto-Slavs?

Let's start with explicit logical paradox, which for some reason was not noticed by official researchers. The author of The Tale of Bygone Years lists the names of the Slavic tribes: the Polans, the Drevlyans, the Polochans, the Dregovichi, the north ... Not the northerners, but the north. The word "north" is not Slavic in origin and in Russian, along with the word "midnight", from time immemorial means a geographical concept. This suggests that the tribe or territory "North" is the northern part, the tip of a certain tribal massif in Proto-Slavic times. Relative to whom in earlier times Chernihiv region, Kursk region - Seversk land, was really northern? Regarding the Scythian-Sarmatians!
Suppose that the Slavs adopted the word "north" as the name of the territory from the Sarmatians who were pushed back (hence defeated) by them. Like the Western Slavs, the name of the Venets. But in order to accept it as the name of the SIDE OF THE SIGHT, it would be necessary to reverse the logic of geographical landmarks that existed at that time. That is, the name of the newly acquired southern (!) Territory “North” begins to designate the direction that is just in the opposite direction. In addition, the Slavs of other tribes, who were not even adjacent to the southern tip of the Slavic ethnic array, had to accept this strange novelty. Is it possible to believe in the possibility of such an absurdity? No, there should have been many people among the Slavs who called midnight “north”, they should have lived among them for a long time, everywhere and not in the role of nailed strangers. If the word "north" entered the Russian language as a designation of the cardinal point, this means that the tribe of the north was observed by our ancestors from within the Scythian-Sarmatian lands, which means that the Proto-Slavs were part of this ethnic formation! It is difficult to find any other explanation.

The tribe of the North (Savirs, Sabirs, etc.) is known from various sources. They are ranked among the Sarmatians, and the Huns, and the Khazars. It is likely that Siberia, where the North lived earlier, owes its name to this Sarmatian tribe. After the collapse of the Hunnic state, part of the north was involved in the union of the Khazar tribes and is mentioned in the Khazar epic as one of the Khazar tribes. According to another version, that part of the north came with the Huns, which at one time (III century BC) did not go to Europe with the rest of the Sarmatians.
The Sarmatians have been known to history since the 6th century BC. e. Then one of the Scythian-Sarmatian tribes, the Massagets (the name is Greek), lived in Central Asia. In 530 B.C. e. the great Persian king Cyrus died in battle with the Massagets while trying to conquer them. In the 320s BC. e. The Massagetae successfully fought during the defense of Sogdiana from the troops of Alexander the Great.
In the III century BC. e. on the eastern outskirts of the settlement of the Indo-Europeans, the process of the formation of Turkic-speaking nomadic tribes is intensively completed as a result of the mixing of Aryans, Finno-Ugric peoples and Mongoloids. From these tribes, the state of the Xiongnu was formed. By 179 BC. e. Xiongnu broke through to the borders of Europe. It was then that the Ural Ugrians were Turkified, and the Caspian Scythians-Khazars were Turkified so much that many historians consider their descendants to be full-fledged Turks. It was the Xiongnu who ousted the Sarmatians from Central Asia and forced them to resettle. Great Scythia was destroyed by them. And what happened to the Scythians themselves? According to B.A. Rybakov, “the Scythians were cut in two by a stream of nomads: some of them went south, to the Crimea, and some moved north, to the forest-steppe, where they were assimilated by the Slavs.” But maybe things were different.
"Sarmatians (Greek - "lizard-headed", remember the snake tradition of the Scythians!) - Iranian-speaking nomadic cattle breeders ... In the III century BC, the movement of Sarmatian tribes towards the Northern Black Sea region began ... Part of the Sarmatians in the II century BC by three tribes - Iazygs, Roxolans (“Roksolans” is the Greek name of the tribe, whose self-name “Rukhsalan” - from the “Iranian” dialect is translated as fair-haired (light) Alans) and Sirmats, came to the bend of the Dnieper in the Nikopol region and during fifty years populated the lands from the Don to the Danube, becoming the masters of the Northern Black Sea region for almost half a millennium ... It is not known for certain how the process of ousting the Scythians from the Black Sea steppes - by military or peaceful means. Scythian and Sarmatian burials of the 3rd century before AD The collapse of Great Scythia separates from the formation on the same territory of Great Sarmatia at least a hundred years.Perhaps there was a great long-term drought in the steppe, and the Scythians themselves went to fertile lands” .(BUT. R. Andreev).
The Sarmatians either could not or did not want to encroach on most of the possessions of the royal Scythians, the Crimea, but, on the contrary, acted as their allies in the wars with the Greeks. Thus, for the already long-settled Cimmerian-Scythian population of the lands conquered by the Sarmatians, there was only a change of power.
"Sarmatians" is the Greek name for a large number of ethnically related, Aryan in origin tribes that did not even form a tribal union. It is unlikely that these tribes suspected that someone called them that way. Each tribe and some groups of tribes had their own names: Alans, Yases (Ases, Yazygs), Roxolans, Sirmatians, Aorses, etc. The Sarmatians did not have a common center, there were civil strife. The social stratification of the Sarmatians was less than that of the Scythians. No one can clearly explain how the Sarmatians differed from the Scythians ethnically. The ethnic connection of the Sakas, Massagets and Roxolans is considered by historians to be obvious. Perhaps the Roxolani and other tribes of the second wave of the Sarmatian migration (II century BC) are just the remnants of the Scythians-Saks defeated by the Huns, more precisely the royal Scythians-Saks. The Sarmatian tribes consisted entirely of warriors, descendants of the Kshatriyas, and their families. Free community members-Vaishya-Scythians remained in their place. Also, as in the previous era - the Cimmerians. It turns out that the royal Scythians simply went to the Crimea, and the Sarmatians took their socio-political place. Thus, the composition of the rest of the population in the lands conquered by the Sarmatians has changed little.
The traditional historical school claims that the Slavs, from the moment the Sarmatians came to Scythia, constantly experienced the raids of these wild and cruel nomads, fought with them for centuries, which is hinted at in folklore. These wars eventually led to the departure of the Proto-Slavs to the north in the 2nd century AD, to a sharp decline in their culture. This period in the history of the Slavs is just associated with the Zarubinets archaeological culture. The belonging of this culture to the Slavs, as already mentioned, is debatable. The “civilized” Greeks and Romans considered the Sarmatians to be barbarians. The morals of the Sarmatians, according to the testimony of their enemies, were distinguished not only by cruelty, but also by love of freedom. As for their savagery, there are interesting objections to this. According to the Greeks, already in the 2nd century BC, the Sarmatians of the Northern Black Sea region had heavy cavalry. The Sarmatian warrior was armed with a heavy long spear, a long sword (just such a sword was common in Europe by the beginning of the Middle Ages), protected by an iron helmet and armor. The armor also protected the horses (once again, remember how the Sarmatians were depicted in the “Column”!). The use of such weapons also implies the presence of a fairly perfect horse attire, in particular, the presence of stirrups. The acquaintance of Europeans, especially the Romans, with the weapons and tactics of the Sarmatian cavalry led to great changes in the military affairs of Europe.
Armored Sarmatian cavalry numbered tens of thousands of soldiers. The Greeks called them "cataphracts", as later they called their heavily armed horsemen. The Sarmatians possessed perfect military tactics and dictated military fashion for the Byzantines and Romans. In this regard, it is not entirely clear how the “Slavs”, armed with darts and light bows, operating in loose formation, “forced out” the perfectly armed and organized Sarmatian cavalry, and even in the steppe conditions?
The Sarmatian cavalry attacked the enemy, forming a wedge. Does this remind the reader of anything? Correctly. It was such a system and similar weapons that the medieval German knights had. But in Europe and in Byzantium, which had heavy cavalry, there were big cities, the craft has long been separated from Agriculture and developed to the guild level. About how the history of the origin of the Germans themselves is connected with the Sarmatians - a conversation ahead.
The large cities of the Sarmatians are not known to traditional science, but then who armed the Sarmatian army with such perfect weapons? After all, the Sarmatians are nomads!?
In the XII century, the Arab geographer al-Idrisi wrote his essay, in which he described the Northern Black Sea region, including the Kuban region, where, according to his ideas, ... Alans lived in numerous and densely populated villages and three large trading cities. The Kuban River was named "Rusiya". And very close, apparently on the site of Kerch (Korchev), was the city of ar-Rusiya! Modern researchers of al-Idrisi do not pay much attention to this mistake (the remnants of the Alans lived far away in the mountains of the North Caucasus since the 4th century), but they are sure that the Arabs copied this information from the works of Ptolemy (2nd century AD, a contemporary of the real Alans and, what the hell is not joking, Sarmatians-Russians!). Can we generally consider the tribes engaged in agriculture, professional trade, and mass handicraft production as classical nomads? But Ptolemy had no information about the Sarmatian territories more remote from the sea! In this regard, one should be wary of the statements of the Greeks and Romans about the savagery of the Scythians and Sarmatians.
The steppe world was alien and often hostile to ancient civilization, arranged according to other principles, incomprehensible to "civilized" neighbors. Representatives of the slave-owning world were surprised at the cruelty of others and did not appreciate other justice. Although their own society was neither more humane nor fairer. Similar "double standards" are familiar to us.
According to Greek legend, the Sarmatians (Sauromatians) descended from the Scythians and the Amazons who found themselves on the shores of the Meotian swamp (Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov). With this legend, the Greeks explained the unusually important role of women in the social structure of the Sarmatians (sometimes ancient authors even called the Sarmatians “woman-ruled”).

Sarmatian women, only before marriage, participated in wars on an equal basis with men. Scythian female military burials are known. Most recently, during excavations in Kyiv, a Sarmatian burial of a female warrior was discovered! The mention in Russian epics of "bogatyrs-polyanitsa" probably refers to this phenomenon. The Byzantines in the 7th century also noted the participation of Slav women in the battles. The position of a woman among the ancient pagan Slavs was much freer than in Christian times. The right to bear arms alone is worth something!

ancient likeness geographical map, Peutinger's Tables (I-III centuries AD), the population that lived where autochthonist historians are looking for the ancestral home of the Slavs is called the Lugii-Sarmatians, Venets, Veneto-Sarmatians, Sarmatians. Of these names, only the word "Sarmatians" does not raise doubts about who exactly in the ethnic sense it means. It is clear that the double names of the tribes are evidence of the ancient geographer about the mixing of the Sarmatians with other tribes (Balts, Thracians, Celts?).
Actually, the Roman writer of the 1st century AD Tacitus wrote about the Wends: “The Wends borrowed a lot from the customs of the Sarmatians, for they extend their warlike campaigns to all the forests and mountains that rise between the Pevkinns and the Fenns (that is, from the lands of the Finno-Finns to the northeastern Roman boundaries). However, they can rather be ranked among the Germans, because they build houses for themselves, wear shields and move on foot ... "
It can be assumed that by the time of the invasion of the Goths in the 3rd century AD, the Scythian-Sarmatians in the forest-steppe zone had long settled and formed a tribal union of Ants (translated from the “Iranian” dialect of the Sarmatians, “Antes” means allies), which was really a pre-state formation of the Proto-Slavs , possibly called Rus, if there were Rukhsalans as Kshatriyas in this formation.
The Trypillians also developed a type of integrated economy natural for this region, which existed through the Cimmerians, Scythians and Sarmatians until the era of capitalism and included agriculture (wheat, barley, flax), cattle breeding (cow, goat, pig, sheep), fishing and hunting . The formation of large settlements and even cities was inevitable. War has ceased to be the main occupation for men.
Then came the Goths. A long war for the Black Sea lands began.
The Byzantine Goth Jordan, describing the events of the III-IV centuries, argued that the ancestors of the Slavs were conquered by the Goths, while listing the names of the tribes conquered by the Goths, Jordan did not cite a single Slavic name. Meanwhile, the Goths conquered the Northern Black Sea region, where, according to Jordan and Procopius of Caesarea, the lands of the Slavic Antes were located in the 6th century. But before the arrival of the Goths, the Sarmatians and Veneto-Sarmatians of the Peutinger Tables lived here!
Procopius of Caesarea in the 6th century wrote that the life of the Slavs is similar to the life of the "Massagetes" (as the Byzantines often called all Sarmatians). Until the 7th century inclusive, Slavic leaders at the head of their squads moved around their Danubian possessions, stopping in temporary military camps (attested by Mauritius). But this is very similar to the way of life of the royal Scythians. This is polyude! Byzantine sources of the 6th-7th centuries do not know the permanent residences of the Slavic nobility. In the 6th-7th centuries, the names of most of the Slavic princes known from Byzantine sources bore traces of the very “Iranian-speaking” that the Slavic nobility inherited from their Sarmatian ancestors: Akamir, Ardagast, Idarizius, Kelagast, Musoky, Piragast, Khatzon.
The Byzantine writer of the turn of the 9th-10th centuries, Leo VI the Wise, relying on more ancient sources, argued that once the Slavs lived as nomads.
According to A.G. Kuzmin, even in the middle of the 10th century, a significant part of the Slavic nobility bore "Iranian" names, which can be seen in the example of the ambassadors of Prince Igor to Byzantium (Sfandr, Istres, Prasten, Froutan) and is "an undoubted fact of the participation of the Scythians and other ethnic groups usually attributed to the Iranian branch of the Indo-European population, in the composition of ancient Russian civilization and even the anthropological type of the Slavic-Russians.
The Arab travelers of the 10th century Masudi and Ibrahim ibn-Yakub in the lands of the Czechs and Bodrichi recorded a legend about the existence in antiquity of a single union of Slavic tribes led by the Valian tribe (Alans?) and their king Majak. According to this legend, the Valian tribe was held in high esteem by the Slavs until they quarreled among themselves.
Alas! Tribal strife to this day is our scourge!
The names of large Slavic tribal unions - Antes, Serbs, Czechs, Dulebs, Croats, North - oddly enough at first glance, "Iranian", i.e. Scythian-Sarmatian origin, as well as the names of the characters in the legend about the founding of Kyiv - Kiy, Schek (Czech), Khoriv (Croat). Availability geographical names with the root "Kyiv" in almost all Slavic countries speaks of the all-Slavic, and not only the all-Russian origin of this legend, which goes back, perhaps, to Scythian times.
So, the Scythian-Sarmatians and the ancient Slavs are anthropologically identical, they lived on common territory, had a close material culture, similar religion and mythology. This was already a written era, and there are numerous testimonies of ancient authors that allow us to assume the relationship of the Slavs and Scythian-Sarmatians.
The similarity of the Scythian-Sarmatians and the ancient Slavs is significant, if not obvious.
But!
The beliefs of the Scythian-Sarmatians, like the beliefs of the Thracians, Wends and Etruscans, are far from Vedic traditions. And, most importantly, the "Iranian", Scythian-Sarmatian dialect is too different from the Old Slavic language.
Deadlock again?
Damn linguists. Again, all the raspberries were spoiled.
But what if we turn to the linguists themselves? After all, they are also interested in “where did the Russian land come from”?
To be continued.

For many years, the Scythians were considered the immediate ancestors of the Slavs. But is it really so? Let's try to figure it out.

The Scythians have always been called barbarians, robbers and robbers. They are destroyers and barbarians. But it was only partly so. This is mainly the opinion of Europeans affected by the attacks.

According to scientists, the Scythians appeared on the territory of the Northern Black Sea region. They settled the lands between the Danube and the Don. Over time, these people created tribal alliances (similar to those of the Eastern Slavs), went to war with some cities in Asia and, possibly, Europe.

The Scythians traded with the Greek colonies. In general, these people were very developed for their time (both in trade and in culture). But one day they had to leave other tribes who wanted to enslave them, to the north. And on their way the Scythians met with the Slavs. Gradually, these two communities mixed and penetrated each other.

Therefore, the fact that the Scythians are the ancestors of the Slavs is not a reliable fact.

Information about the life of the Scythians came to us thanks to the legendary Book of Veles (it consists of tablets on which signs are inscribed). Also, some data was obtained during archaeological excavations.

Descriptions of the Scythians also belong to Herodotus (fifth century BC, Greece). He divided this people into farmers and nomads. According to the historian, it is also traced that the place of the ancestral home of the ancient Slavs simply coincided with the place of "habitation" of the Scythians. The Slavs at that time already had their own language. And the Greeks, by the way, after the departure of the Scythians continued to call them the Slavs. That's where this confusion came from.

There is also evidence that the Eastern Slavs themselves suffered from the attacks of the Scythians. How true this is, we cannot say for sure.

Thus, the Scythians smoothly became part of Slavic people. Although initially they were two independent ethnic groups. For hundreds of years there has been a mixture of languages, cultures and traditions. Therefore, even part of the words in the Russian language, it turns out, came to us precisely from the Scythian language.

Unfortunately, the original Slavic lands remained completely unknown to the "father of history."The regions beyond the Danube, he writes, "appear to be uninhabited and boundless." He knows only one people living north of the Danube, namely the Siginni, a nomadic Iranian-speaking tribe. Siginni in the time of Herodotus occupied the territory along almost the entire steppe left bank of the Danube; in the west, their lands extended to the possessions of the Adriatic Venets. From this we can conclude that in the 5th century BC. e. the areas of Slavic settlement were still north of an almost unbroken mountain range—the Ore Mountains, the Sudetenland, the Tatras, the Beskid, and the Carpathians—stretching across Central and Eastern Europe from west to east.

Herodotus managed to collect much more information about Scythia and the Scythians.

Scythians, in the VIII century BC. e. who ousted the semi-legendary Cimmerians from the Northern Black Sea region, aroused great interest among the Greeks because of their proximity to the Greek colonies in the Crimea, which supplied Athens and other Hellenic city-states with bread. Aristotle even reproached the Athenians for spending whole days in the square, listening to magical stories and stories of people who returned from Borisfen (Dnieper). The Scythians were reputed to be barbarically brave and cruel people: they skinned their dead enemies and drank wine from their skulls. They fought both on foot and on horseback. The Scythian archers were especially famous, whose arrows were smeared with poison. In depicting the way of life of the Scythians, ancient writers rarely managed to avoid tendentiousness: some painted them as cannibals devouring their own children, while others, on the contrary, extolled the purity and integrity of Scythian morals and reproached their compatriots for corrupting these innocent children of nature, introducing them to the achievements of Hellenic civilization.

In addition to personal predilections, which forced Greek writers to stick out certain features of Scythian morals, one purely objective difficulty interfered with the truthful depiction of the Scythians. The fact is that the Greeks constantly confused the Scythians, who belonged to the Iranian-speaking peoples, with other peoples of the Northern Black Sea region. So, Hippocrates in his treatise “On Air, Waters and Localities” described some Mongoloids under the name of the Scythians: “The Scythians resemble only themselves: their skin color is yellow; the body is fat and fleshy, they are beardless, which likens them to men women" 1 . Herodotus himself found it difficult to say anything definite about the population prevailing in "Scythia". “The number of Scythians,” he writes, “I could not find out with accuracy, but I heard two different opinions: according to one, there are a lot of them, according to another, there are actually few Scythians, and besides them they live (in Scythia. — S.Ts.) and other peoples”. Therefore, Herodotus calls Scythians either all the inhabitants of the Black Sea steppes, or only one people, dominating all others. When describing the way of life of the Scythians, the historian also comes into conflict with himself. His characterization of the Scythians as a poor nomadic people, having neither cities nor fortifications, but living in carts and eating livestock products - meat, mare's milk, cottage cheese, etc., is immediately destroyed by the story of Scythian plowmen selling bread.

1 A. Blok in accordance with the "Mongolian" theory of the origin of the Scythians, popular in late XIX- the beginning of the 20th century, endowed them in his famous poem with "slanting eyes", which they never really had.

This contradiction stemmed from the fact that ancient writers had a poor idea of ​​the political and social structure of the steppes. The Scythian state, which was a confederation of the Scythian clans proper, was organized along the lines of all other nomadic empires, when one relatively small horde dominated the alien nomadic hordes and the settled population.

According to Herodotus, the main Scythian horde were the "royal Scythians" - their self-name was "chipped" 2 , whom the historian calls the most valiant and most numerous. They considered all other Scythians to be slaves under their control. The kings of the Scythians-Skolots dressed with truly barbaric splendor. On the clothes of one such lord from the so-called Kul-Ob grave near Kerch, 266 gold plaques with a total weight of up to one and a half kilograms were sewn. Skoloty roamed in Northern Tavria. To the east, in the neighborhood with them, lived another horde, called by Herodotus the nomadic Scythians. Both of these hordes constituted the actual Scythian population of the Northern Black Sea region.

2 Academician B. A. Rybakov in his writings persistently identified the Scythians-Skolots with the Proto-Slavs. As the main argument, he used the word "skoltny" in the meaning of "illegitimate son", referring to one plot from ancient Russian epics, which tells about the birth of a son from Ilya Muromets from a steppe meadow hero. This boy, named Sokolnik (or Podsokolnik), was teased by his peers as “chipped”. The offenders were inhabitants of the steppe, therefore, Rybakov concluded, “chipped” in their mouths is the oldest name for the Slavs, i.e. Herodotus Scythians-Skolots. It is surprising that the respected scientist, carried away by his bold hypothesis, in this case did not bother to look at least in Dahl's dictionary, where the word "chipped" in its mentioned meaning is related to the verbs "to knock together, put together." Thus, “a chipped son”, “a chip”, “a chipper” means the same as the later expression “b ... son”, that is, a “seven-battery” child conceived by a walking mother from an unknown father (by analogy with “ chipped dress" - clothes sewn from several pieces of fabric). The Scythians-chips, in fact, turn out to be completely irrelevant.

Scythia did not extend very far to the north (the Dnieper rapids were not known to Herodotus), covering the rather narrow at that time steppe strip of the Northern Black Sea region. But like any other steppe dwellers, the Scythians often went on military raids on their close and distant neighbors. Judging by archaeological finds, they reached the Oder and Elbe basins in the west, ruining Slavic settlements along the way. The territory of the Lusatian culture was subjected to their invasions from the end of the 6th century BC. e., and these blows in the back, presumably, made it much easier for the Venets to conquer the Slavs. Archaeologists have discovered characteristic Scythian arrowheads stuck in the ramparts of the Lusatian settlements from the outside. Some of the settlements dating back to this time keep traces of fires or destruction, such as, for example, the settlement of Vitsin in the Zelenogursky region of Poland, where, among other things, the skeletons of women and children who died during one of the Scythian raids were found. At the same time, the peculiar and graceful "animal style" of Scythian art found many admirers among Slavic men and women. Numerous Scythian decorations on the sites of Lusatian settlements testify to the constant trade relations of the Slavs with the Scythian world of the Northern Black Sea region.

Trade was most likely carried out through intermediaries, since the tribes of Alisons and “Scythian farmers” known to Herodotus, who lived somewhere along the Bug, wedged between the Slavs and Scythians. Probably, these were some Iranian-speaking peoples subordinate to the Scythians. Further to the north stretched the lands of the neurons, beyond which, according to Herodotus, "there is already a deserted desert." The historian complains that it is impossible to penetrate there because of snowstorms and blizzards: "The earth and air there are full of feathers, and this is what interferes with vision." Herodotus tells about the neurons themselves from hearsay and very sparingly - that their customs are “Scythian”, and they themselves are sorcerers: “... each neuron annually turns into a wolf for several days, and then again takes on a human form.” However, Herodotus adds that he does not believe this, and, of course, he does the right thing. Probably, in this case, information about some magical rite, or, perhaps, the custom of the neurons during the annual religious holiday to dress in wolf skins, reached him in a highly distorted form. Assumptions were made about the Slavic affiliation of the neurons, since the legends about werewolves were later extremely common in Ukraine. However, this is unlikely. In ancient poetry there is a short line with an expressive description of the neur: "... a neur-adversary who dressed a horse in armor." We agree that the Nevr, sitting on an armored horse, bears little resemblance to the ancient Slav, as ancient sources and archeology depict him. But it is known that the Celts were skilled metallurgists and blacksmiths; the cult of the horse was extremely popular among them. Therefore, it is more natural to assume the Celtic affiliation of the Herodotus neurons, linking their name with the name of the Celtic tribe of the Nervii (Nervii).

Such is Scythia and the lands adjacent to it, according to Herodotus. In the classical era of Greece, when the ancient literary tradition took shape and took shape, the Scythians were the most powerful and, most importantly, the most famous people of barbarian Europe to the Greeks. Therefore, subsequently the name of Scythia and the Scythians was used by ancient and medieval writers as the traditional name for the Northern Black Sea region and the inhabitants of the south of our country, and sometimes in general for all of Russia and Russians. Nestor already wrote about this: improve the Tivertsy “sidyakh along the Dniester, along the Bug and along the Dnieper to the sea; are their cities to this day; formerly this land was called by the Greeks the Great Skuf. In the 10th century, Leo Deacon, in his description of the war between Prince Svyatoslav and the Bulgarians and the Byzantine emperor John Tzimiskes, called the Rus by their own name - 24 times, but Scythians - 63 times, Tauro-Scythians - 21 and Taurians - 9 times, without mentioning the name of the Slavs at all ( Syuzyumov M. Ya., Ivanov S. A. Comments on the book: Leo the Deacon. Story. M., 1988. S. 182). Western Europeans used this tradition for a very long time, calling the inhabitants of the Muscovite state “Scythians” even in the 16th-17th centuries.