Those, however, who lived before our times, and particularly those who lived near the time of Homer, were—and among the Greeks were assumed to be—some such people as Homer describes. And see what Herodotus says concerning that king of the Scythians against whom Dareius made his expedition, and the message which the king sent back to him. Cp. 7. 3. 14. Dareius sent a message to King Idanthyrsus in which he reproached the latter for fleeing and not fighting. Idanthyrsus replied that he was not fleeing because of fear, but was merely doing what he was wont to do in time of peace; and if Dareius insisted on a fight, he might search out and violate the ancestral tombs, and thus come to realize whether or no the Scythians would fight; “and in reply to your assertion that you are my master, I say ‘howl on’” ( Herodotus, 4.127 ). See also what Chrysippus Chrysippus of Soli (fl. about 230 B.C.), the Stoic philosopher, was a prolific writer, but with the exception of a few fragments his works are lost. The present reference is obviously to his treatise on Modes of Life , which is quoted by Plut. De Stoicorum Repugnantiis 20.3 = 1043 B ). says concerning the kings of the Bosporus, the house of Leuco. Leuco, who succeeded his father Satyrus I, reigned from 393 to 353 B.C. (see 7. 4. 4). And not only the Persian letters i.e., the letters of Persian kings, such as those quoted by Herodotus. are full of references to that straightforwardness of which I am speaking but also the memoirs written by the Egyptians, Babylonians, and Indians. And it was on this account that Anacharsis, Anacharsis was a Scythian prince and philosopher, one of the “Seven Sages,” a traveller, long a resident of Athens (about 590 B.C.), a friend of Solon, and (according to Ephorus) and inventor (7. 3. 9). See Hdt. 4.76 Abaris, Abaris was called the “Hyperborean” priest and prophet of Apollo, and is said to have visited Athens in the eighth century, or perhaps much later. According to the legend, he healed the sick,m travelled round the world, without once eating, on a golden arrow given him by Apollo, and delivered Sparta from a plague. and other men of the sort were in fair repute among the Greeks, because they displayed a nature characterized by complacency, frugality, and justice. But why should I speak of the men of olden times? For when Alexander, the son of Philip, on his expedition against the Thracians beyond the Haemus, The Balkan Mountains. invaded the country of the Triballians A Thracian tribe. and saw that it extended as far as the Ister and the island of Peuce See 7. 3. 15 and footnote. in the Ister, and that the parts on the far side were held by the Getae, he went as far as that, i.e., as far as the island. it is said, but could not disembark upon the island because of scarcity of boats (for Syrmus, the king of the Triballi had taken refuge there and resisted his attempts); he did, however, cross over to the country of the Getae, took their city, and returned with all speed to his home-land, after receiving gifts from the tribes in question and from Syrmus. And Ptolemaeus, Ptolemaeus Soter, “whom the Macedon ( Paus. 1.6 ), was founder of the Egyptian dynasty and reigned 323 -285 B.C. the son of Lagus, Lagus married Arsinoë, a concubine of Philip. says that on this expedition the Celti who lived about the Adriatic joined Alexander for the sake of establishing friendship and hospitality, and that the king received them kindly and asked them when drinking what it was that they most feared, thinking they would say himself, but that they replied they feared no one, unless it were that Heaven might fall on them, although indeed they added that they put above everything else the friendship of such a man as he. And the following are signs of the straightforwardness of the barbarians: first, the fact that Syrmus refused to consent to the debarkation upon the island and yet sent gifts and made a compact of friendship; and, secondly, that the Celti said that they feared no one, and yet valued above everything else the friendship of great men. Again, Dromichaetes was king of the Getae in the time of the successors of Alexander. Now he, when he captured Lysimachus Lysimachus, one of Alexander’s generals and successors, obtained Thrace as his portion in the division of the provinces after Alexander’s death ( 323 B.C.), assuming the title of king 306 B.C. He was taken captive, and released, by Dromichaetes 291 B.C. alive, who had made an expedition against him, first pointed out the poverty both of himself and of his tribe and likewise their independence of others, and then bade him not to carry on war with people of that sort but rather to deal with them as friends; and after saying this he first entertained him as a guest, and made a compact of friendship, and then released him. Moreover, Plato in his Republic thinks that those who would have a well-governed city should flee as far as possible from the sea, as being a thing that teaches wickedness, and should not live near it. Corais and Groskurd point out that the reference should have been, not to the Republic , but to the Plat. Laws 4.704-705 , where Plato discusses the proper place for founding a city; cp. Aristot. Pol. 7.6 on the same subject. Ephorus, in the fourth book of his history, the book entitled Europe (for he made the circuit In his description, not literally. of Europe as far as the Scythians), says towards the end that the modes of life both of the Sauromatae and of the other Scythians are unlike, for, whereas some are so cruel that they even eat human beings, others abstain from eating any living creature whatever. Now the other writers, he says, tell only about their savagery, because they know that the terrible and the marvellous are startling, but one should tell the opposite facts too and make them patterns of conduct, and he himself, therefore, will tell only about those who follow “most just” habits, for there are some of the Scythian Nomads who feed only on mare’s milk, Cp. the similar statement in 7. 3. 7. and excel all men in justice; and they are mentioned by the poets: by Homer, when he says that Zeus espies the land “of the Galactophagi and Abii, men most just,” Hom. Il. 13.5 and by Hesiod, in what is called his Circuit of the Earth , This poem seems to have comprised the third book of the Megalae Eoeae (now lost). See Pauly-Wissowa, s.v. “Hesiodus,” p. 1206. when he says that Phineus is carried by the Storm Winds “to the land of the Galactophagi, who have their dwellings in wagons.” Hes. Megalae Eoeae Fr. Book 3 Then Ephorus reasons out the cause as follows: since they are frugal in their ways of living and not money-getters, they not only are orderly towards one another, because they have all things in common, their wives, children, the whole of their kin and everything, but also remain invincible and unconquered by outsiders, because they have nothing to be enslaved for. And he cites Choerilus Not, apparently, the tragic poet, contemporary of Aeschylus, but the epic poet of Samos (fl. towards the end of the fifth century B.C.), who wrote, among other poems, an epic poem (exact title uncertain) based on the Persian Wars. The Crossing of the Pontoon-Bridge was probably a sub-title of the epic. The same Choerilus is cited in 14. 5. 9. also, who, in his The Crossing of the Pontoon-Bridge which was constructed by Dareius, In his campaign by Hdt. 4.83-93 ; See 7. 3. 15. says, “the sheep-tending Sacae, of Scythian stock; but they used to live in wheat-producing Asia; however, they were colonists from the Nomads, law-abiding people.” Choerilus Fr And when he calls Anacharsis “wise,” Ephorus says that he belongs to this race, and that he was considered also one of Seven Wise Men because of his perfect self-control and good sense. And he goes on to tell the inventions of Anacharsis—the bellows, the two-fluked anchor and the potter’s wheel. These things I tell knowing full well that Ephorus himself does not tell the whole truth about everything; and particularly in his account of Anacharsis (for how could the wheel be his invention, if Homer, who lived in earlier times, knew of it? “As when a potter his wheel that fits in his hands,” Hom. Il. 18.600 and so on); but as for those other things, I tell them because I wish to make my point clear that there actually was a common report, which was believed by the men of both early and of later times, that a part of the Nomads, I mean those who had settled the farthest away from the rest of mankind, were “galactophagi,” “abii,” and “most just,” and that they were not an invention of Homer. It is but fair, too, to ask Apollodorus to account for the Mysians that are mentioned in the verses of Homer, whether he thinks that these too are inventions Cp. 7. 3. 6. (when the poet says, “and the Mysians, hand-to-hand fighters and the proud Hippenlolgi” Hom. Il. 13.4 ), or takes the poet to mean the Mysians in Asia. Now if he takes the poet to mean those in Asia, he will misinterpret him, as I have said before, 7. 3. 2. but if he calls them an invention, meaning that there were no Mysians in Thrace, he will contradict the facts; for at any rate, even in our own times, Aelius Catus Perhaps as governor of Macedonia. He was consul with C. Sentius 4. A.D. transplanted from the country on the far side of the Ister into Thrace Lower Moesia. fifty thousand persons from among the Getae, a tribe with the same tongue as the Thracians. Cp. 7. 3. 2. And they live there in Thrace now and are called “Moesi”—whether it be that their people of earlier times were so called and that in Asia the name was changed to “Mysi,” See 7. 3. 4. or (what is more apposite to history and the declaration of the poet) that in earlier times their people in Thrace were called “Mysi.” Enough, however, on this subject. I shall now go back to the next topic in the general description. As for the Getae, then, their early history must be left untold, but that which pertains to our own times is about as follows: Boerebistas Also spelled Byrebistas (see 7. 3. 5 and footnote). a Getan, on setting himself in authority over the tribe, restored the people, who had been reduced to an evil plight by numerous wars, and raised them to such a height through training, sobriety, and obedience to his commands that within only a few years he had established a great empire and subordinated to the Getae most of the neighboring peoples. And he began to be formidable even to the Romans, because he would cross the Ister with impunity and plunder Thrace as far as Macedonia and the Illyrian country; and he not only laid waste the country of the Celti who were intermingled See 7. 3. 2 and 7. 5. 1. with the Thracians and the Illyrians, but actually caused the complete disappearance of the Boii Also a Celtic tribe (7. 3. 2). who were under the rule of Critasirus, 7. 5. 2. and also of the Taurisci. Also under the rule of Critasirus (7. 5. 2). To help him secure the complete obedience of his tribe he had as his coadjutor Decaeneus, See 7. 3. 5. a wizard, a man who not only had wandered through Egypt, but also had thoroughly learned certain prognostics through which he would pretend to tell the divine will; and within a short time he was set up as god (as I said when relating the story of Zamolxis). 7. 3. 5. The following is an indication of their complete obedience: they were persuaded to cut down their vines and to live without wine. However, certain men rose up against Boerebistas and he was deposed before the Romans sent an expedition against him; Cp. 7. 3. 5. and those who succeeded him divided the empire into several parts. In fact, only recently, when Augustus Caesar sent an expedition against them, the number of parts into which the empire had been divided was five, though at the time of the insurrection it had been four. Such divisions, to be sure, are only temporary and vary with the times. But there is also another division of the country which has endured from early times, for some of the people are called Daci, whereas others are called Getae—Getae, those who incline towards the Pontus and the east, and Daci, those who incline in the opposite direction towards Germany and the sources of the Ister. The Daci, I think, were called Daï in early times; whence the slave names “Geta” and “Daüs” In Latin, Davus.” which prevailed among the Attic people; for this is more probable than that “Daüs” is from those Scythians who are called “Daae,” Cp. 11. 7. 1, 8. 2, 9. 2. for they live far away in the neighborhood of Hyrcania, and it is not reasonable to suppose that slaves were brought into Attica from there; for the Attic people were wont either to call their slaves by the same names as those of the nations from which they were brought (as “Lydus” or “Syrus ”), or addressed them by names that were prevalent in their countries (as “Manes”or else “Midas” for the Phrygian, or “Tibius” for the Paphlagonian). But though the tribe was raised to such a height by Boerebistas, it has been completely humbled by its own seditions and by the Romans; nevertheless, they are capable, even today, of sending forth an army of forty thousand men.