PREHISTORIC
PART 1
- Ch.X
Termini Liberi Patris
X.
1. ‘Yperboreon daumaue odos. The
wonderful road of the Hyperboreans.
In the history of
megalithic monuments of Dacia, an important place has a long uninterrupted series
of several thousand boulders, or huge slabs, which stretched, until the 18th
century, from Basarabia, through southern Russia, towards Crimea, out of which
a few remains still exist today close to Chisineu.
The learned Domn of
Moldova, Dimitrie Cantermir, wrote
around 1716 the following, regarding this (Descriptio Moldaviae, ed. 1872,
p.15):
“Not far from Chisineu, a little town near the river
Bac, can be seen a series of very large slabs, arranged in a straight line in
such a way, as if they might have been placed there by man’s hand. But what
makes us doubt is, on the one hand, the great size of these slabs, and on the
other hand, the length of the terrain on which they stand. In truth, some of
these boulders cover a space of 3-4 ells (TN – approx. 3.5 to 4.6m) in width
and length, and their line crosses the Nistru and stretches as far as Crimea. In peasant language this series
of rocks is called the Keys of Bac (TN
- or Straits), and the peasants, in their simplicity, say that this construction
was made by smei (dragons), who had
conspired to close the course of the river Bac.
The poet Constantin Stamati, who lived at
Chisineu, in a note written in Russian about the antiquities of Basarabia and
published around 1850, communicates also the following important data regarding
this megalithic construction: “About three versts (TN – cca 3.2km) south of
Chisineu, can be seen a row of very
large stone slabs, half stuck in the ground in a right line, which the
locals call the Keys of the river Bac.
This row of stones starts at the river Prut,
built as a wall, passes through the woods of Capriana, and cuts across the
whole of Basarabia. But the locals dig up these stones from time to time,
so that the ancient wall is destroyed” (Hasdeu,
Dictionarul limbei istorice si poporane, Tom. III. v. Bac, p.2795).
And captain Zascuk, in the best statistical –
geographical description of Basarabia, which he had done at the request of the
Russian government, tells us the following: “From Chisineu, in the direction of
Prut, through the woods of Capriana, a row of stone slabs half buried in the ground once stretched. Those slabs
are still preserved in some places,
and about others the peasants still tell that they’ve taken from them a few
times, for their needs. I don’t think that somebody will ever try to prove that
those stones once formed a compact wall, from behind which the ancient
inhabitants have defended themselves against their neighbors’ invasions. Those
stones followed a continuous uninterrupted route through woods, swamps and
gullies. In all probability they served, like the earth walls, as boundary signs” Captain Zascuk also adds in a
note: “In late surveys of some monastery estates in Basarabia, especially of
those from the woody zone of the districts Chisineu, Orheiu and Iasi, rows of stone slabs, thrust in the ground
and left there from ancient times are mentioned” (Ibid. III. p.2795-6).
Finally, in a
manuscript note, the Romanian patriot Alesandru
Hasdeu from Basarabia, also states that he saw those “blocks of stone
thrust into the ground” close to Chisineu on the estates Petricani and
Ghidighis (Ibid. III. p. 2796).
From this positive
data, transmitted by various authors and eye witnesses, it results that this
monumental row of slabs thrust vertically into the ground, was nothing else
than what in prehistoric archaeology is called an alignment, but of an extraordinary length, which stretched from
Moldova along the valley of Bac, to far away towards east … towards Crimea,
according to Cantemir.
We have to state
something else here, regarding the aspect and technical system of this
megalithic construction. This gigantic series of several tens of thousands of
blocks had not the character of a wall or of a defensive construction. Neither
Prince Cantemir, nor the others who saw, examined and described this
astonishing monument of antiquity, affirm that the slabs or monoliths which
composed this megalithic line, had been arranged and tied together, so as to
form a compact and impenetrable wall. Prince Cantemir calls them only “series maximorum lapidum”. Constantin Stamati calls them “a row in a
straight line of very large slabs” and captain Zascuk, quite competent in
knowing the character of defensive fortifications, declares very precisely: “I
don’t think that somebody will ever try to prove that those stones once formed
a compact wall; in all probability they served … as boundary signs”.
By the nature of
the terrain which it crossed, as well as by its direction from west to east,
this long series of rough stone slabs, thrust into the ground of the wild
deserted places of ancient Scythia, was not made in order to prevent an
invasion.
We are now
presented with the important question, which was the origin and which was the
destination of this marvelous megalithic work?
We find a very
precious mention of this incomparable monument of prehistoric antiquity with Quintus Curtius Rufus, one of the Roman
historians, who probably lived at the time of Vespasian (lib. VII. Cap.7).
Based on Greek
sources, a large part of which we don’t have any more today, Quintus Curtius
Rufus had composed a work in ten books “De
gestis Alexandri Magni”, in which he tells us that king Alexander,
encouraged by his successes in Asia, after defeating the Persians, Bactrians
and other barbarian populations from near the Caspian Sea, decided to expand
his expedition also to the Scythians of
Europe; namely king Alexander believed that until the Macedonians defeated
the Scythians of Europe, considered in those times as undefeatable, their Macedonian empire in Asia will have just a
transitory existence. The defeated populations of Asia, some of which had
already started to rebel, will despise the Macedonians; only if they also
defeated and subjected the Scythians of Europe, the Macedonians will appear
everywhere as the strongest.
So, king Alexander
arrived with his army at Tanais (Don), the great river which separated in those
times the Bactrians from the European Scythians, and Europe from Asia. After
Alexander founded a new city, called “Alexandria”, and made all the necessary
preparations for war with the Scythians, he ordered his army to cross into
Europe. The Scythians tried to oppose him from the other bank of the river
Tanais. But Alexander and his army, despite the raining arrows of the Scythians
and the great rush of the waters of the river Tanais, crossed with boats to the
European bank. The Macedonian foot soldiers, leaving the boats, started the
battle with lances against the riding bands of the Scythians, who occupied the
bank, and the Macedonian cavalry, seeing that the Scythians began to turn their
horses, threw themselves on them and broke their ranks. The Scythians, being
unable to sustain the attack of the Macedonians, gave free reins to the horses
and started to run away, while the Macedonian cavalry, on the order of
Alexander, chased them for the rest of the day and passed even beyond the Posts of Liber Pater.
These Posts of
Liber Pater, Quintus Curtius tells us, “were some monuments, which consisted of blocks or large slabs arranged in a
regular row, at small intervals one from the other”.
So we have
therefore a precise and positive text from the history of Alexander the Great;
text which directly refers to this megalithic alignment from European Scythia
[1].
[1. In Greek antiquity, some authors
thought that the stela (columns), or the legendary Termini of Liber Pater, were
situated in the extreme parts of
It results then
from this important historical document that this monumental series of stone
blocks, whose eastern end reached almost to the Don, was the same megalithic
construction as series maximorum lapidum,
which according to Cantemir stretched from Basarabia through southern
In ancient
historical literature therefore this grandiose monument from the north of the
And this Liber
Pater of the Romans, as we saw in the last chapter, was the same legendary
personality of Dionysos of the Greeks, and Osiris of the Egyptians (Herodotus, lib. II. c. 144; In a Roman
inscription from
We find the same
perfect identity between Liber Pater and Osiris in prehistoric traditions of the
Romanian people. According to some of these legends, the huge plough furrow,
which cuts from west to east the plains of Romania, Basarabia and southern
Russia as far as the Don, had been made by the emperor of the Jidovs,
Ostrea-Novac (Osiris), and according to other traditions, this furrow is
attributed to Ler emperor (Liber
Pater), who had come with countless, evil armies against the inhabitants of
this country [2].
[2. In our folk incantations, Ler emperor (TN – Ler imparat) appears as
a plundering, detested hero. “Ler
emperor” (Osiris) of Romanian folk traditions is only a warlike figure, who
wanders through the world, but totally distinct from “Ler Domnul”, the son of the holy Mother, or Apollo, of our
religious carols. About the origin and archaic meaning of the word “ler” see the chapters referring to the
first Pelasgian empire. We also note here that Liber Pater of the Romans
appears also in an inscription discovered at Narona in
But which was the
primitive destination of these famous monoliths arranged in a row, which
stretched from Prut over Basarabia and southern Russia, towards Don, close to
the point where one passed from Europe to Asia?
In prehistoric
antiquity the columns of rough stone also had a purpose of public use. They
served in those remote times to indicate to travelers the direction through the
less populated lands, and where other orienting signs were missing (Cartailhac, La France prehistorique,
p.315)[3].
[3. Near Tanais also existed, until the Roman epoch, the Altars consecrated to Alexander the Great, as monuments of
his expedition in those parts. Those altars were situated, according to Ptolemy (III.5.12), lower than the
turns of the river Tanais. Orosius
mentions also near Tanais the altars and
posts of Alexander the Great (Historiarum adversus paganos, I. 2)].
The entire vast
area of southern Scythia formed until late, in historical times, a pastoral
region, deserted spaces of limitless pastures, without cities, villages or
forests, on which continuously wandered countless tribes of shepherds,
transporting their households and families in carts, from one place to the
other (Herodotus, lib. IV. 47, 61).
“We have neither towns, nor cultivated fields,
to be afraid that our enemies will lay them bare”, answers Idanthyrsus, the king of the Scythians, to Darius, the king of the Persians, when the latter asked him to
either accept to fight, or bring him gifts, earth and water, as signs of
surrender (Herodotus, lib. IV. 127).
The Greeks, Curtius tells us, called the entire
geographical region of European Sarmatia, the “solitudes of the Scythians”, and the part between the mouths of the
Danube, Nistru and the Pontos, or the lands of lower Basarabia, had especially
the name of the “desert of the Getae”
(Strabo, Geogr. lib. VII. 3.14).
Ammianus Marcellinus (1. XXII c.8) also calls the lands
of Scythia solitudines vastas; and
in “Divisio orbis terrarium”,
antedating the 4th century ad, we read: Dacia. Finitur ab oriente deserto Sarmatiae (Riese, Geographi latini minores, p.17). On Tabula Peutingeriana, the region between the rivers Agalingus (Cogalnic in Basarabia) and Hypanis (Bug) is designated with the
words sors desertus.
Through these
solitudes, north of the Black Sea, Darius had lost his way, with his entire
army; even the warring bands of the Scythians, who were chasing Darius, had
lost their way (Herodotus, lib. IV.
c.136).
In those remote
historical times, the only road which presented fewer difficulties for the
communication between the Carpathians and the lands near the Meotic lake, was
on the valley of Bac in today Basarabia, which then continued from the Nistru
towards the Don. But even this road was only a simple road “per deserta”.
On this way the
invasion of the Neolithic tribes into Europe had taken place. Here was until
late the great line of communication between east and west, between Asia,
always poor, and opulent Europe. “Termini
Liberi Patris”, these monuments of the ancient world, which stretched in a
right line from Prut, along the valley of Bac towards Tanais, appear therefore
as simple itinerary columns in the deserted wilderness of Scythia, with the
purpose of indicating to the travelers and merchants the line of the great road
between Asia and Europe [4].
[4. We find an important note with Pliny, who tells us (Hist. Nat.
IV.17.6) that the Macedonians, in
this expedition of theirs, had followed into the steps of Liber Pater and Hercules,
or in other words, on the roads and guided by the remains of the monuments
of those heroes. The Romans still had ancient traditions about the famous war
deeds of Liber Pater, as results
from another passage of Pliny (Hist.
Hat. Lib. VII.1) regarding Pompei the Great].
Osiris, the king of the Egyptians, or Liber Pater, as the Romans called him,
by defeating Typhon, had also conquered the lands from the north of the Black
Sea. The ancient traditions and legends attributed to Osiris the building of
this astonishing row of blocks thrust into the ground, between Asia and the
Carpathians of Dacia.
In the old prayers
of the Egyptians, worded by the priests of Thebes and Memphis, for the
divinization of Osiris, is mentioned as an eternal blessing, as one of the great
achievements of this monarch, the opening
of the roads in the region of the north, and the geography of antique times
understood par excellence the country of the Scythians as the “region of the
north” (Pierret, Le livre des morts
des anciens Egyptiens, ch. CXLII).
Even Herodotus tells us that the pillars or columns of Sesostris
(the same with Osiris) still existed in the lands of Scythia even during his
times (lib. II. 103). And the poet Ovid
also mentions the triumphal roads of Bachus
or Liber Pater, through Scythia
(Fast. III. 714 seqq) [5].
[5. Erecting triumphal pillars or columns
has been in use with the Romanians until the 14th century. The
Polish chronicler Strykowski writes
the following: The Hungarian king Carolus
(Robert), starting a sudden war against the Valahian (TN – or Muntean, from
Muntenia, another name for Valahia, or the Romanian-country) Domn Basaraba, was thoroughly defeated by
the Munteni and Moldoveni by a stratagem, so that he and a few of his men could
barely escape by running to Hungary. On
the place of the battle the Valahian Domni built a church and erected three
stone pillars, as I myself saw in 1574 when returning from Turkey, beyond
the little market town Gherghita, two days of travel from the Transilvanian
city of Sibiu, in the mountains (Hasdeu,
Archiva istorica, tom.II.p.7)].
This monumental
glorious road of Liber Pater had become legendary in Greek lands even much
earlier than the times of Herodotus.
The poet Pindar mentions in two odes of his this
marvelous monument from the country of the Hyperboreans, settled at the north
of the Lower Danube and the Black Sea even from the time of the Neolithic
migration. In one of these odes the text referring to this long series of
itinerary columns sounds like this: “Beyond the sources of the Nile, as well as
in the country of the Hyperboreans, countless numbers of itinerary pillars
exist, made of cut rock, 100 feet tall and arranged in a row, like monuments
commemorating some glorious deeds” (Isthmia, V. 20)[6].
[6. Pindar uses the word cheleudoi
(sing. cheleudos), which is not a synonym of odoi, but has the meaning
of itinerary pillars (posts). From a
point of view of its origin and form, cheleudos is identical with Romanian
“calauz” or “calauza”, word which in Romanian language is applied to persons as
well as things, particularly to the
posts which indicate the roads. In this text Pindar still tells us that the
itinerary posts from the country of the Hyperboreans were 100 feet high. Taking
as a basis for this unit of measurement the ancient Greek or Olympic foot of
0,382m, the height of these columns was 30,82m. In France, the menhir from
Locmariaker at Morbihan, is 21m long. That some of the stone slabs or boulders,
which formed the megalithic row near the river Bac, had colossal dimensions,
results from the communication of the Russian traveler Sviniin, who had visited Basarabia around 1822. According to him,
these stones had an extraordinary height, looking at some places like the crest
of a mountain (Hasdeu, Dict. III.
p.2796)].
This countless
number or itinerary pillars mentioned by
Pindar, assembled in a row through the country of the Hyperboreans,
appear therefore to be the same megalithic alignment as the “series maximorum
lapidum” about which Cantemir talks, and as “lapides crebris intervallis
dispositi”, or “Termini Liberi Patris” of Quintus Curtius.
In another ode of
his, the poet Pindar praises once
more this extraordinary monument form the country of the Hyperboreans. The
following are his words (Pythia, X.29):
“One would not find
the road, worthy of admiration, which leads to the main place of assembly of
the Hyperboreans, even if one traveled on sea or on land” [7].
[7. Pindar presents here the real
fact of the triumphal road of the Hyperboreans, in a moral sense. He wants to
say in these verses: the road to eternal glory and true happiness cannot be
found, either traveling on sea, or on land. They Hyperboreans appear in ancient
legends as the most just, the happiest and with a zest for life which went
beyond the limits of old age (Pliny,
lib. IV. 26. 11) ].
It results
therefore, from these words of Pindar, that in the country of the Hyperboreans
at the north of the Danube and the Black Sea, a monumental road existed even in his times; an astonishing road,
due to the great number and colossal size of its itinerary pillars arranged in
a row. The origin of this road, says Pindar, went back to some glorious deeds.
So, it was a triumphal road as well,
identical with “Scythici triumphi”
of Liber Pater, mentioned by Ovid. Both poets, Pindar and Ovid, referred to the
same war events, the same legendary monuments.
This marvelous
sacred road from the north of the Lower Danube and the Black Sea, led, as
Pindar tells us, to the common place of
assembly of the Hyperboreans. It crossed therefore a large part of the vast
territory of this people.
As we know, the
magnificent temple of Apollo the
Hyperborean was located in the island called Leuce or Alba (TN –
White) near the mouths of the Danube.
And on the lower parts of the river Prut,
close to this religious metropolis of the Hyperboreans, a city called Piroboridava still existed even during
the Roman epoch, doubtless the same capital, the same political center which
Pindar calls Hyperboreon agon. The
geographical location of Piroboridava, mentioned by Ptolemy (III.10.6.8) was almost identical with that of later
Noviodunum, today Isaccea).
Still on the
eastern parts of Dacia, between the rivers Agalingus (today Cogalnic) and
Hypanis (Bug), an extended population called “Dac(i) Petoporiani” appears settled during the Roman epoch, its
evidently altered name of Daci
Piroboriani, meaning Hyperborean (Tab.
Peut., Ed. Miller, Segm.VIII.3.4).
We recapitulate:
“The marvelous (miraculous) road of the Hyperboreans”,
about which speaks Pindar, and along which were aligned a countless number of
itinerary posts, appears to have been, on the basis of the geographical
location of the Hyperboreans, as well as on the character and destination of
these monuments, one and the same megalithic construction as the long line of
stone boulders thrust into the ground mentioned by Cantemir and Quintus
Curtius.