PART
5 –
Ch.XXXIII.5
The
Pelasgians or proto – Latins (Arimii)
(The
Pelasgians from the northern parts of the
XXXIII.
5. Arimii (Aramaei, Sarmatae, Sauromatae) in European
The ancient
national name of the Scythians was, as Pliny
tells us (lib. VI. 19. 1), Aramaei,
a name modified after the use of the Greek language, which corresponds to a
Latin form of Aramani, as the Greeks
said ‘Romaioi
instead of Romans.
In another
geographical note, the same Pliny, speaking about the regions of
Figures of Scythian
shepherds. Scene represented on a silver vase discovered in a tumulus
near Nicopol, on the western bank of the lower Nipru.
(The Hermitage,
Figures of Royal
Scythians (Schythai basilaioi). Scenes engraved on a vase of electrum,
discovered at Cherci (Panticapaeum s. Bosphorus) in the Crimea.
At left, two warriors converse; one
is leaning on his lance, with his bow tied on his waist, the second leans on
the shield and the lance. At right is another Scythian, who draws a string to
his bow. To protect themselves against the elements, they wear caps (cucullos)
on their heads. Their vestments have
Pelasgian ornamentation. (The Hermitage, St. Petersburg).
Another analogous
name is to be found with Eustathius,
the learned archbishop of Thessalonika. In his commentaries about Dionysius
Periegetus, he writes that the Scythians had been a population of Thracian
origin, which had been also called Lemnaioi (Comm. in Dionys. v. 728,
Ed. Didot, Cod. Paris. L, 2708; Euphorus,
fr. 78; Scymnus, v. 350). Here L
is only a phonetic change of P (as the Roman Lemuria instead of Remuria
– Ovid, Fast. V. 421. 483). Lemnaioi
= ‘Remnaioi,
or Rhemnaei, as results from the
geographical sources communicated by Pliny. The ancient inhabitants of Scythia
were also named Sauromatae by the
Greek authors, and Sarmatae by the
Romans (Pliny, lib. IV. 25. 1).
The origin of this
name goes also back to the Arimii or Arameii people.
In the word Sauromatae, S from the beginning is
only a simple aspiration, used in the ancient times by the populations which
belonged to the Pelasgian nation. In the cosmography of Iulius Honorius we also find for the term of Sarmatae, the variants
Auromatae and Rumate (Riese, Geogr.
Lat. min. p. 45). Stephanos Byzanthinos
calls Sarmatia also Armatia (see ‘Alanos,
oros ‘Armatias; Eusthatius,
in Dionys. v. 305).
With the same
geographer, under the name of Xarimatai figures a population
settled near the Euxine Pontos, probably the same as the ancient Arimaspi. Here
the initial X has the place of a rougher aspiration than a H.
As for the final syllable tae from the names Sauromatae,
Auromatae, Rumate and Xarimatai, it corresponds to the
Latin suffix ani; so that from the
historical and philological point of view, the word Sauromatae, or Sarmatae, is
only a dialectal Greek form of the term Sauromani
or Sarmani.
We find other
ethnographical traces about the Arimii
or Armanii of Scythia in the names
of tribes and localities. Pliny mentions
among the populations which dwelt on the southern part of Scythia, the Rhymozoli and the Rami (lib. VI. 7. 2). With Ptolemy
we find ‘Rymmoi, or ‘Erymmoi, with the dwellings above
the Caspian Sea (lib. VI. c. 14).
Ammianus Marcellinus (4th century) tells us
that the most ferocious and inhumane population of the Tauric peninsula were
the Arinchi (lib. XXII. c. 8).
Jornandes mentions some Scythian witches, called Aliorumnae (Get. c. 24), probably Ario-Rumnae. According to Tacitus, the Arii constituted a warlike and barbarian tribe settled near the
middle of the Vistula (in Russian Poland). Their troupes had a lugubrious and
frightening aspect. Their shields were black, their bodies painted black, they
chose dark nights to attack the enemy (Germ. c. 43). These Arii belonged to the
ethnic family of the Herminoni, or the Arimi of Germany (Mela, Descr. orb. III. 3; Pliny,
lib. IV. 28).
A locality near the
mouths of the river Tyras (Nistru),
had the name ‘Ermonachtos chome (Strabo,
Geogr. Lib. VII. 4. 16). Near the Cimmerian Bosphorus existed the city ‘Ermonassa,
founded by a woman with the same name (Eustathius,
Comm. in Dionys. 553); and on the eastern shores of the Tauric peninsula was Hermisium (Mela, lib. II. 12), today Armiansky. Finally, an ancient city near
the river Nipru (Borysthene) appears at Ptolemy
with the name Serimon (lib. III. 5),
where the first letter is only a simple aspiration, as in Sarmatia (‘Armatia);
Syrgis
(‘Yrgis),
river in Scythia; Sermulia (‘Ermulia), locality in Thrace; Sarminium, city in Pannonia (Ravennatis, Cosmogr. p. 218); Sardiaei (Ardiaei), population in Dalmatia.
We arrive now to
the etymology of the name Schythes, Schythai. Herodotus tells us that the name Scythai
was given by the Greeks (lib. IV. 6).
The Pelasgian nation,
people numerous and powerful, which had conquered by civilization and by arms
most of the ancient world, had an excellent military organization even since
the heroic times. All knew how to use weapons, all had the obligation to do
military service, either for defense, or for conquest. But each people or tribe
had its particular fighting style. Some were more used to fight from a way off,
others from near. Some were armed with bows and shields, others with lances or
spears, some fought on foot, others on horse. From here come the names arcarii (archatoi), scutarii, scutati, sagittarii, lancearii,
hastate, pedites, celeres (equites – Festus,
p. 42), chalasiries with the Egyptians (Herodotus, lib. II. 166. 168).
The shield was one
of the most holy weapons of the peoples from the Danube and the Black Sea. The
great god from the Carpathians is Zeus aigiochos, Jove the shield
bearer (see Ch. XII.7). Juno Sospita (Cicero,
De Nat. Doeor. I. 29) and Juno Curulis (Servius,
I. 17) were also represented with shields in hand.
The national
palladium of Rome was a divine shield (Livy,
lib. I. 20). The entire war cavalry of the ancient
Latins bore shields, equites scutati
omnes (Virgil, Aen. IX. 370).
And Lydus tells us that Romulus chose from
the army of scutati (schoutatoi),
300 of them, for the protection of his own person (De magistr. I. 9). So, we
have here a sort of royal shield bearers.
The Samnitii had elegant shields,
ornamented with gold and silver; the Ligurii
had shields of copper; the Marsii
had a sort of big shields (Livy,
lib. IX. 40; Strabo, lib. IV. 140; Festus, see Albesia scuta). The Brutii, Lucanii and Etruscii all
bore shields with more or less identical shapes. The shield was the permanent
defensive weapon of the Roman legionnaire.
The national troupes
of the Celtiberii – migrated in
ancient times from the Carpathians – were composed mostly of shield bearers (Livy, lib. XXVIII. 2), scutati.
Generally, the
shield had been an ancient national weapon of the Arimic peoples. Homer names
the shield of great Zeus, eremnan aigida (Iliad, IV. 167),
meaning terrible shield by Greek etymology, but Arimic shield, by its barbarian ethnic meaning.
The Scythians were in the beginning a
people of shield bearers (Aelianus,
De nat. anim. II. 16), scutati. The
etymology of the name derives from scut (TN
– shield, Lat. scutum; Gr. schytos,
the animal hide with which were covered the shields).
The ancient Arcadi had been a people of archers (TN – arcasi) [1].
[1. According to Suidas (see ‘Archathas), the Arcadii
had been the most warlike of all the peoples of Hellada. The name of the tribe,
as results from Stephanos Byzanthinos
(Ed. Berkelius, 1688), had been Arcas.
The ancient patronymic name was Arcasidae,
instead of Arcadides and the feminine was Arcasis.
On an old coin from the treasure of the kings of
The Samnitii had their name after the
spears (Gr.saynia) which they bore (Festus,
Samnites).
The Sabinii, one of the most ancient people
of
Among all the
Scythian populations, the bravest, most powerful and most distinguished were
the Royal Scythians, Schythai basilaioi, mentioned by Herodotus (lib. IV. 20). Exactly like
the scutati of
The significance of
the name Scythes can also be found
in an ethnographical note of Herodotus.
The Persians, he tells us, called the Scythians Sacae (lib. VII. 64). In old Greek language, sachos meant shield (TN – scut),
and probably also in the language of the Medi. So, basically the words Scythes and Saces had the same meaning of shield bearer (TN – scutas, Eustathius, Comm. in Dionys. 749).
By traditions and
customs, the Scythians belonged to the Pelasgian ethnic unit.
They considered
themselves the oldest people on earth (Justinus,
lib. II. 1; Ammianus, lib. XXII. 15.
2), exactly like the Pelasgians of Greece, of the islands of the
According to a
tradition gathered by Herodotus, Scythes, the ancient representative of
the Scythian people, had been a son of Echidna (lib. IV. 9), from the country
of the Arimii (Hesiodus, Theog. v. 304), brother of Agathyrsus, the first king of the Agathyrsii from near the river
Maris.
People with simple
customs, but chaste, and with high feelings of justice, the Scythians had in
the beginning the same religious doctrines as the Romans. As Herodotus tells us, the Scythians did
not have the custom to erect statues, temples, or altars to the gods (lib. IV.
59).
Varro tells us the same, that the Romans had
venerated the gods for more than 150 years without simulacra or idols (Augustinus, De civ. Dei, IV. 31).
One single symbol
was held in particular honor by the Scythians: the iron sword of Mars (Herodotus,
lib. IV. 62; Q. Curtius, VII. 8 calls it hasta),
the national god of the Getic people.
We find the same
symbolic cult with the Romans.
The historian Trog Pompeius, who had lived at the
time of Augustus, tells us that the Romans had venerated in the beginning the spears (hastes), as simulacra of the
divinities (Justinus, lib. XLIII.
3). But the Romans had a particular traditional religious cult for the hasta of Mars (Servius, in Virg. Aen. VIII. 3).
At the front of the
Scythian divinities we find Vesta (‘Istie),
a Pelasgian deity par excellence.
Vesta had a principal
cult also with the Romans. She symbolized the might of nature, fire and earth.
The Scythians venerated Terra under
the name of
Vinerea (TN – Veneris, Venus) appears with the
Scythians under the name of ‘Artimpassa, ‘Argimpassa, ‘Aripassa
(Herodotus, lib. IV. 59). This is
either a dialectal, or a corrupt form, of Arimnassa,
where assa is only a simple feminine suffix. Mars was also called by
the Greeks Arimanios (see
Ch.XXXIII.4), while Venus was considered as the wife of Mars of the Getae (Statius, Silv. I. 2. 53), having the
co-name of ‘Areia (Preller, Gr.
Myth. I, 1854, 215), or Artimpassa (with the Scythians), which in fact is the same
as Arimnassa.
Terra Mater. A colossal stone figure (Baba),
like it is often found on the tumuli of
This one is in the park of the city
Novo-Cerkask, near the northern extremity of the Meotic lake.
Her costume is characterized by the
head veil and the front over skirt,
decorated with ornaments
characteristic to the Romanian folk dress.
(After Th. Schiemann, Russland, Polenu,
Livland, 1866, I. p. 31).