S C Y 



Scythse. The towns were Auzacia, Ifiedon Scythica, 

 Charauna, and Soeta. Pompouius Mela afligns to the 

 Scythians much the fame extent and boundaries. The 

 Scythia Pontica was called by the Greeks Moefia. 



The Afiatic Scythia, therefore, comprehended in general 

 Great Tartary, and Ruflia in Afia ; and, in particular, the 

 Scythia beyond or without Imaus contained the regions of 

 Bogdoi, or Oftiacoi, and Tunguri. The Scythia within 

 or on this fide of Imaus comprehended Turkeftan, and 

 Mongul, the Uftieck or Zagatai, Kalmuck and Nogaian 

 Tartars, befides Siberia, the land of the Samoiedes, and 

 Nova Zembla. The three lad mentioned countries, not 

 being fo foon inhabited as the former, were wholly unknown 

 to the ancients ; and the former were peopled by the Bac- 

 trians, Sogdians, Gandari, Sacae, and Maflageta:. Sar- 

 matia contained Albania, Iberia, and Colchis, which now 

 conllitute the CircafDan Tartary and the province of 

 Georgia. (See Circassia and Georgia.) The feas of 

 Scythia, befides the Frozen and Indian ocean, were the 

 Cafpian, the Euxine, and the Palus M<EOtis. The rivers, 

 befides thofe already mentioned, or the Rha or Volga, and 

 the Tanais or Don, were the Oby, Lena, Amur, and 

 Helum, all of which are in Great Tartary : to which we 

 may add the Jaxartes and the Oxus, which difcharged them- 

 felves into the Cafpian fea ; in which fea were iflands called 

 the Scythian iflands. The moft noted mountains were the 

 Taurus, Imaus, and Caucafus. 



European Scythia, whofe confines weltward have been 

 fixed at the Tanais, reached towards the fouth-welt to the 

 Po and the Alps, by which it was divided from the Celtes, 

 or Celto-Gallia, and by the Rhine northward. On the 

 fouth it was bounded by the filer or Danube, and the 

 Euxine fea ; which boundaries were continually changing, 

 on account of the mutual encroachments of the Celtes and 

 Scythians ; and as to its northern limits, which have not 

 been precifely afcertained, they have been fuppofed to 

 ttretch to the fpring-heads of the Boryfthcnes or Dnieper, 

 a\id the Rha or Volga, and fo to that of the Tanais. The 

 .Hticients divided this country into Scythia Arimafpea, lying 

 eailward, and joining to Afian Scythia, and European Sar- 

 matia on the weft ; which were contiguous to each other, 

 and ftretching for fome interval from north to fouth, with- 

 out any perceptible line of feparation. In Scythia, pro- 

 perly fo called, were the Arimafpaei on the north ; the 

 Gctoe, or Dacians, along the Danube, on the fouth ; and 

 the Ni-uri between thefe two. It therefore contained the 

 European RufTia, and the leder Crim Tartary, eallward ; 

 and on the weft, Lithuania, Poland, part of Hungary, 

 Tranfylvania, Walachia, Bulgaria, and Moldavia. This 

 Scythia had no other fea befides the Sarmatian, or Mare 

 Scythicum, now called the Baltic, with the gulfs of Bothnia 

 and Finland, and the White fea joining to the Northern 

 ocean, all unknown to the ancients, if we except the Euxine 

 and Pahis Miotis, wliicli bounded it on the fouth. Its 

 lakes were thofe of Ladoga and Onega in Finland, un- 

 known to the ancient Sarmatians. Their chief rivers on the 

 fouth were the Donetz or little Tanais, Boryfthcnes or 

 Dnieper, Bog, Tyras or Dneifter, and the liter or Da- 

 nube, alL which difcharged themfelvcs into the Euxine ; 

 and on the north-eaft the Great and Little Dvvina, which 

 run, the firll into the White fea, and the other into the gulf 

 of Fn-.land, and therefore unknown to the ancients ; and on 

 the wlII the Villula, which flowed into the Scythian fea, 

 and divided Sarmatia from Germany. 



The whole extent, therefore, of botli Scythias, including 

 the two Sarmatias, reached in longitude from the 20th fo 

 the 85th degree, or even beyond, and from the Alps lo 



S C Y 



the promontory of Tabis, and ftraits of Anian ; and in lati- 

 tude, from Caucafus to tlie Ardic circle, above 2S de- 

 grees. Herodotus indeed fays, that the Hyperboreans were 

 not of Scythian race, but another kind of people, fome of 

 whom were Androphagi, or men-eaters, fierce and cruel ; 

 and others, -viz. the Bald-heads, or Argrippeans, a wife 

 and peaceable people, efteemed facred by all their neigh, 

 hours : but he fpeaks of them merely by report, and with 

 diffidence ; fo that thefe regions were probably then un- 

 known, if not uninhabited. The five cities of Scythia, 

 which we have mentioned, were probably built after the 

 time of Herodotus, who takes no notice of any metropolis ; 

 though he mentions a confiderable branch of Scythians, 

 called Royal Scythians, whom he places along the banks 

 of the Tanais ; this river, as he fays, dividing them from 

 the Afiatic Sarmatians. The original Scythians of Hero- 

 dotus (1. iv.) were confined, by the Danube and the Palus 

 Masotis, within a fquare of 4000 itadia {4CX) Roman miles). 

 Diodorus Sicidus (vol. i. 1. ii. p. 155. ed. Weflel. ) has 

 marked the gradual progrefs of the name and nation. From 

 the mouth of the Danube to the fea of Japan (fays Gibbon, 

 vol. iv.), the whole longitude of Scythia is about no de- 

 grees, which, in that parallel, are equal to more than 

 5000 miles. The latitude of thefe extenfive deferts cannot 

 be fo eafily or fo accurately afcertained ; but from the 40th 

 degree, which touches the wall of China, we may fecurely 

 advance above 1000 miles to the northward, till our pro- 

 grefs is ftopped by the excefilve cold of Siberia. In that 

 dreary climate, inftead of the animated picture of a Tartar 

 camp, tlie fmoke which iffues from the earth, or rather 

 from the inow, betrays the fubterraneous dweUings of the 

 Tongoufes and tiie Samoyedes. The want of horfes and 

 oxen is imperfeftly fupplied by the ufe of rein-deer, and of 

 large dogs ; and the conquerors of the earth infLiifibly de- 

 generate into a race of deformed and diminutive favages, 

 who tremble at the lound of arms. Anc. Un. Hill. vol. iv. 

 See ScyriiiANs and Tartars. 



SCYTHIAN, a word uied very often in the old Greek 

 writers on the materia medica, to diftinguifli the peculiar 

 fort of gum, or other drug, brought from the Scythians. 



The Scythian and Indian drugs have been by many fup- 

 pofed different kinds of the fame medicine ; but this is an 

 error; for it appears very obvious, on comparing the writ- 

 ings of Galen, Aetius, iEgiueta, and other of the later 

 writers among the Greeks, with thofe of Diolcoridcs, 

 Theophraftus, and the other old ones, tliat the words 

 Scythian and Indian mean the fame tiling, and that what 

 the old writers have called Indian, thefe have called Scy- 

 thian. 



The meaning of this is, that thofe things were c.illed 

 Scythian, which were brought from the country of Indo- 

 fcythia, or that part of Scythia which lay at the oftia of 

 the river Indus ; Ijut it is to be obferved, that though the 

 later Greek writers mean this by their term Scythian, yet 

 the word is ufcd in a very different fenfe by the Arabians, 

 Aviccnna, Serapion, and others ; and that wherever they 

 mention a drug under the name of Scytliian, they mean that 

 it comes from the northern parts of Scythia, on the con- 

 fines of Europe. Thefe authors having uiiderftood of this 

 Scythia what the Greek writers have faid of the other, 

 have made no fmall errors in regard to the hiftory of drugs, 

 having given bdelliimi, and many other gums, the produce of 

 only the Scythia of the Greek medical writers, to the 

 fruzen Scythia, before mentioned. 



SCYTHIANS, in ylricient Geography, the inhabitanti 

 of Scythia, confidercd by fome geogr.ipiiical authors as the 

 fame people with the Tatars, or, as they arc more com- 



monly. 



