Scythian Ocean
| Author:Laxman Burdak, IFS (R) |
Scythian Ocean is mentioned by Pliny.[1][2]
Variants
Jat Gotras Namesake
- Scythian Jats = Scythian Gulf (Pliny.vi.15)
- Scythian Jats Scythian Ocean (Northern Ocean/Arctic Ocean)) (Pliny.vi.15)
History
The Scythian Ocean communicates on the northern shores of Asia with the Caspian Sea. Hardouin remarks, that Patrocles, the commander of the Macedonian fleet, was the first to promulgate this notion, he having taken the mouth of the river Volga for a narrow passage, by means of which the Scythian or Northern Ocean made its way into the Caspian Sea.[3]
Mention by Pliny
Pliny[4] mentions ' Nations in the vicinity of the Scythian Ocean.'....Having now stated all that bears reference to the interior of Asia, let us cross in imagination the Riphæan1 Mountains, and traverse the shores of the ocean to the right. On three sides does this ocean wash the coasts of Asia, as the Scythian Ocean on the north, the Eastern Ocean on the east, and the Indian Ocean on the south; and it is again divided into various names, derived from the numerous gulfs which it forms, and the nations which dwell upon its shores.
A great part of Asia, however, which lies exposed to the north, through the noxious effects of those freezing climates, consists of nothing but vast deserts. From the extreme north northeast to the point2 where the sun rises in the summer, it is the country of the Scythians.
1 It is difficult to say what chain of mountains, if indeed any in particular, he would designate by this name. Parisot remarks that these mountains would seem to belong rather to the region of poetry and fable than of fact, and states that it is pretty clear that the Balkan chain, the districts in which the Danube takes its rise, the Alps, the Pyrenees, the Hercynian mountains, and even the chain of Taurus and Caucasus, have at different times been described or mentioned under the name of Riphæan Mountains. It was evidently Pliny's belief that the great Northern Ocean or Scythian Ocean skirted the northern shores of Asia, a little above the latitude perhaps of the northern extremity of the Caspian. In B. iv. c. 26, we find him crossing these, perhaps imaginary, mountains, and then proceeding to the left, along, as he supposes, the extreme northern shores of Europe; here he seems to start from the same point, but turns to the right, and proceeds along the northern, eastern, and southern shores of Asia.
2 North-east.
Mention by Pliny
Pliny[5] mentions 'The Caspian Sea and Hyrcanian Sea.'....Bursting through, this sea makes a passage from the Scythian Ocean into the back of Asia,1 receiving various names from the nations which dwell upon its banks, the two most famous of which are the Caspian and the Hyrcanian races. Clitarchus is of opinion that the Caspian Sea is not less in area than the Euxine. Eratosthenes gives the measure of it on the south-east, along the coast of Cadusia2 and Albania, as five thousand four hundred stadia; thence, through the territories of the Anariaci, the Amardi, and the Hyrcani, to the mouth of the river Zonus he makes four thousand eight hundred stadia, and thence to the mouth of the Jaxartes3 two thousand four hundred; which makes in all a distance of one thousand five hundred and seventy-five miles. Artemidorus, however, makes this sum smaller by twenty-five miles.
Agrippa bounds the Caspian Sea and the nations around it, including Armenia, on the east by the Ocean of the Seres4, on the west by the chain of the Caucasus, on the south by that of Taurus, and on the north by the Scythian Ocean; and he states it, so far as its extent is known, to be four hundred and eighty miles in length, and two hundred and ninety in breadth. There are not wanting, however, some authors who state that its whole circumference, from the Straits,5 is two thousand five hundred miles.
Its waters make their way into this sea by a very narrow mouth,6 but of considerable length; and where it begins to enlarge, it curves obliquely with horns in the form of a crescent, just as though it would make a descent from its mouth into Lake Mæotis, resembling a sickle in shape, as M. Varro says. The first7 of its gulfs is called the Scythian Gulf; it is inhabited on both sides, by the Scythians, who hold communication with each other across the Straits8, the Nomades being on one side, together with the Sauromatæ, divided into tribes with numerous names, and on the other, the Abzoæ, who are also divided into an equal number.
1 His meaning is, that the Scythian Ocean communicates on the northern shores of Asia with the Caspian Sea. Hardouin remarks, that Patrocles, the commander of the Macedonian fleet, was the first to promulgate this notion, he having taken the mouth of the river Volga for a narrow passage, by means of which the Scythian or Northern Ocean made its way into the Caspian Sea
2 The country of the Cadusii, in the mountainous district of Media Atropatene, on the south-west shores of the Caspian Sea, between the parallels of 390 and 370 north latitude. This district probably corresponds with the modern district of Gilan.
3 Now the Syr-Daria or Yellow River, and watering the barren steppes of the Kirghiz-Cossacks. It really discharges itself into the Sea of Aral, and not the Caspian.
4 The supposed Eastern Ocean of the ancients.
5 The imaginary passage by which it was supposed to communicate with the Scythian Ocean.
6 This being in reality the mouth of the Rha or Volga, as mentioned in Note 18, p. 24.
7 On the eastern side.
8 Across the mouths of the Volga.