Costoboci

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The Costoboci were a Dacian tribe, which lived in the areas known today as Maramureş and south-western Ukraine. Archeologically speaking, they are identified with the Lipita culture. When the Roman emperor Trajan conquered Dacia in 106, the Costoboci remained among the free Dacian tribes (unconquered by the Romans).

In western Ukraine Costoboci settlements of Lipita culture were found in Ukrainian villages of Verkhnya Lypytsya hence name Lipita culture), Maydan Holohirskyy, Remezivtsi, Voronyaky, Bolotnya, Zelenyy Hay, Lysychnyky etc. - all in south-western part of Ternopilska oblast, south eastern area of Lvivska oblast and northern area of Ivano-Frankivska oblast of western Ukraine. Archeologists believe that they moved in Upper Dniester area of current western Ukraine from the slopes of the Carpathian mountains along the rivers, left hand tributaries of northern Dniester, as Zolota Lypa river. Here they used to burn their dead probably believing in purifyig power of fire and in afterlife - setting private belongings of the deaseased in holders with their ashes, as it was found in many Dacian settlements in western Ukraine. Their presence here disappears in the early 3rd century. It is believed that they moved back south to heartland Dacia.

From their positions in the north, the Costoboci often raided the Roman province of Dacia, in conjunction with rebellions of the local Dacians. One of these raids (conducted probably by their "king" Pieporus), during the reign of the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius reached as far as Attica, severely affecting the provinces of Moesia, Scythia Minor and Macedonia.

Having been defeated by the Romans, the Costoboci lost much of their power. So, in the year 172, probably bribed by the Romans, the Hasdingi (part of the German tribe of the Vandals) attacked and conquered most of the Costoboci's land. However, this invasion did not put an end to the Dacians living in this territory, as they continued to coexist to a certain degree with the invaders, as evidenced by the archeological sites. The Costoboci living in the east, in what is now Bukovina, probably ended under the control of the Carpians, another free Dacian tribe.