Massagetae

Asia in 323 BC, showing the Massagetae located in modern-day Central Asia.

The Massagetae, or Massageteans (Greek: Μασσαγέται, lat. Massagetai),^[1] were an ancient Eastern Iranian nomadic confederation,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} who inhabited the steppes of Central Asia, north-east of the Caspian Sea (in modern Turkmenistan, western Uzbekistan, and southern Kazakhstan).

The Massagetae are known primarily from the writings of Herodotus who described the Massagetae as living on a sizeable portion of the great plain east of the Caspian Sea.^[7] He several times refers to them as living "beyond the River Araxes", which flows through the Caucasus and into the west Caspian.^[8] Scholars have offered various explanations for this anomaly. For example, Herodotus may have confused two or more rivers, as he had limited and frequently indirect knowledge of geography.^[9]

According to Greek and Roman scholars, the Massagetae were neighboured by the Aspasioi (possibly the Aśvaka) to the north, the Scythians and the Dahae to the west, and the Issedones (possibly the Wusun) to the east. Sogdia (Khorasan) lay to the south.^[10]

In the 4th century B.C. Alexander the Great conquered the Persian empire and campaigned in the east. Massagetae adopted new military tactics of armoured cavalry from Macedonians and in the 4th-3rd centuries BC were able to subdue nearly all the nomad tribes north-east of Macedonian frontier including the Xiongnu who roamed the steppes further east up to the Chinese border. Xiongnu had to acknowledge the Massagetan suzerainty for about a century. But eventually Xiongnu defeated Massagetae and in 165 BC drove them westwards out of their lands.^[11]

Possible connections to other ancient peoples

Many scholars have suggested that the Massagetae were related to the Getae of ancient Eastern Europe and/or the Jats of modern South Asia.^[12] A 9th century work by Rabanus Maurus, De Universo, states: "The Massagetae are in origin from the tribe of the Scythians, and are called Massagetae, as if heavy, that is, strong Getae."^[13][14] In Central Asian languages such as Middle Persian and Avestan, the prefix massa means "great", "heavy", or "strong".^[15]

Some authors, such as Alexander Cunningham, James P. Mallory, Victor H. Mair B.S. Dahiya and Edgar Knobloch have proposed relating the Massagetae to the Gutians of 2000 BC Mesopotamia, and/or a people known in ancient China as the "Da Yuezhi" or "Great Yuezhi" (who founded the Kushan Empire in South Asia). Mallory and Mair suggest that Da Yuezhi may at one time have been pronounced d'ad-ngiwat-tieg, connecting them to the Massagetae.^[16][17][18] Dahiya claimed that the Massagetae and Thyssagetae corresponded to the Da Yuezhi and Xiao Yuezhi ("Lesser Yuezhi").^[19] These theories are not widely accepted, however.

Culture

The original language of the Massagetae is little-known. While it appears to have had similarities to the Eastern Iranian languages, these may have resulted from interactions with neighbouring peoples, such as language contact or sprachbund-type assimilation.

According to Herodotus:

History

Concerning the death of Cyrus the Great of Persia, Herodotus writes:

Ammianus Marcellinus considered the Alans to be the former Massagetae.^[20] At the close of the 4th century CE, Claudian (the court poet of Emperor Honorius and Stilicho) wrote of Alans and Massagetae in the same breath: "the Massagetes who cruelly wound their horses that they may drink their blood, the Alans who break the ice and drink the waters of Maeotis' lake" (In Rufinem).

Procopius writes in History of the Wars Book III: The Vandalic War:^[21] "the Massagetae whom they now call Huns" (XI. 37.), "there was a certain man among the Massagetae, well gifted with courage and strength of body, the leader of a few men; this man had the privilege handed down from his fathers and ancestors to be the first in all the Hunnic armies to attack the enemy" (XVIII. 54.).

Evagrius Scholasticus (Ecclesiastical History. Book 3. Ch. II.): "and in Thrace, by the inroads of the Huns, formerly known by the name of Massagetae, who crossed the Ister without opposition".^[22]

Tadeusz Sulimirski notes that the Sacae also invaded parts of Northern India.^[23] Weer Rajendra Rishi, an Indian linguist^[24] has identified linguistic affinities between Indian and Central Asian languages, which further lends credence to the possibility of historical Sacae influence in Northern India.^[15][23]

Possible connection to the Sakā haumavargā

According to Guive Mirfendereski at the Circle of Ancient Iranian Studies (CAIS), the Massagetae are synonymous with the Sakā haumavargā of South Asian historiography.

See also

• Tomyris
• Mount Imeon
• Indo-Scythians
• Getae

References

External links

• Herodotus Histories
• Ammianus Marcellinus