|
Thraco-Cimmerian is a historiographical and archaeological term, composed of the names of the Thracians and the Cimmerians. It refers to 8th to 7th century BC cultures that intruded into Eastern Central Europe from the area north of the Black Sea. It is uncertain if and how these incursions are related to the historical Thracians and Cimmerians. The latter are known from historical records to have invaded Anatolia around this period, while the Thracians are mentioned as far back as the Iliad and Odyssey, where they participate in the Trojan War; Thracologists and archaeologists generally trace back the Thracians to the Balkan/Carpatho-Danubian Chalcolithic period (Hoddinott et al.).
It is sometimes assumed that the migration of the Cimmerians was triggered by an Iranian expansion, from the area of the former Srubna culture, into the steppes of what is now the Ukraine. Virtually nothing is known about the Cimmerian language, but they are usually speculated to belong to the Satem group on the basis of royal names such as Sandrakshatra. The Thracian language is poorly attested, but available vocabulary suggests a Satem branch, though theories of a Thracian-Iranian branch have been all but discarded, and no close link between Thracian and Iranian has been demonstrated. The Sigynnae, reported by classical authors as a tribe of the Black Sea steppes related to the Medes, may have invaded the area about the time of the Cimmerian expansion.
Archaeologically, "Thraco-Cimmerian" artefacts are metal (usually bronze) items, particularly parts of horse tacks, found in a late Urnfield context, but without local Urnfield predecessors for their type. They appear rather to spread from the Koban culture of the Caucasus and northern Georgia, which together with the Srubna culture, blends into the 9th to 7th centuries pre-Scythian Cernogorovka and Novocerkassk cultures, and by the 7th century, "Thraco-Cimmerian" objects are spread further west over most of Eastern and Central Europe, locations of finds reaching to Denmark and eastern Prussia in the north and to Lake Zürich in the west. Together with these bronze artefacts, earliest Iron items appear, ushering in the European Iron Age, corresponding to the Proto-Celtic expansion from the Hallstatt culture.
The arefacts labelled "Thraco-Cimmerian" all belong to a category of upper class, luxury objects, like weapons, horse tacks and jewelry, and they are recovered only from a small percentage of graves of the period. From this it is assumed that the "Thraco-Cimmerian" migration did not consist of large populations, but rather of relatively small groups who installed themselves as ruling class over the indigenous Urnfield/Hallstatt population.
Още:
И още:
Cimmerians
Their origins are obscure, but they are believed to have been Indo-European. Their language is regarded as being related to either Thracian or Iranian. The Thracian theory is based on the fact that the Greek author Strabo ascribes the "Treri" in one passage to the Thracians (13.1.8) and in another to the Cimmerians (14.1.40). The Iranian theory, on the other hand, argues that the material culture of the Cimmerians in Asia Minor is indistinguishable from that of the contemporary Scythians; furthermore, Assyrian Gimirri and Persian Saka are used synonymously in ancient Near eastern sources, most notably on the famous Behistun inscription. Thus many scholars, including the Russian scholar Askold Ivančik, assume they were closely related to the Scythians. At any rate, even if the Cimmerians were Thracians, or belonged to some unknown Indo-European or non-Indo-European branch, they may well have had an Iranian ruling class, as did the Scythians. In the early twentieth century they were associated with the Proto-Indo-Europeans ("Aryans" or "Japhetites").
Very little is known archaeologically of the Cimmerians of the Northern Black Sea Coast. It has been suggested they may have comprised the so-called "Catacomb culture" of southern Russia, which appears to have been ousted by the "Srubna culture" that advanced from farther east. This parallels the Greek account of how the Cimmerians were displaced by the Scythians. However, the ouster of the Catacomb culture is carbon-dated to the 2nd millennium BC, several hundred years before the Scythians are recorded as having appeared in Asia; the conflicting timeframes are difficult to reconcile.
A few stone stelae found in the Ukraine and the northern Caucasus have been connected with the Cimmerians. They are in a style clearly different from both the later Scythian and the earlier Yamna/Kemi-Oba stelae.
[edit]
Historical accounts
The first historical record of the Cimmerians appears in Assyrian annals in the year 714 BC. These describe how a people termed the Gimirri helped the forces of Sargon II to defeat the kingdom of Urartu. Their original homeland, called Gamir or Uishdish, seems to have been located within the buffer state of Mannae. The later geographer Ptolemy placed the Cimmerian city of Gomara in this region.
Some modern authors assert that the Cimmerians included mercenaries, whom the Assyrians knew as Khumri, who had been resettled there by Sargon. However, later Greek accounts describe the Cimmerians as having previously lived on the steppes, between the Tyras (Dniester) and Tanais (Don) rivers. They are described in Book 11 of Homer's Odyssey as living in a land of fog and darkness at the edge of the world, on the shores of Oceanus. Several kings of the Cimmerians are mentioned in Greek and Mesopotamian sources, including Tugdamme (Lygdamis in Greek; mid-7th century BC), and Sandakhshatra (late-7th century).
According to the Histories of Herodotus (c. 440 BC), the Cimmerians had been expelled from the steppes at some point in the past by the Scythians. To ensure burial in their ancestral homeland, the men of the Cimmerian royal family divided into groups and fought each other to the death. The Cimmerian commoners buried the bodies along the river Tyras and fled from the Scythian advance, across the Caucasus and into Anatolia and the Near East. Their range seems to have extended from Mannae eastward through the Mede settlements of the Zagros Mountains, and south of there as far as Elam.
The migrations of the Cimmerians were recorded by the Assyrians, whose king, Sargon II, died in battle against them in 705 BC. They are subsequently recorded as having conquered Phrygia in 696 BC-695 BC, prompting the Phrygian king Midas to take poison rather than face capture. In 679 BC, during the reign of Esarhaddon of Assyria, they attacked Cilicia and Tabal under their new ruler Teushpa. Esarhaddon defeated them near Hubushna (tentatively identified with modern Cappadocia).
In 654 BC or 652 BC – the exact date is unclear – the Cimmerians attacked the kingdom of Lydia, killing the Lydian king Gyges and causing great destruction to the Lydian capital, Sardis. They returned ten years later during the reign of Gyges' son Ardys II and this time captured the city, with the exception of the citadel. The fall of Sardis was a major shock to the powers of the region; the Greek poets Callinus and Archilochus recorded the fear that it inspired in the Greek colonies of Ionia, some of which were attacked by Cimmerian and Treres raiders.
The Cimmerian occupation of Lydia was brief, however -- possibly due to an outbreak of plague. Between 637 BC and 626 BC they were beaten back by Alyattes II of Lydia. This defeat marked the effective end of Cimmerian power. The term "Gimirri" was used about a century later in the Behistun inscription (ca. 515 BC) as a Babylonian equivalent of Persian Saka (Scythians), but otherwise Cimmerians are not heard of again in Asia, and their ultimate fate is uncertain. It has been speculated that they settled in Cappadocia, known in Armenian as Gamir (the same name as the original Cimmerian homeland in Mannae). However, certain Frankish traditions would locate them at the mouth of the Danube (see Sicambri).
A reference to the Cimmerians is preserved in Gomer גמר of the Hebrew Bible (Standard Hebrew Gómer, Tiberian Hebrew Gōmer, Genesis 10:2, Ezekiel 38:6). As the eldest son of Japheth and the father of Ashkenaz, Riphath and Togarmah, his descendants thus represent one of the major branches of the Japhethic race.
[edit]
Timeline
721-715 BC – Sargon II mentions a land of Gamirr near to Urartu.
714 – suicide of Rusa I of Urartu, after defeat by both the Assyrians and Cimmerians.
705 – Sargon II of Assyria dies on an expedition against the Kulummu.
679/678 – Gimirri under a ruler called Teushpa invade Assyria from Hubuschna (Cappadocia?). Esarhaddon of Assyria defeats them in battle.
676-674 – Cimmerians invade and destroy Phrygia, and reach Paphlagonia.
654 or 652 – Gyges of Lydia dies in battle against the Cimmerians. Sack of Sardis; Cimmerians and Treres plunder Ionian colonies.
644 – Cimmerians occupy Sardis, but withdraw soon afterwards
637-626 – Cimmerians defeated by Alyattes II.
ca. 515 – Last historical record of Cimmerians, in the Behistun inscription of Darius.
[edit]
Language
Of the language of the Cimmerians, only a few personal names have survived in Assyrian inscriptions:
Te-ush-pa, mentioned in the annals of Esarhaddon, has been compared to the Hurrian war deity Teshub; others interpret it as Iranian, comparing the Achaemenid name Teispes (Herodotus 7.11.2)
Dug-dam-me (Dugdammê) king of the Ummân-Manda (nomads) appears in a prayer of Ashurbanipal to Marduk, on a fragment at the British Museum. Other spellings include Dugdammi, and Tugdammê. Yamauchi (1982) interprets the name as Iranian, citing Ossetic "tux-domaeg" meaning "ruling with strength." The name appears corrupted to Lygdamis in Strabo I.3.21.
Sandaksatru, son of Dugdamme. This is an Iranian reading of the name, and Mayrhofer (1981) points out that the name may also be read as Sandakurru. Mayrhofer likewise rejects the interpretation of "with pure regency" as a mixing of Iranian and Indo-Aryan. Ivancik suggests an association with the Anatolian deity Sanda.
Some researchers have attempted to trace various place names to Cimmerian origins. It has been suggested that the Crimea is named after the Cimmerians. This, however, seems to be a faulty premise. The name "Crimea" is traceable to the Turkic word qyrym, "fortress", and the peninsula was known as the Tauric Chersonese ("peninsula of the Tauri") in antiquity (Strabo 7.4.1; Herodotus 4.99.3, Amm. Marc. 22.8.32).
The Cimmerians are now usually classified as an Iranian people, but based on ancient Greek historical sources, a Thracian or (less commonly) a Celtic association is sometimes assumed. According to C. F. Lehmann-Haupt, the language of the Cimmerians could have been a "missing link" between Thracian and Iranian.
[edit]
Possible offshoots
The Cimmerians are thought to have had a number of offshoots. The Thracians have been identified as a possible western branch of the Cimmerians. If Herodotus is to be believed, both peoples originally inhabited the northern shore of the Black Sea, and both were displaced around the same time by invaders from further east. Whereas the Cimmerians would have departed this ancestral homeland by heading east and south across the Caucasus, the Thracians migrated west and south into the Balkans, where they established a successful and long-lived culture. The Tauri, the original inhabitants of the Crimea, are sometimes identified as a people related to the Thracians.
Although the Cimmerians of historical record only appear on the stage of world history for a brief time (during the 7th century BC), numerous Celtic and Germanic peoples have traditions of being descended from the Cimmerians or Scythians, and some of their ethnic names seem to bear out this belief (e.g. Cymru, Cwmry or Cumbria, Cimbri). It is unlikely that either Proto-Celtic or Proto-Germanic entered Europe as late as the 7th century BC, their formation being commonly associated with the Bronze Age Urnfield and Nordic Bronze Age cultures, respectively. It is, however, conceivable that a small-scale (in terms of population) 8th century "Thraco-Cimmerian" migration triggered cultural changes that contributed to the transformation of the Urnfield culture into the Hallstatt C culture, ushering in the European Iron Age.
The etymology of Cymru (i.e. Wales) and Cwmry (i.e. Cumbria), said in Welsh tradition to derive directly from the "Cimmerians", is instead considered by detractors of this theory as being Celtic kom-broges meaning "fellow countrymen". As for the Cimbri tribe, it is not known for certain whether they were Celtic, Germanic, or even, as a third alternative, from an earlier Western Indo-European grouping connected with the Ligurians. In addition, the Merovingian kings of the Franks traditionally traced their lineage, through a pre-Frankish tribe called the Sicambri, to a group of "Cimmerians" who lived near the mouth of the Danube river.
If the Scythians are assumed to be related to the Cimmerians, as has often been claimed, many other peoples claiming possible Scythian descent could also be added to this list.
The association of the Cimmerians with one of the Lost Tribes of Israel plays a certain role in British Israelism.
|
Трако-кимерийската култура
(български)
