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Saka

July 26, 2023

"Sacae" redirects here. For the South Australian College of Advanced Education, see University of South Australia.
For the land of the Saka under the Sassanid dynasty, see Sakastān. Not to be confused with the Sakha (people), the endonym of the Yakut people of Siberia. For other uses, see Saka (disambiguation).

The Saka (Old Persian:𐎿𐎣𐎠 Sakā; Kharoṣṭhī: 𐨯𐨐 Saka; Ancient Egyptian: 𓋴𓎝𓎡𓈉 sk, 𓐠𓎼𓈉 sꜣg; Chinese: 塞, old *Sək, mod. Sè, Sāi), Shaka (Sanskrit (Brāhmī): 𑀰𑀓, , Śaka; Sanskrit (Devanāgarī): शक Śaka, शाक Śāka), or Sacae (Ancient Greek: Σάκαι Sákai; Latin: Sacae) were a group of nomadic Eastern Iranian peoples who historically inhabited the northern and eastern Eurasian Steppe and the Tarim Basin.[3][4]

Saka
Cataphract-style parade armour of a Saka royal, also known as "The Golden Warrior", from the Issyk kurgan, a historical burial site near Almaty, Kazakhstan. Circa 400–200 BC.[1][2]

The Sakas were closely related to the European Scythians, and both groups formed part of the wider Scythian cultures[5] and ultimately derived from the earlier Andronovo culture, and the Saka language formed part of the Scythian languages. However, the Sakas of the Asian steppes are to be distinguished from the Scythians of the Pontic Steppe;[4][6] and although the ancient Persians, ancient Greeks, and ancient Babylonians respectively used the names "Saka," "Scythian," and "Cimmerian" for all the steppe nomads, the name "Saka" is used specifically for the ancient nomads of the eastern steppe, while "Scythian" is used for the related group of nomads living in the western steppe;[4][7][8] While the Cimmerians were often described by contemporaries as culturally Scythian, they may have differed ethnically from the Scythians proper, to whom the Cimmerians were related, and who also displaced and replaced the Cimmerians.[9]

Prominent archaeological remains of the Sakas include Arzhan,[10] Tunnug,[11] the Pazyryk burials,[12] the Issyk kurgan, Saka Kurgan tombs,[13] the Barrows of Tasmola[14] and possibly Tillya Tepe. In the 2nd century BC, many Sakas were driven by the Yuezhi from the steppe into Sogdia and Bactria and then to the northwest of the Indian subcontinent, where they were known as the Indo-Scythians.[15][16][17] Other Sakas invaded the Parthian Empire, eventually settling in Sistan, while others may have migrated to the Dian Kingdom in Yunnan, China. In the Tarim Basin and Taklamakan Desert of today's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, they settled in Khotan, Yarkand, Kashgar and other places.[18]

Name

Etymology

 
Scythian helmet, copper alloy, Afrasiyab, Samarkand, 6th–1st century BCE.

Linguist Oswald Szemerényi studied synonyms of various origins for Scythian and differentiated the following terms: Sakā 𐎿𐎣𐎠, Skuthēs Σκύθης, Skudra 𐎿𐎤𐎢𐎭𐎼, and Sugᵘda 𐎿𐎢𐎦𐎢𐎭.[19]

Derived from an Iranian verbal root sak-, "go, roam" (related to "seek") and thus meaning "nomad" was the term Sakā, from which came the names:

From the Indo-European root (s)kewd-, meaning "propel, shoot" (and from which was also derived the English word shoot), of which *skud- is the zero-grade form, was descended the Scythians' self-name reconstructed by Szemerényi as *Skuδa (roughly "archer"). From this were descended the following exonyms:

  • Akkadian:        Iškuzaya and       Askuzaya, used by the Assyrians
  • Old Persian: 𐎿𐎤𐎢𐎭𐎼 Skudra
  • Ancient Greek: Σκύθης Skúthēs (plural Σκύθαι Skúthai), used by the Ancient Greeks[24]

A late Scythian sound change from /δ/ to /l/ resulted in the evolution of *Skuδa into *Skula. From this was derived the Greek word Skṓlotoi Σκώλοτοι, which, according to Herodotus, was the self-designation of the Royal Scythians.[25][26] Other sound changes have produced Sugᵘda 𐎿𐎢𐎦𐎢𐎭.[19]

Although the Scythians, Saka and Cimmerians were closely related nomadic Iranic peoples, and the ancient Babylonians, ancient Persians and ancient Greeks respectively used the names "Cimmerian," "Saka," and "Scythian" for all the steppe nomads, and early modern historians such as Edward Gibbon used the term Scythian to refer to a variety of nomadic and semi-nomadic peoples across the Eurasian Steppe,

  • the name "Scythian" in contemporary modern scholarship generally refers to the nomadic Iranic people who from the 7th century BC to the 3rd century BC dominated the steppe and forest-steppe zones to the north of the Black Sea, Crimea, the Kuban valley, as well as the Taman and Kerch peninsulas,[27][28]
  • while the name "Saka" is used specifically for their eastern members who inhabited the northern and eastern Eurasian Steppe and the Tarim Basin;[29][30]

Identification

The name Sakā was used by the ancient Persian to refer to all the Iranian nomadic tribes living to the north of their empire, including both those who lived between the Caspian Sea and the Hungry steppe, and those who lived to the north of the Danube and the Black Sea. The Assyrians meanwhile called these nomads the Ishkuzai (Akkadian:        Iškuzaya[31][32]) or Askuzai (Akkadian:        Asguzaya,        mat Askuzaya,        mat Ášguzaya[31][33]), and the Ancient Greeks called them Skuthai (Ancient Greek: Σκύθης Skúthēs, Σκύθοι Skúthoi, Σκύθαι Skúthai).[34]

 
For the Achaemenids, there were three types of Sakas: the Sakā tayai paradraya ("beyond the sea", presumably between the Greeks and the Thracians on the Western side of the Black Sea), the Sakā tigraxaudā ("with pointed caps"), the Sakā haumavargā ("Hauma drinkers", furthest East). Soldiers of the Achaemenid army, Xerxes I tomb detail, circa 480 BC.[35]

The Achaemenid inscriptions initially listed a single group of Sakā. However, following Darius I's campaign of 520 to 518 BC against the Asian nomads, they were differentiated into two groups, both living in Central Asia to the east of the Caspian Sea:[34][36]

A third name was added after the Darius's campaign north of the Danube:[34]

  • the Sakā tayaiy paradraya (𐎿𐎣𐎠 𐏐 𐎫𐎹𐎡𐎹 𐏐 𐎱𐎼𐎭𐎼𐎹) – "the Sakā who live beyond the (Black) Sea," who were the Pontic Scythians of the East European steppes

An additional term is found in two inscriptions elsewhere:[41][34]

  • the Sakaibiš tayaiy para Sugdam (𐎿𐎣𐎡𐎲𐎡𐏁 𐏐 𐎫𐎹𐎡𐎹 𐏐 𐎱𐎼 𐏐 𐎿𐎢𐎥𐎭𐎶) – "Saka who are beyond Sogdia", a term was used by Darius for the people who formed the north-eastern limits of his empire at the opposite end to satrapy of Kush (the Ethiopians).[42][43] These Sakaibiš tayaiy para Sugdam have been suggested to have been the same people as the Sakā haumavargā[44]

Moreover, Darius the Great's Suez Inscriptions mention two group of Sakas:[45][46]

  • the Sꜣg pḥ (𓐠𓎼𓄖𓈉) – "Sakā of the Marshes"
  • the Sk tꜣ (𓋴𓎝𓎡𓇿𓈉) – "Sakā of the Land"

The scholar David Bivar had tentatively identified the Sk tꜣ with the Sakā haumavargā,[47] and John Manuel Cook had tentatively identified the Sꜣg pḥ with the Sakā tigraxaudā.[44] More recently, the scholar Rüdiger Schmitt has suggested that the Sꜣg pḥ and the Sk tꜣ might have collectively designated the Sakā tigraxaudā/Massagetae.[48]

The Achaemenid king Xerxes I listed the Saka coupled with the Dahā (𐎭𐏃𐎠) people of Central Asia,[42][44][41] who might possibly have been identical with the Sakā tigraxaudā.[49][50][51]

Modern terminology

See also: Scythian cultures

Although the ancient Persians, ancient Greeks, and ancient Babylonians respectively used the names "Saka," "Scythian," and "Cimmerian" for all the steppe nomads, modern scholars now use the term Saka to refer specifically to Iranian peoples who inhabited the northern and eastern Eurasian Steppe and the Tarim Basin;[3][52][4][8] and while the Cimmerians were often described by contemporaries as culturally Scythian, they may have differed ethnically from the Scythians proper, to whom the Cimmerians were related, and who also displaced and replaced the Cimmerians.[9]

Location

class=notpageimage|
The Sakas, and main Asian polities, circa 200 BC.[53][54][55]

The Sakā tigraxaudā and Sakā haumavargā both lived in the steppe and highland areas located in northern Central Asia and to the east of the Caspian Sea.[34][36][56]

The Sakā tigraxaudā/Massagetae more specifically lived around Chorasmia[57] and in the lowlands of Central Asia located to the east of the Caspian Sea and the south-east of the Aral Sea, in the Kyzylkum Desert and the Ustyurt Plateau, most especially between the Araxes and Iaxartes rivers.[49][48] The Sakā tigraxaudā/Massagetae could also be found in the Caspian Steppe.[37] The imprecise description of where the Massagetae lived by ancient authors has however led modern scholars to ascribe to them various locations, such as the Oxus delta, the Iaxartes delta, between the Caspian and Aral seas or forther to the north or north-east, but without basing these suggestions on any conclusive arguments.[48] Other locations assigned to the Massagetae include the area corresponding to modern-day Turkmenistan.[58]

The Sakā haumavargā lived around the Pamir Mountains and the Ferghana Valley.[57]

The Sakaibiš tayaiy para Sugdam, who may have been identical with the Sakā haumavargā, lived on the north-east border of the Achaemenid Empire on the Iaxartes river.[34]

Some other Saka groups lived to the east of the Pamir Mountains and to the north of the Iaxartes river,[56] as well as in the regions corresponding to modern-day Qirghizia, Tian Shan, Altai, Tuva, Mongolia, Xinjiang, and Kazakhstan.[57]

The Sək, that is the Saka who were in contact with the Chinese, inhabited the Ili and Chu valleys of modern Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan, which was called the "land of the Sək", i.e. "land of the Saka", in the Book of Han.[59]

History

Origins

Arzhan kurgan (8–7th century BC)
 
 
 
 
Arzhan kurgan and early Saka artifacts, dated to 8–7th century BC
See also: Indo-European migrations and Sintashta culture

Studies of Iron Age individuals investigated show genomic evidence for Caucasus hunter-gatherer and Eastern European hunter-gatherer ancestry. This is consistent with the idea that the blend of EHG and Caucasian elements in carriers of the Yamnaya culture was formed on the European steppe and exported into Central Asia and Siberia26. All of our analyses support the hypothesis that the genetic composition of the Scythians can best be described as a mixture of Yamnaya-related ancestry and East Asian/north Siberian elements.[60]

On the other hand, archaeological evidence now tends to suggest that the origins of Scythian culture, characterized by its kurgans burial mounds and its Animal style of the 1st millennium BC, are to be found among Eastern Scythians rather than their Western counterparts: eastern kurgans are older than western ones (such as the Altaic kurgan Arzhan 1 in Tuva), and elements of the Animal style are first attested in areas of the Yenisei river and modern-day China in the 10th century BCE.[61] The rapid spread of Scythian culture, from the Eastern Scythians to the Western Scythians, is also confirmed by significant east-to-west gene flow across the steppes during the 1st millennium BC.[60][61]

The Sakas spoke a language belonging to the Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages. The Pazyryk burials of the Pazyryk culture in the Ukok Plateau in the 4th and 3rd centuries BC are thought to be of Saka chieftains.[62][63][64] These burials show striking similarities with the earlier Tarim mummies at Gumugou.[63] The Issyk kurgan of south-eastern Kazakhstan,[64] and the Ordos culture of the Ordos Plateau has also been connected with the Saka.[65] It has been suggested that the ruling elite of the Xiongnu was of Saka origin.[66] Some scholars contend that in the 8th century BC, a Saka raid from the Altai may be "connected" with a raid on Zhou China.[67]

Early history

The Saka are attested in historical and archaeological records dating to around the 8th century BC.[68]

The Saka tribe of the Massagetae/Tigraxaudā rose to power in the 8th to 7th centuries BC, when they migrated from the east into Central Asia,[48] from where they expelled the Scythians, another nomadic Iranian tribe to whom they were closely related, after which they came to occupy large areas of the region beginning in the 6th century BC.[37] The Massagetae forcing the Early Scythians to the west across the Araxes river and into the Caucasian and Pontic steppes started a significant movement of the nomadic peoples of the Eurasian Steppe,[69] following which the Scythians displaced the Cimmerians and the Agathyrsi, who were also nomadic Iranian peoples closely related to the Massagetae and the Scythians, conquered their territories,[69][70][37][71][72][73] and invaded Western Asia, where their presence had an important role in the history of the ancient civilisations of Mesopotamia, Anatolia, Egypt, and Iran.[71]

During the 7th century BC itself, Saka presence started appearing in the Tarim Basin region.[68]

According to the ancient Greek historian Diodorus Siculus, the Parthians rebelled against the Medes during the reign of Cyaxares, after which the Parthians put their country and capital city under the protection of the Sakas. This was followed by a long war opposing the Medes to the Saka, the latter of whom were led by the queen Zarinaea. At the end of this war, the Parthians accepted Median rule, and the Saka and the Medes made peace.[74][75][76]

 
Captured Saka king Skunkha, from Mount Behistun, Iran, Achaemenid stone relief from the reign of Darius I (r. 522–486 BC)
 
The Sakas as subjects of the Achaemenid Empire on the statue of Darius I, circa 500 BC.

According to the Greek historian Ctesias, once the Persian Achaemenid Empire's founder, Cyrus, had overthrown his grandfather the Median king Astyages, the Bactrians accepted him as the heir of Astyages and submitted to him, after which he founded the city of Cyropolis on the Iaxartes river as well as seven fortresses to protect the northern frontier of his empire against the Saka. Cyrus then attacked the Sakā haumavargā, initially defeated them and captured their king, Amorges. After this, Amorges's queen, Sparethra, defeated Cyrus with a large army of both men and women warriors and captured Parmises, the brother-in-law of Cyrus and the brother of his wife Amytis, as well as Parmises's three sons, whom Sparethra exchanged in return for her husband, after which Cyrus and Amorges became allies, and Amorges helped Cyrus conquer Lydia.[77][78][79][80][81][82]

Cyrus, accompanied by the Sakā haumavargā of his ally Amorges, later carried out a campaign against the Massagetae/Sakā tigraxaudā in 530 BC.[48] According to Herodotus, Cyrus captured a Massagetaean camp by ruse, after which the Massagetae queen Tomyris led the tribe's main force against the Persians, defeated them, and placed the severed head of Cyrus in a sack full of blood. Some versions of the records of the death of Cyrus named the Derbices, rather than the Massagetae, as the tribe against whom Cyrus died in battle, because the Derbices were a member tribe of the Massagetae confederation or identical with the whole of the Massagetae.[83][48] After Cyrus had been mortally wounded by the Derbices/Massagetae, Amorges and his Sakā haumavargā army helped the Persian soldiers defeat them. Cyrus told his sons to respect their own mother as well as Amorges above everyone else before dying.[82]

Possibly shortly before the 520s BC, the Saka expanded into the valleys of the Ili and Chu in eastern Central Asia.[59] Around 30 Saka tombs in the form of kurgans (burial mounds) have also been found in the Tian Shan area dated to between 550–250 BC.[68]

 
Eurasia in 400 BC, showing location of the Saka and their neighbors

Darius I waged wars against the eastern Sakas during a campaign of 520 to 518 BC where, according to his inscription at Behistun, he conquered the Massagetae/Sakā tigraxaudā, captured their king Skunxa, and replaced him with a ruler who was loyal to Achaemenid rule.[48][82][84] The territories of the Saka were absorbed into the Achaemenid Empire as part of Chorasmia that included much of the territory between the Oxus and the Iaxartes rivers,[85] and the Saka then supplied the Achaemenid army with large number of mounted bowmen.[86] According to Polyaenus, Darius fought against three armies led by three kings, respectively named Sacesphares, Amorges or Homarges, and Thamyris, with Polyaenus's account being based on accurate Persian historical records.[82][87][88] After Darius's administrative reforms of the Achaemenid Empire, the Sakā tigraxaudā were included within the same tax district as the Medes.[89]

During the period of Achaemenid rule, Central Asia was in contact with Saka populations who were themselves in contact with China.[90]

After Alexander the Great conquered the Achaemenid Empire, the Saka resisted his incursions into Central Asia.[52]

At least by the late 2nd century BC, the Sakas had founded states in the Tarim Basin.[18]

Migrations

 
Model of a Saka/Kangju cataphract armour with neck-guard, from Khalchayan. 1st century BCE. Museum of Arts of Uzbekistan, nb 40.[91]

The Saka were pushed out of the Ili and Chu River valleys by the Yuezhi.[92][15][16] An account of the movement of these people is given in Sima Qian's Records of the Grand Historian. The Yuehzhi, who originally lived between Tängri Tagh (Tian Shan) and Dunhuang of Gansu, China,[93] were assaulted and forced to flee from the Hexi Corridor of Gansu by the forces of the Xiongnu ruler Modu Chanyu, who conquered the area in 177–176 BC.[94][95][96][97][98][99] In turn the Yuehzhi were responsible for attacking and pushing the Sai (i.e. Saka) west into Sogdiana, where, between 140 and 130 BC, the latter crossed the Syr Darya into Bactria. The Saka also moved southwards toward the Pamirs and northern India, where they settled in Kashmir, and eastward, to settle in some of the oasis-states of Tarim Basin sites, like Yanqi (焉耆, Karasahr) and Qiuci (龜茲, Kucha).[100][101] The Yuehzhi, themselves under attacks from another nomadic tribe, the Wusun, in 133–132 BC, moved, again, from the Ili and Chu valleys, and occupied the country of Daxia, (大夏, "Bactria").[59][102]

 
The Heavenly Horse is a ceremonial gilted bronze finial with a standing horse, created by the Sakas people between the 4th and 1st centuries BCE.

The ancient Greco-Roman geographer Strabo noted that the four tribes that took down the Bactrians in the Greek and Roman account – the Asioi, Pasianoi, Tokharoi and Sakaraulai – came from land north of the Syr Darya where the Ili and Chu valleys are located.[103][59] Identification of these four tribes varies, but Sakaraulai may indicate an ancient Saka tribe, the Tokharoi is possibly the Yuezhi, and while the Asioi had been proposed to be groups such as the Wusun or Alans.[103][104]

René Grousset wrote of the migration of the Saka: "the Saka, under pressure from the Yueh-chih [Yuezhi], overran Sogdiana and then Bactria, there taking the place of the Greeks." Then, "Thrust back in the south by the Yueh-chih," the Saka occupied "the Saka country, Sakastana, whence the modern Persian Seistan."[103] Some of the Saka fleeing the Yuezhi attacked the Parthian Empire, where they defeated and killed the kings Phraates II and Artabanus.[92] These Sakas were eventually settled by Mithridates II in what become known as Sakastan.[92] According to Harold Walter Bailey, the territory of Drangiana (now in Afghanistan and Pakistan) became known as "Land of the Sakas", and was called Sakastāna in the Persian language of contemporary Iran, in Armenian as Sakastan, with similar equivalents in Pahlavi, Greek, Sogdian, Syriac, Arabic, and the Middle Persian tongue used in Turfan, Xinjiang, China.[105] This is attested in a contemporary Kharosthi inscription found on the Mathura lion capital belonging to the Saka kingdom of the Indo-Scythians (200 BC – 400 AD) in North India,[105] roughly the same time the Chinese record that the Saka had invaded and settled the country of Jibin 罽賓 (i.e. Kashmir, of modern-day India and Pakistan).[106]

Iaroslav Lebedynsky and Victor H. Mair speculate that some Sakas may also have migrated to the area of Yunnan in southern China following their expulsion by the Yuezhi. Excavations of the prehistoric art of the Dian Kingdom of Yunnan have revealed hunting scenes of Caucasoid horsemen in Central Asian clothing.[107] The scenes depicted on these drums sometimes represent these horsemen practising hunting. Animal scenes of felines attacking oxen are also at times reminiscent of Scythian art both in theme and in composition.[108]

 
The Saka kingdom of the Indo-Scythians and contemporary continental Asian polities in 100 BC

Migrations of the 2nd and 1st century BC have left traces in Sogdia and Bactria, but they cannot firmly be attributed to the Saka, similarly with the sites of Sirkap and Taxila in ancient India. The rich graves at Tillya Tepe in Afghanistan are seen as part of a population affected by the Saka.[109]

The Shakya clan of India, to which Gautama Buddha, called Śākyamuni "Sage of the Shakyas", belonged, were also likely Sakas, as Michael Witzel[110] and Christopher I. Beckwith[111] have alleged. The scholar Bryan Levman however criticised this hypothesis for resting on slim to no evidence, and maintains that the Shakyas were a population native to the north-east Gangetic plain who were unrelated to Iranic Sakas.[112]

Indo-Scythians

Main article: Indo-Scythians
 
Head of a Saka warrior, as a defeated enemy of the Yuezhi, from Khalchayan, northern Bactria, 1st century BC.[113][114][115]

The region in modern Afghanistan and Iran where the Saka moved to became known as "land of the Saka" or Sakastan.[105] This is attested in a contemporary Kharosthi inscription found on the Mathura lion capital belonging to the Saka kingdom of the Indo-Scythians (200 BC – 400 AD) in northern India,[105] roughly the same time the Chinese record that the Saka had invaded and settled the country of Jibin 罽賓 (i.e. Kashmir, of modern-day India and Pakistan).[106] In the Persian language of contemporary Iran the territory of Drangiana was called Sakastāna, in Armenian as Sakastan, with similar equivalents in Pahlavi, Greek, Sogdian, Syriac, Arabic, and the Middle Persian tongue used in Turfan, Xinjiang, China.[105] The Sakas also captured Gandhara and Taxila, and migrated to North India.[116] The most famous Indo-Scythian king was Maues.[117] An Indo-Scythians kingdom was established in Mathura (200 BC – 400 AD).[105][17] Weer Rajendra Rishi, an Indian linguist, identified linguistic affinities between Indian and Central Asian languages, which further lends credence to the possibility of historical Sakan influence in North India.[116][118] According to historian Michael Mitchiner, the Abhira tribe were a Saka people cited in the Gunda inscription of the Western Satrap Rudrasimha I dated to AD 181.[119]

Kingdoms in the Tarim Basin

Kingdom of Khotan

Main article: Kingdom of Khotan
 
Coin of Gurgamoya, king of Khotan. Khotan, first century.
Obv: Kharosthi legend, "Of the great king of kings, king of Khotan, Gurgamoya.
Rev: Chinese legend: "Twenty-four grain copper coin". British Museum

The Kingdom of Khotan was a Saka city state in on the southern edge of the Tarim Basin. As a consequence of the Han–Xiongnu War spanning from 133 BC to 89 AD, the Tarim Basin (now Xinjiang, Northwest China), including Khotan and Kashgar, fell under Han Chinese influence, beginning with the reign of Emperor Wu of Han (r. 141–87 BC).[120][121]

Archaeological evidence and documents from Khotan and other sites in the Tarim Basin provided information on the language spoken by the Saka.[105]>[122] The official language of Khotan was initially Gandhari Prakrit written in Kharosthi, and coins from Khotan dated to the 1st century bear dual inscriptions in Chinese and Gandhari Prakrit, indicating links of Khotan to both India and China.[123] Surviving documents however suggest that an Iranian language was used by the people of the kingdom for a long time Third-century AD documents in Prakrit from nearby Shanshan record the title for the king of Khotan as hinajha (i.e. "generalissimo"), a distinctively Iranian-based word equivalent to the Sanskrit title senapati, yet nearly identical to the Khotanese Saka hīnāysa attested in later Khotanese documents.[123] This, along with the fact that the king's recorded regnal periods were given as the Khotanese kṣuṇa, "implies an established connection between the Iranian inhabitants and the royal power," according to the Professor of Iranian Studies Ronald E. Emmerick.[123] He contended that Khotanese-Saka-language royal rescripts of Khotan dated to the 10th century "makes it likely that the ruler of Khotan was a speaker of Iranian."[123] Furthermore, he argued that the early form of the name of Khotan, hvatana, is connected semantically with the name Saka.[123]

The region once again came under Chinese suzerainty with the campaigns of conquest by Emperor Taizong of Tang (r. 626–649).[124] From the late eighth to ninth centuries, the region changed hands between the rival Tang and Tibetan Empires.[125][126] However, by the early 11th century the region fell to the Muslim Turkic peoples of the Kara-Khanid Khanate, which led to both the Turkification of the region as well as its conversion from Buddhism to Islam.

 
A document from Khotan written in Khotanese Saka, part of the Eastern Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages, listing the animals of the Chinese zodiac in the cycle of predictions for people born in that year; ink on paper, early 9th century

Later Khotanese-Saka-language documents, ranging from medical texts to Buddhist literature, have been found in Khotan and Tumshuq (northeast of Kashgar).[105] Similar documents in the Khotanese-Saka language dating mostly to the 10th century have been found in the Dunhuang manuscripts.[127]

Although the ancient Chinese had called Khotan Yutian (于闐), another more native Iranian name occasionally used was Jusadanna (瞿薩旦那), derived from Indo-Iranian Gostan and Gostana, the names of the town and region around it, respectively.[128]

Shule Kingdom

Main article: Shule Kingdom

Much like the neighboring people of the Kingdom of Khotan, people of Kashgar, the capital of Shule, spoke Saka, one of the Eastern Iranian languages.[129] According to the Book of Han, the Saka split and formed several states in the region. These Saka states may include two states to the northwest of Kashgar, and Tumshuq to its northeast, and Tushkurgan south in the Pamirs.[130] Kashgar also conquered other states such as Yarkand and Kucha during the Han dynasty, but in its later history, Kashgar was controlled by various empires, including Tang China,[131][132][133] before it became part of the Turkic Kara-Khanid Khanate in the 10th century. In the 11th century, according to Mahmud al-Kashgari, some non-Turkic languages like the Kanchaki and Sogdian were still used in some areas in the vicinity of Kashgar,[134] and Kanchaki is thought to belong to the Saka language group.[130] It is believed that the Tarim Basin was linguistically Turkified before the 11th century ended.[135]

Historiography

 
Scythia and the Parthian Empire in about 170 BC (before the Yuezhi invaded Bactria).

Persians referred to all northern nomads as Sakas. Herodotus (IV.64) describes them as Scythians, although they figure under a different name:

The Sacae, or Scyths, were clad in trousers, and had on their heads tall stiff caps rising to a point. They bore the bow of their country and the dagger; besides which they carried the battle-axe, or sagaris. They were in truth Amyrgian (Western) Scythians, but the Persians called them Sacae, since that is the name which they gave to all Scythians.

Strabo

In the 1st century BC, the Greek-Roman geographer Strabo gave an extensive description of the peoples of the eastern steppe, whom he located in Central Asia beyond Bactria and Sogdiana.[136]

Strabo went on to list the names of the various tribes he believed to be "Scythian",[136] and in so doing almost certainly conflated them with unrelated tribes of eastern Central Asia. These tribes included the Saka.

Now the greater part of the Scythians, beginning at the Caspian Sea, are called Däae, but those who are situated more to the east than these are named Massagetae and Sacae, whereas all the rest are given the general name of Scythians, though each people is given a separate name of its own. They are all for the most part nomads. But the best known of the nomads are those who took away Bactriana from the Greeks, I mean the Asii, Pasiani, Tochari, and Sacarauli, who originally came from the country on the other side of the Iaxartes River that adjoins that of the Sacae and the Sogdiani and was occupied by the Sacae. And as for the Däae, some of them are called Aparni, some Xanthii, and some Pissuri. Now of these the Aparni are situated closest to Hyrcania and the part of the sea that borders on it, but the remainder extend even as far as the country that stretches parallel to Aria. Between them and Hyrcania and Parthia and extending as far as the Arians is a great waterless desert, which they traversed by long marches and then overran Hyrcania, Nesaea, and the plains of the Parthians. And these people agreed to pay tribute, and the tribute was to allow the invaders at certain appointed times to overrun the country and carry off booty. But when the invaders overran their country more than the agreement allowed, war ensued, and in turn their quarrels were composed and new wars were begun. Such is the life of the other nomads also, who are always attacking their neighbors and then in turn settling their differences.

(Strabo, Geography, 11.8.1; transl. 1903 by H. C. Hamilton & W. Falconer.)[136]

Indian sources

 
Silver coin of the Indo-Scythian King Azes II (ruled c. 35–12 BC). Note the royal tamga on the coin.
Main article: Indo-Scythians

The Sakas receive numerous mentions in Indian texts, including the Purāṇas, the Manusmṛiti, the Rāmāyaṇa, the Mahābhārata, and the Mahābhāṣya of Patanjali.

Language

Main article: Saka language
Issyk inscription
 
Issyk dish with inscription.
 
Drawing of the Issyk inscription.

Modern scholarly consensus is that the Eastern Iranian language ancestral to the Pamir languages in Central Asia and the medieval Saka language of Xinjiang, was one of the Scythian languages.[137] Evidence of the Middle Iranian "Scytho-Khotanese" language survives in Northwest China, where Khotanese-Saka-language documents, ranging from medical texts to Buddhist texts, have been found primarily in Khotan and Tumshuq (northeast of Kashgar).[105] They largely predate the Islamization of Xinjiang under the Turkic-speaking Kara-Khanid Khanate.[105] Similar documents, the Dunhuang manuscripts, were discovered written in the Khotanese Saka language and date mostly from the tenth century.[138]

Attestations of the Saka language show that it was an Eastern Iranian language. The linguistic heartland of Saka was the Kingdom of Khotan, which had two varieties, corresponding to the major settlements at Khotan (now called Hotan) and Tumshuq (now titled Tumxuk).[139][140] Tumshuqese and Khotanese varieties of Saka contain many borrowings from the Middle Indo-Aryan languages, but also share features with the modern Eastern Iranian languages Wakhi and Pashto.[141]

The Issyk inscription, a short fragment on a silver cup found in the Issyk kurgan in Kazakhstan is believed to be an early example of Saka, constituting one of very few autochthonous epigraphic traces of that language.[citation needed] The inscription is in a variant of Kharosthi. Harmatta identifies the dialect as Khotanese Saka, tentatively translating its as: "The vessel should hold wine of grapes, added cooked food, so much, to the mortal, then added cooked fresh butter on".[142]

A growing body of both linguistic and physical anthropological evidence suggest the Wakhi are descendants of Saka.[143][144][145][146][147][148] According to the Indo-Europeanist Martin Kümmel, Wakhi may be classified as a Western Saka dialect; the other attested Saka dialects, Khotanese and Tumshuqese, would then be classified as Eastern Saka.[149]

The Saka heartland was gradually conquered during the Turkic expansion, beginning in the sixth century, and the area was gradually Turkified linguistically under the Uyghurs.

Genetics

See also: Scythian cultures § Genetics, Scythians § Genetics, Sarmatians § Genetics, and Tagar culture § Genetics
 
 
Simplified admixture analysis of ancient steppe populations, including the Pazyryk culture.[150]

The earliest studies could only analyze segments of mtDNA, thus providing only broad correlations of affinity to modern West Eurasian or East Eurasian populations. For example, in a 2002 study the mitochondrial DNA of Saka period male and female skeletal remains from a double inhumation kurgan at the Beral site in Kazakhstan was analysed. The two individuals were found to be not closely related. The HV1 mitochondrial sequence of the male was similar to the Anderson sequence which is most frequent in European populations. The HV1 sequence of the female suggested a greater likelihood of Asian origins.[151]

More recent studies have been able to type for specific mtDNA lineages. For example, a 2004 study examined the HV1 sequence obtained from a male "Scytho-Siberian" at the Kizil site in the Altai Republic. It belonged to the N1a maternal lineage, a geographically West Eurasian lineage.[152] Another study by the same team, again of mtDNA from two Scytho-Siberian skeletons found in the Altai Republic, showed that they had been typical males "of mixed Euro-Mongoloid origin". One of the individuals was found to carry the F2a maternal lineage, and the other the D lineage, both of which are characteristic of East Eurasian populations.[153]

 
A Saka man from the Pazyryk culture (reconstruction from burials, Anokhin Museum).[154]

These early studies have been elaborated by an increasing number of studies by Russian and western scholars. Conclusions are (i) an early, Bronze Age mixing of both west and east Eurasian lineages, with western lineages being found far to the east, but not vice versa; (ii) an apparent reversal by Iron Age times, with an increasing presence of East Eurasian mtDNA lineages in the Western steppe; (iii) the possible role of migrations from the south, the Balkano-Danubian and Iranian regions, toward the steppe.[155][156]

Haplogroups

Ancient Y-DNA data was finally provided by Keyser et al in 2009. They studied the haplotypes and haplogroups of 26 ancient human specimens from the Krasnoyarsk area in Siberia dated from between the middle of the 2nd millennium BC and the 4th century AD (Scythian and Sarmatian timeframe). Nearly all subjects belonged to haplogroup R-M17. The authors suggest that their data shows that between the Bronze and the Iron Ages the constellation of populations known variously as Scythians, Andronovians, etc. were blue- (or green-) eyed, fair-skinned and light-haired people who might have played a role in the early development of the Tarim Basin civilisation. Moreover, this study found that they were genetically more closely related to modern populations in eastern Europe than those of central and southern Asia.[157] The ubiquity and dominance of the R1a Y-DNA lineage contrasted markedly with the diversity seen in the mtDNA profiles.

A genetic study published in Nature in May 2018 examined the remains of twenty-eight Inner Asian Sakas buried between ca. 900 BC to AD 1, compromising eight Sakas of southern Siberia (Tagar culture), eight Sakas of the central steppe (Tasmola culture), and twelve Sakas of the Tian Shan. The six samples of Y-DNA extracted from the Tian Shan Saka belonged to the West Eurasian haplogroups R (four samples), R1 and R1a1. For the five central steppe Saka males, four belonged to haplogroup R1a while one individual (DA19) belonged to haplogroup E1b1b-FT167798*.[158]

The samples of mtDNA extracted from the Tian Shan Saka belonged to C4, H4d, T2a1, U5a1d2b, H2a, U5a1a1, HV6 (two samples), D4j8 (two samples), W1c and G2a1.[159]

Autosomal DNA

The 2018 in study detected significant genetic differences between the Inner Asian Sakas and Scythians of the Pannonian Basin, as well as between different Saka subgroups of southern Siberia, the central steppe and the Tian Shan. While Scythians (or "Hungarian Saka") harbored exclusively ancestry associated with Western Steppe Herders, Inner Asian Saka displayed additional Neolithic Iranian (BMAC) and Southern Siberian hunter-gatherer (represented through a proxy of modern Altaians) components in varying degrees. Tian Shan Sakas were found to be of about 70% Western Steppe Herder (WSH) ancestry, 25% Southern Siberian Hunter-Gatherer ancestry and 5% Iranian Neolithic ancestry. The Iranian Neolithic ancestry was probably from the Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex. Sakas of the Tasmola culture were found to be of about 56% WSH ancestry and 44% Southern Siberian Hunter-Gather ancestry. The peoples of the Tagar culture had about 83.5% WSH ancestry, 9% Ancient North Eurasian (ANE) ancestry and 7.5% Southern Siberian Hunter-Gatherer ancestry. The study suggested that the Inner Asian Saka were the source of West Eurasian ancestry among the Xiongnu, and that the Huns probably emerged through minor male-driven geneflow into the Saka through westward migrations by the Xiongnu.[160]

 
Map of Saka cultures with genetic profiles, according to Jeong et al. (2020): the Sakas combined Western Eurasian (Sintashta,  ) and Ancient Northeast Asian (Baikal EBA,  ) ancestry, with a smaller BMAC admixture ( ).[161]

A genetic study published in 2020 in Cell,[162] successfully modeled the ancestry of major Saka groups as a combination of Sintashta (Western Steppe Herders) and Baikal EBA ancestry (Western Baikal early Bronze Age hunter-gatherers, a profile consisting of Ancient Northeast Asian and Ancient North Eurasian ancestries),[163] with varying degrees of an additional Neolithic Iranian (BMAC) component.[162] Specifically, Central Sakas (Tasmola culture) were found to be of about 43% Sintashta ancestry, 50% Baikal_EBA ancestry and 7% BMAC ancestry. Tagar Sakas (Tagar culture) were found to have an elevated Sintashta proportion (69% Sintashta, 24% Baikal_EBA, and 7% BMAC), while Tian Shan Sakas had an elevated BMAC proportion at 24% (50% Sintashta, 26% Baikal_EBA, and 24% BMAC). The eastern Uyuk Sakas (Chandman culture) had 50% Sintashta, 44% Baikal_EBA, and 6% BMAC ancestry. The Pazyryk Sakas had elevated Baikal_EBA ancestry, with a nearly non-existant BMAC component (32% Sintashta, 68% Baikal_EBA, and ~0% BMAC).[164]

Physical appearance

Early physical analyses have unanimously concluded that the Saka, even those far to the east (e.g. the Pazyryk region), possessed predominantly Europid features, although mixed Euro-Mongoloid phenotypes also occur, depending on site and period.[165]

The 2nd century BC Han Chinese envoy Zhang Qian described the Sai (Saka) as having yellow (probably meaning hazel or green), and blue eyes.[166] In Natural History, the 1st century AD Roman author Pliny the Elder characterises the Seres, sometimes identified as Saka or Tocharians, as red-haired and blue-eyed.[166][167]

Archaeology

 
A Pazyryk horseman in a felt painting from a burial around 300 BC. The Pazyryks appear to be closely related to the Scythians.[168]

The spectacular grave-goods from Arzhan, and others in Tuva, have been dated from about 900 BC onward, and are associated with the Saka. Burials at Pazyryk in the Altay Mountains have included some spectacularly preserved Sakas of the "Pazyryk culture" – including the Ice Maiden of the 5th century BC.

Pazyryk culture

Main article: Pazyryk culture

Saka burials documented by modern archaeologists include the kurgans at Pazyryk in the Ulagan (Red) district of the Altai Republic, south of Novosibirsk in the Altai Mountains of southern Siberia (near Mongolia). Archaeologists have extrapolated the Pazyryk culture from these finds: five large burial mounds and several smaller ones between 1925 and 1949, one opened in 1947 by Russian archaeologist Sergei Rudenko. The burial mounds concealed chambers of larch-logs covered over with large cairns of boulders and stones.[169]

The Pazyryk culture flourished between the 7th and 3rd century BC in the area associated with the Sacae.

Ordinary Pazyryk graves contain only common utensils, but in one, among other treasures, archaeologists found the famous Pazyryk Carpet, the oldest surviving wool-pile oriental rug. Another striking find, a 3-metre-high four-wheel funerary chariot, survived well-preserved from the 5th to 4th century BC.[170]

Tillia Tepe treasure

 
Artifacts found the tombs 2 and 4 of Tillya Tepe and reconstitution of their use on the man and woman found in these tombs
Main article: Tillia Tepe

A site found in 1968 in Tillia Tepe (literally "the golden hill") in northern Afghanistan (former Bactria) near Shebergan consisted of the graves of five women and one man with extremely rich jewelry, dated to around the 1st century BC, and probably related to that of Saka tribes normally living slightly to the north. Altogether the graves yielded several thousands of pieces of fine jewelry, usually made from combinations of gold, turquoise and lapis-lazuli.

A high degree of cultural syncretism pervades the findings, however. Hellenistic cultural and artistic influences appear in many of the forms and human depictions (from amorini to rings with the depiction of Athena and her name inscribed in Greek), attributable to the existence of the Seleucid empire and Greco-Bactrian kingdom in the same area until around 140 BC, and the continued existence of the Indo-Greek kingdom in the northwestern Indian sub-continent until the beginning of our era. This testifies to the richness of cultural influences in the area of Bactria at that time.

Eleke Sazy Burial Complex

In 2020, archaeologists excavated multiple burial mounds in the Eleke Sazy Valley in East Kazakhstan. Here, a large number of gold artifacts were found. These artifacts included golf harness fittings, pendants, chains, appliqués, and more – most of which are in the Animal Style of the Scythian-Saka era dating back to the 5th–4th centuries BC.[171]

Culture

Gender roles

Recently, evidence confirmed by the full-genomic analysis of a Scythian child's remains found in a coffin made of a larch trunk, which was discovered in Saryg-Bulun in Central Tuva, revealed that the individual, previously thought to be male because it had items that were associated with the belief that Scythian society was male-dominated, was actually female. Along with the leather skirt, the burial also contained a leather headdress painted with red pigment, a coat sewn from jerboa fur, a leather belt with bronze ornaments and buckles, a leather quiver with arrows with painted ornaments on the shafts, a fully-preserved battle pick, and a bow. These items provide valuable insights into the material culture and lifestyle of the Scythians, including their hunting and warfare practices, and their use of animal hides for clothing.[172]

Art

Further information: Scythian art
 
Battle scenes between "Kangju" Saka warriors, from the Orlat plaques. 1st century CE.

The art of the Saka was of a similar styles as other Iranian peoples of the steppes, which is referred to collectively as Scythian art. In 2001, the discovery of an undisturbed royal Scythian burial-barrow illustrated Scythian animal-style gold that lacks the direct influence of Greek styles. Forty-four pounds of gold weighed down the royal couple in this burial, discovered near Kyzyl, capital of the Siberian republic of Tuva.

Ancient influences from Central Asia became identifiable in China following contacts of metropolitan China with nomadic western and northwestern border territories from the 8th century BC. The Chinese adopted the Scythian-style animal art of the steppes (descriptions of animals locked in combat), particularly the rectangular belt-plaques made of gold or bronze, and created their own versions in jade and steatite.[173]

Following their expulsion by the Yuezhi, some Saka may also have migrated to the area of Yunnan in southern China. Saka warriors could also have served as mercenaries for the various kingdoms of ancient China. Excavations of the prehistoric art of the Dian civilisation of Yunnan have revealed hunting scenes of Caucasoid horsemen in Central Asian clothing.[174]

Saka influences have been identified as far as Korea and Japan. Various Korean artifacts, such as the royal crowns of the kingdom of Silla, are said to be of "Scythian" design.[175] Similar crowns, brought through contacts with the continent, can also be found in Kofun era Japan.[176]

Clothing

Similar to other eastern Iranian peoples represented on the reliefs of the Apadana at Persepolis, Sakas are depicted as wearing long trousers, which cover the uppers of their boots. Over their shoulders they trail a type of long mantle, with one diagonal edge in back. One particular tribe of Sakas (the Saka tigraxaudā) wore pointed caps. Herodotus in his description of the Persian army mentions the Sakas as wearing trousers and tall pointed caps.[177]

Men and women wore long trousers, often adorned with metal plaques and often embroidered or adorned with felt appliqués; trousers could have been wider or tight fitting depending on the area. Materials used depended on the wealth, climate and necessity.[178]

 
Statuette from the Saka culture in Xinjiang, from a 3rd-century BC burial site north of the Tian Shan, Xinjiang Region Museum, Ürümqi.[179][180] Could alternatively be a Greek hoplite.[181]

Herodotus says Sakas had "high caps tapering to a point and stiffly upright." Asian Saka headgear is clearly visible on the Persepolis Apadana staircase bas-relief – high pointed hat with flaps over ears and the nape of the neck.[182] From China to the Danube delta, men seemed to have worn a variety of soft headgear – either conical like the one described by Herodotus, or rounder, more like a Phrygian cap.

Saka women dressed in much the same fashion as men. A Pazyryk burial, discovered in the 1990s, contained the skeletons of a man and a woman, each with weapons, arrowheads, and an axe. Herodotus mentioned that Sakas had "high caps and … wore trousers." Clothing was sewn from plain-weave wool, hemp cloth, silk fabrics, felt, leather and hides.

Pazyryk findings give the most almost fully preserved garments and clothing worn by the Scythian/Saka peoples. Ancient Persian bas-reliefs, inscriptions from Apadana and Behistun and archaeological findings give visual representations of these garments.

Based on the Pazyryk findings (can be seen also in the south Siberian, Uralic and Kazakhstan rock drawings) some caps were topped with zoomorphic wooden sculptures firmly attached to a cap and forming an integral part of the headgear, similar to the surviving nomad helmets from northern China. Men and warrior women wore tunics, often embroidered, adorned with felt applique work, or metal (golden) plaques.

Persepolis Apadana again serves a good starting point to observe the tunics of the Sakas. They appear to be a sewn, long-sleeved garment that extended to the knees and was girded with a belt, while the owner's weapons were fastened to the belt (sword or dagger, gorytos, battle-axe, whetstone etc.). Based on numerous archeological findings, men and warrior women wore long-sleeved tunics that were always belted, often with richly ornamented belts. The Kazakhstan Saka (e.g. Issyk Golden Man/Maiden) wore shorter and closer-fitting tunics than the Pontic steppe Scythians. Some Pazyryk culture Saka wore short belted tunic with a lapel on the right side, with upright collar, 'puffed' sleeves narrowing at the wrist and bound in narrow cuffs of a color different from the rest of the tunic.

Men and women wore coats: e.g. Pazyryk Saka had many varieties, from fur to felt. They could have worn a riding coat that later was known as a Median robe or Kantus. Long sleeved, and open, it seems that on the Persepolis Apadana Skudrian delegation is perhaps shown wearing such coat. The Pazyryk felt tapestry shows a rider wearing a billowing cloak.

Warfare

A skull from an Iron Age cemetery in South Siberia shows evidence of scalping. It lends physical evidence to the practice of scalp taking by the Scythians living there.[183]

See also

References

Citations

  1. ^ Chang, Claudia (2017). Rethinking Prehistoric Central Asia: Shepherds, Farmers, and Nomads. Routledge. p. 72. ISBN 978-1-351-70158-7.
  2. ^ Rhie, Marylin M. (2002). Early Buddhist art of China and Central Asia. Leiden: Brill. p. Fig. 5.70d. ISBN 978-90-04-11499-9. Fig. 5.70d Gold mail suit, crown and leg covers, from an Issik tomb, period of the Saka tribes, 5th to 4th century B.C., Institute of Archaeology, History and Ethnography, Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan (after Shiruku rodo no yuihO, pl. 18)
  3. ^ a b Beckwith 2009, p. 68 "Modern scholars have mostly used the name Saka to refer specifically to Iranians of the Eastern Steppe and Tarim Basin"
  4. ^ a b c d Dandamayev 1994, p. 37 "In modern scholarship the name 'Sakas' is reserved for the ancient tribes of northern and eastern Central Asia and Eastern Turkestan to distinguish them from the related Massagetae of the Aral region and the Scythians of the Pontic steppes. These tribes spoke Iranian languages, and their chief occupation was nomadic pastoralism."
  5. ^ Unterländer et al. 2017: "During the first millennium BC, nomadic people spread over the Eurasian Steppe from the Altai Mountains over the northern Black Sea area as far as the Carpathian Basin... Greek and Persian historians of the 1st millennium BCE chronicle the existence of the Massagetae and Sauromatians, and later, the Sarmatians and Sacae: cultures possessing artefacts similar to those found in classical Scythian monuments, such as weapons, horse harnesses and a distinctive 'Animal Style' artistic tradition. Accordingly, these groups are often assigned to the Scythian culture..."
  6. ^ Kramrisch, Stella. "Central Asian Arts: Nomadic Cultures". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved September 1, 2018. The Śaka tribe was pasturing its herds in the Pamirs, central Tien Shan, and in the Amu Darya delta. Their gold belt buckles, jewelry, and harness decorations display sheep, griffins, and other animal designs that are similar in style to those used by the Scythians, a nomadic people living in the Kuban basin of the Caucasus region and the western section of the Eurasian plain during the greater part of the 1st millennium bc.
  7. ^ David & McNiven 2018: "Horse-riding nomadism has been referred to as the culture of 'Early Nomads'. This term encompasses different ethnic groups (such as Scythians, Saka, Massagetae, and Yuezhi)..."
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  28. ^ * Dandamayev 1994, p. 37: "In modern scholarship the name 'Sakas' is reserved for the ancient tribes of northern and eastern Central Asia and Eastern Turkestan to distinguish them from the related Massagetae of the Aral region and the Scythians of the Pontic steppes. These tribes spoke Iranian languages, and their chief occupation was nomadic pastoralism."
    • Cernenko 2012, p. 3: "The Scythians lived in the Early Iron Age, and inhabited the northern areas of the Black Sea (Pontic) steppes. Though the 'Scythian period' in the history of Eastern Europe lasted little more than 400 years, from the 7th to the 3rd centuries BC, the impression these horsemen made upon the history of their times was such that a thousand years after they had ceased to exist as a sovereign people, their heartland and the territories which they dominated far beyond it continued to be known as 'greater Scythia'."
    • Melyukova 1990, pp. 97–98: "From the end of the 7th century B.C. to the 4th century B.C. the Central- Eurasian steppes were inhabited by two large groups of kin Iranian-speaking tribes – the Scythians and Sarmatians [...] "[I]t may be confidently stated that from the end of the 7th century to the 3rd century B.C. the Scythians occupied the steppe expanses of the north Black Sea area, from the Don in the east to the Danube in the West."
    • Ivantchik 2018: "Scythians, a nomadic people of Iranian origin who flourished in the steppe lands north of the Black Sea during the 7th–4th centuries BC (Figure 1). For related groups in Central Asia and India, see [...]"
    • Sulimirski 1985, pp. 149–153: "During the first half of the first millennium B.C., c. 3,000 to 2,500 years ago, the southern part of Eastern Europe was occupied mainly by peoples of Iranian stock [...] The main Iranian-speaking peoples of the region at that period were the Scyths and the Sarmatians [...] [T]he population of ancient Scythia was far from being homogeneous, nor were the Scyths themselves a homogeneous people. The country called after them was ruled by their principal tribe, the "Royal Scyths" (Her. iv. 20), who were of Iranian stock and called themselves "Skolotoi" (iv. 6); they were nomads who lived in the steppe east of the Dnieper up to the Don, and in the Crimean steppe [...] The eastern neighbours of the "Royal Scyths," the Sauromatians, were also Iranian; their country extended over the steppe east of the Don and the Volga."
    • Sulimirski & Taylor 1991, p. 547: "The name 'Scythian' is met in the classical authors and has been taken to refer to an ethnic group or people, also mentioned in Near Eastern texts, who inhabited the northern Black Sea region."
    • West 2002, pp. 437–440: "Ordinary Greek (and later Latin) usage could designate as Scythian any northern barbarian from the general area of the Eurasian steppe, the virtually treeless corridor of drought-resistant perennial grassland extending from the Danube to Manchuria. Herodotus seeks greater precision, and this essay is focussed on his Scythians, who belong to the North Pontic steppe [...] These true Scyths seems to be those whom he calls Royal Scyths, that is, the group who claimed hegemony [...] apparently warrior-pastoralists. It is generally agreed, from what we know of their names, that these were people of Iranian stock [...]"
    • Jacobson 1995, pp. 36–37: "When we speak of Scythians, we refer to those Scytho-Siberians who inhabited the Kuban Valley, the Taman and Kerch peninsulas, Crimea, the northern and northeastern littoral of the Black Sea, and the steppe and lower forest steppe regions now shared between Ukraine and Russia, from the seventh century down to the first century B.C [...] They almost certainly spoke an Iranian language [...]"
    • Di Cosmo 1999, p. 924: "The first historical steppe nomads, the Scythians, inhabited the steppe north of the Black Sea from about the eight century B.C."
    • Rice, Tamara Talbot. "Central Asian arts: Nomadic cultures". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved October 4, 2019. [Saka] gold belt buckles, jewelry, and harness decorations display sheep, griffins, and other animal designs that are similar in style to those used by the Scythians, a nomadic people living in the Kuban basin of the Caucasus region and the western section of the Eurasian plain during the greater part of the 1st millennium bc.
  29. ^ * Dandamayev 1994, p. 37: "In modern scholarship the name 'Sakas' is reserved for the ancient tribes of northern and eastern Central Asia and Eastern Turkestan to distinguish them from the related Massagetae of the Aral region and the Scythians of the Pontic steppes. These tribes spoke Iranian languages, and their chief occupation was nomadic pastoralism."
    • Cernenko 2012, p. 3: "The Scythians lived in the Early Iron Age, and inhabited the northern areas of the Black Sea (Pontic) steppes. Though the 'Scythian period' in the history of Eastern Europe lasted little more than 400 years, from the 7th to the 3rd centuries BC, the impression these horsemen made upon the history of their times was such that a thousand years after they had ceased to exist as a sovereign people, their heartland and the territories which they dominated far beyond it continued to be known as 'greater Scythia'."
    • Melyukova 1990, pp. 97–98: "From the end of the 7th century B.C. to the 4th century B.C. the Central- Eurasian steppes were inhabited by two large groups of kin Iranian-speaking tribes – the Scythians and Sarmatians [...] "[I]t may be confidently stated that from the end of the 7th century to the 3rd century B.C. the Scythians occupied the steppe expanses of the north Black Sea area, from the Don in the east to the Danube in the West."
    • Ivantchik 2018: "Scythians, a nomadic people of Iranian origin who flourished in the steppe lands north of the Black Sea during the 7th–4th centuries BC (Figure 1). For related groups in Central Asia and India, see [...]"
    • Sulimirski 1985, pp. 149–153: "During the first half of the first millennium B.C., c. 3,000 to 2,500 years ago, the southern part of Eastern Europe was occupied mainly by peoples of Iranian stock [...] The main Iranian-speaking peoples of the region at that period were the Scyths and the Sarmatians [...] [T]he population of ancient Scythia was far from being homogeneous, nor were the Scyths themselves a homogeneous people. The country called after them was ruled by their principal tribe, the "Royal Scyths" (Her. iv. 20), who were of Iranian stock and called themselves "Skolotoi" (iv. 6); they were nomads who lived in the steppe east of the Dnieper up to the Don, and in the Crimean steppe [...] The eastern neighbours of the "Royal Scyths," the Sauromatians, were also Iranian; their country extended over the steppe east of the Don and the Volga."
    • Sulimirski & Taylor 1991, p. 547: "The name 'Scythian' is met in the classical authors and has been taken to refer to an ethnic group or people, also mentioned in Near Eastern texts, who inhabited the northern Black Sea region."
    • West 2002, pp. 437–440: "Ordinary Greek (and later Latin) usage could designate as Scythian any northern barbarian from the general area of the Eurasian steppe, the virtually treeless corridor of drought-resistant perennial grassland extending from the Danube to Manchuria. Herodotus seeks greater precision, and this essay is focussed on his Scythians, who belong to the North Pontic steppe [...] These true Scyths seems to be those whom he calls Royal Scyths, that is, the group who claimed hegemony [...] apparently warrior-pastoralists. It is generally agreed, from what we know of their names, that these were people of Iranian stock [...]"
    • Jacobson 1995, pp. 36–37: "When we speak of Scythians, we refer to those Scytho-Siberians who inhabited the Kuban Valley, the Taman and Kerch peninsulas, Crimea, the northern and northeastern littoral of the Black Sea, and the steppe and lower forest steppe regions now shared between Ukraine and Russia, from the seventh century down to the first century B.C [...] They almost certainly spoke an Iranian language [...]"
    • Di Cosmo 1999, p. 924: "The first historical steppe nomads, the Scythians, inhabited the steppe north of the Black Sea from about the eight century B.C."
    • Rice, Tamara Talbot. "Central Asian arts: Nomadic cultures". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved October 4, 2019. [Saka] gold belt buckles, jewelry, and harness decorations display sheep, griffins, and other animal designs that are similar in style to those used by the Scythians, a nomadic people living in the Kuban basin of the Caucasus region and the western section of the Eurasian plain during the greater part of the 1st millennium bc.
  30. ^ Kramrisch, Stella. "Central Asian Arts: Nomadic Cultures". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved September 1, 2018. The Śaka tribe was pasturing its herds in the Pamirs, central Tien Shan, and in the Amu Darya delta. Their gold belt buckles, jewelry, and harness decorations display sheep, griffins, and other animal designs that are similar in style to those used by the Scythians, a nomadic people living in the Kuban basin of the Caucasus region and the western section of the Eurasian plain during the greater part of the 1st millennium bc.
  31. ^ a b Parpola, Simo (1970). Neo-Assyrian Toponyms. Kevaeler: Butzon & Bercker. p. 178.
  32. ^ "Iškuzaya [SCYTHIAN] (EN)". oracc.museum.upenn.edu.
  33. ^ "Asguzayu [SCYTHIAN] (EN)". oracc.museum.upenn.edu.
  34. ^ a b c d e f Cook 1985, p. 252-255.
  35. ^ Schmitt, Rüdiger (2003). "HAUMAVARGĀ". Encyclopædia Iranica.
  36. ^ a b Dandamayev 1994, p. 44-46.
  37. ^ a b c d Olbrycht 2000.
  38. ^ Olbrycht 2021: "Apparently the Dahai represented an entity not identical with the other better known groups of the Sakai, i.e. the Sakai (Sakā) tigrakhaudā (Massagetai, roaming in Turkmenistan), and Sakai (Sakā) Haumavargā (in Transoxania and beyond the Syr Daryā)."
  39. ^ Schmitt, Rüdiger (2003). "HAUMAVARGĀ". Encyclopædia Iranica.
  40. ^ Dandamaev, Muhammad A.; Lukonin, Vladimir G. (1989). The Culture and Social Institutions of Ancient Iran. Cambridge University Press. p. 334. ISBN 978-0-521-61191-6.
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  42. ^ a b Bailey 1983, p. 1230.
  43. ^ Briant, Pierre (29 July 2006). From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire. Eisenbrauns. p. 178. ISBN 978-1-57506-120-7. This is Kingdom which I hold, from the Scythians [Saka] who are beyond Sogdiana, thence unto Ethiopia [Cush]; from Sind, thence unto Sardis.
  44. ^ a b c Cook 1985, p. 254-255.
  45. ^ Young 1988, p. 89.
  46. ^ Francfort 1988, p. 177.
  47. ^ Bivar, A. D. H. (1983). "The History of Eastern Iran". In Yarshater, Ehsan (ed.). The Cambridge History of Iran. Vol. 3. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press. p. 181-231. ISBN 978-0-521-20092-9.
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  49. ^ a b Harmatta 1999.
  50. ^ Abetekov, A.; Yusupov, H. (1994). "Ancient Iranian Nomads in Western Central Asia". In Dani, Ahmad Hasan; Harmatta, János; Puri, Baij Nath; Etemadi, G. F.; Bosworth, Clifford Edmund (eds.). History of Civilizations of Central Asia. Paris, France: UNESCO. pp. 24–34. ISBN 978-9-231-02846-5.
  51. ^ Zadneprovskiy, Y. A. (1994). "The Nomads of Northern Central Asia After the Invansion of Alexander". In Dani, Ahmad Hasan; Harmatta, János; Puri, Baij Nath; Etemadi, G. F.; Bosworth, Clifford Edmund (eds.). History of Civilizations of Central Asia. Paris, France: UNESCO. pp. 448–463. ISBN 978-9-231-02846-5. The middle of the third century b.c. saw the rise to power of a group of tribes consisting of the Parni (Aparni) and the Dahae, descendants of the Massagetae of the Aral Sea region.
  52. ^ a b L. T. Yablonsky (2010-06-15). "The Archaeology of Eurasian Nomads". In Donald L. Hardesty (ed.). ARCHAEOLOGY – Volume I. EOLSS. p. 383. ISBN 978-1-84826-002-3.
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  58. ^ Olbrycht 2021.
  59. ^ a b c d Yu 2010: "The Daxia 大夏 people in the valley of the Amu Darya came from the valleys of the rivers Ili and Chu. From the Geography of Strabo one can infer that the four tribes of the Asii and others came from these valleys (the so-called “land of the Sai 塞” in the Hanshu 漢書, ch. 96A). "
  60. ^ a b Unterländer et al. 2017 "Genomic inference reveals that Scythians in the east and the west of the steppe zone can best be described as a mixture of Yamnaya-related ancestry and an East Asian component. Demographic modelling suggests independent origins for eastern and western groups with ongoing gene-flow between them, plausibly explaining the striking uniformity of their material culture. We also find evidence that significant gene-flow from east to west Eurasia must have occurred early during the Iron Age." and "The blend of EHG [European hunter-gatherer] and Caucasian elements in carriers of the Yamnaya culture was formed on the European steppe and exported into Central Asia and Siberia"

    We therefore considered an alternative model in which we treat them as a mix of Yamnaya and the Han (Supplementary Table 25). This model fits all of the Iron Age Scythian groups, consistent with these groups having ancestry related to East Asians not found in the other populations. Alternatively, the Iron Age Scythian groups can also be modelled as a mix of Yamnaya and the north Siberian Nganasan (Supplementary Note 2, Supplementary Table 26).
  61. ^ a b Unterländer et al. 2017 "The origin of the widespread Scythian culture has long been debated in Eurasian archaeology. The northern Black Sea steppe was originally considered the homeland and centre of the Scythians until Terenozhkin formulated the hypothesis of a Central Asian origin. On the other hand, evidence supporting an east Eurasian origin includes the kurgan Arzhan 1 in Tuva, which is considered the earliest Scythian kurgan. Dating of additional burial sites situated in east and west Eurasia confirmed eastern kurgans as older than their western counterparts. Additionally, elements of the characteristic 'Animal Style' dated to the tenth century BCE were found in the region of the Yenisei river and modern-day China, supporting the early presence of Scythian culture in the East."
  62. ^ de Laet & Herrmann 1996, p. 443 "The rich kurgan burials in Pazyryk, Siberia probably were those of Saka chieftains"
  63. ^ a b Kuzmina 2008, p. 94 "Analysis of the clothing, which has analogies in the complex of Saka clothes, particularly in Pazyryk, led Wang Binghua (1987, 42) to the conclusion that they are related to the Saka Culture."
  64. ^ a b Kuzmina 2007, p. 103 "The dress of Iranian-speaking Saka and Scythians is easily reconstructed on the basis of... numerous archaeological discoveries from the Ukraine to the Altai, particularly at Issyk in Kazakhstan... at Pazyryk... and Ak-Alakha"
  65. ^ Lebedynsky 2007, p. 125.
  66. ^ Harmatta 1996, p. 488: "Their royal tribes and kings (shan-yii) bore Iranian names and all the Hsiung-nu words noted by the Chinese can be explained from an Iranian language of Saka type. It is therefore clear that the majority of Hsiung-nu tribes spoke an Eastern Iranian language."
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  139. ^ Sarah Iles Johnston, Religions of the Ancient World: A Guide, Harvard University Press, 2004. pg 197
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  144. ^ Peng, M.S.; Song, J.J.; Zhang, Y.P. (29 November 2017). "Mitochondrial genomes uncover the maternal history of the Pamir populations". European Journal of Human Genetics. 26 (1): 124–136. doi:10.1038/s41431-017-0028-8. PMC 5839027. PMID 29187735.
  145. ^ Frye, R.N. (1984). The History of Ancient Iran. p. 192. ISBN 9783406093975. [T]hese western Saka he distinguishes from eastern Saka who moved south through the Kashgar-Tashkurgan-Gilgit-Swat route to the plains of the sub-continent of India. This would account for the existence of the ancient Khotanese-Saka speakers, documents of whom have been found in western Sinkiang, and the modern Wakhi language of Wakhan in Afghanistan, another modern branch of descendants of Saka speakers parallel to the Ossetes in the west.
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External links

July 26, 2023
saka, sacae, redirects, here, south, australian, college, advanced, education, university, south, australia, land, under, sassanid, dynasty, stān, confused, with, sakha, people, endonym, yakut, people, siberia, other, uses, disambiguation, persian, 𐎿𐎣𐎠, sakā, . Sacae redirects here For the South Australian College of Advanced Education see University of South Australia For the land of the Saka under the Sassanid dynasty see Sakastan Not to be confused with the Sakha people the endonym of the Yakut people of Siberia For other uses see Saka disambiguation The Saka Old Persian 𐎿𐎣𐎠 Saka Kharoṣṭhi 𐨯𐨐 Saka Ancient Egyptian 𓋴𓎝𓎡𓈉 sk 𓐠𓎼𓈉 sꜣg Chinese 塞 old Sek mod Se Sai Shaka Sanskrit Brahmi 𑀰𑀓 Saka Sanskrit Devanagari शक Saka श क Saka or Sacae Ancient Greek Sakai Sakai Latin Sacae were a group of nomadic Eastern Iranian peoples who historically inhabited the northern and eastern Eurasian Steppe and the Tarim Basin 3 4 SakaCataphract style parade armour of a Saka royal also known as The Golden Warrior from the Issyk kurgan a historical burial site near Almaty Kazakhstan Circa 400 200 BC 1 2 The Sakas were closely related to the European Scythians and both groups formed part of the wider Scythian cultures 5 and ultimately derived from the earlier Andronovo culture and the Saka language formed part of the Scythian languages However the Sakas of the Asian steppes are to be distinguished from the Scythians of the Pontic Steppe 4 6 and although the ancient Persians ancient Greeks and ancient Babylonians respectively used the names Saka Scythian and Cimmerian for all the steppe nomads the name Saka is used specifically for the ancient nomads of the eastern steppe while Scythian is used for the related group of nomads living in the western steppe 4 7 8 While the Cimmerians were often described by contemporaries as culturally Scythian they may have differed ethnically from the Scythians proper to whom the Cimmerians were related and who also displaced and replaced the Cimmerians 9 Prominent archaeological remains of the Sakas include Arzhan 10 Tunnug 11 the Pazyryk burials 12 the Issyk kurgan Saka Kurgan tombs 13 the Barrows of Tasmola 14 and possibly Tillya Tepe In the 2nd century BC many Sakas were driven by the Yuezhi from the steppe into Sogdia and Bactria and then to the northwest of the Indian subcontinent where they were known as the Indo Scythians 15 16 17 Other Sakas invaded the Parthian Empire eventually settling in Sistan while others may have migrated to the Dian Kingdom in Yunnan China In the Tarim Basin and Taklamakan Desert of today s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region they settled in Khotan Yarkand Kashgar and other places 18 Contents 1 Name 1 1 Etymology 1 2 Identification 1 3 Modern terminology 2 Location 3 History 3 1 Origins 3 2 Early history 3 3 Migrations 3 4 Indo Scythians 3 5 Kingdoms in the Tarim Basin 3 5 1 Kingdom of Khotan 3 5 2 Shule Kingdom 4 Historiography 4 1 Strabo 4 2 Indian sources 5 Language 6 Genetics 6 1 Haplogroups 6 2 Autosomal DNA 7 Physical appearance 8 Archaeology 8 1 Pazyryk culture 8 2 Tillia Tepe treasure 8 3 Eleke Sazy Burial Complex 9 Culture 9 1 Gender roles 9 2 Art 9 3 Clothing 9 4 Warfare 10 See also 11 References 11 1 Citations 11 2 Bibliography 12 External linksName EditEtymology Edit Scythian helmet copper alloy Afrasiyab Samarkand 6th 1st century BCE Linguist Oswald Szemerenyi studied synonyms of various origins for Scythian and differentiated the following terms Saka 𐎿𐎣𐎠 Skuthes Sky8hs Skudra 𐎿𐎤𐎢𐎭𐎼 and Sugᵘda 𐎿𐎢𐎦𐎢𐎭 19 Derived from an Iranian verbal root sak go roam related to seek and thus meaning nomad was the term Saka from which came the names Old Persian 𐎿𐎣𐎠 Saka used by the ancient Persians to designate all nomads of the Eurasian steppe including the Pontic Scythians 20 Ancient Greek Sakai Sakai Latin Sacae Sanskrit शक Saka Old Chinese 塞 Sek 21 22 23 From the Indo European root s kewd meaning propel shoot and from which was also derived the English word shoot of which skud is the zero grade form was descended the Scythians self name reconstructed by Szemerenyi as Skuda roughly archer From this were descended the following exonyms Akkadian Iskuzaya and Askuzaya used by the Assyrians Old Persian 𐎿𐎤𐎢𐎭𐎼 Skudra Ancient Greek Sky8hs Skuthes plural Sky8ai Skuthai used by the Ancient Greeks 24 The Old Armenian սկիւթ Skiwtʰ is based on itacistic GreekA late Scythian sound change from d to l resulted in the evolution of Skuda into Skula From this was derived the Greek word Skṓlotoi Skwlotoi which according to Herodotus was the self designation of the Royal Scythians 25 26 Other sound changes have produced Sugᵘda 𐎿𐎢𐎦𐎢𐎭 19 Although the Scythians Saka and Cimmerians were closely related nomadic Iranic peoples and the ancient Babylonians ancient Persians and ancient Greeks respectively used the names Cimmerian Saka and Scythian for all the steppe nomads and early modern historians such as Edward Gibbon used the term Scythian to refer to a variety of nomadic and semi nomadic peoples across the Eurasian Steppe the name Scythian in contemporary modern scholarship generally refers to the nomadic Iranic people who from the 7th century BC to the 3rd century BC dominated the steppe and forest steppe zones to the north of the Black Sea Crimea the Kuban valley as well as the Taman and Kerch peninsulas 27 28 while the name Saka is used specifically for their eastern members who inhabited the northern and eastern Eurasian Steppe and the Tarim Basin 29 30 Identification Edit The name Saka was used by the ancient Persian to refer to all the Iranian nomadic tribes living to the north of their empire including both those who lived between the Caspian Sea and the Hungry steppe and those who lived to the north of the Danube and the Black Sea The Assyrians meanwhile called these nomads the Ishkuzai Akkadian Iskuzaya 31 32 or Askuzai Akkadian Asguzaya mat Askuzaya mat Asguzaya 31 33 and the Ancient Greeks called them Skuthai Ancient Greek Sky8hs Skuthes Sky8oi Skuthoi Sky8ai Skuthai 34 For the Achaemenids there were three types of Sakas the Saka tayai paradraya beyond the sea presumably between the Greeks and the Thracians on the Western side of the Black Sea the Saka tigraxauda with pointed caps the Saka haumavarga Hauma drinkers furthest East Soldiers of the Achaemenid army Xerxes I tomb detail circa 480 BC 35 The Achaemenid inscriptions initially listed a single group of Saka However following Darius I s campaign of 520 to 518 BC against the Asian nomads they were differentiated into two groups both living in Central Asia to the east of the Caspian Sea 34 36 the Saka tigraxauda 𐎿𐎣𐎠 𐎫𐎡𐎥𐎼𐎧𐎢𐎭𐎠 Saka who wear pointed caps who were also known as the Massagetae 37 38 the Saka haumavarga 𐎿𐎣𐎠 𐏃𐎢𐎶𐎺𐎼𐎥𐎠 interpreted as Saka who lay hauma around the fire 39 which can be interpreted as Saka who revere hauma 40 A third name was added after the Darius s campaign north of the Danube 34 the Saka tayaiy paradraya 𐎿𐎣𐎠 𐎫𐎹𐎡𐎹 𐎱𐎼𐎭𐎼𐎹 the Saka who live beyond the Black Sea who were the Pontic Scythians of the East European steppesAn additional term is found in two inscriptions elsewhere 41 34 the Sakaibis tayaiy para Sugdam 𐎿𐎣𐎡𐎲𐎡𐏁 𐎫𐎹𐎡𐎹 𐎱𐎼 𐎿𐎢𐎥𐎭𐎶 Saka who are beyond Sogdia a term was used by Darius for the people who formed the north eastern limits of his empire at the opposite end to satrapy of Kush the Ethiopians 42 43 These Sakaibis tayaiy para Sugdam have been suggested to have been the same people as the Saka haumavarga 44 Moreover Darius the Great s Suez Inscriptions mention two group of Sakas 45 46 the Sꜣg pḥ 𓐠𓎼𓄖𓈉 Saka of the Marshes the Sk tꜣ 𓋴𓎝𓎡𓇿𓈉 Saka of the Land The scholar David Bivar had tentatively identified the Sk tꜣ with the Saka haumavarga 47 and John Manuel Cook had tentatively identified the Sꜣg pḥ with the Saka tigraxauda 44 More recently the scholar Rudiger Schmitt has suggested that the Sꜣg pḥ and the Sk tꜣ might have collectively designated the Saka tigraxauda Massagetae 48 The Achaemenid king Xerxes I listed the Saka coupled with the Daha 𐎭𐏃𐎠 people of Central Asia 42 44 41 who might possibly have been identical with the Saka tigraxauda 49 50 51 Modern terminology Edit See also Scythian cultures Although the ancient Persians ancient Greeks and ancient Babylonians respectively used the names Saka Scythian and Cimmerian for all the steppe nomads modern scholars now use the term Saka to refer specifically to Iranian peoples who inhabited the northern and eastern Eurasian Steppe and the Tarim Basin 3 52 4 8 and while the Cimmerians were often described by contemporaries as culturally Scythian they may have differed ethnically from the Scythians proper to whom the Cimmerians were related and who also displaced and replaced the Cimmerians 9 Location Edit 200GRECOBACTRIANSPAR THIAPazyrykcultureSAKASTagarcultureSaglycultureShuleDONGHUSABEANSOrdoscultureDiancultureJINYUEZHIWusuncultureSELEUCIDEMPIREMAURYAEMPIREHANDYNASTYXIONGNUPTOLE MIESMEROEScythiansSarmatiansAlans class notpageimage The Sakas and main Asian polities circa 200 BC 53 54 55 The Saka tigraxauda and Saka haumavarga both lived in the steppe and highland areas located in northern Central Asia and to the east of the Caspian Sea 34 36 56 The Saka tigraxauda Massagetae more specifically lived around Chorasmia 57 and in the lowlands of Central Asia located to the east of the Caspian Sea and the south east of the Aral Sea in the Kyzylkum Desert and the Ustyurt Plateau most especially between the Araxes and Iaxartes rivers 49 48 The Saka tigraxauda Massagetae could also be found in the Caspian Steppe 37 The imprecise description of where the Massagetae lived by ancient authors has however led modern scholars to ascribe to them various locations such as the Oxus delta the Iaxartes delta between the Caspian and Aral seas or forther to the north or north east but without basing these suggestions on any conclusive arguments 48 Other locations assigned to the Massagetae include the area corresponding to modern day Turkmenistan 58 The Saka haumavarga lived around the Pamir Mountains and the Ferghana Valley 57 The Sakaibis tayaiy para Sugdam who may have been identical with the Saka haumavarga lived on the north east border of the Achaemenid Empire on the Iaxartes river 34 Some other Saka groups lived to the east of the Pamir Mountains and to the north of the Iaxartes river 56 as well as in the regions corresponding to modern day Qirghizia Tian Shan Altai Tuva Mongolia Xinjiang and Kazakhstan 57 The Sek that is the Saka who were in contact with the Chinese inhabited the Ili and Chu valleys of modern Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan which was called the land of the Sek i e land of the Saka in the Book of Han 59 History EditOrigins Edit Arzhan kurgan 8 7th century BC Arzhan kurgan and early Saka artifacts dated to 8 7th century BC See also Indo European migrations and Sintashta culture Studies of Iron Age individuals investigated show genomic evidence for Caucasus hunter gatherer and Eastern European hunter gatherer ancestry This is consistent with the idea that the blend of EHG and Caucasian elements in carriers of the Yamnaya culture was formed on the European steppe and exported into Central Asia and Siberia26 All of our analyses support the hypothesis that the genetic composition of the Scythians can best be described as a mixture of Yamnaya related ancestry and East Asian north Siberian elements 60 On the other hand archaeological evidence now tends to suggest that the origins of Scythian culture characterized by its kurgans burial mounds and its Animal style of the 1st millennium BC are to be found among Eastern Scythians rather than their Western counterparts eastern kurgans are older than western ones such as the Altaic kurgan Arzhan 1 in Tuva and elements of the Animal style are first attested in areas of the Yenisei river and modern day China in the 10th century BCE 61 The rapid spread of Scythian culture from the Eastern Scythians to the Western Scythians is also confirmed by significant east to west gene flow across the steppes during the 1st millennium BC 60 61 The Sakas spoke a language belonging to the Iranian branch of the Indo European languages The Pazyryk burials of the Pazyryk culture in the Ukok Plateau in the 4th and 3rd centuries BC are thought to be of Saka chieftains 62 63 64 These burials show striking similarities with the earlier Tarim mummies at Gumugou 63 The Issyk kurgan of south eastern Kazakhstan 64 and the Ordos culture of the Ordos Plateau has also been connected with the Saka 65 It has been suggested that the ruling elite of the Xiongnu was of Saka origin 66 Some scholars contend that in the 8th century BC a Saka raid from the Altai may be connected with a raid on Zhou China 67 Early history Edit The Saka are attested in historical and archaeological records dating to around the 8th century BC 68 The Saka tribe of the Massagetae Tigraxauda rose to power in the 8th to 7th centuries BC when they migrated from the east into Central Asia 48 from where they expelled the Scythians another nomadic Iranian tribe to whom they were closely related after which they came to occupy large areas of the region beginning in the 6th century BC 37 The Massagetae forcing the Early Scythians to the west across the Araxes river and into the Caucasian and Pontic steppes started a significant movement of the nomadic peoples of the Eurasian Steppe 69 following which the Scythians displaced the Cimmerians and the Agathyrsi who were also nomadic Iranian peoples closely related to the Massagetae and the Scythians conquered their territories 69 70 37 71 72 73 and invaded Western Asia where their presence had an important role in the history of the ancient civilisations of Mesopotamia Anatolia Egypt and Iran 71 During the 7th century BC itself Saka presence started appearing in the Tarim Basin region 68 According to the ancient Greek historian Diodorus Siculus the Parthians rebelled against the Medes during the reign of Cyaxares after which the Parthians put their country and capital city under the protection of the Sakas This was followed by a long war opposing the Medes to the Saka the latter of whom were led by the queen Zarinaea At the end of this war the Parthians accepted Median rule and the Saka and the Medes made peace 74 75 76 Captured Saka king Skunkha from Mount Behistun Iran Achaemenid stone relief from the reign of Darius I r 522 486 BC The Sakas as subjects of the Achaemenid Empire on the statue of Darius I circa 500 BC According to the Greek historian Ctesias once the Persian Achaemenid Empire s founder Cyrus had overthrown his grandfather the Median king Astyages the Bactrians accepted him as the heir of Astyages and submitted to him after which he founded the city of Cyropolis on the Iaxartes river as well as seven fortresses to protect the northern frontier of his empire against the Saka Cyrus then attacked the Saka haumavarga initially defeated them and captured their king Amorges After this Amorges s queen Sparethra defeated Cyrus with a large army of both men and women warriors and captured Parmises the brother in law of Cyrus and the brother of his wife Amytis as well as Parmises s three sons whom Sparethra exchanged in return for her husband after which Cyrus and Amorges became allies and Amorges helped Cyrus conquer Lydia 77 78 79 80 81 82 Cyrus accompanied by the Saka haumavarga of his ally Amorges later carried out a campaign against the Massagetae Saka tigraxauda in 530 BC 48 According to Herodotus Cyrus captured a Massagetaean camp by ruse after which the Massagetae queen Tomyris led the tribe s main force against the Persians defeated them and placed the severed head of Cyrus in a sack full of blood Some versions of the records of the death of Cyrus named the Derbices rather than the Massagetae as the tribe against whom Cyrus died in battle because the Derbices were a member tribe of the Massagetae confederation or identical with the whole of the Massagetae 83 48 After Cyrus had been mortally wounded by the Derbices Massagetae Amorges and his Saka haumavarga army helped the Persian soldiers defeat them Cyrus told his sons to respect their own mother as well as Amorges above everyone else before dying 82 Possibly shortly before the 520s BC the Saka expanded into the valleys of the Ili and Chu in eastern Central Asia 59 Around 30 Saka tombs in the form of kurgans burial mounds have also been found in the Tian Shan area dated to between 550 250 BC 68 Eurasia in 400 BC showing location of the Saka and their neighborsDarius I waged wars against the eastern Sakas during a campaign of 520 to 518 BC where according to his inscription at Behistun he conquered the Massagetae Saka tigraxauda captured their king Skunxa and replaced him with a ruler who was loyal to Achaemenid rule 48 82 84 The territories of the Saka were absorbed into the Achaemenid Empire as part of Chorasmia that included much of the territory between the Oxus and the Iaxartes rivers 85 and the Saka then supplied the Achaemenid army with large number of mounted bowmen 86 According to Polyaenus Darius fought against three armies led by three kings respectively named Sacesphares Amorges or Homarges and Thamyris with Polyaenus s account being based on accurate Persian historical records 82 87 88 After Darius s administrative reforms of the Achaemenid Empire the Saka tigraxauda were included within the same tax district as the Medes 89 During the period of Achaemenid rule Central Asia was in contact with Saka populations who were themselves in contact with China 90 After Alexander the Great conquered the Achaemenid Empire the Saka resisted his incursions into Central Asia 52 At least by the late 2nd century BC the Sakas had founded states in the Tarim Basin 18 Migrations Edit Model of a Saka Kangju cataphract armour with neck guard from Khalchayan 1st century BCE Museum of Arts of Uzbekistan nb 40 91 The Saka were pushed out of the Ili and Chu River valleys by the Yuezhi 92 15 16 An account of the movement of these people is given in Sima Qian s Records of the Grand Historian The Yuehzhi who originally lived between Tangri Tagh Tian Shan and Dunhuang of Gansu China 93 were assaulted and forced to flee from the Hexi Corridor of Gansu by the forces of the Xiongnu ruler Modu Chanyu who conquered the area in 177 176 BC 94 95 96 97 98 99 In turn the Yuehzhi were responsible for attacking and pushing the Sai i e Saka west into Sogdiana where between 140 and 130 BC the latter crossed the Syr Darya into Bactria The Saka also moved southwards toward the Pamirs and northern India where they settled in Kashmir and eastward to settle in some of the oasis states of Tarim Basin sites like Yanqi 焉耆 Karasahr and Qiuci 龜茲 Kucha 100 101 The Yuehzhi themselves under attacks from another nomadic tribe the Wusun in 133 132 BC moved again from the Ili and Chu valleys and occupied the country of Daxia 大夏 Bactria 59 102 The Heavenly Horse is a ceremonial gilted bronze finial with a standing horse created by the Sakas people between the 4th and 1st centuries BCE The ancient Greco Roman geographer Strabo noted that the four tribes that took down the Bactrians in the Greek and Roman account the Asioi Pasianoi Tokharoi and Sakaraulai came from land north of the Syr Darya where the Ili and Chu valleys are located 103 59 Identification of these four tribes varies but Sakaraulai may indicate an ancient Saka tribe the Tokharoi is possibly the Yuezhi and while the Asioi had been proposed to be groups such as the Wusun or Alans 103 104 Rene Grousset wrote of the migration of the Saka the Saka under pressure from the Yueh chih Yuezhi overran Sogdiana and then Bactria there taking the place of the Greeks Then Thrust back in the south by the Yueh chih the Saka occupied the Saka country Sakastana whence the modern Persian Seistan 103 Some of the Saka fleeing the Yuezhi attacked the Parthian Empire where they defeated and killed the kings Phraates II and Artabanus 92 These Sakas were eventually settled by Mithridates II in what become known as Sakastan 92 According to Harold Walter Bailey the territory of Drangiana now in Afghanistan and Pakistan became known as Land of the Sakas and was called Sakastana in the Persian language of contemporary Iran in Armenian as Sakastan with similar equivalents in Pahlavi Greek Sogdian Syriac Arabic and the Middle Persian tongue used in Turfan Xinjiang China 105 This is attested in a contemporary Kharosthi inscription found on the Mathura lion capital belonging to the Saka kingdom of the Indo Scythians 200 BC 400 AD in North India 105 roughly the same time the Chinese record that the Saka had invaded and settled the country of Jibin 罽賓 i e Kashmir of modern day India and Pakistan 106 Iaroslav Lebedynsky and Victor H Mair speculate that some Sakas may also have migrated to the area of Yunnan in southern China following their expulsion by the Yuezhi Excavations of the prehistoric art of the Dian Kingdom of Yunnan have revealed hunting scenes of Caucasoid horsemen in Central Asian clothing 107 The scenes depicted on these drums sometimes represent these horsemen practising hunting Animal scenes of felines attacking oxen are also at times reminiscent of Scythian art both in theme and in composition 108 The Saka kingdom of the Indo Scythians and contemporary continental Asian polities in 100 BCMigrations of the 2nd and 1st century BC have left traces in Sogdia and Bactria but they cannot firmly be attributed to the Saka similarly with the sites of Sirkap and Taxila in ancient India The rich graves at Tillya Tepe in Afghanistan are seen as part of a population affected by the Saka 109 The Shakya clan of India to which Gautama Buddha called Sakyamuni Sage of the Shakyas belonged were also likely Sakas as Michael Witzel 110 and Christopher I Beckwith 111 have alleged The scholar Bryan Levman however criticised this hypothesis for resting on slim to no evidence and maintains that the Shakyas were a population native to the north east Gangetic plain who were unrelated to Iranic Sakas 112 Indo Scythians Edit Main article Indo Scythians Head of a Saka warrior as a defeated enemy of the Yuezhi from Khalchayan northern Bactria 1st century BC 113 114 115 The region in modern Afghanistan and Iran where the Saka moved to became known as land of the Saka or Sakastan 105 This is attested in a contemporary Kharosthi inscription found on the Mathura lion capital belonging to the Saka kingdom of the Indo Scythians 200 BC 400 AD in northern India 105 roughly the same time the Chinese record that the Saka had invaded and settled the country of Jibin 罽賓 i e Kashmir of modern day India and Pakistan 106 In the Persian language of contemporary Iran the territory of Drangiana was called Sakastana in Armenian as Sakastan with similar equivalents in Pahlavi Greek Sogdian Syriac Arabic and the Middle Persian tongue used in Turfan Xinjiang China 105 The Sakas also captured Gandhara and Taxila and migrated to North India 116 The most famous Indo Scythian king was Maues 117 An Indo Scythians kingdom was established in Mathura 200 BC 400 AD 105 17 Weer Rajendra Rishi an Indian linguist identified linguistic affinities between Indian and Central Asian languages which further lends credence to the possibility of historical Sakan influence in North India 116 118 According to historian Michael Mitchiner the Abhira tribe were a Saka people cited in the Gunda inscription of the Western Satrap Rudrasimha I dated to AD 181 119 Kingdoms in the Tarim Basin Edit Kingdom of Khotan Edit Main article Kingdom of Khotan Coin of Gurgamoya king of Khotan Khotan first century Obv Kharosthi legend Of the great king of kings king of Khotan Gurgamoya Rev Chinese legend Twenty four grain copper coin British MuseumThe Kingdom of Khotan was a Saka city state in on the southern edge of the Tarim Basin As a consequence of the Han Xiongnu War spanning from 133 BC to 89 AD the Tarim Basin now Xinjiang Northwest China including Khotan and Kashgar fell under Han Chinese influence beginning with the reign of Emperor Wu of Han r 141 87 BC 120 121 Archaeological evidence and documents from Khotan and other sites in the Tarim Basin provided information on the language spoken by the Saka 105 gt 122 The official language of Khotan was initially Gandhari Prakrit written in Kharosthi and coins from Khotan dated to the 1st century bear dual inscriptions in Chinese and Gandhari Prakrit indicating links of Khotan to both India and China 123 Surviving documents however suggest that an Iranian language was used by the people of the kingdom for a long time Third century AD documents in Prakrit from nearby Shanshan record the title for the king of Khotan as hinajha i e generalissimo a distinctively Iranian based word equivalent to the Sanskrit title senapati yet nearly identical to the Khotanese Saka hinaysa attested in later Khotanese documents 123 This along with the fact that the king s recorded regnal periods were given as the Khotanese kṣuṇa implies an established connection between the Iranian inhabitants and the royal power according to the Professor of Iranian Studies Ronald E Emmerick 123 He contended that Khotanese Saka language royal rescripts of Khotan dated to the 10th century makes it likely that the ruler of Khotan was a speaker of Iranian 123 Furthermore he argued that the early form of the name of Khotan hvatana is connected semantically with the name Saka 123 The region once again came under Chinese suzerainty with the campaigns of conquest by Emperor Taizong of Tang r 626 649 124 From the late eighth to ninth centuries the region changed hands between the rival Tang and Tibetan Empires 125 126 However by the early 11th century the region fell to the Muslim Turkic peoples of the Kara Khanid Khanate which led to both the Turkification of the region as well as its conversion from Buddhism to Islam A document from Khotan written in Khotanese Saka part of the Eastern Iranian branch of the Indo European languages listing the animals of the Chinese zodiac in the cycle of predictions for people born in that year ink on paper early 9th centuryLater Khotanese Saka language documents ranging from medical texts to Buddhist literature have been found in Khotan and Tumshuq northeast of Kashgar 105 Similar documents in the Khotanese Saka language dating mostly to the 10th century have been found in the Dunhuang manuscripts 127 Although the ancient Chinese had called Khotan Yutian 于闐 another more native Iranian name occasionally used was Jusadanna 瞿薩旦那 derived from Indo Iranian Gostan and Gostana the names of the town and region around it respectively 128 Shule Kingdom Edit Main article Shule Kingdom Much like the neighboring people of the Kingdom of Khotan people of Kashgar the capital of Shule spoke Saka one of the Eastern Iranian languages 129 According to the Book of Han the Saka split and formed several states in the region These Saka states may include two states to the northwest of Kashgar and Tumshuq to its northeast and Tushkurgan south in the Pamirs 130 Kashgar also conquered other states such as Yarkand and Kucha during the Han dynasty but in its later history Kashgar was controlled by various empires including Tang China 131 132 133 before it became part of the Turkic Kara Khanid Khanate in the 10th century In the 11th century according to Mahmud al Kashgari some non Turkic languages like the Kanchaki and Sogdian were still used in some areas in the vicinity of Kashgar 134 and Kanchaki is thought to belong to the Saka language group 130 It is believed that the Tarim Basin was linguistically Turkified before the 11th century ended 135 Historiography Edit Scythia and the Parthian Empire in about 170 BC before the Yuezhi invaded Bactria Persians referred to all northern nomads as Sakas Herodotus IV 64 describes them as Scythians although they figure under a different name The Sacae or Scyths were clad in trousers and had on their heads tall stiff caps rising to a point They bore the bow of their country and the dagger besides which they carried the battle axe or sagaris They were in truth Amyrgian Western Scythians but the Persians called them Sacae since that is the name which they gave to all Scythians Strabo Edit In the 1st century BC the Greek Roman geographer Strabo gave an extensive description of the peoples of the eastern steppe whom he located in Central Asia beyond Bactria and Sogdiana 136 Strabo went on to list the names of the various tribes he believed to be Scythian 136 and in so doing almost certainly conflated them with unrelated tribes of eastern Central Asia These tribes included the Saka Now the greater part of the Scythians beginning at the Caspian Sea are called Daae but those who are situated more to the east than these are named Massagetae and Sacae whereas all the rest are given the general name of Scythians though each people is given a separate name of its own They are all for the most part nomads But the best known of the nomads are those who took away Bactriana from the Greeks I mean the Asii Pasiani Tochari and Sacarauli who originally came from the country on the other side of the Iaxartes River that adjoins that of the Sacae and the Sogdiani and was occupied by the Sacae And as for the Daae some of them are called Aparni some Xanthii and some Pissuri Now of these the Aparni are situated closest to Hyrcania and the part of the sea that borders on it but the remainder extend even as far as the country that stretches parallel to Aria Between them and Hyrcania and Parthia and extending as far as the Arians is a great waterless desert which they traversed by long marches and then overran Hyrcania Nesaea and the plains of the Parthians And these people agreed to pay tribute and the tribute was to allow the invaders at certain appointed times to overrun the country and carry off booty But when the invaders overran their country more than the agreement allowed war ensued and in turn their quarrels were composed and new wars were begun Such is the life of the other nomads also who are always attacking their neighbors and then in turn settling their differences Strabo Geography 11 8 1 transl 1903 by H C Hamilton amp W Falconer 136 dd Indian sources Edit Silver coin of the Indo Scythian King Azes II ruled c 35 12 BC Note the royal tamga on the coin Main article Indo Scythians The Sakas receive numerous mentions in Indian texts including the Puraṇas the Manusmṛiti the Ramayaṇa the Mahabharata and the Mahabhaṣya of Patanjali Language EditMain article Saka language Issyk inscription Issyk dish with inscription Drawing of the Issyk inscription Modern scholarly consensus is that the Eastern Iranian language ancestral to the Pamir languages in Central Asia and the medieval Saka language of Xinjiang was one of the Scythian languages 137 Evidence of the Middle Iranian Scytho Khotanese language survives in Northwest China where Khotanese Saka language documents ranging from medical texts to Buddhist texts have been found primarily in Khotan and Tumshuq northeast of Kashgar 105 They largely predate the Islamization of Xinjiang under the Turkic speaking Kara Khanid Khanate 105 Similar documents the Dunhuang manuscripts were discovered written in the Khotanese Saka language and date mostly from the tenth century 138 Attestations of the Saka language show that it was an Eastern Iranian language The linguistic heartland of Saka was the Kingdom of Khotan which had two varieties corresponding to the major settlements at Khotan now called Hotan and Tumshuq now titled Tumxuk 139 140 Tumshuqese and Khotanese varieties of Saka contain many borrowings from the Middle Indo Aryan languages but also share features with the modern Eastern Iranian languages Wakhi and Pashto 141 The Issyk inscription a short fragment on a silver cup found in the Issyk kurgan in Kazakhstan is believed to be an early example of Saka constituting one of very few autochthonous epigraphic traces of that language citation needed The inscription is in a variant of Kharosthi Harmatta identifies the dialect as Khotanese Saka tentatively translating its as The vessel should hold wine of grapes added cooked food so much to the mortal then added cooked fresh butter on 142 A growing body of both linguistic and physical anthropological evidence suggest the Wakhi are descendants of Saka 143 144 145 146 147 148 According to the Indo Europeanist Martin Kummel Wakhi may be classified as a Western Saka dialect the other attested Saka dialects Khotanese and Tumshuqese would then be classified as Eastern Saka 149 The Saka heartland was gradually conquered during the Turkic expansion beginning in the sixth century and the area was gradually Turkified linguistically under the Uyghurs Genetics EditSee also Scythian cultures Genetics Scythians Genetics Sarmatians Genetics and Tagar culture Genetics Mezhovskayaculture Ural Karasuk culture Ural to Altai Aldy Belculture Okunevo culture Pazyryk culture Simplified admixture analysis of ancient steppe populations including the Pazyryk culture 150 The earliest studies could only analyze segments of mtDNA thus providing only broad correlations of affinity to modern West Eurasian or East Eurasian populations For example in a 2002 study the mitochondrial DNA of Saka period male and female skeletal remains from a double inhumation kurgan at the Beral site in Kazakhstan was analysed The two individuals were found to be not closely related The HV1 mitochondrial sequence of the male was similar to the Anderson sequence which is most frequent in European populations The HV1 sequence of the female suggested a greater likelihood of Asian origins 151 More recent studies have been able to type for specific mtDNA lineages For example a 2004 study examined the HV1 sequence obtained from a male Scytho Siberian at the Kizil site in the Altai Republic It belonged to the N1a maternal lineage a geographically West Eurasian lineage 152 Another study by the same team again of mtDNA from two Scytho Siberian skeletons found in the Altai Republic showed that they had been typical males of mixed Euro Mongoloid origin One of the individuals was found to carry the F2a maternal lineage and the other the D lineage both of which are characteristic of East Eurasian populations 153 A Saka man from the Pazyryk culture reconstruction from burials Anokhin Museum 154 These early studies have been elaborated by an increasing number of studies by Russian and western scholars Conclusions are i an early Bronze Age mixing of both west and east Eurasian lineages with western lineages being found far to the east but not vice versa ii an apparent reversal by Iron Age times with an increasing presence of East Eurasian mtDNA lineages in the Western steppe iii the possible role of migrations from the south the Balkano Danubian and Iranian regions toward the steppe 155 156 Haplogroups Edit Ancient Y DNA data was finally provided by Keyser et al in 2009 They studied the haplotypes and haplogroups of 26 ancient human specimens from the Krasnoyarsk area in Siberia dated from between the middle of the 2nd millennium BC and the 4th century AD Scythian and Sarmatian timeframe Nearly all subjects belonged to haplogroup R M17 The authors suggest that their data shows that between the Bronze and the Iron Ages the constellation of populations known variously as Scythians Andronovians etc were blue or green eyed fair skinned and light haired people who might have played a role in the early development of the Tarim Basin civilisation Moreover this study found that they were genetically more closely related to modern populations in eastern Europe than those of central and southern Asia 157 The ubiquity and dominance of the R1a Y DNA lineage contrasted markedly with the diversity seen in the mtDNA profiles A genetic study published in Nature in May 2018 examined the remains of twenty eight Inner Asian Sakas buried between ca 900 BC to AD 1 compromising eight Sakas of southern Siberia Tagar culture eight Sakas of the central steppe Tasmola culture and twelve Sakas of the Tian Shan The six samples of Y DNA extracted from the Tian Shan Saka belonged to the West Eurasian haplogroups R four samples R1 and R1a1 For the five central steppe Saka males four belonged to haplogroup R1a while one individual DA19 belonged to haplogroup E1b1b FT167798 158 The samples of mtDNA extracted from the Tian Shan Saka belonged to C4 H4d T2a1 U5a1d2b H2a U5a1a1 HV6 two samples D4j8 two samples W1c and G2a1 159 Autosomal DNA Edit The 2018 in study detected significant genetic differences between the Inner Asian Sakas and Scythians of the Pannonian Basin as well as between different Saka subgroups of southern Siberia the central steppe and the Tian Shan While Scythians or Hungarian Saka harbored exclusively ancestry associated with Western Steppe Herders Inner Asian Saka displayed additional Neolithic Iranian BMAC and Southern Siberian hunter gatherer represented through a proxy of modern Altaians components in varying degrees Tian Shan Sakas were found to be of about 70 Western Steppe Herder WSH ancestry 25 Southern Siberian Hunter Gatherer ancestry and 5 Iranian Neolithic ancestry The Iranian Neolithic ancestry was probably from the Bactria Margiana Archaeological Complex Sakas of the Tasmola culture were found to be of about 56 WSH ancestry and 44 Southern Siberian Hunter Gather ancestry The peoples of the Tagar culture had about 83 5 WSH ancestry 9 Ancient North Eurasian ANE ancestry and 7 5 Southern Siberian Hunter Gatherer ancestry The study suggested that the Inner Asian Saka were the source of West Eurasian ancestry among the Xiongnu and that the Huns probably emerged through minor male driven geneflow into the Saka through westward migrations by the Xiongnu 160 Map of Saka cultures with genetic profiles according to Jeong et al 2020 the Sakas combined Western Eurasian Sintashta and Ancient Northeast Asian Baikal EBA ancestry with a smaller BMAC admixture 161 A genetic study published in 2020 in Cell 162 successfully modeled the ancestry of major Saka groups as a combination of Sintashta Western Steppe Herders and Baikal EBA ancestry Western Baikal early Bronze Age hunter gatherers a profile consisting of Ancient Northeast Asian and Ancient North Eurasian ancestries 163 with varying degrees of an additional Neolithic Iranian BMAC component 162 Specifically Central Sakas Tasmola culture were found to be of about 43 Sintashta ancestry 50 Baikal EBA ancestry and 7 BMAC ancestry Tagar Sakas Tagar culture were found to have an elevated Sintashta proportion 69 Sintashta 24 Baikal EBA and 7 BMAC while Tian Shan Sakas had an elevated BMAC proportion at 24 50 Sintashta 26 Baikal EBA and 24 BMAC The eastern Uyuk Sakas Chandman culture had 50 Sintashta 44 Baikal EBA and 6 BMAC ancestry The Pazyryk Sakas had elevated Baikal EBA ancestry with a nearly non existant BMAC component 32 Sintashta 68 Baikal EBA and 0 BMAC 164 Physical appearance EditEarly physical analyses have unanimously concluded that the Saka even those far to the east e g the Pazyryk region possessed predominantly Europid features although mixed Euro Mongoloid phenotypes also occur depending on site and period 165 The 2nd century BC Han Chinese envoy Zhang Qian described the Sai Saka as having yellow probably meaning hazel or green and blue eyes 166 In Natural History the 1st century AD Roman author Pliny the Elder characterises the Seres sometimes identified as Saka or Tocharians as red haired and blue eyed 166 167 Archaeology Edit A Pazyryk horseman in a felt painting from a burial around 300 BC The Pazyryks appear to be closely related to the Scythians 168 The spectacular grave goods from Arzhan and others in Tuva have been dated from about 900 BC onward and are associated with the Saka Burials at Pazyryk in the Altay Mountains have included some spectacularly preserved Sakas of the Pazyryk culture including the Ice Maiden of the 5th century BC Pazyryk culture Edit Main article Pazyryk culture Saka burials documented by modern archaeologists include the kurgans at Pazyryk in the Ulagan Red district of the Altai Republic south of Novosibirsk in the Altai Mountains of southern Siberia near Mongolia Archaeologists have extrapolated the Pazyryk culture from these finds five large burial mounds and several smaller ones between 1925 and 1949 one opened in 1947 by Russian archaeologist Sergei Rudenko The burial mounds concealed chambers of larch logs covered over with large cairns of boulders and stones 169 The Pazyryk culture flourished between the 7th and 3rd century BC in the area associated with the Sacae Ordinary Pazyryk graves contain only common utensils but in one among other treasures archaeologists found the famous Pazyryk Carpet the oldest surviving wool pile oriental rug Another striking find a 3 metre high four wheel funerary chariot survived well preserved from the 5th to 4th century BC 170 Tillia Tepe treasure Edit Artifacts found the tombs 2 and 4 of Tillya Tepe and reconstitution of their use on the man and woman found in these tombsMain article Tillia Tepe A site found in 1968 in Tillia Tepe literally the golden hill in northern Afghanistan former Bactria near Shebergan consisted of the graves of five women and one man with extremely rich jewelry dated to around the 1st century BC and probably related to that of Saka tribes normally living slightly to the north Altogether the graves yielded several thousands of pieces of fine jewelry usually made from combinations of gold turquoise and lapis lazuli A high degree of cultural syncretism pervades the findings however Hellenistic cultural and artistic influences appear in many of the forms and human depictions from amorini to rings with the depiction of Athena and her name inscribed in Greek attributable to the existence of the Seleucid empire and Greco Bactrian kingdom in the same area until around 140 BC and the continued existence of the Indo Greek kingdom in the northwestern Indian sub continent until the beginning of our era This testifies to the richness of cultural influences in the area of Bactria at that time Eleke Sazy Burial Complex Edit In 2020 archaeologists excavated multiple burial mounds in the Eleke Sazy Valley in East Kazakhstan Here a large number of gold artifacts were found These artifacts included golf harness fittings pendants chains appliques and more most of which are in the Animal Style of the Scythian Saka era dating back to the 5th 4th centuries BC 171 Culture EditGender roles Edit Recently evidence confirmed by the full genomic analysis of a Scythian child s remains found in a coffin made of a larch trunk which was discovered in Saryg Bulun in Central Tuva revealed that the individual previously thought to be male because it had items that were associated with the belief that Scythian society was male dominated was actually female Along with the leather skirt the burial also contained a leather headdress painted with red pigment a coat sewn from jerboa fur a leather belt with bronze ornaments and buckles a leather quiver with arrows with painted ornaments on the shafts a fully preserved battle pick and a bow These items provide valuable insights into the material culture and lifestyle of the Scythians including their hunting and warfare practices and their use of animal hides for clothing 172 Art Edit Further information Scythian art Battle scenes between Kangju Saka warriors from the Orlat plaques 1st century CE The art of the Saka was of a similar styles as other Iranian peoples of the steppes which is referred to collectively as Scythian art In 2001 the discovery of an undisturbed royal Scythian burial barrow illustrated Scythian animal style gold that lacks the direct influence of Greek styles Forty four pounds of gold weighed down the royal couple in this burial discovered near Kyzyl capital of the Siberian republic of Tuva Ancient influences from Central Asia became identifiable in China following contacts of metropolitan China with nomadic western and northwestern border territories from the 8th century BC The Chinese adopted the Scythian style animal art of the steppes descriptions of animals locked in combat particularly the rectangular belt plaques made of gold or bronze and created their own versions in jade and steatite 173 Following their expulsion by the Yuezhi some Saka may also have migrated to the area of Yunnan in southern China Saka warriors could also have served as mercenaries for the various kingdoms of ancient China Excavations of the prehistoric art of the Dian civilisation of Yunnan have revealed hunting scenes of Caucasoid horsemen in Central Asian clothing 174 Saka influences have been identified as far as Korea and Japan Various Korean artifacts such as the royal crowns of the kingdom of Silla are said to be of Scythian design 175 Similar crowns brought through contacts with the continent can also be found in Kofun era Japan 176 Clothing Edit Similar to other eastern Iranian peoples represented on the reliefs of the Apadana at Persepolis Sakas are depicted as wearing long trousers which cover the uppers of their boots Over their shoulders they trail a type of long mantle with one diagonal edge in back One particular tribe of Sakas the Saka tigraxauda wore pointed caps Herodotus in his description of the Persian army mentions the Sakas as wearing trousers and tall pointed caps 177 Men and women wore long trousers often adorned with metal plaques and often embroidered or adorned with felt applique s trousers could have been wider or tight fitting depending on the area Materials used depended on the wealth climate and necessity 178 Statuette from the Saka culture in Xinjiang from a 3rd century BC burial site north of the Tian Shan Xinjiang Region Museum Urumqi 179 180 Could alternatively be a Greek hoplite 181 Herodotus says Sakas had high caps tapering to a point and stiffly upright Asian Saka headgear is clearly visible on the Persepolis Apadana staircase bas relief high pointed hat with flaps over ears and the nape of the neck 182 From China to the Danube delta men seemed to have worn a variety of soft headgear either conical like the one described by Herodotus or rounder more like a Phrygian cap Saka women dressed in much the same fashion as men A Pazyryk burial discovered in the 1990s contained the skeletons of a man and a woman each with weapons arrowheads and an axe Herodotus mentioned that Sakas had high caps and wore trousers Clothing was sewn from plain weave wool hemp cloth silk fabrics felt leather and hides Pazyryk findings give the most almost fully preserved garments and clothing worn by the Scythian Saka peoples Ancient Persian bas reliefs inscriptions from Apadana and Behistun and archaeological findings give visual representations of these garments Based on the Pazyryk findings can be seen also in the south Siberian Uralic and Kazakhstan rock drawings some caps were topped with zoomorphic wooden sculptures firmly attached to a cap and forming an integral part of the headgear similar to the surviving nomad helmets from northern China Men and warrior women wore tunics often embroidered adorned with felt applique work or metal golden plaques Persepolis Apadana again serves a good starting point to observe the tunics of the Sakas They appear to be a sewn long sleeved garment that extended to the knees and was girded with a belt while the owner s weapons were fastened to the belt sword or dagger gorytos battle axe whetstone etc Based on numerous archeological findings men and warrior women wore long sleeved tunics that were always belted often with richly ornamented belts The Kazakhstan Saka e g Issyk Golden Man Maiden wore shorter and closer fitting tunics than the Pontic steppe Scythians Some Pazyryk culture Saka wore short belted tunic with a lapel on the right side with upright collar puffed sleeves narrowing at the wrist and bound in narrow cuffs of a color different from the rest of the tunic Men and women wore coats e g Pazyryk Saka had many varieties from fur to felt They could have worn a riding coat that later was known as a Median robe or Kantus Long sleeved and open it seems that on the Persepolis Apadana Skudrian delegation is perhaps shown wearing such coat The Pazyryk felt tapestry shows a rider wearing a billowing cloak Warfare Edit A skull from an Iron Age cemetery in South Siberia shows evidence of scalping It lends physical evidence to the practice of scalp taking by the Scythians living there 183 See also EditBesshatyr Burial Ground History of the central steppe Sakas in the Mahabharata Sakzai Shaka era Sagetae it Maga Brahmin Scytho Siberian worldReferences EditCitations Edit Chang Claudia 2017 Rethinking Prehistoric Central Asia Shepherds Farmers and Nomads Routledge p 72 ISBN 978 1 351 70158 7 Rhie Marylin M 2002 Early Buddhist art of China and Central Asia Leiden Brill p Fig 5 70d ISBN 978 90 04 11499 9 Fig 5 70d Gold mail suit crown and leg covers from an Issik tomb period of the Saka tribes 5th to 4th century B C Institute of Archaeology History and Ethnography Alma Ata Kazakhstan after Shiruku rodo no yuihO pl 18 a b Beckwith 2009 p 68 Modern scholars have mostly used the name Saka to refer specifically to Iranians of the Eastern Steppe and Tarim Basin a b c d Dandamayev 1994 p 37 In modern scholarship the name Sakas is reserved for the ancient tribes of northern and eastern Central Asia and Eastern Turkestan to distinguish them from the related Massagetae of the Aral region and the Scythians of the Pontic steppes These tribes spoke Iranian languages and their chief occupation was nomadic pastoralism Unterlander et al 2017 During the first millennium BC nomadic people spread over the Eurasian Steppe from the Altai Mountains over the northern Black Sea area as far as the Carpathian Basin Greek and Persian historians of the 1st millennium BCE chronicle the existence of the Massagetae and Sauromatians and later the Sarmatians and Sacae cultures possessing artefacts similar to those found in classical Scythian monuments such as weapons horse harnesses and a distinctive Animal Style artistic tradition Accordingly these groups are often assigned to the Scythian culture Kramrisch Stella Central Asian Arts Nomadic Cultures Encyclopaedia Britannica Online Retrieved September 1 2018 The Saka tribe was pasturing its herds in the Pamirs central Tien Shan and in the Amu Darya delta Their gold belt buckles jewelry and harness decorations display sheep griffins and other animal designs that are similar in style to those used by the Scythians a nomadic people living in the Kuban basin of the Caucasus region and the western section of the Eurasian plain during the greater part of the 1st millennium bc David amp McNiven 2018 Horse riding nomadism has been referred to as the culture of Early Nomads This term encompasses different ethnic groups such as Scythians Saka Massagetae and Yuezhi a b Diakonoff 1985 the Persians called Saka all the northern nomads just as the Greeks called them Scythians and the Babylonians Cimmerians a b Tokhtas ev Sergei R 1991 Cimmerians Encyclopaedia Iranica As the Cimmerians cannot be differentiated archeologically from the Scythians it is possible to speculate about their Iranian origins In the Neo Babylonian texts according to D yakonov including at least some of the Assyrian texts in Babylonian dialect Gimirri and similar forms designate the Scythians and Central Asian Saka reflecting the perception among inhabitants of Mesopotamia that Cimmerians and Scythians represented a single cultural and economic group Zaitseva G I Chugunov K V Alekseev A Yu Dergachev V A Vasiliev S S Sementsov A A Cook G Scott E M Plicht J van der Parzinger H Nagler A 2007 Chronology of Key Barrows Belonging to Different Stages of the Scythian Period in Tuva Arzhan 1 and Arzhan 2 Barrows Radiocarbon 49 2 645 658 doi 10 1017 S0033822200042545 ISSN 0033 8222 Caspari Gino Sadykov Timur Blochin Jegor Hajdas Irka 2018 09 01 Tunnug 1 Arzhan 0 an early Scythian kurgan in Tuva Republic Russia Archaeological Research in Asia 15 82 87 doi 10 1016 j ara 2017 11 001 ISSN 2352 2267 S2CID 135231553 Dergachev V A Vasiliev S S Sementsov A A Zaitseva G I Chugunov K A Sljusarenko I Ju 2001 Dendrochronology and Radiocarbon Dating Methods in Archaeological Studies of Scythian Sites Radiocarbon 43 2A 417 424 doi 10 1017 S0033822200038273 ISSN 0033 8222 Panyushkina Irina Grigoriev Fedor Lange Todd Alimbay Nursan 2013 Radiocarbon and Tree Ring Dates of the Bes Shatyr 3 Saka Kurgan in the Semirechiye Kazakhstan Radiocarbon 55 3 1297 1303 doi 10 1017 S0033822200048207 hdl 10150 628658 ISSN 0033 8222 S2CID 220661798 Beisenov Arman Z Duisenbay Daniyar Akhiyarov Islam Sargizova Gulzada 2016 10 01 Dromos Burials of Tasmola Culture in Central Kazakhstan The Anthropologist 26 1 2 25 33 doi 10 1080 09720073 2016 11892125 ISSN 0972 0073 S2CID 80362028 a b Benjamin Craig March 2003 The Yuezhi Migration and Sogdia Eran ud Aneran Webfestschrift Marshak Archived from the original on 2015 02 18 Retrieved March 1 2015 a b Chinese History Sai 塞 The Saka People or Soghdians Chinaknowledge Archived from the original on 2015 01 19 Retrieved March 1 2015 a b Beckwith 2009 p 85 The Saka or Saka people then began their long migration that ended with their conquest of northern India where they are also known as the Indo Scythians a b Sinor 1990 pp 173 174 a b Szemerenyi Oswald 1980 Four old Iranian ethnic names Scythian Skudra Sogdian Saka PDF Verlag der Osterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften ISBN 0 520 06864 5 West Stephanie 2002 Scythians In Bakker Egbert J de Jong Irene J F van Wees Hans eds Brill s Companion to Herodotus Brill pp 437 456 ISBN 978 90 04 21758 4 Zhang Guang da 1999 History of Civilizations of Central Asia Volume III The crossroads of civilizations AD 250 to 750 UNESCO p 283 ISBN 978 8120815407 H W Bailey 1985 02 07 Indo Scythian Studies Being Khotanese Texts Cambridge University Press p 67 ISBN 978 0 521 11873 6 Callieri Pierfrancesco 2016 SAKAS IN AFGHANISTAN Encyclopaedia Iranica The ethnonym Saka appears in ancient Iranian and Indian sources as the name of the large family of Iranian nomads called Scythians by the Classical Western sources and Sai by the Chinese Gk Sacae OPers Saka Davis Kimball Jeannine Bashilov Vladimir A Yablonsky Leonid T in Russian 1995 Nomads of the Eurasian Steppes in the Early Iron Age Zinat Press pp 27 28 ISBN 978 1 885979 00 1 Ivantchik Askold April 25 2018 SCYTHIANS Encyclopaedia Iranica K E Eduljee Histories by Herodotus Book 4 Melpomene 4 6 Zoroastrian Heritage Retrieved October 20 2020 Jacobson Esther 1995 The art of the Scythians the interpenetration of cultures at the edge of the Hellenic world Handbuch der Orientalistik hrsg von B Spuler Abt 8 Handbook of Uralic studies Leiden New York Koln Brill p 31 ISBN 978 90 04 09856 5 Dandamayev 1994 p 37 In modern scholarship the name Sakas is reserved for the ancient tribes of northern and eastern Central Asia and Eastern Turkestan to distinguish them from the related Massagetae of the Aral region and the Scythians of the Pontic steppes These tribes spoke Iranian languages and their chief occupation was nomadic pastoralism Cernenko 2012 p 3 The Scythians lived in the Early Iron Age and inhabited the northern areas of the Black Sea Pontic steppes Though the Scythian period in the history of Eastern Europe lasted little more than 400 years from the 7th to the 3rd centuries BC the impression these horsemen made upon the history of their times was such that a thousand years after they had ceased to exist as a sovereign people their heartland and the territories which they dominated far beyond it continued to be known as greater Scythia Melyukova 1990 pp 97 98 From the end of the 7th century B C to the 4th century B C the Central Eurasian steppes were inhabited by two large groups of kin Iranian speaking tribes the Scythians and Sarmatians I t may be confidently stated that from the end of the 7th century to the 3rd century B C the Scythians occupied the steppe expanses of the north Black Sea area from the Don in the east to the Danube in the West Ivantchik 2018 Scythians a nomadic people of Iranian origin who flourished in the steppe lands north of the Black Sea during the 7th 4th centuries BC Figure 1 For related groups in Central Asia and India see Sulimirski 1985 pp 149 153 During the first half of the first millennium B C c 3 000 to 2 500 years ago the southern part of Eastern Europe was occupied mainly by peoples of Iranian stock The main Iranian speaking peoples of the region at that period were the Scyths and the Sarmatians T he population of ancient Scythia was far from being homogeneous nor were the Scyths themselves a homogeneous people The country called after them was ruled by their principal tribe the Royal Scyths Her iv 20 who were of Iranian stock and called themselves Skolotoi iv 6 they were nomads who lived in the steppe east of the Dnieper up to the Don and in the Crimean steppe The eastern neighbours of the Royal Scyths the Sauromatians were also Iranian their country extended over the steppe east of the Don and the Volga Sulimirski amp Taylor 1991 p 547 The name Scythian is met in the classical authors and has been taken to refer to an ethnic group or people also mentioned in Near Eastern texts who inhabited the northern Black Sea region West 2002 pp 437 440 Ordinary Greek and later Latin usage could designate as Scythian any northern barbarian from the general area of the Eurasian steppe the virtually treeless corridor of drought resistant perennial grassland extending from the Danube to Manchuria Herodotus seeks greater precision and this essay is focussed on his Scythians who belong to the North Pontic steppe These true Scyths seems to be those whom he calls Royal Scyths that is the group who claimed hegemony apparently warrior pastoralists It is generally agreed from what we know of their names that these were people of Iranian stock Jacobson 1995 pp 36 37 When we speak of Scythians we refer to those Scytho Siberians who inhabited the Kuban Valley the Taman and Kerch peninsulas Crimea the northern and northeastern littoral of the Black Sea and the steppe and lower forest steppe regions now shared between Ukraine and Russia from the seventh century down to the first century B C They almost certainly spoke an Iranian language Di Cosmo 1999 p 924 The first historical steppe nomads the Scythians inhabited the steppe north of the Black Sea from about the eight century B C Rice Tamara Talbot Central Asian arts Nomadic cultures Encyclopaedia Britannica Online Retrieved October 4 2019 Saka gold belt buckles jewelry and harness decorations display sheep griffins and other animal designs that are similar in style to those used by the Scythians a nomadic people living in the Kuban basin of the Caucasus region and the western section of the Eurasian plain during the greater part of the 1st millennium bc Dandamayev 1994 p 37 In modern scholarship the name Sakas is reserved for the ancient tribes of northern and eastern Central Asia and Eastern Turkestan to distinguish them from the related Massagetae of the Aral region and the Scythians of the Pontic steppes These tribes spoke Iranian languages and their chief occupation was nomadic pastoralism Cernenko 2012 p 3 The Scythians lived in the Early Iron Age and inhabited the northern areas of the Black Sea Pontic steppes Though the Scythian period in the history of Eastern Europe lasted little more than 400 years from the 7th to the 3rd centuries BC the impression these horsemen made upon the history of their times was such that a thousand years after they had ceased to exist as a sovereign people their heartland and the territories which they dominated far beyond it continued to be known as greater Scythia Melyukova 1990 pp 97 98 From the end of the 7th century B C to the 4th century B C the Central Eurasian steppes were inhabited by two large groups of kin Iranian speaking tribes the Scythians and Sarmatians I t may be confidently stated that from the end of the 7th century to the 3rd century B C the Scythians occupied the steppe expanses of the north Black Sea area from the Don in the east to the Danube in the West Ivantchik 2018 Scythians a nomadic people of Iranian origin who flourished in the steppe lands north of the Black Sea during the 7th 4th centuries BC Figure 1 For related groups in Central Asia and India see Sulimirski 1985 pp 149 153 During the first half of the first millennium B C c 3 000 to 2 500 years ago the southern part of Eastern Europe was occupied mainly by peoples of Iranian stock The main Iranian speaking peoples of the region at that period were the Scyths and the Sarmatians T he population of ancient Scythia was far from being homogeneous nor were the Scyths themselves a homogeneous people The country called after them was ruled by their principal tribe the Royal Scyths Her iv 20 who were of Iranian stock and called themselves Skolotoi iv 6 they were nomads who lived in the steppe east of the Dnieper up to the Don and in the Crimean steppe The eastern neighbours of the Royal Scyths the Sauromatians were also Iranian their country extended over the steppe east of the Don and the Volga Sulimirski amp Taylor 1991 p 547 The name Scythian is met in the classical authors and has been taken to refer to an ethnic group or people also mentioned in Near Eastern texts who inhabited the northern Black Sea region West 2002 pp 437 440 Ordinary Greek and later Latin usage could designate as Scythian any northern barbarian from the general area of the Eurasian steppe the virtually treeless corridor of drought resistant perennial grassland extending from the Danube to Manchuria Herodotus seeks greater precision and this essay is focussed on his Scythians who belong to the North Pontic steppe These true Scyths seems to be those whom he calls Royal Scyths that is the group who claimed hegemony apparently warrior pastoralists It is generally agreed from what we know of their names that these were people of Iranian stock Jacobson 1995 pp 36 37 When we speak of Scythians we refer to those Scytho Siberians who inhabited the Kuban Valley the Taman and Kerch peninsulas Crimea the northern and northeastern littoral of the Black Sea and the steppe and lower forest steppe regions now shared between Ukraine and Russia from the seventh century down to the first century B C They almost certainly spoke an Iranian language Di Cosmo 1999 p 924 The first historical steppe nomads the Scythians inhabited the steppe north of the Black Sea from about the eight century B C Rice Tamara Talbot Central Asian arts Nomadic cultures Encyclopaedia Britannica Online Retrieved October 4 2019 Saka gold belt buckles jewelry and harness decorations display sheep griffins and other animal designs that are similar in style to those used by the Scythians a nomadic people living in the Kuban basin of the Caucasus region and the western section of the Eurasian plain during the greater part of the 1st millennium bc Kramrisch Stella Central Asian Arts Nomadic Cultures Encyclopaedia Britannica Online Retrieved September 1 2018 The Saka tribe was pasturing its herds in the Pamirs central Tien Shan and in the Amu Darya delta Their gold belt buckles jewelry and harness decorations display sheep griffins and other animal designs that are similar in style to those used by the Scythians a nomadic people living in the Kuban basin of the Caucasus region and the western section of the Eurasian plain during the greater part of the 1st millennium bc a b Parpola Simo 1970 Neo Assyrian Toponyms Kevaeler Butzon amp Bercker p 178 Iskuzaya SCYTHIAN EN oracc museum upenn edu Asguzayu SCYTHIAN EN oracc museum upenn edu a b c d e f Cook 1985 p 252 255 Schmitt Rudiger 2003 HAUMAVARGA Encyclopaedia Iranica a b Dandamayev 1994 p 44 46 a b c d Olbrycht 2000 Olbrycht 2021 Apparently the Dahai represented an entity not identical with the other better known groups of the Sakai i e the Sakai Saka tigrakhauda Massagetai roaming in Turkmenistan and Sakai Saka Haumavarga in Transoxania and beyond the Syr Darya Schmitt Rudiger 2003 HAUMAVARGA Encyclopaedia Iranica Dandamaev Muhammad A Lukonin Vladimir G 1989 The Culture and Social Institutions of Ancient Iran Cambridge University Press p 334 ISBN 978 0 521 61191 6 a b Francfort 1988 p 173 a b Bailey 1983 p 1230 Briant Pierre 29 July 2006 From Cyrus to Alexander A History of the Persian Empire Eisenbrauns p 178 ISBN 978 1 57506 120 7 This is Kingdom which I hold from the Scythians Saka who are beyond Sogdiana thence unto Ethiopia Cush from Sind thence unto Sardis a b c Cook 1985 p 254 255 Young 1988 p 89 Francfort 1988 p 177 Bivar A D H 1983 The History of Eastern Iran In Yarshater Ehsan ed The Cambridge History of Iran Vol 3 Cambridge United Kingdom Cambridge University Press p 181 231 ISBN 978 0 521 20092 9 a b c d e f g Schmitt 2018 a b Harmatta 1999 Abetekov A Yusupov H 1994 Ancient Iranian Nomads in Western Central Asia In Dani Ahmad Hasan Harmatta Janos Puri Baij Nath Etemadi G F Bosworth Clifford Edmund eds History of Civilizations of Central Asia Paris France UNESCO pp 24 34 ISBN 978 9 231 02846 5 Zadneprovskiy Y A 1994 The Nomads of Northern Central Asia After the Invansion of Alexander In Dani Ahmad Hasan Harmatta Janos Puri Baij Nath Etemadi G F Bosworth Clifford Edmund eds History of Civilizations of Central Asia Paris France UNESCO pp 448 463 ISBN 978 9 231 02846 5 The middle of the third century b c saw the rise to power of a group of tribes consisting of the Parni Aparni and the Dahae descendants of the Massagetae of the Aral Sea region a b L T Yablonsky 2010 06 15 The Archaeology of Eurasian Nomads In Donald L Hardesty ed ARCHAEOLOGY Volume I EOLSS p 383 ISBN 978 1 84826 002 3 Coatsworth John Cole Juan Hanagan Michael P Perdue Peter C Tilly Charles Tilly Louise 16 March 2015 Global Connections Volume 1 To 1500 Politics Exchange and Social Life in World History Cambridge University Press p 138 ISBN 978 1 316 29777 3 Atlas of World History Oxford University Press 2002 p 51 ISBN 978 0 19 521921 0 Fauve Jeroen 2021 The European Handbook of Central Asian Studies p 403 ISBN 978 3 8382 1518 1 a b Francfort 1988 p 168 a b c Francfort 1988 p 184 Olbrycht 2021 a b c d Yu 2010 The Daxia 大夏 people in the valley of the Amu Darya came from the valleys of the rivers Ili and Chu From the Geography of Strabo one can infer that the four tribes of the Asii and others came from these valleys the so called land of the Sai 塞 in the Hanshu 漢書 ch 96A a b Unterlander et al 2017 Genomic inference reveals that Scythians in the east and the west of the steppe zone can best be described as a mixture of Yamnaya related ancestry and an East Asian component Demographic modelling suggests independent origins for eastern and western groups with ongoing gene flow between them plausibly explaining the striking uniformity of their material culture We also find evidence that significant gene flow from east to west Eurasia must have occurred early during the Iron Age and The blend of EHG European hunter gatherer and Caucasian elements in carriers of the Yamnaya culture was formed on the European steppe and exported into Central Asia and Siberia We therefore considered an alternative model in which we treat them as a mix of Yamnaya and the Han Supplementary Table 25 This model fits all of the Iron Age Scythian groups consistent with these groups having ancestry related to East Asians not found in the other populations Alternatively the Iron Age Scythian groups can also be modelled as a mix of Yamnaya and the north Siberian Nganasan Supplementary Note 2 Supplementary Table 26 a b Unterlander et al 2017 The origin of the widespread Scythian culture has long been debated in Eurasian archaeology The northern Black Sea steppe was originally considered the homeland and centre of the Scythians until Terenozhkin formulated the hypothesis of a Central Asian origin On the other hand evidence supporting an east Eurasian origin includes the kurgan Arzhan 1 in Tuva which is considered the earliest Scythian kurgan Dating of additional burial sites situated in east and west Eurasia confirmed eastern kurgans as older than their western counterparts Additionally elements of the characteristic Animal Style dated to the tenth century BCE were found in the region of the Yenisei river and modern day China supporting the early presence of Scythian culture in the East de Laet amp Herrmann 1996 p 443 The rich kurgan burials in Pazyryk Siberia probably were those of Saka chieftains a b Kuzmina 2008 p 94 Analysis of the clothing which has analogies in the complex of Saka clothes particularly in Pazyryk led Wang Binghua 1987 42 to the conclusion that they are related to the Saka Culture a b Kuzmina 2007 p 103 The dress of Iranian speaking Saka and Scythians is easily reconstructed on the basis of numerous archaeological discoveries from the Ukraine to the Altai particularly at Issyk in Kazakhstan at Pazyryk and Ak Alakha Lebedynsky 2007 p 125 Harmatta 1996 p 488 Their royal tribes and kings shan yii bore Iranian names and all the Hsiung nu words noted by the Chinese can be explained from an Iranian language of Saka type It is therefore clear that the majority of Hsiung nu tribes spoke an Eastern Iranian language William H McNeill The Steppe Scythian successes Encyclopaedia Britannica Online Archived from the original on 2013 07 15 Retrieved 31 December 2014 The Steppe Military and political developments among the steppe peoples to 100 bc Encyclopaedia Britannica Online Retrieved 2019 09 23 a b c J P mallory Bronze Age Languages of the Tarim Basin PDF Penn Museum Archived from the original PDF on 2016 09 09 a b Sulimirski amp Taylor 1991 p 553 Harmatta 1996 a b Sulimirski amp Taylor 1991 p 560 590 Batty 2007 p 202 203 Sulimirski 1985 Olbrycht 2021 p 17 18 Schmitt Rudiger 2000 ZARINAIA Encyclopaedia Iranica Retrieved 2022 07 08 Mayor Adrienne 2014 The Amazons Lives and Legends of Warrior Women across the Ancient World Princeton United States Princeton University Press pp 379 381 ISBN 978 0 691 14720 8 Francfort 1988 p 171 Dandamayev 1994 pp 35 64 Gera Deborah Levine 2018 Warrior Women The Anonymous Tractatus De Mulieribus Leiden Netherlands New York City United States Brill p 199 200 ISBN 978 9 004 32988 1 Mayor Adrienne 2014 The Amazons Lives and Legends of Warrior Women across the Ancient World Princeton United States Princeton University Press p 382 383 ISBN 978 0 691 17027 5 Kuhrt Amelie 2013 The Persian Empire A Corpus of Sources from the Achaemenid Period London United Kingdom Routledge p 58 ISBN 978 1 136 01694 3 a b c d Schmitt Rudiger 1989 AMORGES Encyclopaedia Iranica Retrieved 2022 07 08 Dandamayev 1994 Shahbazi A Shapur 1989 DARIUS iii Darius I the Great Encyclopaedia Iranica Retrieved 2022 07 12 Cunliffe Barry 24 September 2015 By Steppe Desert and Ocean The Birth of Eurasia Oxford University Press p 235 ISBN 978 0 19 968917 0 Dandamayev 1994 pp 44 46 Vogelsang 1992 p 131 De Jong Albert 1997 Traditions of the Magi Zoroastrianism in Greek and Latin Literature Leiden Netherlands New York City United States BRILL p 297 ISBN 978 9 004 10844 8 Vogelsang 1992 p 160 Francfort 1988 p 185 Besides trade and exchange within the borders of the Achaemenid empire it seems that the part of Central Asua under Achaemenid rule was in contact with the Saka tribes who were in touch with China see the finds of kurgans II and V of Pazyryk and of Xinyuan and Alagou in Xinjiang Frantz Grenet 2022 Splendeurs des oasis d Ouzbekistan Paris Louvre Editions p 56 ISBN 978 8412527858 a b c Baumer 2012 p 290 Mallory J P amp Mair Victor H 2000 The Tarim Mummies Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West Thames amp Hudson London p 58 ISBN 0 500 05101 1 Torday Laszlo 1997 Mounted Archers The Beginnings of Central Asian History Durham The Durham Academic Press pp 80 81 ISBN 978 1 900838 03 0 Yu Ying shih 1986 Han Foreign Relations in The Cambridge History of China Volume I the Ch in and Han Empires 221 BC A D 220 377 462 Edited by Denis Twitchett and Michael Loewe Cambridge Cambridge University Press pp 377 388 391 ISBN 978 0 521 24327 8 Chang Chun shu 2007 The Rise of the Chinese Empire Volume II Frontier Immigration amp Empire in Han China 130 BC AD 157 Ann Arbor University of Michigan Press pp 5 8 ISBN 978 0 472 11534 1 Di Cosmo 2002 pp 174 189 Di Cosmo 2004 pp 196 198 Di Cosmo 2002 pp 241 242 Yu Taishan June 2010 The Earliest Tocharians in China in Victor H Mair ed Sino Platonic Papers Chinese Academy of Social Sciences University of Pennsylvania Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations pp 13 14 21 22 Benjamin Craig The Yuezhi Migration and Sogdia Bernard P 1994 The Greek Kingdoms of Central Asia In Harmatta Janos History of Civilizations of Central Asia Volume II The development of sedentary and nomadic civilizations 700 B C to A D 250 Paris UNESCO pp 96 126 ISBN 92 3 102846 4 a b c Grousset Rene 1970 The Empire of the Steppes Rutgers University Press pp 29 31 ISBN 0 8135 1304 9 Baumer 2012 p 296 a b c d e f g h i j Bailey 1983 a b Ulrich Theobald 26 November 2011 Chinese History Sai 塞 The Saka People or Soghdians ChinaKnowledge de Accessed 2 September 2016 Lebedynsky 2006 p 73 Mallory amp Mair 2008 pp 329 330 Lebedynsky 2006 p 84 Attwood Jayarava 2012 Possible Iranian Origins for the Sakyas and Aspects of Buddhism Journal of the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies 3 Beckwith Christopher I 2015 Greek Buddha Pyrrho s Encounter with Early Buddhism in Central Asia Princeton University Press pp 1 21 ISBN 978 1 4008 6632 8 Levman Bryan Geoffrey 2014 Cultural Remnants of the Indigenous Peoples in the Buddhist Scriptures Buddhist Studies Review 30 2 145 180 doi 10 1558 bsrv v30i2 145 ISSN 1747 9681 The evidence for this final wave is however very slim and there is no evidence for it in the Vedic texts for their western origin Witzel relies on a reference in Paṇini 4 2 131 madravṛjyoḥ to the Vṛjjis in dual relation with the Madras who are from the northwest and to the Mallas in the Jaiminiya Brahamaṇa 198 as arising from the dust of Rajasthan Neither the Sakyas nor any of the other eastern tribes are mentioned and of course there is no proof that any of these are Indo Aryan groups I view the Sakyas and the later Sakas as two separate groups the former being aboriginal Abdullaev Kazim 2007 Nomad Migration in Central Asia in After Alexander Central Asia before Islam Proceedings of the British Academy 133 87 98 Foundation Encyclopaedia Iranica Welcome to Encyclopaedia Iranica iranicaonline org Also a Saka according to this source a b Sulimirski Tadeusz 1970 The Sarmatians Ancient peoples and places Vol 73 New York Praeger pp 113 114 ISBN 9789080057272 The evidence of both the ancient authors and the archaeological remains point to a massive migration of Sacian Sakas Massagetan tribes from the Syr Daria Delta Central Asia by the middle of the second century B C Some of the Syr Darian tribes they also invaded North India Bivar A D H KUSHAN DYNASTY i Dynastic History Encyclopaedia Iranica Retrieved August 31 2018 Rishi Weer Rajendra 1982 India amp Russia linguistic amp cultural affinity Roma p 95 Mitchiner Michael 1978 The ancient amp classical world 600 B C A D 650 Hawkins Publications distributed by B A Seaby p 634 ISBN 978 0 904173 16 1 Loewe Michael 1986 The Former Han Dynasty in The Cambridge History of China Volume I the Ch in and Han Empires 221 B C A D 220 103 222 Edited by Denis Twitchett and Michael Loewe Cambridge Cambridge University Press pp 197 198 ISBN 978 0 521 24327 8 Yu Ying shih 1986 Han Foreign Relations in The Cambridge History of China Volume I the Ch in and Han Empires 221 B C A D 220 377 462 Edited by Denis Twitchett and Michael Loewe Cambridge Cambridge University Press pp 410 411 ISBN 978 0 521 24327 8 Windfuhr Gernot 2013 Iranian Languages Routledge p 377 ISBN 978 1 135 79704 1 a b c d e Emmerick R E 14 April 1983 Chapter 7 Iranian Settlement East of the Pamirs In Ehsan Yarshater ed The Cambridge History of Iran Vol III The Seleucid Parthian and Sasanian Periods Part 1 Cambridge University Press Reissue edition pp 265 266 ISBN 978 0 521 20092 9 Xue Zongzheng 薛宗正 1992 History of the Turks 突厥史 Beijing Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe p 596 598 ISBN 978 7 5004 0432 3 OCLC 28622013 Beckwith Christopher 1987 The Tibetan Empire in Central Asia Princeton NJ Princeton University Press pp 36 146 ISBN 0 691 05494 0 Wechsler Howard J Twitchett Dennis C 1979 Denis C Twitchett John K Fairbank eds The Cambridge History of China Volume 3 Sui and T ang China 589 906 Part I Cambridge University Press pp 225 227 ISBN 978 0 521 21446 9 Hansen Valerie 2005 The Tribute Trade with Khotan in Light of Materials Found at the Dunhuang Library Cave PDF Bulletin of the Asia Institute 19 37 46 Ulrich Theobald 16 October 2011 City states Along the Silk Road ChinaKnowledge de Accessed 2 September 2016 Xavier Tremblay The Spread of Buddhism in Serindia Buddhism Among Iranians Tocharians and Turks before the 13th Century in The Spread of Buddhism eds Ann Heirman and Stephan Peter Bumbacker Leiden Koninklijke Brill 2007 p 77 a b Ahmad Hasan Dani B A Litvinsky Unesco 1996 History of Civilizations of Central Asia The crossroads of civilizations A D 250 to 750 UNESCO pp 283 ISBN 978 92 3 103211 0 Lurje Pavel 2009 YARKAND Encyclopaedia Iranica The territory of Yarkand is for the first time mentioned in the Hanshu 1st century BCE under the name Shache Old Chinese approximately s a j ka which is probably related to the name of the Iranian Saka tribes Whitfield 2004 p 47 Wechsler Howard J Twitchett Dennis C 1979 Denis C Twitchett John K Fairbank eds The Cambridge History of China Volume 3 Sui and T ang China 589 906 Part I Cambridge University Press pp 225 228 ISBN 978 0 521 21446 9 Scott Cameron Levi Ron Sela 2010 Islamic Central Asia An Anthology of Historical Sources Indiana University Press pp 72 ISBN 978 0 253 35385 6 Akiner 28 October 2013 Cultural Change amp Continuity In Routledge pp 71 ISBN 978 1 136 15034 0 a b c Strabo Geography 11 8 1 Perseus tufts edu Retrieved 2012 09 13 Kuz mina Elena E 2007 The Origin of the Indo Iranians Edited by J P Mallory Leiden Boston Brill pp 381 382 ISBN 978 90 04 16054 5 Hansen Valerie 2005 The Tribute Trade with Khotan in Light of Materials Found at the Dunhuang Library Cave PDF Bulletin of the Asia Institute 19 37 46 Archived PDF from the original on 2016 03 04 Retrieved 2016 09 23 Sarah Iles Johnston Religions of the Ancient World A Guide Harvard University Press 2004 pg 197 Edward A Allworth Central Asia A Historical Overview Duke University Press 1994 pp 86 Litvinsky Boris Abramovich Vorobyova Desyatovskaya M I 1999 Religions and religious movements History of civilizations of Central Asia Motilal Banarsidass pp 421 448 ISBN 8120815408 Harmatta 1996 pp 420 421 Kuz mina E E 2007 The Origins of the Indo Iranians BRILL Peng M S Song J J Zhang Y P 29 November 2017 Mitochondrial genomes uncover the maternal history of the Pamir populations European Journal of Human Genetics 26 1 124 136 doi 10 1038 s41431 017 0028 8 PMC 5839027 PMID 29187735 Frye R N 1984 The History of Ancient Iran p 192 ISBN 9783406093975 T hese western Saka he distinguishes from eastern Saka who moved south through the Kashgar Tashkurgan Gilgit Swat route to the plains of the sub continent of India This would account for the existence of the ancient Khotanese Saka speakers documents of whom have been found in western Sinkiang and the modern Wakhi language of Wakhan in Afghanistan another modern branch of descendants of Saka speakers parallel to the Ossetes in the west Bailey H W 1982 The culture of the Sakas in ancient Iranian Khotan Caravan Books pp 7 10 It is noteworthy that the Wakhi language of Wakhan has features phonetics and vocabulary the nearest of Iranian dialects to Khotan Saka Windfuhr G 2013 Iranian Languages Routeledge p 15 ISBN 978 1 135 79704 1 Carpelan C Parpola A Koskikallio P 2001 Early Contacts Between Uralic and Indo European Linguistic and Archaeological Considerations Papers Presented at an International Symposium Held at the Tvarminne Research Station of the University of Helsinki 8 10 January 1999 Suomalais Ugrilainen Seura 242 136 descendants of these languages survive now only in the Ossete language of the Caucasus and the Wakhi language of the Pamirs the latter related to the Saka once spoken in Khotan Novak L 2014 Question of Re classification of Eastern Iranian Languages Linguistica Brunensia 62 1 77 87 Unterlander Martina Palstra Friso Lazaridis Iosif Pilipenko Aleksandr Hofmanova Zuzana Gross Melanie Sell Christian Blocher Jens Kirsanow Karola Rohland Nadin Rieger Benjamin 2017 03 03 Ancestry and demography and descendants of Iron Age nomads of the Eurasian Steppe Nature Communications 8 Figure 7 doi 10 1038 ncomms14615 ISSN 2041 1723 PMC 5337992 PMID 28256537 Clisson I et al 2002 Genetic analysis of human remains from a double inhumation in a frozen kurgan in Kazakhstan Berel site early 3rd century BC International Journal of Legal Medicine 116 5 304 308 doi 10 1007 s00414 002 0295 x PMID 12376844 S2CID 27711154 Ricaut F et al 2004 Genetic Analysis of a Scytho Siberian Skeleton and Its Implications for Ancient Central Asian Migrations Human Biology 76 1 109 125 doi 10 1353 hub 2004 0025 PMID 15222683 S2CID 35948291 Ricaut F et al 2004 Genetic Analysis and Ethnic Affinities From Two Scytho Siberian Skeletons American Journal of Physical Anthropology 123 4 351 360 doi 10 1002 ajpa 10323 PMID 15022363 Legal bid fails to rebury remains of 2 500 year old tattooed ice princess The Siberian Times 2016 Gonzalez Ruiz Mercedes Santos Cristina Jordana Xavier Simon Marc Lalueza Fox Carles Gigli Elena Aluja Maria Pilar Malgosa Assumpcio 2012 Tracing the Origin of the East West Population Admixture in the Altai Region Central Asia PLOS ONE 7 11 e48904 Bibcode 2012PLoSO 748904G doi 10 1371 journal pone 0048904 PMC 3494716 PMID 23152818 Unterlander et al 2017 Keyser C Bouakaze C Crubezy E et al September 2009 Ancient DNA provides new insights into the history of south Siberian Kurgan people Human Genetics 126 3 395 410 doi 10 1007 s00439 009 0683 0 PMID 19449030 S2CID 21347353 Damgaard Peter de Barros May 2018 137 ancient human genomes from across the Eurasian steppes Nature 557 7705 369 374 Bibcode 2018Natur 557 369D doi 10 1038 s41586 018 0094 2 hdl 1887 3202709 PMID 29743675 S2CID 13670282 Damgaard Peter de Barros May 2018 137 ancient human genomes from across the Eurasian steppes Nature 557 7705 369 374 Bibcode 2018Natur 557 369D doi 10 1038 s41586 018 0094 2 hdl 1887 3202709 PMID 29743675 S2CID 13670282 Damgaard Peter de Barros May 2018 137 ancient human genomes from across the Eurasian steppes Nature 557 7705 369 374 Bibcode 2018Natur 557 369D doi 10 1038 s41586 018 0094 2 hdl 1887 3202709 PMID 29743675 S2CID 13670282 Principal component analyses and D statistics suggest that the Xiongnu individuals belong to two distinct groups one being of East Asian origin and the other presenting considerable admixture levels with West Eurasian sources Principal Component Analyses and D statistics suggest that the Xiongnu individuals belong to two distinct groups one being of East Asian origin and the other presenting considerable admixture levels with West Eurasian sources We find that Central Sakas are accepted as a source for these western admixed Xiongnu in a single wave model In line with this finding no East Asian gene flow is detected compared to Central Sakas as these form a clade with respect to the East Asian Xiongnu in a D statistic and furthermore cluster closely together in the PCA Figure 2 Overall our data show that the Xiongnu confederation was genetically heterogeneous and that the Huns emerged following minor male driven East Asian gene flow into the preceding Sakas that they invaded As such our results support the contention that the disappearance of the Inner Asian Scythians and Sakas around two thousand years ago was a cultural transition that coincided with the westward migration of the Xiongnu This Xiongnu invasion also led to the displacement of isolated remnant groups related to Late Bronze Age pastoralists that had remained on the southeastern side of the Tian Shan mountains Jeong et al 2020 Figure 3C a b Jeong et al 2020 Jeong et al 2020 Previously we reported a shared genetic profile among EBA western Baikal hunter gatherers Baikal EBA and Late Bronze Age LBA pastoralists in northern Mongolia Khovsgol LBA Jeong et al 2018 This genetic profile composed of major and minor ANA and ANE ancestry components respectively is also shared with the earlier eastern Baikal Fofonovo EN and Mongolian centralMongolia preBA groups analyzed in this study Figures 3A 3B and 4A suggesting a regional persistence of this genetic profile for nearly three millennia Ancient ANA individuals fall close to the cluster of present day Tungusic and Nivkh speaking populations in northeast Asia indicating that their genetic profile is still present in indigenous populations of the Far East today Jeong et al 2020 Visualization Figure 3C Statistics Table S5 Population Modeling Related to Figures 3 4 and 5 D Sergej Ivanovich Rudenko Sergei I Rudenko 1970 Frozen Tombs of Siberia The Pazyryk Burials of Iron Age Horsemen University of California Press pp 45 46 ISBN 978 0 520 01395 7 Archived from the original on 2017 03 27 Retrieved 2016 09 25 a b Day 2001 pp 55 57 Pliny Naturalis Historia 6 88 Dr Aaron Ralby 2013 Scythians c 700 BCE 600 CE Punching a Cloud Atlas of Military History Parragon pp 224 225 ISBN 978 1 4723 0963 1 Sergej Ivanovich Rudenko Sergei I Rudenko 1970 Frozen Tombs of Siberia The Pazyryk Burials of Iron Age Horsemen University of California Press ISBN 978 0 520 01395 7 Chariot Hermitage Museum Archived from the original on July 6 2001 850 gold artefacts belonging to the Scythian Saka era found in Kazakhstan The Archaeology News Network Retrieved 2021 09 27 New Kilunovskaya M E Semenov V A Busova V S Mustafin Kh Kh Alborova I E amp Matzvai A D 2018 The Unique Burial of a Child of Early Scythian Time at the Cemetery of Saryg Bulun Tuva Archaeology Ethnology and Anthropology of Eurasia 46 3 379 406 Mallory and Mair The Tarim Mummies Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West 2000 Les Saces Iaroslav Lebedynsky p 73 ISBN 2 87772 337 2 Crowns similar to the Scythian ones discovered in Tillia Tepe appear later during the 5th and 6th century at the eastern edge of the Asia continent in the tumulus tombs of the Kingdom of Silla in South East Korea Afganistan les tresors retrouves 2006 p282 ISBN 978 2 7118 5218 5 金冠塚古墳 Sgkohun world coocan jp Archived from the original on 2011 07 22 Retrieved 2010 12 14 Gropp G Clothing v In Pre Islamic Eastern Iran iranicaonline org Encyclopaedia Iranica Retrieved 6 January 2019 Youngsoo Yi Chang 2016 The Study on the Scythian Costume III Focaused on the Scythian of the Pazyryk region in Altai Fashion amp Textile Research Journal 한국의류산업학회지 Korea Institute of Science and Technology 18 4 424 437 doi 10 5805 SFTI 2016 18 4 424 Retrieved October 19 2020 Metropolitan Museum of Art www metmuseum org Di Cosmo 1999 13 5 Statuette of warrior a and bronze cauldron b Saka Betts Alison Vicziany Marika Jia Peter Weiming Castro Angelo Andrea Di 19 December 2019 The Cultures of Ancient Xinjiang Western China Crossroads of the Silk Roads Archaeopress Publishing Ltd p 103 ISBN 978 1 78969 407 9 The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago Photographic Archives Persepolis Apadana E Stairway Tribute Procession the Saka Tigraxauda Delegation 1 Archived 2012 10 12 at the Wayback Machine Retrieved 2012 6 27 Murphy Eileen Gokhman Ilia Chistov Yuri Barkova Ludmilla 2002 Prehistoric Old World Scalping New Cases from the Cemetery of Aymyrlyg South Siberia American Journal of Archaeology 106 1 1 10 doi 10 2307 507186 JSTOR 507186 S2CID 161894416 Bibliography Edit Akiner 28 October 2013 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translation Jeong Choongwon Wang Ke Wilkin Shevan Taylor William Timothy Treal Miller Bryan K Bemmann Jan H Stahl Raphaela Chiovelli Chelsea Knolle Florian Ulziibayar Sodnom Khatanbaatar Dorjpurev Erdenebaatar Diimaajav Erdenebat Ulambayar Ochir Ayudai Ankhsanaa Ganbold Vanchigdash Chuluunkhuu Ochir Battuga Munkhbayar Chuluunbat Tumen Dashzeveg Kovalev Alexey Kradin Nikolay Bazarov Bilikto A Miyagashev Denis A Konovalov Prokopiy B Zhambaltarova Elena Miller Alicia Ventresca Haak Wolfgang Schiffels Stephan Krause Johannes Boivin Nicole Erdene Myagmar Hendy Jessica Warinner Christina November 2020 A Dynamic 6 000 Year Genetic History of Eurasia s Eastern Steppe Cell 183 4 890 904 doi 10 1016 j cell 2020 10 015 ISSN 0092 8674 PMID 33157037 S2CID 214725595 Kuzmina Elena Kuzmina 2007 The Origin of the Indo Iranians BRILL ISBN 978 9004160545 Kuzmina Elena Kuzmina 2008 The Prehistory of the Silk Road University of Pennsylvania Press ISBN 978 0 8122 4041 2 de Laet Sigfried J Herrmann Joachim 1996 History of Humanity From the seventh century B C to the seventh century A D UNESCO ISBN 923102812X Lebedynsky Iaroslav 2006 Les Saces in French Editions Errance ISBN 2877723372 Lebedynsky Iaroslav 2007 Les Nomades in French Editions Errance ISBN 978 2877722544 Loewe Michael 1986 The Former Han Dynasty in The Cambridge History of China Volume I the Ch in and Han Empires 221 B C A D 220 103 222 Edited by Denis Twitchett and Michael Loewe Cambridge Cambridge University Press ISBN 978 0 521 24327 8 Mallory J P Mair Victor H 2008 The Tarim mummies ancient China and the mystery of the earliest peoples from the West 1st pbk ed London Thames amp Hudson ISBN 978 0 500 28372 1 Melyukova A I 1990 The Scythians and Sarmatians In Sinor Denis ed The Cambridge History of Early Inner Asia Cambridge United Kingdom Cambridge University Press pp 97 117 ISBN 978 0 521 24304 9 Millward James A 2007 Eurasian Crossroads A History of Xinjiang illustrated ed Columbia University Press ISBN 0231139241 Olbrycht Marek Jan 2021 Early Arsakid Parthia ca 250 165 B C At the Crossroads of Iranian Hellenistic and Central Asian History Leiden Netherlands Boston United States Brill ISBN 978 9 004 46076 8 Olbrycht Marek Jan 2000 Remarks on the Presence of Iranian Peoples in Europe and Their Asiatic Relations Collectanea Celto Asiatica Cracoviensia Krakow Ksiegarnia Akademicka pp 101 104 ISBN 978 8 371 88337 8 Pulleyblank Edwin G 1970 The Wu sun and Sakas and the Yueh chih Migration Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 33 1970 pp 154 160 Puri B N 1994 The Sakas and Indo Parthians In History of civilizations of Central Asia Volume II The development of sedentary and nomadic civilizations 700 B C to A D 250 Harmatta Janos ed 1994 Paris UNESCO Publishing pp 191 207 Schmitt Rudiger 2018 MASSAGETAE Encyclopaedia Iranica Sulimirski Tadeusz 1970 The Sarmatians Volume 73 of Ancient peoples and places New York Praeger pp 113 114 The evidence of both the ancient authors and the archaeological remains point to a massive migration of Sacian Sakas Massagetan tribes from the Syr Daria Delta Central Asia by the middle of the second century B C Some of the Syr Darian tribes they also invaded North India Sulimirski T 1985 The Scyths In Gershevitch I ed The Cambridge History of Iran The Median and Achaemenian Periods Vol 2 Cambridge University Press pp 149 199 ISBN 978 1 139 05493 5 Sulimirski Tadeusz Taylor T F 1991 The Scythians In Boardman John Edwards I E S Hammond N G L Sollberger E Walker C B F eds The Cambridge Ancient History Vol 3 Cambridge Cambridge University Press pp 547 590 ISBN 978 1 139 05429 4 Theobald Ulrich 26 November 2011 Chinese History Sai 塞 The Saka People or Soghdians ChinaKnowledge de Accessed 2 September 2016 Thomas F W 1906 Sakastana Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 1906 pp 181 216 Torday Laszlo 1997 Mounted Archers The Beginnings of Central Asian History Durham The Durham Academic Press ISBN 978 1 900838 03 0 Sinor Denis 1990 The Cambridge History of Early Inner Asia Volume 1 Cambridge University Press ISBN 0 521 24304 1 Tremblay Xavier 2007 The Spread of Buddhism in Serindia Buddhism Among Iranians Tocharians and Turks before the 13th Century in The Spread of Buddhism eds Ann Heirman and Stephan Peter Bumbacker Leiden Koninklijke Brill Unterlander Martina Palstra Friso Lazaridis Iosif Pilipenko Aleksandr Hofmanova Zuzana Gross Melanie Sell Christian Blocher Jens Kirsanow Karola Rohland Nadin Rieger Benjamin 2017 03 03 Ancestry and demography and descendants of Iron Age nomads of the Eurasian Steppe Nature Communications 8 14615 Bibcode 2017NatCo 814615U doi 10 1038 ncomms14615 ISSN 2041 1723 PMC 5337992 PMID 28256537 Vogelsang W J 1992 The Rise and Organisation of the Achaemenid Empire The Eastern Iranian Evidence Leiden Netherlands New York City United States Brill ISBN 978 9 004 09682 0 Wechsler Howard J Twitchett Dennis C 1979 Denis C Twitchett John K Fairbank eds The Cambridge History of China Volume 3 Sui and T ang China 589 906 Part I Cambridge University Press pp 225 227 ISBN 978 0 521 21446 9 West Barbara A 2009 Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Asia and Oceania Infobase Publishing ISBN 978 1 4381 1913 7 Retrieved January 18 2015 Xue Zongzheng 薛宗正 1992 History of the Turks 突厥史 Beijing Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe ISBN 978 7 5004 0432 3 OCLC 28622013 Young Tyler Cuyler 1988 The Consolidation of the Empire and its Limits of Growth under Darius and Xerxes The Cambridge Ancient History Vol 4 Cambridge United Kingdom Cambridge University Press pp 53 111 ISBN 978 0 521 22804 6 Yu Taishan 1998 A Study of Saka History Sino Platonic Papers No 80 July 1998 Dept of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies University of Pennsylvania Yu Taishan 2000 A Hypothesis about the Source of the Sai Tribes Sino Platonic Papers No 106 September 2000 Dept of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies University of Pennsylvania Yu Taishan 2010 The Earliest Tocharians in China PDF Sino Platonic Papers 204 12 13 Retrieved 2022 07 05 Yu Ying shih 1986 Han Foreign Relations in The Cambridge History of China Volume I the Ch in and Han Empires 221 B C A D 220 377 462 Edited by Denis Twitchett and Michael Loewe Cambridge Cambridge University Press ISBN 978 0 521 24327 8 External links EditEliot Charles Norton Edgcumbe 1911 Saka Encyclopaedia Britannica Vol 24 11th ed p 53 Scythians Sacae by Jona Lendering Article by Kivisild et al on genetic heritage of early Indian settlers Indian Japanese and Chinese Emperors The Sakas Parthians 97 BC 125 AD Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Saka amp oldid 1165813922, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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