Pliny the Elder, The Natural History, BOOK IV. AN ACCOUNT OF COUNTRIES, NATIONS, SEAS, TOWNS, HAVENS, MOUNTAINS, RIVERS, DISTANCES, AND PEOPLES WHO NOW EXIST OR FORMERLY EXISTED., CHAP. 25.

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CHAP. 25.—DACIA, SARMATIA.

On setting out from this spot, all the nations met with are Scythian in general, though various races have occupied the adjacent shores; at one spot the Getæ¹, by the Romans called Daci; at another the Sarmatæ, by the Greeks called Sauromatæ, and the Hamaxobii² or Aorsi, a branch of them; then again the base-born Scythians and descendants of slaves, or else the Troglodytæ³; and then, after them, the Alani⁴ and the Rhoxalani. The higher⁵ parts again, between the Danube and the Hercynian Forest⁶, as far as the winter quarters of Pannonia at Carnuntum⁷, and the borders of the Germans, are occupied by the Sarmatian lazyges⁸, who inhabit the level country and the plains, while the Daci, whom they have driven as far as the river Pathissus⁹, inhabit the mountain and forest ranges. On leaving the river Marus¹⁰, whether it is that or the Duria¹¹, that separates them from the Suevi and the kingdom of Vannius¹², the Basternæ, and, after them, other tribes of the Germans occupy the opposite sides¹³. Agrippa considers the whole of this region, from the Ister to the ocean, to be 2100 miles in length, and 4400 miles in breadth to the river Vistula in the deserts¹⁴ of Sarmatia. The name "Scythian" has extended, in every direction, even to the Sarmatæ and the Germans; but this ancient appellation is now only given to those who dwell beyond those nations, and live unknown to nearly all the rest of the world.

1 Though Strabo distinguishes the Getæ from the Daci, most of the ancient writers, with Pliny, speak of them as identical. It is not known, however, why the Getæ in later times assumed the name of Daci.

2 "Dwellers in waggons." These were a Sarmatian tribe who wandered with their waggons along the banks of the Volga. The chief seats of the Aorsi, who seem in reality to have been a distinct people from the Hamaxobii, was in the country between the Tanais, the Euxine, the Caspian, and the Caucasus.

3 "Dwellers in Caves." This name appears to have been given to various savage races in different parts of the world.

4 There were races of the Alani in Asia on the Caucasus, and in Europe on the Mæotis and the Euxine; but their precise geographical position is not clearly ascertained.

5 The present Transylvania and Hungary.

6 The name given in the age of Pliny to the range of mountains extending around Bohemia, and through Moravia into Hungary.

7 Its ruins are still to be seen on the south bank of the Danube near Haimburg, between Deutsch-Altenburg and Petronell. The Roman fleet of the Danube, with the 14th legion, was originally established there.

8 In Pliny's time this migratory tribe seems to have removed to the plains between the Lower Theiss and the mountains of Transylvania, from which places they had expelled the Dacians.

9 The Lower Theiss.

10 Now the river Mark, Maros, or Morava.

11 The name of the two streams now known as the Dora Baltea and Dora Riparia, both of which fall into the Po. This passage appears to be in a mutilated state.

12 A chief of the Quadi; who, as we learn from Tacitus, was made king of the Suevi by Germanicus, A.D. 19. Being afterwards expelled by his nephews Vangio and Sido, he received from the emperor Claudius a settlement in Pannonia. Tacitus gives the name of Suevia to the whole of the east of Germany from the Danube to the Baltic.

13 According to Hardouin, Pliny here speaks of the other side of the mountainous district called Higher Hungary, facing the Danube and extending from the river Theiss to the Morava.

14 This, according to Sillig, is the real meaning of a desertis here, the distance being measured from the Danube, and not between the Vistula and the wilds of Sarmatia. The reading "four thousand" is probably corrupt, but it seems more likely than that of 404 miles, adopted by Littre, in his French translation.

The Natural History. Pliny the Elder. John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S. H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A. London. Taylor and Francis, Red Lion Court, Fleet Street. 1855.

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Cross-references to this page (4):
- Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), GERMA´NIA
- Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), HERCY´NIA SILVA
- Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854), QUADI
- Smith's Bio, Va'nnius
Cross-references in general dictionaries to this page (13):
- Lewis & Short, Boeōtĭa
- Lewis & Short, Cĭthaeron
- Lewis & Short, Dircē
- Lewis & Short, Gargăphĭe
- Lewis & Short, Hĕlĭcon
- Lewis & Short, Ismēnus
- Lewis & Short, Mycălessos
- Lewis & Short, Oedĭpus
- Lewis & Short, Thēbae
- Lewis & Short, Thespĭae
- Lewis & Short, nātālis
- Lewis & Short, nūmen
- Lewis & Short, suffrāgĭum

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Pliny the Elder, The Natural History
John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S., H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A., Ed.

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CHAP. 25.—DACIA, SARMATIA.

Pliny the Elder, The Natural History John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S., H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A., Ed.

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CHAP. 25.—DACIA, SARMATIA.

Pliny the Elder, The Natural History
John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S., H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A., Ed.