The Sindi ( grc, Σινδοι, Sindoi; la, Sindi) were an ancient

Scythian The Scythians or Scyths, and sometimes also referred to as the Classical Scythians and the Pontic Scythians, were an ancient Eastern * : "In modern scholarship the name 'Sakas' is reserved for the ancient tribes of northern and eastern Centra ...

people who primarily lived in western

Ciscaucasia The North Caucasus, ( ady, Темыр Къафкъас, Temır Qafqas; kbd, Ишхъэрэ Къаукъаз, İṩxhərə Qauqaz; ce, Къилбаседа Кавказ, Q̇ilbaseda Kavkaz; , os, Цӕгат Кавказ, Cægat Kavkaz, inh, ...

. A portion of the Sindi also lived in Central Europe. Their name is variously written, and

Pomponius Mela Pomponius Mela, who wrote around AD 43, was the earliest Roman geographer. He was born in Tingentera (now Algeciras) and died AD 45. His short work (''De situ orbis libri III.'') remained in use nearly to the year 1500. It occupies less ...

calls them Sindones, Lucian, Sindianoi.

History

Ciscaucasia

The Sindi were a tribe of the

Scythians The Scythians or Scyths, and sometimes also referred to as the Classical Scythians and the Pontic Scythians, were an ancient Eastern * : "In modern scholarship the name 'Sakas' is reserved for the ancient tribes of northern and eastern Centra ...

who established themselves on the

Taman peninsula The Taman Peninsula (russian: Тама́нский полуо́стров, ''Tamanskiy poluostrov'') is a peninsula in the present-day Krasnodar Krai of Russia, which borders the Sea of Azov to the North, the Strait of Kerch to the West and the ...

, where they formed a ruling class over the indigenous North Caucasian

Maeotians The Maeotians (; grc, Μαιῶται, translit=Maiōtai; la, Maeōtae) were an ancient people dwelling along the Sea of Azov, which was known in antiquity as the " Maeotian marshes" or " Lake Maeotis".James, Edward Boucher"Maeotae" and "Maeoti ...

. Archaeologically, the Sindi belonged to the

Scythian culture The Scythian culture was an Iron Age archaeological culture which flourished on the Pontic-Caspian steppe in Eastern Europe from about 700 BC to 200 AD. It is associated with the Scythians and other peoples inhabiting the region of Scythia, and ...

, and they progressively became Hellenised due to contact with the

Bosporan Kingdom The Bosporan Kingdom, also known as the Kingdom of the Cimmerian Bosporus (, ''Vasíleio toú Kimmerikoú Vospórou''), was an ancient Greco-Scythian state located in eastern Crimea and the Taman Peninsula on the shores of the Cimmerian Bosporus, ...

. As the Scythians lost more territory in Ciscaucasia to the

Sauromatians The Sauromatian culture (russian: Савроматская культура, Savromatskaya kulʹtura) was a Iron Age culture of horse nomads in the area of the lower Volga River in southern Russia, dated to the 6th to 4th centuries BCE. The name o ...

over the course of the late 6th century BC, the Sindi remained the only Scythian group still present in the region, in the area called Sindica ( grc, Σινδικη, Sindikē) by the Greeks and which corresponded to the area west of present-day Krasnodar, in the Taman peninsula. The kingdom of Sindica existed for only a brief time, and it was soon annexed by the

Central Europe

Unlike the majority of the Sindi, who remained in the northern Caucasus, a smaller section of the Sindi migrated westwards and settled into the Hungarian Plain as part of the expansion of the

into

Central Europe Central Europe is an area of Europe between Western Europe and Eastern Europe, based on a common historical, social and cultural identity. The Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) between Catholicism and Protestantism significantly shaped the a ...

during the 7th to 6th centuries BC, and they soon lost contact with the Scythians who remained in the Pontic Steppe. The 3rd century BC Greek author

Apollonius of Rhodes Apollonius of Rhodes ( grc, Ἀπολλώνιος Ῥόδιος ''Apollṓnios Rhódios''; la, Apollonius Rhodius; fl. first half of 3rd century BC) was an ancient Greek author, best known for the ''Argonautica'', an epic poem about Jason and t ...

located a population of the Sindi living alongside the

Sigynnae The Sigynnae (Ancient Greek: ; Latin: ) were an obscure nomadic people of antiquity who were part of the Scythian cultures. Location The Sigynnae were a nomadic people of uncertain, but possibly Iranian or pre-Iranian origin, who lived north of t ...

and the otherwise unknown Grauci in the "plain of Laurion", which is likely the eastern part of the

Pannonian Basin The Pannonian Basin, or Carpathian Basin, is a large basin situated in south-east Central Europe. The geomorphological term Pannonian Plain is more widely used for roughly the same region though with a somewhat different sense, with only th ...

Archaeology

North Caucasus

The Scythian ruling class in the Maeotian country initially buried their dead in kurgans while the native Maeotian populace were buried in flat cemeteries. Burials in Sindica continued this tradition, and members of the Sindi ruling class continued being buried in kurgans while the Maeotians continued to be buried in flat graves. After earlier Scythian earthworks built in the 6th century BC along the right bank of the Kuban river were abandoned in the 4th century BC, when the Sauromatians took over most of Ciscaucasia, the Sindi built a new series of earthworks on their eastern borders. One of the Sindi earthworks was located at , where was located a kurgan in which several humans were buried and which contained the skeletons of 200 horses.

References

Citations

Sources

* * * *Trubachov, Oleg N., 1999: Indoarica, Nauka, Moscow. {{DEFAULTSORT:Sindi (People) Ancient peoples of Russia History of the western steppe Historical Iranian peoples Scythian tribes