The Asturicani are a

tribe The term tribe is used in many different contexts to refer to a category of human social group. The predominant worldwide use of the term in English is in the discipline of anthropology. The definition is contested, in part due to conflict ...

mentioned by

Ptolemy Claudius Ptolemy (; , ; ; – 160s/170s AD) was a Greco-Roman mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were important to later Byzantine science, Byzant ...

(v. 9. § 7) as dwelling adjacent to the

Pontus Euxinus The Black Sea is a marginal sea, marginal Mediterranean sea (oceanography), mediterranean sea lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bound ...

(Black Sea). A source cited this tribe as one of those located in Anatolia along with

Ancyra Ankara is the capital city of Turkey and the largest capital by area in the world. Located in the central part of Anatolia, the city has a population of 5,290,822 in its urban center ( Etimesgut, Yenimahalle, Çankaya, Keçiören, Altında ...

Balbura ''Balbura'' is a genus of moths in the subfamily Arctiinae The Arctiinae (formerly called the family Arctiidae) are a large and diverse subfamily of moths with around 11,000 species found all over the world, including 6,000 neotropical spe ...

, and Carura, among others. The settlement's believed proximity to the Sea of Azov also

William Smith William, Willie, Will, Bill, or Billy Smith may refer to: Academics * William Smith (Master of Clare College, Cambridge) (1556–1615), English academic * William Smith (antiquary) (c. 1653–1735), English antiquary and historian of University C ...

equates them with the

Aspurgiani The Aspurgiani (Greek: or ) were an ancient people, a tribe of the Maeotae dwelling along east side of the Strait of Kerch along the Palus Maeotis in antiquity. They seem to be identical with the " Asturicani" of Ptolemy (v. 9. § 7). The Aspurg ...

. There are scholars who explain that this association could be based on the way the settlement may not be a tribe but a political party or a

military colony A colony is a territory subject to a form of foreign rule, which rules the territory and its indigenous peoples separated from the foreign rulers, the colonizer, and their ''metropole'' (or "mother country"). This separated rule was often orga ...

. Aspurgiani is also believed to be the same.

References

Smith Smith may refer to: People and fictional characters * Metalsmith, or simply smith, a craftsman fashioning tools or works of art out of various metals * Smith (given name) * Smith (surname), a family name originating in England ** List of people ...

Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography The ''Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography'' is the last in a series of classical dictionaries edited by the English scholar William Smith (1813–1893), following '' A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities'' and the '' Dictionary of G ...

(1857). Ancient peoples {{Asia-hist-stub