Idanthyrsus (; ) is the name of a

Scythian The Scythians ( or ) or Scyths (, but note Scytho- () in composition) and sometimes also referred to as the Pontic Scythians, were an ancient Eastern Iranian equestrian nomadic people who had migrated during the 9th to 8th centuries BC fr ...

king who lived in the 6th century BCE, when he faced an invasion of his country by the

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

Achaemenid Empire The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire, also known as the Persian Empire or First Persian Empire (; , , ), was an Iranian peoples, Iranian empire founded by Cyrus the Great of the Achaemenid dynasty in 550 BC. Based in modern-day Iran, i ...

Name and etymology

The name () is the Hellenized form of a

name whose original form is not attested. The Scythian name has been tentatively suggested by

Ferdinand Justi Ferdinand Justi (2 June 1837 in Marburg, Germany – 17 February 1907 in Marburg) was a German linguist and Orientalist. He finished his studies of linguistics at the University of Marburg and the University of Göttingen. In 1861 he lived in Ma ...

and

Josef Markwart Josef Markwart (originally spelled Josef Marquart: December 9, 1864 in Reichenbach am Heuberg – February 4, 1930 in Berlin) was a German historian and orientalist. He specialized in Turkish and Iranian Studies and the history of the Middl ...

to have been composed of the Iranian term "finding, attaining" or . However, the Iranic sound /d/ had evolved into /δ/ in Proto-Scythian, and later evolved into /l/ in Scythian. The linguist Martin Schwartz has instead reconstructed the original Scythian form of as , meaning "prospering the ally", with the final part modified into , referring to the composite vegetal wand of Bacchus, in Greek because the ancient Greeks associated Scythian peoples with Bacchic rites.

Life

Background

Idanthyrsus was the son of his predecessor, the Scythian king

Saulius Saulius is a masculine given name. Ancient history A Scythian king bore this name: * Saulius, who reigned in the 6th century BC, brother of Anacharsis and father of Idanthyrsus. Lithuania Saulius is also the Lithuanian variant of the Biblical na ...

, who was himself the brother and slayer of

Anacharsis Anacharsis (; ) was a Scythian prince and philosopher of uncertain historicity who lived in the 6th century BC. Life Anacharsis was the brother of the Scythian king Saulius, and both of them were the sons of the previous Scythian king, Gnurus ...

Persian invasion

When

Darius I of Persia Darius I ( ; – 486 BCE), commonly known as Darius the Great, was the third King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire, reigning from 522 BCE until his death in 486 BCE. He ruled the empire at its territorial peak, when it included much of West A ...

invaded Scythia, about 513 BC, and the Scythians retreated before him, he sent a message to Idanthyrsus, calling upon him either to fight or submit. The Scythian king answered that, in fleeing before the Persians, he was not urged by fear, but was merely living the wandering/

nomadic Nomads are communities without fixed habitation who regularly move to and from areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the population of nomadic pa ...

life to which he was accustomed, that there was no reason why he should fight the Persians, as he had neither cities for them to take nor lands. He, however did reply, "But if all you want is to come to fight, we have the graves of our fathers. Come on, find these and try to destroy them: you shall know then whether we will fight you." In his ''

Histories Histories or, in Latin, Historiae may refer to: * the plural of history * ''Histories'' (Herodotus), by Herodotus * ''The Histories'', by Timaeus * ''The Histories'' (Polybius), by Polybius * ''Histories'' by Gaius Sallustius Crispus (Sallust) ...

'',

Herodotus Herodotus (; BC) was a Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus (now Bodrum, Turkey), under Persian control in the 5th century BC, and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria, Italy. He wrote the '' Histori ...

writes the following about the dialogue between the Persian king and Idanthyrsus (2015 publication, ''

Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group Random House is an imprint and publishing group of Penguin Random House. Founded in 1927 by businessmen Bennett Cerf and Donald Klopfer as an imprint of Modern Library, it quickly overtook Modern Library as the parent imprint. Over the followin ...

''); To which the Scythian king replied;

Legacy

Graeco-Roman The Greco-Roman world , also Greco-Roman civilization, Greco-Roman culture or Greco-Latin culture (spelled Græco-Roman or Graeco-Roman in British English), as understood by modern scholars and writers, includes the geographical regions and co ...

authors confused several early Scythian kings such as Išpakaia, Protothyes, and

Madyes Madyes was a Scythian king who ruled during the period of the Scythian presence in West Asia in the 7th century BCE. Madyes was the son of the Scythian king Bartatua and the Assyrian princess Šērūʾa-ēṭirat, and, as an ally of the Neo-Ass ...

, into a single figure, also named Madyes, who led Scythians into defeating the Medes and the legendary

Egyptian ''Egyptian'' describes something of, from, or related to Egypt. Egyptian or Egyptians may refer to: Nations and ethnic groups * Egyptians, a national group in North Africa ** Egyptian culture, a complex and stable culture with thousands of year ...

king Sesōstris, before imposing their rule over Asia for many years before returning to

Scythia Scythia (, ) or Scythica (, ) was a geographic region defined in the ancient Graeco-Roman world that encompassed the Pontic steppe. It was inhabited by Scythians, an ancient Eastern Iranian equestrian nomadic people. Etymology The names ...

. Later Graeco-Roman authors named this Scythian king as Idanthyrsos or

Tanausis Tanausis was a legendary queen of the Goths, according to Jordanes's ''Getica'' (5.47). The 19th-century scholar Alfred von Gutschmid assigned her reign to 1323 BC – 1290 BC. According to the ''Getica'', she was the Gothic queen who halted the ...

, although this Idanthyrsos is a legendary figure separate from the later historical Scythian king Idanthyrsos, from whom the Graeco-Romans derived merely his name.

Explanatory notes

References

Sources

* * * * * * * {{S-end Scythian kings 6th-century BC monarchs Foreign contacts of ancient Egypt Achaemenid Thrace