The Scythian genealogical myth was an epic cycle of the

Scythian religion The Scythian religion refers to the mythology, ritual practices and beliefs of the Scythian cultures, a collection of closely related ancient Iranian peoples who inhabited Central Asia and the Pontic–Caspian steppe in Eastern Europe throughout ...

detailing the origin of the

Scythians The Scythians ( or ) or Scyths (, but note Scytho- () in composition) and sometimes also referred to as the Pontic Scythians, were an Ancient Iranian peoples, ancient Eastern Iranian languages, Eastern Iranian peoples, Iranian Eurasian noma ...

. This myth held an important position in the worldview of Scythian society, and was popular among both the Scythians of the northern Pontic region and the Greeks who had colonised the northern shores of 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 ...

Narrative

Five variants of the Scythian genealogical myth have been retold by Greco-Roman authors, which all traced the origin of the Scythians to the god Targī̆tavah and to the Scythian

Snake-Legged Goddess The Snake-Legged Goddess, also referred to as the Anguipede Goddess, was the ancestor-goddess of the Scythians according to the Scythian religion. Name The "Snake-Legged Goddess" or "Anguiped Goddess" is the modern-day name of this goddess, who ...

: # Herodotus of Halicarnassus's recorded two variants of the myth, and according to his first version, one thousand years before the Scythians were invaded by the Persians in 513 BC, the first man born in hitherto desert Scythia was named

Targitaos Targitaos or Scythes, was the ancestral god of the Scythians according to Scythian mythology. The ancient Greeks identified him with their own hero Hēraklēs. Names Targitaos The name is the Latinisation of the Greek name (), which is itself ...

and was the son of "

Zeus Zeus (, ) is the chief deity of the List of Greek deities, Greek pantheon. He is a sky father, sky and thunder god in ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, who rules as king of the gods on Mount Olympus. Zeus is the child ...

" (that is the Scythian Sky-god Pāpaya) and a daughter (that is the Scythian Earth-goddess Api) of the river Borysthenēs. Targitaos in turn had three sons, who each ruled a different part of the kingdom, named: #* Lipoxais (; ) #* Arpoxais (; ) #* Kolaxais (; ) #:One day three gold objects – a battle-axe, a plough with a yoke, and a drinking cup – fell from the sky, and each brother in turn tried to pick the gold, but when Lipoxais and Arpoxais tried, it burst in flames, while the flames were extinguished when Kolaxais tried. Kolaxais thus became the guardian of this sacred gold (the of

Tabiti Tabiti (Scythian: ; ; ) was the Scythian goddess of the primordial fire which alone existed before the creation of the universe and was the basic essence and the source of all creation. She was the most venerated of all Scythian deities. Name The ...

), and the other brothers decided that he should become the high king and king of the Royal Scythians while they would rule different branches of the Scythians. #::Kolaxais in turn had three sons who each ruled a part of the Scythian kingdom. # According to the second version of the myth recorded by Herodotus, Hēraklēs arrived in deserted Scythia with Gēryōn's cattle. Because of the extremely cold weather of Scythia, Hēraklēs covered himself with his lion skin and went to sleep. When Hēraklēs woke up, he found that his mares had disappeared, and he searched for them until he arrived at a land called the

Woodland A woodland () is, in the broad sense, land covered with woody plants (trees and shrubs), or in a narrow sense, synonymous with wood (or in the U.S., the '' plurale tantum'' woods), a low-density forest forming open habitats with plenty of sunli ...

(; ), where in a cave he found a half-maiden, half-viper being who later revealed to him that she was the mistress of this country, and that she had kept Hēraklēs's horses, which she agreed to return them only if he had sexual intercourse with her. She returned his freedom to Hēraklēs after three sons were born of their union: #* Agathyrsos (; ) #* Gelōnos (; ) #* Skythēs (; ) #:Before Hēraklēs left Scythia, the serpent maiden asked him what should be done once the boys had reached adulthood, and he gave her his girdle and one of his two bows, and told her that they should be each tasked with stringing the bow and putting on the girdle in the correct way, with whoever succeeded being the one who would rule his mother's land while those who would fail the test would be banished. When the time for the test had arrived, only the youngest of the sons, Skythēs, was able to correctly complete it, and he thus became the ancestor of the Scythians and their first king, with all subsequent Scythian kings claiming descent from him. Agathyrsos and Gelōnos, who were exiled, became the ancestors of the Agathyrsoi and Gelōnoi. # A third variant of the myth, recorded by

Gaius Valerius Flaccus Gaius Valerius Flaccus (; died ) was a 1st-century Roman poet who flourished during the "Silver Age" under the Flavian dynasty, and wrote a Latin ''Argonautica'' that owes a great deal to Apollonius of Rhodes' more famous epic.Iūpiter with a half-serpent nymph named Hora. #*The version of the myth recorded by Gaius Valerius Flaccus suggests that Herodotus's first version of the Scythian genealogical myth might have ended with Lipoxais and Arpoxais murdering Kolaxais. # The fourth variant of the myth, recorded by

Diodorus of Sicily Diodorus Siculus or Diodorus of Sicily (; 1st century BC) was an ancient Greek historian from Sicily. He is known for writing the monumental universal history ''Bibliotheca historica'', in forty books, fifteen of which survive intact, bet ...

, calls Skythēs the first Scythian and the first king, and describes him as a son of "Zeus" and an earth-born viper-limbed maiden. # The fifth version of the myth, recorded in the , recorded that after Hēraklēs had defeated the river-god Araxēs, he fathered two sons with his daughter

Echidna Echidnas (), sometimes known as spiny anteaters, are quill-covered monotremes (egg-laying mammals) belonging to the Family (biology), family Tachyglossidae , living in Australia and New Guinea. The four Extant taxon, extant species of echidnas ...

, who were named Agathyrsos and Skythēs, who became the ancestors of the Scythians. Among the two versions of the genealogical myth recorded by Herodotus of Halicarnassus, the first one was the closest to the original Scythian form, while the second one was a more Hellenised version which had been adapted to fit Greek mythological canons. Some regional variations of the genealogical myth might have existed in Scythia, including possibly one which placed the setting of the myth near the mouth of the Tyras river, at the location of the city of Tyras, which was initially called "the snake-filled" () by the Greeks, possibly because the local inhabitants claimed that the home of the serpent-legged Scythian ancestral goddess was located there rather than at Hylaea. The myth of the golden objects which fell from the sky was also present among other Scythic peoples such as the

Saka The Saka, Old Chinese, old , Pinyin, mod. , ), Shaka (Sanskrit (Brāhmī): , , ; Sanskrit (Devanāgarī): , ), or Sacae (Ancient Greek: ; Latin: were a group of nomadic Iranian peoples, Eastern Iranian peoples who lived in the Eurasian ...

of Central Asia, and therefore must have been an ancient Iranian tradition.

Interpretation

The Snake-Legged Goddess

The serpent-mother's traits are consistent across the multiple versions of the genealogical myth and include her being the daughter of either a river-god or of the Earth and dwelling in a cave, as well as her being half-woman and half-snake. The Scythian foremother was also an androgynous goddess who was often represented in art as being bearded. The Snake-Legged Goddess was thus a primordial ancestress of humanity, which made her a liminal figure who founded a dynasty, and was therefore only half-human in appearance while still looking like a snake, itself being a creature capable of passing between the worlds of the living and of the dead with no hindrance. The snake aspect of the goddess is linked to the complex symbology of snakes in various religions due to their ability to disappear into the ground, their venom, the shedding of their skin, their fertility, and their coiling movements, which are associated with the underworld, death, renewal, and fertility: being able to pass from the worlds above and below the earth, as well as of bringing both death and prosperity, snakes were symbols of fertility and revival. The legs of the goddess were sometimes instead depicted as tendrils, which also had a similar function by representing fertility, prosperity, renewal, and the afterlife because they grow from the Earth within which the dead were placed and blossom again each year. The Snake-Legged Goddess was also a feminine deity who appeared in an androgynous form in ritual and cult, as well as in iconography and ritual. This androgyny represented the full inclusiveness of the Snake-Legged Goddess in her role as the primordial ancestress of humanity. The androgyny of the Snake-Legged Goddess also enhanced her inherent duality represented by her snake and tendril limbs. The role of the Snake-Legged Goddess in the genealogical myth is not unlike those of

sirens Siren or sirens may refer to: Common meanings * Siren (alarm), a loud acoustic alarm used to alert people to emergencies * Siren (mythology), an enchanting but dangerous monster in Greek mythology that lured sailors to their deaths. Places * Si ...

and similar non-human beings in Greek mythology, who existed as transgressive women living outside of society and refusing to submit to the yoke of marriage, but instead chose their partners and forced them to join her. Nevertheless, unlike the creatures of Greek myth, the Scythian serpent-maiden did not kill Hēraklēs, who tries to win his freedom from her. The identification of the father of the Snake-Legged Goddess with the river-god Araxes corresponds to the non-mythological origin of the Scythians as recorded by Herodotus of Halicarnassus, according to which the Scythians initially lived along the

Araxes river The Aras is a transboundary river in the Caucasus. It rises in eastern Turkey and flows along the borders between Turkey and Armenia, between Turkey and the Nakhchivan exclave of Azerbaijan, between Iran and both Azerbaijan and Armenia, and, fin ...

until the Massagetae expelled them from their homeland, after which they crossed the Araxes river and migrated westwards.

The myth of Aphroditē Apatouros

The Scythian genealogical myth was a continuation of the legend of () and the Giants as recorded by

Strabo Strabo''Strabo'' (meaning "squinty", as in strabismus) was a term employed by the Romans for anyone whose eyes were distorted or deformed. The father of Pompey was called "Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo, Pompeius Strabo". A native of Sicily so clear-si ...

, according to which the goddess Aphroditē Apatouros had been attacked by Giants and called on Hēraklēs for help. After concealing Hēraklēs, the goddess, under guise of introducing the Giants one by one, treacherously handed them to Hēraklēs, who killed them. Aphroditē Apatouros and "Hēraklēs" then buried the Giants under the earth, due to which volcanic activity remained a constant in the region of Apatouron. Aphroditē Apatouros was the same goddess as the Snake-Legged Goddess of the Scythian genealogical myth, while "Hēraklēs" was in fact Targī̆tavah, and her reward to him for defeating the Giants was her love. The Greek poet

Hesiod Hesiod ( or ; ''Hēsíodos''; ) was an ancient Greece, Greek poet generally thought to have been active between 750 and 650 BC, around the same time as Homer.M. L. West, ''Hesiod: Theogony'', Oxford University Press (1966), p. 40.Jasper Gr ...

might have mentioned this legend in the , where he assimilated the Snake-Legged Goddess to the monstrous figure of

from

Greek mythology Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks, and a genre of ancient Greek folklore, today absorbed alongside Roman mythology into the broader designation of classical mythology. These stories conc ...

. In Hesiod's narrative, "Echidna" was a serpent-nymph living in a cave far from any inhabited lands, and the god Targī̆tavah, assimilated to the Greek hero Hēraklēs, killed two of her children, namely the Hydra of Lerna and the lion of Nemea. Thus, in this story, "Hēraklēs" functioned as a destroyer of evils and a patron of human dwellings located in place where destruction had previously prevailed.

"Hēraklēs"

The "Hēraklēs" of Herodotus of Halicarnassus's second version and from the 's version of the genealogical myth is not the Greek hero Hēraklēs, but the Scythian god Targī̆tavah, who appears in the other recorded variants of the genealogical myth under the name of Targitaos or Skythēs as a son of "Zeus" (that is, the Scythian Sky Father Papaios), and was likely assimilated by the Greeks from the northern shores of the Black Sea with the Greek Hēraklēs because of his important role in the foundational myths of the Greek colonists throughout the Mediterranean basin. The arrival of "Hēraklēs" in the deserted Scythia corresponds to the mythical motif of the conquest of the empty land by the brave invader, while the stealing of his mares by the serpent maiden corresponds to the cattle-raid motif of Indo-Iranic mythology. The reference to "Hēraklēs" driving the cattle of Gēryōn also reflects the motif of the cattle-stealing god widely present among Indo-Iranic peoples, and the reference to him stealing Gēryōn's cattle after defeating him in Herodotus of Halicarnassus's second version of the genealogical myth and of his victory against the river-god Araxēs in the 's version were Hellenised versions of an original Scythian myth depicting the typical mythological theme of the fight of the mythical ancestor-hero, that is of Targī̆tavah, against the

chthonic In Greek mythology, deities referred to as chthonic () or chthonian () were gods or spirits who inhabited the underworld or existed in or under the earth, and were typically associated with death or fertility. The terms "chthonic" and "chthonian" ...

forces, through which he slays the incarnations of the primordial chaos to create the Cosmic order. The Hellenised myth of Targī̆tavah staying in Scythia might have been recorded in the , which mentions a bull-riding cattle-thief Titan, who, in this Hellenised narrative, might have been "Hēraklēs," to whom Targī̆tavah was identified, and who created the

Cimmerian Bosporus The Kerch Strait is a strait in Eastern Europe. It connects the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, separating the Kerch Peninsula of Crimea in the west from the Taman Peninsula of Russia's Krasnodar Krai in the east. The strait is to wide and u ...

by cutting a passage from the

Maeotian swamp The Maeotian Swamp or Maeotian Marshes (, ''hē Maiōtis límnē'', literally ''Maeotian Lake''; ) was a name applied in classical antiquity, antiquity variously to the swamps at the river mouth, mouth of the Tanais River in Scythia (the modern Don ...

. The stolen horses and the bow of Targī̆tavah in the second variant of the genealogical myth connected him to the equestrianism and archery of the Scythians. The peoples of Scythia believed that Targī̆tavah had left a two-cubit long footprint in the territory of the

Tyragetae The Tyrageti, Tyragetae, or Tyrangitae (, Strabo vii.; Ptol. iii. 5. § 25), literally, the Getae of the Tyras, were a sub-tribe of the Getae, situated on the river ''Tyras'' (modern-day Dniester in Moldova and Ukraine). They were regarded as an i ...

, in the region of the middle

Tyras river The Dniester ( ) is a transboundary river in Eastern Europe. It runs first through Ukraine and then through Moldova (from which it more or less separates the breakaway territory of Transnistria), finally discharging into the Black Sea on Ukr ...

, which the local peoples of this area displayed proudly. Since only gods were able to leave footprints on the hard rock, this footprint was held as a sign of divine protection, and, being the ancestor of the Scythians, he became their protector and laid claim to their country and all of its inhabitants for eternity by pressing his footprint into the Scythian rock. Targī̆tavah might also have been identified by the Greeks in southern Scythia with

Achilles In Greek mythology, Achilles ( ) or Achilleus () was a hero of the Trojan War who was known as being the greatest of all the Greek warriors. The central character in Homer's ''Iliad'', he was the son of the Nereids, Nereid Thetis and Peleus, ...

Pontarkhēs (), in which role he was associated with the Snake-Legged Goddess and was the father of her three sons.

Cosmogenesis

This myth explained the origin of the world, and therefore begun with the Heaven father Pāpaya and the Earth-and-Water Mother Api being already established in their respective places, following the Iranic cosmogenic tradition. This was followed by the process of creation proper through the birth of the first man, Targī̆tavah.

Ethnogenesis

The Scythian genealogical myth also ascribed the origin of the Scythians to the Scythian Sky Father Papaios, either directly or through his son Targī̆tavah, and to the Snake-Legged Goddess affiliated to Artimpasa, and also represented the threefold division of the universe into the Heavens, the Earth, and the Underworld, as well as the division of Scythian society into the warrior, priest, and agriculturalist classes.

The desert

The original deserted state of the land of Scythia when Targī̆tavah first arrived there in the myth followed the motif of the primordial state of the land, which was devastated and barren before the first king finally ended this state of chaos by establishing the tilling of the land and the practice of agriculture. One of the themes of both Herodotean versions of the Scythian genealogical myth as well as of the other Scythian origin myth known as the "Polar Cycle" is that of the Scythians' occupation of the virgin land.

The sons of Targī̆tavah

Lipoxais, Arpoxais, and Kolaxais

The names of Targī̆tavah's sons in the first version of the genealogical myth – Lipoxais, Arpoxais, and Kolaxais – end with the suffix "," which is a Hellenisation of the Old Iranian term meaning ruler: *Lipoxais, from Scythian , from an earlier form , means "king of radiance," in the sense of "king of the sun." ::The first element, , is derived from the

Indo-European root The roots of the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European language (PIE) are basic parts of words to carry a lexical meaning, so-called morphemes. PIE roots usually have verbal meaning like "to eat" or "to run". Roots never occurred alone in the langu ...

', meaning "to be bright" a well as "sky" and "heaven," and can also give the name the meaning of "king of heaven." *Arpoxais, from Scythian , means "king of the skillful" and "king of the toilers," as well as "king of the airspace." ::The element might have been a cognate of the

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

term (), which is the name of a group of Indic deities of the

airspace Airspace is the portion of the atmosphere controlled by a country above its territory, including its territorial waters or, more generally, any specific three-dimensional portion of the atmosphere. It is not the same as outer space which is t ...

. *Kolaxais, from Scythian , means "poleaxe-wielding king" or "hammer-wielding king," as well as "sceptre-wielding king," "thunderer king," and "blacksmith king," with the latter meaning "ruling king of the lower world."

=The layers of the cosmos

= The names of the three sons of Targī̆tavah therefore corresponded to the three layers of the cosmos: *Lipoxšaya was the "King of Radiance," and therefore of the Heavens; *R̥buxšaya was the King of the Airspace, and therefore of lightning; *Kolaxšaya was the Poleaxe/Hammer/Sceptre-wielding King and the Thunderer and Blacksmith king, and therefore of the Lower World.

=Progenitors of the social classes

= The genealogical myth also represented the formation of the three social classes of Scythian society, namely the warrior-aristocracy, the clergy, and the peasantry, with each of the sons of Targī̆tavah being forebears of social classes constituting the Scythian people: *Lipoxšaya was the ancestor of the Aukhatai (; ); **The original Scythian form of the Hellenised name might have been , meaning "the blessed ones" or "the holy ones." *R̥buxšaya was the ancestor of the Katiaroi (; ) and the Traspies (; ); **The original Scythian form of might have been derived from , meaning "three horses." **The original Scythian form of the Hellenised name might have been , meaning "possessors of cattle pastures"; *Kolaxšaya was the ancestor of the Paralatai (; ), also known as the Royal Scythians, who were the warrior-aristocracy of the Scythians. **The name was a Greek reflection of the Scythian name , which was a title held by the Scythian warrior-aristocracy to which the kings belonged, with the kings being members of the Paralāta, although not all the Paralāta were kings. The name Paralāta was a cognate of the Avestan title (), which means "first created." The three sons of Targī̆tavah represented the division of Scythian society into a system of tripartite classes which existed among all the Indo-European peoples, and is well-attested among the Indo-Iranic peoples, such as the three-fold class system of Zoroastrianism, as well as the system of the Indic peoples which divided the societies of the Indic peoples into the clerical class of the , the military aristocracy of the to which belonged the warriors and kings, and the wealth-producing ordinary community members of the . These three classes, in turn, each corresponded to the typically Indo-Iranic tripartite structure of the universe of Scythian cosmology, which is also present in the

Vedic upright=1.2, The Vedas are ancient Sanskrit texts of Hinduism. Above: A page from the '' Atharvaveda''. The Vedas ( or ; ), sometimes collectively called the Veda, are a large body of religious texts originating in ancient India. Composed ...

and

Avestan Avestan ( ) is the liturgical language of Zoroastrianism. It belongs to the Iranian languages, Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family and was First language, originally spoken during the Avestan period, Old ...

traditions, and according to which the universe was composed of the heavens, the airspace, and the earth. The three sons of Targī̆tavah were thus ancestors of the various social classes of Scythian society who also represented the three levels of the Cosmos: the upper celestial realm, the middle sphere of the airspace, and the lower terrestrial world, with the central son representing the airspace linking the two others, which also parallels the roles of the Sky Father Papaios, the Earth-and-Water Mother Api, and their child, Targī̆tavah, that is the airspace.

The warrior class

The Scythian genealogical myth thus assigned to the Scythian kings a divine ancestry through descent from Kolaxšaya, as attested when the Scythian king Idanthyrsus claimed Papaios as his ancestor. The name was a Greek reflection of the Scythian name , which was a title held by Scythian kings, and was also a cognate of the Avestan title (), which means "first created." According to the version of the genealogical myth recorded by Gaius Valerius Flaccus, Kolaxšaya and his warriors decorated their shields with "fires divided into three parts," flashing lightning, and pictures of red wings, with the colour red being characteristic of the warrior class in Indo-Iranic tradition.

The priestly class

In Gaius Valerius Flaccus's narrative, Auchus, that is Lipoxšaya, was born with white hair and wore a band which passed around his head three times and whose ends hanged backwards, with the colour white in Indo-Iranic tradition being that of priesthood, and the headband of Auchus being part of a priest's regalia which was depicted in the art of the various ancient

Iranian peoples Iranian peoples, or Iranic peoples, are the collective ethnolinguistic groups who are identified chiefly by their native usage of any of the Iranian languages, which are a branch of the Indo-Iranian languages within the Indo-European langu ...

. These thus signalled Lipoxšaya as the progenitor of Aukhatai, that is the priestly component of Scythian society's tripartite class system.

The farmer class

R̥buxšaya, meanwhile, was the progenitor of the Katiaroi and Traspies, who formed the third section of the Scythian class system, that of the ordinary populace consisting of farmers and horse-breeders. The sub-division of the farmer class into two groups, namely the Katiaroi connected to cattle the Traspies connected to horses, fits an Indo-Iranic motif of which the other iterations include the Zoroastrian Gə̄uš Uruuan (whose name means "the soul of the cow") and Druuāspā (whose name means "(the deity) with healthy horses"), as well as the Vedic

Aśvins The Ashvins (, ), also known as the Ashvini Kumaras and Asvinau,, §1.42. are Hindu twin gods associated with medicine, health, healing, sciences, and the twilight. In the ''Rigveda'', they are described as youthful divine twin horsemen, tra ...

and their sons in later

Hindu Hindus (; ; also known as Sanātanīs) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism, also known by its endonym Sanātana Dharma. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pp. 35–37 Historically, the term has also be ...

tradition,

Nakula Nakula () is a major character in the ancient Indian epic, the ''Mahabharata.'' He is the elder twin brother of Sahadeva and the fourth of the five Pandava brothers. He is the son of Divine twins, twin physician gods, Ashvins, and Madri, the ...

and

Sahadeva Sahadeva () was the youngest of the five Pandava brothers in the ancient Indian epic, the '' Mahabharata''. He and his twin brother Nakula were the sons of Madri, one of the wives of the Pandava patriarch Pandu, and Ashvini Kumaras, the ...

. The name of the Traspies, likely derived from Scythian , meaning "three horses," is also semantically connected to that of the Aśvins.

The gold objects and the class structure

The three golden objects which fell from the sky also represented the various Scythian classes: *the battle-axe represents the warrior-aristocracy; **the battle-axe also functioned as a royal sceptre or staff *the cup, used during religious rituals for offering libations and to prepare , representing the priestly class; *the plough used by farmers to till the fields and the yoke associated with cattle-breeding represented the lowest class of the Katiaroi and Traspies. The golden objects, that is the of Tabiti, as attested by their fiery nature, were the fires of the three classes of Scythian society, with the triunity of the Scythian representing the concept of fire, represented by the goddess

, being the primeval and all-encompassing element permeating the world and being present throughout it. Although each of the three gold objects each corresponded to one of the three layers of the Scythian tripartite class structure, the fact that they all came into the possession of Kolaxšaya and his descendants meant that they had no connections to his elder brothers who also corresponded to two of the three Scythian social classes. The plough-and-yoke and the cup, although representing the farmer and priestly functions, were instead symbols of royal power used in the coronation rites of the Scythian king, which themselves found a parallel in the consecration ceremony of Indic kings. The acquisition of the objects by Kolaxšaya represented the Scythian royal coronation ritual, according to which the world order was disturbed by the death of the previous king and was restored through the coronation of the new king. The falling of the three objects from the sky and Kolaxšaya coming to possessing them was also a myth of the transfer of power from the older generation of gods to the newer one, similar to power leaving

Ouranos In Greek mythology, Uranus ( , also ), sometimes written Ouranos (, ), is the personification of the sky and one of the Greek primordial deities. According to Hesiod, Uranus was the son and husband of Gaia (Earth), with whom he fathered the ...

ancient Greek religion Religious practices in ancient Greece encompassed a collection of beliefs, rituals, and Greek mythology, mythology, in the form of both popular public religion and Cult (religious practice), cult practices. The application of the modern concept ...

and

Varuṇa Varuna (; , ) is a Hindu god. He is one of the earliest deities in pantheon, whose role underwent a significant transformation from the Vedic to the Puranic periods. In the early Vedic era, Varuna is seen as the god-sovereign, ruling the sky ...

in ancient Vedic religion to pass on to the newer generations.

=Kingship

Kingship and the

The Scythian genealogical myth was a variant of an old Indo-European tradition present among the Indo-Iranic peoples, especially those who were part of the steppe cultures, according to which the royal dynasty and, by extension, the nation itself, were born from the union of a serpent-nymph and a travelling hero who was searching for his stolen horses. This motif became widely widespread in the region of the Caucasus. Therefore, the ownership of the three golden objects which fell from the sky, which constituted the of Tābiti, by Kolaxšaya and his descendants constituted a heaven-given manifestation of divine origin of the royal power of the Scythian kings, and of the kings' proximity to Tāpayantī. The Scythian goddess Tāpayantī was herself linked to the , and the ownership of her thus provided to Kolaxšaya the (), that is the royal splendour, which among Iranic peoples was believed to transform the king into a sacred figure and a kind of deity who was sometimes believed to be the brother of the Sun and the Moon. Among the Scythic peoples, this notion of the association of the Sun with kingship was attested by the

Massagetae The Massagetae or Massageteans, also known as Sakā Tigraxaudā or Orthocorybantians, were an ancient Eastern Iranian Saka people who inhabited the steppes of Central Asia and were part of the wider Scythian cultures. The Massagetae rose to powe ...

an practice of sacrificing horses to the Sun-god. The importance of the among the many Scythic peoples is attested by the fact that it is the most widespread element among recorded Scytho-Sarmatian names in the Pontic Steppe region. The of Tāpayantī were thus the physical manifestations of the and were guarded by the kings, with this association being evident in how the golden objects burnt the brothers who were unworthy of kingship, but did not harm the legitimate king, Kolaxšaya. Like the typically Iranic conceptions of the attested in the Zoroastrian and Persian myths, the Scythian was of heavenly origin, and represented an emanation of the sacred fire, and therefore could be itself depicted as objects made of or decorated with gold. It was the who chose the king, legitimised him, and guaranteed his power, while the king himself was seen as being unable of being burnt like fire. The Scythian concept of the was thus tripartite, with all of its three components belonging together to the king, although they could leave the king if he became unworthy. The three components of the also represented an emanation of the celestial fire and each corresponded to one of the three social classes of Scythian society, and were worshipped in religious rites. All Iranic peoples considered gold to be a symbol of and its material incarnation, as well as the metal of the warrior-aristocracy, with the ownership of the in the form of gold being necessary for a warrior to be victorious. Thus, the connection of the and gold with the king represented its connection to the warrior-aristocracy to which the kings belonged. In consequence, Iranic kings surrounded themselves with gold, which was supposed to help them preserve their , hence why Scythian kings only used gold cups, which represented the priestly role of royal power. Due to this, the cups placed in the burials of the earliest Scythian kings at were all made of gold. Because the was believed to have a solar nature, and therefore to be dangerous and capable of harming ordinary humans, the Scythian kings avoided direct contact with members of the populace, and instead communicated with them through the means of royally-appointed messengers who were buried with the kings after their deaths.

Kingship and the social classes

At the same time, the Scythian physical form of the royal consisted of three objects which each represented one of the three social classes of Scythian society, with the king himself thus encompassing and transcending these classes. The narrative of the ancestor of the Paralāta, Kolaxšaya, succeeding in acquiring the gold objects, that is the of Tāpayantī, which had fallen from the sky was also an explanation of the supremacy of the tribe descended from him, that is the Royal Scythians, over the other Scythian tribes, and of the Scythian kings, who bore the title of Paralāta. The ownership of the of Tāpayantī thus gave to Kolaxšaya the right to rule, and they also represented the king's role whereby, as the ruler of all society, he also represented all the social classes, being this the chief warrior, the chief priest, and the chief farmer, with all three social roles united within him. This conceptualisation of the king originating from the warrior-aristocracy but at the same time encompassing the three social functions and representing all the classes by being himself the incarnation of society was one of the fundamental concepts of Indo-Iranic ideology. This practise was also present among the Indic peoples, where the king originated from the warrior aristocracy, and was proclaimed to be a member of the priestly caste and symbolically married the , and then did the same with the producer caste. Other Indic coronation rites also included the symbolic birth of the king from the and castes, thus becoming a member of all three castes at the same time. Although information about coronation rites among the Iranic peoples is meagre, this appears to have been the case among them too. Thus, the passage of the Scythian genealogical myth regarding the three brothers explained how the three sons of Targī̆tavah represented the three social classes, with the youngest of the sons, Kolaxšaya, who was the warrior, also united within himself the function of all three classes. It also explained the dominant role of the warrior-aristocratic class over the other classes. The version of the Scythian genealogical myth retold by Diodorus of Sicily also made the sons of Skythes the progenitors of the social classes: *the corresponded to the warrior class of the , *the corresponded to the rest of the Katiaroi and Traspies.

Pliny the Elder Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/24 79), known in English as Pliny the Elder ( ), was a Roman Empire, Roman author, Natural history, naturalist, and naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and a friend of the Roman emperor, emperor Vesp ...

recorded a Scythian myth, according to which a struggle between the and the resulted in the destruction of the latter by the former, representing the establishment of the supremacy of the warrior class over the producer class. Only the warrior and producer classes are mentioned in this myth because the priestly class was completely subordinate to the warrior aristocracy.

Kingship and institutions

The Scythian genealogical myth originated among the royalty, and was used by the Scythian kings to establish the divine origin of their kingship and their right to rule by virtue of being the descendants of Kolaxšaya. By asserting the supremacy of the youngest brother over the elder ones, the genealogical myth also assigned such a preeminence to the Scythians, who claimed to be the "youngest of all peoples." The genealogical myth also ascribed to the Scythians' political and social institutions an antiquity dating back to the mythical era of the ancestors, which in the Scythian worldview was seen as ensuring the "correctness" of these institutions, which in turn guaranteed the stability and prosperity of Scythian society. In the genealogical myth, Targī̆tavah, the first man born from the union of the Heavenly Father and the Earth-and-Water Mother, represented the primordial unity. This unity incarnated by Targī̆tavah soon underwent fragmentation on the levels of kinship due to Targī̆tavah having three sons, ethnicity and territory in the form of each son founding a different tribe, and class due to the three objects representing three social classes and their respective functions. This fragmentation was finally stopped when the three objects chose Kolaxšaya, who became king when he gained possession of the gold objects which formed the totality of kingship, and his brothers proved themselves to be unworthy of possessing them and therefore became subordinate to him and the peoples descended from them became subordinate to the descendants of Kolaxšaya. After the loss of the primordial state of perfect unity, the gods sought to restore as much of this unity as feasible by choosing Kolaxšaya, who thus encompassed and reintegrated the fragmented elements of the primordial totality within himself by becoming king. In consequence, the following Scythian kings kept the gold objects as both a royal and national treasure which acted as the symbol and legitimising source of their power and position, and which they had to renew each year through religious rituals to preserve the welfare and unity of the Scythians. Thus, priest-kings were in charge of restoring the lost primordial unity among the Scythians.

The sons of Kolaxšaya

The division of the Scythian kingdom between the three sons of Kolaxšaya transposed the Scythian three-fold cosmological structure and social structure composed of three classes onto the institution of Scythian kingship, and therefore also explained the division of Scythia into three kingdoms of which the king of the Royal Scythians was the High King. Thus, Scythia was ruled by three kings, of whom one was the supreme king who guarded the of Tāpayantī. This threefold kingship is a structure recorded in historical times in Herodotus's account of the Scythian campaign of the Persian king Darius I, when the Scythians were ruled by the three kings, namely

Idanthyrsus Idanthyrsus (; ) is the name of a Scythian king who lived in the 6th century BCE, when he faced an invasion of his country by the Persian Achaemenid Empire. Name and etymology The name () is the Hellenized form of a Scythian name whose origina ...

, Skōpasis, and Taxakis, with Idanthyrsus being the Scythian high king while Skōpasis and Taxakis were sub-kings. Kolaxšaya's partition of his kingdom among his three sons also explained the three-fold division of the Scythians into the three tribal groupings of the Royal Scythians, the Nomadic Scythians, and the Agricultural Scythians.

The horse of Kolaxšaya

The mention of a "horse of Kolaxšaya" () in a , recorded by

Alcman Alcman (; ''Alkmán''; fl. 7th century BC) was an Ancient Greek choral lyric poet from Sparta. He is the earliest representative of the Alexandrian canon of the Nine Lyric Poets. He wrote six books of choral poetry, most of which is now lost; h ...

and dedicated to Artemis Orthia or the Dioscuri, suggests that Kolaxšaya possessed an unruly and fabulous horse of a fiery nature which had a white coat. This horse might have been believed to be the ancestor of all war horses. According to Valerius Flaccus's version of the genealogical myth, the horse of Kolaxšaya was killed by the Greek hero

Jason Jason ( ; ) was an ancient Greek mythological hero and leader of the Argonauts, whose quest for the Golden Fleece is featured in Greek literature. He was the son of Aeson, the rightful king of Iolcos. He was married to the sorceress Med ...

, who then killed Kolaxšaya himself. This might reflect the passage of the Scythian genealogical myth where Kolaxšaya himself was murdered by his brothers.

Agathyrsos, Gelōnos, Skythēs

The sons of Targī̆tavah according to the second version of the genealogical myth were each also ancestors of tribes belonging to the

Scythian cultures The Scythian cultures was an archaeological horizon that flourished across the Eurasian Steppe during the Iron Age, from approximately the 9th century BC to the 2nd century AD. It included the Scythian, Sauromatian and Sarma ...

: *Agathyrsos was the ancestor of the Agathyrsoi, *Gelōnos was the ancestor of the Gelōnoi, *Skythēs was the ancestor of the Scythians proper, who were named after him. Each of the sons of Targī̆tavah in the second version of the genealogical myth respectively corresponded to the sons from the first version, with Agathyrsos corresponding to Lipoxšaya, Gelōnos corresponding to R̥buxšaya, and Skythēs corresponding to Kolaxšaya. The "horse of Kolaxšaya" from the of Alcman might alternatively have referred to Scythian horses in general due to the Scythians possibly being considered to be "Kolaxšaya-ians" because of the identification of Skythēs with Kolaxšaya.

The trial of the sons

The tasks which the sons of Targī̆tavah had to perform as trial in this second version of the genealogical myth consisted of stringing a bow, and strapping a tight belt to which was attached a cup. *The bow was a military tool, with a similar set of tools being attributes of the Indic , and it corresponded to the battle-axe which formed part of the of the first version of the genealogical myth. This bow was therefore used to find out which brother was the warrior and would therefore be the ancestor of the warrior class. *The belt with the cup attached to it was a sacerdotal tool, with the belt being associated to priests in Indo-Iranic tradition: adherents of Zoroastrianism had to start wearing the from a young age, attesting of the initiatic role of the belt; and the belt was also used in the initiation rites of the Indic priestly caste; therefore, the belt with a cup attacked to it represented the Scythian king's role as a priest. Thus, after having proven that he was a warrior, Skythēs also obtained the cup and therefore earned the right to perform priestly functions. ** Herodotus claimed that the Scythians of his time still wore cups hanging from their belts in memory of Skythēs. The trial of the sons of Targī̆tavah was a warrior's trial as well as a priest's trial through which Skythēs, as the king, united the social classes composing Scythian society within himself. Thus, Skythēs was the first king and the progenitors of the Scythian kings. The possession of the bow of Targī̆tavah in the second version of the Scythian genealogical myth thus corresponded to the possession of the in the first version, and the function of both was to test the candidate for kingship, with these objects collectively symbolising power and the king's acquisition of them meaning that he passed the rest to become the ruler. The acquisition of the and the bow of Targī̆tavah therefore was part of the king's initiation ritual. The belt with a cup attached to it was also a symbol of royal power in multiple Iranic traditions, and the cup itself was used in coronation rites among the many Indo-Iranic peoples, including the Scythians. Golden cups were also placed in the burials of deceased kings. The cup and the arrows were elements of the Scythian coronation rituals, but they were also symbols of unity among the Scythians, as were the axe and spear, hence why whenever the Scythians concluded a treaty of friendship, they poured wine in a cup and lowered a sword, arrows, an axe, and a spear into it. Similarly, in the story of the cauldron of

Ariantas Ariantas (Scythian: ; ; ) was a king of the Scythians, who, in order to learn the population of his people, commanded every Scythian to bring him one arrow-head. With these arrow-heads he made an enormous brazen or copper vessel, which was set up i ...

, each arrowhead represented a Scythian warrior individually, and the copper vessel standing at the Holy Ways which made from all of the arrowheads functioned as the ritual unification of the Scythians. The arrows and the cup were thus symbols of royal power used in the coronation rites of the Scythian king, which themselves found a parallel in the consecration ceremony of Indic kings. The acquisition of these objects by Kolaxšaya represented the Scythian royal coronation ritual, according to which the world order was disturbed by the death of the previous king and was restored through the coronation of the new king.

The name of the Scythians

The second version of the Scythian genealogical myth also explained the origin of the name of the Scythians as being derived from that of Skythēs ( in early Scythian; in later Scythian), whose name meant "archer," and after whom the Scythians were called ( in later Scythian), meaning "archers."

Hellenisation

The second version of the genealogical myth was one that had been Hellenised, which was not an uncommon practice of ancient Greeks done with the aim of including Barbarian peoples into the orbit of their own civilisation. Greek colonists who settled in remote peripheral regions often connected these new areas to their own myths, deities, and heroes by identifying Greek heroes with the local peoples' mythological forefathers. In

, Hēraklēs had killed the giant Gēryōn and seized his cows, after which he sailed from Gēryōn's home island of Erytheia to Tartēssos in

Iberia The Iberian Peninsula ( ), also known as Iberia, is a peninsula in south-western Europe. Mostly separated from the rest of the European landmass by the Pyrenees, it includes the territories of peninsular Spain and Continental Portugal, compri ...

, from where he passed by the city of Abdēra and reached

Liguria Liguria (; ; , ) is a Regions of Italy, region of north-western Italy; its Capital city, capital is Genoa. Its territory is crossed by the Alps and the Apennine Mountains, Apennines Mountain chain, mountain range and is roughly coextensive with ...

, and then going south to

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

and sailing to

Sicily Sicily (Italian language, Italian and ), officially the Sicilian Region (), is an island in the central Mediterranean Sea, south of the Italian Peninsula in continental Europe and is one of the 20 regions of Italy, regions of Italy. With 4. ...

: on the way, he founded several cities and settlements which the Greeks supposedly later "regained." The population of new territories with characters from Greek mythology and history was thus done to justify their acquisition, and therefore the Greeks turned Hēraklēs into a founder of various nations, dynasties, and cities throughout the

Oikoumenē In ancient Greece, the term ''oecumene'' ( UK) or ''ecumene'' ( US; ) denoted the known, inhabited, or habitable world. In Greek antiquity, it referred to the portions of the world known to Hellenic geographers, subdivided into three continents ...

from Iberia to India, with these feats being described in several epic which were composed and enjoyed popularity within ancient Greek society. These various stories relating Hēraklēs to various ancestral heroes of non-Greek peoples often followed the same narrative of Hēraklēs returning from Erytheia after defeating the giant Gēryōn and stealing his cattle before losing his animals due to them being stolen by an often monstrous figure, after which Hēraklēs had to reacquire his animals by challenging the thief. Within the context of the Scythian genealogical myth, such a story of Hēraklēs was transposed onto the narrative of the union with the snake-maiden so as to emphasise his differences with his Scythian children, while Hēraklēs himself left nothing but a footprint in Scythia. Heracles Geryon Louvre F55

The Hellenisation of the Scythian genealogical myth was, consequently, carried out probably by the Pontic Olbians to further their own interests among the Scythians. Therefore, the Iranic cosmological features such as the union of heaven and earth and the birth of the primordial unity represented by Targī̆tavah were ignored, and humanity as well as divisions in terms of gender, geography, status, and ethnicity had already come into existence. Therefore, version of the Scythian genealogical legend Hellenised by the Pontic Greeks featured one of the most prominent Greek heroes and took place following his adventure on the sunset island of Erytheia where lived Gēryōn. Thus, the production of cultic propaganda for the Greek heroes and deities was done by the colonists to establish their own rights over the lands where they had settled, as well as over the areas around them and their non-Greek populations, and the figures of Hēraklēs and

were important in this process among the Greeks of Olbia and Borysthenes, with Hēraklēs being made into a divine coloniser who civilised the three peoples of Scythia and becoming the father of their eponymous ancestors. The Olbia-centricity of this variant of the myth is exhibited by the mention of Hylaea, which was close to Pontic Olbia, but also by how it constituted an explanation for the cult of Targī̆tavah-Hēraklēs there. Nevertheless, even this Hellenised myth still contained many Scythian elements which had equivalents in various Iranic traditions. In this version of the myth, the snake legs of the mother goddess and her dwelling place within the earth marked her as a native of Scythia. The ambiguous features of the mother goddess, such as her being both human and animal, high-ranking and base, monstrous and seductive, at the same time, corresponded to Greek perceptions of Scythian natives. Therefore, although she ruled over the land, her kingdom was empty, cold, uninhabited, and without any signs of civilisation. Thus, her status was inferior to that of Hēraklēs in this version of the myth regarding her appearance as well as her role within the myth itself, where she followed the advice and instructions of Hēraklēs but did not decide anything. The Hellenised myth contrasted the chthonic cave-dwelling goddess with the Olympian Hēraklēs, who used the sun-chariot of

Helios In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, Helios (; ; Homeric Greek: ) is the god who personification, personifies the Sun. His name is also Latinized as Helius, and he is often given the epithets Hyperion ("the one above") an ...

to complete certain of his labours and to rise to the deities of the celestial realm, and also possessed the bow of

Apollo Apollo is one of the Twelve Olympians, Olympian deities in Ancient Greek religion, ancient Greek and Ancient Roman religion, Roman religion and Greek mythology, Greek and Roman mythology. Apollo has been recognized as a god of archery, mu ...

, which had similar attributes. Heracles on the sea in the bowl of Helios

Therefore, it was Hēraklēs, a Greek, who incarnated both the power of otherness and the otherness of power, arrived into Scythia from abroad to change the situation: in this Hellenised version of the myth, it was through union with Hēraklēs that the pre-civilised Scythia could be transformed into a world more familiar to the Greeks by the introduction of the institution of kingship. Meanwhile, the chthonic Scythian ancestress was later identified by the Graeco-Romans with the monstrous figure of

from

's whom this latter author had located in

Cilicia Cilicia () is a geographical region in southern Anatolia, extending inland from the northeastern coasts of the Mediterranean Sea. Cilicia has a population ranging over six million, concentrated mostly at the Cilician plain (). The region inclu ...

, which was then at the boundaries of Hesiod's known world, and whom Herodotus later located at the boundaries of his own known world, in the cold lands of Scythia that were separated from civilised eyes by the cold. Unlike the negative role of Echidna and of various snakes in Greek mythology, the partially serpentine anatomy of the "Scythian Echidna" denoted her connection with the earth, and therefore of her autochthony, and her theft of the mares of Hēraklēs was more akin to the jokes played on their lovers by beautiful maidens who were always forgiven. And unlike the stories where the animals of Hēraklēs were stolen by hostile enemies, the serpent maiden instead opposed the hero's civilising march and in the end obtained an ambiguous victory by permitting him to leave a permanent sign of his passage through the descendance he had with her. Before Hēraklēs left Scythia, the mother goddess asked him whether she should settle them in her own land or send them to Hēraklēs once they have grown up, which was a way for her to ask whether the sons were to be Scythians (if they were to live with their mother) or Greeks (if they were to live with their father). Hēraklēs's response was to give them his bow, belt, and cup, which were instruments of culture, and declared that whoever among them would be able to string the bow and gird himself with the belt would become king. However, Hēraklēs did not claim any of the children and instead instructed that the son who passed his test and therefore was the most like Hēraklēs himself would inherit Scythia, while the other less able brothers who were therefore less like Hēraklēs would be exiled to the north, in the direction opposite to Hēraklēs's destination in Greece. The bow of Hēraklēs itself represented prosperity, wisdom, and life, and the trial he instructed the mother to put their sons through was meant to choose the most intelligent, skillful and strong one among them to be the king. His sacred union with the Scythian goddess also represented that of the friendly interactions of the Greeks with non-Greeks. Therefore, the addition of Hēraklēs in the second version of the genealogical myth ascribed to the Snake-Legged Goddess's sons a partial Greek ancestry, with the most youngest son proving himself to be the most worthy due to him being more Greek than his brothers through his physical prowess inherited from his father; as well as him obtaining the bow, belt and cup, which were tools of Greek culture; moreover, his inheritance of Scythia meant that he was the brother who lived the closest to the Greeks; and finally by establishing a "more virile" culture than his brothers, whose descendants, the promiscuous and luxury-loving Agathyrsi and the sedentary and farmer Gelonians, led lives which the Greeks perceived as being less masculine and therefore derived from their Asian mother. This Hellenised version of the Scythian genealogical myth therefore presented Skythēs as being a largely but not completely Greek figure, and, in consequence, made his Scythian descendants a people of largely Greek origin. His bow, belt, and horses which he obtained from Hēraklēs were construed in this myth as gifts thanks to which Scythian warriors obtained their offensive, defensive, and mobile capabilities, while the traits which the Greeks perceived negatively among the Scythians, Agathyrsi, and Gelonians were ascribed to their pimordial mother. The goal of this Hellenised Scythian genealogical myth was to impose a superiority of the Greeks over the Scythians as well as to establish a dependency of the Scythians on the Greeks regarding their "civilising" arts, and finally to portray the Scythians proper, who were more Hellenised, as being superior to their more northern and non-Hellenised neighbours such as the Agathyrsi and the Gelonians.

=The divine footprint

= The inhabitants of the Greek colony of Tyras, who identified Targī̆tavah with Hēraklēs, believed that the footprint near the Tyras river had been left by Hēraklēs, and that this was the location where he had attained immortality and divinity. Since only gods were able to leave footprints on the hard rock, this footprint was held among the Greeks as a sign of the divinity of Hēraklēs, with such footprints being held among Greeks to represent the presence of heroes and gods at cult sites. The large size of the footprint was also linked to the ancient Greek image of gods and heroes being recognisable by their sizes and weight, so that the two cubit-long footprint could only have been left by a powerful hero whose body size corresponded to his body size, so that the achievements of Hēraklēs were only believable if they had been carried out by a hero from ancient times whose semi-divine origin manifested itself through a physique surpassing those of regular mortals of the post-mythical age.

=Greek influence

= To propagate this more Hellenised version of the genealogical myth which turned the Scythians into a people of partly Greek origin, and to compete with the first version of the myth, the Greek artisans on the northern shores of the Black Sea produced artistic depictions of this story to distribute as trade goods to the Scythians. The role of Hēraklēs in Greek religion was that of a cultural hero who advanced human settlement and society by destroying incarnations of chaos, but he was also the archetype of the human conquest of death, with Gēryōn himself, whom Hēraklēs defeated, being a representation of death; this theme was continued in the myths of Hēraklēs going to the west to being the golden apples of the

Hesperides In Greek mythology, the Hesperides (; , ) are the nymphs of evening and golden light of sunsets, who were the "Daughters of the Evening" or "Nymphs of the West". They were also called the Atlantides () from their reputed father, Atlas (mytholog ...

and him dragging

Cerberus In Greek mythology, Cerberus ( or ; ''Kérberos'' ), often referred to as the hound of Hades, is a polycephaly, multi-headed dog that guards the gates of the Greek underworld, underworld to prevent the dead from leaving. He was the offspring o ...

out of the

underworld The underworld, also known as the netherworld or hell, is the supernatural world of the dead in various religious traditions and myths, located below the world of the living. Chthonic is the technical adjective for things of the underworld. ...

. These myths transformed the figure of Hēraklēs into an unstoppable traveller who could go to the realm of Death and return from it. Therefore, the Scythian rulers saw the Greek myth of their people as descendants from Hēraklēs as an attractive one, not unlike the similar beliefs held by the kings of

Sparta Sparta was a prominent city-state in Laconia in ancient Greece. In antiquity, the city-state was known as Lacedaemon (), while the name Sparta referred to its main settlement in the Evrotas Valley, valley of Evrotas (river), Evrotas rive ...

and

Macedonia Macedonia (, , , ), most commonly refers to: * North Macedonia, a country in southeastern Europe, known until 2019 as the Republic of Macedonia * Macedonia (ancient kingdom), a kingdom in Greek antiquity * Macedonia (Greece), a former administr ...

. This is attested historically when the Macedonian king Philip II requested the permission of the later Scythian king Ateas to erect a statue to Hēraklēs at the mouth of the Danube, which shows that both the Macedonian and Scythian kings commonly respected Hēraklēs.

=The Herodotean narrative

= When Herodotus of Halicarnassus recorded the Hellenised version of the genealogical myth, he exhibited scepticism towards this narrative within his own text largely because he doubted that the Ocean encircled the earth, but also partly because he had close connections with the Western Greeks of

Magna Graecia Magna Graecia refers to the Greek-speaking areas of southern Italy, encompassing the modern Regions of Italy, Italian regions of Calabria, Apulia, Basilicata, Campania, and Sicily. These regions were Greek colonisation, extensively settled by G ...

, who believed that Hēraklēs had driven the cattle of Gēryōn through their region of the world, and therefore did not accept that he had made a detour to the north to Scythia. Thus, Herodotus clarified that this was a myth told to him by the Pontic Greeks as a clarification to his Western Greek audience who would likely have been hostile to this myth. Herodotus of Halicarnassus described this footprint as being the only wonder in Scythia. Its location, near the river Tyras, also had a symbolic value in the works of Herodotus, since in his worldview rivers separated not only great empires, but also the real world from the mythical world, so that anyone crossing them risked entering a strange world and could be punished through blindness. The status of Scythia as being uninhabited when Hēraklēs arrived there was itself described as a liminal area between the mythical and fantastical worlds in the narrative of Herodotus; the stormy and frosty climate of Scythia, which Herodotus typically used to describe distant lands inhabited by fantastical peoples and creatures, was also such an indication of Hēraklēs entering into a liminal region. Since Herodotus perceived the Scythians and the

Egyptians Egyptians (, ; , ; ) are an ethnic group native to the Nile, Nile Valley in Egypt. Egyptian identity is closely tied to Geography of Egypt, geography. The population is concentrated in the Nile Valley, a small strip of cultivable land stretchi ...

as being diametrical opposites, the footprint of Hēraklēs in Scythia was also the counterpart to the two cubit-long sandal of

Perseus In Greek mythology, Perseus (, ; Greek language, Greek: Περσεύς, Romanization of Greek, translit. Perseús) is the legendary founder of the Perseid dynasty. He was, alongside Cadmus and Bellerophon, the greatest Greek hero and slayer of ...

at Khemmis in Egypt: both marked places which had been sacralised by the appearance of heroes and where the divine and human realms overlapped; at the same time, while Hēraklēs had left his permanent footprint in Scythia, Perseus instead had a fleeting presence, so that the presence of his sandal in his sanctuary in Khemmis was a sign of his visit. The Herodotean record of the Scythian genealogical myth was also intended to present to his audience another group of enemies whom the Greeks' Persian enemies had faced in the form of the Scythians and to create a common picture of the Greeks and Scythians who were both invaded by the Persians as a punishment for previous wrongdoing. This narrative itself was placed by Herodotus in the framework of the "primordial struggle" between Asia and Europe which was the Trojan War. Therefore, the narrative of Herodotus crafted a Greek ancestry for the Scythian "comrades" of the Greeks in their struggle against the Persians. The various Herodotean presentations of the origin of the Scythians, including both versions of the genealogical myth as well as the "Polar Cycle," were intended to present the nomadic lifestyle that enabled the Scythians to defeat the Persians as resulting from an environmental disaster in the form of a northern cold which forced them to resort to a life of wandering and to therefore be recent arrivants in the Pontic Steppe. The narrative of Hēraklēs wandering through the unfamiliar country of Scythia to search for his horse was itself recorded by Herodutus as a parallel to how the Persian army became lost and exhausted its forces while trying to pursue the Scythians during the Achaemenid invasion of Scythia in 513 BCE. At the same time, the Scythians, who were presented as descendants of Hēraklēs in this story, in consequence were protected by him through his divine power to ward off evil, which was also attested through his epithet of (). Similarly, Hēraklēs reaching the abode of the Snake-Legged Goddess in the Woodland of Scythia after she abducted his horses in the myth paralleled how the Scythians intentionally drawing the Persians deeper into Scythia by laying deceptive trails.

Ritual

Relics

The peoples of Scythia believed that Targī̆tavah had left his footprint in the territory of the

, in the region of the middle Tyras river, which the local peoples of this area displayed proudly. The location of this footprint was itself held to have a religious signification, since the Tyras river formed the western limit of the Eurasian steppe and its western banks were elevated, due to which the god of that river was worshipped in Scythia. The inhabitants of the Greek colony of

Tyras Tyras () was an ancient Greek city on the northern coast of the Black Sea. It was founded by colonists from Miletus, probably about 600 BC. The city was situated some 10 km from the mouth of the Tyras River, which is now called the Dn ...

appear to also have had their own variation of the myth of Hēraklēs passing near their city, which is suggested by the presence of the image of Hēraklēs and bulls representing the cattle of Gēryōn on this city's coins.

Shrines

At Hylaea

A Greek language inscription from the later 6th century BC recorded the existence of a shrine at Hylaea which was held in common by both Scythians and Greeks. The shrine at Hylaea was the location of altars to: *the god of the Borysthenes; *Targī̆tavah, referred to in the inscription as Hēraklēs; *the Snake-Legged Goddess, referred to in the inscription as the "Mother of the Gods," because the Greeks identified her with their Mother Goddess

Cybele Cybele ( ; Phrygian: ''Matar Kubileya, Kubeleya'' "Kubeleya Mother", perhaps "Mountain Mother"; Lydian: ''Kuvava''; ''Kybélē'', ''Kybēbē'', ''Kybelis'') is an Anatolian mother goddess; she may have a possible forerunner in the earliest ...

due to her chthonic nature. The inscription located this shrine in the wooded region of Hylaea, where, according to the Scythian genealogical myth, was located the residence of the Snake-Legged Goddess, and where she and Targī̆tavah became the ancestors of the Scythians; the deities to whom the altars of the shrine were dedicated to were all present in the Scythian genealogical myth. The altars at the shrine of Hylaea were located in open air, and were not placed within any larger structure or building. The Olbiopolitan Greeks also worshipped Achilles in his form identified with Targī̆tavah at Hylaea. Women performed rituals at the shrine of Hylaea, and the Scythian prince

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 ...

was killed by his brother, the king Saulius, for having offered sacrifices to the Snake-Legged Goddess at the shrine of Hylaea. Thus, the Olbia-centricity of the Hellenised variant of the genealogical myth also constituted an origin myth for the cult of Targī̆tavah-Hēraklēs at Hylaea, and the mention of the horses of "Hēraklēs" being stolen by the Snake-Legged Goddess dwelling at Hylaea explained the presence of horses in the rituals of this cult.

At Tyras

A cult centre might have existed at the site of the footprint of Targī̆tavah-Hēraklēs on the Tyras river.

The ritual sleep

The ritual sleep was a ceremony conducted at the Holy Ways, where the great bronze cauldron representing the centre of the world was located. During this ceremony, a substitute ritual king would ceremonially sleep in an open air field along with the gold for a single night, possibly as a symbolical ritual impregnation of the earth. This substitute king would receive as much land as he could ride around in one day: this land belonged to the real king and was given to the substitute king to complete his symbolic identification with the real king, following which he would be allowed to live for one year until he would be sacrificed when the time for the next ritual sleep festival would arrive and a successor of the ritual king was chosen. This ceremony also represented the death and rebirth of the Scythian king. This festival corresponded to the royal consecration ceremony of the Indic peoples, where the borders of the king's realm were determined by the territory around which his horse walked. During the ritual sleep ceremony, the king of the Royal Scythians performed the duties of a priest, thus acting as a priest-king. The ceremony of the ritual sleep was the main event of the Scythian calendar, during which the Scythian kings would worship the gold with rich sacrifices. The ceremony might have been held at the moment of the Scythian calendar corresponding to the fall of the gold objects from the heavens.

In art

The Scythian genealogical myth was often featured in Scythian art.

The struggle against chaos

A Scythian depiction of the combat of Targī̆tavah against the chthonic personification of chaos might have been present on one of the bone plaques decorating a comb from the , which was decorated with the scene of two Scythians fighting a monster with the front-legs of a lion, a scaly body, and a fish- or dragon-like split tail, with the monster's appearance connecting it to the element of water, and therefore to the chthonic realm; one of the Scythians in the scene is depicted as dying in the monster's leonine paws while the second man kills it with a spear.

The trial of the sons

The narrative where the three sons of Targī̆tavah were tasked to string the bow of their father might have been represented on a silver cup from

Voronezh Voronezh ( ; , ) is a city and the administrative centre of Voronezh Oblast in southwestern Russia straddling the Voronezh River, located from where it flows into the Don River. The city sits on the Southeastern Railway, which connects wes ...

whose surface is decorated with three scenes where Targī̆tavah explains his first son the task, then banishes his second son for failing the task, and finally gives the younger son a bow as reward for fulfilling the task. Unlike the Greek retelling of the myth, in which "Hēraklēs" returns to Greece and instructs the Snake-Legged Goddess to put their three sons through the trial of the bowstring, these scenes instead represent, in accordance with Scythian traditions of patrilineality, the divine paternal ancestor of the first king, that is Targī̆tavah himself, putting his sons through the trial. Another representation of the trial of the sons of Targī̆tavah might have decorated an

electrum Electrum is a naturally occurring alloy of gold and silver, with trace amounts of copper and other metals. Its color ranges from pale to bright yellow, depending on the proportions of gold and silver. It has been produced artificially and is ...

vessel from the Kul-Oba kurgan, where Targī̆tavah is represented wearing a Greek-type , and his two elder sons who had failed the task of the bowstring are depicted being healed while the third son is shown stringing the bow.

Scythian coins

Coins of the Scythian king Eminakes struck at Pontic Olbia were decorated on their reverse with images of Targī̆tavah, who was Scythian kings' personal symbol, and who was depicted on the coins as the Greek Hēraklēs wearing his lion-skin, and stringing a bow while his knee is bent. Unlike other Greek coins in which Hēraklēs is depicted as an archer, his posture in the coins of Eminakes is similar to that of Targī̆tavah's son stringing the bow from the Kul-Oba vessel. Coins of the later Scythian king Ateas were struck with the image of the head of Hēraklēs wearing a lion-shaped helmet. These coins primarily copied

Macedonian Macedonian most often refers to someone or something from or related to Macedonia. Macedonian(s) may refer to: People Modern * Macedonians (ethnic group), a nation and a South Slavic ethnic group primarily associated with North Macedonia * Mac ...

ones, and were meant to signal the Scythian kingdom as being an equal of the Macedonian kingdom of Philip II, although the choice of the head of Hēraklēs was also meant to emphasise Ateas's descent from Hēraklēs, who was assimilated to Targī̆tavah.

Comparative mythology

Indo-Iranic parallels

Other Iranic parallels

Several parallels to the Scythian genealogical myth existed in various Iranic traditions.

=Zoroastrian parallels

Social classes and Zoroastrian kingship

In the , the three sons of

Zarathustra Zarathushtra Spitama, more commonly known as Zoroaster or Zarathustra, was an Iranian religious reformer who challenged the tenets of the contemporary Ancient Iranian religion, becoming the spiritual founder of Zoroastrianism. Variously descr ...

are assigned the roles of the progenitors of the three social classes, with the eldest son being the head priest, the second son being an agriculturist, and the third son being a warrior. In another passage of the where Zarathustra appears in relation to the three social classes, Zarathustra bestows upon Vištāspa the blessing that he would have ten sons, of whom three would be priests, three would be warriors, and three would be farmer-agriculturists, and one who would be like Vištāspa himself. The concept of the king encompassing and transcending the social classes is present in the Zoroastrian tradition, with the and the of the explicitly propounding this notion of kingship, which was reiterated by the 9th century AD Zoroastrian scholar Zādspram in his writings. The blessing bestowed by Zarathustra to Vištāspa, according to which Vištāspa would have ten sons, of whom three would be priests, three would be warriors, three would be farmers, and the tenth would be like Vištāspa, was derived from the Iranic notion of the three sons as the progenitor of the three social classes, while the tenth son who was to be like Vištāspa represented the king within whom the functions of these three social classes were united. Paralleled the role of the belt with a cup attached to it in establishing Skythēs's role as the supreme priest, Zarathustra was believed to have first established the practise wearing of the belt which adherents of Zoroastrianism had to start wearing from a young age.

Haošiiaŋha and his heirs

The name was a Greek reflection of the Scythian name , which was a cognate of the Avestan title (), which means "first created." In the , Haošiiaŋha was the first king and the ancestor of the warrior class, that is of the military aristocracy of which the kings were members, and the title was assigned in Zoroastrian literature to the first king, Haošiiaŋha, and to his descendants and successors, the

Pishdadian dynasty The Pishdadian dynasty ( ) is a mythical line of primordial kings featured in Zoroastrian belief and Persian mythology. They are presented in legend as originally rulers of the world but whose realm was eventually limited to ''Ērānshahr'' or Gr ...

. In Avestan mythology, Haošiiaŋha Paraδāta held the role of the warrior-king who fought against non-Iranic "barbarians" and had both human and demonic enemies, and also laid the foundations of royal power and of sovereignty. Haošiiaŋha's son Taxma Urupi, who also bore the title of , meanwhile corresponded to the priest-king, being opposed to the same enemies of Haošiiaŋha as well as to sorcerers, and he managed to use magic to turn Aŋra Mainiiu into his horse which he rode for thirty years. Taxma Urupi in Avestan mythology also curbed idolatry and promoted the worship of Ahura Mazdā, and was also credited with inventing writing, which were all attributes of a priest-king, thus making him the equivalent of Lipoxšaya. Taxma Urupi's successor to the kingship, Yima, meanwhile held the role of a "prosperous king," which corresponded to R̥buxšaya's role as the progenitor of the farmer class. Taxma Urupi's creation of the underground enclosure, the , connected him to the lower world, which also signalled his association with the role of the progenitor of the farmer class. Yima's epithet of (), meaning "brilliant" and "shining" was a sign of his proximity to the Sun and the Moon due to his possession of the in his capacity of being king. A myth similar to that of the golden objects falling from the sky was also present in the , where Ahura Mazdā offered to Yima a (either a pick or a shepherd's flute) and an (a cattle goad), both made of gold, which Yima used on the earth to increase the size of its part which was inhabitable. The role of R̥buxšaya as the progenitor of the farmer class finds another parallel in the Zoroastrian tradition, where Haošiiaŋha's brother Vaēgerēδ was the creator of agriculture and the ancestor of the farmer class.

Θrita

In the of the , the hero Θrita was the third mortal man to have prepared the sacred drink. Θrita in turn had two sons, of whom Urvāxšaya was a religious mentor as well as a judge and a lawgiver, while Kərəsāspa was a famous heroic warrior who slew a horned dragon.

=The

The and kingship

Ahura Mazdā offered to Yima the and which Yima used on the earth to increase the inhabitable part of the Earth in the , and Yima used his to perform this task the , thus identifying the with the and . This story paralleled the acquisition of the of Tāpayantī by Kolaxšaya, who thus became the possessor of the and of its physical symbols. The was believed to follow the legitimate king and escape from usurpers, but it was also believed to leave the legitimate king and pass over to a better candidate should he become unjust and violate the laws. Thus, in the , when Yima started to believe lies, his left him three times in three parts: one part took on the form of the Vārᵊγna bird to pass onto the god

Mithra Mithra ( ; ) is an ancient Iranian deity ('' yazata'') of covenants, light, oaths, justice, the Sun, contracts, and friendship. In addition to being the divinity of contracts, Mithra is also a judicial figure, an all-seeing protector of Truth ( ...

, one part passed onto the prince Θraētaona, who became king, and the third part passed onto Θrita's son, the hero Kərəsāspa, who became a dragon-slaying hero just as Θraētaona had previously been, as a result of which Yima lost the kingship and was succeeded by Θraētaona. The narrative of the leaving the legitimate king after corruption is present in the , where the king Kāy Us lost his after attempting to conquer the heavens. In the , Nōtargā attempted to steal the of Frētōn by using witchcraft to place it inside a cow whose milk he gave to his three sons to drink. The rejected each of the sons, and instead passed into one of Nōtargā's daughters, who later gave birth to Kay Apīveh, who possessed the from birth and became the second Kayanian king and the true founder of the

Kayanian dynasty The Kayanians (; also Kays, Kayanids, Kaianids, Kiyani, Kayani, or Kiani) are a legendary dynasty of Persian/Iranian tradition and folklore which supposedly ruled after the Pishdadians, each of whom held the title Kay (such as Kay Khosrow), me ...

, after which his passed on to his heirs. Although this myth is not directly connected to the Scythian genealogical myth, this narrative of the choosing its possessor is nevertheless similar to how the of Tāpayantī rejected Lipoxšaya and R̥buxšaya, and instead chose Kolaxšaya to become their possessor.

The and the social classes

Like among the Scythians, the in Zoroastrianism was also tripartite, which is reflected in a myth recorded by Zādspram, according to which humans at the time of Hōšang (Haošiiaŋha) - although the sets the story during the time of Taxmurup (Taxma Urupi) - were able to travel from one region of the earth to another on the back of the gigantic bull Srisōk. However, the sacred fire on the back of Srisōk fell into the sea and separated into three Zoroastrian Sacred Fires which possessed the and were established at three sites. These Three Fires were: *Ādur Farnbāg, which was dedicated to the priestly class; *Ādur Gušnasp, which was dedicated to the warrior class; *Ādur Burzēn-Mihr, which was dedicated to the farmer class. Unlike the Scythian , the three components of the of the Sasanian period were kept separately due to a later Zoroastrian eschatological notion recorded in the , according to which the union of the Fire of the Priests and the Fire of the Warriors was capable of destroying evil, preserve creation, and the renewal of existence. Therefore, since evil still existed in the world, the reunification had to happen in the end times. Although the Three Fires were located in physically separate spots, they were nevertheless all present within the same kingdom ruled by the same king, due to which the Sasanian kings possessed all three components of the . Although Yima is depicted in later Zoroastrian literature as possessing only two physical manifestations of the , the and , in the , he used three fires to perform all his tasks during his reign, with these fires corresponding to the royal and to the three Scythian possessed by Kolaxšaya. The reference to the "three fires" suggests that in the earlier variants of the myth, Yima was a perfect king who owned an object representing the priestly function in addition to the and , thus possessing the sacred objects which represented the three aspects of kingship and the three social classes, thus corresponding exactly to the three objects which were in the possession of Kolaxšaya in the Scythian genealogical myth. The discrepancy between Yima possessing three sacred objects in the earlier form of the myth and only two in the later variant is due to a later Zoroastrian development, recorded in the narrative from the , where Ahura Mazdā initially offered to Yima to study and preserve the Good Religion, which Yima refused. Ahura Mazdā then offered kingship of the whole world to Yima, and he accepted and therefore received the and , which are described in the text of the as the , meaning "royal powers," and which respectively represent the farmer and warrior functions. Since Yima refused to preserve religion, he did not possess the third physical manifestation of the representing the priestly class, which was to be owned by Zarathustra, hence why the objects possessed by Yima became reduced to two in later Zoroastrian myth. These differences resulted from innovations by the priestly class to discredit the claims of the kings of being the divine agents, and which were canonised in the myth of Yima believing the lies. According to this myth, Yima performed faultless sacrifices which ensured that paradical conditions on prevailed on Earth during his thousand-year rule which were marked by perfect climate, the unity of all beings under his rule, the powerlessness of demons, and the absence of death, old age, hunger, and thirst. However, Yima then listened to the lies and claimed that he was the one who had created all the spiritual and material beings, after which he lost divine favour and his left him, and his perfection and Golden Age ended and were replaced by the present human world where death, disease, wars, demons, lying kings, and propaganda prevailed. This state of trouble could only be ended by the establishment of the Good Religion, which was founded by Zarathustra, who founded priestly institutions, teachings, practices, and texts; unlike other ancient Iranic traditions which held that the king was the divinely-ordained agent who had to restore the primordial paradise, in the Zoroastrian tradition, kings caused disasters for themselves as well as their people and the world because they would inevitably lie, thus making kings themselves the responsibles for the end of this paradisal state. Therefore, Yima's kingship in later Zoroastrian literature was incomplete, since he united within himself the warrior and farmer functions, but not the priestly one, hence why Yima is described in Zoroastrian literature as possessing the full royal but none of the religious , while Zarathustra possessed the full religious but none of the royal . However, in some myths relating to Yima, he possessed a belt, which was a symbol of the priestly class, and Yima's belt was even said to be identical to the Zoroastrian religion in some texts, thus allowing him to use the belt to render Ahriman (the Avestan Aŋra Mainiiu) and his demons powerless. This paralleled the role of the belt with a cup attached to it in establishing Skythēs's role as the supreme priest. According to the , Yima's passed on to: *Frētōn (the Avestan Θraētaona), who received the farmers' part of the ; *Sāmān Karsāsp (the Avestan Kərəsāspa), who received the warriors' part of the ; *Ošnar, a sage who received the priests' part of the . In the of the , Ahura Mazdā told Zarathustra that whoever would be able to capture the that once belonged to Yima, which was hidden in the Vo^urukaša ocean, would obtain three boons, consisting of the boon of the priests, the boon of well-being and wealth, and the boon of victory with which he would be able to destroy all enemies. These three parts were reunited in the of the kings of the

. In both the 's and the 's narratives, the three parts of Yima's are listed in the same order as the sons of Targī̆tavah, with the first part corresponding to the priests, the second part to the farmers, and the third part to the warriors.

=The

= In the Zoroastrian eschatological text, the , the hero Ferēdūn had three sons, who each represented the social classes, were also the ancestors of the three major populations of the known world: *the eldest, Salm, was the ancestor of the producer class, and became the ruler of

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

; *the second, Tōz, was the ancestor of the warrior-aristocracy, and became the ruler of

Turkestan Turkestan,; ; ; ; also spelled Turkistan, is a historical region in Central Asia corresponding to the regions of Transoxiana and East Turkestan (Xinjiang). The region is located in the northwest of modern day China and to the northwest of its ...

and the desert; *the third, Ēriz, was the ancestor of the priesthood, and became the ruler of

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

and

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

. This variant of the myth had, however, undergone some modifications proper to Zoroastrianism, so that the dominant class descended from the youngest son of Ferēdūn was that of the priests rather than the warrior aristocracy. Some aspects of the original version of the myth were nevertheless still present, so that Ferēdūn still gave to Ēriz the , which was normally an attribute of the kings and of the warrior aristocracy; and the power of Ēriz it itself described in the as consisting of , that is of royalty and rulership. In the , Ēriz instead received from his father the (), that is speech, due to the replacement of the original royal attributes of Ēriz by priestly ones. The roles of the sons of Ferēdūn as the ancestors of three peoples parallel the second version of the Scythian genealogical myth recorded by Herodotus of Halicarnassus, where the sons of "Hēraklēs" each became the ancestors of a Scythic tribe.

The sons of Mihr-Narseh

In the 5th century AD, the Sasanid

Mihr-Narseh Mihr-Narseh ( ), was a powerful Iranian dignitary from the House of Suren, who served as minister () of the Sasanian ''shahanshahs'' Yazdegerd I (), Bahram V (), Yazdegerd II () and Peroz I (). According to the Iranologist Richard N. Frye, Mih ...

had his three sons appointed to important positions at the head of the three estates of Persian society: *the eldest son was named the , which was the second highest position within the clerical hierarchy; *the second son was appointed as the , that is the head of the agriculturists, who was also the minister in charge of taxation and finance; *the third son became the , that is the head of the warriors, and the grand marshal. The order of the respective professions of the sons of Mihr-Narseh corresponded to the functions of the sons of both Zarathustra and Targī̆tavah, and Mihr-Narseh might have intentionally chosen this order of professions to emulate Zoroaster himself or one of the ancient pious kings of Zoroastrian mythology. Mihr-Narseh also built four

fire temple A fire temple (; ) is a place of worship for Zoroastrians. In Zoroastrian doctrine, ''atar'' and '' aban'' (fire and water) are agents of ritual purity. Clean, white "ash for the purification ceremonies sregarded as the basis of ritual lif ...

s near his home town, with one being for himself and corresponding to the king's personal fire, which was also the prime fire of the empire, and the other three corresponding to each of his sons and which also corresponded to the three Great Fires of the Sasanid Empire.

The primordial unity

The theme of the primordial unity of creation was also present in the Zoroastrian cosmogenetic myth, where Ahura Mazdā created the Sky, Water, Earth, Plant, Animal, and Human. The first Plant, Animal, and Human each included within their bodies all of the good qualities which were present in the various plants, animals, and humans who later came into existence, so that this state of primordial perfection was characterised by integrity of body and spirit, due to which these original beings were free of vice, disease, suffering and death. This primordial perfection was lost when Aŋra Mainiiu attacked the creations of Ahura Mazdā and killed the primordial plant, the primordial animal, and the primordial human in this specific order. However, the death of these primordial beings was not their end, and they instead fragmented into smaller parts which then became the many types of plants, animals, and humans, all of which contained both some good and some evil, and the ability to reproduce, which was itself the replacement of immortality by the perpetuation of the species. Thus, the original perfection was replaced by a combination of good and evil, and the shattered primordial unity became a multiplicity, with these changes creating the possibility for the arising of confusion and conflict. Therefore, Ahura Mazdā expected that one day Aŋra Mainiiu would be vanquished, and the primordial perfection would be restored, which can only be accomplished by the suppression of liars, evil-doers, and all destructive forces. To achieve this, the Zoroastrian tradition made

the one chosen by Ahura Mazdā to help righteous humans fight Aŋra Mainiiu by cultivating good thoughts, good words, and good deeds, the latter of which included ritual as well as ethical action. Therefore, Zoroastrianism considers unity and harmony as achievable by performing sacrifice, purification, and recitation of sacred hymns, due to which it places priests as the ones in charge of restoring the primordial perfection. Thus, the goal of the priests in the Zoroastrian religion was to restore the primordial paradise which existed at the beginning of creation. This theme is repeated in the myth of Yima, where the paradisal state of the world characterised by abundance, contentment, immortality and perfect peace under his rule corresponds to the primordial unity and perfection. However, once Yima believed the lie, the primordial unity underwent fragmentation, starting when he lost his , which split into three, after which Yima himself was eventually killed by demons and his body was dismembered, and the paradisal Golden Age ended and was replaced by a state of multiplicity, mixture of good and evil, and trouble in the form of the present world dominated by death, disease, wars, demons, and lying kings. According to the Zoroastrian religion, the solution to these troubles was the establishment of the Good Religion by the divinely-ordained Zarathustra, who in consequence founded priestly institutions, teachings, practices, and texts.

=Persian parallels

The primordial unity

The theme of the promordial unity was also present among the religion of the ancient

Persians Persians ( ), or the Persian people (), are an Iranian ethnic group from West Asia that came from an earlier group called the Proto-Iranians, which likely split from the Indo-Iranians in 1800 BCE from either Afghanistan or Central Asia. They ...

, and was often mentioned in

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

royal inscriptions, in which the kings held Ahura Mazda as the source of all creation who brought Heaven, Earth, humanity, and happiness into existence. In these inscriptions, Heaven, Earth, humanity and happiness were all referred to in the singular to denote the state of primordial harmony and unity which initially existed, and during which humanity lived in absolute bliss characterised by peace, calm, and freedom from all conflict. Xerxes detail ruler

This primordial perfection was lost when the Lie entered existence and shattered unity, and spread. Finally, according to the Achaemenid inscriptions, this crisis was resolved when Ahura Mazda made

Darius I 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 ...

king in an act of divine creation. Within this scheme, Darius presented himself as representing the institution of ideal kingship who led the divinely-ordained struggle ensure that good prevails over evil, truth prevails over falsehood, and unity prevails over multiplicity, hence why Darius's inscriptions ended by naming him as "one king over many, one commander over many" (). In one of Darius's inscriptions from

Susa Susa ( ) was an ancient city in the lower Zagros Mountains about east of the Tigris, between the Karkheh River, Karkheh and Dez River, Dez Rivers in Iran. One of the most important cities of the Ancient Near East, Susa served as the capital o ...

, this cosmogenetic narrative is repeated, with Ahura Mazda being described as creating a "wonder," which is also the term used to refer to the palace that Darius had built in

: multiple other inscriptions from Susa describe Darius as having the most skilled artisans from all of the Achaemenid Empire's provinces work the most precious materials of their respective homelands to build the palace, which itself represented a microcosmic wonder which grandiosely restored the perfect unity of creation. In Darius's Susa inscription, his actions are referred to in such a way that he parallels Ahura Mazda, thus portraying Darius as the Creator God himself, rather than as a figure of salvation created by the Creator God. Therefore, within the Achaemenid Persian religion, like in Zoroastrianism, the primordial perfection had to be restored through the suppression of liars, evil-doers, and all destructive forces. However, in the Achaemenid tradition, it was the king who was the agent chosen by Ahura Mazda to restore the primordial perfection by defeating rebels and enemies, proclaiming the truth, imposing the law, uniting all peoples under his rule, and building palaces and gardens where perfect happiness would re-emerge and radiate through creation. Thus, the goal of the kings in the Achaemenid religion was to restore the primordial paradise which existed at the beginning of creation.

The three brothers

The myth of an ancient and pious king whose three sons were the progenitors of the three social classes appears to have existed among the

up till the

Sasanian The Sasanian Empire (), officially Eranshahr ( , "Empire of the Iranians"), was an Iranian empire that was founded and ruled by the House of Sasan from 224 to 651. Enduring for over four centuries, the length of the Sasanian dynasty's reign ...

period in the 5th century AD.

The king and the social classes

The

kings would wear the peasant clothes of their empire's founder,

Cyrus II Cyrus II of Persia ( ; 530 BC), commonly known as Cyrus the Great, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire. Achaemenid dynasty (i. The clan and dynasty) Hailing from Persis, he brought the Achaemenid dynasty to power by defeating the Media ...

, and eat a peasant's meal before being consecrated by the priests, being a ritual whereby the king, who originated among the warrior-aristocracy, also became a member of the producer class. This suggests that the Indo-Iranic concept of the king originating among the warrior-aristocracy and then ritually becoming a member of the priestly and farmer classes, thus encompassing the three social functions and representing all the classes by being himself the incarnation of society. In a prayer from Persepolis, the Achaemenid king

asked Ahura Mazda to protect his kingdom from ills relating to the three social functions, and consisting of hostile armies (representing the warrior function), bad harvests (representing the producer function), and lies (representing the religious aspect). The king thus protected his realm from these three evils because he was himself held to be the good warrior, the protector of the land and of the peasants, and the just king, which were often mentioned virtues in Achaemenid royal inscriptions. The Achaemenid king

Xerxes I Xerxes I ( – August 465 BC), commonly known as Xerxes the Great, was a List of monarchs of Persia, Persian ruler who served as the fourth King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire, reigning from 486 BC until his assassination in 465 BC. He was ...

performed a sacrifice to the Sun-god on the shores of the

Hellespont The Dardanelles ( ; ; ), also known as the Strait of Gallipoli (after the Gallipoli peninsula) and in classical antiquity as the Hellespont ( ; ), is a narrow, natural strait and internationally significant waterway in northwestern Turkey t ...

where, after having poured a libation, he threw in the sea a cup representing the priestly class, the golden which might have represented the farmer class, and an which represented the warrior class. Alternatively, the cup and the might both have represented the priestly class while the still represented the warrior classes, which parallels the second version of the Scythian genealogical myth whereby only the priests and the warriors were represented by objects. The last Achaemenid king,

Darius III Darius III ( ; ; – 330 BC) was the thirteenth and last Achaemenid King of Kings of Persia, reigning from 336 BC to his death in 330 BC. Contrary to his predecessor Artaxerxes IV Arses, Darius was a distant member of the Achaemenid dynasty. ...

, wore a ceremonial dress which was decorated with gold and precious stones, and whose colours were white for the priestly class, purple for the warrior class (the gold and the precious stones also represented this class), and dark blue or green for the farmer class. The colour schema of this ceremonial dress represented the unification of the three social classes within the figure of the king. The golden objects of the Scythian genealogical myth, that is the of Tāpayantī, as attested by their fiery nature, were the fires of the three classes of Scythian society, which had an equivalent in later Sasanid Persia, where the Three Sacred Great Fires of Zoroastrianism were considered as each being sacred to one social class, with the triunity of both the Scythian and the Sasanian Great Fires representing the concept of fire, represented in the Scythian religion by Tabiti, being the primeval and all-encompassing element permeating the world and being present throughout it. During the Sasanid period, the mythical , a composite creature whose anatomy consists of parts of a bird, a dog, and a fish, had been used as a symbol of royalty because the constituent parts of its body meant that it united within itself the three social classes which correspond to the three - celestial, earthly, chthonic - layers of the world in Iranic cosmology, similarly to how the Iranic kings encompassed within themselves and represented these three classes.

The

The notion of the transforming the king into a divine figure and a type of deity who was sometimes seen as the brother of the Sun and the Moon was also present among the pre-Islamic

. Instances of this concept include Herodotus's claim that

Darius Darius may refer to: Persian royalty ;Kings of the Achaemenid Empire * Darius I (the Great, 550 to 487 BC) * Darius II (423 to 404 BC) * Darius III (Codomannus, 380 to 330 BC) ;Crown princes * Darius (son of Xerxes I), crown prince of Persia, ma ...

I was chosen to be king when his horse was the first to neigh at sunrise, and the 's record that Pābag's first dream, in which the Sun shining from the head of Sāsān and illuminating the whole world, was a sign that Ardašīr I would become king. Various Persian kings also held solar titles, and, like the Massagetae, the Persians also sacrificed horses to the Sun-god, with such sacrifices having been performed monthly at the

tomb A tomb ( ''tumbos'') or sepulchre () is a repository for the remains of the dead. It is generally any structurally enclosed interment space or burial chamber, of varying sizes. Placing a corpse into a tomb can be called '' immurement'', alth ...

of Cyrus II, signalling that he had been assimilated to the Sun. Due to the Iranic belief of gold being a material representation of , Achaemenid kings kept large numbers of gold objects in their palaces which would help them preserve their . Because the was believed to be dangerous due to its solar nature, accidentally seeing the king's was considered capable of blinding or even killing whoever accidentally saw it. The Persian practice of , whereby all who met the Achaemenid king had to prostrate before him and had to wait for his permission to rise up again, might have developed as a way to prevent ordinary humans from losing their eyesight or lives by accidentally seeing the royal . As a result of the perceived dangerous nature of the royal , Achaemenid kings were not supposed to come in direct contact with ordinary people. Therefore, as among the Scythians, all interactions between members of the ordinary population and the king had to be made through special intermediates appointed by the king himself. During the Sasanian Empire, those who obtained audiences with the king had to cover their mouths with a white cloth called a (), which was also worn by Zoroastrian priests, in both cases with the aim of preventing the human breath from polluting the sacred fire, which in the temples were the physical fires burning in them, and for the king was his . The king's (called was thus assimilated with the burning fire. According to the , in Pābag's third dream, he saw the Three Sacred Fires, that is Ādur Farnbāg, Ādur Gušnasp, and Ādur Burzēn-Mihr, burning inside the house of Sāsān and illuminating the whole world, which was a sign that a descendant of Sāsān would acquire kingship. This dream also represented the king as the ruler of the three social classes, due to which their corresponding Three Fires which constituted the in

Middle Persian Middle Persian, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg ( Inscriptional Pahlavi script: , Manichaean script: , Avestan script: ) in its later form, is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasania ...

) belonged to him. The among Persians thus was also tripartite. The text of the presented Ardašīr I as being the legitimate king through his possession of the Three Sacred Fires, and Ardašīr I he had a fourth sacred fire, called the Fire, consecrated during his coronation. This was a royal fire which represented the reign of Ardašīr I and was extinguished at his death, after which a new royal fire was consecrated by each Sasanian king. This royal fire represented the unity of the royal and the union of the three social classes within the king. This concept was later recorded by Zādspram, according to whom Fire was the abode of the royal . This view is also present in , according to which the Three Sacred Fires represented the one body of the Fire and were contained in it. The Fire thus encompassed the Three Fires of the three social classes and was the incarnation of the royal , while the Three Fires were the incarnations of its constituent parts. In a legend recorded by

al-Bīrūnī Abu Rayhan Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Biruni (; ; 973after 1050), known as al-Biruni, was a Khwarazmian Iranian scholar and polymath during the Islamic Golden Age. He has been called variously "Father of Comparative Religion", "Father of modern ...

, the Sasanian king

Peroz I Peroz I () was the Sasanian Empire, Sasanian King of Kings () of History of Iran, Iran from 459 to 484. A son of Yazdegerd II (), he disputed the rule of his elder brother and incumbent king Hormizd III (), eventually seizing the throne after a ...

went to perform devotions in one of the most important Fire Temples, named Ādur-Xwarrah, where he embraced with his arms the fire of the temple in the same way that friends did when greeting each other, and the fire reached his beard but did not burn him. According to this legend, the king not burnt because he was himself as an emanation of the sacred fire. Baydad

The Persian imperial banner, known in

Modern Persian New Persian (), also known as Modern Persian () is the current stage of the Persian language spoken since the 8th to 9th centuries until now in Greater Iran and surroundings. It is conventionally divided into three stages: Early New Persian (8th/ ...

as the (, meaning "standard of the kings"), had been used from Achaemenid times till the end of the Sasanian empire as the physical representation of the kings' . The identification of the with the is confirmed in the , where the / was identified with the gods' standard borne by Vərᵊθraγna. The Persians believed that the initially belonged to Θraētaona/Ferēdūn, who bore it during his struggle against Dahāg, and that Ferēdūn emerged victorious thanks to the banner, after which it was inherited successively by his descendants, the Persian kings, who believed that it would ensure their victory in war.

The

The legend of the three sons of was also preserved in the , although its social aspect is less obvious, but not fully lost either. The Scythian genealogical myth's narrative of Kolaxšaya dividing his kingdom among his three sons, who in turn became the ancestors of the different Scythic tribes exhibits clear textual and narrative parallels in 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 ...

, with the story of the descendant of Hōšang (Haošiiaŋha), Ferēdūn, and the latter's three sons – Salm, Tūr, and

Īraj Iraj (; Pahlavi: ērič; from Avestan: , literally "Aryan") is the seventh Shah of the Pishdadian dynasty, depicted in the ''Shahnameh''. Based on Iranian mythology, he is the youngest son of Fereydun. He was killed by his brothers Salm and T ...

– from the . The narrative of the murder of Kolaxšaya by his elder brothers fits the common motif of the competition between three brothers in which the youngest is victorious and is then murdered by his elder brothers. This motif is also present in the , where Ferēdūn tested his three sons, with the youngest, Īraj winning the test, after which Ferēdūn partitioned his kingdom among his sons and giving the best part to Īraj, who was then murdered by his jealous elder brothers. Tahminah

Another story from the with which the Scythian genealogical myth exhibits textual and narrative parallels is that of Īraj's descendant,

Rostam use both this parameter and , birth_date to display the person's date of birth, date of death, and age at death) --> , death_place = Kabulistan , death_cause = With the conspiracy of his half-brother Shaghad, he fell into a we ...

, who went looking for his horses which he had lost during his sleep. When looking for his, Rostam arrived at the palace of the king of Samangan, and in the night he was visited by the king's daughter, Tahmīna, who had stolen his horses, and who asked him in marriage. Rostam accepted Tahmīna's proposal and had a son with her, but Rostam had to leave Tahmīna after the marriage ceremony, although before departing he gave her a jewel from his bow as a symbol of future child. The parallels between this Persian myth and the second version of the Scythian genealogical myth recorded by Herodotus of Halicarnassus thus attest that the latter myth was of a typically Iranic origin, or alternatively that the 's author, Ferdowsī, had read the second version of the Scythian genealogical myth as recorded by Herodotus. In the , the Sasanian king Ardašīr I's (), that is his /, transformed itself into a , whose composite nature consisting of parts of a bird, a dog, and a fish, meant that it united within itself the three social classes which correspond to the three - celestial, earthly, chthonic - layers of the world in Iranic cosmology, similarly to how the Iranic kings encompassed within themselves and represented these three classes.

=The Sword of Mars

= According to

Jordanes Jordanes (; Greek language, Greek: Ιορδάνης), also written as Jordanis or Jornandes, was a 6th-century Eastern Roman bureaucrat, claimed to be of Goths, Gothic descent, who became a historian later in life. He wrote two works, one on R ...

, the Hunnish king

Attila Attila ( or ; ), frequently called Attila the Hun, was the ruler of the Huns from 434 until his death in early 453. He was also the leader of an empire consisting of Huns, Ostrogoths, Alans, and Gepids, among others, in Central Europe, C ...

from the

Migration Period The Migration Period ( 300 to 600 AD), also known as the Barbarian Invasions, was a period in European history marked by large-scale migrations that saw the fall of the Western Roman Empire and subsequent settlement of its former territories ...

claimed to have obtained the sacred Scythian sword which had fallen from the sky that he called the " Sword of Mars," and which he believed made him powerful in war and made of him the "prince of the entire world." This was a later continuation of the Scythian tradition of the golden objects which had fallen from the heavens.

=Ossetian parallels

= In Ossetian folklore, the ancestor of the Ossetian people, Os-Bæǧatyr (), had three sons, respectively named Sidæmon (), Kusæg (), and Æǧwyz (), who each founded a clan. Each of the clans possessed certain attributes, and each of their ancestors among the three sons of Os-Bæǧatyr received an object made of gold corresponding to these attributes: *Sidæmon received a golden cloth, and his descendants were numerous in number; *Æǧwyz received a sword, and his descendants were valorous warriors; *Kusæg received a ball, and his descendants were renowned. The myth of the sons of Os-Bæǧatyr therefore corresponded to the first variant of the Scythian genealogical myth, with the three sons who founded the three social classes and functions each receiving sacred objects made of gold which represented these functions. Unlike in the Scythian myth, however, each brother became the possessor of one of the three objects, reflecting the more egalitarian social norms of the

Sarmatian The Sarmatians (; ; Latin: ) were a large confederation of Ancient Iranian peoples, ancient Iranian Eurasian nomads, equestrian nomadic peoples who dominated the Pontic–Caspian steppe, Pontic steppe from about the 5th century BCE to the 4t ...

ancestors of the Ossetians.

In the

The Scythian religion's three-fold division of the universe into three levels and society into three classes is present in the Ossetian , where the three clans of the Nartæ lived in three different neighbourhoods or villages of the same mountain: *the Æxsærtæggatæ () clan represented the warrior class and lived on the higher level of the mountain; **The ancestor of the Æxsærtæggatæ, Wærxæg, was a figure who exhibits similarities to Kolaxšaya. *the Alægatæ () clan represented the priestly class and lived on the middle level of the mountain; *the Borætæ () clan represented the farmer class and lived on the lower level of the mountain. The different clans corresponded the different social classes, and the levels were they respectively lived represented their respective classes' position within the three-fold class structure of the Scytho-Sarmatian peoples. The location of the Æxsærtæggatæ at the highest level of the mountain was thus a representation of the dominance of the warrior aristocracy over the priestly and farmer classes. A similar narrative to the myth of the struggle between the Paloi and the Napoi is present in the , where the clan of the Æxsærtæggatæ, who possess manhood and strength and therefore correspond to the -, exterminate the clan Borætæ, who were wealthy and therefore corresponded to the Katiaroi and Traspies. Only the warrior and producer classes are mentioned in this myth because the priestly class was completely subordinate to the warrior aristocracy. In the , the hero Batyraʒ was born from the union of the hero Xæmyts and an unnamed nymph who was the daughter of the river-god Donbettyr, similarly to how the ancestor of the Scythians was born from the union of Targī̆tavah and the Snake-Legged Goddess in the Scythian genealogical myth. Batyraʒ later had to go through three trials which represented the three social functions to prove himself as the best among the Nartæ: he had to prove himself as a heroic warrior in the first trial; conduct himself decently at feasts held during festivals in the second trial; and conducting himself nobly towards women. As reward for succeeding in his trial, Batyraʒ received three ancestral treasures, which corresponded to the narrative of Kolaxšaya successfully passing the test to obtain the three golden objects in the first version of the Scythian genealogical myth, but also to the second version of the genealogical myth where Skythēs had to go through two different trials which each corresponded to one social function. Batyraʒ thus corresponded to the Iranic concept of the ideal king whose rule is guaranteed by his possession of the physical representations of the three social classes and who embodies their three domains of activity; however, since kingship had ceased to exist among Ossetians, Batyraʒ therefore became the best among the Nartæ instead of the king. The equivalent of the horse of Kolaxšaya in the might have been the celestial horse Ærfæn, who is often referred to as being winged and fiery-footed in the sagas. Ærfæn was the horse of Wastyrǵi, who was the patron saint of men and warriors, or of Wyryzmæg, the eldest member of the Æxsærtæggatæ who was also similar in certain ways to Kolaxšaya. Within the , the closest parallel to Kolaxšaya was

Soslan Soslan () is an Ossetian male given name widespread among Ossetians in Russia. Origin This given name originates from the Ossetian name for Sosruqo, a character in North Caucasian mythology, in particular, in the Nart saga. It etymologically c ...

, and the three celestial boons of the Nartæ were called the treasures of Soslan. Among other presents from the gods, Soslan had received the horse Ærfæn, who was invulnerable just like Soslan and could be killed only by stabbing its hooves. Ærfæn later avenged Soslan by killing the responsible for his death, Syrdon. Ærfæn itself was the ancestor of a group of miraculous horses named the Dur-dur, meaning "horses of stone," and who bore the epithet of (, from Old Iranic , meaning "strong horse," and also present in the Sarmatian anthroponym () and ethnonym ()). According to the , each of the clans of the Nartæ was connected to a clan of horses, and themselves might have belonged to the Æxsærtæggatæ, who corresponded to Kolaxšaya and the Paralāta. The horse of Wyryzmæg and Soslan had a white coat, which connected it to the priestly function, while the horse of Wastyrǵi had a white or red coat, with the red colour being that of the warrior function: this colour combination thus represented the fusion of the priestly and warrior functions and the prominence of the warrior-aristocracy among the Scythian peoples.

Indic parallels

The meaning of the name of Lipoxšaya as possibly meaning "king of heaven" connected him to sun-deities or to gods of the heavens such as Dyauṣpitṛ and Iūpiter. The name of R̥buxšaya was formed following the same structure as the Sanskrit theonym (), who was the leader of Ṛbhú and formed a triad with the other two members of the Ṛbhú. Likewise, R̥buxšaya formed a triad with the Katiaroi and the Traspies, with the name of the Traspies, which was semantically connected to the name of one the Ṛbhu, Vibhu, whose name meant "mighty" and "prosperous." The name of the father of the Ṛbhu, Sudhanvan, meant "having a good bow," which made him an equivalent of Targī̆tavah, the possession of whose bow was necessary for his sons to obtain royal power.

= Kingship

The narrative of the Kolaxšaya successfully passing the tests to become king in both versions of the genealogical myth also found a parallel in the Indic myth of the king

Pṛthu Prithu (Sanskrit: पृथु, ''Pṛthu'', lit. "large, great, important, abundant") is a sovereign ( chakravarti), featured in the Puranas. According to Hinduism, he is an avatar (incarnation) of the preserver god—Vishnu. He is also call ...

as retold by

Megasthenes Megasthenes ( ; , died 290 BCE) was an ancient Greek historian, indologist, diplomat, ethnographer and explorer in the Hellenistic period. He described India in his book '' Indica'', which is now lost, but has been partially reconstructe ...

, who identified him with the Greek god

Dionysos In ancient Greek religion and myth, Dionysus (; ) is the god of wine-making, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, festivity, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, and theatre. He was also known as Bacchus ( or ; ) by the Greek ...

and the Greek hero Hēraklēs. According to Megasthenes's narrative, when "Dionysos" first arrived in India, he found that there was no agriculture, with the people living in a state of savagery, the land remaining uncultivated and not bearing any fruits. "Dionysos" (that is, Pṛthu) then taught Indians to use weapons; and, after finding the land to be uncultivated and barren, he introduced the use of the plough and gave people the seeds of plants, and also taught them how to harvest and store food and grow grapes. In the original Indic myth, Pṛthu was first consecrated king and the son of the tyrant Veṇā, under whom the land was wild and uncultivated, similarly to how Scythia was initially an uncultivated desert land when Targī̆tavah first arrived there. Before the first king, Pṛthu, was initiated into kingship, all the plants would wither and the people died from hunger. Pṛthu then milked various forms of agricultural knowledge from the Earth, who had taken the form of a cow, and then he first started the practice of tilling the land using a plough and sought to preserve all the food. Thus, thanks to Pṛthu, the Earth began to bear fruit, cows began to produce milk, there was food, and he was responsible for the beginning of settled life and the foundation of cities, trade, cattle-breeding, the tilling of the land, and for the establishment of truth and lies, that is of laws and justice. The closest Indic parallel to the acquisition of power by Kolaxšaya through his mastery of the various objects was the ceremony through which the king was consecrated. The itself was initially a yearly ceremony through which the depleted forces of fertility in the world were restored before they would become depleted again by the end of each following year. During the , the king performed the , that is the "harnessing of offerings into the yoke," through which he "harnessed" the year, itself divided into 12 months each represented by an offering, into the yoke used to till the land so as to usher in the rainy season. During the ceremony, the king was identified with the king of the gods,

Indra Indra (; ) is the Hindu god of weather, considered the king of the Deva (Hinduism), Devas and Svarga in Hinduism. He is associated with the sky, lightning, weather, thunder, storms, rains, river flows, and war. volumes Indra is the m ...

, whose main role was to provide rain, and Indra was considered to be the one who was directing the plough in the field during the ceremony. Thus, the Indic king was identified with Indra during this sacrifice which ended the year and acquired the thirteenth month, that is the New Year. The use of the plough and yoke harnessed to bulls to till the land during the , that is for the first time each year and to survey the land, was itself part of the functions of Indo-Iranic kings. During the ceremony, the Indic king was also identified with the god who protected the law,

. This thus represented the king's position as the chief judge of his realm, which made him the embodiment of law and righteousness, and therefore his role as the embodiment of the priestly functions. Guardians of the eight directions 02

The king was also offered a bow with three arrows during the , which represented his masculine royal power and his connection with his heirs. The cup attached to the belt in the second version of the genealogical myth was also connected to the Indic coronation ritual whereby and holy waters used to anoint the king were prepared in similar vessels which were given to the king. The plough-and-yoke was necessary for the consecration of kings and was a symbol of royal power, with the first tilling by the king and the symbolic delimitation of boundaries being associated to the use of bulls. The bowl and the arrows were also required for the coronation rite. The plough-and-yoke, vessel and bow therefore signalled the king as representing the functions of all social classes within himself during the ceremony. These objects held the same function in the Scythian genealogical myth The axe of Kolaxšaya meanwhile semantically corresponded to the percussive instruments wielded by Indra, who was also the god of thunder and rain, such as his (mace) and (thunderbolt). The royal wielder of the mace was also connected to the Ṛbhu gods of the airspace, with Indra's being named after Ṛbhukṣan, who was the leader of the Ṛbhu. The Ṛbhu were also blacksmith gods who created the two horses of Indra; the Ṛbhu also accompanied Indra, and rode on the same chariot as him; Ṛbhukṣan also served Indra and both Indra and Ṛbhukṣan offered sacrifices together, even going so far as to merge. This association to the Ṛbhu connected Indra to blacksmithing, with the blacksmith in ancient mythologies being a sacred figure who was a thunderer and a divine creator who was linked to ploughing and the liberation of the waters.

Non-Iranic parallels

In Greek mythology

The king Cecrops, who, in Greek mythology, was the first king of Athens who had introduced the Athenians to religious rituals and marriage, was an anguipede ancestral figure. Similarly to the Scythian Snake-Legged Goddess, Cecrops was an autochton born from the Earth, and he was human above the waist and a snake below it, which indicated his dual character as being associated with the nether world and death as well as with life and renewal.

In Italic mythology

The myth of the king

Italus Italus or Italos (from ) was a legendary king of the Oenotrians, ancient people of Italic origin who inhabited the region now called Calabria, in southern Italy. In his ''Fabularum Liber'' (or ''Fabulae''), Gaius Julius Hyginus recorded the myth ...

recorded by

Aristotle Aristotle (; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, a ...

was similar to that of Kolaxšaya in that it was a myth about the deeds of the first king, Italus, who taught the people to cultivate the land. In

Roman mythology Roman mythology is the body of myths of ancient Rome as represented in the literature and visual arts of the Romans, and is a form of Roman folklore. "Roman mythology" may also refer to the modern study of these representations, and to th ...

, the story of the encounter of

Hercules Hercules (, ) is the Roman equivalent of the Greek divine hero Heracles, son of Jupiter and the mortal Alcmena. In classical mythology, Hercules is famous for his strength and for his numerous far-ranging adventures. The Romans adapted the Gr ...

, who was the Italic equivalent of Hēraklēs, with the thief

Cacus In Greek and Roman mythology, Cacus (, derived from κακός, meaning bad) was a fire-breathing giant and the son of Vulcan (Plutarch called him son of Hephaestus). He was killed by Hercules after terrorizing the Aventine Hill before the foun ...

exhibits some parallels with the story of Hēraklēs's stay in Scythia: Cacus stole four bulls and four cows from the cattle of Geryon that Hercules was driving; this was a model for the historical sacrifice of cows and bulls at the site where Hercules was believed to have defeated Cacus. Although Cacus, like the Scythian Snake-Legged Goddess, had power over the land where he dwelt, the encounter between Hercules and Cacus in the Roman myth was wholly hostile, unlike the amorous one in the Scythian myth.

In Celtic mythology

=The myth of Keltine

= A genealogical legend similar to the Scythian genealogical myth existed in ancient

Celtic mythology Celtic mythology is the body of myths belonging to the Celtic peoples.Cunliffe, Barry, (1997) ''The Ancient Celts''. Oxford, Oxford University Press , pp. 183 (religion), 202, 204–8. Like other Iron Age Europeans, Celtic peoples followed ...

. This myth was later Hellenised by the ancient Greeks living on the southern coasts of Gaul and recorded by various classical authors. The combination of the various versions of this myth provides a common narrative: :In Keltikē, that is the Celtic country, the king Bretan(n)os had a daughter named Keltinē or Keltō, who fell in love with "Hēraklēs" who was driving the cattle of Gēryōn from Iberia to

Tiryns Tiryns ( or ; Ancient Greek: Τίρυνς; Modern Greek: Τίρυνθα) is a Mycenaean archaeological site in Argolis in the Peloponnese, and the location from which the mythical hero Heracles was said to have performed his Twelve Labours. It ...

. Keltinē/Keltō stole the cattle of "Hēraklēs" to force him to have sexual intercourse with her, and from their union was born a son named Galatēs or Keltos to whom the mother gave a bow left by "Hēraklēs." Galatēs/Keltos became king after pulling the bow of "Hēraklēs," and the

Celts The Celts ( , see Names of the Celts#Pronunciation, pronunciation for different usages) or Celtic peoples ( ) were a collection of Indo-European languages, Indo-European peoples. "The Celts, an ancient Indo-European people, reached the apoge ...

were descended from him. Another Celtic version adds that the princess, called

Pyrene Pyrene is a polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) consisting of four fused benzene rings, resulting in a flat aromatic system. The chemical formula is . This yellow-green solid is the smallest peri-fused PAH (one where the rings are fused thro ...

, bore Heracles a serpent for a son. Those legends are very similar to the Scythian genealogical myth, with common elements including "Hēraklēs" driving the cattle of Gēryōn from Iberia to Greece, and then meeting with a local woman who abducted his horses, having sexual intercourse with the woman, and the birth from this union of a son who founded a nation and became king by pulling his father's bow. The acquisition of the golden objects by Kolaxšaya in the first version of the Scythian genealogical myth, especially, has an exact parallel in the inheritance of the bow of "Hēraklēs" by Galatēs/Keltos in the Celtic genealogical myth, with the latter corresponding to the Celtic inheritance law whereby, when heritage was partitioned between brothers, the youngest would receive the estate, all buildings, 8 acres of land, an axe, a cauldron, and a coulter. There were nevertheless also some differences between the Scythian and Celtic genealogical myths: *the consort of "Hēraklēs" was the Snake-Legged Goddess in the Scythian myth, while she was a beautiful princess in the Celtic myth; *the horses of the chariot of "Hēraklēs" were stolen in the Scythian myth, while the cattle of Gēryōn that "Hēraklēs" was driving were stolen in the Celtic myth; *three sons were born from the union of "Hēraklēs" and the local woman in the Scythian myth, while only one son was born in the Celtic myth. Despite their similarities, the exact relationship between the Scythian and Celtic genealogical myths is still unclear.

=Mélusine

= The fairy Mélusine from mediaeval Celtic folklore also exhibited parallels to the role of the Snake-Legged Goddess in the Scythian genealogical myth. After her husband broke his oath to her and saw her reptilian body, Melusine was forced to leave him.

In Germanic mythology

King Svafrlame Secures the Sword Tyrfing

The motif of the weapon given to the mortals was present in mediaeval

Germanic myth Germanic Myth refers to an idealized or valorized view of German tribes living to the North of Rome in the first century CE. It takes inspiration from ''Germania'', a 1st-century account of Germanic tribes by Tacitus. One of the earliest idealizati ...

, with the transmission of a sword being connected to a prophecy in both the and the ; due to the production techniques and the use of steel, which was a scarce material, swords were seen as symbols of status in mediaeval Germanic societies. These swords were also seen as magical objects with their own names and personalities, with their power being considered to be of otherworldly origin that was either supernatural or chthonic, and in the myths they were often manufactured by Dwarves. The fate of these swords' owners was linked to them in mysterious and deadly ways, and whoever obtained them also gained the virtues of their previous owners.

In Slavic mythology

Like the Scythian blacksmith-king Kolaxšaya, it was Kyi, who was one of

three 3 (three) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4, and is the smallest odd prime number and the only prime preceding a square number. It has religious and cultural significance in many societies ...

brothers and a blacksmith, who founded the city of

Kyiv Kyiv, also Kiev, is the capital and most populous List of cities in Ukraine, city of Ukraine. Located in the north-central part of the country, it straddles both sides of the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2022, its population was 2, ...

Slavic mythology Slavic paganism, Slavic mythology, or Slavic religion refer to the Religion, religious beliefs, myths, and ritual practices of the Slavs before Christianisation of the Slavs, Christianisation, which occurred at various stages between the 8th and ...

Turkic borrowings

The Scythian genealogical myth was borrowed by certain

Turkic peoples Turkic peoples are a collection of diverse ethnic groups of West Asia, West, Central Asia, Central, East Asia, East, and North Asia as well as parts of Europe, who speak Turkic languages.. "Turkic peoples, any of various peoples whose members ...

who had assimilated the

peoples of Central Asia. Such a borrowed version is present in the

Uyghur Uyghur may refer to: * Uyghurs, a Turkic ethnic group living in Eastern and Central Asia (West China) ** Uyghur language, a Turkic language spoken primarily by the Uyghurs *** Old Uyghur language, a different Turkic language spoken in the Uyghur K ...

version of the , according to which the ancestor of the

Oghuz Turks The Oghuz Turks ( Middle Turkic: , ) were a western Turkic people who spoke the Oghuz branch of the Turkic language family. In the 8th century, they formed a tribal confederation conventionally named the Oghuz Yabgu State in Central Asia ...

, Oghuz Qaghan, had two wives. The first wife of Oghuz Qaghan came down to the earth from the sky in a ray of blue light, and with her he had three sons, named: *Kün (meaning "Sun"), *Ay (meaning "Moon"), *Yultuz (meaning "Star"). Oghuz Qaghan's second wife was first found inside a tree in the middle of a lake, and with her he had three sons, named: *Kök (meaning "Sky"), *Tagh (meaning "Mountain"), *Dëngiz (meaning "Sea"). Oghuz Qaghan's sons from his first wife became the ancestors of the s, while his sons from his second wife became the subjects of the qaghans. This myth is based on the opposition of the celestial and earthly binary whereby the woman from heaven became the ancestress of the rulers and the woman from the earth became the ancestress of the subjects. Although the celestial characters of the sons of the celestial wife of Oghuz Qaghan correspond to the celestial nature of their mother, the sons of Oghuz Qaghan's earthly wife do not all have earthly characters, and instead represent the three layers of the universe, with Kök (Sky) standing for the celestial realm, Tagh (Mountain) for the earthly realm, and Dëngiz for the marine and chthonic realm. The narrative of the three brothers representing the three layers of the universe who were born from the earthly maiden did not represent the traditional Turkic cosmology, but instead corresponded to the Iranic one due to having been borrowed from the Saka peoples of Central Asia. Since early Turkic societies were different from Iranic ones, the myth's meaning relating to the origin of social functions was therefore not retained when it was borrowed, due to which the difference between the three brothers did not play any important role in the Turkic legend and even contradicted the myth itself.

References

Sources

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Narrative

Interpretation

The Snake-Legged Goddess

The myth of Aphroditē Apatouros

"Hēraklēs"

Cosmogenesis

Ethnogenesis

The desert

The sons of Targī̆tavah

Lipoxais, Arpoxais, and Kolaxais

=The layers of the cosmos

=Progenitors of the social classes

=Kingship

The sons of Kolaxšaya

The horse of Kolaxšaya

Agathyrsos, Gelōnos, Skythēs

The trial of the sons

The name of the Scythians

Hellenisation

=The divine footprint

=Greek influence

=The Herodotean narrative

Ritual

Relics

Shrines

At Hylaea

At Tyras

The ritual sleep

In art

The struggle against chaos

The trial of the sons

Scythian coins

Comparative mythology

Indo-Iranic parallels

Other Iranic parallels

=Zoroastrian parallels

=The

=The

=Persian parallels

=The Sword of Mars

=Ossetian parallels

Indic parallels

= Kingship

Non-Iranic parallels

In Greek mythology

In Italic mythology

In Celtic mythology

=The myth of Keltine

=Mélusine

In Germanic mythology

In Slavic mythology

Turkic borrowings

References

Sources

Further reading