From: tgpedersen
Message: 64342
Date: 2009-07-06
>20 BCE)
>
> --- On Sun, 7/5/09, tgpedersen <tgpedersen@...> wrote:
>
> Any references? (For the Yazig assault on Zarubinis between 40 and
>Sigh. I'll try again: Was there a line of reasoning using the
> ****GK: Plenty. I'll cite them when I get back home in
> mid-month.*****
>
> (GK)According to Ukrainian archaeologists this was a local war
> between Yazigi and Zarubinians, in the period subsequent to the
> Burebista era.
>
> (TP)Why subsequent?
>
> >GK: Because the Burebista era ended ca. 44 BCE.
>
> Of course, but was there a specific dating relative to Burebista's
> reign and campaigns?
>
> ****GK: The destruction of Olbia was dated ca. 50 BCE.****
>[TP] > (GK) Doesn't prove part of them might not have gone elsewhere.
>
> (GK) One has to guess the motives. There is such a dearth of
> information that it's quite difficult.
>
>
>
> (TP)They might have had a psycho leader who thought he should
> carve up an empire in the North.
>
> GK: Apparently the Zarubinians were strong enough to beat them
> off. In any case this is all posterior to the Ariovistus epoch.
> (GK)But one thing is certain: everyone is agreed on this. The
> Yazigi were located in the steppes between Danube and Dnipro at
> the time of the Mithradates saga and after. They were basically
> still there in Augustan times.
>
> ****GK: Acceptance of such a principle would lead to theActually, they recently found in Vilnius mass graves of those
> elimination of historical science as we know it. "Everything is
> possible" but everything is not provable. Whether we like it or not
> if we want to be scientists and not novelists we have to rely on
> extant evidence for our hypotheses. I might think that the Yazigi
> assaulted the Zarubinisns every year. I might postulate Zarubinian
> counter rushes into the steppes. But this would be imagination not
> science. It might even be true but I would have no way of proving
> it. *****
>
>
>
> GK: There is no evidence for that. Arguing like you do one
> might say they went to India, Africa, America, China. If there is
> nothing to indicate a presence somewhere one is not entitled to
> postulate same (to quote Charlie Chan). This is an elementary
> principle of historical investigation.
>
>
>
> (TP)Use your elementary principle of historical investigation on
> this one:
>
> We know that the French live in France. However some pseudo-
> historical sources seem to indicate that they were near Moscow in
> the early 19th century.
>
> ****GK: Without the surviving reliable documentation (much of it
> contemporary), we wouldn't know that the French invaded the Russian
> Empire in 1812. And left in 1812. (But perhaps I am wrong. Perhaps
> enough identifiable objects have survived to make an archaeological
> case.
> I haven't looked at this from that angle: too recent, too muchHuh? What was that? When?
> written on it. No pressing need. Given the tremendous quantity of
> verifiable material a "pseudo-historical source" claiming French
> invasion of Moscow would not, as to that point, be considered
> "pseudo-historical") We only know of the Scythian assaults on
> settlements of the Lusatian culture in Poland through srchaeology.
> It's theoretically possible that Yazigi attacked the Przeworskians.We'll see. This new uniform form inventory must have come from
> But if they did, no evidence of any kind remains.
> Nothing as clear as the attacks against the Zarubinians. *****The old 'barbed wire on the prairie' conflict.
>
>
> They are one of the main Sarmatian groups with which he concluded
> a treaty in ca. 2 BCE. Their migration into Hungary did not begin
> until the early years of the 1rst c. AD. There is no record of any
> kind, historical or archaeologicaL of any move into any of the
> Przeworsk areas by them.
>
>
>
> (TP) Snorri and Saxo are historical sources too.
>
>
>
> GK: They are completely unreliable for the period in question,
> since they are basically in conflict with secure contemporary
> sources. They are just as unreliable as the Scythian Foundation
> legend is for the period 1500 BCE ("the country was a void, then
> Targitaus apppeared") or the Kyivan Primary Chronicle is for the
> period 50 AD ("Andrew the Apostle travelled from Chersonesos to
> Rome by the Viking route, up the Dnipro et, to Novgorod, then by
> cean, pillars of hercules, and into the Mediterranean" ). This is
> all elementary stuff.
>
>
>
> (TP) Where does the whole Sarmatian tradition in Poland stem from?
>
> GK: I believe this emerges in the 16th c. Snorri was not the
> only one with a fertile imagination. But perhaps Piotr could be
> more precise if he has time or patience to comment. In the 17th c.
> Ukrainians developed a similar theory (perhaps borrowed) about
> their ancestors (!) the Roxolanians. And in the 16th c. also
> Russian chroniclers came up with a pedigree for Ivan the terrible
> reaching back to Augustus (!).Interesting stuff but completely
> irrelevant historically. BTW Lithuanians also developed a notion
> of their state having been founded in the 1rst c. AD by refugees
> from Nero's Rome led by one Polemon (or some similar name I don't
> remember precisely). The earlier Polish chronicles don't mention
> "Sarmatism" as far as I remember.
>
>
> ...
>
>
> > NB> Another point known about the Yazigi. They were very
> > determined nomads, and could not abide "mixed residences" with an
> > agricultural population. When large groups of them migrated from
> > their earlier haunts, they "cleared" the area of their new
> > settlements of local peasants. There is good evidence of this
> > along the Dnister r. (settled in the 1rst c AD) and in the area
> > of the finally destroyed Zarubinian fortresses (all previous
> > locals were either killed or chased out, and only nomad burials
> > are found from the mid- 1rst c. AD). Which does not mean that
> > agriculturalists did not remain in areas controlled by the
> > nomads. They just didn't "co-habit" with them. The same thing
> > happened in Hungary. Some Dacians were allowed to remain, but
> > most were chased away or killed. The absence of any such
> > slaughters or removals in Przeworsk in the 1rst c. BCE is a
> > good initial indicator thhat no Yazigi arrived. Actually, the
> > depopulation of Gubin Yastorf and middle Silesia might have been
> > an argument 'for", but there is no corroborating positive
> > evidence of a Yazigi presence so these depopulations must be
> > explained otherwise (as indeed they have been).
>
> (TP)Those germs that kill the host are not very successful compared
> to those who don't; any nomad tribe which conquered its way deep
> enough into Europe faced the choice between razing the ground and
> then having to retreat for want of new targets, or set up a
> semblance of governance structure and become the settled lords of
> the land, as described in Wolfram's "The Goths", discussed here
> earlier. A charismatic enough leader would have realized, like
> Alexander, that if you live in permanent hostility with the local
> providers of foodstuff, your empire won't last long, and would have
> discouraged such predatory behavior,
>
> ****GK: I don't think you understand the point. (BTW neither Goths
> nor Alexander were nomads, but that's peripheral.) It's a question
> of social economics. Nomads were quite ready to co-exist with
> settled agriculturalists. The Scythian example is sufficient. As
> is that of the Huns, and many others. But co-habitation was
> another matter. Genuine nomads would not share the same habitation
> space with agriculturalists.
> Only when (and if) a decision was made to switch economies, and IThe Goths did that in Western Europe, not upon first contact,
> know of no example where this was made upon first contact,
> massively.
> Otherwise, they lived separately, even if frequently (not always)It seems to me now you have softened up your previous hardline
> amicably enough with "their" agriculturalists (even the Yazigi once
> they had carved out their space.) Military campaigns would be
> another matter.****
>