From: george knysh
Message: 64628
Date: 2009-08-07
--- On Fri, 8/7/09, tgpedersen <tgpedersen@...> wrote:
Ah, where were we...
****GK: Waiting for more information about the Przeworsk inhumations you believe to be relevant to your thesis.****
Pliny, Naturalis Historia, Book IV. XIII.:
http://tinyurl. com/nmmg7j
'
96 Incipit deinde clarior aperiri fama ab gente Inguaeonum, quae est prima in Germania. Mons Saevo ibi, inmensus nec Ripaeis iugis minor, inmanem ad Cimbrorum usque promunturium efficit sinum, qui Codanus vocatur, refertus insulis, quarum clarissima est Scatinavia, inconpertae magnitudinis, portionem tantum eius, quod notum sit, Hillevionum gente quingentis incolente pagis: quare alterum orbem terrarum eam appellant. nec minor est opinione Aeningia.
97 quidam haec habitari ad Vistlam usque fluvium a Sarmatis, Venedis,
Sciris, Hirris tradunt, sinum Cylipenum vocari
****GK: Pliny is reporting some "quidam". These vague views are not comparable to archaeological data and hardly constitute a problem. But as long as we are talking about this footnote to a footnote, there are some additional points which could be made. I don't think the Pliny text should read "Sarmatis, Venedis" but rather "Sarmatis Venedis". In fact it's the Venedi which are being discussed. As late as Tacitus there was no set opinion about this population, i.e. were they "Sarmatae" or "Germani"? (Cf. Germania, cap. 46) And cf. the tabula Peutingeriana at
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/50/TabulaPeutingeriana.jpg
which has both "Venedae" and "Sarmatae Venedae" on the North Danubian plains.. (this information could have gone back to the time of the Moesian governor Plautus Aelianus). Note the "Roxolani Sarmatae" still east of the Dnister. And the Lupiones Sarmatae west of the Venedae.
So we're not really dealing with Sarmatians proper here in this almost certainly corrupted Pliny segment. I think I know who these Danubian Sarmatae Venedae were (Pliny had alternative information about this population) but since this doesn't really affect your thesis I won't mention this here.*****
Apparently archaeology is in conflict with the written sources here.
****GK: I agree.****
'The land opposite [to the Cimbrian peninsula / Jutland] was the Lithuanian-Latvian shore.' Highly unlikely interpretation.
****GK: Quite. For the Romans "Sarmatia" ended at the Vistula. I think that the corrupted Pliny passage may have omitted something between its "Sarmatis Venedis" and its "Scirris Hirris", like a "deinde" or something similar. I think the Scirri probably referred (in this source, whatever it was) to the Yastorf or Elbe G. population east of the Codanus on the Baltic, and west of the Vistula.****
http://en.wikipedia .org/wiki/ File:Baltic_ Sea_map.png
And the expediency of moving Pliny's Aeningia there does not resolve the conflict between Pliny and archaeology wrt. the question of whether the Sarmatians were on the Baltic or not.
****GK: Well of course the "Sarmatians" were on the Baltic. The only question is: which "Sarmatians"? No Roman or Greek writer to my knowledge ever located the Sarmatians proper (i.e. Yazigi, Roxolani, Aorsi, Alani) on the Baltic.****