The Illyrians were in these ancient times also bounded on the east by the Phrygians and Thracians, as well as by the Pelasgi. The Phrygians were at this time the immediate neighbours of the Macedonians in Lebæa, by whom they were called Brygians (Βρύγες, Βρύγοι, Βρίγες); they dwelt at the foot of the snowy Bermius, where the fabulous rose-gardens of King Midas were situated, while walking in which the wise Silenus was fabled to have been taken prisoner. They also fought from this place (as the _Telegonia_ of Eugamon related) with the Thesprotians of Epirus. At no great distance from hence were the Mygdonians, the people nearest related to the Phrygians. According to Xanthus, this nation did not migrate to Asia until after the Trojan War. But, in the first place, the Cretan traditions begin with religious ceremonies and fables, which appear from the most ancient testimonies to have been derived from Phrygians of Asia; and secondly the Armenians, who were beyond a doubt of a kindred race to the Phrygians, were considered as an aboriginal nation in their own territory. It will therefore be sufficient to recognise the same race of men in Armenia, Asia Minor, and at the foot of Mount Bermius, without supposing that all the Armenians and Phrygians emigrated from the latter settlement on the Macedonian coast. The intermediate space between Illyria and Asia, a district across which numerous nations migrated in ancient times, was peopled irregularly from so many sides, that the national uniformity which seems to have once existed in those parts was speedily deranged. The most important documents respecting the connection between the Phrygian and other nations are the traces that remain of its dialect. It was well known in Plato’s time that many primitive words of the Grecian language were to be recognised with a slight alteration in the Phrygian, such as πῦρ, ὕδωρ, κύων; and the great similarity of grammatical structure which the Armenian now displays with the Greek, must be referred to this original connection. The Phrygians in Asia have, however, been without doubt intermixed with Syrians, who not only established themselves on the right bank of the Halys, but on the left also in Lycaonia, and as far as Lycia, and accordingly adopted much of the Syrian language and religion. Their enthusiastic and frantic ceremonies, however, had doubtless always formed part of their religion; these they had in common with their immediate neighbours, the Thracians: but the ancient Greeks appear to have been almost entirely unacquainted with such rites.