branch were in possession of the Punjab, and the middle branch in possession of Iran, and there arrived at the religious conceptions expressed in the hymns of the Rigveda, and in the creed of Iran, as it existed before Zarathrustra. As it was the Scoloti who gave names from their language to the rivers which flowed through their steppes, they must have pastured their flocks on them from an early period. Not less than these names, and the legend of the Scoloti about the antiquity of their nation and its origin from the Borysthenes, does the comparison of the Iranian languages support the conclusion that the Sarmatians and the Scoloti must have broken off from the tribes of Iran at a very early period,[512] and the Scoloti, who are situated further to the west on this side of the Don, earlier than the Sarmatians. If, therefore, we must recognise in the Scolotians and Sarmatians people of Aryan stock and character, their neighbours in the north, the Neuri, the Androphagi, and the Melanchlæni, must count as the fathers of the Sclaves.[513] FOOTNOTES: [470] "Iliad," 13, 5, 6. Strabo, p. 300, 302. Æsch. "Prom." 11. 1, 2, 416. [471] Herod. 1, 201; 4, 13, 27. On the confusion of the Araxes and Jaxartes in Herodotus, see vol. v. [472] Herod. 4, 21, 57, 123. Cf. Strabo, p. 496-498. [473] Herod. 4, 47-50. [474] Neumann, "Die Hellenen im Scythenlande," s. 202, 215. [475] Herod. 4, 47. Neumann, _loc. cit._ s. 80. [476] Herod. 4, 53. [477] Herod. 4, 18, 100, 106, 107, 125. [478] Tzetzes, "Chil." 7, 144, 163. [479] "Prom." 285, 802. Yet Æschylus appears to place the Arimaspi in the North-west, and not in the North-east. [480] Strabo, p. 311. [481] Herod. 4, 2, 61, 63. [482] Herod. 4, 114, 122. [483] Herod. 4, 75. Hippocr. "De Aere," p. 92, ed. Coray. Strabo, p. 307. [484] Neumann, _loc. cit._ s. 278 ff. [485] Herod. 4, 127. Herodotus represents Idanthyrsus as saying, "As my lords I acknowledge only Zeus (the sky-god), my forefather, and Hestia, the queen of the Scythians." [486] Herod. 4, 59. [487] Herod. 4, 5. The series of Scythian kings which can be collected from Herodotus is: Protothyas, about 650 B.C.; Madyras, about 630 B.C.; Saulius, about 550 B.C.; Idanthyrsus, about 500 B.C. Herod. I, 103; 4, 76. Beside this succession of kings we may place the pedigree of Anacharsis, who came to Hellas about 580 B.C., and must, therefore, have been born about 610 B.C. His father, Gnurus, was, therefore, born at the latest in 630 B.C.; his grandfather, Lycus, in 650 B.C.; and his great-grandfather, Spargapeithes, in 670 B.C. [488] Herod. 4, 78, 80. [489] Herod. 4, 69, 120. [490] Herod. 4, 69. [491] Herod. 4, 71, 78. [492] Herod. 4, 68. [493] Herod. 4, 71, 72. [494] Herod. 2, 167. [495] Cf. Curtius, 10, 1. [496] Ælian. "Nat. Anim." 2, 16; 9, 15. [497] Herod. 4, 3, 70. [498] Herod. 4, 64. [499] Herod. 4, 66. [500] Herod. 4, 64. [501] Herod. 4, 65. [502] Herod. 4, 73. [503] Herod. 6, 84; Hippocr., "De Morb.," 4, 13. "De Leg." p. 637.