Greece -- History -- To 146 B.C.; History, Ancient
25. So far as these, I say, the land is known; but concerning the region
to the North of the bald-headed men no one can speak with certainty,
for lofty and impassable mountains divide it off, and no one passes over
them. However these bald-headed men say (though I do not believe it)
that the mountains are inhabited by men with goats' feet; and that after
one has passed beyond these, others are found who sleep through six
months of the year. This I do not admit at all as true. However, the
country to the East of the bald-headed men is known with certainty,
being inhabited by the Issedonians, but that which lies beyond both the
bald-headed men and the Issedonians towards the North Wind is unknown,
except so far as we know it from the accounts given by these nations
which have just been mentioned.
26. The Issedonians are said to have these customs:—when a man's father
is dead, all the relations bring cattle to the house, and then having
slain them and cut up the flesh, they cut up also the dead body of the
father of their entertainer, and mixing all the flesh together they set
forth a banquet. His skull however they strip of the flesh and clean it
out and then gild it over, and after that they deal with it as a sacred
thing 31 and perform for the dead man great sacrifices every year.
This each son does for his father, just as the Hellenes keep the day of
memorial for the dead. 32 In other respects however this race also is
said to live righteously, and their women have equal rights with the
men.
27. These then also are known; but as to the region beyond them, it
is the Issedonians who report that there are there one-eyed men and
gold-guarding griffins; and the Scythians report this having received it
from them, and from the Scythians we, that is the rest of mankind, have
got our belief; and we call them in Scythian language Arimaspians, for
the Scythians call the number one arima and the eye spu.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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