SCYTHIA

Scythia has been selected by Roberto Amati in relation to the real history of european integration, then enlisted in the People, Dates, Places and Events category, accompanied by own fact SHEET useful to the comprehension, completed of historical MAPS AND IMAGES or with a direct linking to the related Blog contents dedicated to the entire history of european integration and the future of Europe.

Scythia is one of the most important place in the history of european integration and will probably have influence on the future of United europe, because it has always been the prior road for people coming from Asia to enter Europe and intersection of the different journey directions of migrations, melting pot of peoples and cultures, historical homeland of the Scythians civilty

Where is Scythia? Scythia is a geographic region defined in the ancient Graeco-Roman world referrring to the Pontic–Caspian steppe inhabited by the inhabited by an ancient Eastern Indo-Iranian equestrian nomadic people, the Scythians, that is a latinisations of the ancient Greek name Skuthia (Σκυθία), itself derived from the endonym Skuδa meaning "archer". The territory of the Scythian kingdom extended from the Don river at East to the Danube river at West, covering the treeless lands immediately northern of the Black Sea's coastline inhabited by nomadic horse breeders, as well as the fertile black-earth forest-steppe area in middle Russia inhabited by agricultural population. During the Hellenistic age, the use of Scythia by Greeks and Romans was extended to the southern Russian steppe in general as well as the entire treeless steppe bounded up to the Chinese marches in the far east.

Originary, Scythians came from the eastern coast of the Black Sea towards the Caucasus mountains, from where they spreaded into southern Russia, Ukraine, Balkanian and Pannonian regions at West while they occupied all the immense area between Aral Lake and Caspian Sea, in the middle of Asia, so founding he Scythian empire known to all the ancient Middle East civilties especially for their specific ability of chevalier warriors and archers. Before the arrival of the Scythians, the region of the Pontic Steppe was dominated by Agathyrsi, who were nomadic Indo-Iranian people who had been pushed westwards away from their original home around Lake Maeotis, into the Carpathian region. When presumably the climate changed around V century B.C., the steppes became warmer and wetter so favouring the steppe nomads to move from the centre of Asia into Scythia lands, where grass grew abundantly and permitted the nomadic cattle and horses breeders Scythians to settle.

Scythians could repel the annexation tentative by the Persian Empire in IV century B.C., just before the Persian Wars, so that they remained independent until disappeared some times after when another related nomadic Iranian people, the Sarmatians, moved from the East into the Pontic steppe and replaced them. Due to the Sarmatian invasion, the name of the region changed in "Sarmatia" and all the great northern plain over the Carpathian chain had been called Russian-Sarmatian Plain.

Scythia had been related in greek myth to the hero Heracle, who had descendances in several Indo-Iranic peoples worshipers of him, of Zeus and Ares Gods, such as the Sarmatians, the Alanis, the Cimmerians and in general the "Kurgan" civilty peoples spreaded all around Eastern Europe and Russia since II millennium B.C.. That particular culture influenced part of the Indo-european peoples who settled for a long period in Scythia giving form to the Yamnaya civilty, mother of the succeeding european cultures of Slavs, Germans, Celts, Milesians, Tuatha and Gaelic-Scots peoples when they moved and spreaded all around Europe duting the Bronze Age. To remain in the mythical field, it is written that Scythia had been ruled in ancient times by the royal house descending from Tubal Cain (read this article) and by the lineage of Esau (the twin of Jacob, father of Israelites tribes), after the presence of the Arimaspians and probably of the Abel progenie.

In christian age, the seminomads chevalier warriors riding the polish horses race became henemies of the Roman Empire, even if Scythia was the sphere of evangelization of Andrew the Apostol (the father of the Ortodox Church), until it was occupied by the jewish Khazars who had been destroyed by the christian Rus' XI century A.D.. Tiem after, the Tatar invaded Scythia and pushed Russians to the north until they were defeated by the Cossacks in XVI century A.D., who ruled that region until the final conquest of the Russian Zarade ruled by the Romanov dinasty.

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