[gothic-l] Re: Snorri on Reidgotaland

[malmqvist52 at YAHOO.SE]

Hi,
I forgot to mention that I earlier had posted this and that Sigmund
answered briefly on it that the first article was hilarious to him as
he also had stated in an earlier post.

-----
Hi all,
I thought this would interest you, so I took the liberty of
crossposting this from the NC-list.
The post # is 2427

Faskens inlay looks quite serious to me, even though I haven't had
the time to check the references yet. One annoying thing is of course
he uncautious handling of non-historical expressions like 12 tribes
of Israel( or 10 lost),Japhet and Sem

Anyway I didn't laugh about it when I read it.
nor did I when reading this one earlier posted here by Sigmund
Lofstedt:
http://www.world-destiny.org/a36cim.htm

Regards
Anders M

Anyway here is the NC-post:
--------------
I found on the internet the next article on site:
http://www.christianbiblestudy.org/OPS/CIMMER.htm

I don't know if you know this one, but in case not I have decided
because of the issue of the Scythians and Umman-Manda to mention the
whole article here.
Some points are maybe less interesting than others (but maybe other
people are more interesting just in the so-called less interesting
points).
This article are not my conclusions but that of W. B. Fasken. Still I
am anxious to comments about this.

- Prof B. Rom

Here follows the article:


CIMMERIANS AND SCYTHIANS
by Brig-General W. B. Fasken, C.B.
Cimmeria
The name Kimmerioi is mentioned once, and once only, in the Odyssey
of Homer. On this solitary mention of the name it is said that the
Cimmerii (Latin form; Cimmerians, English form) were a very ancient
people, numerous and well known, and could not be of Israelitish
orign.
Homer lived about the ninth century B.C., but the poems were probably
not written down till a later date (The World's Great Books, Vol.III,
pp. 1871, 1875). The Kimmerioi of Homer were located by him in a land
"covered in mist and cloud, nor does the sun, shining, look down on
them with his rays, either when he mounts to the starry heaven, nor
when he turns again to earth from heaven, but doleful night is spread
over wretched folk" (Odyssey xi. 14 ff). To get there, Ulysses - who
had been sent by the enchantress Circe to consult the dead in Hades -
set out from the Isle of Circe, which was itself a long way west of
Greece, in the Mediterranean Sea To reach it they went to "Oceanus."
In the plan of "The World according to Hecataeus," in the History of
Ancient Geography, by E. H. Bunbury, Oceanus was the encircling sea
that ran round all known lands and seas and was outside the
Mediterranean Sea, beyond the Pillars of Hercules (Gibraltar). The
obvious inference is that Cimmeria, which was over realms and seas,
and on a distant shore from the "Isle of Circe" unto which Ulysses
returned by the aid of Zephyrus (a west wind) was certainly not in
the Black Sea.
William O'Connor Morris ("Ireland," Cambridge Historical Series,
1896, p.2) and Ridgeway ("Early Days of Greece" Encyclopedia
Britannica, xi Edit, Vol V) both agree in the probability that
Cimmerii, and Cimbri are one race. This certainly points to Homer's
Cimmeria being in N. W. Europe. This, too, is confirmed in Dictionary
of classic Antiquities, by Dr. Oskar Seiffert, translated from the
German by Nettleship and Sandys, 1908: "The realm of Hades. . . in
the Odyssey, its entrance, and outer courts, are on the western side
of the river Oceanus. . . Here is the abode of the Cimmerians, veiled
in darkness and cloud, where the sun never shines."
Duncker, in his History of Greece (Bentley, 1886, p.193) says: "On
the northern shores of the Black Sea the Milesian sailors found a
much more severe winter than in their own home . . . and thought they
had found the end of the world, and the land of the wintry Cimmerians
. . .When, beyond the Black Sea, a new expanse of water (the Sea of
Azov) disclosed itself, the mariners thought that they had at last
reached Oceanus, and the entrance to Maeotis received the name of
Cimmerian Bosphorus." Especially as this seemed to be confirmed by:
"on the western side of the Black Sea lay, not far from the mouth of
the Danube, an island, the white limestone cliffs of which shone from
afar: the Greeks called it 'The White Island (Leuke)'."
A similar geographical blunder led our first Atlantic - navigators to
term the American aboriginal an "Indian," because they were under the
impression that they had sailed round the world and had come upon
India.
It looks as if the mythological Kimmerioi of Homer were in reality
residents of the white Island north-west from Greece, and probably
not, at that time, occupying the Crimea in the east There is,
moreover, no mention of the Cimmerians among the people of Thrace,
nor in Scythia about the Crimea, nor on any part of the Black Sea
until the seventh century B.C., when they are FOUND on the south side
of that water.

Lehmann-Haupt, in his article, "Kimmerier" (referred to in the
preface), argues that "Horner knew nothing actually of the Cimmerian
invasions, but only knew the Cimmerians in their northern homes" (S.
50). "Homer's description does not apply in the least to conditions
in the Crimea, but has in mind the long winter nights in the north to
which the long summer days correspond" In confirmation, he cites
Niebuhr (Bell. Goth II, XV, p.205), "where Precopius on the basis of
personal communications, made by reliable authorities from among the
Heruli (or Eruli), who still maintained connexion with those of their
tribe who had remained in Scandinavia, gives an intimate account of
forty days' light in summer and forty days' darkness in winter" (S.
55). Finsler's Homer (1914) p.25 says: "It has long been recognized
that Odyssey x, lines 82-85, refer to the long summer days* . . .
vice versa, the account of the country of the Cimmerians which was
plunged in eternal night supplies definite evidence of the long
northern winter night; this country must surely be Jutland, the
Cimmerian peninsula" (S. 56). "Homer's description therefore does not
fit the Cimmerians. It may well apply, however, to the home of the
Cimbri . . ." (S. 57) When, therefore, the Cimbri penetrated from
their northern homes as far as Italy and showed themselves to be a
tribe of marauding nomads, this circumstance led to the regarding of
the Cimmerians of the Crimea as a scattered branch of the Cimbri . .
." From Strabo (VII, 2,2. C. 293) it is learned that Poseidonius also
conjectured that "the Cimmerian Bosporus was named after them, being
equivalent to 'Cimbrian,' the Greeks naming the Cimbri 'Kimmerioi'
(S. 58)." A similar view is expressed in Plutarch (Caius Marius in
the Vitae Parallelae,'): "Others, however, say that the Cimmerians
who were first known to the ancient Greeks were not a large part of
the entire people . . . whereas the largest and most warlike part of
the people dwelt at the confines of the earth, along the outer sea .
. . From these regions, then, these Barbarians sallied forth against
Italy, being called at first Cimmerians, and then, not
inappropriately, Cimbri" (S. 58).
Note:-* ". . . we came to (line 82) Telepylus of the laestrygonians
(83) where herdsman calls to herdsman as he drives in his flock, and
the other answers as he drives his forth. There a man who never slept
could have (85) earned a double wage, one by herding cattle . . ."
(Loeb Classical Library)
Sharon Turner, Arnold, Niebuhr, and Iappenburg all say that Cimbri
and Cimmeril were identical. Lehmann-Haupt cites Bury in The Homeric
and Historic Kimmerians (Klio VI, 79-88), who discusses the
extraordinary account by Procopious of the island of Brittia, based
on local accounts, which he inserted as a digression in his Gothic
Wars (IV, 20). To this island the souls of the dead are rowed over by
inhabitants of the mainland facing it, who are summoned to the task
by nocturnal knocking at their doors. This spirit-island is dearly
characteristic, judging from the details concerning its inhabitants
("and the names of these nations are Angili, Frissones, and
Brittones, the last named from the island itself"), Angles, Frisians,
and Britons. The details, however, stopped Procopious (as Bury
pointed out) from relating them to the Britain he knew so well, and
caused him to place this "double" of Britain between that country and
Thule (Scandinavia: Bury 80, 3) (LH., S. 62).
Lehmann-Haupt concludes his long analysis (18 folio pages) of "The
Cimmerians in Homer and other Myth": 'Thus the information relating
to the Cimmerians in Odyssey XI only lacks any proper connection if,
with Finsler, who himself relates it to Jutland, one places it among
the connected complex of data, all of which point to the Black Sea"
(S. 65).
There is, however, a considerable volume of opinion that Homeric
geography reflects Ionian geographical knowledge of the colonizing
period in Pontus, but others regard most of the Homeric statements as
reflecting an earlier phase of navigation, and as mainly referring to
regions west of Greece. The description of the Ocean Stream certainly
looks like an account of the tidal currents at Gibraltar, and it is
quite probable that early adventurers passed out into the Atlantic,
and reached a cloudy and fog-infested climate.

The So-Called Indo-European Migration
Rogers, in Babylonia and Assyria, says: "In the reign of Esarhaddon
there was felt, for the first time, in all its keenness, the danger
of an overflow of the land by Indo-European migrations."
Alter giving the Scythians' own account of their traditional history
(11. IV, 5-7) and the Greek account (H. IV, 8-10) Herodotus continues
(H. IV, 11 and 12): "There is also another different story in which I
am more inclined to put faith than in any other." Not a very
convincing method of introducing a statement of so-called history,
not contemporary, but put together two or three centuries after the
events occurred, and aptly described by Minns as "a confused account
of happenings which it is almost impossible to credit."
The story is familiar; the nomad Scythians, inhabiting Asia, being
hard-pressed in war by the Massagetae, fled away across the Araxes
(here the Volga) to the Cimmerian country (Crimea and South Russia).
On their approach the Cimmerians got frightened. The King's party
wanted to fight, the people wanted to retreat They then divided into
two equal forces and fought together. "An the Royal tribe were slain,
and the people buried them near the river Tyras, where their grave is
still to be seen. Then the rest of the Cimmerians departed, and the
Scythians, on their coming, took possession of a deserted land."
Then a strange thing happened; the Cimmerians (excluding, presumably,
the Royal tribe who had all been slain) fled, not in continuation of
the line of momentum of the attack, that is from east to west, but
back, west to east, along the same track by which the attack had
come. Then the Cimmerians turned sharply to the right, by the coast
of the Black Sea, while their pursuers, the Scythians, overshot them
and keeping the Caucasus, on their right, proceeded inland and poured
into Media.
Edward Meyer, Geschichte des Alterthums, from Historians' History
(II, p.140), evidently sees the absurdity of all this, and says:
"About the eighth century B. C.), the Scyihian Scoloti, one of the
Iranian nomadic tribes, ostensibly crowded out by the Massagetae,
crossed the Volga and the Don, and drove the Cimmerians out of their
abode . . . In all probability they went over the Danube into Thrace,
being joined by Thracian tribes on the way" (my italics).
Bunbury (Ancient Geography, I, p.208) says: "It seems impossible to
believe the story (by Herodotus), thus told, or to connect it with
the Cimmerian invasion of lower Asia"
Again, Niebuhr has shown that there is great intrinsic improbability
in Herodotus' narrative. He also thought that they (the Cimmerians)
must have come to the Thracian Bosphorus, for they must have got into
Asia Minor somehow, to attack Lydia.
Minus (Scythians and Greeks, 1913, p.41) writes: "Mullenhoff ~A III,
p. 19, ff) suppose that there never were any Cimmerians at all north
of the Euxine, that they are only known in Asia Minor, that their
name was traditionally assigned to Trajan, far beyond the limits of
the Roman Empire, and that they were really invaders from Thrace or
the parts beyond . . . It is hard to think that Herodotus simply
invented all the story of the Cimmerians coming from the north side
of the Pontus, though, even so, it is at first sight difficult to see
precisely how things happened; how if the Cimmerians fled south-east,
there should have been their Kings' tombs on the Tyras (Dniester). .
."
That in the eighth century B.C., the Cimmerians, after losing half
their total strength about the Crimea, and after being pursued by the
Scythians through the Caucasus, should revive to such an extent that
their pressure on Urartu - strong state which had lately defeated
even the Assyrians under Sargon (L H., S. 10) -as sufficient to cause
(according to Lehmann-Haupt, S.9) their great King Rusas I to commit
suicide, is beyond the limit of credence. The more one looks at a
modern map Of south-west Asia the more fantastic the Herodotus story
appears, especially if one, uses - as the famous Marquis of Salisbury
advised for such studies - a large scale map.

The Assyrian Captivities
It is to be noted that accurately dated history, in these parts,
commences' with the "limmu" of 893 B.C., the "limmu" being the
magistrate appointed for one year, and after whom the year was named.
(Ancient History of the Near East, Hall, p. 445.)
The first captivity of Israel (Reuben, Gad and half-tribe of
Manasseh) was in 734 B.C. (cuneiform records of Tiglath Pilezar) and
not in 740 B.C. (Ussher). They were brought to Halah, Habor, Hara and
to the river of Gozan (Gozan was, probably, a district stretching
across Upper Mesopotamia) where, before long, they must have been
coming into contact with the fighting between Assyria and Urartu and
her ally Minnai (Ararat and Minni of Jer. 51:27) during the years 719-
714 B.C. (L. H., S. 7-9).
The second captivity of Israel (the remainder of the ten tribes) was
carried Out when Sargon captured Samaria, after a three years' siege
in 722 B.C. (Assyrian monuments), and 721 B.C. Ussher). Josephus Bk.
ix, ch. 14 is headed: "How Shalmanezer took Samaria by force and
TRANSPLANT THE THE TEN TRIBES INTO MEDIA, and brought the nation of
the Cuthaeans into their country;" also in Section I of the same he
says: "Shalmanezer, the King ofAssyria . . . besieged Samaria three
years and took it by force in the ninth year of the reign of Hoshea
(actually taken by Sargon after Shalmanezer's death). . . and quite
demolished the government of the Israelites, and transplanted ALL THE
PEOPLE into Media and Persia, and when he had removed these people
out of this their land, he transplanted other nations out of Cuthah
(a place so called for there is still a river of that name in Persia)
into Samaria, and into the country of the Israelites. So the Ten
Tribes of Israelite: were removed out of Judaea."
It is necessary to draw special attention to this because there is
reiterated argument that the removal was only partial.
>From Problems in Biblical and Mesopotamian Ethnography and Geography,
by G.R. Gair, we get the following:
(Page 12) "In the account of the first deportation of Israelites
there is no mention of Media at all. At the second and more important
captivity the cities of the Medes are distinctly mentioned. Yet Media
was not conquered till about 715 B.C. In that year Sargon conquered
the Medes as far as the Elburz Ranges (Mt. Demavend) and received the
tribute of 28 chieftans. Again in 713 B.C., 46 chiefs were taken."
(Page 17) Inscription of Khorsabad translated by Oppert. "I besieged
and occupied the town of Samaria and took 27,280 of its inhabitants
captive."
(Page 18) If the ruling caste of the Kingdom of Samaria only were
deported it seems strange that the Assyrians went to such pains to
repeople the land. We read in 2nd Kings 17:24: "And the King of
Assyria brought men from Babylon and from Cuthah and from Ava, and
from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim and placed them in the cities of
Samaria instead of the children of Israel," while on the columns of
Khorsabad (Records of the Past, translated by Dr. J. Oppert)
referring to the year after the fall of Samaria we read: "I marched
against the tribes of Tasidi, of Ibadidi, of Marsemani, of Hayapai;
of the land (of Arabia). I pulled them out of their dwelling and I
placed them in the town of Samaria" From this inscription we learn
that seven years after the fall of Samaria peoples from very distant
lands were being deported to that city supplementary to those
catalogues by the Bible. (Page 20) Also in connection with the second
revolt of Hamath in 715 B.C., in which Arpad, Simyra, Damascus, and
Samaria, were involved, even if all Israel were not deported at the
fall of Samaria in 721 B.C. the chances for the nationality surviving
after this further result were very slight (Page 19).
In an article by Mr. H. A. Marchant, 'The Riddle of History Solved"
in the Banner of Israel, XXXIII, 2nd June, 1909, we read: "It must be
remembered that when the Jews (Judahites) returned from Babylon they
did not accuse any of the mixed medley who opposed them of being
their brethren Ephraim-Israel"
The reason why the monumental inscriptions do not mention any vast
number of captives is that:
(1) Esarhaddon (681-668 B.C.) wilfully defaced Tiglath-Pilezer's (745-
727 B.C.) inscriptions, but such as remain confirm the Bible.
(2) Shalmanezer (727-722 B.C.) was too busy fighting during his short
reign to write inscriptions.
(3) The whole Phoenician mainland was in revolt, and when the
promised help from Egypt did not mature, they all, except Samaria,
submitted to Shalmanezer, but no record of captives was kept.
Further, the Bible says (2nd Kings 17:18): "THERE WAS NONE LEFT BUT
THE TRIBE OF JUDAH ONLY"
It is argued that when the Bible says (2nd Kings 17:6 and 18:11) "in
the cities of the Medes," it does not mean what it says.
We may therefore assume that large numbers of ten-tribed northern
Israel were gathering, from 734 B.C. onwards, and multiplying
exceedingly, according to prophecy, about the Armenian plateau and
the Zagros mountains. This is confirmed too in Tobit VII, where it
appears that certain Israelites of the captivity, in Nineveh, came to
Ecbatana, Also Diodorus (II, ch. 3) refers to two colonies - which he
calls Scythians, but evidently from the words "despicable for their
mean original" were captive Israelites one out of Assyria, the other
out of Media.
In Aids to the Student of the Holy Bible (Eyre and Spottiswoode,
1880), written by many well known writers of that day (including the
late Professor Sayce), map 8 shows that the settlement of the
Israelite exiles of the second captivity is located in Media, in the
very spot where the Umman-Manda revolted in the days of Esarhaddon,
after the Israelites had been located there for about forty years.
This will be dealt with later (see p.22, last four lines).

Campaigns around Assyria and in Asia Minor
>From Klauber (cited by Lehmann-Haupt) we learn that Esarhaddon (who
reigned 681-663 B.C.) addressed an appeal to the sun-god for help,
when threatened by Kashtereti (Manda) and Mamiti-Arsu (Mede), as
brought to light by Knudson (Leipzig, 1893), and by Klauber twenty
years later.
(LH., S. 19): -Will Kashtariti and his warriors, or the warriors of
the Gimirrai (whom Lehmann-Haupt definitely equates with the
Cimmerians) or the warriors of the Media, or the warriors of Mannai,
or any enemy whatsoever, succeed in their plan?" The "plan" is the
taking of the Assyrian city of Kishassu by storm. This with Kartam
and five other cities "on the eastern borders of Assyria" (L.H., S.
19) was taken, according to the Babylonian Chronicle, during the
invasion of Assyria by the Cimmerians (Article in Bab. Assyr.
Geschichte by G.P. Tiele Historians' History, I, p.423.) This
campaign took place in the district of Khubushkia (between the upper
Zab and the Tigris. Sayce; and C.P. Tiele, Bab. Assyr. Geschichte),
circa 677 B.C. (formerly given as 673 B.C., but Lehmann-Haupt gives
weighty argument for the earlier date). On the other hand, Hall (The
Ancient History of the Near East, p.495) says that "the war lasted
for several years, ending in 672 B.C. with the reassured
inviolability of the northern frontier." Esarhaddon's appeal to the
sun-god at the threat of "revolt"* by the Cimmerians and their allies
was due to fright, and, by giving an Assyrian Princess in marriage,
he formed an alliance with Bartatua, King of Ishguzai (Asguza,
Ashkenaz, Sayce, Higher Criticism, p.484) with whose help the
invasion was finally defeated and Teushpa (Teispes, the reputed
ancestor of Cyrus and Darius) was killed (L.H., S. 17)
Note:- * It should be noted from Higher Criticism, Sayce, 6th edit,
p. 485 - that the words used by Kashtariti, In writing to Mamiti-
Arsu, were "Let us revolt," showing that the Cimmerians were Assyrlan
subjcts at the time, and were not, as has been supposed, taking part
in any sc-called Indo-European invasion.
Let us pause to consider who all these various people were:
Hall (op. cit, p.495) speaks of "The nomad tribes of the Gimirrai.
These, the Gomer of the Hebrews, and the Kimmerians of the Greeks."
Sayce (op. cit, pp.483-486) speaks of "The Kingdom of Minni adjoined
that of Ararat (Urartu) on the south-east Ararat, as we have seen,
was the name given by the Assyrians and Hebrews to the country called
Bianias in the native inscriptions, the capital of which was at Van,
while the Minni of Scripture are termed Manna in the Assyrian text,
and Mana in those of Van."
(Ibid) Saparda was in Bithynia and Galatia (cuneiform tablet, 275
B.C., Dr. Strassmaier). Here was the land of Sepbarad in which was
the captivity of Jerusalem (Obadiah, verse 20). This contradicts Hall
(op. cit, p.483), who writes: We are not told that they were carried
into captivity, but were regarded as spoil."
The true Medes (Mads) of the Assyrian inscription were, according to
Sayce (Historians' History, II, p.584) "the Kurdish tribes who lived
eastward of Assyria, and whose territory extended as far as the
Caspian Sea They were for the most part Indo-European in language and
Aryan in descent,** and lived like the Greeks in small states, each
of which obeyed a city lord of its own."
Note:- ** According to modern ideas, there is an Aryan language, but
not an Aryan race.
The Umman-Manda. A general designation for nomadic northmen (umman .
. . horde; manda . . . full, numerous). Gadd in Fall of Nineveh (p.
14, footnote), says: "It is certainly used of the Ciminerians,
thought apparently not of the actual Scythians (Asguzai, Isguzai)."
After this campaign, about the Zagos mountains and the Armenian
plateau, the Cimmerians under Tugdamme (the Lygamis of Strabo), who,
like Teushpa, appears as an Umman-Manda, engaged in a further series
of battles in Cappadocia and Cilicia, being finally driven across the
Halys (circa 673 B.C.). Then began the campaign of the Cimmerians
against Phrygia, which they destroyed (L.H., S. 28), and then against
Lydia under Gyges (Assyrian "Gugu"), who first made his allegiance to
Asshur-banipal, and then revolted Sardis was taken by the Cimmerians,
and Gyges killed (circa 652 B.C.) (L.H.). The Cimmerians then
attacked the Greek coast cities in conjunction with their related
stock, the Treres, who had come across the straits from the west, as
stated by Cailinus. Subsequently, the Cimmerians were driven out of
Western Asia Minor by Gyge's son, Ardys, and his grandson, Alyattes,
and were met and defeated by the Assyrian army of Syria, about the
Cilician Gates, when Tugdamme (Lygdamis) was killed and his son
Sandakshatra became their leader (Hall, op. cit, p.509). Alyattes
ended his six years' contest with the Cimmerians (Manda, as shown
below) by giving his daughter Aryanis to Astyages, the son of
Cyaxares. (See below.)
Prior to the death of Asshur-banipal two invasions of Assyria had
taken place: one under Phraortes (circa 634 B.C.), which was
defeated, and the other under Cyaxares (Uvakh-shatara) - who reigned
634-594 B.C., or by another calculation 625-585 B.C. - (circa 630
B.C.), in which Nineveh was besieged, but rescued by Scythians under
Madyes, son of Protothyes (the latter considered to be the same as
Bartarua, King of the Ishguzai) (H. II, 102 ff.).
>From Gadd, Fall of Nineveh, we learn that Nabopolassar, Viceroy of
Babylon, revolted from Assyria some time between 620 and 617 B.C. In
the summer of 614 B.C., Cyaxares marched upon Nineveh, an alliance
was made between Media (Manda; see below) and Babylon, formally
sealed by the marriage between Cyaxares' daughter, Amytis, with
Nebuchadnezzar. Thereby, incidentally, Astyages (Cyaxares' son; see
above) became brother-in-law of Nebuchadnezzar (Nabopolassar's son).
During 613 B.C. there was a pause in the siege when the Medes (Manda)
were engaged with Bactrian Scythians (Scoloti), but these were
eventually persuaded to join the Manda-Babylonian alliance, and in
July-August 612 B.C. Nineveh fell.

Medes and Umman-Manda
Sayce (Higher Criticism and the Monuments, p.519, ff.) also deals
with this question of the Medes and the Manda: "If it is startling to
learn that Cyrus was in reality an Elamite Prince, it is equally
startling to find that Istuvegu (Astyages) was King, not of the
Medes, but of the Manda . . . Teuspa (Teispes), the leader of the
Gimirrai, is called a Manda by Esarhaddon, and an inscription of
Asshur-banipal, recently discovered by Dr. Strong, returns thanks to
the Assyrian gods for the defeat of that 'limb of Satan,' Tuktammu,
of the Manda, or Duktammu (possibly the Lygdamis of Strabo), who led
the Cimmerians into Kalikia (Cilicia), from thence they afterwards
marched westward and burned Sardis. At all events, we must see in him
a forerunner, if not a predecessor, of Istuvegu (the Astyages of the
Greeks), who governed the Manda in Ekbatana. Ekbatana, the modern
Hamadan, called Achmetha in the Old Testament (Ezra 6:2), the
Hangmatana of the Persian inscriptions, had been built in the
territory of the old kingdom of Ellipi. Ellipi had been tributary to
Sargon, and in the time of Sennacherib we find it in alliance with,
Elam. After this it disappears from history. The Manda had descended
upon it and made it the chief city of their power. It would seem that
the Manda of Ekbatana were the Scythians of classical history. As we
have seen, Teuspa the Kimmerian and his people are termed 'Manda' by
Esarhaddon and in the inscriptions of Darius; the Gimirra Umurgah of
the Babylonian text, correspond with the Saka Humavarka of the
Persian text The Saka Humavarka are the Amyrgian Sakae of Herodotus
(VII, 64) who, he tells us, were the Scythians of the Greeks. Totally
distinct from the 'Manda' were the Mada, or Medes. Their land lay to
the north-east of Ekbatana, and extended as far as the shores of the
Caspian Sea. . . When, in the generations that preceded Darius
Hystaspes, Cyrus became the founder of the Persian Empire the Medes
and the Manda were confounded one with the other. Astyages, the
Suzerain of Cyrus, was transformed into a Mede, and the city of
Ekbatana into the capital of a Median Empire. The illusion has lasted
down to our own age . . . It was not until the discovery of the
monuments of Nabonidus and Cyrus that the truth at last came to
light, and it was found that the history we had so long believed was
founded upon a philological mistake."
It seems a pity that the late Professor Sayce did not go a step
further to state definitely that it was neither the Medes, nor the
Umman-Manda of Abraham's time, that destroyed Assyria, but the new
people Cimmerii, who had ousted the Umman-Manda from their former
ruling position in Media and had become in the eyes of neighboring
countries, not in their own, Umman-Manda by affiliation.

Chronology
The question of dates is important in connection with the Herodotus
story.
The invasion of the Scythians (according to L.H., S.6) must have
taken place twenty-eight years before the fall of Nineveh. The event
is now fixed definitely at 612 B.C., so that puts the commencement of
the Scythian invasion at 640 B.C, and as the Scythians were
(according to the same story) pursuing the Cimmerians at the time,
the Cimmerians can only just have preceded them in their flight over
the Caucasus.

But, according to accurate dating by "Lmnmu" (see page 11):
1. It will be seen, from page 10, that the Cimmerians had exerted
such pressure on Urartu, about 715 B.C., as to be responsible
(according to L.H., S. 10,11) for the suicide of Rusas I.
2. The defeat and death of "Teushpa, the Cimmerian, a nomad, whose
country is far distant, I slew and destroyed in the district of
Hubushna (Khubashna, Khubushkia) with all his troop" in 677 B.C. (see
page 14.)
>From this it is apparent that the Cimmerians were fighting hard in
Urartu and on the north-east border of Assyria, thirty-seven to
seventy-five years before the date about which (according to the
Herodotus story) they were being pursued over the Caucasas by the
Scythians.
It is also to be noted that Lehmann-Haupt states that the Gimirall,
whom he definitely equates with the Cimmerians, never appear in
conjunction with the Ishguzai (scythians), but always together with
other northerners, the Mannai, Sapardi and Medians, as if allied, or
at least making war in common, with them.

Gomer
Another important question is this: Was Gomer of Genesis 10 the same
people as the Cimmerians of later times? Scholars seem to think so.
But is this justified? Gomer, the wife of Hosea (Hosea 1), even
though a wife of whoredom, is unlikely to be a descendant of Japhet,
as she is intended to represent backsliding Israel - in the parable
of the relation of Yahweh to Israel - and therefore must be
reasonably expected to be a descendant of Shem, and not of Japhet. It
is also remarkable that this Hosea-Gomer seed was placed, after the
ten tribes had been taken captive by the Assyrians, in the very
localities where the Cimmerians revolted.

Cimmeria and Samaria
The northern kingdom of Israel was called Samaria (Ussher 975 B.C. -
see 1st Kings 13:32) long before Omri built its capital city
"Shomeron," which the Greek Septuagint renders "Samareia" Josephus,
in Book VIII, Chap. XII, 5, says that Omri called the city Samarion
and that the Greeks turned it into Samaria The Bible says that Omri
called it Shomeron (1st Kings 16:24 margin).
The fear of the Syrians caused continuous emigration of northern
Israel to the Isles of the West in Benhadad's time (1st Kings 15:20),
and, when "the Lord began to cut Israel short," in Hazael's time (2nd
Kings 10:32). Further, northern Dan seems to have disappeared before
the advent of the Assyrians, as narrated in 2nd Kings 15:29. These
movements were probably effected by means of the maritime trade for
tin, etc., through the Mediterranean to the Scilly Isles and
Cornwall, long before the actual captivities took place.
Rev. George Cooke, D.D., Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford, in an
article in the Encyclopedia Britannica 14th edition (VII, 769) says:
"A vivid description ," of the Phoenicians' trade at the time of
Tyre's prosperity is given by Ezekiel (27:12-25). . . Between Israel
and Phoenicia the relations naturally were dose: the former provided
certain necessaries of life and received in exchange articles of
luxury and splendor (ibid 16-18). . . It was the trade with Tarshish,
i.e. the region of Tartessus in S.W. Spain, which contributed most to
the Phoenician's wealth . . . From Gadeira (now Cadiz) the Sidonian
ships ventured further on the ocean and drew tin from the mines of
N.W. Spain, or from the richer deposits in the Cassiterides, i.e. the
Tin Islands, now known as the Scillies."
Also from an article by H. J. E. Peake, President of the Royal
Anthropological Institute of Britain (ibid, Vol.11, p.248,
"Archaeology, Trade Routes"): "From Sicily there are indications of
trade in various directions . . . as far as the coasts of Spain and
Portugal. There is even reason for believing that from Portugal a
further line of coastal trade ran to Brittany and the Channel
Islands, and ultimately to Ireland and the east of Britain, as well
as to the amber coast of Denmark These gold deposits and the tin
lodes of Cornwall, as well as certain copper and, perhaps, gold
deposits in Wales were the lures that tempted the first bronze
traders to these countries. Thus it was that within a very few
centuries after the first use of this alloy (2200 B.C., ibid, p.247)
bronze was brought to the British Isles" (ibid, p. 252).
Further evidence of this westward movement is found int the existence
of stone circles, similar to that of Stonehenge, at ports of call
north and south of the Mediterranean, in Spain, in Brittany, and in
about two hundred places in Britain.
Also from The British Museum Guide to Early Iron Age Antiquities
(1925) we learn that M. Salomon Reinach thinks that the Phrygians
were here (Britain) about 850 B.C., even before the Phoenicians. This
is supported by the evidence of the "Scyphus Cup," said to have been
found in the Thames between Putney and Hammersmith, which has
peculiarities marking it as coming from the neighborhood of Troy
between 1000 and 700 B.C. (ibid, pp.90,91). While The British Guide
to the Antiquities of the Bronze Age, 1920 (p. 151) indicates that
the oldest route of intercourse between east and west was from
Hissarlik (second city of Troy) before 2000 B.C., through Spain,
Portugal and France (especially Brittany) to the British Isles and
northern Europe.

Cimmerians and Scythians
It is a pity that scholars - when giving us history from the
monuments - instead of putting the monumental name in the text of a
translation and what they think it meant in a note, frequently put
"Scythian" or "Barbarian" in the text of the book or in the
translation of the cylinder instead of the actual name used.
In a paper of this sort there is no opportunity to give the requisite
background, in detail, for an examination of this question, but in
chapters VII and VIII of my book, Israel's Racial Origin and
Migrations (1934), authority is given for the tradition that the
early colonies of Greece and Phrygia were furnished by Israelites
from Egypt principally by the tribe of Dan but Zara-Judah cannot be
excluded.
This is merely to indicate the idea that at a very early date,
(between 1500 and 750 B.C.) the shores of the Aegean and the Black
Sea were largely populated with Israel people, many of whom had
probably never even been into Palestine. By the time that the
Cimmerian drama opens these Israelites would be known as Ionians and
Thracians.
It really does seem as if, in the endeavor to get rid of the Old
Testament, modern critics omit to take any account of Israelites who
were placed in captivity in Assyria from 734 B.C. and onwards and in
the cities of the Medes from circa 715 B.C. onwards. These ten tribes
of Israel, whose fighting strength was over a million in David's time
(1st Chron 21:5, as compared with 800,000 by 2nd Samuel 24:9) must in
the subsequent centuries have multiplied enormously, till Josephus
(xi, 5) could describe them - at the period after the return of the
Jews (Judah, Benjamin and Levi) from the Babylonian captivity (518
B.C.) - as being beyond the Euphrates, where their numbers had
increased almost beyond credibility.
Where were they and what were they now named? Because from Ezekiel
20:39 it is obvious that the Israel name-which included "EL," the
name of God-was to be taken away and Israel was to be lost in a sea
of names. Sir Henry Rawlinson says (in Ancient Monarchies, II, p.513)
that the opinion of Herodotus (IV, c. 11,12) that the Scythians
entered Asia in pursuit of the Cimmerians is childish and may be
safely set aside. Is it not possible that it contains the germ of the
actual course of events?
The Israelites were taken into captivity, from 734 B.C. onwards, and
placed partly in Assyria and partly in Media. The Cimmerians are
revealed by the monuments and made known by Rawlinson and Sayce. They
are found in the very localities about Urartu (Ararat) and in the
Zagros mountains about Kar-Kassi, north of Elam, where some of the
ten tribes of Israel were placed during the lifetime of the captives
from Samaria (see p.13, last two lines if.). The latter were known by
the Assyrians even before their captivity, as the Bit Khumri, as
shown on the Black obelisk of Shalmanezer II (860-825 B.C.) now in
the British Museum. This name originated from Omri, who was king of
Israel 929-918 B.C. Ussher) (1st Kings 16:23,28). From the days of
Omri they must have been known to the Assyrians as Khurnri, which
Pinches shows was actually pronounced Ghomr.
Now Diodorus Siculus, who wrote during the first century B.C. refers,
in Bk. II Ch. 3, to two remarkable colonies among the Scythians, "the
one they brought out of Assyria, and settled in the country lying
between Paphiagonia and Pontus the other one of Media, which they
placed near the river Tanais."
Danvers (in Israel Redivivus, p.97) says: "Thus Diodorus Siculus
identifies two colonies amongst the Scythians, who may have been
Israelites of the Assynan captivity (see p. 13, end of last paragraph
but one) and this appears to suggest that the Israelites of the
Assyrian captivity did migrate from Asia into Europe with the
Scythians, and were, for the time being, known by that name."
Allatius (Allaci, Leone), too, states (ibid, p.98) that the districts
of Iberia and Coichis "were peopled by Israelites from the banks of
the Chaboras."
This does not infer that the Israelites up to the time of the end of
the Assyrian captivity period (circa 734-669 B.C. 65 years), or even
up to the time of the Behistun inscription (circa 515 B.C.) were
known otherwise than as Saka (Persian) and Gimirrs (Babylonian) but
it does infer that, later, when the Greek writers gave the general
designation of "Scythian" to all wandering tribes, Herodotus followed
suit, and, not knowing that the Saka (Gimirra) were Kimmerioi, called
them Scythians, and also said that the Persians called all the
Scythians Saka, whereas they really called the Cimmerians Saka. At a
later stage, the Israelites were merged in the various wandering
tribes known as Scythians, and became known as such.
Dr, Donaldson in Varronianus (1844), p.51, remarks that in the
immense area to which the ancients gave the name of Scythia we must
distinguish between the Sarmatae or Sauromatae, who were mainly, or
to a large extent, Sclavonian; the Scythae, or Asa-Goths; the Sacae,
or Saxons, who were identical ultimately with the Daci, or Danes; and
the Scolotae, or Asa-Galatae, also called Cimmerii.
>From 2nd Esdras 13:40-46, we learn that the ten tribes took a journey
of a year and a half to Arsareth; Herodotus wrote about the migration
of Scythian people from the south of the Caspian to a country north-
west of the Black Sea, and as neither of them mentions any incursion
of other peoples, in the same direction and to the same districts, it
is but a natural deduction that both the accounts refer to the same
people, notwithstanding that the one is called Israelites and the
other Scythians.
This does not appear more unreasonable than the tradition (among
others) which Herodotus is "inclined to," of events which happened
two hundred years and more previous to his date of writing,
especially bearing in mind that Herodotus committed the anachronism
of applying the generic term "Scythian" to the particular people
certainly known, at the time he was writing about, as Saka.
The fact seems to be that no Assyrian, Babylonian or Persian wrote
"Scythian." They wrote Umman-Manda, Zab-Manda, Mada, Gimmlrra, Saka.
It was the Greeks who introduced the word Scythian. The days of
Assyria, Babylon and Persia were all over and the Greek period was
well advanced before you find the Greek name Scythian on any
monumental inscription (Encyclopedia Biblica, Vol. IV, p.4330).
et us try to dear up this question of names:
1. From p.7, Lehmann-Haupt (S. 58) quotes Strabo VII. 2,2. C 293, who
cites Poseidonius as saying, "the Cimmerian Bosporus was named after
them (Cimbri), being equivalent to Cimbrian, the Greeks naming the
Cimbri 'Kimmerioi'."
2. Rogers (in his History of Babylonia and Assyria, II, pp.286-293)
says in a note: "The name Manda in the Babylonian text applies to the
same people that were called Sakae or Scythians by the Greeks."
3. C.P. Tiele, in an article from Babn. Assy. Gesch. (Historians'
History, I, p. 422) says: "Cimmerians or, more accurately, the Umman-
Manda."
4. Pinches says that the Manda were in Media in the time of Abraham.
Therefore if the Cimmerians are now the Manda they must have ousted
the Umman-Manda from their former ruling position in Media and had
become in the eyes of the neighbouring countries, not in their own,
Umman-Manda by affiliation. Here we have the old story, the conqueror
taking the name of the conquered. As Minns says in Scythians and
Greeks, p.40: "All history tells us, easily as nations change their
language, they change their names still more easily."
5. From p.14 it will be seen that Lehmann-Haupt (op. cit, S. 19)
definitely equates the Gimirrai and the Cimmerians; and on p.15 Hall
(op. cit, p.495) equates the Gimirrai with Gomer of the Hebrews and
with Kimmerioi of the Greeks.
6. From p.17, Sayce says that Teuspa or Teispes, the leader of the
Gimirrai is called a Manda by Esarhaddon, and he quotes from the
Darius inscription (Behistun) that the Ginrrra Umurgah of the
Babylonian text corresponds with the Saka Humavarka of the Persian
text. Also that the Macla (or true Medes) were totally distinct from
the Manda.
7. Finally, Omri built Shomeron, and the Assyrians wrote Omri as
Khumri (as shown on the Black obelisk now in the British Museum).
Pinches (in his Assyria and Babylonia, p.339) Says: "Omri was
likewise pronounced in accordance with the older system before the
'Ghain' became 'Ayin.' Hurnri shows that they said at that time
'Ghomri'." By the time of Esarhaddon this was written Gimmerai.

Conclusion
The arguments put forward suggest:
1. A western Cimmeria possibly Jutland or Britain - of which Homer
had heard only vaguely.
2. An eastern Cimmeria, subsequendy developed by later waves of the
same Iranian-Thracian people, actually Israel.
3. That the whole edifice of the story by Herodotus is based on an
extremely shaky foundation.
4. That there is no evidence whatever for the Cimmerians being found
in Assyria, Armenia, or Asia Minor, until after the smashing-up of
the kingdom of Beth-Khurnri and the transportation of the Khumri
people to those very localities.
5. That it was the earlier captivity of Israel which was long engaged
in the fighting with Assyrians, about Urartu, till (according to
Esdras) they went to Arsareth.
6. That it was the later captivities of Israel (721, 715 B.C. and
onwards) which ousted the original Umman-Manda from the leadership of
Media, and became affiliated as Umman-Manda themselves. After their
defeat in 677 B.C., and the death of Teushpa (Teispes), their leader
in the field, they were driven into Asia Minor, as Cimmerians, by the
Assyrians under Esarhaddon, aided (then) by Ishguzai (Seythians), and
subsequently engaged in years of fighting with the Lydians.
7. That the Ishguzai under Bartatua were genuinely a tribe of
Scythians.
8. That the Scythians under Madyes who attacked Cyaxares during the
first abortive siege of Nineveh, may also have been Ishguzai, but
they were more probably Bactrian Scythians (Scolotai) from western
Asia These were subsequently persuaded to join Cyaxares for the final
capture of Nineveh, and it was probably these who ruled Asia for 28
years, whether before, during, or after, the siege of Nineveh (if at
all?) no one seems able to say.
9. That there is no evidence whatever that the Japhetic Gomer of
Genesis 10 and the (presumably) non-Israelite Gomer of Ezekiel 38:6,
are the same as the symbolic Gomer of Hosea, which represents
backsliding (Shemiticunot Semitic) Israel.
10. That the later Gomer of Hosea may genuinely mean Cimmerian.
According to Pinches they were called Ghomri in Hosea's day.
To sum up. I suggest the following explanation of the ideas examined
in this paper:
The indications of Homer's geography seem to show that the Cimmerians
which he had heard of were filtrations of the people from Samaria,
who from the time of Omri circ. 918 B.C. (Ussher) were known as
Khumri (as shown in the Black Obelisk), whence - it is suggested that
the name Cimmerii is derived. These Cimmerians were beyond Oceanus in
a wintry land north-west of Greece, and were actually on the shores
of the North Sea or in Britain. Subsequent to the earlier Homeric
writings the Milesian sailors discovered the Sea of Azov, and,
thinking they had reached Homer's "land of wintry Cimmerians," named
its entrance the "Cimmerian Bosporus." The report of the doings of
the Cimmerians in the east, in the eighth and seventh centuries B.C.,
reverberated throughout the known world, the geography of which was
little known, and may have induced Aeschylus (writing in the fifth
century B.C.), who was a poet and not a geographer, to locate the
Cimmerians in the Crimea It is quite possible that there were some
Cimmerians there by that time. Herodotus (484-425 B.C.), on the other
hand, had to account for the actual presence of Cimmerians in Asia
Minor, in the seventh century B.C., so the story of the Cimmerians,
started by Homer in his description of their wintry abode north-west
of Greece, and carried on by the Milesian sailors naming the Crimea
the Bosporus Cimmerius, led to Herodotus accepting the story to which
he "inclined" This seems to be a notable instance of what Sayce
(Higher Criticism and the Monuments, p.529) describes as a history
that has no perspective, though it is based on facts, and blends into
one picture manifold events and personages of the past.
Both Esdras and Herodotus describe the same actual event The former
(correctly) calls the people, who passed over the Caucasus, Israel,
whereas Herodotus accepted the story, which was an inversion of what
took place more than two hundred years before he wrote. The
Cimmerians were not driven from the Crimea through the Caucasus by
the Scythians. The Israelites in the form of Sakae, Cimmerians, and
Gimirrai, went from the Armenian table-land to Arsareth (Scythia) and
other Cimmerians already there (about the Crimea) gave way - as
described on page 79 of my book, Israel's Racial Origin and
Migrations (1934) - part moving into Thrace and part rejoining the
Cimmerians still remaining in Asia Minor.
The confusion of events in the eighth and seventh centuries B.C., was
largely added to by the fact that the (Eastern) Cimmerians had
settled in what used to be the land of ancient Gomer, which in the
time of Dungi (probably third millennium B.C.) was (from the
description given) in Northern Media, possibly south of the Caspian.
They therefore became "Gomer," just as the Teutons have become
Germans, and the Angles and Scots have become Britons. Thus the
Cimmerians, the seed of Hosea's wife of whoredom - Gomer of Hosea is
actually the captive Israelites, became identified with the Gimmirai,
who were supposed to be derived from the inhabitants of Gomer, but
were really the same people.
The End
-----------

Best whishes
Anders


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