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Cimmerians:Grand Masters of Horse Archery

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  Quote Xianpei Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: Cimmerians:Grand Masters of Horse Archery
    Posted: 22-Nov-2007 at 15:56

Hi Folks,

 
The origins of Cimmerian is not very clear.  What is their origins?
 
Although ancient history accounts that Scythians expelled Crimmerians out of steppes of present-day's South Russia after the two nomadic tribes had fought hard each other, it would be interesting to imagine how Crimmerian and Scythian horse-riding archers "dogfight" each other: the Scythians wanted to expand their lands, whilst Crimmerians aimed at protecting thier homeland.  Who was the grand master of horse riding tactics in the steppe war between them?
 
What was the Appearance of Crimmerian warriors at that time?
 
How Crimmerians vanished in the history?  Any possible relevant offsprings or cross mixing with other races....
 
Please somebody helps on this!
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  Quote Sarmat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22-Nov-2007 at 21:50
Cimmerians are considered Iranics. After the Skythian onslaught they escaped to Minor Asia and intermingled with Frygians and Lidians.
 
 
We know that ethnically they were closed to Skythians. However, I don't think that there is some evidence suggesting that they were especially famous as "the Grand Masters of Horse Archery." Their military tactic in fact was most likely very similar to the Skythian one.


Edited by Sarmat12 - 22-Nov-2007 at 21:56
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  Quote Xianpei Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23-Nov-2007 at 03:00
Hi Sarmat,

1. So, can we say that Cimmerians are within the same family of Skythian?
If yes, the physical appearance of Cimmerian is just the same as that of Skythian / Scythian, right?

2. Can you let me know where I can get into digging more information on Frygians and Lidian because I am very interested to know why the Cimmerians vanished in the stage of Steppe so fast in the 8th Century BC.    Thanks!

3. Could it be that Thracians closely relates to Cimmerian?  I meant they intermingled each other as well?
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  Quote Xianpei Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Nov-2007 at 07:43
Originally posted by Sarmat12

Cimmerians are considered Iranics. After the Skythian onslaught they escaped to Minor Asia and intermingled with Frygians and Lidians.
 
 
We know that ethnically they were closed to Skythians. However, I don't think that there is some evidence suggesting that they were especially famous as "the Grand Masters of Horse Archery." Their military tactic in fact was most likely very similar to the Skythian one.


The following links have some insight on it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurasian_nomads
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/cimmerians
http://www.ancientlibrary.com/wcd/cimmerians


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  Quote Chilbudios Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Nov-2007 at 10:11
http://apar.archaeology.ro/ds_artrjaeng.htm on archaeology, Cimmerians and their alleged onslaught and driving away by Scythians.
 
Therefore, Xianpei, archaeologically it looks like no Cimmerians vanished in the steppes, but there's a continuous material culture.
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  Quote Xianpei Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Nov-2007 at 13:57
Hi Chibudios,

Tks for your link provided!

That means Cimmerians have older history (Note: not longer ) than Scythians, right?

Again, if you have any info site that has picture(s) of Cimmerian warrior, I will appreciate for your letting me know.   I still failed to search one up to now.
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  Quote Chilbudios Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Nov-2007 at 14:54

I think the author wants to say there was a relatively uniform steppe culture and that the alleged migrations of Scythians or Cimmerians (as described by Herodotus) are not supported archaeologically and consequently there is not much sense in discussing a "Cimmerian steppe culture". There is even recent Russian scholarship (A. Y. Alekseev, N. K. Kachalova) minimalizing also on archaeological grounds the Cimmerian presence in the steppes north of Caucasus and Black Sea, and even some dubious theories (like in A. Kristensen's book "Who were the Cimmerians  and where did they come from?" where some arguments based on Assyrian sources suggest the Cimmerians are re-settled Israelites!!, however the theory may have some merits in its contributions to a reinterpretion of the classical account of Herodotus). At the same time the prestigious Cambridge Ancient History series claims (on a bit outdated scholarship, given some recent reassessments like the ones I've just mentioned) the Cimmerians were rather some Thracian or Thracian-related population living on the northern shores of the Black Sea (volume III.2, p. 555).

In plain English, it's not at all certain who the Cimmerians were and where they came from, not even certain if and how did they dominate the north-Pontic steppes. The only certain history we have of them is south of Caucasus.
 
If you look for pictures I suggest you should look for Assyrian inscriptions, however I do not know of any visual representation of them. Maybe someone more knowledgeable on Assyrian sources can guide you.
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  Quote xi_tujue Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Nov-2007 at 17:10
Conan teh Barbarian was cimmerian right Tongue
I rather be a nomadic barbarian than a sedentary savage
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  Quote Chilbudios Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Nov-2007 at 17:31
Right, and he fought monsters and sorcerers Smile
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  Quote xi_tujue Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Nov-2007 at 19:02
but realy i heard teh creator based Conan on the cimmerians
I rather be a nomadic barbarian than a sedentary savage
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  Quote Chilbudios Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26-Nov-2007 at 22:13
Conan is no more Cimmerian than Kull is an Atlant.
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  Quote xi_tujue Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27-Nov-2007 at 06:00
I don't mean the blonde over muscled Conan played by Arnold

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conan_the_Barbarian
I rather be a nomadic barbarian than a sedentary savage
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  Quote Xianpei Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27-Nov-2007 at 10:12
Originally posted by Chilbudios

I think the author wants to say there was a relatively uniform steppe culture and that the alleged migrations of Scythians or Cimmerians (as described by Herodotus) are not supported archaeologically and consequently there is not much sense in discussing a "Cimmerian steppe culture". There is even recent Russian scholarship (A. Y. Alekseev, N. K. Kachalova) minimalizing also on archaeological grounds the Cimmerian presence in the steppes north of Caucasus and Black Sea, and even some dubious theories (like in A. Kristensen's book "Who were the Cimmerians  and where did they come from?" where some arguments based on Assyrian sources suggest the Cimmerians are re-settled Israelites!!, however the theory may have some merits in its contributions to a reinterpretion of the classical account of Herodotus). At the same time the prestigious Cambridge Ancient History series claims (on a bit outdated scholarship, given some recent reassessments like the ones I've just mentioned) the Cimmerians were rather some Thracian or Thracian-related population living on the northern shores of the Black Sea (volume III.2, p. 555).

In plain English, it's not at all certain who the Cimmerians were and where they came from, not even certain if and how did they dominate the north-Pontic steppes. The only certain history we have of them is south of Caucasus.
 
If you look for pictures I suggest you should look for Assyrian inscriptions, however I do not know of any visual representation of them. Maybe someone more knowledgeable on Assyrian sources can guide you.


The above suggests that the origins of Cimmercians is obscure.  And this is why I am highly interested in this thread.
It seems there are different views about their orgins, at least:

Iranian Vs Israelites Vs Thracian....     what else...?

Chilbudios,  which "theory" you would more probably tend to buy?
And yes, I will go to search those related  Assyrian inscriptions to see if I am lucky to get one picture of Cimmerian warrior. (not that fiction one by Bob Howard)
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  Quote Chilbudios Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27-Nov-2007 at 16:56

Unless some more evidences will pop up to support a Cimmerian society in the north-Pontic steppes, I guess the only topic of research making sense is who were the Cimmerians south of Caucasus. I remember I've read something about some IE etymologies on the Cimmerian kings/chiefs names, which would point out that they (at least their elite) spoke an IE language (maybe an Iranian one).

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  Quote Sarmat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Nov-2007 at 05:12
Well. I have to say, that, in fact, we even do not know for 100% the ethnic composition of Skythians. Very few words survived from their language, however, generally speaking they are considered Iranian speakers.
 
Of course, the case of Cimmerians is even more obscured. There are only 3 Cimmerian words (the names of Cimmerian kings) which survived in Assyrian chronicles.
 
Those names also commonly decoded as "Iranian." However, again, it's still a hypo, yet the most popular hypo.
 
Anthropologically Cimmerians were closed to the people of Northern regions of Caspian Sea (as show the archeological data on Cimmerian graves). Those people are also commonly characterized as Iranics.
 
Archeological artefacts of Cimmerian do show some similarities with Skythian culture, but they do also have some specific features.
 
There are only 2 known images of Cimmerians, both look very similar to the Antique depiction of Skythians:
 
The image from Etruscan ceramics
 
 
 
 
The image from Greek ceramics:
 
 
Some examples of Cimmerian artefacts found in the northern Black Sea region:
 
 
 
In fact, there is aslo a hypo which says that Cimmerians were in fact just a kind of "vangard" of the Skythian forces.
 
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  Quote Xianpei Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Nov-2007 at 09:14
Sarmat12,

Thanks a lot for your pictures!  To me , these images are precious.
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  Quote Tar Szernd Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Nov-2007 at 11:30
The arrowheads in the last picture are from different styles/ages. The 3 edge head on the left was made surely 2-3 Centuries later(iron age- though of bronze) than the others(bronze age).
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  Quote Sarmat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Nov-2007 at 17:23
Yes. That's true. Those arrowheads might have several centuries difference between them. Yet, they all belong to the culture that archeologiests identified as "Cimmerian."
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  Quote Sarmat Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Nov-2007 at 17:23
Originally posted by Xianpei

Sarmat12,

Thanks a lot for your pictures!  To me , these images are precious.
 
You are very welcome ! Smile
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  Quote Suren Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Nov-2007 at 18:32


Look at this picture. It is from Persepolis and shows Scythian costumes.   If you compare it with cimmerian pictures you will found a lot of similarities.


Edited by Suren - 28-Nov-2007 at 19:34
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