Histories

For when men have no established cities or forts, but are all nomads and mounted archers, not living by tilling the soil but by raising cattle and carrying their dwellings on wagons, how can they not be invincible and unapproachable?

They have made this discovery in a land that suits their purpose and has rivers that are their allies; for their country is flat and grassy and well-watered, and rivers run through it not very many fewer in number than the canals of Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt.

As many of them as are famous and can be entered from the sea, I shall name. There is the Ister, which has five mouths, and the +Dnestr (river), Europe Tyras, and Hypanis, and +Dnepr (river), Europe Borysthenes, and Panticapes, and Hypacuris, and Gerrhus, and +Azov [39.433,47.1] (inhabited place), Rostov, Rossiya, Russia, Asia Tanaïs. Their courses are as I shall indicate.

The Ister, the greatest of all rivers which we know, flows with the same volume in summer and winter; it is most westerly Scythian river of all, and the greatest because other rivers are its tributaries.

Those that make it great, five flowing through the Scythian country, are these: the river called by Scythians Porata and by Greeks Pyretus,[*](Probably the +Prut [28.166,45.5] (river), Europe Pruth; the modern names of the other four rivers mentioned here are matters of conjecture.) and besides this the Tiarantus, the Ararus, the Naparis, and the Ordessus.

The first-named of these rivers is a great stream flowing east and uniting its waters with the Ister; the second, the Tiarantus, is more westerly and smaller; the Ararus, Naparis, and Ordessus flow between these two and pour their waters into the Ister.