Hi guys,

What people present day are the direct descendants of the Scythians, Sarmatians, Alans, Goths, Huns etc.?

So far, I've heard the Pathans of Afghanistan, and the Jatts of Punjab. Any other groups? Anyone ever heard of the Jatts?

Sorry if this discussion has already happend.

regards,

Welcome!:)
And Dark Age nomads have cropped up in the discussion before, but prolly not if there are modern descendants.

As far as I know no modern people claim direct descent from any of the ones you mentioned, but I could be mistaken.

The problem is dual; on the one hand we don't quite know what kind of 'people' these groups were to begin with, and the national mythologies claiming descent have historically always been dodgy. (And don't really apply anymore.)

The Scythians seem to have been a varied bunch, looking at the evidence of their graves. The Scythians closest to Europe looked European and then they became progressivley more Asian looking the further east you got. It may have been a linguistic/cultural unified group, but more likely 'Scythinan' could be how the Greek lumped several people with similar culture/lifestyle (horse nomad)?

And the problem with the others is similar. The tentative identification of the Huns with the Xiung-nu (sp?) of Chinese history makes sense, but there is no conclusive evidence. And the Huns just disappeared, though I think there are parts of eastern Europe where local legend has tried to make a connection. ('Attila' is a pretty popular name in Hungary, but I would put that down to later tinkering with the Hungarian national identity.)

As for the Sarmatians, that's another shadowy group of horse nomads and no one really know what happened to them. In their case it's known that the Polish nobility in the 14th c. or so made up a myth of their own radical difference from the commoners based on the assumption that they were of 'Sarmatian' ancestry.

Goths: Germanic peoples are inherently tricky. There were so many of them. Part of the 'ethnic' identification is based on ruling dynasty. Culturally and linguistically they were all pretty similar, which makes one suspect the groups weren't that stable.

Historically the Ostrogoths after their defeat by the Byzantines in Italy just faded from history. The Visigoths set up shop in Spain, and the christian nobility after the Arab conquest still considered their ancestry Visigothic. Consequently one can find later Spanish examples of an emphasis of this link.

However, all the Dark Age Germanic people (ruling classes?) to hit Latin Europe left a legacy for the later nobility to pick up on. French nobles on the 17th c. would oppose their German origin (Frank, Norman) to the commoners (Gauls). Same could be done with the Langobards in Italy, and as stated, the Spanish had the Visigoths. The political decline of the aristocracy post-French Rev. pretty much ensured that this identification would be dropped from various ideas of national origin.

The Swedes during the 16th and 17th c. had an official national super-ideology of themselves as 'Gothic/Geatic' in the sense that Sweden was assumed to have been the origin of the Gothic people who conquered most of W. Europe.

At the church meeting in Basel in the 15th c. the Swedish bishop Nicolaus Ragvaldi managed to pursade the rest that Sweden deserved the seat of honour because his ancestors had conquered Europe. The Spanish did try to protest, using the argument that surely it was better to be descended from the people who conquered stuff, than from their cousins who stayed at home.:lol:
However with no real supporting evidence, 18th and 19th c. historiography pretty much concluded it was all myth anyway.

And no, I've never heard of the Jatts of Punjab, and didn't know the Pathans claim descent from some historical horse nomadic people. Looking at the Jatt link I get the impression they have some very 19th c.-esque ideas of origin and race?:confusion:

What I have read is that at least some of the Pathans serving in the British army in the 19th c. claimed to be one of the lost tribes of Israel, and Jewish.;) That's kind of the point of mystic racial origin. You can change it to suit current needs.

There are few present known descendants of those people. This is due to several factors, but the main ones are:
- The overthrow of the Scythians by the Sarmatians
- The emergence of the Huns on the Ukrainian steppes. Most tribes got lost in the creation of the massive empire.
- The fact that records of tribes in Turkestan are few and far between during the ancient period. There were extremely large and powerful nomadic empires, such as the Massagetae, but nothing substantial is known about them because no records of them were made.
- The global disaster of 535AD. For a whole year, the entire world experienced perpetual winter. The mad search for food led to mass migrations and chaotic conditions in which many tribes were most.
- The emergence and collapse of the Gok Turkish empires. The empires united the world between modern Hungary and Korea, and managed to coalesce and integrate them somewhat effectively. By the time the empires fell, the old tribes had been replaced by new ones (such as the Khazars, Pechenegs, Sabirs, Turgish, etc.) and they began to see themselves as Turks, as opposed to Scythian, Sacae, Hunnish, Oghuz, etc. It is nigh impossible to trace tribes from before the Gok Turks to after them. Only the largest, such as the Uighurs, Basmyls, On-Okh and Kyrgyz managed to continue after them, but they eventually faced massive external and internal pressures and settled in their respective regions.

The above is very simplistic but it serves its' purpose.

The global disaster of 535AD
Could you expand a bit on that?
I know that erruption of the Krakatau is sometimes brought up, but me thinks, for a disaster of that size there are remarkably few contemporary reports, and even today it is something geologists tend to bring up, while historicans largely ignore it?

I now the 535AD blowout is sometimes referred to when explaining the hiccup in the Mayan civ — abandoned cities, relocation etc.

Others have done a good job in explaining some theories on what happened to all these various peoples.

What happens is all these different nomadic people are often descendants of one another. I've read the Sarmatians are descendants of the Scythians living further west in modern day Ukraine. And the Alans are a Sarmatian people. The problem is that many of the ancient settled people (Romans, Greeks, Chinese, Persians, Indians) that documented these horse nomads tend to either lump them all together or use their own terms. It gets harder to distinguish them.

From what I've read some Alans migrated westwards and intermingled with the eastern Germanic people (Vandals and Goths) while others would eventually mix with the Slavic people that emerged in Eastern Europe after the Germanic people moved westwards (or were intermingled as well).

Its confusing but I feel Mongoloid Cow makes a good point about the Turks and their role in all of this. The Turks moved from the east (northern and western China) towards Central Asia as different tribes (Buglars, Avars etc.) and pretty much intermingled with all these indo-european horse nomads. Although their language base was different the culture otherwise was pretty similar.

A bit confusing but I was looking ups Jats since I have heard the term before. Check this site out: http://www.geocities.com/pak_history/punjabis.html
They are descendants of various invaders into western India. Now days people like the Rajputs claim all sorts of foreign ancestory (as do a lot of people all around the world and often legitamely so) but by now they look far more Indian than anything else.

The Goths were a Germanic people. The Germanic people are another Indo-European bunch that in very ancient times (like pretty much all Indo European people) emerged from around the Black Sea. They moved into northern Europe while the rest of Europe was run over by the Gauls. Eventually they broke out during the Roman times. The eastern Germanic people are your famous ones, the Vandals, Visigoths, Ostrogoths. They were located in what is now Eastern Europe. Many of them migrated westwards, others became mixed into the Slavic tribes that emerged a bit later on. The more western Germans were the Franks, Saxons etc. They're descedants make up your modern day Germans, Dutch, Swedes, Norwegians, Danes and so on.

This is a pretty brief overview. There's a lot of generalizing and many assumptions. Some people question whether these theories are even correct. And now in 2005 people are so mixed it's really impossible to try to trace back or group people. And even grouping people by language groups (Indo-European people are grouped by their general language base) may not be totally accurate. This is just what I've read.

Hi guys,

Interesting responses; what I dont understand is how some people can come to beleive such powerful warriors can simply dissappear, without a doubt, there are descendants of these martial people.

The Jatts of Punjab claim descent from the Massagetae tribe of Scythia; Rajputs were initially Jatts until the 10th-11th century when they were given the choice of Social status by the Hindu's of India. For status, they took upon the caste title of Rajput or "Son of Kings" and converted formally into both caste system and Hinduism.

My non-Indian blood is quite visible, I stand 6'1, incredibly fair skin, blue eyes and black hair; this is not exactly what every Jatt looks like present day, but for the most part a Jatt is quite different physically from the general Indian population.

The Jatts have kept the martial traditions of their ancestors alive, they are also known as powerful horse warriors and warlords; till this day Jatts are known to have a weapon in hand at all times. I suggest to discuss this in more depth you guys could start posting on www.Jattworld.com and post your thoughts on this etc.

I am not even close to being any sort of scholar, but on that site theres a few guys that might be able to give you a run for your money. Please do join if your interested.

warm regards,

Seems quite likely to me that they simply wish to pretend to be of Scythian origin because it's more "glorious".

Hi Corsair,

The British, during their time in India, had kept many accounts of the Jatt people, studied their culture etc. and also find a link between the Jatts and the Getae people.

Scythian is a pretty general term, it includes people from Europe to Asia, so physical differences are definitely going to be there.

Many historians/scholars have tackled this issue; refer to www.Jattworld.com for exact books, quotes etc.

regards,

Could you expand a bit on that?
I know that erruption of the Krakatau is sometimes brought up, but me thinks, for a disaster of that size there are remarkably few contemporary reports, and even today it is something geologists tend to bring up, while historicans largely ignore it?

It happened, unquestionably. Historical sources may be skewed, incomplete or lost- but dendrochronology and ice-core samples are the smoking gun of the weather's history.

Oh, I don't question that eruption. But, why should it have such a huge impact? The most devastating eruption in written history (1815, Tambora) did have some consequences; but, while 1816 is recorded as the 'Year without Summer' it didn't cause the collaps of civilizations anywhere...

The Krakatoan eruption in 535AD caused a winter for an entire year world-wide. The Mayans weren't the only empire / civilisation to largely disappear that year or soon after - the Juan Juan were another (being overthrown by the Gok Turks), and then there's the Burgundian Kingdom (in eastern and southern France), the Hepthalites suffered some distasters in Afghanistan, etc, etc.

A point I should make is that all horse nomads from Ukraine to the Tien Shan Mountians (and beyond) were divided into three groups (not just "Scythians") by the ancient peoples: the Scythians, the Sacae, and the Houma-Sacae.

Then, how comes there is only a single author who sticks to that theory? Even Wikipedia specificially mentions "this theory is not widely accepted" (the German article more or less says 'not accepted at all')? ;)
I'm admittedly no expert here, but if not even google reveals lots of links, I'm suspicious.
AFAIK, there also is only this single Byzantine Historician reporting about it.
Totally unrelated IMHO (and undisputed) of course is the 'Plague of Justinian', which occured shortly after, and its effect on Europe/ the Mediterranean.

Determinism isn't trendy right now. The fact is that you didn't get cultures collapsing promptly on Day 1 535AD. Instead, you got balances of power shifting due to climate changes, and a "domino" effect taking place. In the 30 years that followed 535AD, the **** hit the fan just about everywhere. Coincidence? Possibly, but I buy the catastrophe theory.

AFAIK, there also is only this single Byzantine Historician reporting about it.
Totally unrelated IMHO (and undisputed) of course is the 'Plague of Justinian', which occured shortly after, and its effect on Europe/ the Mediterranean.

I think I'll do a thread on the subject. Give me a bit of time- it'll avoid threadjacking this one.

I know this is an old topic, but I saw it while browsing on Google and just had to reply.

I'm a Pashtun (or Pathan as the South Asians call us) by ancestry and I really do believe that Pashtuns have Scythian "blood" in them. Most scholars now suggest that Scythians were not a homogeneous group of people, but instead were a mix of several different nomadic peoples.

I've also taken the National Geographic's (Genographic Project) DNA test which shows you where your ancestors traveled to after they left Africa. My most recent male ancestor (the person I get my Y-chromosome from) came from Northern Siberia, which (for those who may not know) is around the northern most area of Russia.

I have Pashtun friends who have also taken this test and they have gotten results pointing towards the same theory. They'll have European, Iranic, or Turkic lineages.

The Pashtun identity was born pretty much around the same time as when the barbarian tribes vanished. Also, in the Pashto language, the word Saka means ones own, or true. It is used to describe full relationships, e.g. Zama saka ror (My true (full) brother).

Being a Pashtun, I can only speak for my own ethnic group, and I can say we have a lot of diversity. You can find individuals who are as dark as Africans and those who look no different than a stereotypical Scot. The vast majority, however, are of an olive complexion. I do believe this is also in line with the theory suggesting that Scythians were a heterogeneous bunch.

interesting - I wonder how far back they can trace genography. I suppose they are building it as they go.

Whether the Saka Rauka were related to the Scythians is rather hotly debated.

Then, how comes there is only a single author who sticks to that theory? Even Wikipedia specificially mentions "this theory is not widely accepted" (the German article more or less says 'not accepted at all')?
Especially the german version is a very bad source for hsitory. They try to germanize the Huns stating it is world-wide accepted that the name Attila derives from gothic based on some written sources that only mention a similar word for father while there is a bunch of similar words meaning the same and sounding similar in other languages, too. According to my readings it is much more accepted that the name Attila is of turkic origin. Even more, I'm pretty sure that I read that the hunnic names is the best reason to think why huns were of tuirkic origin. Besides of this, from what I remember they dealt with german sources only - so how do they know what is globally accepted? Not to mention that the article was inpolite towards Turks I visited it last time.
Another example. I worked hard to convice people there that Liszt was hungarian. Almost any source, any enciclopedia calls him a hungarian componist. Furthermore, the german wiki wrote that Liszt never considered himself Hungarian which is definately wrong. There are several letters where he does, even calling himself a Magyar - not Hungarian. After my interception they now state that he considered himself an hungarian while giving the impression that he didn't know what he's talking about. That's at least the way they argumented on the discussion page.

So no wiki for history. Maybe if you like to give statistics or something as they are cited. Wiki itself counts as not citable in scientific works.

Never mind, I was mistakenly thinking of the Yuezhi. The Saka were indeed Scythian peoples.

interesting - I wonder how far back they can trace genography. I suppose they are building it as they go.

Oh man, they'll go all the way back to when your ancestors left Africa. For me that was some 75,000 years ago. I'd recommend anyone who is interested in their own lineages to take the test. It's a life changing experience, in my opinion.

And yeah, they are building it as they go on. They're even going into the completely rural areas and taking samples from people who live in tribal societies or villages etc. Very cool stuff.

Also, I forgot to mention in my previous post that the Scythians (according to scholars) spoke an Eastern Iranian language. Modern Pashto is also classified as an Eastern Iranian language.

I know this is an old topic, but I saw it while browsing on Google and just had to reply.

I'm a Pashtun (or Pathan as the South Asians call us) by ancestry and I really do believe that Pashtuns have Scythian "blood" in them. Most scholars now suggest that Scythians were not a homogeneous group of people, but instead were a mix of several different nomadic peoples.

That's not particularly surprising. Steppe states usually rose and fell so easily because they didn't really have to exterminate each other -- the loser in a war would join the winner and the combined tribe would include people from a whole bunch of different "bloodlines". It would really be astounding if a steppe tribe had somehow kept itself unmixed.

I've had few time last time and see how horribly old this is only now... Uhhh...

Hi guys,

What people present day are the direct descendants of the Scythians, Sarmatians, Alans, Goths, Huns etc.?

So far, I've heard the Pathans of Afghanistan, and the Jatts of Punjab. Any other groups? Anyone ever heard of the Jatts?

Sorry if this discussion has already happend.

regards,

Only Alans have direct descendants, who retain their iranic language: these are Ossetians.
Goths, Scythians, Sarmatians, Huns etc are all extinct and it makes no sense to claim someone is their descendants.

Goths, Scythians, Sarmatians, Huns etc are all extinct and it makes no sense to claim someone is their descendants.

I would find it unlikely that they were that completely wiped out.

I would find it unlikely that they were that completely wiped out.
Why? They were all political organizations, not ethnic ones. Do you see a Hunnic Kingdom on the world map today?

I would find it unlikely that they were that completely wiped out.

Not wiped out, but desintegrated as political entities, and assimilated when it comes to ethnicity. There may be, of course, some genetic descendants of Scythians, but no direct ethnic or political ones.

Why? They were all political organizations, not ethnic ones. Do you see a Hunnic Kingdom on the world map today?

The Scythian tribes were not ethnically based? :confused:

Anyway, all this talk of Scythians reminds me of who the real descendants are:



You are millions. We are hordes and hordes and hordes.
Try and take us on!
Yes, we are Scythians! Yes, we are Asians -
With slanted and greedy eyes!

For you, the ages, for us a single hour.
We, like obedient slaves,
Held up a shield between two enemy races -
The Tatars and Europe!

For ages and ages your old furnace raged
And drowned out the roar of avalanches,
And Lisbon and Messina's fall
To you was but a monstrous fairy tale!

For hundreds of years you gazed at the East,
Storing up and melting down our jewels,
And, jeering, you merely counted the days
Until your cannons you could point at us!

The time is come. Trouble beats its wings -
And every day our grudges grow,
And the day will come when every trace
Of your Paestums may vanish!

O, old world! While you still survive,
While you still suffer your sweet torture,
Come to a halt, sage as Oedipus,
Before the ancient riddle of the Sphinx!..

Russia is a Sphinx. Rejoicing, grieving,
And drenched in black blood,
It gazes, gazes, gazes at you,
With hatred and with love!..

It has been ages since you've loved
As our blood still loves!
You have forgotten that there is a love
That can destroy and burn!

We love all- the heat of cold numbers,
The gift of divine visions,
We understand all- sharp Gallic sense
And gloomy Teutonic genius...

We remember all- the hell of Parisian streets,
And Venetian chills,
The distant aroma of lemon groves
And the smoky towers of Cologne...

We love the flesh - its flavor and its color,
And the stifling, mortal scent of flesh...
Is it our fault if your skeleton cracks
In our heavy, tender paws?

When pulling back on the reins
Of playful, high-spirited horses,
It is our custom to break their heavy backs
And tame the stubborn slave girls...

Come to us! Leave the horrors of war,
And come to our peaceful embrace!
Before it's too late - sheathe your old sword,
Comrades! We shall be brothers!

But if not - we have nothing to lose,
And we are not above treachery!
For ages and ages you will be cursed
By your sickly, belated offspring!

Throughout the woods and thickets
In front of pretty Europe
We will spread out! We'll turn to you
With our Asian muzzles.

Come everyone, come to the Urals!
We're clearing a battlefield there
Between steel machines breathing integrals
And the wild Tatar Horde!

But we are no longer your shield,
Henceforth we'll not do battle!
As mortal battles rages we'll watch
With our narrow eyes!

We will not lift a finger when the cruel Huns
Rummage the pockets of corpses,
Burn cities, drive cattle into churches,
And roast the meat of our white brothers!..

Come to your senses for the last time, old world!
Our barbaric lyre is calling you
One final time, to a joyous brotherly feast
To a brotherly feast of labor and of peace!

The Scythian tribes were not ethnically based? :confused:
Why would they have been?

Why would they have been?

Well its not like the Huns, who clearly had a leadership different from their troop bodies. The Scythians presumably lived in the same area for at least a thousand years.

Well its not like the Huns, who clearly had a leadership different from their troop bodies. The Scythians presumably lived in the same area for at least a thousand years.
"The Scythians" is such a horrendously imprecise term that it makes it hard to tell what you're talking about. There are three possibilities:

An individual political group of some kind, associated with Herodotean Skythoi
An ethnic construct transcending tribal structure to encompass all groups who presumably spoke one Scythian language
The subset of pastoralist groups referred to by various Greek authors as Skythoi

If you are talking about 1), then "it depends"; while individual pastoralist groups on a very small scale may have had some kind of ethnic connection with one another, virtually all of the individual groups that we see as military protagonists were not ethnically/linguistically unified, from the Sakarauka to the Issedones to other, further afield groups such as the Manju or the Mongols or the Huns. And even then, I would not be too sure about alleging ethnic ties too much. Because while individual families might have lived vaguely in the same-ish area for a very long time, individual tribes or other political groups rarely existed for any appreciable length of time, frequently breaking up and re-coalescing around different figures in different configurations.

If you are talking about 2), then of course an ethnic construct like "the Scythians" is an ethnic construct. (Although I have no idea to what it would refer.) It doesn't refer to anything particularly useful, if it refers to anything at all, of course, but it's there.

If you are talking about 3), then it is not an ethnic construct; for instance, Saka and Saurometai groups were both lumped in by Greek authors as "Skythoi", and Greek authors themselves acknowledged this. Literary pretensions after the Hellenistic period led ethnographers and historians to continue using the term "Scythians" for people who liked riding horses up to the Mongols and beyond. But you know this.

When he said

it makes no sense to claim someone is their descendants.

I took that to mean that he was saying that there aren't people descended from Scythians, et al. I wasn't claiming that there are recognizable successor states to these groups, but there are individuals who had them for ancestors - and those individuals may be concentrated in certain regions.

When he said



I took that to mean that he was saying that there aren't people descended from Scythians, et al. I wasn't claiming that there are recognizable successor states to these groups, but there are individuals who had them for ancestors - and those individuals may be concentrated in certain regions.

my post clearly doesn't say they have no descendants, but that it makes no sense to claim someone is their descendant, because - apart from genetics - they have nothing in common with them, politically, culturally etc.

Why "apart from genetics"? Isn't all that matters when talking about descendants?

Whatever.

Why "apart from genetics"? Isn't all that matters when talking about descendants?

Whatever.

If genetics was what mattered, then the only people that mattered would be the indigenous paleolithic poples. That's the vast majority of the gene pool in all populations.

I agree with Dachs. It sounds a lot like trying to figure out who the Keltos (Celts) were.