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The Sakas or Sacae were a population of Central Asian nomadic tribes speaking an eastern Iranian language.
Sakas (English form of Old Iranian Saka, nominative plural masculine case; ancient Greek S??a?, Sakai; Sanskrit ) resided in and migrated over the plains of Eurasia from Eastern Europe to Xinjiang Province, China, from the Old Persian Period to the Middle Persian Period when they were displaced by or integrated with Turkic language speakers during the Turkic migration.
In the Achaemenid Empire much of their range was made a satrapy, Saka (Old Iranian nominative singular masculine case), named after them.
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The Sakas or Sacae were a population of Central Asian nomadic tribes speaking an eastern Iranian language.
Name, language and background history
The Sakas (English form of Old Iranian Saka, nominative plural masculine case; ancient Greek S??a?, Sakai; Sanskrit ) resided in and migrated over the plains of Eurasia from Eastern Europe to Xinjiang Province, China, from the Old Persian Period to the Middle Persian Period when they were displaced by or integrated with Turkic language speakers during the Turkic migration.
In the Achaemenid Empire much of their range was made a satrapy, Saka (Old Iranian nominative singular masculine case), named after them. They also resided in other provinces of ancient Iran.
The ancient Greeks called the Sakas the Scythians but recognized that in the language of the Persian Empire they were called more nearly Sakai. To them the name Sakai in addition to meaning all the Scyths meant explicitly also the ones of Central Asia and the Far East. These latter lived in what is now Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, parts of India, parts of Iran, the Altay Mountains, Siberia in Russia, and Xinjiang Province of China in the centuries before 300 AD, the start of the Middle Persian period. Hence the Romans recognized both Saceans (Sacae) and Scyths (Scythae). Stephanus of Byzantium referred to the Sakas in Ethnica as Saka sena, or Sakaraucae. Isidorus of Charax used the term "Saka" in his work "Parthian stations".
The Scythians were recognized in ancient languages at either end of their range. They were known to the Chinese as the Sai (Chinese: ?, Old Sinitic *s?k). Chinese Imperial reports by General Ban Chao and the Greek history by Stephanus Byzantinus record how the Sakasena, originally Scythians, were pushed west and displaced by Asian tribes who themselves became known as Scythians as they inhabited the regions they conquered. On the west they were among the first Iranians to enter the Middle East. The Assyrians of the time of Esarhaddon record campaigning against a people they called in the Akkadian the Ashkuza or Ishhuza. Hugo Winckler was the first to associate them with the Scyths and the identification remains without serious question. They were closely associated with the Gimirrai, who were the Cimmerians known to the ancient Greeks. These Scythians were mainly interested in settling in the kingdom of Urartu, which later became Armenia. The district of Shacusen, Uti Province, reflects their name. In ancient Hebrew texts, the Ashkuz (Ashkenaz) are even considered to be a direct offshoot from the Gimirri (Gomer). The Scythians also extended into the Ukraine south of Kiev and into Thrace and Macedon. In recognition of the fact that these latter were different enough to merit a distinct name the Achaemenids created a separate satrapy for them, Skudra, though who used the term first, the Greeks or the Persians, remains unknown. The name appears in Elamitic as iš-ku-ud-ra and in Akkadian as is-ku-du-ru. Not all the Iranians living in the north were called Scythians, although they may have been considered that. The Issedones and Massagetae were generally north of the Black Sea somewhere.
There is no proof that in the Old Iranian period the Scythians spoke anything other than Old Iranian, despite the fact that they were assigned regional names. The linguistic picture is quite different in the Middle Iranian period, however. The only remnants of the Saka language come from Xinjiang, China, but the language there is widely divergent from the rest of Iranian and accordingly is called eastern or northeastern Iranian. It also is divided into two divergent dialects.
By the time of the Middle Iranian period, the Scyths had either dissimilated into peoples of other names, such as the Sarmatians, Alans and Roxolani, or had been displaced by or assimilated to the Huns.
Scythians and Sakas in classical sources
Modern historical accounts of the Indo-Scythian wars often assume that the Scythian protagonists were a single tribe called the Saka (Sakai or Sakas). But earlier Greek and Latin texts suggest that the term Scythians referred to a much more widespread grouping of Central Asian peoples.
To Herodotus (484-425 BC), the Sakai were the 'Amurgioi Skuthai' (i.e. Scythians from Ammyurgia). Strabo (Gaius Julius Caesar Strabo, 63 BC-AD 24 circa) suggests that the term Skuthais (Scythians) referred to the Sakai and several other tribes. Arrian (Lucius Flavius Arrianus 'Xenophon' , c AD 92-175), refers to the Sakai as Skuthon (a Scythian people) or the Skuthai (the Scythians) who inhabit Asia.
It is clear that the Greek and Latin scholars cited here believed, all Sakai were Scythians, but not all Scythians were Sakai. It seems likely that modern confusion about the identity of the Scythians is partly due to the Persians. According to Herodotus, the Persians called all Scythians by the name Sakas. Pliny the Elder (Gaius Plinius Secundus, AD 23–79) provides a more detailed explanation, stating that the Persians gave the name Sakai to the Scythian tribes: "nearest to them". This likely explains why the Scythians began to be called Sakai.
Another clue to the true identity of the Scythians is the widespread area in which classical scholars thought they lived. The ancient Greeks wrote that the homelands of the Scythian peoples included Central Asia east of the Caspian Sea, north of Hindukush/Karakoram and west of China extending as far as Siberia. This suggests Scythia was a generic term that was loosely applied to a vast area of Central Asia spanning numerous groups and diverse ethnicities.
Strabo defined all the Central Asian clans inhabiting the area east of the Caspian Sea as Scythian in culture. Diodorus (Diodorus Siculus, c90–30 BC) said that Mt Hemodos was the dividing line between Scythia and India, ancient Greek sources used a variety of names for this mountain, including Himaos, Imaos and Paropamisos but generally place it in the Himalayas.
Ptolemy (Claudius Ptolemaeus, c90-168) writes that Skuthia was not only "within the Imaos" (the Himalayas) and "beyond the Imaos" (north of the Himalayas), but also speaks of a separate "land of the Sakais" within Scythia. Both Solinus and Pliny report that the Ganges was one of the greatest rivers of India and has its source in the Scythian mountains.
When ancient texts refer to the Sakai living in the Mt. Hemodos area or the Himalayan region, they are also talking about a much wider area than the modern Himalayas. Greek texts refer to Mt. Hemodos as Kaukasos, the Caucasus, which is the Greek word for the entire Hindukush region. In the ancient Sanskrit/Pali texts, the Himalayas spanned the eastern and western oceans and so included the Hindukush and Karakoram ranges.
Ptolemy meanwhile says that the Scythian tribes living in the Hindukush ranges were only at the southern fringe of the Scythian world. By this definition, the Parama Kambojas tribe who lived in the far off Transoxiana territory as distant as the Fargana and Zeravshan valleys were also Scythians.
With Scythia covering such a wide area, it is no wonder classical scholars like Strabo and the Historiae Philippicae writings of 1st century BC Roman historian Pompeius Trogus (Gnaeus Pompeius Trogus), classified any "Asian" (Osian) and Kambojan clans connected with horse culture as Scythic races.
Strabo’s evidence
According to the Greek chronicler Strabo, Bactria was taken by nomads like "the Asioi and the Pasianoi, and the Tacharoi and the Sakaraukai, who originally came from the other side of the Iaxartou [River] (Syr Darya) that adjoins that of the Sakai and the Sogdoanou and was occupied by the Saki."
The Prologus XLI of Historiae Philippicae also refers to the Scythian invasion of the Greek kingdom of Bactria and Sogdia—the invaders are described as "Sarauceans" (Saraucae) and "Asians" (Asiani). The Sarauceans are Sacarauls and "Asians" are the Asians (Asioi) of Strabo. These references conceal the information that after being turned out from Issyk-Kul lake and in their movements to Bactria via Sogdiana and Fargana, under pressure from the Da Yuezhih, the Issyk-kul Sakas (Sakaraulois) had been joined on the way by sections of other Scythian tribes of the intervening regions during their southerly or south-westerly movements to Bactria. The term Asio (or Asii) obviously refers to horse Peopleand undoubtedly refers to the Kambojas of the Parama Kamboja domain whose Aswas or horses too have been glorified by Mahabharata as being of excellent quality. In fact, Asio, Asi/Asii, Asva/Aswa, Ari-aspi, Aspasios, Aspasii (or Hippasii) are variant names the Classical writers have given to the horse-clans of the Kambojas of Scythian domain. These terms are most likely derived from the Old-Persian words for horse, "asa" and "aspa." The Tokharios are assumed by some scholars to be Rishikas. But the Rishikas were a closely affiliated to the Parama-Kambojas as per Mahabharata evidence. Similarly, the Pasianois were another Scythian tribe from Central Asia. Saraucae or Sakarauloi obviously refers to the Saka proper from Issyk-kul Lake. Some scholars tend to link the Rishikas with Tukharas and later with the Ta Yue-chis themselves. If one accepts this connection, then the Tukharas (
> Rishikas > Yue-chihs) had controlled the eastern parts of Bactria country (Ta-hia) while the combined forces of the Sakarauloi, 'Asio' (horse people = Parama Kambojas) and the 'Pasinoi' of Strabo etc had occupied its western parts after being displaced from the original home in Fargana/Alai valley by the Ta-Yuechis. As stated earlier, Ta-hia is taken to mean Tukhara/Tokhara which also included Badakshan, Chitral, Kafirstan and Wakhan which are said to have formed eastern parts of Bactria According to other scholars, it were the Saka hordes alone who had put an end to the Greek kingdom of Bactria.
Location of the Sakas
It is proven that in the 3rd century AD the Sacae had their own kingdom in Khotan. Therefore the Sacaes are sometimes called Khotan-Sacae Because of the Huns who had pushed the Kushans out from their territory, the Sacae had to flee to south where they migrated in Sistan. The Sakas had at least three major settlements, Saka Haumavarka, Saka Tigrakhauda and Saka Taradarya, according to inscriptions left by King Achaemenid Darius I (522-486 BC) in the city of Hamadan and his royal seat of Perspolis. However, scholars think these three settlements may be merely remnants of a much greater civilization left by the waves of Scythian migrations back to the middle of the 8th century BC.
The Darian inscriptions say that the Sakas Haumavarka lived "beyond Sogdiana" (para-Sugudam) which ,when seen from Perspolis, seems to point to Tashkant, Fargana, Kashgar and nearby regions. The Sakas Tigrakhauda lived near the Arals in the lower valleys of the Jaxartes as well as the plains north of the Jaxartes. The third Sakas settlement,Sakas Taradarya, was located north of the Black Sea in the Russian Steppes.
There are also references to the Saka Haumavarka in ancient Indian texts. It seems likely that it was these Sakas Haumavarka and other allied tribes such as the Lohas, Parama Kambojas, Rishikas, etc that lived in, and north of the Pamir mountains as far as Kashgar, Fargana and Issyk-Kul Lake, that entered into conflict with the Da Yuezhi or Great Yuezhi and migrated into northern India. According to the evidence furnished by Mahabharata, the Transoxian Pamir mountains and regions to the north as far as Fargana were known as the lands of the allied Lohas, Parama Kambojas, Rishikas, etc tribes. All these peoples living in the Scythia of the classical writers or the Shakadvipa of Indian texts, were lumped together and given the general name Sacae by Greeks and Sakas by the Iranians. They were known as Shakas in Indian texts.
Origins
The Scythian language is considered by mainstream historians and linguists as one of the Iranian languages.
The Saka speakers were gradually conquered and acculturated by the Turkic expansion to Central Asia beginning in the 4th century.
Ashkanian is the dynasty name of the Parthian empire and sources indicate that the Parthian revolt against Greek dominance over Persia started in the Semnan region.
Ashkanian means "Sakan people" or "Saka descendants". An Arab source names Sagsar as the place from which Ashkanians originated.
Sagsar, or according to varies sources, "Saka sar" or "Sagasar", is now modern Sangsar, a city in the mountainous region of Semnan Province, in the north of Iran.
Semnan is also derived from Sakestan, which during the Parthian empire was one of the largest provinces connecting the northern Alborz mountains to eastern Iran bordering the Kushan empire, now Pakistan and Afghanistan. Moreover, many of the legends recorded in the national Persian epic, Shahnameh are believed to be a mixture of Persian, Sogdian and Saka legends. Sagsar and Semnan are mentioned in Firdosi's Shahnameh, particularly honoring the brave people of Sagsar and their courageous uprising against injustice. Sangsaris are still famous for being a sensitive people, proud of their culture and language, one of oldest and best preserved of ancient Iranian languages.
The most notable Saka burial to date, whose occupant is referred to as the "Golden Man", was found in Kazakhstan. The silver dish found with the "Golden Man" is of a type common to other Germanic finds and is inscribed with a form of runic writing related to that found in Germanic and Scandinavian runic writing. See Issyk Kurgan.
Archeological evidence and histographies shows a worldview of Sakas, similar to that of ancient German and Scandinavian traditions and closely related to that of present-day Kazakhs and Mongols. It is theorized that they believed Man was a part of the Universe, Cosmos, Heaven, Sun, mountains, river, in total nature, and shows close affinities with Shamanism and Tengriism which are still practiced today, from Kazakhstan to Siberia which conceive of God as related to Cosmic laws and forces. However, modern Kazakhs are Muslim, most modern Mongols are Buddhists, and Siberian Shamanism is not known to be directly connected to Indo-European religion. However, many cultures have changed religious practices over the period of millennia.
Indo-Scythians
The Sakas were also one of several tribes that conquered India from the northwest, where they established the rule of the Indo-Scythians. The Saka Era is used by the Indian national calendar, a few other Hindu calendars, and the Cambodian Buddhist calendar—its year zero begins near the vernal equinox of 78. See Kushan Empire article for more complex description of Kushan-Scythian dating.
There has been no strong genetic link discovered between the Kazakhs and peoples of India; however, the marker R1a1 accounts for more than 50% of Altay, Kyrgyz, Slavic and NW Indian/Pakistani males.
It is likely that by about 600 BC, Central Asia was occupied by a number of ethnic groups, all nomadic equestrians sharing simple cultural traits.
Parama Kambojas and Saka connection
According to scholars, term Kamboja may be explained as Kam+boja. Boja is the Iranian equivalent of the Sanskrit Bhoja which means Lord or King or Master. Thus, Kambojas may be explained as Lords or Masters or Rulers of Kam country.
The root Kam implying place or region is reflected in the Kama valley, a region lying between the Khyber Pass and Jalalabad. It is also reflected in the place names Kama-daka, Kamma-Shilman, Kama-bela of Kabol; in the Kamdesh or Kambrom, Kamich, Kama and Kamu & Kamatol of the Kunar and Bashgul valleys. It is further reflected in the vast expanses of the region called Kazal-kam and Kara-kam lying on either side of the Oxus north of Hindukush in parts of Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. There is also a river named Kama in the Russian Steppes. Kambah is also said to be name of an ancient town some destinations north-west of Samarkhand in Uzbekistan.
The Ptolemian term Kamoi also refers to a people of the region falling in the Oxus/Jaxartes doab. According to Seth, it seems highly likely that the ancient Kambojas had their habitats in the doab of the river Vamksu (Oxus) and Syr (Jaxartes) (ancient Suguda) and beyond in the hilly regions of Syr. The territory is watered by numerous tributaries of the Oxus and Jaxartes and was referred to as Komdei by Ptolemy. Roman historian Ammianus Marcellinus (325 AD-330 AD) labelled the mountainous region of Suguda as Komedas.
These names seem to point towards 'Komdesh' (Kambojdesh ?) which was the original home of the Kambojas. Ptolemy has also stated that there is a tribe variously called Komroi, Komedei or Komoi which occupies the highlands of Bactriaa and Sogdiana countries.
Al-Maqidisi in his book Al-Muqhni calls the people of this territory Kumiji a name that apparently points to the Sanskrit Kamboja. The Komdei of Ptolemy has been identified with the Kiumito of Hiun Tsang. Scholars have identified this Kiumito as the habitat of Iranian Kambojas. The Kumuda-dvipa of the Puranas is said to lie to north of Pamirs in the Tartary region and is equivalent to the Komdei of Ptolemy and the Kumadas of Ammianus Marcellinus.
The fifth century Sanskrit poet Kalidasa attests that the Hunas and Kambojas lived as neighbors in their respective west and east Oxus valleys. Rajatarangini of Kalhana also refers to Tukharas and Kambojas living respectively in the west and east Oxus valleys, during the 8th century AD.
Scholars believe that the Kiumito of Hiun Tsang is same as the Kamboja of Raghuvamsa and of Rajatarangini and represents the Iranian section of the Kambojas. The Kumuda or Kumuda-dvipa of Indian texts and the Komdei of Ptolemy lay in the Shaka-dvipa per Mahabharata and Puranic texts. Komdei apparently refers to the region which has been called Parama Kamboja in Mahabharata. This was the region where the Rishikas, Parama Kambojas, Lohas and other allied people dwelt.
Needless to say that all these people including the Parama Kambojas were Scythians by culture for obvious reasons. Writing on the Rishikas, V. S. Aggarwala observes: "The name Rishika occurs in Mahabharata as a part of 'Shakadvipa'. Arjuna had conquered Rishikas across the Vakshu (Oxus) which flowed through the Shaka country." As the Parama Kambojas, Lohas and the Rishikas were all neighborly tribes and were allied in their fight against Arjuna, this strongly suggests that the Transoxian Lohas and Parama Kambojas were also located in Shakadvipa or Scythia.
Bailey lists several breeds of Kamboja horses and states that their haya- and javana- breeds ( 'swift horse') refer to the famous horses of the Farghana breed. Praja Bhata, a Kashmiri Sanskrit poet and author of the fourth Rajatarangini while writing about the history of Moghul dynasty in India, addresses emperor Babur as a Yavana king hailing from Kambhoja. Since Vabur (Babur) was native of Fargana (in Kyrgyzstan of Central Asia), this Indian reference seems to extend the Kamboja i.e the Parama Kamboja domain almost as far as to Fargana.
Thus the foregoing discussion sufficiently proves that the territory of the Parama Kambojas lay in a region beyond Imaos or Himalaya/Hindukush, the region that ancient Sanskrit texts such as Mahabharata labelled Shakadvipa and classical writers Strabo and Diodorus define as part of Scythia (see above). This allows the conclusion that the Parama Kambojas, the Rishikas and Lohas were Scythians.
According to Serge Thion: "It seems from some inscriptions that the Kambojas were a royal clan of the Sakas better known under the Greek name of Scyths" .
Sakas in Ancient Indian Literature
The Indo-Scythians were named "Shaka" in India, an extension on the name Saca used by the Persians to designate Scythians. Shakas receive numerous mentions in texts like the Puranas, the Manusmriti, the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, the Mahabhasya of Patanjali, the Brhat Samhita of Varaha Mihira, the Kavyamimamsa, the Brihat-Katha-Manjari, the Katha-Sarit Sagara and several other old texts. The Shakas are described as part of an amalgam of other war-like tribes from the northwest.
The founder of Buddhism, Shakyamuni Buddha, is recorded to have been a member of a tribe called Shakya or Sakiya. It is unknown whether this name indicates a relationship to the Sakas of later Indian history.
See also
Books and Articles
- Bailey, H. W. 1958. "Languages of the Saka." Handbuch der Orientalistik, I. Abt., 4. Bd., I. Absch., Leiden-Köln. 1958.
- Davis-Kimball, Jeannine. 2002. Warrior Women: An Archaeologist's Search for History's Hidden Heroines. Warner Books, New York. 1st Trade printing, 2003. ISBN 0-446-67983-6 (pbk).
- Bulletin of the Asia Institute: The Archaeology and Art of Central Asia. Studies From the Former Soviet Union. New Series. Edited by B. A. Litvinskii and Carol Altman Bromberg. Translation directed by Mary Fleming Zirin. Vol. 8, (1994), pp. 37-46.
- Hill, John E. 2004. The Western Regions according to the Hou Hanshu. Draft annotated English translation.
- Hill, John E. 2004. The Peoples of the West from the Weilue ?? by Yu Huan ??: A Third Century Chinese Account Composed between 239 and 265 CE. Draft annotated English translation.
- Lebedynsky, Iaroslav. (2006). Les Saces: Les <> d'Asie, VIIIe av. J.-C.-IVe sičcle apr. J.-C. Editions Errance, Paris. ISBN 2-87772-337-2 (in French).
- Pulleyblank, Edwin G. 1970. "The Wu-sun and Sakas and the Yüeh-chih Migration." Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 33 (1970), pp. 154-160.
- Puri, B. N. 1994. "The Sakas and Indo-Parthians." In: History of civilizations of Central Asia, Volume II. The development of sedentary and nomadic civilizations: 700 B.C. to A.D. 250. Harmatta, János, ed., 1994. Paris: UNESCO Publishing, pp. 191-207.
- Thomas, F. W. 1906. "Sakastana." Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (1906), pp. 181-216.
- Yu, Taishan. 1998. A Study of Saka History. Sino-Platonic Papers No. 80. July, 1998. Dept. of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Pennsylvania.
- Yu, Taishan. 2000. A Hypothesis about the Source of the Sai Tribes. Sino-Platonic Papers No. 106. September, 2000. Dept. of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Pennsylvania.
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