Looking for a good book about the scythians...

[Folkert van Wijk]

I am gooing to cross the russian steppe by train so I would like something in style to read and study for more or less 3 weeks...
Because of my celtic interrest BC the Scythians (Maybe I would like to reenact them in the future) would be the clossesed thing, but other eastern steppe horse riding cultures would do also...

[Paullus Scipio]

I can only speak of English lamguage publications, but the following are good, though not all are in print ( you might have to scour Amazon and various second-hand book sites...)

'The Scythians 700-300 B.C' -Dr E.V Cernenko and Dr M.V. Gorelik -OSPREY
...a short book like all Ospreys but a good accurate introduction, especially to military aspects

'The World of the Scythians' Renate Rolle Batsford 1989 (translated from German: Die Welt der Skythen - Verlag C.J. Bucher 1980)) - a good general History

'The First Horsemen' Time-Life International ( nederland B.V.) - another general history - lavish colour photos, good maps

'The Royal Hordes' E.d. Phillips Thames and Hudson 1965 - another general history, well illustrated

'Scythians and Greeks' E.H. Minns 1913 - describes the fascinating interaction between Scythians and Greeks around the Black sea

'Iranians and Greeks in South Russia' M. Rostovtzev, Oxford 1922 - somewhat old now, but an often used source book

and of course, for a detailed look at the fabulous Pazyryk tomb burials,

'Frozen Tombs of Siberia' S. Rudenko J.M. Dent and sons London 1970, translated from Russian Kultura Naseliniya Gornogo Altaya v Skrifsko Vremya U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences Moscow/Leningrad 1953

There are more but several of these should give you some good reading to whet your apetite.....

[hoplite14gr]

Check Krasnodar Museum if it is in your way.

Kind regards

[vergilius]

Wauw!! do you have to do this for your job or is it a holliday?
be sure to wear warm clothes !!

[Senovara]

'The Scythians 700-300 B.C' -Dr E.V Cernenko and Dr M.V. Gorelik -OSPREY
...a short book like all Ospreys but a good accurate introduction, especially to military aspects

I have this book, and as Paul states, a very good introduction to Scythian military! There are also some very nice illustrations.

[Folkert van Wijk]

I can only speak of English lamguage publications, but the following are good, though not all are in print ( you might have to scour Amazon and various second-hand book sites...)

'The Scythians 700-300 B.C' -Dr E.V Cernenko and Dr M.V. Gorelik -OSPREY
...a short book like all Ospreys but a good accurate introduction, especially to military aspects

'The World of the Scythians' Renate Rolle Batsford 1989 (translated from German: Die Welt der Skythen - Verlag C.J. Bucher 1980)) - a good general History

'The First Horsemen' Time-Life International ( nederland B.V.) - another general history - lavish colour photos, good maps

'The Royal Hordes' E.d. Phillips Thames and Hudson 1965 - another general history, well illustrated

'Scythians and Greeks' E.H. Minns 1913 - describes the fascinating interaction between Scythians and Greeks around the Black sea

'Iranians and Greeks in South Russia' M. Rostovtzev, Oxford 1922 - somewhat old now, but an often used source book

and of course, for a detailed look at the fabulous Pazyryk tomb burials,

'Frozen Tombs of Siberia' S. Rudenko J.M. Dent and sons London 1970, translated from Russian Kultura Naseliniya Gornogo Altaya v Skrifsko Vremya U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences Moscow/Leningrad 1953

There are more but several of these should give you some good reading to whet your apetite.....

Thanks again Paullus1 this looks like a good list to chose from.
I all ready have the Time Life book, as a mather of fact I do have the whole serie. so that one allready got me interrested allong with the fact that there are some Scythian things found in Celtic graves I believe...

[bachmat66]

question - do you mean by Scythians the inhabitants of the great Eurasian steppe from the east to the west i.e. from China to the Carpathian Mountains and today's Pakistan in the south - time frame 7cBC to 3c BC?
I am asking this because the Osprey book on the Scythians concetrates on the western part of the Scythian world - the Black Sea steppes. There is notable absence of the eastern Sctyhians aka Saka in that book (when book on Pazyryk is exculusively about them) - but there is more about the Saka in the book by Mair and Mallory - 'The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West'(also on Yuezhi/Kushans, Tocharians, Parthians etc ), or 'The Mummies of Ãœrümchi' by Elizabeth Wayland Barber(very interesting chapters about textiles) or 'Warrior Women: An Archaeologist’s Search for History’s Hidden Heroines' by Jeannine Davis-Kimball (sort of feminist history of the steppe ) . Also a good book on the Saka is "The Golden Deer of Eurasia.' (got a copy via Amazon quite cheap)

Sarmatians - the most important in English is the Tadeusz Sulimirski's 'The Sarmatians' published in the 1970s, also 'Sarmatians' by prof Mariusz Mielczarek - with translating/editing help from Richard Brzezinski (very curcumscribed by the Osprey editors and their peculiar format).
also, famous Bernard S. Bachrach's 'A History of the Alans in the West, from their first appearance in the sources of classical antiquity through the early middle ages' - all good stroy telling
this book - DiCosmo's 'Ancient China and its Enemies' deals with the nomads from the eastern, Chinese, perspective, quite refreshing.

Huns - Otto J. Mänchen-Helfen's 'World of the Huns'. Also Nikonorov -Armies of Bactria (vo1 &2) has lots of info about the Yuezhi/Kushans...

Also the famous Russian ethnohistorian Lev Gumilov wrote two very interesting books on the Huns and early Turks or as he calls them Turkuts - I am not sure if they have been translated into any western European languages (I read them in Polish and Russian)
You could also take a copy of works by Herodotos, Tacitus and Pliny the Elder, and Ammianus Marcellinus .. by now your suitcase will be 50kg or more - you will need a sturdy team of horses to carry all that reading

[Folkert van Wijk]

The trip would be a holliday but unfortunatly with just a view stops (we can't just step out of the train when ever we like, because we have reservations on that train) so most likely no Krasnodar Museum only some time in Moskow, Ulanbatar and Bejing to go and visit a museum there, I quess they would have something Scythian there to?

Besides that we do go and live a couple of days with a nomad family somewhere in Mongolia.

Hi Dariusz,
Also thanks for your list, I think my reenactmet interrest wil be the western Scythians, but besides that, the great Eurasian steppe would be interresting to get the feel and idea while I'm there...

Afterwards I am going to be brainwasted anyway and can only think of bows, arrows and horses... :lol:

[caiusbeerquitius]

Hi!
There is a skyth group coming into being in munich at the moment.
6 members or so. i can establish contact, if you want.
There, what an incident - was a extremely good exhibition about the skyths which ended last week - sponsored by the Hypo Bank.
The exhibition was quite consummate and presented the latest results of skythian studies. The Catalogue will be a standard work for years to come.
Here´s a link to the exhibiton:
www.hypo-kunsthalle.de/newweb/skythen.html
www.dainst.de/index_7492_de.html

And here´s a link to the catalogue:
[url:3pqo1h6i]http://www.amazon.de/Zeichen-goldenen-Greifen-Wilfried-Menghin/dp/3791338552/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=gateway&qid=1201719172&sr=8-1[/url]

[jonwr]

If you are in Beijing and are interested in archery see if you can get to see this bowyer Yang Fuxi He makes an affordable copy of a Chinese bow.
Also got to throw in my 2 cents for 'The World of the Scythians' I think you will enjoy the read.
Jon R

[Robert Vermaat]

I am gooing to cross the russian steppe by train so I would like something in style to read and study for more or less 3 weeks...

Hiya Folkert!

Back from abroad and now gone already? :wink:

[Treveri Gaul]

http://szkita.lap.hu/

articles Hungarian and English language from Scithian/Szittya.