INTERNET ENCYCLOPEDIA OF UKRAINE FEATURES: THE IRON AGE IN UKRAINE: THE CIMMERIANS, SCYTHIANS AND SARMATIANS
The oldest known Iron-Age settlers in Ukraine were the nomadic Cimmerians who settled there around 10th century BC. In the 8th century BC, the territories of today's Ukraine came under the control of the Scythians, tribes of nomadic horsemen who founded an empire that stretched from the Danube River in the west to the Ural Mountains in the east. The Scythians were divided into several major tribal groups. Agrarian Scythian groups lived in what is now Poltava region and between the Boh River and the Dnieper River. The lower Boh River region near Olbia was inhabited by Hellenized Scythians, known as Callipidae; the central Dniester River region was home to the Alazones; and north of them were the Aroteres. The kingdom was dominated by the Royal Scythians, a small but bellicose minority in the lower Dnieper River region and the Crimea that had established a system of dynastic succession. The Scythians reached their apex in the 4th century BC under King Ateas, who united all the tribal factions under his rule. Subsequently they began a period of decline brought about by constant attacks by the Sarmatians. The Scythians were forced to abandon the steppe to their rivals and re-established themselves
in the 2nd century BC in Scythia Minor, with their capital in Neapolis in the Crimea. The onslaught of the Ostrogoths in the 3rd century AD and the Huns in the 4th century broke the power of the Scythians and Sarmatians, who subsequently disappeared as ethnic entities and assimilated into other cultures. They were largely forgotten, but interest in them was revived as a result of some spectacular finds of Scythian gold treasures in the burial mounds in Ukraine and the Kuban, starting from 1763...
Learn more about the times of the Scythians and Sarmatians on the Ukrainian territory by visiting: http://www.encyclopediaofukraine.com/featuredentry.asp or
