Sciri

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Author:Laxman Burdak, IFS (R)

Sciri were a Germanic people. They are believed to have spoken an East Germanic language. Their name probably means "the pure ones". Probably Sciri is derived from sanskrit word Kshira (क्षीर) (milk pudding). [1]

Variants

Jat clans

Name

  • Since the 19th century, the etymology of the Sciri name has been connected to such Germanic words as Gothic skeirs ("sheer", "pure"). [2] Rudolf Much, in the first edition of the Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde pointed out that this could be interpreted three ways: "bright" (clari, splendidi), "honest" (candidi, sinceri) or "pure" and "unmixed", and he mentioned that the latter racial implication might make sense for a people living near a borderland.[3] In more recent times scholars such as Herwig Wolfram have often accepted this latter idea, interpreting the name Sciri to mean "the pure ones", and contrasting their name with that of the neighboring Bastarnae, who were ethnically mixed according to this interpretation, and thus, according to this account, named "the bastards".[4]
  • Not all scholars have accepted this. Robert L. Reynolds and Robert S. Lopez, for example, suggested an Iranian etymology for Sciri, relating it to the Middle Persian shīr ("milk, lion").[5]
  • Probably Sciri is derived from sanskrit word Kshira (क्षीर) (milk pudding). [6]

History

The Sciri were mentioned already in the late 3rd century BC as participants in a raid on the city of Olbia near modern-day Odessa. In the late 4th century they lived somewhere north of the Black Sea and Lower Danube in the vicinity of the Goths. By the early 5th century, the Sciri had been subdued by the Huns, whom they fought under at the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains in 451 AD.

After the death of Attila, the Sciri broke free from Hunnic rule at the Battle of Nedao in 454 AD. They subsequently were recorded holding their own kingdom north of the Middle Danube, under the leadership of Edeko and his son Onoulphus. After the destruction of this kingdom by the Ostrogoths in the late 460s AD, Odoacer, another son of Edeko, attained high status within the Roman army in Italy, ruling Sciri, Rugii and other non-Roman peoples as a king. Odoacer eventually made himself King of Italy in 476 AD, effectively ending the Western Roman Empire.

Odoacer was in turn deposed and killed by Theodoric the Great in 493 AD. Along with the Rugii, Heruli and other Middle Danubian peoples, the Sciri might also have contributed to the formation of the Bavarii.

The Sciri under Hunnic rule

In the late 4th century AD, the Sciri were conquered by the Huns. [7] In 381 AD a force of Sciri, Carpi and some Huns crossed the lower Danube into the Roman Empire. They were forced back by the emperor Theodosius.[8]

Sometime in the late 4th or early 5th century, the Sciri are believed to have moved westwards into the Middle Danube region. Here they formed part of a polity established by the Hunnic leader Uldin.[9]In 409 AD the Sciri and Huns under Uldin crossed the Danube and invaded the Roman Balkans. They captured Castra Martis, but were eventually defeated and Uldin was killed.[10] While the Hunnic prisoners were drafted into the Roman army, captured Sciri were enslaved and sent as coloni to Anatolia.[11] The Sciri were a numerous people at this time, and the coloni were distributed over a widespread area in order to prevent them from revolting.[12] These events are described in the Codex Theodosianus.[13]

During the height of the Hunnic empire under their leader Attila, the Sciri were subjects of Attila and provided potent infantry for him. Attila's empire included not only Huns and Sciri, but also Goths, Gepids, Thuringi, Rugii, Suebi, Heruli, Alans and Sarmatians.[14] The Sciri participated in Attila's invasion of Gaul in 451 AD.[15]

As the Hunnic empire disintegrated, one group of Sciri were settled in the Roman empire in Scythia Minor and Lower Moesia south of the Lower Danube.[16][17] Jordanes mentions four tribes that remained loyal to the Huns under Dengizich: Ultzinzures, Bittugures, Bardores and Angisciri. The last might be a Scirian remnant.[18]The name Angisciri has been analyzed as Germanic for "grassland Sciri", but it may be an unrelated Turkic name since the other three names in the list are Turkic.[19]

Jat History

Hukum Singh Panwar (Pauria)[20] writes....We pick up certain words from the archaic and classical languages of Europe, which are "genetically the daughter dialects" of Sanskrit and prakrat languages of the Indo-Aryans. The words are, Sal or Saal (living room in Jatu and old High German, Anglo-Saxon, old Celtic and French), Sammel[21] (joint or shared in Jatu & OHG & A.S.) to milk is melk or ''miluh or miluk in OHG[22] and mel or melna in Jatu, gurh (jaggery) in OHG is gur in Jatu, Schiera of OHG[23] is Sheera of Jatu Kshir of Sanskrit is kheer in Jatu and Kyre (milk pudding) in OHGIbid. .

External links

References

  1. ↑ Hukum Singh Panwar (Pauria): The Jats:Their Origin, Antiquity and Migrations/The migrations of the Jats to the North-Western countries,p.266
  2. ↑ Schütte, Gudmund (1933). Our Forefathers. Vol. 2. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781107677234. p. 29.
  3. ↑ Hoops (ed.) RGA (1918-1919), "Skiren", Vol.4. which starts on page 191
  4. ↑ Wolfram, Herwig (2005). The Roman Empire and Its Germanic Peoples. University of California Press. ISBN 9780520244900. p. 4.
  5. ↑ Reynolds, Robert L.; Lopez, Robert S. (October 1946). "Odoacer: German or Hun?". The American Historical Review. American Historical Association. 52.p.42
  6. ↑ Hukum Singh Panwar (Pauria): The Jats:Their Origin, Antiquity and Migrations/The migrations of the Jats to the North-Western countries,p.266
  7. ↑ Heather, Peter (2007). The Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780195325416. p. 475.
  8. ↑ Heather 2010, p. 222.
  9. ↑ Heather 2010, pp. 174–176, 183, 187, 216.
  10. ↑ Heather 2010, pp. 174–176, 183, 187, 216.
  11. ↑ Heather 2010, pp. 174–176, 183, 187, 216.
  12. ↑ Maenchen-Helfen, Otto J. (1973). The World of the Huns: Studies in Their History and Culture. University of California Press. ISBN 9780520015968. pp. 65–66.
  13. ↑ Heather 2010, pp. 661–662.
  14. ↑ Heather 2010, p. 208, 235
  15. ↑ Goffart, Walter (2010). Barbarian Tides: The Migration Age and the Later Roman Empire. University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 978-0812200287. pp. 203–205.
  16. ↑ Heather 2010, p. 239.
  17. ↑ Jordanes (1908). The Origins and Deeds of the Goths. Translated by Mierow, Charles C. Princeton University Press. p. L (265).
  18. ↑ Reynolds, Robert L.; Lopez, Robert S. (October 1946). "Odoacer: German or Hun?". The American Historical Review. American Historical Association. 52 (1): 36–53. doi:10.2307/1845067. JSTOR 1845067. p. 41.
  19. ↑ Maenchen-Helfen 1973, p. 439.
  20. ↑ Hukum Singh Panwar (Pauria): The Jats:Their Origin, Antiquity and Migrations/The migrations of the Jats to the North-Western countries,p.266
  21. ↑ Collins Gem, German Eng. Die., 1991, p. 211.
  22. ↑ Chamb. Dic., op.cit., p. 572, Webs. Dic., op.cit., p.537.
  23. ↑ Asiatic Res. Vol.II, pp. 33-38.
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