before, were more learned. Then the people
were divided under ruling families. The Visigoths served
the family of the Balthi and the Ostrogoths served the
renowned Amali. They were the first race of men to 43
string the bow with cords, as Lucan, who is more of a
historian than a poet, affirms:

"They string Armenian bows with Getic cords."

[Sidenote: THE RIVER DON]

[Sidenote: THE DNIEPER]

In earliest times they sang of the deeds of their ancestors
in strains of song accompanied by the cithara; chanting
of Eterpamara, Hanala, Fritigern, Vidigoia and
others whose fame among them is great; such heroes as
admiring antiquity scarce proclaims its own to be. Then, 44
as the story goes, Vesosis waged a war disastrous to
himself against the Scythians, whom ancient tradition
asserts to have been the husbands of the Amazons. Concerning
these female warriors Orosius speaks in convincing
language. Thus we can clearly prove that Vesosis
then fought with the Goths, since we know surely that he
waged war with the husbands of the Amazons. They
dwelt at that time along a bend of Lake Maeotis, from
the river Borysthenes, which the natives call the Danaper,
to the stream of the Tanais. By the Tanais I mean the 45
river which flows down from the Rhipaeian mountains
and rushes with so swift a current that when the neighboring
streams or Lake Maeotis and the Bosphorus are
frozen fast, it is the only river that is kept warm by the
rugged mountains and is never solidified by the Scythian
cold. It is also famous as the boundary of Asia and
Europe. For the other Tanais is the one which rises in
the mountains of the Chrinni and flows into the Caspian
Sea. The Danaper begins in a great marsh and issues 46
from it as from its mother. It is sweet and fit to drink
as far as half-way down its course. It also produces fish
of a fine flavor and without bones, having only cartilage
as the frame-work of their bodies. But as it approaches
the Pontus it receives a little spring called Exampaeus,
so very bitter that although the river is navigable for the
length of a forty days' voyage, it is so altered by the
water of this scanty stream as to become tainted and
unlike itself, and flows thus tainted into the sea between
the Greek towns of Callipidae and Hypanis. At its mouth
there is an island named Achilles. Between these two
rivers is a vast land filled with forests and treacherous
swamps.

[Sidenote: DEFEAT OF VESOSI