А.М. Хазанов
Социальная история скифов.
Основные проблемы развития
древних кочевников евразийских степей.
// М.: ГРВЛ. 1975. 344 с.
[ аннотация: ]
В книге раскрывается социальная история скифского общества в сопоставлении с социальной историей других индоевропейских народов и древних кочевников Евразии. Исследуются общие закономерности возникновения и функционирования кочевых обществ, формирования в них классов и государства, взаимоотношения кочевников и земледельцев. Предлагается новая периодизация истории кочевничества в Евразии. Много внимания уделено исследованию общетеоретических проблем кочевничества и раннеклассовых обществ.
Содержание
Введение. Некоторые аспекты экологии номадизма в евразийских степях. — 5
Глава I. Источники и литература. — 15
Источники. — 15
История изучения социальной организации скифов. — 24
История изучения социальной организации кочевников евразийских степей и некоторые дискуссионные проблемы кочевниковедения. — 32
Глава II. Скифские этногонические легенды как исторический источник. — 36
Источники. — 36
Анализ. — 38
Выводы. — 53
Глава III. Семья и брак. — 55
Формы и численность семьи. — 55
Особенности семьи у кочевников евразийских степей. — 73
Брак. — 76
Положение женщин. — 83
Линейность, локальность и счёт родства. — 86
Вопрос о пережитках матрилинейности. — 88
Формы собственности и порядок наследования. — 91
Глава IV. Формы социальной организации. — 99
Низшие звенья социальной организации. — 99
Род. — 104
Высшие звенья социальной организации. — 111
Вопрос об общине. — 123
Социальная организация скифов и её место среди общественных структур евразийских кочевников . — 127
Глава V. Социальная стратификация и формы эксплуатации. — 131
Рабы. — 133
Категории зависимого населения. — 148
Рядовое свободное население. — 164
Жречество. — 168
Аристократия. — 179
Царский род. — 191
Выводы. — 200
Глава VI. Скифская государственность и её место среди государственных образований кочевников евразийских степей. — 203
Начальный период скифской истории. — 203
Скифы в Передней Азии. — 218
Скифия в VI-V вв. до н.э. — 225
Скифия в конце V-III в. до н.э. — 238
Скифия в последние века до нашей эры — первые века нашей эры. — 246
О характере государственных образований у кочевников евразийских степей. — 251
Заключение. Общее и особенное в историческом развитии кочевников евразийских степей и принципы периодизации их истории. — 264
Примечания. — 275
Библиография. — 285
Список условных сокращений. — 315
Предметный указатель. — 317
Именной указатель. — 322
Указатель географических и политических наименований. — 326
Указатель этнических наименований. — 329
Археологический указатель. — 332
Предисловие. ^
Предлагаемая вниманию читателя книга посвящена трём основным проблемам.
Как видно уже из её названия, по степени их важности для меня и соответственно по уделяемому им месту эти проблемы следующие:
1) социальная история и социальная организация скифов;
2) основные закономерности функционирования и развития обществ древних кочевников евразийских степей;
3) общее и особенное в социальной организации и истории кочевников евразийских степей в целом.
Кроме того, довольно много места уделено трансформации социальной организации общества с комплексной скотоводческо-земледельческой экономикой в связи с переходом к кочеванию — проблеме, для исследования которой только скифское общество представляет необходимый, хотя и недостаточный, материал.
Впрочем, скудость источниковедческой базы по древним кочевникам при работе над книгой ощущалась почти постоянно. Поэтому нередко приходилось прибегать к дедукции и к аналогиям. В.А. Гордлевский заметил однажды, что «аналогия, конечно, объясняет, облегчает понимание фактов, однако, как ни убедительна она, в ней исчезает осязательность» [Гордлевский, 1960, стр. 32]. Когда же фактов не хватает, возможности аналогий становятся ещё более ограниченными. И всё же иного выхода не было. Поэтому я стремился максимально широко использовать сравнительно-этнографический и исторический материал по кочевникам евразийских степей не только для того, чтобы выявить общие и специфические черты в их социальной организации и истории, но также чтобы с его помощью попытаться выяснить некоторые особенности скифского общества. В первом случае правомерность подобного подхода едва ли нуждается в особом обосновании, во втором — она во многом зависит от решения намеченных выше проблем. Более подробное обоснование конкретных параллелей и аналогий приводится в тексте. Хочу лишь сразу подчеркнуть, что по изложенным причинам некоторые выводы относительно скифского общества представляются гипотетическими мне самому.
К тому же надо учитывать, что скифы, сарматы и некоторые другие кочевники являлись иранцами, а хунну и более поздние номады — тюрками и монголами. Это, с одной стороны, побуждает к определенной осторожности в поисках аналогий, но с другой — облегчает выявление общих черт в кочевых обществах с разными этническими и культурными традициями.
Написанию этой книги предшествовала работа над некоторыми более частными проблемами номадизма в евразийских степях. Именно она утвердила меня в той мысли, что социальную организацию и историю скифов нельзя изучать в отрыве от социальной организации и истории остальных кочевников евразийских степей, а специфику кочевников средневековья и
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даже нового времени нельзя понять в полной мере без детального сравнения их с кочевниками древности. После этого оставалось самое трудное — найти время и написать книгу. Теперь она написана, и не мне судить о её недостатках и достоинствах. Feci, quod potui, faciant meliora potentes.
На мою же долю остается только приятный долг поблагодарить всех помогавших мне словом и делом, консультациями и советами, предоставлением неопубликованных материалов и полевых записей. Первая признательность— моей жене И.А. Хазановой, сделавшей всё, чтобы облегчить мне работу над этой книгой. Рукопись книги, полностью или частично, читали и сделали ряд полезных замечаний С.А. Арутюнов, Ю.Г. Виноградов, С.Г. Кляшторный, И.В. Куклина, А.М. Лесков, Е.М. Мелетинский, А.И. Мелюкова, Д.С. Раевский, Е.В. Черненко, М.А. Членов, А.И. Шкурко. Им я приношу особую благодарность. И конечно, я не могу не упомянуть всех своих коллег и товарищей по совместной работе в Секторе по изучению истории первобытного общества Института этнографии АН СССР, постоянной поддержке которых я обязан очень многим.
Но больше всего я признателен своему покойному учителю Борису Николаевичу Гракову. Он не только всегда щедро делился со мной своими огромными знаниями, оригинальными замыслами и идеями. Он учил меня большему — этике и эстетике научного исследования, необходимости искать собственные пути в науке и просто преданности любимому делу.
Summary. ^
Social history of Scythians. Main problems of development among ancient pastoral nomads of Eurasian steppes.
The main problems treated in the present monograph have been formulated in the preface. They are listed in order of their importance for the author and consequently of the space allotted to them: (1) Social history and social organization of the Scythians. (2) Main regularities of development and functioning in ancient pastoral nomadic societies of Eurasian steppes. (3) General view of the common and specific traits in social organization and social history of the nomads in Eurasian steppes.
In addition the study gives considerable space to the special problem of transformation within a society’s social structure when a combined pastoral — agricultural economy is affected by nomadization.
The preface looks at some aspects of pastoral nomadic ecology in Eurasian steppes. Pastoral nomadism is defined as a specific mode of subsistence in which extensive pastoralism predominates while most of the population is involved into periodic camp shifting. Five main varieties of pastoral nomadism are singled out: North African — Near Eastern, Subsaharan African, Eurasian, Tibetan and North Asian. The pastoral nomads studied in this work belong to a single variety — the Eurasian — taking up the territory of a zone of steppes, semi-deserts and deserts stretching from the Danube to Northern China. This variety is characterized by the predominance of the sheep in the composition of the herd, the presence of cattle, the use of the horse as the main saddle animal and of the horse and, until recently, of the ox as beasts of burden.
The introduction of pastoral nomadism to Eurasian steppes mainly concluding at the beginning of the 1st millenium B.C., is considered as a result of adaptation of the communities with producing economy in specific ecological niches caused by the simultaneous effect of various environmental, socio-economic and historical factors.
Departing from the character of pastoral roaming the
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author singles out five main types of pastoral nomadism in the investigated region which were on the one hand determined by the ecology of concrete areas and on the other connected with the social processes taking place in the nomadic societies. Three features are specially noted: the species and proportional composition of the herd underwent little change with time; the singled out types of pastoral roaming existed not only in modern times and in the Middle Ages but also in antiquity; finally, sedentarization and nomadization were two reversible and contrary processes occurring in Eurasian steppes throughout nomadic history.
Chapter I is devoted to an analysis of the sources and to historiographic questions. The selection of the sources was guided by the three-fold aim of the study. In relation to the Scythian society all kinds of available material were utilized, first of all the written and archeological data followed by linguistics, numismatics, etc.; as to other ancient nomads the data of the classical and Chinese written traditions and to a smaller extent that of archeology have been drawn upon. In the case of the Middle Ages and modern times — chronicles, travel literature and other documents alongside ethnographic material, heroic epics and contemporary historico-ethnological studies.
The work traces the history of research in the field of Scythian and other Eurasian pastoral nomads and comes to the conclusion that problems connected with their social history and social organization as in all other cases of nomadic pastoralism remain unresolved in both Soviet and foreign special literature.
Chapter II deals with the use of the Scythian ethnogonic legend as an historical source. The opinion is supported that this legend has come down in three versions, out of which two — the «Scythian» and the «Hellenic» — were recorded by Herodotus (Her., IV, 5-7 and IV, 8-10) and one by Diodorus (Diod., II, 43). The version of Diodorus in the earliest for it retains the echo of the struggle surrounding the assertion of the Scythians in Eastern Europe and the creation of the Scythian body politic. The recension of the «Scythian» version of Herodotus took place later, after the creation of the Scythian kingdom dominated by the tribe of the royal Scythians. This version’s main tendencies were the insistence on the common descent of all the Scythians, the divine sanction of all Scythia’s social rules and the support of the belief in the voluntary acceptance of the dominant position enjoyed by the royal Scythians and their dynasty.
The «Hellenic» version of Herodotus reflects the hegemonical ambitions of the Scythians towards the neighbouring non-Scythian peoples. It could either be the latest or just present
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a part of the legend reaching Herodotus in an incomplete and disintegrated state.
Chapter III is devoted to family and marriage among the Scythians in comparison with other pastoral nomads of Eurasian steppes. Archeological data is called upon in an attempt to establish the main types and the size of the Scythian family because written sources alone cannot provide us with a full answer. The conclusion is made that while the nomadic Scythians at the early stage of their history experienced a certain spread of nuclear, polygynic or smaller extended families, later in the wake of developing sedentarization the size of the families inceased and extended families possibly started to predominate.
The study supports the view that in all pastoral nomadic societies of Eurasian steppes nuclear and polygynic families coexisted with extended families while those last did not constitute a majority. Predominance of numerically small nomadic families is explained by the specific nature of the nomads’ economy.
The little we know about Scythian marital norms consists of monogamy for women while tolerating polygyny.
The sources leave the impression of a somewhat lowly position of the woman in Scythian society particularly in comparison with the apparently matrilineal Sauromatians. However, if we take the whole data on the pastoral nomads it rejects any exact correlation between the woman’s position in a given society and its lineality.
The chapter also analyses material on lineality, locality and kinship system in Scythian society. Levirate receives most attention among familial and marital customs. Facts are cited to witness its spread among practically all Eurasian nomads and an explanation is offered of this phenomenon.
It is noted that cattle and other movable property among Scythians and all other pastoral nomads always formed a part of private-familial and individual possessions. The study tends to underline that institution of private property in cattle not only preceded development of nomadic pastoralism but served as one of its preconditions. In addition, the chapter investigates order of inheritance and succession among Scythians and other nomads. In this connection the custom of minorate, widespread among most Eurasian pastoral nomads possibly including Scythians, comes under scrutiny.
Chapter IV is devoted to reconstructing main forms of social organization in Scythian society. By the middle of the 5th c. B.C. the Scythian kingdom consisted of three βασιληίαι. One of these, headed by the supreme ruler of all Scythia, was the largest. It is possible that βασιληίαι sometimes included provinces ἀρχαί which originally seem to have been tribal
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alliances or groupings consisting of separate νομοί which, in their turn, had a tribal basis. It cannot be ruled out that ἀρχαί were no obligatory intermediate stage between βασιληίαι and νομοί. Tribes, at least among nomadic Scythians, consisted of clans and their various subdivisions which had a multitied structure. These last in their turn consisted of kinship groups apparently placed at different taxonomic levels. Further development of Scythians’ social organization is also considered as well as the problem of communal ties among them.
On the whole Scythian social organization has three characteristic features.
Firstly, it had at its base the clans and tribal connections supported by the fictitious principles of genealogical kinship. Secondly, the clans and tribal structure of Scythian society was characteristically subdivided at all its levels. Thirdly, this sort of Scythian social structure had another role as the foundation of the military organization.
The social organization of Scythian society considerably differed from the contemporaneous social organization of sedentary Iranian peoples while forms of the social organization among all Eurasian pastoral nomads in antiquity and Middle Ages demonstrate pronounced similarities. These forms are predominantly based of clan and tribal foundations while territorial ties which start developing only in cases of overrun agricultural regions or sedentarization processes. The study notes that we cannot fully oppose to each other tribal and territorial principles of social organization. Among nomads territorial connections usually do not come out as such but are cushioned by clan and tribal ones. In conclusion the chapter considers reasons determining the persistence of tribal organization among nomads.
Chapter V is devoted to social stratification and forms of exploitation existing in Scythian society. The lowest rung of Scythia’s hierarchical ladder was occupied by slaves. However, they did not play any major role in production. The monograph also analyses data on slavery among other Eurasian nomads, coming to the conclusion that forms of slave exploitation among nomads are always fairly uniform: first of all selling them on external markets or freeing for a ransom, to a lesser degree using them in domestic service, mainly aristocratic, and mostly in domestic economy. The main reason of this phenomenon consists in pastoral nomadic economy’s specific nature — it does not require any great number of working hands. Requirements in extra labour were easily covered by internal resources.
Higher than slaves were placed various categories of dependent population. Of these we can trace in Scythian
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society the stratum of impoverished nomads who had lost any means of conducting their own husbandry and working for their rich compatriots or else settling on the land, ϑεράποντες — perhaps servants of Scythian aristocracy whose social position is not fully clear and lastly tributaries.
As a tributary condition we understand a variety of collective dependence consisting in surrendering some of their produce and fulfilling other obligations by dependent groups for the benefit of the conqueror without being integrated into his socioeconomic structure. An analysis of concrete material conducted in the monograph suggests that tributary dependence (mainly of villagers and townspeople) was the leading form of dependence in Scythian as well as other nomadic state formations of Eurasian steppes in antiquity and medieval times. At the same time the widely spreading tributary condition became a conservating factor of primitive early class relationships among nomads, for it meant the prevalence of external exploitation over internal.
The bulk of the free population of nomadic Scythians came even higher forming a special estate with a certain differentiation within itself.
The privileged estate was represented by priesthood whose existence among Scythians and many other nomadic peoples is argued in the monograph. Aristocracy was another privileged estate consisting of clan and tribal nobles, blood aristocracy of its kind, and serving nobles whose social position depended from their closeness to the king, their status in the administrative apparatus, etc. Representatives of tribal aristocracy also differed in their degree of nobility and the size of the structural subdivisions of Scythian society placed under their control.
At the top of social hierarchy Scythians had their royal clan standing out against all other strata both privileged and dependent. According to available sources royal power descended from father to son. This puts Scythians apart from most other nomads who had no firmly fixed rules of succession. However, Scythians like other nomads considered supreme power as belonging to the whole ruling clan, from this stemmed the principle of power-sharing entitling every member of the ruling clan to administer a certain nomadic group with a certain grazing area and a part of conquered agricultural territory.
On the whole Scythian society was very similar to other pastoral nomadic societies of antiquity and Middle Ages in Eurasian steppes. It was far removed from the model of the estates reconstructed by G. Dumézil for the time of Indo-European community. However, this traditional model seemed to persist in Scythians’ ideological sphere.
Chapter VI is devoted to the history of Scythian statehood
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and its place among nomadic state formations in Eurasian steppes. The author argues that Scythians appeared in Eastern Europe no later than 1st half of 8th. c. B.C. and originally conquered pre-Caucasian and lower Don areas. That is where Scythians formed an alliance after which in the 2nd half of 8th c. they conquered lands North of the Black Sea partly ousting and partly incorporating into their alliance Cymmerians who used to dwell in the region. This Scythian alliance of 8th — turn of 7th cc. was predominantly nomadic in its composition and had not yet reached state level.
Their first state, the First Scythian Kingdom, rose among Scythians penetrating in 7th c. B.C. from territories North of the Black Sea into the Near East. It was dominated by interethnic forms of dependency based on subjugation of agricultural population in Eastern Transcaucasia, plunder and levied contributions (as far as Syria and Egypt for some periods), regular tribute (Midia), tribute disguised as gifts (Egypt), possibly also payments for military support (Assyria).
After being defeated and driven from the Near East, Scythians had to reconquer lands North of the Black Sea in the 1st half of 6th c. B.C. In the 2nd half of that century Scythians succeeded in dominating the agricultural tribes of the Forest-Steppe and to place them under tribute. As a result their state was reconstructed with the appearance of the Second Scythian Kingdom which reached its zenith in the 4th c. B.C.
The main features of Scythia’s social development at the end of the 5th c. and in the 4th c. B.C. were the involvement of its privileged stratum into trade with Greeks and the efforts to control this trade as well as other phenomena partly stemming from these two: aggressive external policy, intensified exploitation of dependent population, progressing stratification among nomads. Trading with Greeks stimulated also sedenterization processes.
The fall of the Second Scythian Kingdom came about in the 2nd half of the 3rd c. B.C. under the onslaught of Celts and Thraceans from the West and Sarmatians from the East. Scythia’s later history is mainly dominated by sedentary agrarian and city elements. As a result of the defeats suffered by Scythians there were formed two separate states, two Lesser Scythias, one in Dobrudja and the other in the Crimea and the Lower Dnieper area. In the first state former nomads, more exactly their nobility, retained their power over the agrarian population abandoning at the same time their nomadic way of life. In the second (the Third Scythian Kingdom) one can note a massive sedentarization. Interethnic dependence was replaced by developing forms of dependence within society itself. Enmity of the Third Scythian Kingdom towards Greek
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settlements of the Northern Black Sea coast grew worse while it regarded them as unnecessary intermediaries in its wheat trade. Besides, settling nomads were attracted by their agricultural belt. However, later Scythia was both culturally and socioeconomically far less advanced than its Greek neighbours. It was no coincidence that Scythia was the first state North of the Black Sea to collapse as a result of the beginning Great Migration of peoples.
The given chapter also deals with problems of the rise and nature of statehood among nomads of Eurasian steppes. A whole number of socio-economic factors including limited possibilities and instability common to nomadic extensive pastoralism, lack of any sphere of intensive labour, absence of private property on land and pasture, all these slowed down class formation and made indispensable certain forms of mutual help and cooperation, among them a politico-military organization based on a clan and tribal structure. For these reasons statehood rarely arose on a purely nomadic foundation and was characteristically short-lived. As a rule nomadic states appeared in the process of conquering agrarian-urban societies. These conquests were facilitated by a number of circumstances considered in the monograph.
States arising as a result of agrarian societies being conquered by nomads can be tentatively divided into two types. The first were based on tributary relationships while interaction between nomads and agrarian population was mainly taking part in the sphere of politics (the First and the Second Scythian Kingdoms, the Hunnu state, the Khazar Kaganate, the Golden Horde, etc.). Two variaties of further development can be traced for such states. In the first, their existence ends with the secession of agricultural areas. This throws nomads far back in their social development (e.g. European Hunnu, much later Kazakhs and Turkmen). In the second case sedentarization became predominant among nomads resulting in a transformation of their society (the Third Scythian Kingdom, the Uighur state).
The second type of state created by nomads is characterized by integration of peasants and nomads within the framework of a single socio-economic structure. A synthesis was taking place between social relationships common to the conquerors and more developed relationships of the conquered. The nomadic ruling stratum in such states quickly turned into the ruling class of settled population or else merged with its predecessor. The rest of nomads could still retain special status as supplier of military contingents, pillar of the dynasty, etc., but its social position grew worse. Although this type of state owed its existence to nomads, the nature of their dominant socio-economic relationships was now determined by
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the level attained in agrarian regions (Parthia, the Kushan state, Empires of Seljuks, Osmans and Khulagides, etc.).
As a result of conducted analysis we can affirm that formative conditions and main ways of development characterizing nomadic state formations in antiquity and Middle Ages demonstrate considerable similarity if not total uniformity.
The Conclusion treats correlations of common and particular features in the historical development of pastoral nomads in Eurasian steppes and guidelines to subdividing their history into periods. A comparison of Scythian society with other nomadic societies of antiquity in Eurasian steppes demonstrates not only their essential uniformity but a similarity of many concrete forms of social organization, social institutions and elements of culture. Existing differences are partly connected with differing ethno-cultural traditions and varying sources of external influence and partly with variations of development levels. At the same time main socio-economic structures of Eurasian nomads in antiquity as well as main directions of their social development are quite close to those of medieval and later nomads. Causes of this phenomenon are again rooted in specific features of an extensive nomadic economy, altering only slightly with time and having as its natural consequence a tendency towards reproduction of the same forms of social organization. The study analyses historic periodizations of Eurasia’s nomadic societies advanced by a number of scholars and demonstrates their inadequate nature.
Internal development among nomads themselves does not yet offer valid criteria for such periodizations. That is why a basis for such periodization could be found in the fact of close and determined links which had always existed between nomadic and sedentary agrarian societies. As a result, their history is subdivided into three stages, those of nomadism in antiquity, in Middle Ages and in modern times in accordance with general periodization of universal history. Differences between the three separate stages are more quantitative rather than qualitative. Besides, historical and ethnic differences between stages stand out more prominently than economico-cultural.
On the whole nomadic societies tend towards stagnation and impasses, they lack adequate possibilities for internal development, they are characterized by a certain reversibility of social processes and a prevalence of tradition over innovation.
Pastoral nomadism was, up to a time, the most effective method of economically using arid territories. However, nomadism’s reverse side consists in social stagnation. Only one cure of this situation has been discovered so far — it is a changeover to sedentarization and complex economy in which according to the ecology of the given region and some other conditions pastoralism may become predominant.
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