Res Gestae

Among these the Nervii[*](Cf. xxii. 8, 40; these are the Neuri of Herodotus (iv. 105).) inhabit the interior of the country near the lofty, precipitous peaks nipped by the north winds and benumbed with ice and snow. Behind these are the Vidini[*](The Budini of Herodotus, iv. 108–9.) and the Geloni, exceedingly savage races, who strip the skins from their slain enemies to make clothing for themselves and coverings for their horses in war.[*](See Mela, ii. 1, 14.) On the frontier of the Geloni are the Agathyrsi, who checker their bodies and dye their hair with a blue colour[*](This detail is not mentioned by Herodotus (iv. 101).) —the common people with a few small marks, but the nobles with more and broader spots of dye.[*](Cf. Pliny, N.H. iv. 80; Mela, ii. 1, 10.)

Beyond these are the Melanchlaenae[*](According to Herodotus, iv. 107, they get their name from their black clothing.) and the Anthropophagi, who according to report lead a nomadic life and feed upon human flesh; and because of this abominable food they are left to themselves and all their former neighbours have moved to distant parts of the earth. And so the entire north-eastern[*](Oriens aestivus, north-east (Pliny, N.H. xvii. 105), so called because the sun rises in that quarter in summer. Hibernus oriens for south-east also occurs, and occidens aestivus for north-west (Columella, i. 6, 2); o. h.,, Livy, xliv. 46, 5. Cf. Gesner, Lex. Rusticum, s.v. aequinoctialis oriens. ) tract, until one comes to the Seres,[*](Chinese of Central and E. Asia (see xxiii. 6, 64). The Seres and the Ganges are not mentioned by Herodotus, nor the Halani except perhaps as Massagetae (i. 204).) has remained uninhabitable.

In another part of the country, near the abodes of the Amazons, the Halani mount to the eastward, divided

Thus the Halani (whose various peoples it is unnecessary now to enumerate) are divided between the two[*](I.e., Europe and Asia, in which Africa was often included.) parts of the earth, but although widely separated from each other and roaming over vast tracts, as Nomads do, yet in the course of time they have united under one name, and are, for short, all called Halani because of the similarity in their customs, their savage mode of life, and their weapons.

For they have no huts and care nothing for using the plowshare, but they live upon flesh and an abundance of milk, and dwell in wagons, which they cover with rounded canopies of bark and drive over the boundless wastes. And when they come to a place rich in grass, they place their carts in a circle and feed like wild beasts. As soon as the fodder is used up, they place their cities, as we might call them, on the wagons and so convey them: in the wagons the males have intercourse with the women, and in the wagons their babes are born and reared; wagons form their permanent dwellings, and wherever they come, that place they look upon as their natural home.

Driving their plow-cattle before them, they pasture them with their flocks, and they give particular attention to breeding horses. In that land the fields are always green, and here and there are places set thick with fruit trees. Hence, wherever