The Sciritae or Skiritai or Skioreitai or Skioritai ( Greek : Σκιρῖται and Σκιωρεῖται ) were a people subject to Sparta , whose status is comparable to that of the Perioeci . Deriving their name from the town of Skiritis , a mountainous region located in northern Laconia on the border with Arcadia , between the Oenus and the Eurotas rivers.
9-517: According to Stephanus of Byzantium and Hesychius of Alexandria , the Sciritae were of Arcadian origin. Their way of life was essentially rural: they mostly lived in villages, of which the biggest were Oion and Caryai. Their territory was inhospitable, but was of strategic importance for Sparta since it controlled the road to Tegea , which explains why it rapidly fell in Spartan hands. Their status
18-407: A complement to the civic army . According to Thucydides ( v. 67 ), they fought on the extreme-left wing in the battle-line, the most threatening position for the hoplite phalanx : "In this battle the left wing was composed of the Sciritae, who in a Lacedaemonian army have always that post to themselves alone". At night, they were placed as sentinels ahead of the army ( Xenophon , Constitution of
27-469: Is a vast work, with sometimes hundreds of list entries under each letter of the greek alphabet: Α – Ω . Even as an epitome, the Ethnica is of enormous value for geographical, mythological , and religious information about ancient Greece . Nearly every article in the epitome contains a reference to some ancient writer, as an authority for the name of the place. From the surviving fragments, we see that
36-794: The Spartans , xii. 3) and acted as scouts to open the way for the king, whom they only could precede. According to Suda , they were six hundred men and during the battle they were the first to engage and the last to withdraw. In the Cyropaedia (IV, 2), Xenophon compares them to the Hyrcanian cavalry, used by the Assyrians as rear-guard. Stephanus of Byzantium Stephanus or Stephen of Byzantium ( Latin : Stephanus Byzantinus ; ‹See Tfd› Greek : Στέφανος Βυζάντιος , Stéphanos Byzántios ; fl. 6th century AD)
45-730: The latter includes a passage from the comic poet Alexis on the Seven Largest Islands . Another respectable fragment, from the article Δύμη to the end of Δ , exists in a manuscript of the Fonds Coislin , the library formed by Pierre Séguier . The first modern printed edition of the work was published by the Aldine Press in Venice in 1502. The complete standard edition is still that of August Meineke (1849, reprinted at Graz, 1958), and by convention, references to
54-664: The original contained considerable quotations from ancient authors, besides many interesting particulars, topographical, historical, mythological, and others. Stephanus cites Artemidorus , Polybius , Aelius Herodianus , Herodotus , Thucydides , Xenophon , Strabo and other writers. He is the only writer to cite a lost work attributed to Sophaenetus . The chief fragments remaining of the original work are preserved by Constantine Porphyrogennetos in De Administrando Imperio , ch. 23 (the article Ίβηρίαι δύο ) and De thematibus , ii. 10 (an account of Sicily );
63-636: The work was later reduced to an epitome by a certain Hermolaus, who dedicated his epitome to Justinian; whether the first or second emperor of that name is meant is disputed, but it seems probable that Stephanus flourished in Byzantium in the earlier part of the sixth century AD, under Justinian I . Stephanos' work, originally written in Greek , takes the form of an alphabetical dictionary or encyclopedia of geographical toponymns , ethnonymns etc. It
72-600: Was a Byzantine grammarian and the author of an important geographical dictionary entitled Ethnica ( Ἐθνικά ). Only meagre fragments of the dictionary survive, but the epitome is extant, compiled by one Hermolaus , not otherwise identified. Nothing is known about the life of Stephanus, except that he was a Greek grammarian who was active in Constantinople , and lived after the time of Arcadius and Honorius , and before that of Justinian II . Later writers provide no information about him, but they do note that
81-490: Was similar to that of the Perioeci, but Xenophon distinguished between them writing: "To meet the case of a hostile approach at night, he assigned the duty of acting as sentries outside the lines to the Sciritae. In these days the duty is shared by foreigners, if any happen to be present in the camp." In war the Sciritae formed an elite corps of light infantry , a lochos ( battalion ) of about 600 men, which were used as
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