Category Archives: Medes (often interchanged with Persians)

Armenians: Kyrsilos and Strabo on a Thessalian origin story, on worship of Anahita and on supposed sacred prostitution (early first century CE)

Assyrians, Medes and Persians: Ktesias on Persian Matters via Diodoros and Photios (early fourth century BCE)

Assyrians, Medes, Persians, Macedonians, and Parthians: Polyhistor, Bion and Agathias on a succession of empires (mid-first century BCE on)

Babylonian diasporas: Josephos and other Judeans on legends of migration from Babel (first-second centuries CE)

Babylonians and Assyrians: Herodotos on legendary queens and outstanding customs (mid-fifth century BCE)

Eastern and northern peoples: Bardaisan of Edessa’s Book of the Laws of Countries, Pseudo-Clementines, and Origen on astrology and peoples (second-third centuries CE)

Egyptian and Persian wisdom: Plutarch on the “barbarian-lover” Herodotos (early second century CE)

Egyptian perspectives: Oracles of the Lamb and the Potter on Greco-Macedonians and other foreigners (third-second centuries BCE)

Ethnic diversity in Libya / Africa: Sallust on legends of migration (mid-first century BCE)

Indians, Ethiopians, and Celts: Dio of Prusa critiques foreign imports and luxury (late first century CE)

Indians: Herodotos on eastern peoples at the ends of the earth (mid-fifth century BCE)

Kimmerians and Kolchians: Herodotos on other Pontic peoples (mid-fifth century BCE)

Lydians: Diodoros on materialistic Croesus, consultation of Anacharsis and other sages, and Persian conquest (mid-first century BCE)

Medes: Diodoros on Datis and legends of an Athenian-Median connection (mid-first century BCE)

Mediterranean peoples: Augustus on his own achievements, conquests and alliances with peoples (14 CE)

Mediterranean peoples: Diodoros, Pliny and Plutarch on Pompey’s subjugation of peoples of the world (mid-first century BCE on)

Parthians, Libyans, Egyptians and others: Acts of the Apostles on legends of Judean migration (early second century CE)

Parthians, Medes, and Babylonians: Pliny the Elder (first century CE)

Persian wisdom: Ammianus Marcellinus on Zoroaster, Hystaspes, and the Magians (late fourth century CE)

Persian wisdom: Lactantius and others on the Oracles of Hystaspes the Mede (third century CE)

Persian, Babylonian, and Indian wisdom: Pseudo-Lucian on long-living sages and peoples (third century CE and earlier)

Persians and Medes: Douris, Herakleides, Klearchos, and others on royal banquets (fifth-fourth centuries BCE)

Persians and Medes: Herodotos on customs (mid-fifth century BCE)

Persians and Medes: Thucydides on Medizing (late-fifth century BCE)

Persians and peoples in their territory: Strabo on their customs and on bandit peoples (early first century CE)

Persians, Celts, Thracians, and others: Polyainos on “tricky” barbarians (mid-second century CE)

Persians, Hyrkanians, Armenians, Derbikians and others: Curtius Rufus on the mixed composition of the army of Darius III (first century CE)

Persians: Clement of Alexandria [IV] on the elements among Greek philosophers and Persian Magians (late second century CE)

Persians: Xenophon and an anonymous author on royal customs and Cyrus (early fourth century BCE / second century BCE)

Romans: Dionysios on Roman origins, Italic peoples, and legends of Greek and Pelasgian migrations to Italy (late first century BCE)

Romans: Rabbis on four successive imperial powers – Babylonians, Medes, Greeks, Romans (fifth century CE and earlier)

Scythians and other Pontic peoples: Herodotos on the “most ignorant peoples of all” (fifth century BCE)

Scythians, Amazons, and Hyperboreans: Diodoros on some northerners (mid-first century BCE)