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Ὑλαίη. The region on the left bank of the lower Dnieper was once well wooded—at least in comparison to most of South Russia (cf. 109. 2 for woods among Budini), the bareness of which H. well describes (c. 19). Dio Chrys. (Or. 36) compares the trees of the Hylaea to ‘masts of ships’. Neumann, H. S. (pp. 82 seq.) quotes Rubruquis in the thirteenth century and others to prove there were once forests in South Russia, where now there are none: he sums up ‘the steppes are gradually encroaching; their desolation in the Middle Ages was less complete than it is to-day, and following the same law, we can maintain that it had advanced even less in Classical times’.

γεωργοί. The distinction between the ‘husbandmen Scyths’ and the ‘ploughmen Scyths’ (c. 17) lies in the fact that the latter grew corn only to sell, the former practised husbandry generally. In 53. 4, H., perhaps following a different informant, gives them ‘ten days'’ extent; probably they reached as far as the rapids of the Dnieper.

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