The ethnogenesis of the Sarmatians occurred during the 4th to 3rd centuries BC, when Scythian-related nomads originating from the southern Ural foothills migrated southwest into the territory of the Sauromatians, between the lower Volga and Don rivers. The territory inhabited by the Sarmatians, which was known as Sarmatia ( / s ɑːr ˈ m eɪ ʃ i ə/) to Greco-Roman ethnographers, covered the western part of greater Scythia, and corresponded to today's Central Ukraine, South-Eastern Ukraine, Southern Russia, Russian Volga, and South-Ural regions, and to a smaller extent the northeastern Balkans and around Moldova. The Sarmatians themselves apparently called themselves "Aryans", "Arii". By that derivation was noted the high status of women ( matriarchy), which was unusual from the Greek point of view and went to the invention of Amazons (the Greek name for Sarmatians was Sarmatai Gynaikokratoumenoi, ruled by women). Oleg Trubachyov derived the name from the Indo-Aryan *sar-ma(n)t (feminine – rich in women, ruled by women), the Indo-Aryan and Indo-Iranian word *sar- (woman) and the Indo-Iranian adjective suffix -ma(n)t/wa(n)t. *sauruma- was a derivation of the Iranian root *sar-, itself a cognate of the Avestan base sar- ( 𐬯𐬀𐬭), which means "to move suddenly" and which was a cognate of the Old Indic base tsar- ( त्सर्) from which were derived the terms tsarati- ( त्सरति) and tsaru- ( त्सरु), meaning "hunter." This name was connected to Saⁱrima- ( 𐬯𐬀𐬌𐬭𐬌𐬨𐬀), which was the name of a Western region, and from which was derived the name of the Šāhnāme character Salm. The 20th-century English scholar Harold Walter Bailey derived the name Σαρμαται from *Saurumatā, composed of *sauruma- and the East Iranian plural suffix -tā. Though it was historically suggested that their name derives from the word lizard ( sauros), linking to the Sarmatians' use of reptile-like scale armour and dragon standards, this almost certainly unfounded. Nevertheless, historians often regarded these as two separate peoples, and archaeologists habitually use the term 'Sauromatian' to identify the earliest phase of Sarmatian culture. The Greek name Sarmatai sometimes appears as Sauromatai (Σαυρομάται), which is almost certainly a variant of the same name.
Map of the Roman empire under Hadrian (ruled 117–138 AD), showing the location of the Sarmatae in the Ukrainian steppe region A people related to the Sarmatians, known as the Alans, survived in the North Caucasus into the Early Middle Ages, ultimately giving rise to the modern Ossetic ethnic group. Other Sarmatians were assimilated and absorbed by the Early Slavs. The Sarmatians in the Bosporan Kingdom assimilated into the Greek civilization, while others were absorbed by the proto- Circassian Meot people, the Alans and the Goths. Since large parts of today's Russia, specifically the land between the Ural Mountains and the Don River, were controlled in the fifth century BC by the Sarmatians, the Volga–Don and Ural steppes sometimes are called "Sarmatian Motherland." With the Hunnic invasions of the fourth century, many Sarmatians joined the Goths and other Germanic tribes ( Vandals) in the settlement of the Western Roman Empire. In the third century AD, their dominance of the Pontic Steppe was broken by the Germanic Goths. In the first century AD, the Sarmatians began encroaching upon the Roman Empire in alliance with Germanic tribes. At their greatest reported extent, around 100 BC, these tribes ranged from the Vistula River to the mouth of the Danube and eastward to the Volga, bordering the shores of the Black and Caspian seas as well as the Caucasus to the south. They started migrating westward around the fourth and third centuries BC, coming to dominate the closely related Scythians by 200 BC. Originating in the central parts of the Eurasian Steppe, the Sarmatians were part of the wider Scythian cultures. The Sarmatians ( / s ɑːr ˈ m eɪ ʃ i ə n z/ Ancient Greek: Σαρμάται, romanized: Sarmatai Latin: Sarmatae ) were a large confederation of ancient Eastern Iranian equestrian nomadic peoples of classical antiquity who dominated the Pontic steppe from about the 3rd century BC to the 4th century AD.
Depiction of a Sarmatian from a Roman sarcophagus, second century AD
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