herodotus

were cowards and effeminate. 103. Thus doing he traversed thecontinent, until at last he passed over to Europe from Asia andsubdued the Scythians and also the Thracians. These, I am of opinion,were the furthest[87] people to which the Egyptian army came, for intheir country the pillars are found to have been set up, but in theland beyond this they are no longer found. From this point he turnedand began to go back; and when he came to the river Phasis, whathappened then I cannot say for certain, whether the king Sesostrishimself divided off a certain portion of his army and left the menthere as settlers in the land, or whether some of his soldiers werewearied by his distant marches and remained by the river Phasis. 104.For the people of Colchis are evidently Egyptian, and this I perceivedfor myself before I heard it from others. So when I had come toconsider the matter I asked them both; and the Colchians hadremembrance of the Egyptians more than the Egyptians of the Colchians;but the Egyptians said they believed that the Colchians were a portionof the army of Sesostris. That this was so I conjectured myself notonly because they are dark-skinned and have curly hair (this of itselfamounts to nothing, for there are other races which are so), but alsostill more because the Colchians, Egyptians, and Ethiopians alone ofall the races of men have practised circumcision from the first. ThePhenicians and the Syrians[88] who dwell in Palestine confessthemselves that they have learnt it from the Egyptians, and theSyrians[89] about the river Thermodon and the river Parthenios, andthe Macronians, who are their neighbours, say that they have learnt itlately from the Colchians. These are the only races of men whopractise circumcision, and these evidently practise it in the samemanner as the Egyptians. Of the Egyptians themselves however and theEthiopians, I am not able to say which learnt from the other, forundoubtedly it is a most ancient custom; but that the other nationslearnt it by intercourse with the Egyptians, this among others is tome a strong proof, namely that those of the Phenicians who haveintercourse with Hellas cease to follow the example of the Egyptiansin this matter, and do not circumcise their children. 105. Now let metell another thing about the Colchians to show how they resemble theEgyptians:--they alone work flax in the same fashion as theEgyptians,[90] and the two nations are like one another in their wholemanner of living and also in their language: now the linen of Colchisis called by the Hellenes Sardonic, whereas that from Egypt is calledEgyptian. 106. The pillars which Sesostris of Egypt set up in thevarious countries are for the most part no longer to be seen extant;but in Syria Palestine I myself saw them existing with the inscriptionupon them which I have mentioned and the emblem. Moreover in Ioniathere are two figures of this man carved upon rocks, one on the roadby which one goes from the land of Ephesos to Phocaia, and the otheron the road from Sardis to Smyrna. In each place there is a figure of