SOL Search

Scythian, son of Seuthes. He wrote the so-called Scythinian Oracles[1] and Marriage of the river Hebros and Purifications and a Theogony in prose and Arrival of Apollo among the Hyperboreans in meter. He came from Scythia to Greece.
The legendary arrow belongs to him, the one he flew on from Greece to Hyperborean Scythia. It was given to him by Apollo.[2]
Gregory the Theologian mentioned this man in his Epitaphios for Basil the Great.[3]
They say[4] that once, when there was a plague throughout the entire inhabited world, Apollo told the Greeks and barbarians who had come to consult his oracle that the Athenian people should make prayers on behalf of all of them. So, many peoples sent ambassadors to them, and Abaris, they say, came as ambassador of the Hyperboreans in the third Olympiad.[5]
[Note] that the Bulgarians thoroughly destroyed the Avars[6] by force.
[Note] that these Avars drove out the Sabinorians, when they themselves had been expelled by peoples living near the shore of the Ocean, who left their own land when a mist formed in the flood of the Ocean and a crowd of griffins appeared; the story was that they would not stop until they had devoured the race of men. So the people driven away by these monsters invaded their neighbors. As the invaders were stronger, the others submitted and left, just as the Saragurians, when they were driven out, went to the Akatziri Huns.[7]
The declension is Abaris, Abaridos [genitive singular], Abaridas [accusative plural], and with apocope Abaris [also accusative plural, with a long iota].
See about these things under 'Bulgarians'.[8]

*)/abaris: *sku/qhs, *seu/qou ui(o/s. sunegra/yato de\ xrhsmou\s tou\s kaloume/nous *skuqinou\s kai\ *ga/mon *(/ebrou tou= potamou= kai\ *kaqarmou\s kai\ *qeogoni/an kataloga/dhn kai\ *)apo/llwnos a)/ficin ei)s *(uperbore/ous e)mme/trws. h(=ke de\ e)k *skuqw=n ei)s *(ella/da. tou/tou o( muqologou/menos o)i+sto\s, tou= petome/nou a)po\ th=s *(ella/dos me/xri tw=n *(uperbore/wn *skuqw=n: e)do/qh de\ au)tw=| para\ tou= *)apo/llwnos. tou/tou kai\ *grhgo/rios o( *qeolo/gos e)n tw=| ei)s to\n me/gan *basi/leion *)epitafi/w| mnh/mhn pepoi/htai. fasi\ de\ o(/ti loimou= kata\ pa=san th\n oi)koume/nhn gegono/tos a)nei=len o( *)apo/llwn manteuome/nois *(/ellhsi kai\ barba/rois to\n *)aqhnai/wn dh=mon u(pe\r pa/ntwn eu)xa\s poih/sasqai. presbeuome/nwn de\ pollw=n e)qnw=n pro\s au)tou\s, kai\ *)/abarin e)c *(uperbore/wn presbeuth\n a)fike/sqai le/gousi kata\ th\n g# *)olumpia/da. o(/ti tou\s *)aba/ris oi( *bou/lgaroi kata\ kra/tos a)/rdhn h)fa/nisan. o(/ti oi( *)aba/ris ou(=toi e)ch/lasan *sabi/nwras, metana/stai geno/menoi u(po\ e)qnw=n oi)kou/ntwn me\n th\n parwkeani=tin a)kth/n, th\n de\ xw/ran a)polipo/ntwn dia\ to\ e)c a)naxu/sews tou= *)wkeanou= o(mixlw=des gino/menon, kai\ grupw=n de\ plh=qos a)nafane/n: o(/per h)=n lo/gos mh\ pro/teron pau/sasqai pri\n h)\ bora\n poih=sai to\ tw=n a)nqrw/pwn ge/nos. dio\ dh\ u(po\ tw=nde e)launo/menoi tw=n deinw=n toi=s plhsioxw/rois e)ne/ballon: kai\ tw=n e)pio/ntwn dunatwte/rwn o)/ntwn oi( th\n e)/fodon u(fista/menoi metani/stanto, w(/sper kai\ oi( *sara/gouroi e)laqe/ntes pro\s toi=s *)akati/rois *ou)/nnois e)ge/nonto. kli/netai de\ *)/abaris, *)aba/ridos, tou\s *)aba/ridas, kai\ kata\ a)pokoph\n *)aba/ris. zh/tei peri\ tw=n au)tw=n e)n tw=| *bou/lgaroi.

See generally A.H. Griffiths in OCD(4) p.1: "legendary devotee of Apollo from the far north, a shamanistic missionary and saviour-figure like Aristeas [alpha 3900]". Adler credits this part of the entry to the Epitome Onomatologi Hesychii Milesii.
[1] Or in one manuscript, 'Skythian'.
[2] Perhaps from a scholion on the passage about to be cited (so Adler). Cf. Herodotos 4.36.1 (web address 1).
[3] Gregory of Nazianzus PG 36.524b.
[4] This material is from Harpokration s.v. *)/abaris
[5] 768-765 BCE. Harpokration (see preceding note) cites Hippostratos (FGrH 568 F4) to this effect, but adds that there were later alternatives: the twenty-first Olympiad (696-693) or "the time of Croesus, king of Lydia" (so Pindar, fr.270 Snell-Maehler), i.e. c.560-546.
[6] The word used for the Avars here, *)aba/ris, is a homograph for the name of the Hyperborean wise man Abaris, so this separate section on the Avars is included in this entry. There is no indication that the lexicographer sees any connection between the two topics. In mid-C6 CE the Avars were a nomadic people of the steppe north of the Black Sea; cf. Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium s.v. Avars. On the territories of the Avars and of their surrounding ethnic groups in the epoch of Justinian (cf. iota 446 generally), see Louth (110, map).
[7] Priscus fr.30 FHG (4.104), still 30 Bornmann. The final part reappears at alpha 820 and sigma 111.
[8] beta 423.

RE Abaris (1) I.16-17
Macartney, C.A. "On the Greek Sources for the History of the Turks in the Sixth Century." BSOAS 11 (1944): 266-275
A.P. Kazhdan, ed. et al., The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, (Oxford 1991)
A. Louth, "Justinian and His Legacy," in J. Shepard, ed., The Cambridge History of the Byzantine Empire c. 500-1492, (Cambridge 2008) 99-129.

William Hutton (Modified translation and notes, added keywords, set status.) on 19 January 2001@14:57:43.
David Whitehead (augmented notes and bibliography; cosmetics) on 9 February 2001@05:20:43.
David Whitehead (added note) on 14 February 2001@06:09:48.
Mihai Olteanu (The only thracian item concerning Abaris is his father's name. Everything else pledes for his sythian ('hyperborean') origin. This is why I suppose we deal here with a copist mistake, and I propose the emendation: ́Αβαρις: Σκύθης, *Σκύθου υἱός (for Σκύθης as mythological character, see for example Herodotos 4,10).) on 22 January 2002@21:55:20.
David Whitehead (augmented notes and keywords; cosmetics) on 23 January 2002@03:11:25.
David Whitehead (augmented n.6 and added a keyword) on 5 October 2004@03:21:13.
William Hutton (augmented notes, added link and keywords, set status) on 24 August 2007@11:05:00.
Jennifer Benedict (cosmeticule) on 25 March 2008@00:16:43.
David Whitehead (another note; cosmetics) on 28 March 2014@06:23:27.
David Whitehead (updated a ref) on 29 July 2014@12:06:21.
David Whitehead (updated a ref) on 31 January 2015@09:22:24.
Catharine Roth (tweaked translation) on 18 February 2024@01:49:17.
Ronald Allen (expanded n.6, added further bibliography) on 21 August 2024@11:18:37.

Suda On Line Search