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The Saka (Old Persian: ''Sakā''; New Persian/(パシュトー語:ساکا); Sanskrit: ''Śaka''; Greek: ; Latin: ''Sacae''; ; Old Chinese: '' *Sək'') was the term used in Persian and Sanskrit sources for the Scythians, a large group of Eastern Iranian nomadic tribes on the Eurasian Steppe.〔P. Lurje, “(Yārkand )”, Encyclopædia Iranica, online edition〕 "The regions of Tashkent, Fergana, and Kashgar were inhabited by the people known to the Chinese under the name Sse (ancient pronunciation, Ssek), to the Persians and Indians as Saka, or Shaka, and to the Greeks as Sakai: our Sakas. They were in fact the 'Scythians of Asia.' They formed a branch of the great Scytho-Sarmatian family; that is, they were nomadic Iranians from the northwestern steppes." ==Usage of the name ''Saka''== Modern debate about the identity of the "Saka" is due partly to ambiguous usage of the word by ancient, non-Saka authorities. According to Herodotus, the Persians gave the name "Saka" to all Scythians.〔Herodotus Book VII, 64〕 However, Pliny the Elder (''Gaius Plinius Secundus'', AD 23–79) claims that the Persians gave the name Sakai only to the Scythian tribes "nearest to them".〔Naturalis Historia, VI, 19, 50〕 The Scythians to the far north of Assyria were also called the ''Saka suni'' "Saka or Scythian sons" by the Persians. The Assyrians of the time of Esarhaddon record campaigning against a people they called in the Akkadian the ''Ashkuza'' or ''Ishhuza''. Another people, the ''Gimirrai'',〔 who were known to the ancient Greeks as the Cimmerians, were closely associated with the Sakas. In ancient Hebrew texts, the ''Ashkuz'' (''Ashkenaz'') are considered to be a direct offshoot from the Gimirri (Gomer).〔"The sons of Gomer were Ashkenaz, Riphath,() and Togarmah." See also the entry for Ashkenaz in 〕 The Saka were regarded by the Babylonians as synonymous with the ''Gimirrai''; both names are used on the trilingual Behistun inscription, carved in 515 BC on the order of Darius the Great.〔George Rawlinson, noted in his translation of ''History of Herodotus'', Book VII, p. 378〕 (These people were reported to be mainly interested in settling in the kingdom of Urartu, later part of Armenia, and Shacusen in Uti Province derives its name from them.) The Behistun inscription mentions four divisions of Scythians: *the ''Sakā paradraya'' "Saka beyond the sea" of Sarmatia, *the ''Sakā tigraxaudā'' "Saka with pointy hats/caps", *the ''Sakā haumavargā'' "haoma-drinking Saka"〔http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/haumavarga〕 (Amyrgians, the Saka tribe in closest proximity to Bactria and Sogdiana), *the ''Sakā para Sugdam'' "Saka beyond Sugda (Sogdiana)" at the Jaxartes. Of these, the ''Sakā tigraxaudā'' were the Saka proper. The ''Sakā paradraya'' were the western Scythians or Sarmatians, the ''Sakā haumavargā'' and ''Sakā para Sugdam'' were likely Scythian tribes associated with or split off from the original Saka. In the modern era, the archaeologist Hugo Winckler (1863–1913) was the first to associate the Sakas with the Scyths. I. Gershevitch, in ''The Cambridge History of Iran'', states: "The Persians gave the single name Sakā both to the nomads whom they encountered between the Hunger steppe and the Caspian, and equally to those north of the Danube and Black Sea against whom Darius later campaigned; and the Greeks and Assyrians called all those who were known to them by the name Skuthai (Iškuzai). Sakā and Skuthai evidently constituted a generic name for the nomads on the northern frontiers."〔I. Gershevitch,''The Cambridge History of Iran'' (Volume 2), Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, p. 253 .〕 Conversely, the political historian B. N. Mukerjee has claimed that ancient Greek and Roman scholars believed that while "all Sakai were Scythians", "not all Scythians were Sakai". 〔B. N. Mukerjee, ''Political History of Ancient India'', 1996, p 690-91.〕 Persian sources often treat them as a single tribe called the Saka (''Sakai'' or ''Sakas''), but Greek and Latin texts suggest that the Scythians were composed of many sub-groups.〔Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain & Ireland By Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland-page-323〕
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