Unfortunately, we know next to nothing about the Scythian of that period [Old Iranian] – we have only a couple of personal and tribal names in Greek and Persian sources at our disposal – and cannot even determine with any degree of certainty whether it was a single language.
Classification
Ossetian is an Eastern Iranic language. The vast majority of Scythological scholars agree in considering the Scythian languages a part of the Eastern Iranic languages too. This relies principally on the fact that the Greek inscriptions of the Northern Black Sea Coast contain several hundreds of Sarmatian names showing a close affinity to the Ossetian language.[2][3]
Some scholars detect a division of Scythian into two dialects: a western, more conservative dialect, and an eastern, more innovative one.[4] The Scythian languages may have formed a dialect continuum:
Alanic languages or Scytho-Sarmatian in the west: were spoken by people originally of Iranic stock from the 8th and 7th century BC onwards in the area of Ukraine, Southern Russia and Kazakhstan.
Modern Ossetian survives as a continuation of the language family possibly represented by Scytho-Sarmatian inscriptions, although the Scytho-Sarmatian language family "does not simply represent the same [Ossetian] language" at an earlier date.
It is highly probable that already in the Old Iranic period, there were some eastern Scythian dialects which gave rise to the ancestor(s) of the Sogdian and Yaghnobi languages, although data required to test this hypothesis is presently lacking.[6] More recent scholarship suggests that this is due to the Scythian languages and the Sogdo-Bactrian languages descending from a larger shared genetic phylum coined as Northeastern Iranian.
The Scythian languages shared some features with other Eastern Iranic languages, such as the use of the suffix -ta to denote the plural form, which is also present in Sogdian, Chorasmian, Ossetian, and Yaghnobi.[7] This again hints towards the idea that these languages share more recent common ancestry through the existence of a possible Northeastern Iranian dialect cluster.
^Cimmerian's position within the Northeastern Iranian group is poorly understood, as is the case with many languages within the Eastern Iranian areal category itself. Although commonly believed to belong to the Scytho-Sarmatian branch of the Scythian languages, Cimmerians predate the Arzhan culture which is associated with the expansions of True Scythians, including Sarmatians, and as such, their language was likely basal to the Scythian group
^Associated with the spread of cultures related to or descended from the Arzhan culture
^Also commonly referred to as Scytho-Khotanese. This branch corresponds to the eastern varities of the Scythian phylum, which are in closer affinity with one another than they are with the western Scytho-Sarmatian varities. They would have likely been spoken by various Saka tribes ranging from the Dahae, the Massagetae, to the Uyuk culture, however the continuity of this categorization is rather dubious as these tribes existed within a vast time range spanning from the 9th century BCE to approximately 1006 CE. Perhaps better understood as an areal group with members sharing more similarities with each other than with other Scythian varities, given a matching time period
^Also commonly referred to as Scytho-Sarmatian. This categorization includes all other western Scythian (Sarmatian) varities that were not spoken by the Alans, including the dialects of the Iazyges
^Also represents all the now-extinct Alanic varities that did not develop into Ossetic, such as those spoken in continental Europe and North Africa
^Compare L. Zgusta, Die griechischen Personennamen griechischer Städte der nördlichen Schwarzmeerküste [The Greek personal names of the Greek cities of the northern Black Sea coast], 1955.
Alemany, Agustí (2006). "Onomastica Elamo-Scythica". In del Olmo Lete, Gregorio; Feliu, Lluís; Millet Albà, Adelina (eds.). Sapal tibnim mû illakû: Studies Presented to Joaquín Sanmartín on the Occasion of his 64th Birthday (in Spanish). Barcelona, Spain: Editorial AUSA. pp. 29–34. ISBN978-8-488-81071-7.
Harmatta, J. (1970). "Studies in the History and Language of the Sarmatians". Acta Universitatis de Attila József Nominatae: Acta antiqua et archaeologica. 13. Szeged, Hungary: University of Szeged.
Humbach, Helmut; Faiss, Klaus (2012). Herodotus's Scythians and Ptolemy's Central Asia: Semasiological and Onomasiological Studies. Wiesbaden: Dr. Ludwig Reichert Verlag.
Rjabchikov, Sergei V. The Long Awaited Bilingua in Ancient Greek and Scytho-Sarmatian Languages from Bosporan Kingdom; Scytho-Sarmatian Texts Written in Greek Letters. In: I.I. Ivanovskaya and M.V. Posnova (eds.) Fundamental’naya i prikladnaya nauka: Sostoyanie i tendentsii razvitiya. Sbornik statey XXV mezhdunarodnoy nauchno-prakticheskoy konferentsii, sostoyavsheysya 28 noyabrya 2022 g. v g. Petrozavodske. Petrozavodsk: International Center for Scientific Partnership “New Science”, 2022, pp. 178-193.
Tokhtasyev, Sergey[in Russian] (2005a). "Проблема Скифского Языка в Современной Науке" [The Problem of the Scythian Language in Contemporary Studies]. In Cojocaru, Victor (ed.). Ethnic Contacts and Cultural Exchanges North and West of the Black Sea from the Greek Colonization to the Ottoman Conquest. Proceedings of the International Symposium Ethnic contacts and Cultural Exchanges North and West of the Black Sea, Iaşi, June 12–17, 2005. Iași, Romania: Trinitas. pp. 59–108. ISBN978-9-737-83450-8.
Zgusta, L.: Die griechischen Personennamen griechischer Städte der nördlichen Schwarzmeerküste. Die ethnischen Verhältnisse, namentlich das Verhältnis der Skythen und Sarmaten, im Lichte der Namenforschung, Prague 1955.
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