Iazyges

Iazyges, a tribe of Sarmatians first heard of on the Maeotis, where they were among the allies of Mithridates the Great.

Moving westward across Scythia, and hence called Metanastae, they were on the lower Danube by the time of Ovid, and about AD 50 occupied the plains east of the Theiss.

Here, under the general name of Sarmatae, they were a constant threat to the Roman province of Dacia. They were divided into freemen and serfs (Sarmatae Limigantes), the latter of whom had a different manner of life and were probably an older settled population enslaved by nomad masters. They rose against them in AD 34, but were repressed by foreign aid.

Nothing is heard of Iazyges or Sarmatae after the Hunnish invasions. Graves at Keszthely and elsewhere in the Theiss valley, shown by their contents to belong to nomads of the first centuries AD, are referred to the Iazyges.

This entry was originally from the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.