AORSI. seems to be the only ground on which Ritter places lilxnVdiinai xt the confluence of the Cophen and the Indus. But the whole course of the narrative, in the historians, seems clearly to require a position higher up the Indus, at the month of the Burrindoo for example. That Aornus itself also was close to the Indus, is stated by Diodorus, Curtius, and Strabo; and though the same would scarcely be inferred from Arrian, he says nothing positively to the contrary. The mistake of Strabo, that the base of the rock is washed by the Indus near its source, is not so very great as might at first sight appear; for, in common with the other ancient geographers, he understands by the source of the Indus, the place where it breaks through the chain of the Himalaya.
The name Aornus is an example of the signifi- cant appellations which the Greeks were fond of using, either as corruptions of, or substitutes for, the native names. In like manner, Dionysius Pe- riegetes calls the Himalaya "Aopvis (1151). [P. S.]
2. A city in Bactriana. Arrian (iii. 29) speaks of Aornus and Bactra as the largest cities in the country of the Bactrii. Aornus had an acropolis (&rpa) in which Alexander left a garrison after taking the place. There is no indication of its site, except that Alexander took it before he reached Oreus. [G. L.]
AORSI (^Aofxrot: Strab., Ptol., Plin., Steph.B.), or ADORSI (Tac. Arm. xii. 15), a numerous and poverfril pec^Ie, both in Europe and in Asia. Ptokmy (iii. 5. § 22) names the European Aorsi ami fig the peoples of Sarmatia, between the Venedic Gulf (^BtJdc') and the Khipaean mountains {i. e. in the esstem part of Prussia), and places them S. of the Agathyrsi, and N. of the Pagyritae. The Astatic Aorsi he places in Scythia intra iiwM^Tw^ on ^e NE. shore of the Caspian, between the Astotae^ who dwelt £. of the mouth of the river Rka ( Voljfd)f and the Jaxartae, who extended to the mer Jazartes (vi. 14. § 10). The latter is supposed to have been the original position of the people, as Strabo expressly states (xi. p. 506); but of course the same question arises as in the case of the other great tribes found both in Euro- pean Sarmatia and Asiatic Scythia; and so Eich- wald seeks the original abodes of the Aorsi in the Russian province of Vologda, on the strength of the resemblance of the name to that of the Finnish race of the £ne, now found there. (Geog. d. Casp. Meeres, pp. 358, foll.) Pliny mentions the Euro- pean Aorsi, with the Hamaxobii, as tribes of the Sarmatians, in the general sense of that word, in- cluding the "Scythian races" who dwelt along the N. coast of the Euxine E. of the mouth of the Danube; and more specifically, next to the Getae (iv. 12. s. 25. xi. s. 18).
The chief seat of the Aorsi, and where they ap- pear in history, was in the country between the Tanaïs, the Euxine, the Caspian, and the Caucasus. Here Strabo places (xi. p. 492), S. of the nomade Srvthians, who dwell on waggons, the Sarmatians, who are also Scythians, namely the Aorsi and Siraci, extending to the S. as far as the Caucasian mountains; some of them being nomades, and others dwelling in tents, and cultivating the land (tfdiriTai Kol yucpTfoi). Further on (p. 506), he speaks more particularly of the Aorsi and Siraci; but the meaning is obscured by errors in the text. The sense seems to be, as given in Groskurd's translation, that there were tribes of the Aorsi and
AOUS. 151
the Siraci on the E. side of the Palus Maeotis (Sea of Azov the former dwelling on the Tanaïs, and the latter further to the S. on the Achardeus, a river flowing from the Caucasus into the Maeotis. Both were powerful, for when Pharnaces (the son of Mithridates the Great) held the kingdom of Bosporus, he was furnished with 20,000 horsemen by Abeacus, king of the Siraci, and with 200,000 by Spadines, king of the Aorsi. But both these peoples are regarded by Strabo as only exiles of the great nation of the Aorsi, who dwelt further to the north (r&v kv^rdpto, ol ftyw^Aopcroi), and who as- sisted Pharnaces with a still greater force. These more northern Aorsi, he adds, possessed the greater part of the coast of the Caspian, and carried on an extensive traffic in Indian and Babylonian merchan- dize, which they brought on camels from Media and Armenia. They were rich and wore ornaments of gold.
In A. D. 50, the Aorsi, or, as Tacitus calls them, Adorsi, aided Cotys, king of Bosporus, and the Romans with a body of cavalry, against the rebel Mithridates, who was assisted by the Siraci. (Tac. Ann. xii. 15.)
Some modern writers attempt to identify the Aorsi with the Avars, so celebrated in Byzantine and medieval history. [P. S.]
AOTJS, more rarely AEAS ("Awoy, 'A»oy, *A^oj, Pol. Strab. Li v.: Afa?, Hecat. ap. Strab. p. 316; Scylax, 8. r. 'lAAvpioi; Steph. B. s. v. AdKfjMv; Yal. Max. i. 5. ext. 2; erroneously called AjfiivSyAyios by Pint. Caes. 38, and Anas, "Avor, by Dion Cass, xii. 45 : Vi6saj Vuisaay Vovusta), the chief river of Illyria, or Epirus Nova, rises in Mount Lacmon, the northern part of the range of Mount Pindus, flows in a north-westerly direction, then "suddenly turns a little to the southward of west; and having pursued this course for 12 miles, between two mountains of extreme steepness, then recovers its north-western direction, which it pursues to the sea," into which it falls a little S. of Apollonia. (Herod, ix. 93; Strab., Steph. B., ll. cc. Leake, Northern Greece, vol. iv. p. 384.) The two moun- tains mentioned above approach very near each other, and form the celebrated pass, now called the Stena of the Vidsa^ and known in antiquity by the name of the Fauces Aktioonenses, from its vi- cinity to the city of Antigoneia. (Fauces ad An- tigoneam, Liv. xxxii. 5 ; t4 trap' ^Avnydvcuw (rreyd, Pol. ii. 5.) Antigoneia (Tepeléni) was situated near the northern entrance of the pass at the junc- tion of the Aous with a river, now called Dhryno, Drino, or Druno. At the termination of the pass on the south is the modem village of Klisúra, a name which it has obviously received from its situ- ation. It was in this pass that Philip V., king of Macedonia, in vain attempted to arrest the progress of the Roman consul, T. Quinctius Flamininus, into Epirus. Philip was encamped with the main body of his forces on Mount Aeropus, and his general, Athenagoras, with the light troops on Mount As- naus. (Liv. l. c.) If Philip was encamped on the right bank of the river, as there seems every reason for believing, Aeropus corresponds to Mount Trebu- sín, and Asnaus to Mount Nemértzika, The pass is well described by Plutarch (Flamin. 3) in a passage which he probably borrowed from Polybius. He comperes it to the defile of the Peneius at Tempe, adding "that it is deficient in the beautiful groves, the verdant forests, the pleasant retreats and mea- dows which border the Peneius; but in the lofty
