Panticapes (Inhulets), Hypacyris,
Gerrhus, and Tanais (Don).The region within the Scythian Pontic realm which was covered with forests was named by the Greeks as
the country of Hylaea (Ancient Greek: Υλαια, romanized: Hulaia , lit. 'the Woodland'), and consisted of
the region of the lower Dnipro river along the territory of what is modern-day Kherson.[57][58]
Earlier ancient West Asian and Greek sources also included Ciscaucasia within the confines of Scythia.
However, Ciscaucasia was no longer part of Scythia by the 5th century BC, and the Don river formed its
easternmost limit.[59]
Little Scythia
After the 3rd century BC, Scythian territory because restricted to two small states, each called "Little
Scythia," respectively located in Dobruja and Crimea:
in Dobruja, the Scythian kingdom's territory stretched from Tyras or even Pontic Olbia in the
north to Odessus in the south;[60] in Crimea, the Scythian kingdom covered a limited a territory which included the steppes and
foothills of Crimea until Taurida, the lower Dnieper, and the lower Southern Bug rivers.[43]History
The 5th-century BC Greek historian Herodotus of Halicarnassus is the
most important literary source on the origins of the Scythians
Because the Scythians did not use writing and they did not leave much material remains due to their
nomadic lifestyle, most of the information regarding them has been pieced from the accounts of
outsiders such as the Assyrians, Persians, and Greeks, as well as from archaeological study of their burial
mounds.[61]