title: Cimmerians
abstract: Cimmerians (Κιμμέριοι, Assyrian Gimirri, the ‘Gomer’ of Ezek. 38: 6; Gen. 10: 2), a people driven from south Russia by the nomad Scyths (Hdt. 1. 16 f.). They overthrew Phrygia under the last King *Midas (2) (c.676?), killed *Gyges, took the lower town of Sardis (c.644), and terrorized Ionia (Strabo 647, citing *Callinus and *Archilochus), but were gradually destroyed by epidemics and in wars with *Lydia and Assyria. Their name survived in the Cimmerian *Bosporus (2) (straits of Kerch') and some 
journal: Oxford University Press eBooks