τριήκοντα. The distance (about 300 miles) is a little more than that across Asia Minor (about 250 miles), to which H. assigns only five days (72. 3 n.), while here he allows thirty days, a far more probable estimate. H.'s distances are not actual measurements, but are only estimates based on the usual time taken for the journeys. Here, on the Black Sea coast, a great detour would be necessary.
For the Saspeires north-west of Media and south of the modern Georgia, cf. iii. 94 n. H.'s words here and in iv. 37 seem to point to the fact that one of the great roads of the Persian Empire ran from Ecbatana, past Lake Urmiah, into the upper valley of the Araxes, where the Saspeires lived, and thence over the mountains, to the Phasis valley and the Black Sea.
Καυκάσιον ὄρος. There are only two roads across the Caucasus:
(1) The ‘Caucasian Gates’, nearly in the centre, where the modern road past Vladikavkas runs.
(2) The road on the west of the Caspian, past Derbend, where the railway runs; probably H. means this second road. Stein, however, thinks neither of these can be called ‘much longer’, and so brings the Scyths east of the Caspian. This was probably the actual route of part of the invaders, but H. clearly did not know it.
