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The '''Toreatae''' ([[Greek language|Greek]]: {{lang|grc|Τορεᾶται}}, [[Strabo]] xi. 2. 11) or '''Toretae''' (Greek: {{lang|grc|Τορεταί}}, [[Stephanus of Byzantium|Steph. B.]] ''s. v.''; Dionys. Per. 682; [[Pliny the Elder|Plin.]] vi. 5; [[Mela]], i. 2; Avien. ''Orb. Terr.'' 867) were a tribe of the [[Maeotae]] in Asiatic [[Sarmatians|Sarmatia]]. Strabo describes them as living among the [[Maeotae]], [[Sindi (people)|Sindi]], [[Dandarii]], [[Agri (Maeotae)|Agri]], [[Arrechi]], [[Tarpetes]], [[Obidiaceni]], [[Sittaceni]], [[Dosci]], and [[Aspurgiani]], among others. (xi. 2. 11) 

[[Ptolemy]] (v. 9. § 9) mentions a {{lang|grc|Τορετικὴ ἀκρὰ}} in Asiatic Sarmatia; and in another passage (iii. 5. § 25) he  speaks of the {{lang|grc|Τορεκκάδαι}} ([[Toreccadae]]) as a people in European Sarmatia, who are perhaps the same as the Toretae or Toreatae.

The Toreatae were one of the [[Maeotae]] tribes, who lived in the 1st millennium BC on the eastern and south-eastern coast of the [[Azov sea]]. Russian archeologists, historians and ethnographers in the Soviet period concluded that Maeotae was one of the names of the tribes of the [[Adyghe people]] (or [[Circassians]]): in the [[Great Soviet Encyclopedia]] (in the article ''[[Adyghe people]]'')  was written:<ref>[http://gatchina3000.ru/big/002/515_bolshaya-sovetskaya.htm Great Soviet Encyclopedia.Adyghe]</ref><blockquote>Living in the basin of the river Kuban were some of the tribes of the ([[Adyghe people]]), who generally were given the collective name "Maeotae" by ancient historians.</blockquote>

The [[Maeotae]], engaged in farming and fishing, were thought by other Soviet writers to be a mixture of speakers of [[Adyghe language]] and an [[Iranian languages|Iranian]] language. In the 4th–3rd centuries BC many of them were incorporated into the [[Bosporan kingdom]].<ref>[http://bse.sci-lib.com/article075575.html Меоты], [[Great Soviet Encyclopedia]]</ref>

==References==
{{Reflist|colwidth=30em}}
* [https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0198%3Abook%3D11%3Achapter%3D2%3Asection%3D11 Strabo's book 11 on-line]
*{{SmithDGRG}}

[[Category:Peoples of the Caucasus]]
[[Category:History of the North Caucasus]]
[[Category:Ancient history of the Caucasus]]
[[Category:Kabardino-Balkaria]]
[[Category:Ancient Circassian tribes]]

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