River-Daughter of the Borysthenes

River-nymph tier (rendered 'deity'). Unnamed in the sources beyond 'daughter of Borysthenes'; her term carries the river's Greek name. Herodotos praises the Borysthenes as the most profitable of rivers (4.53).

Children

• First Man Targitaos

Domains

• rivers

Relations

• lover: Sky-Father PapaiosReciprocal of scythian_papaios.lover — In the Scythians' own origin myth, Targitaos is born of Zeus (Papaios) and a daughter of the river Borysthenes.Herodotus, Histories 4.5 (primary)

Sources

• The mother of the first man Targitaos is a daughter of the river Borysthenes (the Dnieper), joined with Zeus-Papaios.: Herodotos, Histories 4.5 (Godley) (primary)
• She represents the deified Dnieper, the river the Scythians revered most after the Istros (Hdt 4.53); a water-nymph consort of the sky-god in the dynastic charter.: D.S. Raevskiy (1977); R. Schmitt et al., Encyclopaedia Iranica, 'Scythians' (secondary)