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The Tauri have the following customs. They offer in sacrifice to the
Virgin all shipwrecked persons, and all Greeks compelled to put into
their ports by stress of weather. The mode of sacrifice is this.
After the preparatory ceremonies, they strike the victim on the head
with a club. Then, according to some accounts, they hurl the trunk
from the precipice whereon the temple stands, and nail the head to a
cross. Others grant that the head is treated in this way, but deny
that the body is thrown down the cliff - on the contrary, they say,
it is buried. The goddess to whom these sacrifices are offered the
Tauri themselves declare to be Iphigenia the daughter of Agamemnon.
When they take prisoners in war they treat them in the following way.
The man who has taken a captive cuts off his head, and carrying it to
his home, fixes it upon a tall pole, which he elevates above his
house, most commonly over the chimney. The reason that the heads are
set up so high, is (it is said) in order that the whole house may be
under their protection. These people live entirely by war and plundering.
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