The Dahae, also known as the Daae, Dahas or Dahaeans (Old Persian: ; Ancient Greek: , , , ; Latin: ; Chinese: ; Persian: ) were an ancient Eastern Iranian nomadic tribal confederation, who inhabited the steppes of Central Asia. Identification The Dahae may have been the () or () people mentioned in the s as one of the five peoples following the Zoroastrian religion, along with the (), (), (), and (), although this identification is uncertain. The Iranologist János Harmatta has identified the Massagetae as being the same as the people named ("Saka who wear pointed hats") by the Persians, and with the . Harmatta's identification is based on the mention of the as living between the Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers, where Arrian also located the Massagetae and the Dahae. The scholars A. Abetekov and H. Yusupov have also suggested that the were a constituent tribe of the Massagetae. The scholar Y. A. Zadneprovskiy has instead suggested that the Dahae were descendants of the Massagetae. The scholar Marek Jan Olbrycht, who has also identified the Massagetae with the , however considers the as being a separate group from the Saka to which the Massagetae/ belonged. Location The Dahae initially lived in the north-eastern part of the Persian Achaemenid Empire, in the arid steppes of the Karakum Desert near Margiana, alongside the Saka groups and the Sogdians and Chorasmians, and immediately to the north of Hyrcania. During late 4th and early 3rd centuries BCE, the Dahae, and especially their constituent tribe of the Parni, had settled along the southern and southwestern fringes of the Karakum desert, and by the mid-3rd century BCE they had moved west and had settled along the southeastern shores of the Caspian Sea, in the lands to the north of Hyrcania. Two other Dahae tribes, the Xanthioi and the Pissouroi, lived further east till the regions to the north of Areia. Name The name of the Dahae, attested in the Old Persian form , is derived from a Saka language name meaning "man," based on the common practice among various peoples of calling themselves "man" in their own languages. This term is attested in the Khotanese form . The Dahae were a nomadic people, and no known sedentary settlement can be attributed to them. The scholar David Gordon White has instead suggested that the name of the Dahae meant "Stranglers," and was derived