TROGLODYTES, "cave-dwellers," a name applied by ancient writers to different tribes in various parts of the world. Strabo speaks of them in Moesia, south of the Danube (vii. 318), in the Caucasus (xi. 506), but especially in various parts of Africa from Libya (xvii. 828) to the Red Sea. The troglodyte Ethiopians of Herodotus (iv. 183) in inner Africa, very swift of foot, living on lizards and creeping things, and with a speech like the screech of an owl, have been identified with the Tebus of Fezzan. According to Aristotle (Hist. An viii. 12) a dwarfish race of Troglodytes dwelt on the upper course of the Nile, who pos sessed horses and were in his opinion the Pygmies of fable. But the best known of these African cave-dwellers were the inhabit ants of the "Troglodyte country" (T puyXoSitrucli) on the coast of the Red Sea, as far north as the Greek port of Berenice, as recorded by Diodorus (iii. 31) and Photius (p. 454 Bekker) from Agatharchides of Cnidus, and by Artemidorus in Strabo (xvi. 776).
They were a pastoral people, living entirely on the flesh of their herds, or, in the season of fresh pasture, on mingled milk and blood. But they killed only old or sick cattle (as indeed they killed old men who could no longer follow the flock), and the butchers were called "unclean." They gave the name of parent to no man, but only to the cattle which provided their subsist ence. They went almost naked; the women wore necklaces of shells as amulets. They practised circumcision or an operation of a more serious kind. The dead body, its neck and legs bound together with withies of the shrub called paliurus, was set up on a mound, and pelted with stones amidst the jeers of the onlookers, until its face was completely covered with them. A goat's horn was then placed above it, and the crowd dispersed with manifes tations of joy.