Aethicus Ister

Aethicus Ister (Aethicus Donares, Aethicus of Istria or Aethicus Ister) was the protagonist of the 7th/8th-century Cosmographia, purportedly written by a man of church Hieronymus (Jerome, but not the Church Father Jerome), who purportedly censors an even older work for producing the book as its censored version. It is a forgery from the Middle Ages.

It describes the travels of Aethicus around the world, and includes descriptions of foreign peoples in usually less than favourable terms. It displays a flat Earth cosmology, maybe for making sport of it. There are also numerous passages which deal directly with the legends of Alexander the Great. Heinz Löwe (1913–1991) found a striking correspondence between the letters of Aethicus and the Old Turkic script. He considers Aethicus to be of late Avar ethnicity from the Carpathian basin. Aethicus is believed by Franz Brunhölzl to have been a Scythian that lived in the region of present day Dobrogea, Romania.