[Scythian standards,] which they carry in war, are textiles decorated with a dye that simulates the appearance of snakes especially, and they are suspended on poles of equal length. Here is the clever use [sc. they are put to]: when those who are carrying them are running or are even mounted on horses, they swell out, so that they very much seem to look like the creatures, and they also make a sound in concert with the movement from the breeze that goes through them forcefully.