I was particularly fascinated by the discoveries of the Soviet archaeologist Sergei Rudenko. In the 1940s, Rudenko excavated several fifth-century B.C. tombs near Pazyryk on the northern slopes of the Altai Mountains, in the old Issedonian territory visited by Aristeas. Besides many gold artifacts including griffins, Rudenko was astonished to find some mummified nomads preserved in the permafrost for 2,500 years... Decades later, in 1993 and 1995, Russian archaeologists unearthed two more tattooed mummies of the same era near Pazyryk... These tattooed images closely matched the earliest literary records and the bronze Greek griffins from Samos. The conclusion was clear: These nomadic people had known the griffin lore collected by Aristeas!The key to being a successful nomad is to keep moving. These losers were so slow they actually mummified. ;')
I thought the Griffin lore originated with the steppe people...of note were the Schythians(sp).