Salmasius, Indeed, Charges Him With Confounding The East And West
In His Description Of India.
His geography, in the most important
particular of the relative distances of places, is rendered of very little
utility or authority, from the circumstance pointed out and proved by
D'Anville, that he indiscriminately reckons eight stadia to the mile,
without reference to the difference between the Greek and Roman stadium.
He
has, however, added two articles of information to the geographical and
commercial knowledge of the east possessed before his time; the one is the
account of the new course of navigation from Arabia to the coast of
Malabar, which has been already described; the other is a description of
Trapobane, or Ceylon, which, though inaccurate and obscure in many points,
must be regarded as a real and important addition to the geographical
knowledge of the Romans.
Pliny's geography of the north is the most full and curious of all
antiquity. After describing the Hellespont, Moeotis, Dacia, Sarmatia,
ancient Scythia, and the isles in the Euxine Sea, and proceeding last from
Spain, he passes north to the Scythic Ocean, and returns west towards
Spain. The coast of part of the Baltic seems to have been partly known to
him; he particularly mentions an island called Baltia, where amber was
found; but he supposes that the Baltic Sea itself was connected with the
Caspian and Indian Oceans. Pliny is the first author who names Scandinavia,
which he represents as an island, the extent of which was not then known;
but by Scandinavia there is reason to believe the present Scandia is meant.
Denmark may probably be rcognised in the Dumnor of this author, and Norway
in Noligen. The mountain Soevo, which he describes as forming a vast bay
called Codanus, extending to the promontory of the Cimbri, is supposed by
some to be the mountains that run along the Vistula on the eastern
extremity of Germany, and by others to be that chain of mountains which
commence at Gottenburgh. The whole of his information respecting the north
seems to have been drawn from the expeditions of Drusus, Varus, and
Germanicus, to the Elbe and the Weser, and from the accounts of the
merchants who traded thither for amber.
Tacitus, who died about twenty years after Pliny, seems to have acquired a
knowledge of the north more accurate in some respects than the latter
possessed. In his admirable description of Germany, he mentions the
Suiones, and from the name, as well as other circumstances, there can be
little doubt that they inhabited the southern part of modern Sweden.
The northern promontory of Scotland was known to Diodorus Siculus under the
name of Orcas; but the insularity of Britain was certainly not ascertained
till the fleet sent out by Agricola sailed round it, about eighty-four
years after Christ. Tacitus, who mentions this circumstance, also informs
us, that Ireland, which was known by name to the Greeks, was much
frequented in his time by merchants, from whose information he adds, that
its harbours were better known than those of Britain: this statement,
however, there is much reason to question, as in the time of Caesar, all
that the Romans knew of Ireland was its relative position to Britain, and
that it was about half its size.
The emperor Trajan, who reigned between A.D. 98 and A.D. 117, was not only
a great conqueror, carrying the Roman armies beyond the Danube into Dacia,
and into Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Assyria, and thus extending and
rendering more accurate the geographical knowledge of his subjects; but he
was also attentive to the improvement and commercial prosperity of the
empire. He made good roads from one end of the empire to the other; he
constructed a convenient and safe harbour at Centum Cellae (Civita Vecchia),
and another at Ancona on the Adriatic: he dug a new and navigable canal,
which conveyed the waters of the Nahar-Malcha, or royal canal of
Nebuchadnezzar, into the river Tigris; and he is supposed to have repaired
or renewed the Egyptian canal between the Nile and the Red Sea. He also
gave directions and authority to Pliny, who was appointed governor of
Pontus and Bithynia, to examine minutely into the commerce of those
provinces, and into the revenues derived from it, and other sources.
The emperor Adrian passed nearly the whole of his reign in visiting the
different parts of his dominions: he began his journey in Gaul, and thence
into Germany; he afterwards passed into Britain. On his return to Gaul, he
visited Spain; on his next journey he went to Athens, and thence into the
east; and on his second return to Rome, he visited Sicily; his third
journey comprised the African provinces; his fourth was employed in again
visiting the east; from Syria he went into Arabia, and thence into Egypt,
where he repaired and adorned the city of Alexandria, restoring to the
inhabitants their former privileges, and encouraging their commerce. On his
journey back to Rome, he visited Syria, Thrace, Macedonia, and Athens. By
his orders, an artificial port was constructed at Trebizond on a coast
destitute by nature of secure harbours, from which this city derived great
wealth and splendour.
The only writer in the time of Adrian, from whom we can derive any
additional information respecting the geography and trade of the Romans, is
Arrian. He was a native of Nicodemia, and esteemed one of the most learned
men of his age; to him we are indebted for the journal of Nearchus's
voyage, an abstract of which has been given. His accuracy as a geographer,
is sufficiently established in that work, and indeed, in almost all the
particulars respecting India, which he has detailed in his history of the
expedition of Alexander the Great; and in his Indica, which may be regarded
as an appendix to that history. He lived at Rome, under the emperors
Adrian, Antoninus, and Marcus Aurelius, and was preferred to the highest
posts of honour, and even to the consulship.
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