The Abundance Of The Necessaries Of Life Was So Very
Great, That A Gallon Of Wine Was Sometimes Sold In Italy For Less Than
Three Farthings, And A Quarter Of Wheat At About Five Shillings And
Sixpence.
Towards a country thus wisely governed, and rich and fertile,
commerce was naturally attracted; and it was encouraged and protected by
Theodoric:
He established a free intercourse among all the provinces by sea
and land: the city gates were never shut; and it was a common saying, "that
a purse of gold might safely be left in the field." About this period, many
rich Jews fixed their residence in the principal cities of Italy, for the
purposes of trade and commerce.
The most particular information we possess respecting the geographical
knowledge, and the Indian commerce of the ancients at the beginning of the
sixth century, is derived from a work of Cosmas, surnamed Indico Pleustes,
or the Indian navigator. He was originally a merchant, and afterwards
became a monk; and Gibbon justly observes, that his work displays the
knowledge of a merchant, with the prejudices of a monk. It is entitled
_Christian Topography_, and was composed at Alexandria, in the middle
of the fifth century, about twenty years after he had performed his voyage.
The chief object of his work was to confute the opinions that the earth was
a globe, and that there was a temperate zone on the south of the torrid
zone. According to Cosmas, the earth is a vast plane surrounded by a wall:
its extent 400 days' journey from east to west, and half as much from north
to south.
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