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ULTIMA THULE;
OR,
A SUMMER IN ICELAND.
[Illustration: From a Photo
M‘Farlane & Erskine, Lithrs. Edinr.
REYKJAVIK, THE CAPITAL OF ICELAND.
Frontispiece, Vol. I.]
ULTIMA THULE;
OR,
A SUMMER IN ICELAND.
BY
RICHARD F. BURTON.
With Historical Introduction, Maps, and Illustrations.
VOL. I
WILLIAM P. NIMMO.
LONDON: 14 KING WILLIAM STREET, STRAND;
AND EDINBURGH.
1875.
EDINBURGH:
PRINTED BY M‘FARLANE AND ERSKINE,
ST JAMES SQUARE.
DEDICATION.
TRIESTE, _March 1875_.
MY DEAR SIR,
Be pleased to accept this very inadequate return for the varied
information with which you have favoured me, and for all your
hospitality and kindness to me at Edinburgh and elsewhere.
You are so well known as a traveller in Iceland, and as a warm and
generous friend to the Icelander, that you will not be held responsible
for my over freedom of speech, nor for any unpopular opinions expressed
in the pages honoured by bearing your name.
Pray believe me,
Yours very sincerely,
RICHARD F. BURTON.
ROBERT MACKAY SMITH, ESQ.,
ETC., ETC., ETC.,
EDINBURGH.
“Signor, non sotto l’ombra in piaggia molle
Tra fonti e fior, tra Ninfe e tra Sirene;
Ma in cima al l’erto e faticoso colle,
Della virtù riposto è il nostro bene:
Chi non gela, e non suda, e non s’estolle
Dalle vie del piacer, là non perviene.”
--TASSO, xvii. 61.
“Not among nymphs and sirens, founts and flowers,
Not in voluptuous herbage in the shade;
But on the toilsome steep where valour towers
Alone, O Prince, our supreme good is laid;
Who from the paths of pleasure will not raise
His thoughts; nor freeze nor sweat, arrives not there.”
--JAMES.
“In somma, ho avuto sempre mai d’avanti agli occhi quelle sante
leggi della Storia, di non osar dire il falso, né temer di dire il
vero; e mi lusingo di non avervi contravenuto.”
--ABBATE CLAVIGERO.
PREFACE.
According to the fashion of the day, this volume should have been
published two years ago, shortly after my return from Iceland. The truth
is that before the second third had been written, I found a large fallow
of pre-historic study, the Castellieri of Istria, and I could not help
putting hand to the work at “Iceland’s” expense. But this much of delay
is, methinks, a disadvantage rather in popular prejudice than in point
of fact. The loss of freshness brings with it not a little gain. Whilst
all the scenes and events of a journey, during and immediately after its
progress, appear like an unartistic sketch, confused and without
comparative distance; time gives perspective, and relation of details,
and distinction of light and shade. Moreover, in treating of Iceland
there is present danger of misleading the reader, unless due reflection
correct hasty work. The subject is, to some extent, like Greece and
Palestine, of the sensational type: we have all read in childhood, about
those “Wonders of the World,” Hekla and the Geysir, and, as must happen
under the circumstances, we have all drawn for ourselves our own
Iceland--a distorted and exaggerated mental picture of what has not met,
and will not meet, the eye of sense. Moreover, the travellers of the
early century saw scenes of thrilling horror, of majestic grandeur, and
of heavenly beauty, where our more critical, perhaps more cultivated,
taste finds very humble features. They had “Iceland on the brain,” and
they were wise in their generation: honours and popularity await the man
who ever praises, the thorough partisan who never blames. But not the
less our revulsion of feeling requires careful coercion: it always risks
under-rating what we have found so much over-valued, of tinging
neutral-hued sobriety with an angry flush of disappointment.
I went to Iceland feeling by instinct that many travellers had
prodigiously exaggerated their descriptions, possibly because they had
seldom left home. “The most difficult and expensive country in the
world” would certainly prove cheap and easy after the Andes and the
Haurán. What could be made of “giddy rapid rivers” at most three feet
deep, and if deeper provided with ferries? Yet the “scare” had succeeded
in making a deep impression: one tourist came to Iceland prepared to
cross the streams “in buff,” and firmly determined on no account to
climb a scaur. “The ruts are only one danger of Icelandic travelling,
_the_ danger is crossing the streams,” says a modern author--how his
descriptions were derided by a couple of English officers who had ridden
about the Himalayas! What could I think of the “stupendous precipice of
Almannagjá,” of the “frightful chasm,” of the “dreadful abyss, causing
the most disagreeable emotions,” when also told that men ride up and
down the side? Yet another says, “rush for your life” from the
unfortunate Strokkr; whilst we are actually threatened with perils of
polar bears--half-starved wretches floated ashore upon ice-floes to be
slaughtered by the peasants with toy scythes before they can stretch
their cramped and numbed limbs. The “horrific deep chasms” of the
Reykjavik-Hafnafjörð road, and the popular sketches, affected me with
extreme incredulity. A friend described to me life in Iceland as living
in a corner, the very incarnation of the passive mood; and travelling
there as full of stolid, stupid risks, that invite you to come and to
repent coming, not like the swiftly pursuing or treacherously lurking
perils of tropical climes, but invested with a horror of their own--such
was not my experience.
Shortly after returning to England, I published, in the columns of the
_Morning Standard_ (October to November 1872), two letters for the
benefit of intending tourists and explorers. Written in the most sober
and realistic style, and translated into many of the languages of
Europe, they gained for me scant credit at home. “Old Identity” again
kicked against the goad of “New Iniquity,” and what could I expect?
Mackenzie and Henderson, who _would_ “feast wondering eyes” upon
everything and everybody, had set the example of treating Iceland as an
exceptional theme. They found followers: even the hard-headed Scot
gallops between Reykjavik and Thingvellir along the edge of a “dreadful
precipice,” where I saw only the humblest ravine; and travellers to the
age-weary, worn-out Geysir rise at midnight in their excitement to sing
those “grand old psalm-tunes, such as York and the Old Hundredth.” Need
it be said that Mr Cook’s pilgrim-tourists have done exactly the same
thing in the Holy Land?
My matter-of-fact notions were set down as the effects of “Peter
Porcupine,” over-“combativeness,” and the undue “spirit of opposition”
that characterises an Objector-General, with the “morbid object of
gaining popularity by stating something new”--a hasty judgment, which
justifies me in writing these volumes, and in supporting my previously
expressed views. I can appeal for confirmation to the dozen intelligent
English tourists who were in Iceland at the same time as myself: all
united with me in deriding their previous conceptions, and in forming
the estimate here offered to the public.
My plan throughout this volume has been as follows: The reader, not the
critic, is assumed to know as little about the island as its author did
before visiting it; and the first impressions are carefully recorded,
not only as a _mise en scène_, but for conciseness’ sake, so that only
differences, not resemblances, may require subsequent notice. Thus the
capital and its environs are painted at some length, whilst most authors
simply land at the little port, and set out at once for the interior.
The cruise to the north coast, and the “Cockney trip” to Hekla and the
Geysir are related with less circumstance, but I have added itineraries,
as such details have not yet appeared in English. The journey through
the eastern country claims considerable space. Critics tell us that
African travellers have so much trouble to reach the Unexplored Regions,
that they are apt to report all they see at wearying length, and to
empty the contents of their journals upon the public. But every mile of
new, or even comparatively new, ground deserves careful topographical
notices: let the general reader “skip” such photos if he likes, but let
them be written at least for the purpose of future comparison. Again,
the Icelanders may complain, like the Swiss, that, whilst their country
has become a touring-field to Europe, scant attention is paid to
themselves. I have endeavoured to remedy this grievance by ethnological
descriptions; and though it has been my desire to speak of things, and
states of things, not of persons, it has been impossible at times to
avoid personalities. And, whilst a wanderer knowing only enough of the
language to express his humble wants, whose travels have been limited to
a single fine season, has little right _ex cathedrâ_, to pronounce, even
in this scanty community, upon religion and politics, upon commerce and
civilisation; he is fully justified in quoting as his own the judgments
formed by consulting experts and authorities, upon whom his experience,
and that “sixth sense” developed by the life-long habit of observation,
have taught him to rely.
There is still much to be done in Iceland, and I flatter myself that the
fifteenth chapter, which shows my only attempt at actual exploration,
will supply adventurous men with useful hints. The geography, especially
of that huge white blot, the south-eastern part, is unknown; and a tyro
can be usefully employed there in collecting specimens of botany. The
meteorology, again, is highly interesting--does the cold in the “Insula
quæ glacialis dicitur” increase, as some have supposed, the effect of
the “precession of the equinoxes, the revolution of the apsides,
variations in the excentricity of the earth’s orbit,” etc.? Or has it
increased at all since Saga times? Evidently it would be most
interesting to compare the Icelandic glacier-formations with those of
Switzerland; and to determine if the rules laid down by the “De Saussure
of Great Britain,” the late Professor David Forbes, by Professor
Tyndall, and by Mr Whymper, the conqueror of the mighty Matterhorn, are
here applicable. As anthropologists, we ask why a people once so famed
for arms, if not for arts, has almost disappeared from the world’s
history--is the change caused by politics or religion; is it the logical
sequence of monarchy or “media,” of icy winters, of earthquakes and
volcanoes, of pestilence and famine? We are curious to learn why a noble
poetry should have ceased to sing. And as we have dwelt upon the past,
so we would speculate upon the future of the Scandinavian race, which is
supposed to be tending to reunion in its old homes, and which, as it
enlarges its education, will, like the Slav, take high rank in the
European family.
The main object of the book, however, has been to advocate the
development of the island. Sensible Icelanders freely confess that the
life-struggle at home is hard, very hard, and that the “Alma Mater” is a
“Dura Mater,” but they have not suggested any remedy for the evil. I
hold three measures to be absolutely necessary; the first is the working
of the sulphur deposits--not to mention the silica--now in English
hands; the second, a systematic reform of the primitive means and
appliances with which the islanders labour in their gold mines, the
fisheries; and, thirdly, the extension of the emigrating movement, now
become a prime need when the population is denser than at any period of
its thousand-year history. Concerning that “make-shift,” the pony
traffic, and the ill-judged export of sheep and black cattle, ample
details will also be found.
No care has been omitted in securing for these pages as much correctness
as the reader can expect. Mr Robert Mackay Smith, of Edinburgh, whose
name I have placed, with permission, at the beginning of this volume,
obliged me with the details of his own travels. Dr Richard S. Charnock,
whose extensive reading and access to libraries fit him well for the
task, assisted me in the Introductory Section, which treats of Thule. Mr
Gwyn Jeffreys kindly examined my little collection of shells; Mr Alfred
Newton was good enough to suggest hints concerning a possible “last of
the Gare-fowl;” and Mr Watts, of Vatna-, or rather Klofa-, Jökull fame,
gave me a list of his stages. My fellow-traveller, Mr Alfred G. Lock of
Roselands, kept me thoroughly well posted, at great trouble to himself,
in ephemeral literature concerning Iceland. When preparing my manuscript
for the press, I found that the notes showed various lacunæ and want of
details resulting from lack of time: Mr Jón A. Hjaltalín of the
Advocates’ Library, Edinburgh, whose name is sufficient recommendation,
consented to become my _collaborateur_ in working up the Introduction;
and Mr A. H. Gunlögsen has revised the sheets in my absence from home.
Of the late Dr Cowie I shall speak in another place. Mr Vincent
courteously placed his paper on “Sulphur in Iceland,” at my disposal;
and Mr P. le Neve Foster, Secretary of the Society of Arts, allowed me
to borrow from it or to reprint it. Mr William P. Nimmo has brought out
the book in the most handsome and liberal form. I thank these gentlemen
from my heart, and, at the same time, I warn my readers that all sins of
commission and omission occurring in these pages, must be charged upon
the author, and the author alone.
* * * * *
Allow me to conclude this necessary preliminary ramble with the lines of
good “old Dan Geffry:”
“For every word men may not chide or pleine,
For in this world certain ne wight there is
That he ne doth or sayth sometime amis.”
CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTION.
SECTION I.
OF THULE PAGE
Thule, Poetical and Rhetorical, 2
Strabo, Mela, Pliny, Ptolemy, 3
Thule, part of Great Britain, 11
Thule = Scandia, 23
Thule = Iceland, 25
Thule (Etymology of), 32
SECTION II.
PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY OF ICELAND.
Genesis and Geology, 35
Hydrography, 53
Climate, 55
Chronometry, 70
Summary, 75
SECTION III.
HISTORICAL NOTES, 78
SECTION IV.
POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY OF ICELAND.
General Considerations, 113
Divisions, 116
Judicial Procedure, 120
SECTION V.
ANTHROPOLOGY.
Statistics, 122
General Considerations, 130
Personal Appearance, 131
Character, 137
Society, 141
The Family, 148
Diseases, 151
SECTION VI.
EDUCATION AND PROFESSIONS.
Education, 155
Professions, 162
SECTION VII.
ZOOLOGICAL NOTES, ETC.
Animals Wild and Tame, 169
Notes on the Flora, 175
Agriculture and Cattle-Breeding, 179
Fisheries and Fishing, 189
Industry, 198
Emigration, 208
SECTION VIII.
TAXATION, ETC.
Taxation, 209
Coins, 215
Weights and Measures, 218
Communication and Commerce, 219
Visit to the Store, 225
Prices and Imports, 230
SECTION IX.
CATALOGUE, ETC.
Catalogue-Raisonné of Modern Travels
in Iceland, 235
Preparations for Travel, 260
CHAPTER I.
The Steam-Ship “Queen”--The Orkneys and Maes Howe--The Shetlands
and the Færoe Islands, 267-300
Note on Stone Implements, 300-306
CHAPTER II.
The Landfall--Fishing Fleet--To Reykjavik, 307-329
CHAPTER III.
Reykjavik--The Suburbs--The Lodging-House--The Club and
the Way we spend the Day, 330-347
CHAPTER IV.
Sunday at Reykjavik--Drinking in Iceland, 348-362
CHAPTER V.
Visits--Convivialities--The Catholic View of the
“Reformation”--Surtar-brand--The
Home-Rule Party, 363-380
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
VOL. I.
Reykjavik, Capital of Iceland, _Frontispiece_.
General Map of Iceland, _Introduction_, 1
The Dwarfie Stone, Hoy, Orkney, 266
St Magnus’ Cathedral and Earl’s Palace, Kirkwall, 283
Stone Implements found in Shetland, 303-306
Cottage in Reykjavik, 337
The Anglo-Icelandic Host, 345
The Lich-House, Cemetery, Reykjavik, 349
Iceland Woman--Sunday Wear, 354
Iceland Woman--Monday Wear, 355
The Head Constable, 358
[Illustration: ICELAND.]
ULTIMA THULE;
OR,
A SUMMER IN ICELAND.
INTRODUCTION.
SECTION I. OF THULE.
But is Iceland “Ultima Thule?”
The author hopes to make it evident that “Thule” was used according to
date in five several senses--a sufficient reason for the confusion which
has so long invested the subject. It has been well remarked that no
place is more often mentioned by the ancients than the “island hid from
us by snow and winter;” and yet, that no position is more
controverted.[1] There has been a “King of Thule,” and now there is a
“Princess of Thule,”--but where and what is “Thule?”
It will take some time to clear up the darkness which has been heaped by
a host of writers upon “Thule,” and we will begin by distributing the
debated word.
_Firstly_, It was attributed poetically, rhetorically, and per
synecdochen, to the northern “period of cosmographie,” and to its
people, real or supposed.
_Secondly_, It was applied to Iceland, and to Iceland only, from the
earliest ages of its exploration.
_Thirdly_, In the centuries when imperial Rome extended her sceptre to
the north of “the Britains;” it was given to the outlying parts,
Ireland, Scotland, the Orkneys, the Shetlands, and features known only
to fabulous geography.
_Fourthly_, The later Roman writers prolonged it to the “Scania Island,”
modern Norway, Sweden, and Lapland. This Thule should be called
“Procopiana.”
_Fifthly_, Between the establishment of Christianity in England, and the
official or modern rediscovery, the term Thule was once more, as of old,
limited to Iceland.
I.
“THULE,” POETICAL AND RHETORICAL.
The following are popular instances of Thule used in its first sense,
the remotest part of the septentrional world, when it was a “fabulosa
non minus quam famosa insula.” Virgil has only one allusion to it
(Georg., i. 30, 31):
“Tibi serviat ultima Thule,
Teque sibi generum Tethys emat omnibus undis;”
but his epithet has been consecrated by a bevy of succeeding poets.
Servius, commenting upon Virgil, explains:
“Thyle insula est oceani inter septentrionalem et occidentalem
plagam, ultra Britanniam, Hiberniam, Orcadas;”
which is vague enough. He is afterwards more precise:
“At this island, when the sun is in Cancer, the days are said to be
continuous without nights. Various marvels are related of it, both
by Greek and later writers; by Ctesias and Diogenes among the
former, and by Samnonicus among the latter.”
The work of Ctesias here referred to is little known: Thule would hardly
enter into Persica and Indica (B.C. 400). Of Diogenes presently.
Samnonicus Sorenus was a writer put to death by command of Caracalla
(Notes and Queries, t. ii., v. 119, p. 301).
L. Annæus Seneca (ob. A.D. 65) first re-echoes Virgil in the celebrated
“prophetic verses,” whose sense has been extended to the New World:
“Venient annis secula seris,
Quibus Oceanus vincula rerum
Laxet, et ingens pateat tellus,
Tethysque novos detegat orbes,
Nec sit terris ultima Thule.”
--Medea, 375, et seq.
Ammianus Marcellinus (ob. circ. A.D. 390) uses (History, lib. xviii., 6,
31) the adage, “Etiamsi apud Thulen moraretur Ursicinus.”
Claudius Claudianus (flor. A.D. 395-408) sings:
“Et nostro procul axe remotam
Insolito belli tremeficit murmure Thulen!”
--De Bell. Getic., 203, _et seq._
And--
“Te vel Hyperboreo damnatam sidere Thulen,
Te vel ad incensas Libyæ comitatur arenas.”
--_In Rufin._, ii. 240.
Finally, we find in Aurelius Prudentius (nat. A.D. 348):
“Ultima littora Thules
Transadigit.”
II.
STRABO, MELA, PLINY, PTOLEMY.
Entering upon the second phase of the subject, it is advisable to
consider what has been written concerning Thule, by the four patriarchs
of classical geography. With Strabo Thule is Iceland; in Mela it is
indefinite; and to Pliny and Ptolemy it is part of Britain, with an
_arrière pensée_ of Iceland: of Pytheas and Eratosthenes we must also
say a few words.
STRABO.
Strabo (nat. B.C. 54; Introduction, vol. i., p. 99, Hamilton and
Falconer’s translation, Bohn, 1854) tells us, § 2:
“Thence (_i.e._, from the Dneiper) to the parallel of Thule, which
Pytheas says is six days’ sail north from Britain and near the
Frozen Sea, other 11,500 stadia” [a measure which we will assume
with Leake to be 700 = 1°].
Again, § 3:
“But that the Dneiper is under the same parallel as Thule, what man
in his senses could ever agree to this? Pytheas, who has given us
the history of Thule, is known to be a man upon whom no reliance
can be placed; and other writers who have seen Britain and
Ierne[2](Ireland?), although they tell us of many small islands
round Britain, make no mention whatever of Thule.”
In § 4:
“Now from Marseille to the centre of Britain is not more than 5000
stadia; and if from the centre of Britain we advance north not more
than 4000 stadia, we arrive at a temperature in which it is
scarcely possible to exist. Such indeed is that of Ierne.
Consequently the far region in which Eratosthenes places Thule must
be totally uninhabitable. By what guess-work he arrived at the
conclusion that between the latitude of Thule and the Dnieper there
was a difference of 11,500 stadia, I am unable to divine.”
In book ii., chap. 4, §§ 1, 2, he thus disposes of Pytheas (“by whom
many have been deceived”):
“It is this last writer who states that he travelled all over
Britain on foot, and that the island is above 40,000 stadia in
circumference.[3] It is likewise he who describes Thule and other
neighbouring places, where, according to him, neither earth, water,
nor air exist separately, but a sort of concretion of all these,
resembling marine sponge, in which the earth, the sea, and all
things were suspended, this forming, as it were, a link to unite
the whole together. It can neither be travelled over nor sailed
through. As for the substance, he affirms that he has beheld it
with his own eyes; the rest he reports on the authority of others.
So much for the statements of Pytheas, who tells us besides, that
after he had returned thence, he traversed the whole coasts of
Europe from Gades to the Don. Polybius asks, ‘How is it possible
that a private individual, and one too in narrow circumstances,
could ever have performed such vast expeditions by sea and land?[4]
And how could Eratosthenes, who hesitates whether he may rely on
his statements in general, place such entire confidence in what the
writer relates concerning Britain, Gades, and Iberia?’ Says he,
‘It would have been better had Eratosthenes trusted to the
Messenian (Euhemerus or Evemerus) rather than to this writer. The
former merely pretends to have sailed into one [unknown] country,
viz., Panchæa, but the latter that he has visited the whole of the
north of Europe, as far as the ends of the earth; which statement,
even had it been made by Mercury, we should not have believed.
Nevertheless Eratosthenes, who terms Euhemerus a Bergæan, gives
credit to Pytheas, although even Dicærchus would not believe him.’”
In book ii., chap. 5, § 8, we have a further notice of Thule:
“It is true that Pytheas Massiliensis affirms that the farthest
country north of the British Islands is Thule; for which place, he
says, the summer tropic and the Arctic circle is all one. But he
records no other particulars concerning it; [he does not say]
whether Thule is an island, or whether it continues habitable up to
the point where the summer tropic becomes one with the Arctic
circle. For myself, I fancy that the northern boundaries of the
habitable earth are greatly south of this. Modern writers tell us
of nothing beyond Ierne which lies just north of Britain, where the
people live miserably and like savages, on account of the severity
of the cold. It is here, in my opinion, the bounds of the habitable
earth ought to be fixed.”
Finally, in book iv., chap. 5, § 5, we have the most important notice of
all:
“The description of Thule is still more uncertain on account of its
secluded situation; for they consider it the northernmost of all
lands, of which the names are known. The falsity of what Pytheas
has related concerning this and neighbouring places, is proved by
what he has asserted of well-known countries. For if, as we have
shown, his descriptions of these is in the main incorrect, what he
says of far distant countries is still more likely to be false.
_Nevertheless, as far as astronomy and mathematics are
concerned,[5] he appears to have reasoned correctly that people
bordering on the frozen zone would be destitute of cultivated
fruits and almost deprived of the domestic animals_; that their
food would consist of millet, herbs, fruits, and roots; and that
where there was corn and honey they would make drink of these. That
having no bright sun they would thresh their corn and store it in
vast granaries, threshing-floors being useless on account of the
rain and want of sun.”
The whole question evidently hinges upon the credibility of Pytheas
Massiliensis, who travelled about the time of Alexander the Great. It
has been ably argued, pro and con, by a host of writers, and in our day
by the late Sir G. C. Lewis (Astronomy of the Ancients, p. 467, et
seq.), and by Sir John Lubbock (Prehistoric Times, p. 59). But the
dispute has not been settled. I would remark that the old traveller’s
account is consistent enough. He appears to place Thule under N. lat.
66° (assuming, as Strabo does, the tropic at 24°), a parallel which
would pass through the north of Iceland. He is quite right about the
absence of fruits. His spongy matter may have been ice-brash, Medusæ,
the German meer-lungen, or even pumice-stone, which modern travellers
have found floating in such quantities upon the sea, within reach of
volcanoes, that their movements were arrested. We read that about a
month before the eruption of A.D. 1783, a submarine vent burst forth at
a distance of nearly seventy miles in a south-westerly direction off
Cape Reykjanes, and ejected such immense quantities of pumice that the
surface of the ocean was covered with it to the distance of 150 miles,
and the spring ships were impeded in their course. Also when Herodotus,
a Greek--whose world embraced the Eridanus or Amber River, the Tin
Isles, the Arimaspians and the Hyperboreans--could confound snow with
feathers, Pytheas, a Marseillais, might be allowed some latitude in
describing glaciers. Poverty has not prevented the most audacious
journeys; and discovery has been mainly the work of individuals. Geminus
(Isagoge, etc., cap. 5) opines that Pytheas was taken to Iceland against
his will. The barbarians showed him where the sun set on the shortest
day, and rose again after a short interval. Then the sea began to
thicken “pulmonis marini (πνεὑμονι θαλαττἱῳ) simile.” He afterwards
heard that where the sun does not set, is the uttermost part of the
world, and cannot be travelled over. Greek _outrecuidance_ evidently
hated to be taught by a kind of Gaul like Pytheas. Strabo, with his
captious, bilious, and acrid criticism, is wrong, and Pytheas is right,
in a highly important part of the question, the inhabitability of the
island. In fact, sundry modern writers have declared that, as far as we
have the means of judging, Strabo’s predecessors, Pytheas and
Eratosthenes, were more correctly informed than he was concerning the
geography of the western parts of Europe.[6] The learned Isaac Casaubon
(Commentaries upon Strabo) thus decides the question clean against his
author: “Thule--non esse aliam quæ Islandia hodie dicitur, facile doctis
viris assentior.” He adds that Eratosthenes held Pytheas to be an
oracle, but when Polybius and others found his geography loose in points
familiar to the Greeks, they pronounced him a liar, and rejected all he
wrote.
I must therefore conclude that Pytheas, with all his fables, by Thule
meant Iceland, and Iceland only; moreover, that he had acquired some
knowledge of the island. Indeed Gosselin opined that both Pytheas and
Eratosthenes had had access to the memoirs of some unknown ancient
people to whom Europe and its seas were as well known as to ourselves.
He argues that this people could not have been Babylonians, Phœnicians,
Carthaginians, nor Egyptians. Bailly (Hist. de l’Astr. An., 1-3),
entertaining a similar opinion, supposes them, after the fashion of the
day, to be Antediluvians.
MELA.
Pomponius Mela (A.D. 41-54; De Situ Orbis, iii. 6) is our next
authority. After mentioning Britannia and Iverna, the thirty islands of
the Orcades, the seven Hæmodæ (Shetlands) fronting Germany,[7] and the
Scandinavian Isle held by the Teutons,[8] he says:
“Thule fronts the seaboard of the Belcæ (alii Belgæ and Bergæ),[9]
an island celebrated in the Greek poetry and in our own. There, as
the sun rises to set afar off, the nights are indeed short; but
during winter, as in other places, obscure; in summer they are
light, because throughout that season (the sun), already raising
himself higher (above the horizon), despite not being seen, yet
illuminates the nearest parts by his approaching splendour. At the
solstices there is no darkness, because then (the sun), becoming
more manifest, shows not only his rays, but the greater part” (of
his disc).
PLINY.
The next authority is Pliny (nat. A.D. 23, ob. A.D. 79), who makes Thule
the northernmost British island. Both he and Cæsar (Bell. Gall., v. 13),
placing Mona about N. lat. 66°, declare that the sun does not set in
summer, but perpetually disappears during the winter solstice. To the
former phase Cæsar assigns thirty days, Pliny six months (_senis
mensibus_). The great natural philosopher mentions the Massilian
traveller without abusing him:
“Pytheas informs us that this is the case (_i.e._, the day lasting
six months, and the night being of equal length) in the island of
Thule, which is six days’ sail from the north of Britain” (Nat.
Hist., vol. i., book ii., chap. 77, Bostock and Riley, Bohn, 1835).
In book iv., chap. 30, occurs:
“The most remote of all that we find mentioned is Thule, in which,
as we have previously stated, there is no night at the summer
solstice, when the sun is passing through the sign of Cancer;
while, on the other hand, at the winter solstice there is no day.”
Again (loc. cit.):
“There are writers also who make mention of some other islands,
Scandia, namely, Damna, Bergos, and, greater than all, Nerigos (or
Nerigo, Noreg, _i.e._, Norway), from which persons embark for
Thule. At one day’s sail from Thule, is the Frozen Ocean, which by
some is called the Cronian Sea.”
Finally, in book vi., chap. 39, we find:
“The last of all is the Scythian parallel,[10] which runs from the
Riphæan range to Thule, in which, as we have already stated, the
year is divided into days and nights alternately of six months’
duration.”
With these passages before us, it is easy to understand why popular
writers generally assume Pliny’s Thule to be the Shetland Isles. But he
evidently confirms the account of Pytheas, and adds the significant
detail about the Cronian or Frozen Sea. It is well established that the
ocean south of Iceland is not icy, whilst the northern and western
shores are often frost-bound.
PTOLEMY.
Claudius Ptolemy, the Pelusian (flor. A.D. 159-161) notices θούλη in
nine places. After correcting (book i., chap. 20, §§ 7, 8,[11] = p.
17[12]) the errors of Maximus of Tyre, he says (book i., chap. 24, § 4,
= p. 19): “Consequently also the parallel passing through Thule shall be
laid down as ν β’ (52) sections from η το ζ η, along the lines of
latitude ξ, ο, π.” The same chapter (§ 6, = p. 20) tells us, “Also shall
be comprehended the interval between ο and κ southwards, that is,
between the parallels passing through Thule and through Rhodes κ ζ (27)
sections.” Thirdly, the same chapter (§ 17, = p. 22) continues: “κ,
through which shall be described the line (of latitude) defining the
north, and falling on the island of Thule.” Fourthly, in the same (§ 20,
= p. 22), we find: “And as τὸ μῆκος (the longitude) is commensurable
with τὸ πλάτος (the latitude), since upon the sphere whose great circle
is five, of these the parallel passing through Thule is about β and δ´”
(2¼).
Book ii., chap. 3, § 32, = p.28, establishes the position of Thule:
“And above them (the Orkades) is the (island of) Thule, whose--
Western parts are in E. long. (Ferro?) 29° N lat. 63°
The Easternmost being in ” ” 31° 40´ ” 63°
” Northernmost ” ” ” 30° 20´ ” 63° 15´
” Southernmost ” ” ” 30° 20´ ” 62° 40´
And the Mid Isle in, ” ” 30° 20´ ” 63° “
The sixth book (chap. 16, § 1, = p. 113) tells us:
“Serica is bounded west by Scythia beyond the Imaus mountain,
according to the line laid down; on the north by an unknown land on
the parallel passing through Thule; on the east by regions also
unknown, along the meridional line whose limits are:
“E. long. 180´´ N. lat. 63°
” 18° ” 35°”
Again we find (book vii., chap. 5, § 12, = p. 125):
“But the northern part is bounded by the parallel which is north of
the equinoctial line 63 parts (_i.e._, N. lat. 63°), and this is
described through Thule, the Island. So that the breadth of the
known world is 76° 25´, or in round numbers, 80 degrees.”[13]
Lastly (book viii., chap, 3, § 3, = p. 131) we are told:
“But the (Island) Thule has its greatest day of twenty equinoctial
hours, and from Alexandria it is distant two equinoctial hours to
the west.”[14]
Thus Ptolemy’s Thule is a long narrow island, 160 by 35 miles, and his
description, despite the times in which he wrote, is applicable rather
to North Britain and even to Iceland, than to Scandinavia. He is
consistent in his assertions: (1.) That Thule is an island; (2.) That
its northernmost point extends to 3° 17´ south of the Polar circle (66°
32´); (3.) That it lies north of the Orcades.[15] Manifestly we cannot
rely upon the longitudes, Ptolemy’s first meridian being still _sub
judice_. The late Mr Hogg suggested[16] that the zero of longitude was
not, as usually assumed, at Ferro in the Fortunate Islands (W. long.
(G.) 24° 23´ 40´´ to 24° 34´), but at “S. Antonio, Cape Verd Islands”
(read São Antão[17]) in W. long. (G.) 25° 2´ 40´´ to 25° 25´ 45´´--a
change which would give in round numbers a difference of fifty
miles.[18] Nothing more need be added upon this head. Pytheas and
Eratosthenes evidently referred to Iceland; Mela did the same in making
it front Bergen; Pliny heard of it when he relates that from Nerigos
persons embark for Thule; and neglecting Ptolemy’s latitudes and
longitudes, his description tallies best with Iceland.
III.
THULE, PART OF GREAT BRITAIN
Of Thule applied to some part of Great Britain we have a multitude of
instances, which are ably and lengthily brought together by Sir Robert
Sibbald.[19] Our writer begins by establishing the fact that the
ancients connected the idea of darkness with the north.
“These places of Homer πρὸς ζόφον (ad caliginem), and οὐ γὰρ ἴδμεν
ὅπου ζόφου (neque enim scimus ubi sit caligo), are by Strabo (ii. §
6) interpreted of the north, “Nescimus ubi sit Septentrio” (We know
not where the north is).
He quotes Tibullus (nat. circ. B.C. 54; iv. 1, 154):
“Illic et densâ tellus absconditur umbrâ.”
And Pub. Papinius Statius (nat. circ. A.D. 61; Sylv., iii., Ad Claudiam
Uxorem, v. 20):
“Vel super Hesperiæ vada caligantia Thiles.”
Again (Sylv., iv. 4, 62):
“----aut nigræ littora Thule.”
And again (Sylv., v. 1, 90, 91):
“----quantum ultimus orbis,
Cesserit et refluo circumsona gurgite Thule.”
Strabo (book ii., chap. 4, § 8) is quoted to show by Pytheas, that Thule
is “one of those islands that are called British,” and we have seen
Strabo’s own opinion that it lies farther south than where the Massilian
placed it. He quotes Catullus (B.C. 87; Ad Furium Carm., xii.):
“Sive trans altas gradietur Alpes,
Cæsaris visens monumenta magni,
Gallicum Rhenum, horribilesque ultimosque Britannos;”
and Horace (i. 35, 30):
“Serves iturum Cæsarem in ultimos
Orbis Britannos;”
to show that the Britons were the northernmost people then known. Due
use is made of Silius Italicus (nat. circ. A.D. 25; Punic, lib. xvii.,
417, 418):
“Cœrulus hand alitur cum dimicat incola Thule,
Agmina falcifero circumvenit arcta covino,”
for it appears from Cæsar’s Commentaries, that the bluish colour and the
fighting out of hooked chariots were in use among the inhabitants of
Britain. Pliny also (N. H., iv. 30) treats of Thule in the same chapter
where he treats of the British Isles, “ultima omnium quæ memoratum est
Thule.” Tacitus says (Agric. Vita, cap. x.) when the Roman navy sailed
about Britain, “dispecta est et Thule.”[20]
‘Ireland, properly so called, was the first of the British Isles which
got the name Thule, being the first that the Carthaginians met with as
they steered their course from Cadiz to the west; and hence it is that
Statius (Ad Claud. Uxor., lib. iii., v. 20) calls Thule ‘Hesperia,’ and
it seems to be the same that is said by (the pseudo) Aristotle (Liber de
Mirab. Auscult) to have been discovered by the Carthaginians when he
speaks thus (lxxxv.):
“‘In the sea beyond the Pillars of Hercules, they say, the
Carthaginians found a fertile island uninhabited, abounding in wood
and navigable rivers, and stored with very great plenty of fruits
(_fructibus_) of all sorts,[21] distant several days’ voyage from
the continent.’
And Bochartus (Geog. Sac.) confirms this by what he observes, that an
ancient author, Antonius Diogenes,[22] who wrote twenty-four books of
the strange things (or Incredibilities) related of Thule,[23] not long
after the time of Alexander the Great, had his history from the Ciparis
Tables, dug at Tyre out of the tombs of Mantinea and Dercilis
(Dercyllides), who had gone from Tyre to Thule, and had stayed some time
there. But though this be the first Thule discovered by the
Carthaginians, yet it is not that mentioned by the Roman writers, for
they speak of the Thule which the Romans were in and made a conquest of,
but it is certain they were never in Iceland properly so called.
“That they were in Thule appears from Statius (Sylv., v. 2, 54):
“‘----quantusque nigrantem
Fluctibus occiduis fessoque Hyperione Thulen
Intrârit mandata gerens.’
Now the father of Crispinus, to whom he writes, was Vectius Bolanus,
governor of Britain, A.D. 69, under Vitellius (as Tacitus informs us),
which is clearly proved by the same poet (Sylv., v. 2, 140-143):
“‘Quod si te magno tellus frenata parenti
Accipiat--
Quanta Caledonios attollet gloria campos!
Cum tibi longævus referet trucis incola terræ;
Hic suetus dare jura parens.’
The words ‘Caledonios’ and’ trucis incola terræ’ clearly show that by
Thule is meant the north part of Britain, which was then possessed by
the Picts, designed by the name ‘Caledonios,’ and by the Scots, designed
as ‘trucis incola terræ,’ the same epithet that Claudian (De Bell. Get.,
416) gives to the Scots in these verses:
“‘Venit et extremis legio prætenta Britannis,
Quæ Scoto dat fræna truci, ferroque notatas
Perlegit exsangues Picto moriente figuras.’
And of this north part of Britain that verse of Juvenal (Sat., xv. 112):
“‘De conducendo loquitur jam rhetore Thule,’[24]
is also to be understood. Of this the best exposition is taken from
Tacitus (Agric., xxi.):
“‘Jam verò principum filios, liberalibus artibus erudire, et
ingenia Britannorum studiis Gallorum anteferre, ut qui modò linguam
Romanum abnuebant, eloquentiam concupiscerent.’
“Claudian (De III. Consul. Honor., 52-56) yet more particularly gives
the name of Thule to the north part of Britain:
“‘Facta tui numerabat avi, quem littus adustæ
Horrescit Libyæ, ratibusque impervia Thule.
Ille leves Mauros, nec falso nomine Pictos
Edomuit, Scotumque vago mucrone secutus,
Fregit Hyperboreas remis audacibus undas.’
And in these lines (De IV. Consul. Honor., 26-33):
“‘Ille, Caledoniis posuit qui castra pruinis,
Qui medios Libyæ sub casside pertulit æstus,
Terribilis Mauro, debellatorque Britanni
Littoris, ac pariter Boreæ vastator et Austri.
Quid rigor æternus cœli, quid sidera prosunt?
Ignotumque fretum? Maduerunt Saxoue fuso,
Orcades: incaluit Pictorum sanguine Thule:
Scotorum cumulos flevit glacialis Ierne,’
where, by placing the Moors and Britons as the remotest people then
known, and mentioning the Scots and Picts as the inhabitants of Thule
and Ierne, he demonstrates clearly that Thule is the north part of the
isle of Britain, inhabited by the Scots and Picts. For this Ierne, or,
as some read it, ‘Hyberne,’ can no way be understood of Ireland properly
so called; first, because Ireland can never deserve the epithet
‘glacialis,’[25] since, by the testimony of the Irish writers, the snow
and ice continue not any time there; secondly, the Romans were never in
Ireland, whereas, according to the above-mentioned verses, Theodosius
passed over the Friths of Forth and Clyde, called by him ‘Hyperboreæ
undæ,’ and entered Strathearn, which to this day bears the name Ierne;
in which Roman medals are found, and the Roman camps and military ways
are to be seen--the undoubted testimonies of their being there; and
therefore is so to be understood in the same poet’s lines upon Stilicho
(see De Laud. Stilich., lib. ii., 250-254), who was employed in the
British war:
“‘Me quoque vicinis pereuntem gentibus, inquit,
Me juvit Stilicho, totam cum Scotus Iernen
Movit, et infesto spumavit remige Tethys.
Illius effectum curis, ne tela timerem
Scotica, ne Pictum tremerem.’
Now, Tethys in these verses, and the ‘undæ Hyperboreæ’ in the verses
before mentioned, cannot be understood of the sea between Scotland and
Ireland, for Ireland lies to the south of the Roman province, and the
situation of the Scots’ and Picts’ country is to the north of it; for
it was separated by the two Friths of Forth and Clyde from the Roman
province, which clearly shows it was to be understood of them: the same
thing that is also imported by the words ‘Hyperboreas undas’ and
‘remis;’ for these cannot be understood of the Irish Sea, which is to
the south of the Roman province, and is very tempestuous, and cannot so
well be passed by oars as the Friths of Forth and Clyde. And the same
poet has put this beyond all doubt (in the verses before quoted, De
Bell. Get., 416).
“For were it to be understood of the Irish Sea, then the wall and the
‘prætenturæ’ (_legio prætenta_) should have been placed upon the
Scottish shore that was over against that country, which is called
Strathearn now, and is the true Ierne not only mentioned by Claudian,
but also by Juvenal in these verses (I. Sat., ii. 160):
“‘Arma quidem ultra
Litora Juvenæ promovimus, et modò captas
Oreadas, ac minimâ contentos nocte Britannos.’
“That this Thule was a part of Britain, the Roman writers seem to be
very clear, especially Silius Italicus in the verses before quoted.
“But to make it appear which part of Britain the Thule was which is
mentioned by the Romans, it will be fit to see to which part of Britain
the epithets attributed by writers to Thule do best agree. First, then,
it was a remote part, ‘ultima Thule,’ as if this were the remotest part
of Britain; so Tacitus (Agric., xxx.) brings in Galgacus expressing it,
‘We, the uttermost bounds of land and liberty,’ etc. Then Thule was
towards the north, and so was this country with respect to the Roman
province; and, thirdly, it might deserve the name Thule (darkness),
because of its obscure and dark aspect, it being in those days all
overgrown with woods. Fourthly, the length of the day annexed to Thule:
and, upon this account, it must be the country to the north and to the
east of Ierne, by the verses of Juvenal before mentioned (V. Sat., xv.
112).
“Another property of Thule given by Tacitus (loc. cit.) is that about it
is ‘mare pigram et grave remigantibus,’ which agrees indeed to the sea
upon the north-east part of Scotland, but not for the reason that
Tacitus gives, _i.e._, for want of winds, but because of the contrary
tides which drive several ways, and stop not only boats with oars, but
ships under sail.
“But Thule is most expressly described to be this very same country that
we treat of by Conradus Celtes:
“‘Orcadibus quâ cincta suis Tyle et glacialis
Insula.’
“This same epithet Claudian (see p. 15) gives to Ierne, when he calls it
‘Glacialis Ierne;’ and this Thule he makes to be encompassed ‘suis
Orcadibus,’ which isles lie over-against it; and a little after he gives
it the like epithet with ‘mare pigrum.’
“‘Et jam sub septem spectant vaga rostra Trionos
Quà Tyle est rigidis insula cincta vadis.’
And afterwards he makes the Orcades to lie over-against this Thule, and
seems to have in his eye the skerries and weels in Pictland (Pentland?)
Frith in these lines:
“‘Est locus Arctoo quà se Germania tractu
Claudit, et in rigidis Tyle ubi surgit aquis,
Quam juxta infamos scopuli et petrosa vorago
Asperat undisonis saxa pudenta vadis
Orcadas has memorant dictas a nomine Græco.”[26]
“But the clearest testimony of all we owe to Arngrimus Jonas (Specimen
Islandicum, A.D. 1593),[27] when he brings in the verses of Fortunatus
(lib. viii., cap. 1), who sings of St Hilarion (ob. A.D. 372):
“‘Eloquii currente rotâ penetravit ad Indos,
Ingeniumque potens ultima Thule colit.’
“And then reckoning up the several nations enlightened by him, he
mentions Britain amongst the rest:
“‘Thrax, Italus, Scytha, Persa, Indus,
Geta, Daca, Britannus.’[28]
“To which he adds, ‘From whence it may fairly enough be inferred that
either Britain or (as Pliny will have it) some island of Britain was the
_ultima Thule_.’ And afterwards, ‘To confirm the opinion of Pliny and
his followers, who will have some of the British Isles, or particularly,
that farthest in the Scottish dominions to be Thule, I must acknowledge
that the history of the kings of Norway says the same thing, in the life
of King Magnus, who, in an expedition to the Orcades and Hebrides and
into Scotland and Britain, touched also at the Island of Thule and
subdued it.’
“By all this, I think, it appears sufficiently that the north-east part
of Scotland, which Severus the emperor and Theodosius the Great infested
with their armies, and in which, as Boethius[29] shows us, Roman medals
were found, is undoubtedly the Thule mentioned by the Roman writers; and
this also, if we believe the learned Arngrimus Jonas, was meant by
Ptolemy, where he saith, that, to the twenty-first parallel drawn
through Thule by Ptolemy, the latitude answers to 55° 36´, so that our
country in those ancient times passed under the name of Thule and
Hibernia, and the ‘Hiberni et Picti, incolæ Thules’ are the same people
who were afterwards called Scots.[30]
“I shall only add one remark more, and that is, that we need not have
recourse for the rise of the name Scot, to the fabulous account of the
monks who bring it from Scota, Pharaoh’s daughter, married to Gathelus;
since without that strain, if it be granted that the country was once
called Thule, which in the Phœnician language signifies ‘darkness,’ we
have a very fair reason for the name Scotia, which signifies the same in
the Greek tongue. And it is very well known that it was usual with the
Greeks (who next to the Phœnicians were the best navigators) not only to
retain the Phœnician name of the place, but likewise to give one in
their own language of the same import; and since the learned Bochartus
has very ingeniously deduced the Greek name of the whole island,
Βρετανικὴ, from Bratanack and Barat anac,[31] in the Phœnician tongue
signifying ‘a land of tin’ (which the Greeks not only reduced to their
own termination, but likewise called the British isles[32] Κασσιτερίδες,
that is, ‘lands of tin,’[33] which is the signification of the
Phœnician and Greek names); we may take the same liberty to derive the
Greek name Scotia from Phœnician Thule;[34] but this is so fully treated
of in the ‘Scotia Antiqua,’ that I need say no more.”
To these authorities may be added Silius Italicus (lib. iii., 597), who
manifestly places “unknown Thule” about Scotland:
“Hine pater ignotam donabit vincere Thulen
Inque Caledonios primus trahit agmina lucos.”
R. Festus Avienus (Descr. Orb. Ter.), metaphrasing Dionysius, treats of
Thule when speaking of Britain, and yet gives “the unknown island” an
Arctic day:
“Longa dehinc celeri si quis rate marmora currat,
Inveniet vasto surgentem gurgite Thulen;
Hinc cùm plaustra poli tangit Phœbeïus ignis
Nocte sub inlustri rota solis fomite flagrat
Continuò clarumque diem nox œucula ducit.”
We have also the testimony of Richard of Cirencester (Ricardus
Coronensis, ob. circ. A.D. 1401), who tells us (De Situ Britanniæ) that
in the time of the later emperors, “Thule” was applied to Valentia or
Valentiana, the district between the wall of Severus and the rampart of
Antoninus, including the south part of Scotland, Northumberland, and a
portion of Cumberland.
It might have been supposed that the distinct mention of the Orcades and
Hebrides[35] by Pliny (N. H., lib. iv., cap. 30), and by Ptolemy (lib.
ii., cap. 3, § 32, = p. 28), would have barred their claim to the
classic title. This is far from being the case. John Brand (A Brief
Description of Orkney, etc., Edin. 1701, Pinkerton, iii., p. 782), after
quoting Claudian and Conradus Celtes, with others who call Thule
“Britannicarum insularum septentrionissimam,” thus disposes of Iceland:
“I greatly doubt if ever the Romans had the knowledge of Iceland,
their eagles never having come and been displayed to the north of
Scotland or Orkney. ‘Imperii fuerat Romani Scotia limes,’ saith the
great Scaliger. Ptolemy will have it to be among the Isles of
Zetland; and Boethius, our historian (Boethius, in p. 740, also in
p. 755, which quotes from his life of Mainus, king of Scots),
distinguisheth between a first and a second Thule, calling Ila the
first, and Louisa the second, which are reckoned among the isles
called Hebrides. ‘Ptolemæus inter Schethlandicas insulas, quæ ultra
Orchades sunt, ant proxime Norwegiam sitam vult, haud quaquam
propter immensam intercapedinem intelligi potest, nos autem Ilam
(Islay?) primam Leuisam (Lewis) Hebridum præstantissimam secundam
Thulen vocamus.’ But I am inclined to think that although some
might design a particular place by the Thule, yet generally by a
synecdoche, usual with the Roman authors, they might denote all
those places remote from them to the north, and especially Britain
and the northern parts thereof, whither their arms did come.”
The Shetland claimants take another line of argument. Eutropius (A.D.
330-375, lib. vii.) makes the emperor Claudius, during his invasion of
Britain (A.D. 43) annex the Orkneys: “Quasdam insulas etiam ultra
Britanniam, in oceano positas, Romano imperio addidit, quæ appellantur
Orcades.” Pliny, they say, endorses Pytheas Massiliensis, who writes
that Thule is six days’ sail north of Britain. Tacitus (loc. cit.)
declares that Agricola sailed round Britain, conquered the Orcades, and
saw Thule. The latter cannot be the Orcades or Hebrides, because both
are mentioned by Pliny, and as their northerly point is not so far north
as Cape Wrath, they could hardly be described as “ultra Britanniam.”
Caithness and other parts of Scotland are put out of court, since they
are all to the south of Orkney, and therefore not beyond it. The Færoes
and Iceland are excluded, because they were both too distant to be
visited by the frail galleys of the Romans, unaided as they were, either
by the compass or the science of navigation, and they could not possibly
have been seen from Orkney. The same arguments apply to the Norwegian
coast, which also is not an island, and is not situated north of
Britain.
By this “process of elimination,” we are compelled to conclude that
Shetland, and only Shetland, justifies the descriptions and allusions to
the “Ultima Thule” contained in the Latin classics. It consists of
islands which, viewed from afar, might be mistaken for one. It lies
north of the Orkneys, from some parts of which Foula the Fair Isle, or
the bluff of Fitfulhead, can be seen in clear weather. A passage of six
days would be a fair average in the primitive barks of the Romans, who
were never much distinguished for seamanship. The more positive proofs
are the Roman coins found in the country, according to Dr Hibbert
(Description of the Shetland Islands, Edin. 1822), and the ruins of a
fortification in the island of Fetlar, which the same authority declares
to be a Roman camp.
It need hardly be observed that all these arguments are insufficient,
and that the utmost they prove is the determination by Agricola and his
men, that the venerable Thule was part of the Shetlands. Probably they
saw only the loom of land to the north, and identified it with the
“period of earth.” Possibly they might have been swayed by the verbal
resemblance of Foula, which may be seen from the Orkneys: it is
evidently Fogla or Fugla-ey, and the same desire to clear up a foggy
point of geography, which made Abyssinian Bruce discover the sources of
the Nile in the fountains of the Blue River, found Thule in
“Fowl-isle.”[36] The opinion, however, has found supporters. Gaspar
Peucerus (De Terræ Dimensione) declares that the Ptolemeian Thule is to
be recognised in the Shetlands, which he heard “the sailors call
Thilensel” (Fugl-insel?). Cellarius (Geog. Ant., ii. 4) discovers Thule
in the island of Hjaltland (Shetland), or in the Færoe group, “quæ in
eâdem fere latitudinem sunt.” He is followed by Probus (Com. on Virgil,
ii. 358), who makes Thule the farthest of the Orcades; by the
philosopher Petrus Ramus (de la Ramée); by Johannes Myritius, who rather
cleaves to the end of Britain; by the learned Vossius, who prefers the
Hebrides or Orcades; by Buchner (Ad Tacit. Agric., cap. 10); by Camden,
by Gosselin, and others. Stephanus Byzantinus says: “Thule insula magna
in oceano sub Hyperboreas partes, ubi æstivus dies ex viginti horis
æqualibus constat, nox verò ex quatuor. Hyberna verò dies à contrario.”
This calculation would place Thule three degrees south of the Polar
circle, and would better suit the Færoe archipelago (N. lat. 61° 23´ to
62° 26´ 40´´). Forcellini understands Cellarius also to refer to the
Færoes; De Kerguelen Tremarec (Voyages) opines for Iceland.
IV.
THULE = SCANDIA.
It has been seen that Pliny (Nat. Hist., iv. 16) apparently separates
Norway from Thule; moreover, that Ptolemy (ii. 3) confirmed by
Agatharcides and Stephanus Byzantinus (lib. i., in extremis), whilst
pointing to North Britain and to Scandia, or Scandinavia, in his time
held to be an island,[37] and little known to the civilised world, adds
details which rather belong to Iceland. On the other hand, it is evident
that during the later Roman empire, Thule was applied to Scandinavia.
Procopius, the Byzantine historian (nat. circ. A.D. 500), leaves no
doubt upon this point. He devotes to it a considerable space (lib. ii.,
De Bello Gothico, c. 15), and his account will be little abridged. After
relating how a party of Heruli, when conquered by the Longobardi, passed
through the lands of the Slavini, the Varni (Οὐάρνοι, al. Harmi), and
the Dani (Δάνοι, al. Dacæ), till they reached the ocean, he makes them
take ship and settle at Thule:
“The island is ten times larger than Britain, and far to the
north.[38] The greater part of it is desert. The inhabited region
contains thirteen great peoples, each governed by its own king. A
curious phenomenon is reported from that place: every year, about
the summer solstice, the sun remains forty days above the horizon.
Six months after this there is a night of forty days, a time of
sorrow, when all intercourse and business are at an end. I (says
Procopius) was greatly desirous of seeing this marvel for myself,
but the opportunity was ever wanting. I therefore asked those who
had been there how the sun rises and sets. They told me that for
forty consecutive days, the sun lights the island; sometimes from
the east, at other times from the west; but that when he returns to
the same point where he appeared, a single day is counted. During
the season of forty nights, time is measured by the moon. When
thirty-five of these long and lasting nights have passed, some of
the people ascend the highest mountains, and give warning to those
below that after five days more they will see the sun. The Thulitæ
rejoice over the good news, and celebrate in the dark a festival
which in ceremony exceeds all their others. Although this happens
every year, still it would appear the inhabitants apprehend a total
desertion of the sun.
“Amongst the barbarian peoples of Thule, none are so savage as the
Skithifini (Σκιθίφινοι, al. Scritifini). Like beasts,[39] they
ignore clothes and shoes; they drink no wine, and they eat nothing
which the earth grows. Both men and women, who will not take the
trouble of cultivation, occupy themselves exclusively with hunting,
and the forests and mountains supply them abundantly with game.
They eat the flesh, and, being without flax and wool, they wear the
skins, which they fasten with sinews, having no knowledge of
sewing. Also, they do not bring up their offspring like other
people. The children of the Thulitæ are fed upon the marrow of
beasts, instead of being suckled by their mothers. When the woman
has been delivered, she wraps her babe in a skin, secures it in
another, places some brains in its mouth, and sets out with her man
for the chase, in which both sexes equally excel. The Thulitæ adore
several gods and demons, some of whom they believe to inhabit the
sky, others the air; some are on the earth and in the sea, whilst
others of the smaller kind, affect the rivers and springs. They
often offer sacrifices and immolate all manner of victims, the most
acceptable being the first man captured in war; he is sacrificed to
Mars (Thor?), the most powerful of all their gods. On these
occasions they do not simply slay the victim, they either hang him
to a tree, or roll him over thorns, or put him to death in some
other way, choosing the most cruel.
“Such are the customs of the _Thulitæ_, amongst whom are the Goths
(Γαυτοί), a fecund people that gave land to the Herulian
immigrants. The remnants of this race who lived amongst the Romans,
after slaying their king, sent their chief worthies to the island
of Thule, for the purpose of finding if any of the royal blood
there remained. The deputies were successful, and chose out of many
one who pleased them the most. But as he died on the way, they
returned (to Thule) and brought with them one Todasius (Τοδάσιος,
al. Datis); this man was accompanied by his brother named Aordus
(Ἄορδς) and by two hundred youths of the island.”
This description of Thule is evidently great Scandinavia, not little
Iceland. Hence Ortilius (Thesaurus sub voc.) D’Anville, who rejects
Iceland; Farnaby, Schœnning (Von Nordich. Land in Neue Allg. Welt-Gesch,
vol. xiii., p. 14, et seq.); Rudbeck, who understands Sweden; Murray
(loc. cit.); Wedel (Alhandlung über die “Alt-Scandinavische Gesch.,” p.
32, et seq.); Schlözer (Allg. Nordisch. Gesch, pp. 14, 16), Parisot, and
other geographers, have referred the descriptions of Procopius
especially to the Norwegian canton still called “Tyle-mark,” or
“Tile-mark.” Maltebrun (iii. 6) prefers Jutland, on the continent of
Denmark, part of which, he hears, is still termed “Thy” or “Thy-land.”
Calstron believed that all Scandinavia was meant. Celtes (Schardius,
Basil ed., p. 59) makes Iceland “one of the isles of the ocean,”
together with Scandia, Dania, Suecia, etc. Adelung (Mithridates)
supports the claims of Norway. Others go as far as Lapland, and even
Greenland has not been without claimants to the honour. Yet in the sixth
century, Jornandes (De Origine Actuque Getarum Liber, p. 393, Basle
edition of 1531), after mentioning the thirty-four Orcades, says, “Habet
et in ultimo plagæ occidentalis aliam insulam nomine Thyle, de quâ
Mantuanus, Italia, ‘tibi serviat ultima Thyle,’” and he carefully
distinguishes it from the “ampla insula nomine Scanzia.”[40]
V.
THULE=ICELAND.
It has been shown that the accounts of Pytheas, supported by details
from Pliny and Ptolemy, refer only to Iceland. They are confirmed by the
following authorities. In Caius Julius Solinus (A.D. 230; 2 vols. fol.,
Traj. ad Rhenum, 1689), we find Thule five days’ sail from Orkney, and
we cannot allow less than 100 knots for the δρόμος νυχθήμερος, or a
total of 500 direct geographical miles; the run from northern Orkney to
the south coast of Iceland being about this distance. The Polyhistor,
held an oracle in the Middle Ages, adds (chap, xx., lll):
“Inter multas quæ circa Britanniam sunt insulas, Thylen ultimam
esse commemorat. In quâ æstivo solstitio dicit esse noctem nullam.
Brumali verò perinde diem nullum.”[41]
Orosius, whose history (London, 8vo, 1773) extends to A.D. 417, says:
“Tylen per infinitum à cæteris separatam undique terris in medio
sitam oceano vix paucis notam haberi.”
Isidorus Hispalensis (A.D. 600-636; Orig. Seu Etym., xiv. 6; Opera
Omnia, fol., Parisiis, 1601) appears to repeat Pliny:
“Thyle verò ultimam oceani insulam inter Septentrionem et
occidentalem plagam,[42] ultra Britanniam sitam esse describit, à
sole nomen habentem, quia in eâ æstivum solstitium sol faciat, et
nullus ultra eam dies sit. Ultra Thylen vèro pigrum et concretum
mare.”
The last sentence of the bishop being emphatically true in winter. Other
authorities who identify Thule with Iceland, are Cluverius (Germ. Ant.,
ii. 39), Harduin and Dalechamp (Ad Plin.), Bougainville (c. 1, p. 152),
Hill (Ad Dionys.), Penzel (Ad Strab.), Pontanus (Chorog. Dan. Descrip.,
p. 74), Isaac Thilo (Dissert., Lips., A.D. 1660), Gerhard Mercator, and
Mannert (Geog., i., p. 78), to mention no others. Martin (Histoire des
Gaules, i. 159) takes the Gauls to Iceland.
In the ninth century we have positive evidence that Thule had returned
to its oldest signification, Iceland. The monk Dicuilus, who wrote in
the year 825,[43] relates that thirty years before that date (A.D. 795)
he had seen and spoken with several religious who had inhabited the
island of Thule between February and August. He asserts that Iceland and
the Færoes had been discovered by his countrymen; and his calculation of
the seasons and the days at different times of the year, together with
the assertion that a day’s sail thence towards the north would bring
them to the Frozen Sea, shows that “Iceland, and Iceland alone, could
have been the island visited by the anchorites.”
The Domesday Book of the north, the “Landnámabók,” whose lists of 1400
places and 3000 persons were drawn up by various authors in the twelfth
century, supported, according to Mr Blackwell (note, p. 189), “by other
ancient Icelandic documents,” simply states (Prologus, p. 2), “Before
Iceland was settled by the Northmen there were men there called by the
Northmen Papæ. These men were Christians, and are thought to have come
from the west, for there were found Irish books, bells (biöllur), staves
(baglar), and various other things, whence it is thought that they were
Westmen,” Irishmen--a name still preserved in the Vestmannaeyjar
archipelago. Moreover, we learn that these relics were found in Papey
(the Isle of the Papæ), a rock off the eastern coast, which still bears
the same name, and at Papyli, in the interior; and finally, that “the
Christians left the country when the Northmen settled there”[44]--the
latter being pragmatical pagans.
Mr Blackwell concludes that these people were probably fishermen from
the north of Ireland and the Western Isles of Scotland, who may annually
have frequented the northern seas, and made Papey one of their winter
stations. Mr Dasent (i., vii.) more justly identifies them with the
Papar or Culdees (?), a class of churchmen who have left their traces in
almost every one of the outlying islands of the west. Under the name of
“Papar” we find them in the Orkneys and Shetlands, the Færoes and
Iceland; “and to this day the term ‘Papey’ in all these localities
denotes the fact that the same pious monks who had followed St
Columba[45] to Iona, and who had filled the cells at Enhallow and
Egilsha and Papa, in the Orkneys, were those who, according to the
account of Dicuil, had sought Thule or Iceland that they might pray to
God in peace.”[46] These Culdees were not likely to spread, as they
carried no women, but they left traces of their occupation in their
cells and church furniture.
The simple story told by Dicuil is eminently suggestive. Thus Thule
became, probably for a second time, one of the “Britanniæ,” the Isles of
Britain; and we may consider the discovery a rediscovery, like the
central African lakes, whence Ptolemy derived the Nile. When the rude
barks of the eighth century could habitually ply between Ireland and
Iceland, we cannot reject as unfit the Roman galleys, or even the
Phœnico-Carthaginian fleets. The Periplus of Himilco was not more
perilous than the Periplus of Hanno, and the Portuguese frequented the
northern seas long before they had doubled Cape Horn. Bergmann had
evidently no right to determine that Iceland was not “Ultima Thule,”
_because_--(1.) The Romans were bad sailors; (2.) They were in the habit
of writing “Rome--her mark” wherever they went, whereas no signs of
their occupation are visible in Iceland; and (3.) Because Iceland was
probably raised from the sea at the time when the Vesuvian eruption
buried Herculaneum and Pompeii.
It is true that Roman remains have not yet been discovered in Iceland,
but this is a negative proof which time may demolish; moreover, the same
absence of traces characterises the Papar occupation which we know to
have been a fact. On the other hand, Uno Von Troil speaks of a ruined
castle near “Videdal” (Viðidalr), some 200 perches in circumference, and
smaller features of the same kind on the glebe of Skeggestað, near
Langanes. Mr Henderson[47] declares of Hrutur’s cave, or rather caves--a
vast apartment 72 feet long by 24 broad and 12 high, within which is a
small recess 15 feet by 9, apparently a sleeping place--that both “are
said to have been cut by people in former times.”
We are, then, justified in concluding that we need no longer question
with Synesius, if such a place as Thule exists, or doubt with Giraldus
Cambrensis, whether it has yet been discovered. We may follow A. W.
Wilhelm (Germanien, etc., 1823), and believe with the Teatro Grande
Orteliano, “Islandia insula, veteribus Thyle dicta, miraculis si quæ
alia clarissima.” We may agree with Mannert that Iceland might have been
discovered by Pytheas the Phocæan, and even by the Carthaginians. We may
even support what appears to be rather an extreme opinion:
“Pytheam præterà increpat Strabo ut mendacem, qui Hiberniam et
Uxisamam (Ushant) ad occidentem ponit à Galliâ, cum hæc omnia, ait,
ad Septentrionem vergant. Itaque veteres geographi Hiberniæ situm
definiunt meliùs quam scriptoris seculi aurei Augusti, Himilco et
Phœnices meliùs quam Græci vel Romani” (Rer. Script. Hib., prol.
i., xii.).
Moreover, it appears certain that the old tradition of Thule, though
different ages applied the word differently, was never completely lost;
and that the Irish rediscovered the island before the eighth century, if
not much earlier, when the official rediscovery dates from the ninth,
and the earliest documents from the eleventh and twelfth.
The Venerable Bede (eighth century) speaks of Iceland under the name of
Thyle, more than a hundred years before its official discovery by the
Scandinavians; and Alfred (ninth century), in his translation of Orosius
(p. 31), assures us that the utmost land to the north-west of Ireland
was called Thila, and that it was known to few on account of its great
distance. Yet even after the occupation of Iceland by the Northmen, we
find in the literary world the same vagueness which prevailed in earlier
ages. For instance, Isaac Tzetzes (twelfth century), in his notes on
Lycophron, calls the fabled Fortunate Islands of the Greeks “the Isle of
Souls, a British island between the west of Britain and Thule towards
the east,” which is impossible. But in the fifteenth century Petrarch
has left us a valuable notice of the knowledge then familiar to men of
letters (De Situ Insulæ Thules, epist. i., lib. iii., De Rebus Fam.,
vol. i., pp. 136-141, ed. 1869, J. Fracassetti, Le Monnier. Florentia).
In reply to his own “Quæro quiânam mundi parte Thule sit insula?” he
quotes Virgil, Seneca, Boethius, Solinus, Isidore, Orosius, Claudian,
Pliny, and Mela. He could obtain no information from “Riccardo, quondam
Anglorum regis cancellario”--Richard de Bury was probably too busy for
such trifles. He learned something, however, from the “Libellus de
Mirabilibus Hiberniæ, à Giraldo (Cambrensi) quodam aulico Henrici
secundi, regis Anglorum.” And after quoting this “scriptorum cohors,” he
thus ends with “pointing a moral”--“Lateat ad aquilonem Thyle, lateat ad
austrum Nili caput, modò non lateat in medio consistens virtus,”
etc.[48]
Icelandic Thule was advocated by Saxo Grammaticus; but his opinion was
strongly opposed by his commentator (Johannis Stephanii, Notæ Uberiores
in Hist. Dan. Sax. Gram. Soræ, ed. 1644, fol.). The words of the
latter’s preface are--“Ex opinione magis vulgari, quam rei veritate
_Thylenses_ ubique nominat Saxo, qui Islandi rectius dicerentur;” but he
relies chiefly upon the controvertible arguments of “Arngrimus Jonas.”
Iceland was opposed by Gaspar Peucerus (De Terræ Dim.), by Crantzius
(Præfatio in Norvagiam, borrowed from Nicolaus Synesius, epist. 148); by
Abraham Ortelius (Theatrum Orbis and Thesaurum Geographicum), and by
Philippus Cluverus (Germania Antiqua). The globe of Martin Behaim (A.D.
1430-1506) shows a certain knowledge of details: “In Iceland fair men
are found who are Christians. The custom of its inhabitants is to sell
dogs at a very high rate; while they willingly part with some of their
children to merchants for nothing, that they may have sufficient to
support the remainder. Item.--In Iceland are found men eighty years old
who have never tasted bread. In this country no corn grows, and in lieu
of bread dried fish is eaten. In Iceland it is the stock fish is taken
which is brought to our country.”
THULE (ETYMOLOGY OF).
Perhaps the origin of “Thule” is ground more debatable and debated than
even its geographical position.
“Some,” says Sibbald, “derive the name Thule from the Arabic word
Tule (طول = Túl), which signifies ‘afar off,’
and, as it were with allusion to this, the poets usually call it
‘Ultima Thule;’ but I rather prefer the reason of the name given by
the learned Bochartus,[49] who makes it to be Phœnician, and
affirms that it signifies ‘darkness’ in that language. Thule
(צל) in the Tyrian tongue was ‘a shadow,’
whence it is commonly used to signify ‘darkness,’ and the island
Thule is as much as to say, an ‘island of darkness;’ which name how
exactly it agrees to the island so called at the utmost point to
the north is known to everybody.”
Others find Thule in the Carthaginian צל = “obscurity;” the Hebrew has
צלל, and the Arabic ظل = obscuravit.”
After using or abusing the Semitic tongues, we come to Greek, which puts
forth three principal claimants: θόλος = fuscus color, caligo; τέλος, a
goal; and τηλὲ, procul. Meanwhile Isidorus (Orig. Seu Etym., lib. xiv.,
6) derives Thyle, as has been shown, from the sun and its solstice. In
the twelfth century, Suidas (Lex. sub voc.) makes Thulis (θούλις) a king
who reigned over Egypt and the isles of the ocean, one of which was
called after his name.
Etymologists presently applied themselves to the Gothic languages and
their derivatives; and they did not reject geographical resemblances.
Pontanus (loc. cit., i., p. 746) asserts that the islands about the
Norwegian coast were generally called Thuyle. Ortelius (Thesaur. and
Theatr. Orbis, p. 103), relying upon Ptolemy’s latitudes and longitudes,
declares that “Thilir” was the term applied to the people of Norwegian
“Tilemark;” the latter word is also written “Thulemarchia” (Johannes
Gothus); “Thielemark,” “Thylemark” and “Tellemarck” (Pontanus).[50] Not
a few writers refer “Thule,” as has been said, to “Thy” or “Thy-land,”
the extreme point of Jutland. The commentator on Saxo Grammaticus,
before referred to, records a derivation of “Thule:”
“Quod vel instar _Tholi_, cujusdam orbis terrarum sit imposita, vel
quod eo navigantes ad ploratum (tothülen Belgæ dicunt)
proficiscerentur.”
In p. 175 he becomes still more vague:
“Rectius itaque Velljus nostro, juxtà ac M. Christiernus Petri,
primus Saxonis interpres, reddidere Blend aff Telløe vel Blend aff
Tyløe. Quænam verò iste sint insulæ, juxtà scimus cum
ignarissimis.”[51]
Prætorius (De Orbi Goth., iii. 4, § 3) deduces “Thule” from the Gothic
“Tiel,” “Teule,” or “Tuole” (= τέλος, finis), meaning a long distance,
and denoting the remotest land; he doubts the existence of the place,
with D’Anville (Mem. de Paris, vol. xxxvii., p. 439). Reinerus
Reineccius (Reinech, Historiæ tam Sacræ quam Profanæ Cognitio, Frankf.
et Lipsiæ, 1685, and Methodus Legendi, etc., Historiam tam Sacram quam
Profanam, Frankf. 1670) advocates the Saxon “Tell,” meaning a
limit--limes septentrionis atque occidentis. Dr Charnock compares the
Saxon “Deel,” a part or portion, and quotes Wachter (Gloss. Germ.), who
gives amongst other meanings of “Teil” (hod. Theil), pars, portio,
segmentum, and “teilen,” _i.e._, dividere in partes.
Torfæus (Hist. Norwegiæ, i. 5, p. 12) proposes a variety of derivations.
Wilhelm Obermüller (Wörterbuch, etc., Williams and Norgate, Lond. 1872)
would explain “Thule Procopiana,” by Dal (a dale), or “Tulla,” also
written “Tolin” and “Tullin,” a meadow or pasturage; and he remarks that
Norwegian “Tellemark” or “Thilemark,” is of the same descent. The
Thracian Kelts had a kingdom of Tyle, which here probably signified
“Dail,” a fortress. When Pliny makes men sail from Nerigos to “Thule,”
the latter might have meant _Du-ile_, “the little island,” or perhaps
“the dark (‘dubh,’ cloudy and wintry) isle.”
Even the orthography of “Thule” is disputed, and there are sundry
variants--Thula, Thyle, Thile, Thila, Tyle, and Tila. The popular Greek
form adopted by Strabo, Ptolemy, Agathemerus, Isidorus, Jornandes (De
Reb. Get., cap. 1, 1), Procopius (De Bell. Goth., ii. 15) and Stephanus
Byzantinus, is θούλη, which in Romaic would be pronounced “Thúle;” the
ethnic being θουλαῖς (Thulæus), and θουλίτης (_plur._ θουλίται). The
Latins (Mela, Pliny, Tacitus, Anonymus Ravennæ, Martianus, Solinus,
etc.) seem to have preferred “Thule;” and Cluverius (Germ. Ant., iii.
39) rejects all others as barbarous. The learned and humorous Salmasius
(in Solin., cap. xxii.) declares that “Thyle” ought never to be written,
despite many good codices of Virgil, Pliny, Jornandes, Isidore, the
Anon. Ravennæ, and others, which give Thyle and even Tyle, θύλη and
θυλίτης; Æthicus (in Cosmog., p. 730), borrowing from Orosius, has
“Tilæ;” Boethius (xx. 11), “Tile” and “Ðyle.”
We here conclude the subject of Thule, “celebrata omnium litteris
insula.” To do it full justice, and especially to quote from the
“cohort” of modern writers, would require a volume.