The route by sea is pointed out in a clear and satisfactory manner, by some

of the ancient authors, particularly the author of the Periplus of the

Erythrean Sea. In enumerating the exports from Nelkundah, he particularly

mentions silk stuffs, and adds, that they were brought to this place from

countries further to the east. Nelkundah was a town in Malabar, about

twelve miles up a small river, at the mouth of which was the port of

Barake; at this port, the vessels of the ancients rode till their lading

was brought down from Nelkundah. This place seems to have been the

centrical mart between the countries that lie to the east and west of Cape

Comorin, or the hither and further peninsula of India; fleets sailed from

it to Khruse, which there is every reason to believe was part of the

peninsula of Malacca; and we have the authority of Ptolemy, that there was

a commercial communication between it and the northern provinces of China.

But at a later period than the age of the Periplus, silk was brought by sea

from China to Ceylon, and thence conveyed to Africa and Europe. Cosmos, who

lived in the sixth century, informs us, that the Tzenistæ or Chinese,

brought to Ceylon, silks, aloes, cloves, and sandal wood. That his

Tzenistsæ, are the Chinese, there can be no doubt; for he mentions them as

inhabiting a country producing silk, beyond which there is no country, for

the ocean encircles it oh the east. From this it is evident that the

Tzenistæ of this author, and the Seres of the ancients, are the same; and

in specifying the imports into Ceylon, he mentions silk thread, as coming

from countries farther to the east, particularly from the Chinese. We thus

see by what sea route silk was brought from China to those places with

which the western nations had a communication; it was imported either into

the peninsula of Malacca by sea, and thence by sea to Nelkundah, whence it

was brought by a third voyage to the Red Sea; or it was brought directly

from China to Ceylon, from which place there was a regular sea

communication also with the Red Sea.

The author of the Periplus informs us, that raw as well as manufactured

silk were conveyed by land through Bactria, to Baraguza or Guzerat, and by

the Ganges to Limurike; according to this first route, the silks of China

must have come the whole length of Tartary, from the great wall, into

Bactria; from Bactria, they passed the mountains to the sources of the

Indus, and by that river they were brought down to Patala, or Barbarike, in

Scindi, and thence to Guzerat: the line must have been nearly the same when

silk was brought to the sources of the Ganges; at the mouth of this river,

it was embarked for Limurike in Canara. All the silk, therefore, that went

by land to Bactria, passed down the Indus to Guzerat; all that deviated

more to the east, and came by Thibet, passed down the Ganges to Bengal.

A third land route by which silk was brought to the Persian merchants, and

by them sold to the Romans, was from Samarcand and Bochara, through the

northern provinces of China, to the metropolis of the latter country: this,

however, was a long, difficult, and dangerous route. From Samarcand to the

first town of the Chinese, was a journey of from 60 to 100 days; as soon as

the caravans passed the Jaxartes, they entered the desert, in which they

were necessarily exposed to great privations, as well as to great risk from

the wandering tribes. The merchants of Samarcand and Bochara, on their

return from China, transported the raw or manufactured silk into Persia;

and the Persian merchants sold it to the Romans at the fairs of Armenia and

Nisibis.

Another land route is particularly described by Ptolemy: according to his

detail, this immense inland communication began from the bay of Issus, in

Cilicia; it then crossed Mesopotamia, from the Euphrates to the Tigris,

near Hieropolis: it then passed through part of Assyria and Media, to

Ecbatana and the Caspian Pass; after this, through Parthia to Hecatompylos:

from this place to Hyrcania; then to Antioch, in Margiana; and hence into

Bactria. From Bactria, a mountainous country was to be crossed, and the

country of the Sacæ, to Tachkend, or the Stone Tower. Near this place was

the station of those merchants who traded directly with the Seres. The

defile of Conghez was next passed, and the region of Cosia or Cashgar

through the country of the Itaguri, to the capital of China. Seven months

were employed on this journey, and the distance in a right line amounted to

2800 miles. That the whole of this journey was sometimes performed by

individuals for the purchase of silk and other Chinese commodities, we have

the express testimony of Ptolemy; for he informs us, that Maes, a

Macedonian merchant, sent his agent through the entire route which we have

just described. It is not surprising, therefore, that silk should have

borne such an exorbitant price at Rome; but it is astonishing that any

commodity, however precious, could bear the expence of such a land

carriage.

The only other routes by land, by which silk was brought from China into

Europe, seem to have corresponded, in the latter part of their direction,

with the land routes from India, already described. Indeed, it may

naturally be supposed, that the Indian merchants, as soon as they learned

the high prices of silk at Rome, would purchase it, and send it along with

the produce and manufactures of their own country, by the caravans to

Palmyra, and by river navigation to the Euxine: and we have seen, that on

the capture of Palmyra, by Aurelian, silk was one of the articles of

plunder.

We are now to take notice of the laws which were passed by the Romans for

the improvement of navigation and commerce; and in this part of our subject

we shall follow the same plan and arrangement which we have adopted in

treating of the commerce itself; that is, we shall give a connected view of

these laws, or at least the most important of them, from the period when

the Romans began to interest themselves in commerce, till the decline of

the empire.

These laws may be divided into three heads: first, laws relating to the

protection and privileges allowed to mariners by the Roman emperors;

secondly, laws relating to particular fleets; and lastly, laws relating to

particular branches of trade.

1. The fifth title of the thirteenth book of the Theodosian code of laws

entirely relates to the privileges of mariners. It appears, from this, that

by a law made by the Emperor Constans, and confirmed by Julian, protection

was granted to them from all personal injuries; and it was expressly

ordered, that they should enjoy perfect security, and be defended from all

sort of violence and injustice. The emperor Justinian considered this law

so indispensably necessary to secure the object which it had in view, that

he not only adopted it into his famous code, but decreed that whoever

should seize and apply the ships of mariners, against their wishes, to any

other purpose than that for which they were designed, should be punished

with death. In the same part of his code, he repeats and confirms a law of

the emperors Valentinian, Valens, and Gratian, inflicting death on any one

who should insult seafaring men. In another law, adopted into the same code

from the statutes of former emperors, judges and magistrates are forbidden,

on pain of death, to give them any manner of trouble. They were also

exempted from paying tribute, though the same law which exempts them, taxes

merchants. No person who had exercised any mean or dishonourable employment

was allowed to become a mariner; and the emperors Constantine and Julian

raised them to the dignity of knights, and, shortly afterwards, they were

declared capable of being admitted into the senate.

As a counterbalance to those privileges and honours, it appears, that

mariners, at least such of them as might be required for the protection of

the state, were obliged to conform themselves to certain rules and

conditions, otherwise the laws already quoted did not benefit them. They

were obliged to possess certain lands; and, indeed, it would seem that the

profession and privileges of a mariner depended on his retaining these

lands. When these lands were sold, the purchaser was obliged to perform

towards the state all those services which were required of a mariner, and

in return he obtained all the privileges, dignities, and exemptions granted

to that class of men. This, however, was productive of great inconvenience

to the state; since, if the lands were purchased by persons ignorant of

maritime affairs, they could not be so effective as persons accustomed to

the sea. From this consideration a law was passed, that when such lands as

were held on condition of sea-service passed into the possession of those

who were unaccustomed to the sea, they should revert to their original

owners. It was also ordered, that such privileged mariners should

punctually perform all services required of them by the state; that they

should not object to carry any particular merchandize; that they should not

take into their vessels above a certain quantity of goods, in order that

they might not, by being over laden, be rendered unfit for the service of

the state; and that they should not change their employment for any other,

even though it were more honourable or lucrative. The whole shipping, and

all the seamen, seem thus to have been entirely under the management and

controul of the state; there were, however, a few exceptions. Individuals,

who possessed influence sufficient, or from other causes, were permitted to

possess ships of their own, but only on the express condition that the

state might command them and the services of their crews, whenever it was

necessary. The legal rate of interest was fixed by Justinian at six per

cent.; but for the convenience and encouragement of trade, eight was

allowed on money lent to merchants and manufacturers; and twelve on the

risk of bottomry.

2. There are several laws in the Theodosian code which relate to the

different fleets of the empire: the Eastern fleet, the principal port of

which was Seleucia, a city of Syria, on the Orontes, by which were conveyed

to Rome and Constantinople, all the oriential merchandize that came by the

land route we have described to Syria, was particularly noticed, as well as

some smaller fleets depending on it, as the fleet of the island of

Carpathus. The privileges granted to the African fleet are expressly given

to the Eastern fleet.

In another part of the code of Justinian, the trade between the Romans and

Persians is regulated: the places were the fairs and markets are to be kept

are fixed and named; these were near the confines of the two kingdoms; and

these confines neither party was allowed to pass.

From a law of the emperor Constans, inserted in the Theodosian code, it

appears that some of the ships which came from Spain to Rome were freighted

for the service of the state; and these are particularly regulated and

privileged in this law.

There were several laws made also respecting the fleet which the emperors

employed for the purpose of collecting the tribute and revenue, and

conveying it to Home and Constantinople. The law of the emperors Leo and

Zeno, which is inserted in the Justinian code, mentions the fleet which was

kept to guard the treasures: and by another law, taken from the Theodosian

code, we learn, that the guards of the treasures, who went in this fleet,

were officers under the superintendent of the imperial revenue.

3. We have already mentioned the dependence of Rome on foreign nations for

corn, and the encouragement given, during the republic and in the early

times of the empire, to the importation of this necessary article. In the

Theodosian and Justinian code, encouragement to the importation of it seems

still to have been a paramount object, especially from Egypt; for though

from an edict of Justinian it would appear that the cargoes from this

country, of whatever they consisted, were guarded and encouraged by law,

yet we know that the principal freight of the ships which traded between

Alexandria and Rome and Constantinople was corn, and that other merchandize

was taken on board the corn fleets only on particular occasions, or, where

it was necessary, to complete the cargoes. Among the other edicts of

Justinian, regulating the trade of Egypt, there is one which seems to have

been passed in consequence of the abuses that had crept into the trade of

corn and other commodities, which were shipped from Alexandria for

Constantinople. These abuses arose from the management of this trade being

in the hands of a very few persons: the emperor therefore passed a law,

dividing the management into different branches, each to be held by

separate individuals. From the code of Justinian we also learn, that corn

was embarked from other ports of Egypt besides Alexandria, by private

merchants; but these were not permitted to export it without permission of

the emperor, and even then not till after the imperial fleet was fairly at

sea. The importance of the corn trade of Egypt fully justified these laws;

for at this period Constantinople was annually supplied with 260,000

quarters of wheat from this country.

The resources of the Romans were principally derived from the tribute

levied on the conquered countries; but in part also from duties on

merchandize: in the latter point of view, alone, they fall under our

notice. No custom duties seem to have been imposed till the time of

Augustus; but in his reign, and that of his immediate successors, duties

were imposed on every kind of merchandize which was imported into Rome; the

rate varied from the eighth to the fortieth part of the value of the

article. The most full and minute list of articles of luxury on which

custom duties were levied, is to be found in the rescript of the emperors

Marcus and Commodus, relating to the goods imported into Egypt from the

East. In the preamble to this rescript it is expressly declared, that no

blame shall attach to the collectors of the customs, for not informing the

merchant of the amount of the custom duties while the goods are in transit;

but if the merchant wishes to enter them, the officer is not to lead him

into error. The chief and most valuable articles on which, by this

rescript, duties were to be levied, were cinnamon, myrrh, pepper, ginger,

and aromatics; precious stones; Parthian and Babylonian leather; cottons;

silks, raw and manufactured: ebony, ivory, and eunuchs.

Till the reign of Justinian, the straits of the Bosphorus and Hellespont

were open to the freedom of trade, nothing being prohibited but the

exportation of arms for the service of the barbarians: but the avarice, or

the profusion of that emperor, stationed at each of the gates of

Constantinople a praetor, whose duty it was to levy a duty on all goods

brought into the city, while, on the other hand, heavy custom duties were

exacted on all vessels and merchandize that entered the harbour. This

emperor also exacted in a most rigorous manner, a duty in kind: which,

however, had existed long before his time: we allude to the annona, or

supply of corn for use of the army and capital. This was a grievous and

arbitrary exaction: rendered still more so "by the partial injustice of

weights and measures, and the expence and labour of distant carriage." In a

time of scarcity, Justinian ordered an extraordinary requisition of corn to

be levied on Thrace, Bithynia, and Phrygia; for which the proprietors, (as

Gibbon observes,) "after a wearisome journey, and a perilous navigation

received so inadequate a compensation, that they would have chosen the

alternative of delivering both the corn and price at the doors of their

granaries."

Having thus given a connected and general view of the Roman commerce, we

shall next proceed to investigate the progress of geographical knowledge

among them. In our chronological arrangement of this progress, incidental

and detached notices respecting their commerce will occur, which, though

they could not well be introduced in the general view, yet will serve to

render the picture of it more complete.

It is evident that the principal accessions to geographical knowledge among

the Romans, at least till their ambition was satinted, or nearly so, by

conquest, must have been derived from their military expeditions. It is

only towards the time of Augustus that we find men, whose sole object in

visiting foreign countries was to become acquainted with their state,

manners, &c.

Polybius is one of the earliest authors who give us a glimpse of the state

of geographical knowledge among the Romans, about the middle of the second

century before Christ, the period when he flourished. lie was the great

friend of Scipio, whom he accompanied in his expedition against Carthage.

From his enquiries while in Africa, he informed himself of the geography of

the northern parts of that quarter of the world; and he actually visited

the coast as far as Mount Atlas, or Cape Nun, beyond which, however, he

does not seem to have proceeded. He wrote a Periplus, or account of his

voyage, which is not in existence, but is referred to and quoted by Pliny.

He possessed also more accurate information of the western coasts of Europe

than was had before; derived, it would appear, from the voyages of some

Romans. Yet, with all this knowledge of what we may deem distant parts,

Polybius was ignorant of the real shape of Italy, which he describes as

stretching from east to west; a mistake which seems to have originated with

him, and was copied by Strabo.

Varro, who was Pompey's lieutenant during the war against the pirates, and

obtained a naval crown on that occasion, among the almost infinite variety

of topics on which he wrote, was the author of a work on navigation;

unfortunately, however, only the title of it is extant: had it yet

remained, it would have thrown much light on the state of navigation,

geography, and commerce among the Romans in his time.

Julius Caesar's attention to science in the midst of his wars and perils is

well known. He first formed the idea of a general survey of the whole

empire; and for this purpose obtained a decree of the senate. The survey

was finished by Augustus: the execution of it was committed to three Greek

geographers. The survey of the eastern portion of the empire was committed

to Zenodoxus, who completed it, in fourteen years, five months, and nine

days. The northern division was finished by Theodoras in twenty years,

eight months, and ten days: and the southern division was finished in

twenty-five years, one month, and ten days. This survey, with the

supplementary surveys of the new provinces, as they were conquered and

added to the empire, formed the basis of the geography of Ptolemy. It

appears from Vegetius, that every governor of a province was furnished with

a description of it, in which were given the distance of places, the nature

of the roads, the face of the country, the direction of the rivers, &c.: he

adds, that all these were delineated on a map as well as described in

writing. Of this excellent plan for the itineraries and surveys of the

Roman empire, from which the ancient geographers obtained their fullest and

most accurate information, Julius Cæsar was the author.

Julius Cæsar certainly added much to geographical knowledge by his

conquests of Gaul and Britain: his information respecting the latter,

however, as might be expected, is very erroneous. Yet, that even its very

northern parts were known by name to the Romans soon after his death, is

apparent, from this circumstance, that Diodorus Siculus, who died towards

the middle of the reign of Augustus, mentions Orkas; which, he says, forms

the northern extremity of the island of Britain. This is the very first

mention of any place in Scotland by any writer.

One of the first objects of Augustus, after he had reduced Egypt, was to

explore the interior of Africa, either for the purpose of conquest, or to

obtain the precious commodities, especially frankincense and aromatics,

which he had learned were the produce of those countries. Ælius Gallus was

selected by the emperor for this expedition, and he was accompanied by the

geographer Strabo; who, however, has not given such accurate information of

the route which was pursued as might have been expected. This is the more

to be lamented, as Pliny informs us that the places which were visited

during this expedition are not to be found in authors previous to his time.

Gallus was directed by the emperor to explore Ethiopia, the country of the

Troglodytæ and Arabia. The expedition against Ethiopia, which Gallus

entrusted to Petronius, we shall afterwards examine, confining ourselves at

present to the proceedings and progress of Gallus himself. His own force

consisted of 10,000 men, to which were added 500, supplied by Herod, king

of the Jews; and 1000 Nabathians from Petra; besides a fleet of eighty

ships of war and 130 transports. Syllæus, the minister of the king of the

Nabathians, undertook to conduct the expedition; but as it was not for the

interest either of his king or country that it should succeed, he betrayed

his trust, and, according to Strabo, was executed at Rome for his treachery

on this occasion. His object was to delay the expedition as much as

possible: this he effected by persuading Gallus to prepare a fleet, which

was unnecessary, as the army might have followed the route of the caravans,

through a friendly country, from Cleopatris, where the expedition

commenced, to the head of the Elanitic Gulf. The troops, however, were

embarked, and, as the navigation of the Sea of Suez was intricate, the

fleet was fifteen days in arriving at Leuke Kome: here, in consequence of

the soldiers having become, during their voyage, afflicted with various

disorders, and the year being far advanced, Gallus was obliged to remain

till the spring. Another delay was contrived by Syllæus on their leaving

Leuke Kome. After this, they seem to have proceeded with more celerity, and

with very little opposition from the natives, till they came to a city of

some strength: this they were obliged to besiege in regular form; but,

after lying before it for six days, Gallus was forced, for want of water,

to raise the siege, and to terminate the expedition. He was told that at

this time he was within two days' journey of the land of aromatics and

frankincense, the great object which Augustus had in view. On his retreat,

he no longer trusted to Syllæus, but changed the route of the army,

directing it from the interior to the coast. At Nera, in Petræa, the army

embarked, and was eleven days in crossing the gulf to Myos Hormos: from

this place it traversed the country of the Troglodytes to Coptus, on the

Nile. Two years were spent in this unfortunate expedition. It is extremely

difficult to fix on the limit of this expedition, but it is probable that

the town which Gallus besieged, and beyond which he did not penetrate, was

the capital of the Mineans. From the time of this expedition, the Romans

always maintained a footing on the coast of the Red Sea; and either during

the residence of Gallus at Leuke Kome, or soon afterwards, they placed a

garrison in this place, where they collected the customs, gradually

extending their conquests and their geographical knowledge down the Gulf,

till they reached the ocean. This seems to have been the only beneficial

consequence resulting from the expedition of Gallus.

We must now attend to the expedition of Petronius against the Ethiopians.

This was completely successful, and Candakè, their queen, was obliged, as a

token of her submission, to send ambassadors to Augustus, who was at that

time in the island of Samos. About this period the commerce of the

Egyptians,--which, in fact, was the commerce of the Romans,--was extended

to the Troglodytes,--with whom previously they had carried on little or no

trade.

The first account of the island of Ceylon, under the name of Taprobane, was

brought to Europe by the Macedonians, who had accompanied Alexander into

the east. It is mentioned, and a short description given of it, by

Onesicritus and Eratosthenes. Iambulus, however, who lived in the time of

Augustus, is the first author who enters into any details regarding it; and

though much of what he states is undoubtedly fabulous, yet there are

particulars surprizingly correct, and such as confirm his own account, that

he actually, visited the island. According to Diodorus Siculus, he was the

son of a merchant, and a merchant himself; and while trading in Arabia for

spices, he was taken prisoner and carried into Arabia, whence he was

carried off by the Ethiopians, and put into a ship, which was driven by the

monsoon to Ceylon. The details he mentions, that are most curious and most

conformable to truth, are the stature of the natives and the flexibility of

their joints; the length of their ears, bored and pendant; the perpetual

verdure of the trees; the attachment of the natives to astronomy; their

worship of the elements, and particularly of the sun and moon; their cotton

garments; the men having one wife in common; the days and nights being

equal in length; and the Calamus, or Maiz. It is extraordinary, howeve'r,

that Iambulus never mentions cinnamon, which, as he was a dealer in spices,

it might have been supposed would have attracted his particular attention.

One of the most celebrated geographers among the ancients, flourished

during the reign of Augustus;--we allude to Strabo: his fundamental

principles are, the globosity of the earth, and its centripetal force; he

also lays down rules for constructing globes, but he seems ignorant of the

mode of fixing the position of places by their latitude or longitude, or,

at least, he neglects it. In order to render his geographical knowledge

more accurate and complete, he travelled over most of the countries between

Armenia on the east and Etruria on the west, and from his native country,

on the borders of the Euxine sea, to the borders of Ethiopia. The portion

of the globe which he describes, is bounded on the north by the Baltic, on

the east by the Ganges, on the south by the mouth of the river Senegal, and

on the west by Spain. In describing the countries which he himself had

visited, he is generally very accurate, but his accounts of those he had

not visited, are frequently erroneous or very incomplete. His information

respecting Ceylon and the countries of the Ganges, seems to have been

derived entirely from the statements brought to Europe by the generals of

Alexander.

In the reign of Claudius, the knowledge of the Romans respecting the

interior of Africa, was slightly extended by the expedition of Suetonius

Paulinus; he was the first Roman who crossed Mount Atlas, and during the

winter penetrated through the deserts, which are described as formed of

black dust, till he reached a river called the Niger. Paulinus wrote an

account of this expedition, which, however, is not extant: Pliny quotes it.

In the reign of Claudius, also, the island of Ceylon became better known,

in consequence of an accident which happened to the freedman of a Roman,

who farmed the customs in the Red Sea. This man, in the execution of his

duty, was blown off the coast of Arabia, across the ocean to Taprobane, or

Ceylon; here he was hospitably received by the king, and after a residence

of six months was sent back, along with ambassadors, to Claudius. They

informed the emperor that their country was very extensive, populous, and

opulent, abounding in gold, silver, and pearls. It seems probable that the

circumstance of the freedman having been carried to Ceylon by a steady and

regular wind, and this man and the ambassadors having returned by a wind

directly opposite, but as steady and regular, had some influence in the

discovery of the monsoon. As this discovery led necessarily to a direct

communication between Africa and India, and grea'ly enlarged the knowledge

of the Romans respecting the latter country, as well as their commercial

connections with it, it will be proper to notice it in a particular manner.

This important discovery is supposed to have been made in the seventh year

of the reign of Claudius, answering to the forty-seventh of the Christian

era. The following is the account given of it by the author of the Periplus

of the Erythrean Sea, as translated by Dr. Vincent:

"The whole navigation, such as it has been described from Adan in Arabia

Felix and Kanè to the ports of India, was performed formerly in small

vessels, by adhering to the shore and following the indention of the coast;

but Hippalus was the pilot who first discovered the direct course across

the ocean, by observing the position of the ports and the general

appearance of the sea; for, at the season when the annual winds peculiar to

our climate settle in the north, and blow for a continuance upon our coast

from the Mediterranean, in the Indian ocean the wind is constantly to the

south west; and this wind has in those seas obtained the name of Hippalus,

from the pilot who first attempted the passage by means of it to the east.

"From the period of that discovery to the present time, vessels bound to

India take their departure either from Kanè on the Arabian, or from Cape

Arometa on the African side. From these points they stretch out to the open

sea at once, leaving all the windings of the gulfs and bays at a distance,

and make directly for their several destinations on the coast of India.

Those that are intended for Limurike waiting some time before they sail,

but those that are destined for Barugaza, or Scindi, seldom more than three

days."

If we may credit Pliny, the Greek merchants of Egypt for some years after

the discovery of the monsoon, did not venture further out to sea than was

absolutely necessary, by crossing the widest part of the entry of the

Persian Gulf, to reach Patala at the mouth of the Indus; but they

afterwards found shorter routes, or rather stretched more to the south, so

as to reach lower down on the coast of India: they also enlarged their

vessels, carried cargoes of greater value, and in order to beat off the

pirates, which then as at present infested this part of the Indian coast,

they put on board their vessels a band of archers. Myos Hormos, or

Berenice, was the port on the Red Sea from which they sailed; in forty days

they arrived at Musiris, on the west coast of India. The homeward passage

was begun in December or January, when the north east monsoon commenced;

this carried them to the entrance of the Red Sea, up which to their port

they were generally favored by southerly winds.

As there is no good reason to believe that the ancients made regular

voyages to India, previously to the discovery of the monsoons; yet, as it

is an undoubted fact that some of the exclusive productions of that

country, particularly cinnamon, were obtained by them, through their

voyages on the Red Sea; it becomes an important and interesting enquiry, by

what means these productions were brought to those places on this sea, from

which the Romans obtained them. In our opinion, the Arabians were the first

who introduced Indian productions into the west from the earliest period to

which history goes back, and they continued to supply the merchants who

traded on the Red Sea with them, till, by the discovery of the monsoon, a

direct communication was opened between that sea and India.

At least seventeen centuries before the Christian era, we have undoubted

evidence of the traffic of the Arabians in the spices, &c. of India; for in

the 27th chapter of Genesis we learn, that the Ishmaelites from Gilead

conducted a caravan of camels laden with the spices of India, and the

balsam and myrrh of Hadraumaut, in the regular course of traffic to Egypt

for sale. In the 30th chapter of Exodus, cinnamon, cassia, myrrh,

frankincense, &c. are mentioned, some of which are the exclusive produce of

India; these were used for religious purposes, but at the same time the

quantities of them specified are so great, that it is evident they must

have been easily obtained. Spices are mentioned, along with balm and other

productions of Canaan, in the present destined by Jacob for Joseph. These

testimonies from holy writ are perfectly in unison with what we learn from

Herodotus; this author enumerates oriental spices as regularly used in

Egypt for embalming the dead.

It is sufficiently evident, therefore, that, at a very early period, the

productions of India were imported into Egypt. That the Arabians were the

merchants who imported them, is rendered highly probable from several

circumstances. The Ishmaelites, mentioned in the 37th chapter of Genesis,

are undoubtedly the Nabathians, whose country is represented by all the

geographers, historians, and poets, as the source of all the precious

commodities of the east; the ancients, erroneously supposing that cinnamon,

which we know to be an exclusive production of India, was the produce of

Arabia, because they were supplied with it, along with other aromatics,

from that country. The proof that the Nabathians and the Ishmaelites are

the same, is to be found in the evident derivation of the former name, from

Nebaioth, the son of Ishmael. The traditions of the Arabians coincide with

the genealogy of the Scriptures, in regarding Joktan, the fourth son of

Shem, as the origin of those trihes which occupied Sabæa and Hadraumaut, or

the incense country; Ishmael as the father of the families which settled in

Arabia Deserta; and Edom as the ancestor of the Idumeans, who settled in

Arabia Petræa.

Eight hundred years before the Christian era, the merchandize of the

Sabeans is particularly noticed by the prophet Isaiah; and even long before

his time, we are informed, that there were no such spices as the Queen of

Sheba gave to Solomon. That Sheba is Sabæa, or Arabia Felix, we learn from

Ezekiel:--"The merchants of Sheba and Ramah, they were thy merchants: they

occupied in thy fairs with chief of all spices, and with all precious

stones and gold." Six hundred and fifty years after Isaiah bore his

testimony to the commerce of Sabæa, we have the authority of Agatharcides,

that the merchants of this country traded to India; that the great wealth

and luxury of Sabæa were principally derived from this trade; and that, at

the time when Egypt possessed the monopoly of the Indian trade, with

respect to Europe, the Sabeans enjoyed a similar advantage with regard to

Egypt.

Having thus established the fact, that, from the earliest period of which

we have any record, the Arabians were the merchants who brought the

cinnamon, &c. of India into the west, we must, in the next place, endeavour

to ascertain by what means and route this commerce was carried on; and we

think we can prove that the communication between Arabia and India, at a

very early period, was both by sea and land.

There were many circumstances connected with Arabia and the Arabians, which

would necessarily turn their thoughts to maritime affairs, and when they

had once embarked in maritime commerce, would particularly direct it to

India. The sea washed three sides of the peninsula of Arabia: the Arabians

were not, like the Egyptians, prejudiced, either by their habits or their

religion, against the sea. The monsoons must have been perceived by them,

from part of the sea-coast lying within their influence; and it can hardly

be supposed that a sea-faring people would not take advantage of them, to

embark in such a lucrative trade as that of India. "There is no history

which treats of them which does not notice them as pirates, or merchants,

by sea, as robbers, or traders, by land. We scarcely touch upon them,

accidentally, in any author, without finding that they were the carriers of

the Indian Ocean." From the earliest period that history begins to notice

them, Sabæa, Hadraumaut, and Oman, are described as the residences of

navigators; and as these places are, in the earliest historians, celebrated

for their maritime commerce, it is reasonable to suppose that they were

equally so before the ancient historians acquired any knowledge of them.

We cannot go farther back, with respect to the fact of the Arabians being

in India, than the voyage of Nearchus; but in the journal of this

navigator, we find manifest traces of Arabian navigators on the coast of

Mekran, previous to his expedition: he also found proofs of their commerce

on the coast of Gadrosia, and Arabic names of places--a pilot to direct

him, and vessels of the country in the Gulf of Persia. Large ships from the

Indus, Patala, Persis, and Karmania came to Arabia, as early as the time of

Agatharcides; and it is probable that these ships were navigated by

Arabians, as the inhabitants of India were not, at this time, and, indeed,

never have been celebrated for their maritime enterprize and skill. The

same author mentions a town, a little without the Red Sea, from whence, he

says, the Sabeans sent out colonies or factories into India, and to which

the large ships he describes came with their cargoes from India. This is

the first historical evidence to prove the establishment of Arabian

factories and merchants in the ports of India. In the time of Pliny, the

Arabians were in such numbers on the coast of Malabar, and at Ceylon, that,

according to that author, the inhabitants of the former had embraced their

religion, and the ports of the latter were entirely in their power. Their

settlements and commerce in India are repeatedly mentioned in the Periplus

of the Erythrean Sea, and likewise their settlements down the coast of

Africa to Rhaptum, before it was visited by the Greeks from Egypt. For,

besides their voyages from India to their own country, they frequently

brought Indian commodities direct to the coast of Africa. At Sabaea, the

great mart of the Arabian commerce with India, the Greeks, as late as the

reign of Philometor, purchased the spices and other productions of the

east. As there was a complete monopoly of them at this place, in the hands

of the Arabians, the Greek navigators and merchants were induced, in the

hopes of obtaining them cheaper, to pass the Straits of Babelmandeb, and on

the coast of Africa they found cinnamon and other produce of India, which

had been brought hither by the Arabian traders.

The evidence of the land trade between Arabia and India, from a very early

period, is equally clear and decisive: Petra, the capital of Arabia Petrea,

was the centre of this trade. To it the caravans, in all ages, came from

Minea, in the interior of Arabia, and from Gherra, in the Gulf of

Persia,--from Hadraumaut, on the Ocean, and some even from Sabaea. From

Petra, the trade again spread in every direction--to Egypt, Palestine, and

Syria, through Arsinoe, Gaza, Tyre, Jerusalem, Damascus, and other places

of less consequence, all lying on routes terminating in the Mediterranean.

The Gherrheans, who were a Babylonian colony settled in that part of

Arabia, which extends along the south coast of the Persian Gulf, are the

earliest conductors of caravans upon record. They are first mentioned by

Agatharcides, who compares their wealth with that of the Sabeans, and

describes them as the agents for all the precious commodities of Asia and

Europe: he adds that they brought much wealth into Syria, and furnished a

variety of articles, which were afterwards manufactured or resold by the

Phoenicians. But the only route by which Syria and Phoenicia could have

been supplied by them, was through Petra. The particular articles with

which their caravans were loaded, according to Strabo, were the produce of

Arabia, and the spices of India. Besides the route of their caravans,

across the whole peninsula to Petra, it appears that they sometimes carried

their merchandize in boats up the Euphrates to Babylon, or even 240 miles

higher up, to Thapsacus, and thence dispersed it in all directions by land.

The exact site of the country of the Mineans cannot be certainly fixed; but

it is probable that it was to the south of Hedjaz, to the north of

Hadraumaut, and to the eastward of Sabaea. According to Strabo, their

caravans passed in seventy days from Hadraumaut to Aisla, which was within

ten miles of Petra. They were laden with aloes, gold, myrrh, frankincense,

and other aromatics.

We can but faintly and obscurely trace the fluctuations in the trade of

Petra, in the remote periods of history. We know that Solomon was in

possession of Idumea, but whether it was subdued by Nebuchadnezzar is

doubtful. This sovereign, however, seems to have formed some plan of

depriving the Gherrheans of the commerce of the Gulf of Persia. He raised a

mound to confine the waters of the Tigris: he built a city to stop the

incursions of the Arabs, and opened a communication between the rivers

Tigris and Euphrates. After this there is no account of Idumea till some

years subsequent to the death of Alexander the Great: at this period two

expeditions were sent into it against its capital, Petra, by Antigonus,

both of which were unsuccessful. These expeditions were undertaken about

the years 308 and 309 before Christ. The history of Idumea, from this

period, is better ascertained: harassed by the powerful kingdoms of Syria

and Egypt,--contiguous to both of which it lay,--it seems to have been

governed by princes of its own, who were partly independent, and partly

under the influence of the monarchs of Syria and Egypt. About sixty-three

years before Christ, Pompey took Petra; and, from that period, the

sovereigns of Idumea were tributary to the Romans. This city, however,

still retained its commerce, and was in a flourishing condition, as we are

informed by Strabo, on the authority of his friend Athenedorus, who visited

it about thirty-six years after it. He describes it as built on a rock,

distinguished, however, from all the rocks in that part of Arabia, from

being supplied with an abundant spring of water. Its natural position, as

well as art, rendered it a fortress of importance in the desert. He

represents the people as rich, civilized, and peaceable; the government as

regal, but the chief power as lodged in a minister selected by the king,

who had the title of the king's brother. Syllaeus, who betrayed Elius

Gallus, appears to have been a minister of this description.

The next mention that occurs of the trade of Petra is in the Periplus of

the Erythrean Sea, the date of which, though uncertain, there is good

reason to fix in Nero's reign. According to this work, Leuke Kome, at the

mouth of the Elanitic Gulf, was the point of communication with Petra, the

capital of the country, the residence of Malachus, the king of the

Nabathians. "Leuke Kome, itself, had the rank of a mart in respect to the

small vessels which obtained their cargoes in Arabia, for which reason

there was a garrison placed in it, under the command of a centurion, both

for the purpose of protection, and in order to collect a duty of

twenty-five in the hundred." In the reign of Trajan, Idumea was reduced

into the form of a Roman province, by one of his generals; after this time

it not does fall within our plan to notice it, except merely to state, that

its subjection does not seem to have been complete or permanent, for during

the latter empire, there were certainly sovereigns of this part of Arabia,

in some degree independent, whose influence and alliance were courted by

the Romans and Persians, whenever a war was about to commence between these

two powers.

From this sketch of the trade of the Arabians from the earliest period, we

may conclude, in the first place, that when navigation was in its infancy,

it was confined, or almost entirely so, to a land trade carried on by

caravans; and that Petra was the centre to which these caravans tended from

the east and the south, bringing with them from the former the commodities

of India, and from the latter the commodities of the more fertile part of

Arabia. From Petra, all these goods were again transported by land to the

shores of the Mediterranean and to Egypt. In the second place, when

navigation became more commonly known and practised, (and there is good

reason to believe that it was known and practised among the Arabians,

especially those near the Persian Gulf, at a very early period,) a portion

of the Indian commodities, which before had been carried by land to Petra

were brought by sea to Sabaea. It appears that in the age of Agatharcides,

the monopoly of the trade between India and Europe by this route was wholly

possessed by the Sabeans; that, in order to evade the effects of this

monopoly, the Greeks of Egypt found their way to Aden and Hadraumaut, in

Arabia, and to Mosullon on the coast of Africa. Here they met with other

Arabians, who at this time also traded to India, and sold them Indian goods

at a cheaper rate. And, lastly, we have seen that these ports on the

southern coast of Arabia, and on the coast of Africa, were frequented by

the merchants of Egypt, till, by the discovery of the monsoon, their ships

were enabled to sail directly to India. It is undoubtedly true that before

this discovery, single ships occasionally reached India by adhering to the

coast all the way, but the direct communication was very rare. After the

nature of the monsoon was thoroughly understood, and it was ascertained

that complete dependence could be placed on its steadiness and regularity,

and that by its change, the ships could be brought as safely and quickly

back from India, as they had reached it, the ancients, who at first only

ventured to the mouth of the Indus, gradually made their way down the

western coast of the Indian peninsula.

The Periplus of the Erythrean Sea, a work which has been frequently

referred to, is rich in materials to illustrate the geographical knowledge

and the commercial enterprize of the ancients in the part of the world to

which it relates. We have already assigned its date to the age of Nero. Our

limits will prevent us from giving a full account of this work; we shall

therefore, in the first place, give a short abstract of the geographical

knowledge which it displays, and in the next place, illustrate from it, the

nature of the commerce carried on, on the Red Sea, the adjacent coasts of

Africa and Arabia, and the ports of India, which are noticed in it.

At the time of Strabo, the geography of the ancients did not extend, on the

eastern coast of Africa, further to the south than a promontory called Noti

Cornu, (the Southern Horn,) which seems to have been in about 12-1/2

degrees north latitude. Beyond this an arid coast, without ports or fresh

water, arrested the progress of navigation; but it appears by the Periplus,

that this promontory was now passed, and commerce had extended to the port

of Rhapta and the isle of Menutias, which are supposed to correspond with

Babel Velho and the island of Magadoxa. The author of the Periplus, who

seems to have been a merchant personally acquainted with most of the places

he describes, had heard of, but not visited the promontory Prasum: he

represents the ocean beyond Rhapta as entirely unknown, but as believed to

continue its western direction, and after having washed the south coast of

Ethiopia, to join the Western Ocean. The whole of the west coast of India,

from the Indus to Trapobane, is minutely described in the Periplus. Some of

the particulars of the manners and customs of the inhabitants coincide in a

striking manner with those of the present day; this observation applies,

among other points, to the pirates between Bombay and Goa.

Dr. Vincent, in his learned commentary on the Periplus, gives it as his

opinion, that the author of the Periplus never went further than Nelkundah

himself, that is, to the boundary between the provinces of Canara and

Malabar. The east coast of the Indian peninsula is not traced so minutely

nor so accurately as the west coast, though there are names and

descriptions in the Periplus, from which it may fairly be inferred, that

the author alludes to Cavary, Masulapatam, Calingapatam, Coromandel, and

other places and districts of this part of India. The countries beyond the

Ganges, the Golden Chersonese, and the countries towards China, are very

obscurely noticed in the Periplus, though the information he gives

respecting the trade carried on in these parts is much more minute and

accurate. His description of the direction of the coast of India, is on the

whole, surprisingly consonant to truth: according to him, it tends from

north to south, as far as Colchos (Travancore); at this place it bends to

the east, and afterwards to the north; and then again a little to the east,

as far as the Ganges. He is the first author in whom can clearly be traced

the name of the great southern division of India: his term is

Dachanabades,--Dachan signifying south, and abad a city; and Decan is still

the general name of all the country to the south of Baroche, the boundary

assigned by the author. The particulars he mentions of the bay of Cutch, of

Cambay, of Baroche, and of the Ghauts, may also be mentioned as proofs of

his accuracy with respect to those parts of India, which he visited in

person.

Having thus given a sketch of the geographical knowledge contained the

Periplus, we shall next attend to the commercial information which it

conveys. As this work is divided into two distinct parts, the first

comprising the coast of the Red Sea, and of Africa, from Myos Hormos on the

former, to Rhapta in the latter: and the second part, beginning at the same

place, and including the whole coast of Arabia, both that which lies on the

Red Sea, and that which lies on the Ocean, and then stretching from the

Gulf of Persia to Guzerat, describing the coast of Malabar, as far as

Ceylon, we shall, in our abstract of the commercial intelligence it

contains, enumerate the principal imports and exports of the most

frequented marts in Africa, (including the Red Sea,) Arabia, and India.

I. The Red Sea and Africa. Myos Hormos is described as the first port of

Egypt on the Red Sea; as it lies in twenty-seven degrees north latitude,

and Rhapta, the boundary of the Periplus to the south, in nearly ten

degrees south latitude, the distance between them will be about 2,500

miles. It is to be supposed, that every thing relating to the geography,

navigation, and commerce of the Red Sea, from Myos Hormos to Aduli, on the

western side, and Moosa, on the eastern side of it, was well known to the

merchants of Egypt, as the author of the Periplus gives no circumstantial

account of any port, till he arrives at these places. It appears, also,

that till the ships arrived at these places, they kept the mid-channel of

the Red Sea, and, consequently, there was no occasion, or indeed,

opportunity of describing the intermediate ports. We have already

mentioned, that Myos Hormos was fixed on by Ptolemy Philadelphus, in

preference to Arsinoe, because the navigation of the western part of the

Red Sea, on which the latter was placed, was intricate and tedious.

Berenice was afterwards selected, as being still lower down: but it is

worthy of remark, that neither Berenice, nor Ptolemais Theron, another port

of the Ptolemies, were harbours, but merely roadsteads, though from our

author's description, there were an almost infinite number of safe

harbours, creeks, bays, &c. in every part of the Red Sea.

Aduli, the first port on the west side of the Red Sea, and the port of

communication with Axuma, was, in the age of the Periplus, subject to the

same prince, who possessed the whole coast, from Berenice. The exports from

this place were confined to ivory, brought from the interior on both sides

of the Nile; the horns of the rhinoceros, and tortoise-shell. The imports

were very numerous, forming an assortment, as Dr. Vincent justly observes,

as specific as a modern invoice: the principal articles were, cloth,

manufactured in Egypt, unmilled, for the Barbarian market. The term,

Barbarii, was applied to the Egyptians, to the whole western coast of the

Red Sea, and was derived from Barbar, the native name of the country

inhabited by the Troglodytes, Icthyophagi, and shepherds: as these were

much hated and dreaded by the Egyptians, Barbarii became a term of reproach

and dread, and in this sense it was adopted by the Greeks and Romans, and

has passed into the modern European languages. But to return from this

digression,--the other imports were robes, manufactured at Arsinoe; cloths

dyed, so as to imitate the Tyrian purple; linens, fringed mantles, glass or

crystal, murrhine cups, orichalchum, or mixed metal for trinkets and coin;

brass vessels for cooking, the pieces of which, when they happened to be

broken, were worn by the women as ornaments; iron, for weapons and other

purposes; knives, daggers, hatchets, &c.; brass bowls, wine, oil, gold and

silver plate, camp cloaks, and cover-lids: these formed the principal

articles of import from Myos Hormos, and as they are very numerous,

compared with the exports, it seems surprising that coin should also have

been imported, but that this was the case, we are expressly told by the

author of the Periplus, who particularizes Roman currency, under the name

of Denarii. The following articles imported into Aduli, must have come

through Arabia, from India: Indian iron; Indian cottons; coverlids, and

sashes made of cotton; cotton cloth, dyed the colour of the mallow-flower,

and a few muslins.

The Periplus next passes without the Straits of Babelmandeb: on the African

side, four principal marts are mentioned, to all of which the epithet of

Tapera, is applied, signifying their position beyond the straits. The first

of these marts is Abalitis: as this place had no port, goods were conveyed

to the ships in boats and rafts; they were also employed by the natives, in

carrying on a trade with the opposite ports of Arabia: what they imported

from Arabia, is not specified; but they exported thither gums, a small

quantity of ivory, tortoise-shell, and myrrh of the finest quality. This

last article being purchased by the Greek merchants, in Sabæa, was regarded

by them as a native production of that part of Arabia, when, in reality, as

we learn from the Periplus, it was the produce of Africa. There were

imported into Abalitis, from Egypt, flint glass, and glass vessels

unsorted; unripe grapes from Diospolis, which were used to make the rob of

grapes; unmilled cloths, for the Barbaric market; corn, wine, and tin; the

last article must have come from Britain.

The next mart is Malao, likewise a roadstead; the imports were the same as

those of Abalitis, with the addition of tunics; cloaks manufactured at

Arsinoe, milled and dyed; iron, and a small quantity of specie: the exports

were, myrrh, frankincense, cassia, inferior cinnamon, substituted for the

oriential; gum, and a few slaves. The only article of export peculiar to

the third mart, Mundus, was a fragrant gum, which seems to have grown only

in its vicinity.

The fourth and last mart mentioned as lying on the African side of the

channel, which opens from the Straits of Babelmandeb, is Mosullon; this was

the most important mart on the whole coast, and that which gave a specific

name to the trade of the ancients: the imports were numerous, comprising,

besides those already mentioned, some that were peculiar to this place,

such as vessels of silver, a small quantity of iron, and flint glass: the

exports were, cinnamon, of an inferior quality; the quantity of this

article is noticed as so great, that larger vessels were employed in the

trade of this port, expressly for conveying it, than were seen in the other

ports of Africa. We are informed by Pliny, that Mosullon was a great market

for cinnamon,--and it would seem, from its being conveyed in large vessels

by sea, that it came from Arabia. The cinnamon mentioned in the Periplus,

is, indeed, particularized as of an inferior quality, which is directly at

variance with the authority of Dioscorides, who expressly states that the

Mosulletic species is one of prime quality; if this were the case, it must

have been Indian. The other exports were gums, drugs, tortoise-shell,

incense, frankincense, brought from distant places; ivory, and a small

quantity of myrrh. The abundance of aromatic articles, which the Greeks

procured on this part of the coast, induced them to give the name of

Aromatic to the whole country, and particularly to the town and promontory

at the eastern extremity of it. Cape Aromata, the Gardefan of the moderns,

is not only the extreme point east of the continent of Africa, but also

forms the southern point of entrance on the approach to the Red Sea, and is

the boundary of the monsoon. At the marts between Mosullon and this Cape,

no articles of commerce are specified, except frankincense, in great

abundance and of the best quality, at Alkannai. At the Cape itself, there

was a mart, with an exposed roadsted; and to the south of it, was another

mart; from both these, the principal exports consisted of various kinds of

aromatics.

At Aromata, the Barbaria of the ancients, or the Adel of the moderns,

terminates; and the coast of Azania, or Agan, begins. The first mart on

this coast is Opone, from which there were exported, besides the usual

aromatics and other articles, slaves of a superior description, chiefly for

the Egyptian market, and tortoise-shell, also of a superior sort, and in

great abundance. There was nothing peculiar in the imports. In this part of

his work, the author of the Periplus, mentions and describes the annual

voyage between the coast of Africa and India: after enumerating the

articles imported from the latter country, which consisted chiefly of corn,

rice, butter; oil of Sesanum; cotton, raw and manufactured sashes; and

honey from the cane, called sugar; he adds, that "many vessels are employed

in this commerce, expressly for the importation of these articles, and

others, which have a more distant destination, sell part of their cargoes

on this coast, and take in the produce in return." This seems to be the

first historical evidence of a commercial intercourse between India and

Africa, independent of the voyages of the Arabians; and as the parts from

which the ships sailed to India, lay within the limits of the monsoon, it

most probably was accomplished by means of it, and directly from land to

land, without coasting round by the Gulf of Persia. The ports on the west

coast of India, to which the trade was carried on, were Ariake and

Barugaza, in Guzerat and Concan.

No mart is mentioned after Opone, till we arrive at Rhapta. This place was

so named by the Greeks, because the ships employed by the inhabitants were

raised from a bottom composed of a single piece of wood, and the sides were

sewed to it, instead of being nailed. In order to preserve the sewing, the

whole outside was covered over with some of the gums of the country. It is

a circumstance worthy of notice, that when the Portuguese first visited

this coast, they found ships of exactly the same materials and

construction. At Rhapta, the customs were farmed by the merchants of Moosa,

though it was subject to one of the princes of Yeman. Arabian commanders

and supercargoes were always employed in their ships, from their experience

in the navigation: the imports of Rhapta were, lances, principally

manufactured at Moosa; axes, knives, awls, and various kinds of glass: the

exports were, ivory, inferior to the Aduli ivory, but cheap, and in great

abundance; the horns of the rhinoceros, tortoise shell, superior to any of

this coast, but not equal to the Indian; and an article called Nauplius,

the nature of which is not known.

At the period when the Periplus was written, the coast was unknown beyond

Rhapta; at this place, therefore, the journal of this voyage terminates;

but this place, there is every reason to believe that the author visited in

person.

The commencement of the second voyage is from Berenice: from this port he

conducts us to Myos Hormos, and there across the Red Sea to Leuke Kome in

Arabia. This port we have already noticed as in the possession of the

Romans, and forming the point of communication with Petra. We have also

stated from our author, that at Leuke Kome the Romans kept a garrison, and

collected a duty of twenty-five per cent. on the goods imported and

exported. From it to the coast below Burnt Island, there was no trade

carried on, in consequence of the dangers of the navigation from rocks, the

want of harbours, the poverty and barbarism of the natives, who seem to

have been pirates, and the want of produce and manufactures.

In the farthest bay of the east or Arabian coast of the Red Sea, about

thirty miles from the straits, was Moosa, the regular mart of the country,

established, protected, and privileged as such by the government. It was

not a harbour, but a road with good anchorage on a sandy bottom. The

inhabitants were Arabians, and it was much resorted to by merchants, both

on account of the produce and manufactures of the adjacent country, and on

account of its trade to India. The imports into Moosa were principally

purple cloth of different qualities and prices; garments made in the

Arabian manner, with sleeves, plain and mixed; saffron; an aromatic rush

used in medicine; muslins, cloaks, quilts, but only a few plain, and made

according to the fashion of the country; sashes of various colours; some

corn and wine, and coin to pay for the balance of trade. In order to

ingratiate the sovereigns of the country, horses, mules, gold plate, silver

plate richly embossed, splendid robes, and brass goods were also imported,

expressly as presents to them. One of these sovereigns was styled the

friend of the Roman emperors. Embassies were frequently sent to him from

Rome, and it is probable that for him the presents were chiefly designed.

The exports from Moosa were myrrh of the best quality, gum, and very pure

and white alabaster, of which boxes were made; there was likewise exported

a variety of articles, the produce and manufacture of Aduli, which were

brought from that place to Moosa.

We are next directed to the ports beyond the Straits of Babelmandeb. The

wind in passing them is described as violent, coming on in sudden and

dangerous squalls, in consequence of its confinement between the two capes

which formed the entrance to the straits. The first place beyond them,

about 120 miles to the east, described in the Periplus, is a village called

Arabia Felix: this, there is every reason to believe, is Aden. It is

represented in the Periplus as having been a place of great importance

before the fleets sailed directly from India to Egypt, or from Egypt to the

east. Till this occurred, the fleets from the east met in this harbour the

fleets from Egypt. This description and account of it exactly corresponds

with what Agatharcides relates: he says it received its name of Eudaimon,

(_fortunate,_) on account of the ships from India and Egypt meeting

there, before the merchants of Egypt had the courage to venture further

towards the eastern marts. Its importance seems to have continued in some

degree till it was destroyed by the Romans, probably in the time of

Claudius: the object and reason of this act was to prevent the trade, which

in his time had begun to direct its course to India, from reverting to this

place.

About 200 miles to the east of Aden was the port of Kane. The country in

its vicinity is represented as producing a great quantity of excellent

frankincense, which was conveyed to Kane by land in caravans, and by sea in

vessels, or in rafts which were floated by means of inflated skins. This

was a port of considerable trade; the merchants trading to Baragyza,

Scindi, Oman, and Persis, as well as to the ports in Africa, beyond the

straits. The goods imported were principally from Egypt, and consisted of a

small quantity of wheat, wine, cloaths for the Arabian market, common,

plain, and mixed; brass, tin, Mediterranean coral, which was in great

repute in India, so that the great demand for it prevented the Gauls in the

south of France, according to Pliny, from adorning their swords, &c. with

it, as they were wont to do; storax, plate, money, horses, statues or

images, and cloth. The exports were confined to the produce of the country,

especially frankincense and aloes. At Syagros, which is described as a

promontory fronting the east, and the largest in the world, there was a

garrison for the protection of the place, which was the repository of all

the incense collected in these parts.

The island of Dioscorides (Socotra) is next described. It was inhabited on

its northern side, (the only part of it that was then inhabited,) by a few

Arabians, Indians, and Greeks, who seem to have fixed a permanent or

temporary abode here, for the purpose of obtaining tortoise-shell: this was

much prized, being of a yellow colour, very hard and durable, and used to

make cases, boxes, and writing tables; this and dragon's blood were its

chief productions. In exchange for them, there were imported rice, corn,

Indian cotton goods, and women slaves.

The first mart beyond Cape Syagros is Moscha, which is represented as much

resorted to on account of the sacchalitic incense which is imported there.

This was so extremely abundant that it lay in heaps, with no other

protection than that which was derived from the gods, for whose sacrifices

it was intended. It is added that it was not possible for any person to

procure a cargo of it without the permission of the king; and that the

vessels were observed and searched so thoroughly, that not a single grain

of it could be clandestinely exported. The intercourse between this port

and Kane was regular; and besides this, it was frequented by such ships as

arrived from India too late in the season: here they continued during the

unfavourable monsoon, exchanging muslins, corn, and oil, for frankincense.

A small island, which is supposed to be the modern Mazeira, was visited by

vessels from Kane to collect or purchase tortoise-shell: the priests in the

island are represented in the Periplus as wearing aprons made of the fibres

of the cocoa tree: this is the earliest mention of this tree.

Moçandon, the extreme point south of the Gulf of Persia, was the land from

which the Arabians, (to use a maritime phrase) took their departure, with

various superstitious observances, imploring a blessing on their intended

voyage, and setting adrift a small toy, rigged like a ship, which, if

dashed to pieces, was supposed to be accepted by the god of the ocean,

instead of their ship.

It is impossible to determine from the Periplus, whether the author was

personally acquainted with the navigation, ports, and trade of the Gulf of

Persia: the probability is that he was not, as he mentions only two

particulars connected with it; the pearl fishery, and the town of Apologus,

a celebrated mart at the mouth of the Euphrates; the pearl fishery he

describes as extending from Moçandon to Bahrain. Apologus is the present

Oboleh, on the canal that leads from the Euphrates to Basra.

If the author of the Periplus did not enter the Gulf of Persia, he

certainly stretched over, with the monsoon, either to Karmania, or directly

to Scindi, or to the Gulf of Cambay; for at these places the minuteness of

information which distinguishes the journal again appears.

Omana in Persia is the first mart described; it lay in the province of

Gadrosia, but as it is not mentioned by Nearchus, who found Arabs in most

other parts of the province, we may conclude that it was founded after his

time. The trade between this place and Baragaza in India, was regular and

direct, and the goods brought from the latter to the former, seems

afterwards to have been sent to Oboleh at the head of the Gulf; the imports

were brass, sandal-wood; timber, of what kind is not specified; horn,

ebony; this is the first port the trade of which included ebony and

sandal-wood: frankincense was imported from Kane. The exports to Arabia and

Baragaza were purple cloth for the natives; wine, a large quantity of

dates, gold, slaves, and pearls of an inferior quality.

The first place in India to which the merchants of Egypt, while they

followed the ancient course of navigation by coasting, were accustomed to

trade, was Patala on the Indus; for we have admitted that single vessels

occasionally ventured beyond the Straits of Babelmandeb, before the

discovery of the monsoon, though the trade from Egypt to India, previously

to that discovery, was by no means frequent or regular. The goods imported

into Patala were woollen cloth of a slight fabric, linen, woven in checquer

work, some precious stones, and some kind of aromatics unknown in India,

probably the produce of Africa or Arabia; coral, storax, glass vessels of

various descriptions, some plate, money, and wine. From Patala, the

Egyptian merchants brought spices, gems of different kinds, particularly

sapphires, silk stuffs, silk thread, cotton cloths, and pepper. As Patala

is not mentioned in the Periplus, it is probable it was abandoned for

Baragaza, a far more considerable mart on the same coast, and most probably

Baroche on the Nerbuddah.

Before describing Baragaza, however, the author of the Periplus mentions

two places on the Indus, which were frequented for the purposes of

commerce: the first near the mouth of the river, called Barbarike; and the

other higher up, called Minagara: the latter was the capital of a kingdom

which extended as far as Barogaza. As the king of this country was

possessed of a place of such consequence to the merchants as Baragaza, and

as from his provinces, or through them, the most valuable cargoes were

obtained, it was of the utmost moment that his good will and protection

should be obtained and preserved. For this purpose there were imported, as

presents for him, the following articles, all expensive, and the very best

of their kind: plate of very great value; musical instruments; handsome

virgins for the haram; wine of the very best quality; plain cloth, but of

the finest sort; and perfumes. Besides these presents, there were likewise

imported a great quantity of plain garments, and some mixed or inferior

cloth; topazes, coral, storax, frankincense, glass vessels, plate, specie,

and wine. The exports were costus, a kind of spice; bdellium, a gum; a

yellow dye, spikenard, emeralds, sapphires, cottons, silk thread, indigo,

or perhaps the indicum of Pliny, which was probably Indian ink: skins are

likewise enumerated, with the epithet _serica_ prefixed to them, but

of what kind they were cannot be determined: wine is specified as an

article of import into this and other places; three kinds of it are

particularized: wine from Laodicea in Syria, which is still celebrated for

its wine; Italian wine, and Arabian wine. Some suppose that the last was

palm or toddy wine, which seems to have been a great article of trade.

We come now to Baragaza: the author first mentions the produce of the

district; it consisted of corn, rice, oil of Sesamum, ghee or butter, and

cotton: he then, in a most minute and accurate manner, describes the

approach to the harbour; the extraordinarily high tides, the rapidity with

which they roll in and again recede, especially at the new moon, the

difficult pilotage of the river, are all noticed. On account of these

dangers and difficulties, he adds, that pilots were appointed by the

government, with large boats, well manned, who put to sea to wait the

approach of ships. These pilots, as soon as they come on board, bring the

ship's head round, and keep her clear of the shoals at the mouth of the

river; if necessary, they tow the ship from station to station, where there

is good anchorage; these stations were called Basons, and seem to have been

pools retaining the water, after the tide had receded from other parts. The

navigation of the river was performed only as long as the tide was

favorable; as soon as it turned, the ships anchored in these stations.

The sovereign to whom Baragaza belonged is represented as so very anxious

to render it the only mart, that he would not permit ships to enter any of

his other harbours; if they attempted it, they were boarded and conducted

to Baragaza; at this place were collected all the produce and manufactures

of this part of India: some of which were brought down the river Nerbuddah;

others were conveyed across the mountains by caravans. The merchandize of

Bengal, and even of the Seres, was collected here, besides the produce of

Africa, and of the countries further to the south in India. The whole

arrangement of this place was correspondent to this extensive commerce, for

the author informs us, that such was the despatch in transacting business,

that a cargo could be entirely landed and sold, and a new cargo obtained

and put on board in the space of three days.

From Ozeni to the east of Baragaza, formerly the capital of the country,

there was brought to the latter place for exportation, chiefly the

following articles: onyx stones, porcelaine, fine muslins, muslins dyed of

the colour of the melon, and common cotton in great quantities: from the

Panjab there were brought for exportation, spikenard of different kinds,

costus, bdellium, ivory, murrhine cups, myrrh, pepper, &c. The imports were

wine, of all the three sorts already mentioned, brass, tin, lead, coral,

topazes, cloth of different kinds, sashes, storax, sweet lotus, white

glass, stibium, cinnabar, and a small quantity of perfumes: a considerable

quantity of corn was also imported; the denarius, both gold and silver,

exchanging with profit against the coin of the country, on account of its

greater purity.

From Baragaza the author proceeds to a description of the coast of the

Decan, which, as we have already mentioned, is remarkable for its accuracy,

as well as for its first mentioning the appellation Decan. At the distance

of twenty days' journey to the south lies Plithana, and ten days' journey

to the east of this is Tagara, both marts of great consequence, and the

latter the capital of the country. From these are brought down, through

difficult roads, several articles to Baragaza, particularly onyx stones

from Plithana, and cottons and muslin from Tagara "If we should now

describe, (observed Dr. Vincent) the arc of a circle from Minnagar, on the

Indus, through Ougein to Dowlatabad on the Godavery, of which Baroche

should be the centre, we might comprehend the extent of the intelligence

acquired by the merchant of the Periplus. But allowing that this was the

knowledge of the age, and not of the individual only, where is this

knowledge preserved, except in this brief narrative? which, with all the

corruption of its text, is still an inestimable treasure to all those who

wish to compare the first dawning of our knowledge in the east with the

meridian light which we now enjoy by the intercourse and conquests of the

Europeans. An arc of this sort comprehends near three degrees of a great

circle: and if upon such a space, and at such a distance from the coast, we

find nothing but what is confirmed by the actual appearance of the country,

at the present moment, great allowance is to be made for those parts of the

work which are less conspicuous, for the author did certainly not visit

every place which he mentions; and there are manifest omissions in the

text, as well as errors and corruptions."

The province of Canara, called by the author of the Periplus Limurike,

follows in his description the pirate coast; after Limurike, he describes

Pandion, corresponding with what is at present called Malabar Proper; this

is succeeded by Paralia and Comari, and the description of the west coast

of India is terminated by the pearl fishery and Ceylon. There were several

small ports in Limurike frequented by the country ships; but the only mart

frequented by vessels from Egypt was Musiris: it was likewise a great

resort of native vessels from Ariake or Concan. The articles imported were

nearly the same as those at Baragaza, but the exports from it were more

numerous and valuable: this seems to have arisen from its lying nearer to

the eastern and richer parts of India. The principal exports were, pearls

in great abundance and extraordinary beauty; a variety of silk stuffs; rich

perfumes; tortoise-shell; different kinds of transparent gems, especially

diamonds; and pepper in large quantites, and of the best quality.

The port of Nelkundah, which, as we have already remarked, was the limit of

our author's personal knowledge, was a place of very great trade; it was

much frequented, principally on account of the betel and pepper, which were

procured there on very reasonable terms: the pepper is distinguished, in

the list of its imports, as the pepper of Cottonara. Besides this article

and betel, the only exports were, pearls, ivory, silks, spikenard, precious

stones, and tortoise-shell; the imports were chiefly specie, topazes,

cloth, stibium, coral, glass, brass, tin, lead, wine, corn, &c.

The ports to the south of Nelkundah are described in a cursory manner in

the Periplus; they were frequented principally by the country ships, which

carried on a lucrative trade between them and the ports in the north of

India. The exports of the island of Trapobane, or Ceylon, are

particularized as consisting chiefly of pearls, gems, tortoise-shells, and

muslins: cinnamon is not named; an almost decisive proof, if other proof

were wanting, that the author of the Periplus had never visited this

island. That trading voyages were carried on by the natives from the

southern ports of India, not only to the northern ports of the western side

of that country, but also to the eastern ports in the Bay of Bengal, and to

the farther peninsula itself, we are expressly informed, as our author

mentions vessels of great bulk adapted to the voyages made to the Ganges

and the Golden Chersonese, in contradistinction to other and smaller

vessels employed in the voyages to Limurike.

Of the remainder of the Periplus little notice is requisite, the account of

the countries beyond Cape Comorin being entirely drawn from report, and

consequently erroneous, both in respect to geography and commerce. In some

particulars regarding the latter, however, it is surprisingly accurate: the

Gangetic muslins are praised as the finest manufacture of the sort, and

Gangetic spikenard is also noticed; the other articles of traffic in the

ports on the Ganges were betel and pearls. Thina is also mentioned as a

city, in the interior of a country immediately under the north, at a

certain point where the sea terminates; from this city both the raw

material and manufactured silks are brought by land through Bactria to

Baragaza, or else down the Ganges, and thence by sea to Limurike: the

routes we have already described. The means of approach to Thina are

represented as very difficult; some merchants, however, came from it to a

great mart which is annually held near it. The Sesatoe, who from the

description of them are evidently Tartars, frequent this mart with their

wives and children. "They are squat and thick-set, with their face broad

and their nose greatly depressed. The articles they bring for trade are of

great bulk, and inveloped in mats made of rushes, which, in their outward

appearance, resemble the early leaves of the vine. Their place of assembly

is between their own borders and those of China; and here spreading out

their mats, they hold a fair for several days, and at the conclusion of it,

return to their own country in the interior. Upon their retreat the Thinæ,

who have continued on the watch, repair to the spot and collect the mats

which the strangers left behind at their departure; from these they pick

out the haulm, and drawing out the fibres, spread the leaves double, and

make them into balls, and then pass the fibres through them. Of these balls

there are three sorts, in this form they take the name of Malabathrum."

On this account Dr. Vincent very justly remarks, that we have here, upon

the whole, a description of that mode of traffic, which has always been

adopted by the Chinese, and by which they to this hour trade with Russia,

Thibet, and Ava.

Many of the particulars which we have given on the subject of the Roman

trade are supplied by Pliny, who wrote his natural history when Rome was in

its most flourishing state under the reign of Vespasian. His works consist

of thirty-seven books, the first six comprise the system of the world and

the geography as it was then known. After examining the accounts of

Polybius, Agrippa, and Artemidorus, he assigns the following comparative

magnitudes to the three great divisions of the earth. Europe rather more

than a third, Asia about a fourth, and Africa about a fifth of the whole.

With few exceptions, his geographical knowledge of the east and of the

north, the parts of the world of which the ancients were the most ignorant,

was very inaccurate: he supposes the Ganges to be the north-eastern limit

of Asia, and that from it the coast turned to the north, where it was

washed by the sea of Serica, between which and a strait, which he imagined

formed a communication from the Caspian to the Scythian ocean, he admits

but a very small space. According to the system of Pliny, therefore, the

ocean occupied the whole county of Siberia, Mogul Tartary, China, &c. He

derived his information respecting India from the journals of Nearchus, and

the other officers of Alexander; and yet such is his ignorance, or the

corrupt state of the text, or the vitiated medium through which he received

his information, that it is not easy to reconcile his account with that of

Nearchus. 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 Cæsar, 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 Cellæ (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. In the year A.D. 170, he was

appointed governor of Pontus, by Adrian, for the special purpose of

opposing the Alani, who were invading that part of the empire. His

situation and opportunities as governor, enabled him to derive the most

accurate and particular information respecting the Euxine Sea, which he

addressed in a letter to Adrian; this Periplus, as it is called, "contains

whatever the governor of Pontus had seen, from Trebizond to Dioscurias;

whatever he had heard from Dioscurias to the Danube and whatever he knew

from the Danube to Trebizond."

The letter begins with the arrival of Arrian at Trebizond, at which place,

the artificial port already noticed was then forming. At Trebizond he

embarked, and surveyed the eastern coast of the Euxine Sea, visiting every

where the Roman garrisons. His course led him past the mouth of the Phasis,

the waters of which, he remarks, floated a long time on those of the sea,

by reason of their superior lightness. A strong garrison was stationed at

the mouth of this river, to protect this part of the country against the

Barbarians; he adds, however, in his letter, that the new suburbs which had

been built by the merchants and veterans, required some additional defence,

and that he had, accordingly, for the greater security of the place,

strengthened it with a new ditch: he ended his voyage at Sebastapolis, the

most distant city garrisoned by the Romans. The description of the coasts

of Asia, from Byzantium to Trebizond, and another of the interior, from

Sebastapolis to the Bosphorus Cimmerius, and thence to Byzantium, is added

to his voyage. The great object of this minute and accurate survey was to

enable the emperor to take what measures he might deem proper, in case he

designed to interfere in the affairs of the Bosphorus, as well as to point

out the means of defence against the Alani, and other enemies of the Roman

power.

We have contented ourselves with this short abstract of the Periplus of the

Euxine, because we have already given all the important information it

contains on the subject of the commerce of this sea. It is very inferior in

merit to the Periplus of the Euxine, which has also been attributed to this

Arrian, though Dr. Vincent, we think, has proved that it is the work of an

earlier writer, and of a merchant.

As the Roman conquests extended, their geographical knowledge of course

increased. In the reign of Antoninus Pius, their armies had forced a

passage much further north in Britain than they had ever ventured before.

One of the results of this success was a maritime survey, or rather two

partial surveys of the north part of Britain, from which the geography of

that part of the island was compiled by Ptolemy.

The maritime laws of the Rhodians, or those which passed under their name,

seem to have been the basis and authority of the Roman maritime laws at

this period; for we are told, that when a merchant complained to the

emperor that he had been plundered by the imperial officers at the

Cyclades, where he had been shipwrecked, the latter replied, that he indeed

was lord of the earth, but that the sea was governed by the Rhodian laws,

and that from them he would obtain redress. This part of the Rhodian law,

however, had been but lately adopted by the Romans; for Antoninus is

expressly mentioned as having enacted, among other laws, that shipwrecked

merchandize should be the entire property of the lawful owners, without any

interference or participation of the officers of the exchequer, and that

those who were guilty of plundering wrecks should be severely punished.

One of the most important and complete surveys of the Roman empire (the

idea of which, as has been already stated, was first formed by Julius

Cæsar) was begun and finished in the reign of Antoninus, and is well known

under the appellation of his Itinerary. It has, indeed, been objected to

this date of the Itinerary, that it contains places which were not known in

the time of Antonine, and names of places which they did not bear till

after his reign; thus mention is made of the province of Arcadia in Egypt,

and of Honorius in Pontus, so styled in honor of the sons of the emperor

Theodosius. But the fact seems to be that alterations and additions were

made to the Itinerary, and that occasionally, or perhaps under each

subsequent emperor, new editions of it were published. From the maritime

part of this Itinerary of Antoninus we derive a clear idea of the timidity

or want of skill and enterprise of the Mediterranean seamen in their

commercial voyages. All the ports which it was prudent or necessary, for

the safety of the voyage, to touch at, in sailing from Achaia to Africa are

enumerated; and of these there are no fewer than twenty, some of them at

the heads of bays on the coasts of Greece, Epirus, and Italy, and within

the Straits of Sicily as far as Messina. Their course was then to be

directed along the east and south coasts of Sicily to the west point of it;

from an island off this point they took their departure for the coast of

Africa, a distance of about ninety miles.

These Itineraries undoubtedly were drawn up in as accurate a manner as

possible; but till the time of Ptolemy they were of little service to

geography or commerce, as, for a private individual to have one in his

possession was deemed a crime little short of high treason. Geography as a

science, therefore, had hitherto made little advances; indeed the discovery

and example of Hipparchus, of reducing it to astronomical basis, seems to

have been forgotten or neglected till the middle of the second century. The

first after him, who attempted to fix geography on the base of science was

Marinus, of Tyre, who lived a short time before Ptolemy; of his work we

have only extracts given by this geographer. He divided the terms latitude

and longitude, which, as we have already stated, were introduced by

Artemidorus (A.C. 104) into degrees, and these degrees into their parts,

though this improvement was not reduced generally to practice before

Ptolemy, for we are informed by him, that Marinus had the latitude of some

places and the longitude of others, but scarcely one position where he

could ascertain both.

With regard to the extent of Marinus' geographical knowledge, or the

accuracy of his details, we cannot form a fair judgment from the fragments

of his works which remain. According to Ptolemy, he had examined the

history of preceding ages, and all the information that had been collected

in his own time, comparing and rectifying them as he proceeded in his own

account.

It will be recollected that the Periplus of the Erythrean Sea did not trace

the African coast lower down than Rhapta; but Marinus mentions Prasum,

which, according to that hypothesis, which fixes it in the lowest southern

latitude, must have been seven degrees to the south of Rhapta. So far,

therefore, the knowlege of the ancients, in the time of Marinus, respecting

the east coast of Africa extended; but, as neither he nor Ptolemy mentions

a single place between Rhapta and Prasum, it is probable that the latter

was not frequently or regularly visited for the purposes of trade, but that

commercial voyages were still confined to the limit of Rhapta. We have just

stated that Prasum, according to the most moderate hypothesis, must be

fixed seven degrees to the south of Rhapta. Marinus, however, fixes it

either in thirty-five degrees south, or under the tropic of Capricorn. He

was led into this and similar errors by assigning too great a number of

stadia to the degree. Ptolemy endeavours to correct him, and places Prasum

in latitude 15, 30 south; it is remarkable that the Prasum of Ptolemy is

precisely at Mosambique, the last of the Arabian settlements in the

following ages, and the Prasum of Marinus, if under the tropic of

Capricorn, is the limit of the knowledge of the Arabians on this coast of

Africa.

Marinus, as quoted by Ptolemy, affirms that he was in possession of the

journals of two expeditions under the command of Septimus Flaccus and

Julius Maternus: the former of these officers set off from Cyrene, and the

latter from Leptis; and, according to Marinus, they penetrated through the

interior of Africa to the southward of the Equator, as far as a nation they

styled Agesymba. The error of Marinus with respect to the valuation of the

stadium, has led him to fix this nation in twenty-four degrees south

latitude; if allowance, however, be made for his error, the Agesymba will

still be placed under the Equator,--a great distance for a land expedition

to have readied in the interior of Africa. Flaccus reported that the

Ethiopians of Agesymba, were three months journeying to the south of the

Garamantes, and the latter were 5400 of the stadia of Marinus, distant from

Cyrene. According to the journal of Maternus, when the king of the

Garamantes set off to attack the people of Agesymba, he marched four months

to the south.

There are also some notices in Marinus of voyages performed along the coast

of Africa, between India and Africa, and along part of the coast of India;

he particularly mentions one Theophilus who frequented the coast of Azania,

and who was carried by a south-west wind from Rhapta to Aromata in twenty

days; and Diogenes, one of the traders to India, who on his return after he

had come in sight of Aromata, was caught by the north-east monsoon, and

carried down the coast during twenty-five days, till he reached the lakes

from which the Nile issues. Marinus also mentions a Diogenes Samius, who

describes the course held by vessels from the Indus to the coast of Cambay,

and from Arabia to the coast of Africa. According to him, in the former

voyage they sailed with the Bull in the middle of the heavens, and the

Pleiades in the middle of the main yard; in the latter voyage, they sailed

to the south, and by the star Canobus.

We now arrive at the name of Ptolemy, certainly the most celebrated

geographer of antiquity. He was a native of Alexandria, and flourished in

the reign of the emperor Marcus Antoninus. In the application of astronomy

to geography, he followed Hipparchus principally, and he seems from his

residence at Alexandria to have derived much information through the

merchants and navigators of that city, as well as from its magnificent and

valuable library. His great work, as it has reached us, consists almost

entirely of an elementary picture of the earth, (if it may be so called,)

in which its figure and size, and the position of places are determined.

There is only a short notice of the division of countries, and it is very

seldom that any historical notice is added. To this outline, it is supposed

that Ptolemy had added a detailed account of the countries then known,

which is lost.

His geography, such as we have described it, consists of eight books, and

is certainly much more scientific than any which had been previously

written on this science. In it there appears, for the first time, an

application of geometrical principles to the construction of maps: the

different projections of the sphere, and a distribution of the several

places on the earth, according to their latitude and longitude. Geography

was thus established on its proper principles, and intimately connected

with astronomical observations and mathematical science. The utility and

merit of Ptolemy's work seems to have been understood and acknowledged soon

after it appeared. Agathemidorus, who lived not long after him, praises him

for having reduced geography to a regular system; and adds, that he treats

of every thing relating to it, not carelessly, or merely according to the

ideas of his own, but to what had been delivered by more ancient authors,

adopting from them whatever he found consonant to truth. Agathodæmon, an

artist of Alexandria, observing the request in which his work was held,

prepared a set of maps to illustrate it, in which all the places mentioned

in it were laid down, with the latitudes and longitudes he assigned them.

The reputation of his geography remained unshaken and undiminished during

the middle ages, both in Arabia and Europe; and even now, the scientific

language which he first employed, is constantly used, and the position of

places ascertained by specifying their latitude and longitude.

It was not to be expected, however, that Ptolemy could accurately fix the

longitude and latitude of places in the remoter parts of the then known

world; his latitudes and longitudes are accordingly frequently erroneous,

but especially the latter. This arose partly from his taking five hundred

stadia for a degree of a great circle, and partly from the vague method of

calculating distances, by the estimate of travellers and merchants, and the

number of days employed in their journies by land, and voyages by sea. As

he took seven hundred stadia for a degree of latitude, his errors in

latitude are not so important; and though the latitude he assigns to

particular places is incorrect, yet the length of the globe, according to

him, or the distance from the extreme points north and south, then known,

is not far from the truth. Thus the latitude of Thule, according to

Ptolemy, is 64 degrees north, and the parallel through the cinnamon country

16° 24' south, that is, 80° 24' on the whole, a difference from the truth

of not more than six or seven degrees. It is remarked by D'Anville, and Dr.

Vincent coincides in the justice of the remark, that the grandest mistake

in the geography of Ptolemy has led to the greatest discovery of modern

times. Strabo had affirmed, that nothing obstructed the passage from Spain

to India by a westerly course, but the immensity of the Atlantic ocean;

but, according to Ptolemy's errors in longitude, this ocean was lessened by

sixty degrees; and as all the Portuguese navigators were acquainted with

his work, as soon as it was resolved to attempt a passage to India, the

difficulty was, in their idea, lessened by sixty degrees; and when Columbus

sailed from Spain, he calculated on sixty degrees less than the real

distance from that country to India. Thus, to repeat the observation of

D'Anville, the greatest of his errors proved eventually the efficient cause

of the greatest discovery of the moderns.

Beside the peculiar merit of Ptolemy, which was perceived and acknowledged

as soon as his work appeared, he possesses another excellence, which, as

far as we know, was first pointed out and dwelt upon by Dr. Vincent.

According to him, Ptolemy, in his description of India, serves as the point

of connection between the Macedonian orthography and the Sanscrit,

dispersing light on both sides, and showing himself like a luminary in the

centre. He seems indeed to have obtained the native appellations of the

places in India, in a wonderful manner; and thus, by recording names which

cannot be mistaken, he affords the means of ascertaining the country, even

though he gives no particulars regarding it. We have applied this remark to

India exclusively, but it might be extended to almost all the names of

places that occur in Ptolemy, though, as respects India, his obtaining the

native appellations is more striking and useful.

Having offered these general remarks on the excellencies and errors of

Ptolemy, we shall next proceed to give a short and rapid sketch of his

geographical knowledge respecting Europe, Asia, and Africa. On the

north-east of Europe he gives an accurate description of the course of the

Wolga; and further to the south, he lays down the course of the Tanais,

much nearer what it really is than the course assigned it by Strabo. He

seems to have been acquainted with the southern shores of the Baltic from

the western Dwina, or the Vistula, to the Cimbric Chersonesus: he also

describes part of the present Livonia. The Chersonesus, however, he

stretches two degrees too far to the north, and also gives it too great a

bend to the east. He applies the name of Thule to a country situated to the

north-east of Britain; if his usual error in longitude is rectified, the

position he assigns Thule would correspond with that of Norway. Such seem

to have been the limits of his Europe, unless, perhaps, he had some vague

idea of the south of Sweden.

He begins his geographical tables with the British isles; and here is one

of his greatest errors. According to him, the north part of Britain

stretches to the east, instead of to the north: the Mull of Galloway is the

most northern promontory, and the land from it bends due east. The Western

Islands run east and west, along the north shore of Ireland, the west being

the true north point in them. He is, however, on the whole, pretty accurate

in his location of the tribes which at that period inhabited Scotland.

Strabo had placed Ireland to the north of Britain, but in its true

latitude. Ptolemy's map, which is the first geographical document of that

island, represents it to the west of Britain, but five degrees further to

the north than it actually is. He delineates its general shape, rivers, and

promontories with tolerable accuracy, and some of his towns may be traced

in their present appellations, as Dublin in Eblana. It has already been

noticed that he was probably acquainted with the south of Sweden, and his

four Scandinavian islands are evidently Zealand, Funen, Laland, and

Falster. It is remarkable that his geography is more accurate almost in

proportion as it recedes from the Mediterranean. The form which he assigns

to Italy is much farther removed from the truth than the form of most of

the other European countries which he describes. His fundamental error in

longitude led him to give to the Mediterranean Sea a much greater extent

than it actually possesses. According to him, it occupies nearly sixty-five

degrees; and it is a singular circumstance, as well as a decisive proof of

the influence of his authority, as well of the slow progress of accurate

and experimental geography, that his mensuration of this sea was reputed as

exact till the reign of Louis XIV., when it was curtailed of nearly

twenty-five degrees by observation.

The principal points in the geography of Asia, as given by Ptolemy, respect

the coasts of India, the route to the Seres, and the Caspian sea. His

delineation of India is equally erroneous with his delineation of the

British Isles: according to him, it stretches in a right line from west to

east, a little to the south of a line drawn between the Ganges and the

Indus. He possessed, however, information respecting places in the farther

peninsula of India, the locality of several of which, by comparing his

names with the Sanscrit, may be traced with considerable certainty. He

assigns to the island of Ceylon a very erroneous locality, arising from his

error respecting the form of India, and likewise an extent far exceeding

the truth. He is the first author, however, who mentions the seven mouths

of the Ganges. The route to the Seres, which he describes, has been already

noticed: it is remarkable that the latitude which he assigns to his Sera

metropolis, is within little more than a degree of the latitude of Pekin,

which, in the opinion of Dr. Vincent, is one of the most illustrious

approximations to truth that ancient geography affords. His description of

Arabia is, on the whole, accurate; he has, however, greatly diminished the

extent of the Arabian Gulf, and by at the same time increasing the size of

the Persian, he has necessarily given an erroneous form to this part of

Asia. The ancient opinion of Herodotus, that the Caspian was a sea by

itself, unconnected with any other, which was overlooked or disbelieved by

Strabo, Arrian, &c. was adopted by Ptolemy, but he erroneously describes it

as if its greatest length was from east to west. The peninsula to which he

gives the name of the Golden Chersonesus, and which is probably Malacca, he

describes as stretching from north to south: to the east of it he places a

great bay, and in the most distant part of it the station of Catigara.

Beyond this, he asserts that the earth is utterly unknown, and that the

land bends from this to the west, till it joins the promontory of Prasum in

Africa, at which place this quarter of the world terminated to the south.

Hence it appears that he did not admit a communication between the Indian

and Atlantic oceans, and that he believed the Erythrean sea to be a vast

basin, entirely enclosed by the land.

Strabo and Pliny believed that Africa terminated under the torrid zone, and

that the Atlantic and Indian oceans joined. Ptolemy, as we have just seen,

rejected this idea, and following the opinion of Hipparchus, that the earth

was not surrounded by the ocean, but that the ocean was divided into large

basins, separated from each other by intervening land, maintained, that

while the eastern coast of Africa at Cape Prasum united with the coast of

Asia at the bay of the Golden Chersonesus, the western coast of Africa,

after forming a great gulf, which he named Hespericus, extended between the

east and south till it joined India. The promontory of Prasum was

undoubtedly the limit of Ptolemy's knowledge of the east coast of Africa:

the limit of his knowledge of the west coast is not so easily fixed: some

suppose that it did not reach beyond the river Nun; while others, with more

reason, extend it to the Gulf of St. Cyprian, because the Fortunate

Islands, which he assumed as his first meridian, will carry his knowledge

beyond the Nun; and because, at the Gulf of St. Cyprian, the coast turns

suddenly and abruptly to the east, in such a manner as may be supposed to

have led Ptolemy to believe that it stretched towards and joined the coast

of India.

Of some of the interior parts of Africa Ptolemy possessed clear and

accurate information; regarding others, he presents us with a mass of

confused notions. He clearly points out the Niger, though he fixes its

source in a wrong latitude. In the cities of Tucabath and Tagana, which he

places on its banks, may perhaps be recognized Tombuctoo and Gana. The most

striking defect in his geography of the interior of Africa is, that he does

not allow sufficient extent to the great desert of Sahara, while the

southern parts are too much expanded. He places the sources of the Nile,

and the Mountains of the Moon in south latitude thirteen, instead of north

latitude six or seven; but the error of latitude is not so remarkable and

unaccountable as the very erroneous latitude which he assigns to Cape

Aromata, on a coast which was visited every year by merchants he must have

seen at Alexandria. The most difficult point to explain in Ptolemy's

central Africa is the river Gir, which he describes as equal in length to

the Niger, and running in the same direction, till it loses itself in the

same lake. What this river is, geographers have not agreed. It is mentioned

by Claudian, as resembling the Nile in the abundance of its waters.

Agethimedorus, a geographer of the third century, regards it and the Niger

as the same river.

What then was the amount of the knowledge of the ancients, as it existed

among the Romans, in the height of their power, respecting the form,

extent, and surface of the globe? If we view a map drawn up according to

their ideas, we are immediately struck with the form they assigned the

world, and perceive with what propriety they called the extent of the world

from east to west longitude or _length_, and the extent from north to

south latitude, or _breadth_. In some maps, especially that drawn up

from the celebrated Peutingerian Tables, which contain an itinerary of the

whole Roman empire, thirty-five degrees of longitude occupy twenty-eight

feet eight inches, whereas thirteen degrees of latitude are compressed

within the space of one foot. It is easy to conceive how it happened that

too much space is assigned between places situated east and west of each

other, as the latitude of a place is much more easily determined than its

longitude. At the same time, as the routes of the Roman armies generally

were from east to west, the countries lying in that direction were better

known than those lying to the north and south, though the longitudes, and

general space assigned the world, in the former deviation, were erroneous.

It was the opinion of most of the ancient geographers, that there was a

southern continent or hemisphere, to correspond to and balance the

northern; and this they formed by cutting off the great triangle to the

south. The ancients also, while they curtailed those parts of the world

with which they were unacquainted, extended the known parts.

The limit of the Roman geography of Europe to the north was the Baltic,

beyond which they had some very imperfect and obscure notion of the south

of Sweden, and perhaps of Norway. They were acquainted with the countries

on the eastern boundary of Europe lying on the Danube and the Vistula, and

the rivers Wolga and Tanais seem also to have been tolerably well known to

them. Of the whole of the west of Europe they were well informed, with the

exception of the general figure, and some part of the British isles.

With respect to Africa, the Romans seem to have been acquainted with

one-third of it. The promontory of Prasum was the limit of their knowledge

on the east coast: its limits on the western coast it is not so easy to

fix. The western horn was the limit of the voyage of Hanno, which,

according to some, is Cape Nun; and, according to others, Cape Three

Points, in Guinea; and we have observed already, that the Gulf of St.

Cyprian was probably the limit of Ptolemy's knowledge. The coasts of Africa

on the Mediterranean, and on the Red Sea, were of course well known to the

Romans; and some points of their information respecting the interior were

clear and accurate, but, as for these, they trusted almost entirely to the

reports of merchants, they were as frequently erroneous.

The northern, north-western, north-eastern, and east parts of Asia were

almost utterly unknown to the Romans; but they possessed tolerably accurate

information regarding the whole hither peninsula of India, from the Indus

to the Ganges, and some partial and unconnected notices of the farther

peninsula and of China.

[5] The most probable opinion is, that they were made of fluat of

lime, or Derbyshire spar.