Page:The geography of Strabo (1854) Volume 1.djvu/129

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CHAP. I. § 17.
INTRODUCTION.
115

zone, and which crosses the Cinnamon Country.[1] We have proved that the regions not more than 5000 stadia north of Keltica, as far as Ierne,[p 1] are scarcely habitable, but their reasoning leads to the conclusion that there is another circle fitted for the habitation of man, although 3800 stadia north of Ierne.[2] And that Bactra is still farther north than the mouth of the Caspian or Hyrcanian Sea, which is distant about 6000 stadia from the recess of the Caspian and the mountains of Armenia and Media, and which appears to be the most northerly point of the whole coast as far as India, with a sea navigable to India all the way, as Patrocles, who had the government of these regions, affirms. Now Bactriana stretches 1000 stadia farther north. Beyond this the Scythians occupy a much larger territory, bounded by the Northern Ocean: here they dwell, though to be sure theirs is a nomade life. But we ask how they could exist here at all, supposing even Bactra to be beyond the limits of the habitable globe. The distance from the Caucasus to the Northern Sea through Bactra would be

  1. ↑ The Greek has Κιναμωμοφόρου Ίνδικῆς. We have omitted the latter word altogether from the translation, as being a slip of the pen. Strabo certainly never supposed the Cinnamon Country to be any where in India.
  2. ↑ Perhaps it may aid the reader in realizing these different reasonings if we give a summary of them in figures.
    Strabo supposes that Hipparchus, reckoning from the
    equator to the limits of the inhabited earth,    		 8,800 stadia
    should have fixed the southern extremity of India
    more to the north by    		 4,000
    and the northern extremity of India, according to the
    measures of Deimachus, still more to the north by    		 30,000
    Total 42,800
    Now, Strabo adds, following Hipparchus, the
    northern shores of Keltica and the mouth of the
    Dnieper, are distant from the equator    		 34,000
    Ierne, in a climate almost uninhabitable, was,
    according to Strabo’s own impression, situated
    to the north of Keltica    		 5,000
    39,000
    Then, according to Hipparchus, the habitable
    latitudes would extend still farther than Ierne by    		 3,800
    Total 42,800

    The great fertility of Bactriana, according to Strabo, appeared to be inconsistent with a position so far towards the north. In this he was correct.

  1. ↑ Ireland.
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