Page:The geography of Strabo (1854) Volume 1.djvu/316

inhabit the Alps which lie above that city, and a portion of the sea-coast, where they intermingle with the Greeks. The ancient Greeks gave to the Salyes the name of Ligyes,^[1] and to the country which was in the possession of the Marseillese, that of Ligystica.^[2] The later Greeks named them Kelto-Ligyes,^[3] and assigned to them the whole of the plains extending as far as Luerion^[4] and the Rhone. They are divided into ten cantons, and are capable of raising troops not only of infantry, but of cavalry also. These people were the first of the Transalpine Kelts whom the Romans subdued after maintaining a lengthened war against them and the Ligurians. They closed [against the Romans] all the roads into Iberia along the sea-coast, and carried on a system of pillage both by sea and land. Their strength so increased that large armies were scarcely able to force a passage. And after a war of eighty years, the Romans were hardly able to obtain a breadth of twelve stadia for the purpose of making a public road. After this, however, the Romans subdued the whole of them, and established among them a regular form of government, and imposed a tribute.^[5]

4. After the Salyes, the Albienses, the Albiœci,^[6] and the Vocontii inhabit the northern portion of the mountains. The Vocontii extend as far as the Allobriges, and occupy vast valleys in the depths of the mountains, not inferior to those inhabited by the Allobriges. Both the Allobriges and Ligurians are subject to the pretors sent into the Narbonnaise, but the Vocontii are governed by their own laws, as we have said of the Volcæ of Nemausus.^{[p 1]} Of the Ligurians between the Var and Genoa, those along the sea are considered Italians; while the mountaineers are governed by a prefect of the equestrian order, as is the case in regard to other nations wholly barbarous.