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HISTORY OF THE PERSIAN EMPIRE |
I.
ALL the territory that lies west of the river Indus up to the river Cophen is
inhabited by Astacenians and Assacenians, Indian tribes. But they are not, like
the Indians dwelling within the river Indus, tall of stature, nor similarly
brave in spirit, nor as black as the greater part of the Indians. These long ago
were subject to the Assyrians; then to the Medes, and so they became subject to
the Persians; and they paid tribute to Cyrus son of Cambyses from their
territory, as Cyrus commanded. The Nysaeans are not an Indian race; but part of
those who came with Dionysus to India; possibly even of those Greeks who became
past service in the wars which Dionysus waged with Indians; possibly also
volunteers of the neighbouring tribes whom Dionysus settled there together with
the Greeks, calling the country Nysaea from the mountain Nysa, and the city
itself Nysa. And the mountain near the city, on whose foothills Nysa is built,
is called Merus because of the incident at Dionysus' birth. All this the poets
sang about Dionysus; and I leave it to the narrators of Greek or Eastern history
to recount them. Among the Assacenians is Massaca, a great city, where resides
the chief authority of the Assacian land; and another city Peucela, this also a
great city, not far from the Indus. These places then are inhabited on this side
of the Indus towards the west, as far as the river Cophen.
II.
But the parts from the Indus eastward, these I shall call India, and its
inhabitants Indians. The boundary of the land of India towards the north is
Mount Taurus. It is not still called Taurus in this land; but Taurus begins from
the sea over against Pamphylia and Lycia and Cilicia; and reaches as far as the
Eastern Ocean, running right across Asia. But the mountain has different names
in different places; in one, Parapamisus, in another Hemodus; elsewhere it is
called Imaon, and perhaps has all sorts of other names; but the Macedonians who
fought with Alexander called it Caucasus; another Caucasus, that is, not the
Scythian; so that the story ran that Alexander came even to the far side of the
Caucasus. The western part of India is bounded by the river Indus right down to
the ocean, where the river runs out by two mouths, not joined together as are
the five mouths of the Ister; but like those of the Nile, by which the Egyptian
delta is formed; thus also the Indian delta is formed by the river Indus, not
less than the Egyptian; and this in the Indian tongue is called Pattala. Towards
the south this ocean bounds the land of India, and eastward the sea itself is
the boundary. The southern part near Pattala and the mouths of the Indus were
surveyed by Alexander and Macedonians, and many Greeks; as for the eastern part,
Alexander did not traverse this beyond the river Hyphasis. A few historians have
described the parts which are this side of the Ganges and where are the mouths
of the Ganges and the city of Palimbothra, the greatest Indian city on the
Ganges.
III.
I hope I may be allowed to regard Eratosthenes of Cyrene as worthy of special
credit, since he was a student of Geography. He states that beginning with Mount
Taurus, where are the springs of the river Indus, along the Indus to the Ocean,
and to the mouths of the Indus, the side of India is thirteen thousand stades in
length. The opposite side to this one, that from the same mountain to the
Eastern Ocean, he does not reckon as merely equal to the former side, since it
has a promontory running well into the sea; the promontory stretching to about
three thousand stades. So then he would make this side of India, to the
eastward, a total length of sixteen thousand stades. This he gives, then, as the
breadth of India. Its length, however, from west to east, up to the city of
Palimbothra, he states that he gives as measured by reed-measurements; for there
is a royal road; and this extends to ten thousand stades; beyond that, the
information is not so certain. Those, however, who have followed common talk say
that including the promontory, which runs into the sea, India extends over about
ten thousand stades; but farther north its length is about twenty thousand
stades. But Ctesias of Cnidus affirms that the land of India is equal in size to
the rest of Asia, which is absurd; and Onesicritus is absurd, who says that
India is a third of the entire world; Nearchus, for his part, states that the
journey through the actual plain of India is a four months' journey. Megasthenes
would have the breadth of India that from east to west which others call its
length; and he says that it is of sixteen thousand stades, at its shortest
stretch. From north to south, then, becomes for him its length, and it extends
twenty-two thousand three hundred stades, to its narrowest point. The Indian
rivers are greater than any others in Asia; greatest are the Ganges and the
Indus, whence the land gets its name; each of these is greater than the Nile of
Egypt and the Scythian Ister, even were these put together; my own idea is that
even the Acesines is greater than the Ister and the Nile, where the Acesines
having taken in the Hydaspes, Hydraotes, and Hyphasis, runs into the Indus, so
that its breadth there becomes thirty stades. Possibly also other greater rivers
run through the land of India.
IV.
As for the yonder side of the Hyphasis, I cannot speak with confidence, since
Alexander did not proceed beyond the Hyphasis. But of these two greatest rivers,
the Ganges and the Indus, Megasthenes wrote that the Ganges is much greater than
the Indus, and so do all others who mention the Ganges; for (they say) the
Ganges is already large as it comes from its springs, and receives as
tributaries the river Cainas and the Erannoboas and the Cossoanus, all
navigable; also the river Sonus and the Sittocatis and the Solomatis, these
likewise navigable. Then besides there are the Condochates and the Sambus and
Magon and Agoranis and Omalis; and also there run into it the Commenases, a
great river, and the Cacuthis and Andomatis, flowing from the Indian tribe of
the Mandiadinae; after them the Amystis by the city Catadupas, and the Oxymagis
at the place called Pazalae, and the Errenysis among the Mathae, an Indian
tribe, also meet the Ganges. Megasthenes says that of these none is inferior to
the Maeander, where the Maeander is navigable. The breath therefore of the
Ganges, where it is at its narrowest, runs to a hundred stades; often it spreads
into lakes, so that the opposite side cannot be seen, where it is low and has no
projections of hills. It is the same with the Indus; the Hydraotes, in the
territory of the Cambistholians, receives the Hyphasis in that of the Astrybae,
and the Saranges from the Cecians, and the Neydrus from the Attacenians, and
flows, with these, into the Acesines. The Hydaspes also among the Oxydracae
receives the Sinarus among the Arispae and it too flows out into the Acesines.
The Acesines among the Mallians joins the Indus; and the Tutapus, a large river,
flows into the Acesines. All these rivers swell the Acesines, and proudly
retaining its own name it flows into the Indus. The Cophen, in the Peucelaetis,
taking with it the Malantus, the Soastus, and the Garroeas, joins the Indus.
Above these the Parenus and Saparnus, not far from one another, flow into the
Indus. The Soanus, from the mountains of the Abissareans, without any tributary,
flows into it. Most of these Megasthenes reports to be navigable. It should not
then be incredible that neither Nile nor Ister can be even compared with Indus
or Ganges in volume of water. For we know of no tributary to the Nile; rather
from it canals have been cut through the land of Egypt. As for the Ister, it
emerges from its springs a meagre stream, but receives many tributaries; yet not
equal in number to the Indian tributaries which flow into Indus or Ganges; and
very few of these are navigable; I myself have only noticed the Enus and the
Saus. The Enus on the line between Norica and Rhaetia joins the Ister, the Saus
in Paeonia. The country where the rivers join is called Taurunus. If anybody is
aware of other navigable rivers which form tributaries to the Ister, he
certainly does not know many.
V.
I hope that anyone who desires to explain the cause of the number and size of
the Indian rivers will do so; and that my remarks may be regarded as set down on
hearsay only. For Megasthenes has recorded names of many other rivers, which
beyond the Ganges and the Indus run into the eastern and southern outer ocean;
so that he states the number of Indian rivers in all to be fifty-eight, and
these all navigable. But not even Megasthenes, so far as I can see, travelled
over any large part of India; yet a good deal more than the followers of
Alexander son of Philip did. For he states that he met Sandracottus, the
greatest of the Indian kings, and Porus, even greater than he was. This
Megasthenes says, moreover, that the Indians waged war on no men, nor other men
on the Indians, but on the other hand that Sesostris the Egyptian, after
subduing the most part of Asia, and after invading Europe with an army, yet
returned back; and Indathyrsis the Scythian who started from Scythia subdued
many tribes of Asia, and invaded Egypt victoriously; but Semiramis the Assyrian
queen tried to invade India, but died before she could carry out her purposes;
it was in fact Alexander only who actually invaded India. Before Alexander, too,
there is a considerable tradition about Dionysus as having also invaded India,
and having subdued the Indians; about Heracles there is not much tradition. As
for Dionysus, the city of Nysa is no mean memorial of his expedition, and also
Mount Merus, and the growth of ivy on this mountain then the habit of the
Indians themselves setting out to battle with the sound of drums and cymbals;
and their dappled costume, like that worn by the bacchanals, of Dionysus. But of
Heracles the memorials are slight. Yet the story of the rock Aornos, which
Alexander forced, namely, that Heracles could not capture it, I am inclined to
think a Macedonian boast; just as the Macedonians called Parapamisus by the name
of Caucasus, though it has nothing to do with Caucasus. And besides, learning
that there was a cave among the Parapamisadae, they said that this was the cave
of Prometheus the Titan, in which he was crucified for his theft of the fire.
Among the Sibae, too, an Indian tribe, having noticed them clad with skins they
used to assert that they were relics of Heracles' expedition. What is more, as
the Sibae carried a club, and they brand their cattle with a club, they referred
this too to some memory of Heracles' club. If anyone believes this, at least it
must be some other Heracles, not he of Thebes, but either of Tyre or of Egypt,
or some great king of the higher inhabited country near India.
VI.
This then must be regarded as a digression, so that too much credence may not be
given to the stories which certain persons have related about the Indians beyond
the Hyphasis; for those who served under Alexander are reasonably trustworthy up
to the Hyphasis. For Megasthenes tells us this also about an Indian river; its
name is Silas, it flows from a spring of the same name as the river through the
territory of the Sileans, the people also named both from river and spring; its
water has the following peculiarity; nothing is supported by it, nothing can
swim in it or float upon it, but everything goes straight to the bottom; so far
is this water thinner and more aery than any other. In the summer there is rain
through India; especially on the mountains, Parapamisus and Hemodus and the
Imaus, and from them the rivers run great and turbulent. The plains of India
also receive rain in summer, and much part of them becomes swamp; in fact
Alexander's army retired from the river Acesines in midsummer, when the river
had overflowed on to the plains; from these, therefore, one can gauge the
flooding of the Nile, since probably the mountains of Ethiopia receive rain in
summer, and from them the Nile is swollen and overflows its banks on to the land
of Egypt the Nile therefore also runs turbid this time of the year, as it
probably would not be from melting snow; nor yet if its stream was dammed up by
the seasonal winds which blow during the summer; and besides, the mountains of
Ethiopia are probably not snowcovered, on account of the heat. But that they
receive rain as India does is not outside the bounds of probability; since in
other respects India is not unlike Ethiopia, and the Indian rivers have
crocodiles like the Ethiopian and Egyptian Nile; and some of the Indian rivers
have fish and other large water animals like those of the Nile, save the
river-horse: though Onesicritus states that they do have the river-horse also.
The appearance of the inhabitants, too, is not so far different in India and
Ethiopia; the southern Indians resemble the Ethiopians a good deal, and, are
black of countenance, and their hair black also, only they are not as snub-nosed
or so woolly-haired as the Ethiopians; but the northern Indians are most like
the Egyptians in appearance.
VII.
Megasthenes states that there are one hundred and eighteen Indian tribes. That
there are many, I agree with Megasthenes; but I cannot conjecture how he learnt
and recorded the exact number, when he never visited any great part of India,
and since these different races have not much intercourse one with another. The
Indians, he says, were originally nomads, as are the non-agricultural Scythians,
who wandering in their waggons inhabit now one and now another part of Scythia;
not dwelling in cities and not reverencing any temples of the gods; just so the
Indians also had no cities and built no temples; but were clothed with the skins
of animals slain in the chase, and for food ate the bark of trees; these trees
were called in the Indian tongue Tala, and there grew upon them, just as on the
tops of palm trees, what look like clews of wool. They also used as food what
game they had captured, eating it raw, before, at least, Dionysus came into
India. But when Dionysus had come, and become master of India, he founded
cities, and gave laws for these cities, and became to the Indians the bestower
of wine, as to the Greeks, and taught them to sow their land, giving them seed.
It may be that Triptolemus, when he was sent out by Demeter to sow the entire
earth, did not come this way; or perhaps before Triptolemus this Dionysus
whoever he was came to India and gave the Indians seeds of domesticated plants;
then Dionysus first yoked oxen to the plough and made most of the Indians
agriculturists instead of wanderers, and armed them also with the arms of
warfare. Further, Dionysus taught them to reverence other gods, but especially,
of course, himself, with clashings of cymbals and beating of drums and dancing
in the Satyric fashion, the dance called among Greeks the 'cordax'; and taught
them to wear long hair in honour of the god, and instructed them in the wearing
of the conical cap and the anointings with perfumes; so that the Indians came
out even against Alexander to battle with the sound of cymbals and drums.
VIII.
When departing from India, after making all these arrangements, he made
Spatembas king of the land, one of his Companions, being most expert in Bacchic
rites; when Spatembas died, Budyas his son reigned in his stead; the father was
King of India fifty-two years, and the son twenty years; and his son, again,
came to the throne, one Cradeuas; and his descendants for the most part received
the kingdom in succession, son succeeding father; if the succession failed, then
the kings were appointed for some pre-eminence. But Heracles, whom tradition
states to have arrived as far as India, was called by the Indians themselves
'Indigenous.' This Heracles was chiefly honoured by the Surasenians, an Indian
tribe, among whom are two great cities, Methora and Cleisobora, and the
navigable river Iobares flows through their territory. Megasthenes also says
that the garb which this Heracles wore was like that of the Theban Heracles, as
also the Indians themselves record; he also had many sons in his country, for
this Heracles too wedded many wives; he had only one daughter, called Pandaea;
as also the country in which she was born, and to rule which Heracles educated
her, was called Pandaea after the girl; here she possessed five hundred
elephants given by her father, four thousand horsemen, and as many as a hundred
and thirty thousand foot-soldiers. This also some writers relate about Heracles;
he traversed all the earth and sea, and when he had rid the earth of evil
monsters he found in the sea a jewel much affected by women. And thus, even to
our day, those who bring exports from India to our country purchase these jewels
at great price and export them, and all Greeks in old time, and Romans now who
are rich and prosperous, are more eager to buy the sea pearl, as it is called in
the Indian tongue for that Heracles, the jewel appearing to him charming,
collected from all the sea to India this kind of pearl, to adorn his daughter.
And Megasthenes says that this oyster is taken with nets; that it is a native of
the sea, many oysters being together, like bees; and that the pearl oysters have
a king or queen, as bees do. Should anyone by chance capture the king, he can
easily surround the rest of the oysters; but should the king slip through, then
the others cannot be taken; and of those that are taken, the Indians let their
flesh rot, but use the skeleton as an ornament. For among the Indians this pearl
sometimes is worth three times its weight in solid gold, which is itself dug up
in India.
IX.
In this country where Heracles' daughter was queen, the girls are marriageable
at seven years, and the men do not live longer than forty years. About this
there is a story among the Indians, that Heracles, to whom when in mature years
this daughter was born, realizing that his own end was near, and knowing of no
worthy husband to whom he might bestow his daughter, himself became her husband
when she was seven, so that Indian kings, their children, were left behind.
Heracles made her then marriageable, and hence all the royal race of Pandaea
arose, with the same privilege from Heracles. But I think, even if Heracles was
able to accomplish anything so absurd, he could have lengthened his own life, so
as to mate with the girl when of maturer years. But really if this about the age
of the girls in this district is true, it seems to me to tend the same way as
the men's age, since the oldest of them die at forty years. For when old age
comes on so much sooner and death with age, maturity will reasonably be earlier,
in proportion to the end; so that at thirty the men might be on the threshold of
old age, and at twenty, men in their prime, and manhood at about fifteen, so
that the women might reasonably be marriageable at seven. For that the fruits
ripen earlier in this country than elsewhere, and perish earlier, this
Megasthenes himself tells us. From Dionysus to Sandracottus the Indians counted
a hundred and fifty-three kings, over six thousand and forty-two years, and
during this time thrice [Movements were made] for liberty . . . this for three
hundred years; the other for a hundred and twenty years; the Indians say that
Dionysus was fifteen generations earlier than Heracles; but no one else ever
invaded India, not even Cyrus son of Cambyses, though he made an expedition
against the Scythians, and in all other ways was the most energetic of the kings
in Asia; but Alexander came and conquered by force of arms all the countries he
entered; and would have conquered the whole world had his army been willing. But
no Indian ever went outside his own country on a warlike expedition, so
righteous were they.
X.
This also is related; that Indians do not put up memorials to the dead; but they
regard their virtues as sufficient memorials for the departed, and the songs
which they sing at their funerals. As for the cities of India, one could not
record their number accurately by reason of their multitude; but those of them
which are near rivers or near the sea, they build of wood; for if they were
built of brick, they could not last long because of the rain, and also because
their rivers overflow their banks and fill the plains with water. But such
cities as are built on high and lofty places, they make of brick and clay. The
greatest of the Indian cities is called Palimbothra, in the district of the
Prasians, at the confluence of the Erannoboas and the Ganges; the Ganges,
greatest of all rivers; the Erannoboas may be the third of the Indian rivers,
itself greater than the rivers of other countries; but it yields precedence to
the Ganges, when it pours into it its tributary stream. And Megasthenes says
that the length of the city along either side, where it is longest, reaches to
eighty stades its breadth to fifteen; and a ditch has been dug round the city,
six plethra in breadth, thirty cubits high; and on the wall are five hundred and
seventy towers, and sixty-four gates. This also is remarkable in India, that all
Indians are free, and no Indian at all is a slave. In this the Indians agree
with the Lacedaemonians. Yet the Lacedaemonians have Helots for slaves, who
perform the duties of slaves; but the Indians have no slaves at all, much less
is any Indian a slave.
XI.
The Indians generally are divided into seven castes. Those called the wise men
are less in number than the rest, but chiefest in honour and regard. For they
are under no necessity to do any bodily labour; nor to contribute from the
results of their work to the common store; in fact, no sort of constraint
whatever rests upon these wise men, save to offer the sacrifices to the gods on
behalf of the people of India. Then whenever anyone sacrifices privately, one of
these wise men acts as instructor of the sacrifice, since otherwise the
sacrifice would not have proved acceptable to the gods. These Indians also are
alone expert in prophecy, and none, save one of the wise men, is allowed to
prophesy. And they prophesy about the seasons of the year, or of any impending
public calamity: but they do not trouble to prophesy on private matters to
individuals, either because their prophecy does not condescend to smaller
things, or because it is undignified for them to trouble about such things. And
when one has thrice made an error in his prophecy, he does not suffer any harm,
except that he must for ever hold his peace; and no one will ever persuade such
a one to prophesy on whom this silence has been enjoined. These wise men spend
their time naked, during the winter in the open air and sunshine, but in summer,
when the sun is strong, in the meadows and the marsh lands under great trees;
their shade Nearchus computes to reach five plethra all round, and ten thousand
men could take shade under one tree; so great are these trees. They eat fruits
in their season, and the bark of the trees; this is sweet and nutritious as much
as are the dates of the palm. Then next to these come the farmers, these being
the most numerous class of Indians; they have no use for warlike arms or warlike
deeds, but they till the land; and they pay the taxes to the kings and to the
cities, such as are self-governing; and if there is internal war among the
Indians, they may not touch these workers, and not even devastate the land
itself; but some are making war and slaying all comers, and others close by are
peacefully ploughing or gathering the fruits or shaking down apples or
harvesting. The third class of Indians are the herdsmen, pasturers of sheep and
cattle, and these dwell neither by cities nor in the villages. They are nomads
and get their living on the hillsides, and they pay taxes from their animals;
they hunt also birds and wild game in the country.
XII
The fourth class is of artisans and shopkeepers; these are workers, and pay
tribute from their works, save such as make weapons of war; these are paid by
the community. In this class are the shipwrights and sailors, who navigate the
rivers. The fifth class of Indians is the soldiers' class, next after the
farmers in number; these have the greatest freedom and the most spirit. They
practise military pursuits only. Their weapons others forge for them, and again
others provide horses; others too serve in the camps, those who groom their
horses and polish their weapons, guide the elephants, and keep in order and
drive the chariots. They themselves, when there is need of war, go to war, but
in time of peace they make merry; and they receive so much pay from the
community that they can easily from their pay support others. The sixth class of
Indians are those called overlookers. They oversee everything that goes on in
the country or in the cities; and this they report to the King, where the
Indians are governed by kings, or to the authorities, where they are
independent. To these it is illegal to make any false report; nor was any Indian
ever accused of such falsification. The seventh class is those who deliberate
abbut the community together with the King, or, in such cities as are
self-governing, with the authorities. In number this class is small, but in
wisdom and uprightness it bears the palm from all others; from this class are
selected their governors, district governors, and deputies, custodians of the
treasures, officers of army and navy, financial officers, and overseers of
agricultural works. To marry out of any class is unlawful -- as, for instance,
into the farmer class from the artisans, or the other way; nor must the same man
practise two pursuits; nor change from one class into another, as to turn farmer
from shepherd, or shepherd from artisan. It is only permitted to join the wise
men out of any class; for their business is not an easy one, but of all most
laborious.
XIII.
Most wild animals which the Greeks hunt the Indians hunt also, but these have a
way of hunting elephants unlike all other kinds of hunting, just as these
animals are unlike other animals. It is this they choose a place that is level
and open to the sun's heat, and dig a ditch in a circle, wide enough for a great
army to camp within it. They dig the ditch five fathoms broad, and four deep.
The earth which they throw out of the ditch they heap on either side of the
ditch, and so use it as a wall; then they make shelters for themselves, dug out
of the wall on the outside of the ditch, and leave small windows in them;
through these the light comes in, and also they watch the animals coming in and
charging into the enclosure. Then within the enclosure they leave some three or
four of the females, those that are tamest, and leave only one entrance by the
ditch, making a bridge over it; and here they heap much earth and grass so that
the animals cannot distinguish the bridge, and so suspect any guile. The hunters
then keep themselves out of the way, hiding under the shelters dug in the ditch.
Now the wild elephants do not approach inhabited places by daylight, but at
night they wander all about and feed in herds, following the largest and finest
of their number, as cows do the bulls. And when they approach the ditch and hear
the trumpeting of the females and perceive them by their scent, they rush to the
walled enclosure; and when, working round the outside edge of the ditch, they
find the bridge, they push across it into the enclosure. Then the hunters,
perceiving the entry of the wild elephants, some smartly remove the bridge,
others hurrying to the neighbouring villages report that the elephants are
caught in the enclosure; and the inhabitants on hearing the news mount the most
spirited, and at the same time most disciplined elephants, and then drive them
towards the enclosure, and when they have driven them thither they do not at
once join battle, but allow the wild elephants to grow distressed by hunger and
to be tamed by thirst. But when they think they are sufficiently distressed,
then they erect the bridge again, and enter the enclosure; and at first there is
a fierce battle between the tamed elephants and the captives, and then, as one
would expect, the wild elephants are tamed, distressed as they are by a sinking
of their spirits and by hunger. Then the riders dismounting from the tamed
elephants tie together the feet of the now languid wild ones; then they order
the tamed elephants to punish the rest by repeated blows, till in their distress
they fall to earth; then they come near them and throw nooses round their necks;
and climb on them as they lie there. And that they may not toss their drivers
nor do them any injury, they make an incision in their necks with a sharp knife,
all round, and bind their noose round the wound, so that by reason of the sore
they keep their heads and necks still. For were they to turn round to do
mischief, the wound beneath the rope chafes them. And so they keep quiet, and
perceiving that they are conquered, they are led of by the tamed elephants by
the rope.
XIV.
Such elephants as are not yet full grown or from some defect are not worth the
acquiring, they allow to depart to their own laim, Then they lead of their
captives to the villages and first of all give them green shoots and grass to
eat; but they, from want of heart, are not willing to eat anything; so the
Indians range themselves about them and with songs and drums and cymbals,
beating and singing, lull them to sleep. For if there is an intelligent animal,
it is the elephant. Some of them have been known, when their drivers have
perished in battle, to have caught them up and carried them to burial; others
have stood over them and protected them. Others, when they have fallen, have
actively fought for them; one, indeed, who in a passion slew his driver, died
from remorse and grief. I myself have seen an elephant clanging the cymbals, and
others dancing; two cymbals were fastened to the player's forelegs, and one on
his trunk, and he rhythmically beat with his trunk the cymbal on either leg in
turn; the dancers danced in circle, and raising and bending their forelegs in
turn moved also rhythmically, as the player with the cymbals marked the time for
them. The elephants mate in spring, as do oxen and horses, when certain pores
about the temples of the females open and exhale; the female bears its
offispring sixteen months at the least, eighteen at most; it has one foal, as
does a mare; and this it suckles till its eighth year. The longest-lived
elephants survive to two hundred years; but many die before that by disease; but
as far as mere age goes, they reach this age. If their eyes are affected, cow's
milk injected cures them; for their other sicknesses a draught of dark wine, and
for their wounds swine's flesh roast, and laid on the spot, are good. These are
the Indian remedies for them.
XV.
The Indians regard the tiger as much stronger than the elephant. Nearchus writes
that he had seen a tiger's skin, but no tiger; the Indians record that the tiger
is in size as great as the largest horse, and its swiftness and strength without
parallel, for a tiger, when it meets an elephant, leaps on to the head and
easily throttles it. Those, however, which we see and call tigers are dappled
jackals, but larger than ordinary jackals. Nay, about ants also Nearchus says
that he himself saw no ant, of the sort which some writers have described as
native of India; he saw, however, several of their skins brought into the
Macedonian camp.Megasthenes, however confirms the accounts given about these
ants; that ants do dig up gold, not indeed for the gold, but as they naturally
burrow, that they may make holes, just as our small ants excavate a small amount
of earth; but these, which are bigger than foxes, dig up earth also
proportionate to their size; the earth is auriferous, and thus the Indians get
their gold. Megasthenes, however, merely quotes hearsay, and as I have no
certainty to write on the subject, I readily dismiss this subject of ants. But
Nearchus describes, as something miraculous, parrots, as being found in India,
and describes the parrot, and how it utters a human voice. But I having seen
several, and knowing others acquainted with this bird, shall not dilate on them
as anything remarkable; nor yet upon the size of the apes, nor the beauty of
some Indian apes, and the method of capture. For I should only say what everyone
knows, except perhaps that apes are anywhere beautiful. And further Nearchus
says that snakes are hunted there, dappled and swift; and that which he states
Peithon son of Antigenes to have caught, was upwards of sixteen cubits; but the
Indians (he proceeds) state that the largest snakes are much larger than this.
No Greek physicians have discovered a remedy against Indian snake-bite; but the
Indians themselves used to cure those who were struck. And Nearchus adds that
Alexander had gathered about him Indians very skilled in physic, and orders were
sent round the camp that anyone bitten by a snake was to report at the royal
pavilion. But there are not many illnesses in India, since the seasons are more
temperate than with us. If anyone is seriously ill, they would inform their wise
men, and they were thought to use the divine help to cure what could be cured.
XVI.
The Indians wear linen garments, as Nearchus says, the linen coming from the
trees of which I have already made mention. This linen is either brighter than
the whiteness of other linen, or the people's own blackness makes it appear
unusually bright. They have a linen tunic to the middle of the calf, and for
outer garments, one thrown round about their shoulders, and one wound round
their heads. They wear ivory ear-rings, that is, the rich Indians; the common
people do not use them. Nearchus writes that they dye their beards various
colours; some therefore have these as white-looking as possible, others dark,
others crimson, others purple, others grass-green. The more dignified Indians
use sunshades against the summer heat. They have slippers of white skin, and
these too made neatly; and the soles of their sandals are of different colours,
and also high, so that the wearers seem taller. Indian war equipment differs;
the infantry have a bow, of the height of the owner; this they poise on the
ground, and set their left foot against it, and shoot thus; drawing the
bowstring a very long way back; for their arrows are little short of three
cubits, and nothing can stand against an arrow shot by an Indian archer, neither
shield nor breastplate nor any strong armour. In their left hands they carry
small shields of untanned hide, narrower than their bearers, but not much
shorter. Some have javelins in place of bows. All carry a broad scimitar, its
length not under three cubits; and this, when they have a hand-to-hand fight --
and Indians do not readily fight so among themselves -- they bring down with
both hands in smiting, so that the stroke may be an effective one. Their
horsemen have two javelins, like lances, and a small shield smaller than the
infantry's. The horses have no saddles, nor do they use Greek bits nor any like
the Celtic bits, but round the end of the horses' mouths they have an untanned
stitched rein fitted; in this they have fitted, on the inner side, bronze or
iron spikes, but rather blunted; the rich people have ivory spikes; within the
mouth of the horses is a bit, like a spit, to either end of which the reins are
attached. Then when they tighten the reins this bit masters the horse, and the
spikes, being attached thereto, prick the horse and compel it to obey the rein.
XVII.
The Indians in shape are thin and tall and much lighter in movement than the
rest of mankind. They usually ride on camels, horses, and asses; the richer men
on elephants. For the elephant in India is a royal mount; then next in dignity
is a four-horse chariot, and camels come third; to ride on a single horse is
low. Their women, such as are of great modesty, can be seduced by no other gift,
but yield themselves to anyone who gives an elephant; and the Indians think it
no disgrace to yield thus on the gift of an elephant, but rather it seems
honourable for a woman that her beauty should be valued at an elephant. They
marry neither giving anything nor receiving anything; such girls as are
marriageable their fathers bring out and allow anyone who proves victorious in
wrestling or boxing or running or shows pre-eminence in any other manly pursuit
to choose among them. The Indians eat meal and till the ground, except the
mountaineers; but these eat the flesh of game. This must be enough for a
description of the Indians, being the most notable things which Nearchus and
Megasthenes, men of credit, have recorded about them. But as the main subject of
this my history was not to write an account of the Indian customs but the way in
which Alexander's navy reached Persia from India, this must all be accounted a
digression.
XVIII.
For Alexander, when his fleet was made ready on the banks of the Hydaspes,
collected together all the Phoenicians and all the Cyprians and Egyptians who
had followed the northern expedition. From these he manned his ships, picking
out as crews and rowers for them any who were skilled in seafaring. There were
also a good many islanders in the army, who understood these things, and Ionians
and Hellespontines. As commanders of triremes were appointed, from the
Macedonians, Hephaestion son of Amyntor, and Leonnatus son of Eunous, Lysimachus
son of Agathocles, and Asclepiodorus son of Timander, and Archon son of
Cleinias, and Demonicus son of Athenaeus, Archias son of Anaxidotus, Ophellas
son of Seilenus, Timanthes son of Pantiades; all these were of Pella. From
Amphipolis these were appointed officers: Nearchus son of Androtimus, who wrote
the account of the voyage; and Laomedon son of Larichus, and Androsthenes son of
Callistratus; and from Orestis. Craterus son of Alexander, and Perdiccas son of
Orontes. Of Eordaea, Ptolemaeus son of Lagos and Aristonous son of Peisaeus;
from Pydna, Metron son of Epicharmus and Nicarchides son of Simus. Then besides,
Attalus son of Andromenes, of Stympha Peucestas son of Alexander, from Mieza;
Peithon son of Crateuas, of Alcomenae; Leonnatus son of Antipater, of Aegae;
Pantauchus son of Nicolaus, of Aloris; Mylleas son of Zoilus, of Beroea; all
these being Macedonians. Of Greeks, Medius son of Oxynthemis, of Larisa; Eumenes
son of Hieronymus, from Cardia; Critobulus, son of Plato, of Cos; Thoas son of
Menodorus, and Maeander, son of Mandrogenes, of Magnesia; Andron son of
Cabeleus, of Teos; of Cyprians, Nicocles son of Pasicrates, of Soh; and
Nithaphon son of Pnytagoras, of Salamis. Alexander appointed also a Persian
trierarch, Bagoas son of Pharnuces; but of Alexander's own ship the helmsman was
Onesicritus of Astypalaea; and the accountant of the whole fleet was Euagoras
son of Eucleon, of Corinth. As admiral was appointed Nearchus, son of
Androtimus, Cretan by race, and he lived. in Amphipolis on the Strymon. And when
Alexander had made all these dispositions, he sacrificed to the gods, both the
gods of his race and all of whom the prophets had warned him, and to Poseidon
and Amphitrite and the Nereids and to Ocean himself and to the river Hydaspes,
whence he started, and to the Acesines, into which the Hydaspes runs, and to the
Indus, into which both run; and he instituted contests of art and of athletics,
and victims for sacrifice were given to all the army, according to their
detachments.
XIX.
Then when he had made all ready for starting the voyage, Alexander ordered
Craterus to march by the one side of the Hydaspes with his army, cavalry and
infantry alike; Hephaestion had already started along the other, with another
army even bigger than that under Craterus. Hephaestion took with him the
elephants, up to the number of two hundred. Alexander himself took with him all
the peltasts, as they are called, and all the archers, and of the cavalry, those
called 'Companions'; in all, eight thousand. But Craterus and Hephaestion, with
their forces, were ordered to march ahead and await the fleet. But he sent
Philip, whom he had made satrap of this country, to the banks of the river
Acesines, Philip also with a considerable force; for by this time a hundred and
twenty thousand men of fighting age were following him, together with those whom
he himself had brought from the sea-coast; and with those also whom his
officers, sent to recruit forces, had brought back; so that he now led all sorts
of Oriental tribes, and armed in every sort of fashion. Then he himself loosing
his ships sailed down the Hydaspes to the meeting-place of Acesines and
Hydaspes. His whole fleet of ships was eighteen hundred, both ships of war and
merchantmen, and horse transports besides and others bringing provisions
together with the troops. And how his fleet descended the rivers, and the tribes
he conquered on the descent, and how he endangered himself among the Mallians,
and the wound he there received, then the way in which Peucestas and Leonnatus
defended him as he lay there -- all this I have related already in my other
history, written in the Attic dialect. This my present work, however, is a story
of the voyage, which Nearchus successfully undertook with his fleet starting
from the mouths of the Indus by the Ocean to the Persian Gulf, which some call
the Red Sea.
XX.
On this Nearchus writes thus: Alexander had a vehement desire to sail the sea
which stretches from India to Persia; but he disliked the length of the voyage
and feared lest, meeting with some country desert or without roadsteads, or not
properly provided with the fruits of the earth, his whole fleet might be
destroyed; and this, being no small blot on his great achievements, might wreck
all his happiness; but yet his desire to do something unusual and strange won
the day; still, he was in doubt whom he should choose, as equal to his designs;
and also as the right man to encourage the personnel of the fleet, -- sent as
they were on an expedition of this kind, so that they should not feel that they
were being sent blindly to manifest dangers. And Nearchus says that Alexander
discussed with him whom he should select to be admiral of this fleet; but as
mention was made of one and another, and as Alexander rejected some, as not
willing to risk themselves for his sake, others as chicken-hearted, others as
consumed by desire for home, and finding some objection to each; then Nearchus
himself spoke and pledged himself thus : '0 King, I undertake to lead your
fleet! And may God help the emprise! I will bring your ships and men safe to
Persia, if this sea is so much as navigable and the undertaking not above human
powers.' Alexander, however, replied that he would not allow one of his friends
to run such risks and endure such distress; yet Nearchus, did not slacken in his
request, but besought Alexander earnestly; till at length Alexander accepted
Nearchus' willing spirit, and appointed him admiral of the entire fieet, on
which the part of the army which was detailed to sail on this voyage and the
crews felt easier in mind, being sure that Alexander would never have exposed
Nearchus to obvious danger unless they also were to come through safe. Then the
splendour of the whole preparations and the smart equipment of the ships, and
the outstanding enthusiasm of the commanders of the triremes about the different
services and the crews had uplifted even those who a short while ago were
hesitating, both to bravery and to higher hopes about the whole affair; and
besides it contributed not a little to the general good spirits of the force
that Alexander himself had started down the Indus and had explored both outlets,
even into the Ocean, and had offered victims to Poseidon, and all the other sea
gods, and gave splendid gifts to the sea. Then trusting as they did in
Alexander's generally remarkable good fortune, they felt that there was nothing
that he might not dare, and nothing that he could not carry through.
XXI.
Now when the trade winds had sunk to rest, which continue blowing from the Ocean
to the land all the summer season, and hence render the voyage impossible, they
put to sea, in the archonship at Athens of Cephisodorus, on the twentieth day of
the month Boedromion, as the Athenians reckon it; but as the Macedonians and
Asians counted it, it was ... the eleventh year of Alexander's reign. Nearchus
also sacrificed, before weighing anchor, to Zeus the Saviour, and he too held an
athletic contest. Then moving out from their roadstead, they anchored on the
first day in the Indus river near a great canal, and remained there two days;
the district was called Stura; it was about a hundred stades from the roadstead.
Then on the third day they started forthand sailed to another canal, thirty
stades' distance, and this canal was already-salt; for the sea came up into it,
especially at full tides, and then at the ebb the water remained there, mingled
with the river water. This place was called Caumara. Thence they sailed twenty
stades and anchored at Coreestis, still on the river. Thence they started again
and sailed not so very far, for they saw a reef at this outlet of the river
Indus, and the waves were breaking violently on the shore, and the shore itself
was very rough. But where there was a softer part of the reef, they dug a
channel, five stades long, and brought the ships down it, when the flood tide
came up from the sea. Then sailing round, to a distance of a hundred and fifty
stades, they anchored at a sandy island called Crocala, and stayed there through
the next day; and there lives here an Indian race called Arabeans, of whom I
made mention in my larger history; and that they have their name from the river
Arabis, which runs through their country and finds its outlet in the sea,
forming the boundary between this country and that of the Oreitans. From
Crocala, keeping on the right hand the hill they call Irus, they sailed on, with
a low-lying island on their left; and the island running parallel with the shore
makes a narrow bay. Then when they had sailed through this, they anchored in a
harbour with good anchorage; and as Ne'archus considered the harbour a large and
fine one, he called it Alexander's Haven. At the heads of the harbour there lies
an island, about two stades away, called Bibacta; the neighbouring region,
however, is called Sangada. This island, forming a barrier to the sea, of itself
makes a harbour. There constant strong winds were blowing off the ocean.
Nearchus therefore, fearing lest some of the natives might collect to plunder
the camp, surrounded the place with a stone wall. He stayed there thirty-three
days; and through that time, he says, the soldiers hunted for mussels, oysters,
and razor-fish, as they are called; they were all of unusual size. much larger
than those of our seas. They also drank briny water.
XXII.
On the wind falling, they weighed anchor; and after sailing sixty stades they
moored off a sandy shore; there was a desert island near the shore. They used
this, therefore, as a breakwater and moored there: the island was called Domai.
On the shore there was no water, but after advancing some twenty stades inland
they found good water. Next day they sailed up to nightfall to Saranga, some
three hundred stades, and moored off the beach, and water was found about eight
stades from the beach. Thence they sailed and moored at Sacala, a desert spot.
Then making their way through two rocks, so close together that the oar-blades
of the ships touched the rocks to port and starboard, they moored at
Morontobara, after sailing some three hundred stades. The harbour is spacious,
circular, deep, and calm, but its entrance is narrow. They called it, in the
natives' language, 'The Ladies' Pool,' since a lady was the first sovereign of
this district. When they had got safe through the rocks, they met great waves,
and the sea running strong; and moreover it seemed very hazardous to sail
seaward of the cliffs. For the next day, however, they sailed with an island on
their port beam, so as to break the sea, so close indeed to the beach that one
would have conjectured that it was a channel cut between the island and the
coast. The entire passage was of some seventy stades. On the beach were many
thick trees, and the island was wholly covered with shady forest. About dawn,
they sailed outside the island, by a narrow and turbulent passage; for the tide
was still falling. And when they had sailed some hundred and twenty stades they
anchored in the mouth of the river Arabis. There was a fine large harbour by its
mouth; but there was no drinking water; for the mouths of the Arabis were mixed
with sea-water. However, after penetrating forty stades inland they found a
water-hole, and after drawing water thence they returned back again. By the
harbour was a high island, desert, and round it one could get oysters and all
kinds of fish. Up to this the country of the Arabeans extends; they are the last
Indians settled in this direction; from here on the territory, of the Oreitans
begins.
XXIII.
Leaving the outlets of the Arabis they coasted along the territory of the
Oreitans, and anchored at Pagala, after a voyage of two hundred stades, near a
breaking sea; but they were able all the same to cast anchor. The crews rode out
the seas in their vessels, though a few went in seach of water, and procured it.
Next day they sailed at dawn, and after making four hundred and thirty stades
they put in towards evening at Cabana, and moored on a desert shore. There too
was a heavy surf, and so they anchored their vessels well out to sea. It was on
this part of the voyage that a heavy squall from seaward caught the fleet, and
two warships were lost on the passage, and one galley; the men swam off and got
to safety, as they were sailing quite near the land. But about midnight they
weighed anchor and sailed as far as Cocala, which was about two hundred stades
from the beach off which they had anchored. The ships kept the open sea and
anchored, but Nearchus disembarked the crews and bivouacked on shore; after all
these toils and dangers in the sea, they desired to rest awhile. The camp was
entrenched, to keep off the natives. Here Leonnatus, who had been in charge of
operations against the Oreitans, beat in a great battle the Oreitans, along with
others who had joined their enterprise. He slew some six thousand of them,
including all the higher officers; of the cavalry with Leonnatus, fifteen fell,
and of his infantry, among a few others, Apollophanes satrap of Gadrosia. This I
have related in my other history, and also how Leonnatus was crowned by
Alexander for this exploit with a golden coronet before the Macedonians. There
provision of corn had been gathered ready, by Alexander's orders, to victual the
host; and they took on board ten days' rations. The ships which had suffered in
the passage so far they repaired; and whatever troops Nearchus thought were
inclined to malinger he handed over to Leonnatus, but he himself recruited his
fleet from Leonnatus' soldiery.
XXIV.
Thence they set sail and progressed with a favouring wind; and after a passage
of five hundred stades the anchored by a torrent, which ,was called Tomerus.
There was a lagoon at the mouths of the river, and the depressions near the bank
were inhabited by natives in stifling cabins. These seeing the convoy sailing up
were astounded, and lining along the shore stood ready to repel any who should
attempt a landing. They carried thick spears, about six cubits long; these had
no iron tip, but the same result was obtained by hardening the point with fire.
They were in number about six hundred. Nearchus observed these evidently
standing firm and drawn up in order, and ordered the ships to hold back within
range, so that their missiles might reach the shore; for the natives' spears,
which looked stalwart, were good for close fighting, but had no terrors against
a volley. Then Nearchus took the lightest and lightest-armed troops, such as
were also the best swimmers, and bade them swim off as soon as the word was
given. Their orders were that, as soon as any swimmer found bottom, he should
await his mate, and not attack the natives till they had their formation three
deep; but then they were to raise their battle cry and charge at the double. On
the word, those detailed for this service dived from the ships into the sea, and
swam smartly, and took up their formation in orderly manner, and having made a
phalanx, charged, raising, for their part, their battle cry to the God of War,
and those on shipboard raised the cry along with them; and arrows and missiles
from the engines were hurled against the natives. They, astounded at the flash
of the armour, and the swiftness of the charge, and attacked by showers of
arrows and missiles, half naked as they were, never stopped to resist but gave
way. Some were killed in flight; others were captured; but some escaped into the
hills. Those captured were hairy, not only their heads but the rest of their
bodies; their nails were rather like beasts' claws; they used their nails
(according to report) as if they were iron tools; with these they tore asunder
their fishes, and even the less solid kinds of wood; everything else they cleft
with sharp stones; for iron they did not possess. For clothing they wore skins
of animals, some even the thick skins of the larger fishes.
XXV.
Here the crews beached their ships and repaired such as had suffered. On the
sixth day from this they set sail, and after voyaging about three hundred stades
they came to a country which was the last point in the territory of the
Oreitans: the district was called Malana. Such Oreitans as live inland, away
from the sea, dress as the Indians do, and equip themselves similarly for
warfare; but their dialect and customs differ. The length of the coasting voyage
along the territory of the Arabeis was about a thousand, stades from the point
of departure; the length of the Oreitan coast sixteen hundred. As they sailed
along the land of India for thence onward the natives are no longer Indians
--Nearchus states that their shadows weree not cast in the same way; but where
they were making for the high seas and steering a southerly course, their
shadows appeared to fall southerly too; but whenever the sun was at midday, then
everything seemed shadowless. Then such of the stars as they had seen hitherto
in the sky, some were completely hidden, others showed themselves low down
towards the earth; those they had seen continually before were now observed both
setting, and then at once rising again. I think this tale of Nearchus' is
likely; since in Syene of Egypt, when the sun is at the summer solstice, people
show a well where at midday one sees no shade; and in Meroe, at the same season,
no shadows are cast. So it seems reasonable that in India too, since they are
far southward, the same natural phenomena may occur, and especially in the
Indian Ocean, just because it particularly runs southward. But here I must leave
this subject.
XXVI.
Next to the Oreitans, more inland, dwelt the Gadrosians, whose country Alexander
and his army had much pains in traversing; indeed they suffered more than during
all the rest of his expedition: all this I have related in my larger history.
Below the Gadrosians, as you follow the actual coast, dwell the people called
the Fish-eaters. The fleet sailed past their country. On the first day they
unmoored about the second watch, and put in at Bagisara; a distance along the
coast of about six hundred stades. There is a safe harbour there, and a village
called Pasira, some sixty stades from the sea; the natives about it are called
Pasireans. The next day they weighed anchor earlier than usual and sailed round
a promontory which ran far seaward, and was high, and precipitous. Then they dug
wells; and obtained only a little water, and that poor and for that day they
rode at anchor, because there was heavy surf on the beach. Next day they put in
at Colta after a voyage of two hundred stades. Thence they departed at dawn, and
after voyaging six hundred stades anchored at Calyba. A village is on the shore,
a few date-palms grew near it, and there were dates, still green, upon them.
About a hundred stades from the beach is an island called Carnine. There the
villagers brought gifts to Nearchus, sheep and fishes; the mutton, he says, had
a fishy taste, like the flesh of the sea-birds, since even the sheep feed on
fish; for there is no grass in the place. However, on the next day they sailed
two hundred stades and moored off a beach, and a village about thirty stades
from the sea; it was called Cissa, an Carbis was the name of the strip of coast.
There they found a few boats, the sort which poor fishermen might use; but the
fishermen themselves they did not find, for they had run away as soon as they
saw the ships anchoring. There was no corn there, and the army had spent most of
its store; but they caught and embarked there some goats, and so sailed away.
Rounding a tall cape running some hundred and fifty stades into the sea, they
put in at a calm harbour; there was water there, and fishermen dwelt near; the
harbour was called Mosarna.
XXVII.
Nearchus tells us that from this point a pilot sailed with them, a Gadrosian
called Hydraces. He had promised to take them as far as Carmania; from thence on
the navigation was not difficult, but the districts were better known, up to the
Persian Gulf. From Mosarna they sailed at night, seven hundred and fifty stades,
to the beach of Balomus. Thence again to Barna, a village, four hundred stades,
where there were many date-palms and a garden; and in the garden grew myrtles
and abundant flowers, of which wreaths were woven by the natives. There for the
first time they saw garden-trees, and men dwelling there not entirely like
animals. Thence they coasted a further two hundred stades and reached Dendrobosa
and the ships kept the roadstead at anchor. Thence about midnight they sailed
and came to a harbour Cophas, after a voyage of about four hundred stades; here
dwelt fishermen, with small and feeble boats; and they did not row with their
oars on a rowlock, as the Greeks do, but as you do in a river, propelling the
water on this side or that like labourers digging I the soil. At the harbour was
abundant pure water. About the first watch they weighed anchor and arrived at
Cyiza, after a passage of eight hundred stades, where there was a desert beach
and a heavy surf. Here, therefore, they anchored, and each ship took its own
meal. Thence they voyaged five hundred stades and arrived at a small town built
near the shore on a hill. Nearchus, who imagined that the district must be
tilled, told Archias of Pella, son of Anaxidotus, who was sailing with Nearchus,
and was a notable Macedonian, that they must surprise the town, since he had no
hope that the natives would give the army provisions of their good-will; while
he could not capture the town by force, but this would require a siege and much
delay; while they in the meanwhile were short of provisions. But that the land
did produce corn he could gather from the straw which they saw lying deep near
the beach. When they had come to this resolve, Nearchus bade the fleet in
general to get ready as if to go to sea; and Archias, in his place, made all
ready for the voyage; but Nearchus himself was left behind with a single ship
and went off as if to have a look at the town.
XXVIII.
As Nearchus approached the walls, the natives brought him, in a friendly way,
gifts from the city; tunny-fish baked in earthen pans; for there dwell the
westernmost of the Fish-eating tribes, and were the first whom the Greeks had
seen cooking their food; and they brought also a few cakes and dates from the
palms. Nearchus said that he accepted these gratefully; and desired to visit the
town, and they permitted him to enter. But as soon as he passed inside the
gates, he bade two of the archers to occupy the postern, while he and two
others, and the interpreter, mounted the wall on this side and signalled to
Archias and his men as had been arranged: that Nearchus should signal, and
Archias understand and do what had been ordered. On seeing the signal the
Macedonians beached their ships with all speed; they leapt in haste into the
sea, while the natives, astounded at this manoeuvre, ran to their arms. The
interpreter with Nearchus cried out that they should give corn to the army, if
they wanted to save their city; and the natives replied that they had none, and
at the same time attacked the wall. But the archers with Nearchus shooting from
above easily held them up. When, however, the natives saw that their town was
already occupied and almost on the way to be enslaved, they begged Nearchus to
take what corn they had and retire, but not to destroy the town. Nearchus,
however, bade Archias to seize the gates and the neighbouring wall; but he sent
with the natives some soldiers to see whether they would without any trick
reveal their corn. They showed freely their flour, ground down from the dried
fish; but only a small quantity of corn and barley. In fact they used as flour
what they got from the fish; and loaves of corn flour they used as a delicacy.
When, however, they had shown all they had, the Greeks provisioned themselves
from what was there, and put to sea, anchoring by a headland which the
inhabitants regarded as sacred to the Sun: the headland was called Bageia.
XXIX.
Thence, weighing anchor about midnight, they voyaged another thousand stades to
Talmena, a harbour giving good anchorage. Thence they went to Canasis, a
deserted town, four hundred stades farther; here they found a well sunk; and
near by were growing wild date-palms. They cut out the hearts of these and ate
them; for the army had run short of food. In fact they were now really
distressed by hunger, and sailed on therefore by day and night, and anchored off
a desolate shore. But Nearchus, afraid that they would disembark and leave their
ships from faint-heartedness, purposely kept the ships in the open roadstead.
They sailed thence and anchored at Canate, after a voyage of seven hundred and
fifty stades. Here there are a beach and shallow channels. Thence they sailed
eight hundred stades, anchoring at Troea; there were small and poverty-stricken
villages on the coast. The inhabitants deserted their huts and the Greeks found
there a small quantity of corn, and dates from the palms. They slaughtered seven
camels which had been left there, and ate the flesh of them. About daybreak they
weighed anchor and sailed three hundred stades, and anchored at Dagaseira; there
some wandering tribe dwelt. Sailing thence they sailed without stop all night
andday, and after a voyage of eleven hundred stades they got past the country of
the Fish-eaters, where they had been much distressed by want of food. They did
not moor near shore, for there was a long line of surf, but at anchor, in the
open. The length of the voyage along the coast of the Fish-eaters is a little
above ten thousand stades. These Fish-eaters live on fish; and hence their name;
only a few of them fish, for only a few have proper boats and have any skill in
the art of catching fish; but for the most part it is the receding tide which
provides their catch. Some have made nets also for this kind of fishing; most of
them about two stades in length. They make the nets from the bark of the
date-palm, twisting the bark like twine. And when the sea recedes and the earth
is left, where the earth remains dry it has no fish, as a rule; but where there
are hollows, some of the water remains, and in this a large number of fish,
mostly small, but some large ones too. They throw their nets over these and so
catch them. They eat them raw, just as they take them from the water, that is,
the more tender kinds; the larger ones, which are tougher, they dry in the sun
till they are quite sere and then pound them and make a flour and bread of them;
others even make cakes of this flour. Even their flocks are fed on the fish,
dried; for the country has no meadows and produces no grass. They collect also
in many places crabs and oysters and shell-fish. There are natural salts in the
country; from these they make oil. Those of them who inhabit the desert parts of
their country, treeless as it is and with no cultivated parts, find all their
sustenance in the fishing but a few of them sow part of their district, using
the corn as a relish to the fish, for the fish form their bread. The richest
among them have built huts; they collect the bones of any large fish which the
sea casts up, and use them in place of beams. Doors they make from any flat
bones which they can pick up. But the greater part of them, and the poorer sort,
have huts made from the fishes' backbones.
XXX.
Large whales live in the outer ocean, and fishes much larger than those in our
inland sea. Nearchus states that when they left Cyiza, about daybreak they saw
water being blown upwards from the sea as it might be shot upwards by the force
of a waterspout. They were astonished, and asked the pilots of the convoy what
it might be and how it was caused; they replied that these whales as they rove
about the ocean spout up the water to a great height; the sailors, however, were
so startled that the oars fell from their hands. Nearchus went and encouraged
and cheered them, and whenever he sailed past any vessel, he signalled them to
turn the ship's bow on towards the whales as if to give them battle; and raising
their battle cry with the sound of the surge to row with rapid strokes and with
a great deal of noise. So they all took heart of grace and sailed together
according to signal. But when they actually were nearing the monsters, then they
shouted with all the power of their throats, and the bugles blared, and the
rowers made the utmost splashings with their oars. So the whales, now visible at
the bows of the ships, were scared, and dived into the depths; then not long
afterwards they came up astern and spouted the sea-water on high. Thereupon
joyful applause welcomed this unexpected salvation, and much praise was showered
on Nearchus for his courage and prudence. Some of these whales go ashore at
different parts of the coast; and when the ebb comes, they are caught in the
shallows; and some even were cast ashore high and dry; thus they would perish
and decay, and their flesh rotting off them would leave the bones convenient to
be used by the natives for their huts. Moreover, the bones in their ribs served
for the larger beams for their dwellings; and the smaller for rafters; the
jawbones were the doorposts, since many of these whales reached a length of
five-and-twenty fathoms.
XXXI.
While they were coasting along the territory of the Fish-eaters, they heard a
rumour about an island,' which lies some little distance from the mainland in
this direction, about a hundred stades, but is uninhabited. The natives said
that it was sacred to the Sun and was called Nosala, and that no human being
ever of his own will put in there; but that anyone who ignorantly touched there
at once disappeared. Nearchus, however, says that one of his galleys with an
Egyptian crew was lost with all hands not far from this island, and that the
pilots stoutly averred about it that they had touched ignorantly on the island
and so had disappeared. But Nearchus sent a thirty-oar to sail round the island,
with orders not to put in, but that the crew should shout loudly, while coasting
round as near as they dared; and should call on the lost helmsman by name, or
any of the crew whose name they knew. As no one answered, he tells us that he
himself sailed up to the island, and compelled his unwilling crew to put in;
then he went ashore and exploded this island fairy-tale. They heard also another
current story about this island, that one of the Nereids dwelt there; but the
name of this Nereid was not told. She showed much friendliness to any sailor who
approached the island; but then turned him into a fish and threw him into the
sea. The Sun then became irritated with the Nereid, and bade her leave the
island; and she agreed to remove thence, but begged that the spell on her be
removed; the Sun consented; and such human beings as she had turned into fishes
he pitied, and turned them again from fishes into human beings, and hence arose
the people called Fish-eaters, and so they descended to Alexander's day.
Nearchus shows that all this is mere legend; but I have no commendation for his
pains and his scholarship; the stories are easy enough to demolish; and I regard
it as tedious to relate these old tales and then prove them all false.
XXXII.
Beyond these Fish-eaters the Gadrosians inhabit the interior, a poor and sandy
territory; this was where Alexander's army and Alexander himself suffered so
seriously, as I have already related in my other book. But when the fleet,
leaving the Fish-eaters, put in at Carmania, they anchored in the open, at the
point where they first touched Carmania; since there was a long and rough line
of surf parallel with the coast. From there they sailed no further due west, but
took a new course and steered with their bows pointing between north and west.
Carmania is better wooded than the country of the Fisheaters, and bears more
fruits; it has more grass, and is well watered. They moored at an inhabited
place called Badis, in Carmania; with many cultivated trees growing, except the
olive tree, and good vines; it also produced corn. Thence they set out and
voyaged eight hundred stades, and moored off a desert shore; and they sighted a
long cape jutting out far into the ocean; it seemed as if the headland itself
was a day's sail away. Those who had knowledge of the district said that this
promontory belonged to Arabia, and was called Maceta; and that thence the
Assyrians imported cinnamon and other spices. From this beach of which the fleet
anchored in the open roadstead, and the promontory, which they sighted opposite
them, running out into the sea, the bay (this is my opinion, and Nearchus held
the same) runs back into the interior, and would seem to be the Red Sea. When
they sighted this cape, Onesicritus bade them take their course from it and sail
direct to it, in order not to have the trouble of coasting round the bay.
Nearchus, however, replied that Onesicritus was a fool, if he was ignorant of
Alexander's purpose in despatching the expedition. It was not because he was
unequal to the bringing all his force safely through on foot that he had
despatched the fleet; but he desired to reconnoitre the coasts that lay on the
line of the voyage, the roadsteads, the islets; to explore thoroughly any bay
which appeared, and to learn of any cities which lay on the sea-coast; and to
find out what land was fruitful, and what was desert. They must therefore not
spoil Alexander's undertaking, especially when they were almost at the close of
their toils, and were, moreover, no longer in any difficulty about provisions on
their coasting cruise. His own fear was, since the cape ran a long way
southward, that they would find the land there waterless and sun-scorched. This
view prevailed; and I think that Nearchus evidently saved the expeditionary
force by this decision; for it is generally held that this cape and the country
about it are entirely desert and quite denuded of water.
XXXIII.
They sailed then, leaving this part of the shore, hugging the land; and after
voyaging some seven hundred stades they anchored off another beach, called
Neoptana. Then at dawn they moved off seaward, and after traversing a hundred
stades, they moored by the river Anamis; the district was called Harmozeia. All
here was friendly, and produced fruit of all sorts, except that olives did hot
grow there. There they disembarked, and had a welcome rest from their long
toils, remembering the miseries they had endured by sea and on the coast of the
Fish-eaters; recounting one to another the desolate character of the country,
the almost bestial nature of the inhabitants, and their own distresses. Some of
them advanced some distance inland, breaking away from the main force, some in
pursuit of this, and some of that. There a man appeared to them, wearing a Greek
cloak, and dressed otherwise in the Greek fashion, and speaking Greek also.
Those who first sighted him said that they burst into tears, so strange did it
seem after all these miseries to see a Greek, and to hear Greek spoken. They
asked whence he came, who he was; and he said that he had become separated from
Alexander's camp, and that the camp, and Alexander himself, were not very far
distant. Shouting aloud and clapping their hands they brought this man to
Nearchus; and he told Nearchus everything, and that the camp and the King
himself were distant five days' journey from the coast. He also promised to show
Nearchus, the governor of this district and did so; and Nearchus took counsel
with him how to march inland to meet the King. For the moment indeed he returned
to the ship; but at dawn he had the ships drawn up on shore, to repair any which
had been damaged on the voyage; and also because he had determined to leave the
greater part of his force behind here. So he had a double stockade built round
the ships' station, and a mud wall with a deep trench, beginning from the bank
of the river and going on to the beach, where his ships had been dragged ashore.
XXXIV.
While Nearchus was busied with these arrangements, the governor of the country,
who had been told that Alexander felt the deepest concern about this expedition,
took for granted that he would receive some great reward from Alexander if he
should be the first to tell him of the safety of the expeditionary force, and
that Nearchus would presently appear before the King. So then he hastened by the
shortest route and told Alexander: 'See, here is Nearchus coming from the
ships.' On this Alexander, though not believing what was told him, yet, as he
naturally would be, was pleased by the news itself. But when day succeeded day,
and Alexander, reckoning the time when he received the good news, could not any
longer believe it, when, moreover, relay sent after relay, to escort Nearchus,
either went a part of the route, and meeting no one, came back unsuccessful, or
went on further, and missing Nearchus' party, did not themselves return at all,
then Alexander bade the man be arrested for spreading a false tale and making
things all the worse by this false happiness; and Alexander showed both by his
looks and his mind that he was wounded with a very poignant grief. Meanwhile,
however, some of those sent to search for Nearchus, who had horses to convey
him, and chariots, did meet on the way Nearchus and Archias, and five or six
others; that was the number of the party which came inland with him. On this
meeting they recognized neither Nearchus nor Archias -- so altered did they
appear; with their hair long, unwashed, covered with brine, wizened, pale from
sleeplessness and all their other distresses; when, however, they asked where
Alexander might be, the search party gave reply as to the locality and passed
on. Archias, however, had a happy thought, and said to Nearchus: 'I suspect,
Nearchus, that these persons who are traversing the same road as ours through
this desert country have been sent for the express purpose of finding us; as for
their failure to recognize us, I do not wonder at that; we are in such a sorry
plight as to be unrecognizable. Let us tell them who we are and ask them why
they come hither.' Nearchus approved; they did ask whither the party was going;
and they replied: 'To look for Nearchus and his naval force.' Whereupon, 'Here
am I, Nearchus,' said he, 'and here is Archias. Do you lead on; we will make a
full report to Alexander about the expeditionary force.'
XXXV.
The soldiers took them up in their cars and drove back again. Some of them ,
anxious to be beforehand with the good news, ran forward and told Alexander:
'Here is Nearchus; and with him Archias and five besides, coming to your
presence.' They could not, however, answer any questions about the fleet.
Alexander thereupon became possessed of the idea that these few had been
miraculously saved, but that his whole army had perished; and did not so much
rejoice at the safe arrival of Nearchus and Archias, as he was bitterly pained
by the loss of all his force. Hardly had the soldiers told this much, when
Nearchus and Archias approached; Alexander could only with great difficulty
recognize them; and seeing them as he did long-haired and ill-clad, his grief
for the whole fleet and its personnel received even greater surety. Giving his
right hand to Nearchus and leading him aside from the Companions and the
bodyguard, for a long time he wept; but at length recovering himself he said:
'That you come back safe to us, and Archias here, the entire disaster is
tempered to me; but how perished the fleet and the force?' 'Sir,' he replied,
'your ships and men are safe; we are come to tell with our own lips of their
safety.' On this Alexander wept the more, since the safety of the force had
seemed too good to be true; and then he enquired where the ships were anchored.
Nearchus replied: 'They are all drawn up at the mouth of the river Anamis, and
are undergoing a refit.' Alexander then called to witness Zeus of the Greeks and
the Libyan, Ammon that in good truth he rejoiced more at this news than because
he had conquered all Asia since the grief he had felt at the supposed loss of
the fleet cancelled all his other good fortune.
XXXVI.
The governor of the province, however, whom Alexander had arrested for his false
tidings, seeing Nearchus there on the spot, fell at his feet:
'Here,'
he said, 'am I, who reported your safe arrival to Alexander; you see in what
plight I now am.' So Nearchus begged Alexander to let him go, and he was let
off. Alexander then sacrificed thank-offerings for the safety of his host, to
Zeus the Saviour, Heracles, Apollo the Averter of Evil, Poseidon and all the
gods of the sea; and he held a contest of art and of athletics, and also a
procession; Nearchus was in the front row in the procession, and the troops
showered on him ribbons and flowers. At the end of the procession Alexander said
to Nearchus: 'I will not let you, Nearchus, run risks or suffer distresses again
like those of the past; some other admiral shall henceforth command the navy
till he brings it into Susa.' Nearchus, however, broke in and said: 'King, I
will obey you in all things, as is my bounden duty; but should you desire to do
me a gracious favour, do not this thing, but let me be the admiral of your fleet
right up to the end, till I bring your ships safe to Susa. Let it not be said
that you entrusted me with the difficult and desperate work, but the easy task
which leads to ready fame was taken away and put into another's hands.'
Alexander checked his speaking further and thanked him warmly to boot; and so he
sent him back a signal giving him a force as escort, but a small one, as he was
going through friendly territory. Yet his journey to the sea was not untroubled;
the natives of the country round about were in possession of the strong places
of Carmania, since their satrap had been put to death by Alexander's orders, and
his successor appointed, Tlepolemus, had not established his authority. Twice
then or even thrice on the one day the party came into conflict with different
bodies of natives who kept coming up, and thus without losing any time they only
just managed to get safe to the sea-coast. Then Nearchus sacrificed to Zeus the
Saviour and held an athletic meeting.
XXXVII.
When therefore Nearchus had thus duly performed all his religious duties, they
weighed anchor. Coasting along a rough and desert island, they anchored off
another island, a large one, and inhabited; this was after a voyage of three
hundred stades, from their point of departure. The desert island was called
Organa, and that off which they moored Oaracta. Vines grew on it and date-palms;
and it produced corn; the length of the island was eight hundred stades. The
governor of the island, Mazenes, sailed with them as far as Susa as a volunteer
pilot. They said that in this island the tomb of the first chief of this
territory was shown; his name was Erythres, and hence came the name of the sea.
Thence they weighed anchor and sailed onward, and when they had coasted about
two hundred stades along this same island they anchored off it once more and
sighted another island, about forty stades from this large one. It was said to
be sacred to Poseidon, and not to be trod by foot of man. About dawn they put
out to sea, and were met by so violent an ebb that three of the ships ran ashore
and were held hard and fast on dry land, and the rest only just sailed through
the surf and got safe into deep water. The ships, however, which ran aground
were floated off when next flood came, and arrived next day where the main fleet
was. They moored at another island, about three hundred stades from the
mainland, after a voyage of four hundred stades. Thence they sailed about dawn,
and passed on their port side a desert island; its name was Pylora. Then they
anchored at Sisidona, a desolate little township, with nothing but water and
fish; for the natives here were fish-eaters whether they would or not, because
they dwelt in so desolate a territory. Thence they got water, and reached Cape
Tarsias, which runs right out into the sea, after a voyage of three hundred
stades. Thence they made for Cataea, a desert island, and low-lying; this was
said to be sacred to Hermes and Aphrodite; the voyage was of three hundred
stades. Every year the natives round about send sheep and goats as sacred to
Hermes and Aphrodite, and one could see them, now quite wild from lapse of time
and want of handling.
XXXVIII.
So far extends Carmania; beyond this is Persia. The length of the voyage along
the Carmanian coast is three thousand seven hundred stades. The natives' way of
life is like that of the Persians, to whom they are also neighbours; and they
wear the same military equipment. The Greeks moved on thence, from the sacred
island, and were already coasting along Persian territory; they put in at a
place called Eas, where a harbour is formed by a small desert island, which is
called Cecandrus; the voyage thither is four hundred stades. At daybreak they
sailed to another island, an inhabited one, and anchored there; here, according
to Nearchus, there is pearl fishing, as in the Indian Ocean. They sailed along
the point of this island, a distance of forty stades, and there moored. Next
they anchored off a tall hill, called Ochus, in a safe harbour; fishermen dwelt
on its banks. Thence they sailed four hundred and fifty stades, and anchored off
Apostana; many boats were anchored there, and there was a village near, about
sixty stades from the sea. They weighed anchor at night and sailed thence to a
gulf, with a good many villages settled round about. This was a voyage of four
hundred stades; and they anchored below a mountain, on which grew many
date-pahns and other fruit trees such as flourish in Greece. Thence they
um-noored and sailed along to Gogana, about six hundred stades, to an inhabited
district; and they anchored off the torrent, called Areon, just at its outlet.
The anchorage there was uncomfortable; the entrance was narrow, just at the
mouth, since the ebb tide caused shallows in all the neighbourhood of the
outlet. After this they anchored again, at another river-mouth, after a voyage
of about eight hundred stades. This river was called Sitacus. Even here,
however, they did not find a pleasant anchorage; in fact this whole voyage along
Persia was shallows, surf, and lagoons. There they found a great supply of corn;
brought together there by the King's orders, for their provisioning; there they
abode twenty-one days in all; they drew up the ships, and repaired those that
had suffered, and the others too they put in order.
XXXIX.
Thence they started and reached the city of Hieratis, a populous place. The
voyage was of seven hundred and fifty stades; and they anchored in a channel
running from the river to the sea and called Heratemis. At sunrise they sailed
along the coast to a torrent called Padagrus; the entire district forms. a
peninsula. There were many gardens, and all sorts of fruit trees were growing
there; the name of the place was Mesambria. From Mesambria they sailed and after
a voyage of about two hundred stades anchored at Taoce on the river Granis.
Inland from here was a Persian royal residence, about two hundred stades from
the mouth of the river. On this voyage, Nearchus says, a great whale was seen,
stranded on the shore, and some of the sailors sailed past it and measured it,
and said it was of ninety cubits' length. Its hide was scaly, and so thick that
it was a cubit in depth; and it had many oysters, limpets, and seaweeds growing
on it. Nearchus also says that they could see many dolphins round the whale, and
these larger than the Mediterranean dolphins. Going on hence, they put in at the
torrent Rogonis, in a good harbour; the length of this voyage was two hundred
stades. Thence again they sailed four hundred stades and bivouacked on the side
of a torrent; its name was Brizana. Then they found difficult anchorage; there
were surf, and shallows, and reefs showing above the sea. But when the flood
tide came in, they were able to anchor; when, however,, the tide retired again,
the ships were left high and dry. Then when the flood duly returned, they sailed
out, and anchored in a river called Oroatis, greatest, according to Nearchus, of
all the rivers which on this coast run into the Ocean.
XL.
The Persians dwell up to this point and the Susians next to them. Above the
Susians lives another independent tribe; these are called Uxians, and in my
earlier history I have described them as brigands. The length of the voyage
along the Persian coast was four thousand four hundred stades. The Persian land
is divided, they say, into three climatic zones. The part which lies by the Red
Sea is sandy and sterile, owing to the heat. Then the next zone, northward, has
a temperate climate; the country is grassy and has lush meadows and many
vines
and all other fruits except the olive; it is rich with all sorts of gardens, has
pure rivers running through, and also lakes, and is good both for all sorts of
birds which frequent rivers and lakes, and for horses, and also pastures the
other domestic animals, and is well wooded, and has plenty of game. The next
zone, still going northward, is wintry and snowy, Nearchus. tells us of some
envoys from the Black Sea who after quite a short journey met Alexander
traversing Persia and caused him no small astonishment; and they explained to
Alexander how short the journey was. I have explained that the Uxians are
neighbours to the Susians, as the Mardians they also are brigands live next the
Persians, and the Cossaeans come next to the Medes. All these tribes Alexander
reduced, coming upon them in winter-time, when they thought their country
unapproachable. He also founded cities so that they should no longer be nomads
but cultivators, and tillers of the ground, and so having a stake in the country
might be deterred from raiding one another. From here the convoy passed along
the Susian territory. About this part of the voyage Nearchus says he cannot
speak with accurate detail, except about the roadsteads and the length of the
voyage. This is because the country is for the most part marshy and ruins out
well into the sea, with breakers, and is very hard to get good anchorage in. So
their voyage was mostly in the open sea. They sailed out, therefore from the
mouths of the river, where they had encamped, just on the Persian border, taking
on board water for five days; for the pilots said that they would meet no fresh
water.
XLI.
Then after traversing five hundred stades they anchored in the mouth of a lake,
full of fish, called Cataderbis: at the mouth was a small island called
Margastana. Thence about daybreak they sailed out and passed the shallows in
columns of single ships; the shallows were marked on either side by poles driven
down, just as in the strait between the island Leucas and Acarnania signposts
have been set up for navigators so that the ships should not ground on the
shallows. However, the shallows round Leucas are sandy and render it easy for
those aground to get off; but here it is mud on both sides of the channel, both
deep and tenacious; once aground there, they could not possibly get of. For the
punt-poles sank into the mud and gave them no help, and it proved impossible for
the crews to disembark and push the ships off, for they sank up to their breasts
in the ooze. Thus then they sailed out with great difficulty and traversed six
hundred stades, each crew abiding by its ship; and then they took thought for
supper. During the night, however, they were fortunate in reaching deep sailing
water and next day also, up to the evening; they sailed nine hundred stades, and
anchored in the mouth of the Euphrates near a village of Babylonia, called
Didotis; here the merchants gather together frankincense from the neighbouring
country and all other sweet-smelling spices which Arabia produces. From the
mouth of the Euphrates to Babylon Nearchus says it is a voyage of three thousand
three hundred stades.
XLII.
There they heard that Alexander was departing towards Susa. They therefore
sailed back, in order to sail up the Pasitigris and meet Alexander. So they
sailed back, with the land of Susia on their left, and they went along the lake
into which the Tigris runs. It flows from Armenia past the city of Ninus, which
once was a great and rich city, and so makes the region between itself and the
Euphrates; that is why it is called 'Between the Rivers.' The voyage from the
lake up to the river itself is six hundred stades, and there is a village of
Susia called Aginis; this village is five hundred stades from Susa. The length
of the voyage along Susian territory to the mouth of the Pasitigris is two
thousand stades. From there they sailed up the Pasitigris through inhabited and
prosperous country. Then they had sailed up about a hundred and fifty stades
they moored there, waiting for the scouts whom Nearchus had sent to see where
the King was. He himself sacrificed to the Saviour gods, and held an athletic
meeting, and the whole naval force made merry. And when news was brought that
Alexander was now approaching they sailed again up the river; and they moored
near the pontoon bridge on which Alexander intended to take his army over to
Susa. There the two forces met; Alexander offered sacrifices for his ships and
men, come safe back again, and games were held; and whenever Nearchus appeared
in the camp, the troops pelted him with ribbons and flowers. There also Nearchus
and Leonnatus were crowned by Alexander with a golden crown; Nearchus for the
safe conveying of the ships, Leonnatus for the victory he had achieved among the
Oreitans and the natives who dwelt next to them. Thus then Alexander received
safe back his navy, which had started from the mouths of the Indus.
XLIII.
On the right side of the Red Sea beyond Babylonia is the chief part of Arabia,
and of this a part comes down to the sea of Phoenicia and Palestinian Syria, but
on the west, up to the Mediterranean, the Egyptians are upon the Arabian
borders. Along Egypt a gulf running in from the Great Sea makes it clear that by
reason of the gulf's joining with the High Seas one might sail round from
Babylon into this gulf which runs into Egypt. Yet, in point of fact, no one has
yet sailed round this way by reason of the heat and the desert nature of the
coasts, only a few people who sailed over the open sea. But those of the army of
Cambyses who came safe from Egypt to Susa and those troops who were sent from
Ptolemy Lagus to Seleucus Nicator at Babylon through Arabia crossed an isthmus
in a period of eight days and passed through a waterless and desert country,
riding fast upon camels, carrying water for themselves on their camels, and
travelling by night; for during the day they could not come out of shelter by
reason of the heat. So far is the region on the other side of this stretch of
land, which we have demonstrated to be an isthmus from the Arabian gulf running
into the Red Sea, from being inhabited, that its northern parts are quite desert
and sandy. Yet from the Arabian gulf which runs along Egypt people have started,
and have circumnavigated the greater part of Arabia hoping to reach the sea
nearest to Susa and Persia, and thus have sailed so far round the Arabian coast
as the amount of fresh water taken aboard their vessels have permitted, and then
have returned home again. And those whom Alexander sent from Babylon, in order
that, sailing as far as they could on the right of the Red Sea, they might
reconnoitre the country on this side, these explorers sighted certain islands
lying on their course, and very possibly put in at the mainland of Arabia. But
the cape which Nearchus says his party sighted running out into the sea opposite
Carmania no one has ever been able to round, and thus turn inwards towards the
far side. I am inclined to think that had this been navigable,ft and had there
been any passage, it would have been proved navigable, and a passage found, by
the indefatigable energy of Alexander. Moreover, Hanno the Libyan started out
from Carthage and passed the pillars of Heracles and sailed into the outer
Ocean, with Libya on his port side, and he sailed on towards the east,
five-and-thirty days all told. But when at last he turned southward, he fell in
with every sort of difficulty, want of water, blazing heat, and fiery streams
running into the sea. But Cyrene, lying in the more desert parts of Africa, is
grassy and fertile and well-watered; it bears all sorts of fruits and animals,
right up to the region where the silphium grows; beyond this silphium belt its
upper parts are bare and sandy. Here this my history shall cease, which, as well
as my other, deals with Alexander of Macedon son of Philip.
THE END