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ἀφικτο γῆς ἕκαστος ὀλίγην κομίζων μοῖραν, ἔβαλον εἰς ταῦτα καὶ συνεμέγα νυον· καλοῦσι δὲ βόθρον τοῦτον, ᾧ καὶ τὸν Ολυμπον ὀνόματι Μοῦνδον εἶτα ὥσπερ κύκλον κέντρῳ περιέγραψαν τὴν πόλιν: Nempe in hanc fossam rotundam eorum velut conjecerc, quibus vel necessitas, vel luxuria pretium facit: his Deos manes placare, his communem quasi thesaurum, nunquam tollendum, deserendum nunquam, constituere videntur voluisse: hunc mundum à se dictum ter in anno videntur cærimoniâ quâdam aperuisse: de hoc mundo denique, sive cœlo, (Olympum vocat Plutarch.) accipio illud Virgilianum ænigma,

Dic quibus in terris, et eris mihi magnus Apollo,
Tres pateat cœli spatium non ampliùs ulnas."

P. W.

NOTES on Part of the POEM of FESTUS AVIENUS; who extracted the Substance of it, as he himself admits, from a Punic Voyage to Cadiz, to the River Loire, to the Scylley, or Scilly, Islands, to Cornwall, to Ireland, and to Albion; a Voyage performed by Himilco, the celebrated Carthaginian Admiral.

NO. II.

Ir is a circumstance very favorable to ascertaining and fixing the sites of the above-named ancient tribes, that the old city of Tarshish forms in this poem a centre, around which the others are drawn at their proportionate distances. "Hic Gadir urbs est, dicta Tartessus priùs." Himilco sailed toward the north, (as Pliny observes in the 2d b. and the 67th §.) in the same year in which Hanno proceeded to the central shore of Africa, which is now denominated Sierra Leona. Now in this voyage of Hanno, as in Avienus, the Tyrians and the colonists from Carthage gave to many colonies the same name. Three cities, connected by trade with Tyre, have been distinguished by the same appellation: the first is the birth-place of St. Paul, Tarsus in Cilicia; the second is the city mentioned with Ophir; the third and most important town was the Tartessus of Spain. Now as to the long-lost port of Ophir, Dr. Vincent has learnedly defined in what quarter of the globe, and on what shore it was: Sir William Jones placed it in Malacca: the Portuguese voyagers in 1650. suspected it to be Sophala: Bruce, by reasonings on the Monsoons, assigns both Tarshish and Ophir,to the African shore, parallel to the coasts of Madagascar. Wilford, in the Asiatic Researches, has conceived the very probable idea, that the identical letters, which compose the word Ophir, are to be found in our word Africa: [many Punic coins are stamped with a name, which may be equally read Ophir or Aphir, and as an explanation of the meaning of this term, the figure of a horse is added on the reverse of the coin: Virgil's verses intimate that on the coins of Carthage "a horse's head" was impressed]: hence Wilford infers, that the "Voyage to Ophir" is merely synonymous with a "Voyage to Southern Africa:" I add the word southern, 10

distinguish this part of Africa from its northern coasts, all washed by the Mediterranean, which in the age of Moses was called the - Lubim in the book of the Kings, and in the Chronicles the Lubim and Succim but which appellation was expressed in the Greek letter by Lybia, and even in the New Testament by Lybo-Phenicia.

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Parkhurst's Lexicon, under the phrase "Ships of Tarshish,” is unsatisfactory on the subject of the trade to Ophir and Tarshish: of the latter city, three places, as I said above, bare the name in the same early age, Tarsus in Cilicia, built, says Strabo, B. 14. by the last king of Persia, Sardanapalus; the one in the dispute above-named; and Tartessus or Gades in Spain. The articles of trade to the two cities Ophir and Tarshish, are only to be seen in Africa, but those of the trade to one of the cities are equally found in Spain and Cilicia: one of the Classics alludes to this very triennial trade, but I do not recollect the -name of the author. The Phoenicians built, (says Maurice, in his Ind. Antiq. vol. 6.) Tartessus on the River Bætis and Columnæ, now Corunna, with its ancient pharos, or lighthouse. [Now vitrified fully as much as the Scotch or Pictish forts, said Sir R. Kerr Porter to me after his Spanish tour, and in ruins.] Near Cornwall the isles of Scylley intimate islands sacred to the Sun. The Phoenicians exported thence skins, lead, and tin: the Britons used a boat covered with skins: the tin was carried overland to Marseilles by the Greeks; but the latter people had not sailed to our island prior to the "Travels of Herodotus," or to the year 450 before Christ, or the remarkable era of the arrival on our coast, of the following admiral-Himilco, who was sent by Carthage to visit the shores of Western Europe, and. who probably planted colonies in Cornwall.'

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One historian, yet more celebrated than Mr. Maurice, has collected from many passages in the classics the fables, or the annals of those early ages: Mariana, who in the beginning of his History of Spain, employs the 8th chapter on the Geryons, and on the barbarism of the Spaniards, who were taught by Osyris the use of bread, and the plantation of the vine; and on the Lybian Hercules, who visited Spain, and died: The 10th chapter is filled with the king Atlas; and the 21st with the Voyage of Himilco around the shores of Europe during two years, and with his gracious reception, and his honors at the city of Carthage. The judicious reader will be anxious to ascertain the real and classical authorities for the above narrative of Hercules. They are these "Geryon had led a colony," says Plutarch, in the Life of Sertorius, from Africa into Spain; but the colony was invaded by Osyris, the Egyptian, and the aged leader was defeated, slain, and buried at Gades: his three sons inherited only misfortunes." Under the fiction of a giant with a triple body, the classic poets, whom I quoted above, 'have recorded their unsuccessful engagement with Hercules. "The victor built," Strabo adds, in his 3d book and 169th page, "the city of Calpe Carteia," [its ruins still are seen near to Gibraltar;] a "florishing town in his age." Sanchoniatho and Silius Italicus observe, that Hercules Melacartus was honored with a temple at Gadir, which admitted no images within its sacred inclosure." Mela, in the 3d book, and at the 6th c. records, "that the Tyrians covered his ashes with a temple

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celebrated for its antiquity, and its treasures:" Livy relates the honors which were paid to his remains by his illustrious countryman Hannibal. Plutarch adds, that "the hero slew Anteus Atlas in his capital city Tingis." Pliny, in the fourth book, and at the close of the 36th section, adds, "The brothers, the Geryons, are supposed to have reigned in Erythia, whose flocks the celebrated Hercules seized." And Strabo, in the third book, and at the 169th page, thus refers to the same tradition: Pherecydes appears to have given to Gades the name of Erythea, in which the oxen of Geryon are placed: others, however, understand by that name an island contiguous to Gades, and separated by the narrow frith of one stadium, or vulgarly, one furlong: the latter build their conjectures on the excellence of the pastures."

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The following crowd of verses occur in Avienus, on these dark traditions concerning this remarkable labor of Hercules: v. 304 and 305.; .v. 335 and 336.; v. 324. 5. 6. 7. 8; from v. 355th even to v. 370; and v. 262. 3. 4. 5.

V. 304. Gerontis arcem, et prominens fani, ut suprà
Sumus elocuti, distinet medium salum.

V. 305.

V. 335.

Utrosque interfluit tenue fretum,
Quod Herma porro et Herculis dictum est via.
Est Herma porrò cespitum munitio

V. 336.
V. 324.

325.

6.

Interfluum quæ altrinsecùs munit locum.
Aliique rursus Herculis dicunt viam.

7.

Stravisse quippè maria fertur Herculis,

8.

Iter ut pateret facilè captivo gregi.
Nuncupari has Herculis

V. 355.

7.

6. Ait columnas; stadia triginta refert
Has distineri, horrere sylvis undique
8. Inhospitasque semper esse nauticis.
9. Inesse quippe dicit ollis Herculis
360.

Et templa et aras: invehi advenas rates
1. Deo litare, abire festino pede :

2. Nefas putatum demorari in insulis : 3. Circum atque juxta plurimo tractu jacens 4. Manere tradit tenue prolixè mare: 5. Navigia onusta adire non valent locos 6. Breve ob fluentum, et pingue littori lutum. 7. Sed si voluntas fortè quem subegerit 8. Adire fanum, properet ad Lunæ insulam 9. Agere carinam, eximere classi pondera, 370. Levique cymbâ vix superferri salo. V. 262. Et quæ vetustum Græciæ nomen tenet 3. Gerontis arx est eminus; namque ex eâ 4. Geryona quondam nuncupatum accepimus. Hic ora latè sunt sinûs Tartessii.

5.

86. Hic sunt columnæ pervicacis Herculis,
Abila atque Calpe; lævâ dicti cespitis

Libyæ propinquæ spatia duro perstrepunt
Septentrione, sed loco certæ tenent.

Let the reader contrast the above passage with the verses which will be quoted below from p. 341 to 348. Strabo, in the third book, and at the 139th page, describes the same scenery. "There you see the hill of the two tribes, the Basistani, and the Bastuli, the hill named Calpe, [the modern Gibraltar] not vast in circumference, but of so great an elevation, that it appears at a distance to be insular." At the 170th page of the same book he adds, "Some authors give, as the name of the

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Herculean pillars, Calpe and Abila, which is a mountain opposite to Calpe and situated in the part of Africa, named by Eratosthenes, Metagonium, a portion of the Numidian race.”

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At the 354th verse Avienus had asserted, that one geographer had named two islands the pillars of Hercules: even this conjecture has not escaped Strabo: in the third book, and at the 168th page, he observes, "that two islands, one of which was denominated the temple of Juno, were by some authors deemed to be the pillars." A more minute delineation of this scene, by an intelligent friend who saw it, will, I hope, prove agreeable to the patriotic Englishman. "The appearance of the strait, when it first opened upon us rather to the northwest early in the morning, was picturesque. The high hills on the Spanish coast to our left seemed to be surmounted in gradation, by a back ground of still higher irregular hills, and behind these again, by the enormous mountains of Granada, nebulous and irregular, faintly pointing to the neighbouring moon.' Standing on and nearer, the brown parched and stony high hills of Spain strike as great, but not pleasing objects; especially as they rise behind Cape Trafalgar gradually, between high land on the Spanish main, and a something lower range of the Barbary hills: the passage now begins to open, and you soon are struck, not by an arm of the ocean dividing the two continents of Europe and Africa by its vast and irresistible force, as it were repelling two approaching worlds, and forcing back its hills and mountains on either side, as they crumble before its stupendous torrent, but by a considerable river, romantically skirted by high and varied hills and cliffs, down which you are smoothly but rapidly conveyed, while you command the retreating shores on either side, and as you pass on and near the borders, are greeted with a most extraordinary, I had almost said, a sublime, clatter and rattle of the many waters, hurrying by and jostling every rock and prominence, which obtrudes: the noise, when near the shore, is surprising: the noise, like a reverberated echo, arises from the height of the rocky shore: as you glide on quick and smoothly, the occasional bays and irregular line of coasting hills amuse the eye, rather than delight it, except by the singular novelty of the scene. Still behind all on the left side, but before you, the vast Granada mountains begin again to meet you with a more unclouded aspect; and on the right, Atlas on the African background shows, but to no great advantage, its famed mass and height. It is pleasant as you tide it smoothly down, to contemplate two quarters of the globe thus broken in sunder by a stream not four miles wide, apparently not wider than the river Humber, though really measuring twenty miles across. But the high coasts so call off the eye, that you do not perceive the intermediate breadth. Tangier, as it opens midway, obtains a partial view, because it is Tangier, the Tingis of king Anteus and Atlas, and the capital of Juba; but behold! while you are reminded of its history, a rude abrupt mass, detached as it were from the main land, and nearly insular,' stands forth beyond the Spanish shore, and meets the eye with its brown, and often cloud-capped irregular high ridge, announcing itself the far-famed wonder, Gibraltar. As you approach, it still seems to stand higher and higher, and to recede, in order to receive the ship into its grand extensive circular bay,

while the high land on the Spanish side of Cabrito-point, makes a picturesque and rough fore-ground; and as you enter the bay, its neighbouring and more inland mountains slope back and border the circle of the bay with a grand and most irregular outline, terminating at a high point near, and opposite to, Gibraltar; which slopes suddenly to the neutral sands, at three feet above the level of the sea."

As the reader is now distinctly and minutely informed, that the straits of Abila or of Gibraltar are in width twenty miles, he will smile at the simplicity and the childish inaccuracy of the loose and discordant estimates of its width, which occur in Avienus at verses 336.7. and at verse 370. and from verse 341 to the 355th. But if he reads the above accurate delineation of my friend, (as Sir Robert Kerr Porter observed it, with the intelligent eye of a superior artist,) he will cease to despise the venerable ancients for their mistake, since the mistake was very natural in the infancy of both navigation and astronomy, of both picturesque painting, and of accurate hydrography.

V. 335.

Utrosque interfluit tenue fretum,

Quod Herma porrò et Herculis dictum est via:
Amphipolis urbis incola Ecdæmon aït,
Non plus habere longitudinis modo,
Quàm porriguntur centum et octo millia,
Et distineri millibus terras tribus :

V. 370. Sed ad columnas quidquid interfunditur
Undæ æstuantis, stadia septem vix aït
Damastus esse: Caryandæus Scylax
Medium fluentum inter columnas adserit
Tantum patere, quantus æstus Bosphoro est.
Hic Herculanæ stant columnæ,

V. 574.

V. 341.

V. 342.

V. 343.

Quas modum utriusque haberi continentis legimus.
Sunt pervia porro saxa prominentia

V. 344.

Abila et Calpe: Calpe in Hispano solo

V. 345.

V. 346.

V. 347.

V. 348.

V. 349.
V. 350.

Maurisiorum est Abila: namque Abilam vocant
Gens Punicorum, mons quod, altus barbaro est,
Id est Latino; dici et auctor Plautus est.
Calpe que rursum in Græciâ speciei cavæ
Teretisque visu noncupatur uncei.
Atheniensis dicit Euctemon item
Non esse saxa, aut vertices adsurgere,
Parte ex utrâque : cespitem Libyci soli
Europæ et oram memorat insulas duas
Interjacere: Nuncupari has Herculis
V. 355. Ait columnas; stadia triginta refert
Has distineri.

V. 90.

V. 91.

V. 92. V. 93.

V. 94.

V. 95.

V. 96.

V. 97.

V. 98.

V. 99.

Et prominentis hìc jugi surgit caput
(Estrymnum illud dixit ævum antiquius)
Molesque celsa saxei fastigii

Tota in tepentem maximè vergit notum.
Sub hujus autem prominentis vertice

Sinus dehiscit incolis Estrymnicus,

In quo insulæ sese exerunt Estrymnides

Axe jacentes et metallo divites

Stanni, atque plumbi: multa vis hic gentis est,
Superbus animus, efficax solertia,

V. 100. Negotiandi cura jugis omnibus.

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