Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/257

 JIACEOBII. bia wherein the only productive soil for some hun- dreds of miles south of Philae consists of narrow slips of ground adjacent to and irrigated by the Nile. From the southern frontier of Egypt to the nearest frontier of Abyssinia the only practical road for an army lies along the river bank, and the distance to be travereed is at least 900 miles. We must therefore abandon the belief that the Macrobians dwelt in the farthest south. But there are other suspicious features in the naiTative. Similar length of days is ascribed by Herodotus to the Tar- tessians (i. 163; comp. Anacreon, ap. Strab. iii. 2), nor should it be overlooked that the Hyperboreans in the extreme north are also denominated Macrobii. We may also bear in mind the mythical aspect of Homer's Aethiopians {Iliad, i. 423) in which pas- sage the epithet " faultless " {ajj-v/xoves) implies not moral but physical superiority (comp. Herod, iii. 20: fieyttTTOi Koi KaWiaroi avdpwTrwv wavTcoi'). " Men," as Dr. Kenrick justly remarks, " groaning under the burden of the social state, have in every age been prone to indulge in such pictures of ease and abun- dance as Herodotus, in the passages cited, and Pin- dar {Pyth. X. 57) draw of countries beyond the limits of geographical knowledge and of times beyond the origin of history." If, then, we do not yield up the Macrobii to myth or fable altogether, we must seek for them in some district nearer Aegypt. Whatever tribe or region Cambyses intended to subdue, gold was abundant, and brass, or rather copper, scarce among them. Now the modern inhabitants of Kordofan {15° 20' — 10° N. lat., 28° — 32° E. long.) are commonly called Nobah, and Nob is an old Aegyptian word for gold. Again, the Macrobii were singularly tall, well pro- portioned and healthy; and Kordofan has, from time iminemorial, supplied the valley of the Nile with able-bodied and comely slaves of both sexes (Hume, ap. Walpole, Turkey, p. 392). Moreover, the ca- ravans bear with them, as marketable wares, wrought and unwrought copper to this district. In 1821 Mohammed Ali achieved what Cambyses failed in attempting. With less than 7000 men, half of whom indeed perished through fatigue and the cli- mate, he subdued all the countries contiguous to the Nile as far as Sennaar and /Toj-c^q/aw inclusive: and the objects which stimulated his expedition were gold and slaves. We shall therefore perhaps not greatly err in assigning to the Macrobii of Hero- dotus a local habitation much nearer than Abyssinia to the southern frontier of Aegypt, nor in suggesting that their name, in the language of the Greeks, is a corruption of the Semitic word Magrabi, i. e. the dwellers in the west. A position west of the Nile would account also for the knowledge possessed by the Ichthyophagi of Elephantis {Bojah or Bisharye Arabs) of the languages of the Macrobii. The modern Bisharyes occupy the country east of the Nile from Aegypt to Abyssinia; and their trade and journeys extend from the Red Sea to Km-dofan. If then we regard the Macrobii (the Magrabi) and the Ichthyophagi (the Bisharye) as respectively seated on the east and west banks of the Nile, the latter people will have been the most available guides whom Cambyses could employ for exploring the land of the Macrobians. It should be remembered, however, that Herodotus derived his knowledge of the Persian expedition either irom the Persian conquerors of Aegypt, or from the Aegyptian priests themselves: neither of whom would be willing to disclose to an inc^uisitive VOL. II. MACRON TEICHOS. 241 foreigner the actual situation of a land in which gold was so abundant. By placing it in the far south, and exaggerating the hardships endured by the army of Cambyses, they might justly hope to deter strangers from prying into the recesses of a region from which themselves were deriving a profitable monopoly. Upon the wonders of the Macrobian land it would be hardly worth while to dwell, were they not in singular accordance with some known features in the physical or commercial character of that region. In the southern portion of Kordofan the hills rise to a considerable height, and iron ore in some districts is plentiful. The fountain of health may thus have been one of several mineral springs. The ascription of extreme longevity to a people who dwelt in a hot and by no means healthy climate may be explained by the supposition that, whereas many of the pastoral tribes in these regions put to death their old people, when no longer capable of moving from place to place, the Macrobians abstained from so crael a practice. The procerity of the king seems to imply that the chieftains of the Macrobii belonged to a dif- ferent race from their subjects (compare Scylax, ap. Aristot. vii. p. 1332). " The Table of the Sun" is the market-place in which trade, or rather barter, was carried on with strangers, according to a prac- tice mentioned by Cosmas, the Indian marhier, who describes the annual fairs of southern Aethicpia in terms not unlike those employed by Herodotus in his accountof the Macrobians (pp'. 1 38, 1 39). [W. B. D.] MACROCE'PHALI (MaKpoKe>oAoi), that is, " people with long heads." (Strab. i. p. 43.) The Siginni, a barbarous tribe about Mount Caucasus, artificially contrived to lengthen their heads as much as possible. (Strab. xi. p. 520; comp. Hippocr. de Aer. 35.) It appears that owing to this custom they were called Macrocephali ; at least Pliny vi. 4), Pomp. Mela (i. 19), and Scylax (p. 33), speak of a nation of this name in the north-east of Pontus. The anonymous author of the Feripl. Pont. Eux. (p. 14) regards them as the same people as the Macrones, but Pliny {I. c.) clearly distin- guishes the two. [L. S.] JIACRO'NES (MaKpwves), a powerful tribe in the east of Pontus, about the Moschici moun- tains. They are described as wearing garments made of hair, and as using in war wooden helmets, small shields of wicker-work, and short lances with long points. (Herod, ii. 104, vii. 78; Xenoph. Anab. iv. 8. § 3, v. 5. § 18, vii. 8. § 25; comp. Eeca.t. Fragm. 191; Scylax, p. 33; Dionys. Perieg. 766; Apollon. Rhod. ii. 22; Plin. vi. 4 ; Joseph, c. Apion. i. § 22, who asserts that they obsei-ved the custom of circumcision.) Strabo (xii. p. 548) remarks, in passing, that the people formerly called Macrones bore in his day the name of Sanni, though Pliny (I. c.) speaks of the Sanni and Macrones as two distinct peoples. They appear to have always been a rude and wild tribe, until civilisation and Christianity were introduced among them in the reign of Justinian. (I'rocop. Bell. Pers.'u 15, Bell. Goth. iv. 2, de Aed. iii. 6.) [L. S.] MACRON TEICHOS (Ma/rpbr r^xo^), also called " the wall of Anastasius," was a fortification constructed in A. D. 507, by the emperor Anasta- sius I. of Constantinople, as a means of defence against the Bulgarians: it consisted of a strong wall run- ning across the isthmus of Constantinople, from ti o coast of the Propontis to that of the Euxiie.