Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/261

 MAERA. lat. 15°, the capital, no doubt, of the Maphoritae, whom he places above the Homeritae and Adramitae of the southern coast. [Maphoiiitae.] The situation of this tribe is still marived by the wide and very fruitful Wadij Mayfah, in the midst of which " the very extensive village named Mayfah^ situated at the eastern base of the Hummarees," perhaps marks the site of the Maepha metropolis. Mr. Forster, however, identifies it with the ruined .site of Kakab-el-IIojar, discovered and described by Lieut. Wellstead in 1 834, the situation of which is thus stated by that officer: — " Nukab-el-TIajar is situated north-west, and is distant forty-eight miles from the village of 'Ain [on the coast], which is marked on the chart in latitude 14° 2' north, and longitude 46° 30' east, nearly." It stands in the centre of the Wady Meifah, nearly 20 miles north of the village of that name, and was evidently a jjlace of considerable importance in ancient times. The inscription over the gateway, in the ancient Arabic character, commonly known as the Hadrau- niatic, would doubtless throw light on the history of this castle; and it is curious that while the at- tempted decipherments of Professor Eoediger and Mr. Charles Forster have so little in common, both would agree in identifying it with Maepha; for while the former discovers the name Mefa twice in the first line of the inscription, the latter, who pro- nounces that this name " has no existence in the in- scription," compensates for this disappointment by discovering a list of proper names, which serve to connect it with several historical personages, among whom are an Arabian patriarch, Mohareb, son of Koreish, " belonging to a period certainly prior to the Christian era;" and CharibaiJl, " that king of the Homerites and Sabaeans celebrated by Arrian (^Periplm Maris Eryth. pp. 13, 14, apud Hudson Geograj)hici Minores), whose alliance in the reign of Claudius was assiduously courted by the Ko- mans. The inscription further mentions many of the buildings described by Lieut. Wellstead. (Forster, vol. ii. pp. 193—204, 383—393.) [G. W.] MAERA. [Mantineia.1 MAESIA SILVA, a forest of Etruria, in the ter- ritory of the Veientines, which was conquered from them by Ancus Marcius. (Liv. i. 33.) Its site cannot be determined with certainty, but it was pro- bably situated on the right bank of the Tiber, between Rome and the sea-coast. Pliny also no- tices it as abounding in dormice. (Plin. viii. 58. s. 83.) [E. H.B.] MAESO'LIA (v Moio-coAta, Ptol. vii. 1. § 15; in Peripl. p. 35, MacaAia), a district on the eastern coast of Ilindostdn, along the Bay of Bengal, corre- sponding to that now occupied by the Cu-cars and the upper part of the Coromandel coast. Ptolemy mentions two towns in its territory which he calls Emporia, namely, Contacossyla (probably the pre- sent MasulipaUana') and Allosygna. The district was traversed by a river of considerable size, the Maesolus (now Goddvari), which flows into the ^(^y oj" Bengal, after giving its name to the sur- rounding country. It was from one of the ports of Maesolia that merchants were in the habit of taking ship and crossing the Bay of Bengal to the Aurea Chersonesus. The people were called Maesoli (Mai- o-ciAof). (Vincent, Peripl. vol. ii. p. 521.) [V.] MAESO'LUS (6 MaiaicXos, Ptol. vii. 1. §§ 15, 37), a river of considerable size, which rises in the Deccan or midland part of Ilindostdn, and flows in a course at first SE., and then nearly E MAGDALA. 245 till it falls into the Bay of Bengal in lat. 18°. N. There has been some dispute among geographers as to its modern representative, some making it the same as the Kistna, and some as the Goddvari. The latter is probably the most correct supposition. Ptolemy places its source in the Orudii or Aruedi mountains, which would seem to be part of the chain of the western Ghats. [V.] MA'GABA {Kurgh Bagli), a considerable moun- tain in the central part of Galatia, W. of the river Halys, and E. of the city of Ancyra, which was only 10 Roman miles distant from it. In b. c. 189, when Manlius was carrying on war against the Galatians, the Tectosagi and Trocmi took refuge on Mt. IIagaba, and there defended themselves against the Romans, but were defeated. (Liv. xsxviii. 19,26; Flor. i. 11 .) According to Rufus Festus (11), this mountain was afterwards called Modiacus. [L. S.] MAGABULA, a place mentioned in the Peuting. Table in Pontus Polcmoniacus, on the road from Comana to Nicopolis, at a distance of 2 1 miles from the former city. There can be no doubt but that it is the same place as Megalula (M67aAouAa) men- tioned by Ptolemy (v. 6. § 10); but its exact site cannot be ascertained. [L. S.] MAGARSA, JIAGAESUS, or MEGARSUS (Ma- yapaa, Mdyapaus, Meyapaos), a town in the eastern part of Cilicia, situated on a height close to the mouth of the river Pyramus. (Strab. xiv. p. 676.) Alexander, previous to tlie battle of Issus, maixdied from Soli to Megarsus, and there offered sacrifices to Athena Megarsis, and to Amphilochus, the son of Amphiaraus, the reputed founder of the place. (An-ian, Anab. ii. 5.) It seems to have formed the port of Mallus (Steph. Byz. s. v. Mdyapaos; Lycoph. 439 ; Plin. // . N. v. 22). The hill on which the town stood now bears the name of Karadash, and vestiges of ancient buildings are still seen upon it. (Leake, Asia Minor, p. 215, foil.) [L. S.] MAGDALA (MaySaAa: Eth. MaySaArii'os), a to'Ti of Galilee, chiefly noted as the birthplace of that Mary to whom the distinguished name of Jlag- dalene is ever applied in the Gospel. The place itself is mentioned only by S. Matthew (xv. 39), where we find the words to 'opia MaySaXd, which are repre- sented in the parallel passage in S. Mark (viii. 10) as TO /ue'prj AaA/xavovda. As neither does this name occur elsewhere, we have no clue to the situation of the town ; although, a modern writer says, " it seems to follow from the New Testament itself tliati it lay on the west side of the lake." The argument is, that, on leaving the coast of Jlagdala, our Lord embarked again, and " departed to the other siile," — " an expression which in the N. T. is applied al- most exclusively to the country east of the lake and of the Jordan." (Robinson, Bib. lies.volnl p. 278.) There can, however, be no difliculty in iilcntifying it with the site of the modern village of Me/del in the SE. corner of the plain of Gennesaret; where there certainly existed an ancient town of the name, no- ticed in the Jerusalem Tahnud, compiled in Tibe- rias, from which it is not mors than 4 or 5 miles distant, on the north: probably identical also with Migdal-el, in the tribe of Naphtali. (Josh. xix. 38.) It "is a small and insignificant village, " looking much Mke a ruin, though exhibiting no marks of antiquity." (Robinson, I. c.) Pococke's argument against this identification is unintelligible: — " This does not seem to be iIagdalum mentioned in Scrip- ture, because that is spoken of with Dalmanutha, which was to the ea-st of the sea." (^Observations K 3