Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/444

 428 NIE. NIE (Ni^, Isidor. Parth. 16, ed.Miiller), a small place in Ariana, probably the present Neh, in Ko- hiHan. [V.] NIGEIR or NIGIR (Niyeip, Ptol. iv. 6. § 14; NiVp, Asathem. ii. 10; Niger, gen. Nigris, Plin. V. 4, 8, viii. 32), a great river of interior Libya, flowing from W. to E. It has long been a moot point among geographers whether the Nigeir of the ancients should be identified with the river now known as the Djolibd or Qiiorra, which, after taking its course through the vast plains or low- lands of Central Africa, turns southwards towards the Bight of Benin, where it enters the sea. For instance, Gosselin {Geographie des Anciens, vol. i. pp. 125—135) came to tbe conclusion that the an- cients possessed no knowledge of NW. Africa to the S. of the river Nun. Walckenaer (Eecherches Geo- graphiques sur I'lnterieur de VAfriqiie Septen- trionale, Paris, 1821) also, who has carefully dis- cu.ssed this point, sums up the result of his inquiries by asserting that none of Ptolemy's rivers can be the same as the DJulibd or any other stream of the Biledu-l-Suddn, as that region was quite unknown to antiquity, and was, in reality, discovered by the Arabs. Following in the same track, Jlr. Cooley (^Claudius Ptolemy and the Nile, London, 1854) regards the Nigeir as a hypothetical river, repre- senting collectively the waters of the Bikdu-l-Jerid. On the other hand, Colonel Leake {Journ. Geog. Soc. vol. ii. pp. 1 — 28), whose views are adopted in the present article, considers that Ptolemy's informa- tion on the Djolibd or Qiiorra, although extremely imperfect, was real. There seems, indeed, to be reason for believing that its discoveiy may be placed at a much earlier period, and that its banks were reached by the young Nasamones. [Nasamones.] Ptolemy's statements (I. c.) are annexed, from which it will be seen that the arguments in favour of the identity of his Nigeir with the Quorra are very strong. He believed that the earth was spherical; he divided the great circle into 360°; of these de- grees he placed the same number in the breadth of N. Africa, that modern observations confirm; in the length of the same country he erred only one-tenth in excess. While in the interior, proceeding from a point of the W. coast, where his positions approxi- mate to modern geography, he placed a great river, flowing from W. to E., exactly in the latitude where the Qiiorra flows in that direction.* In considering the exact meaning of this passage. greatest rivers are the Geir and the NiL'eir- E.long. N. lat. The Geir unites Mount Usargala with the Garamantic Pharanx. A river diverges from it at - - 42° 0' 16'^ 0' And makes the lake Chelonides, of which the middle is iu - - - 40° 0' 20^ 0' This river is said to be lost under- ground, and to reappear, formii'g another river, of which the W. eod is;it iCP 0' 16° 0' The E. part of the river forms the lake Nuba, of which the pojitinn is b<P 0' 15° 0' The Nigeir joins the mountains Man- drusand Thala,,-ind forms the lake Nigrites, of which the position is - 15° 0' 18° 0' This river has two northerly diver- gents to the mountains Sagapola and Usargala; to the K. one diver- gent to the lake Libye, the posi- tion of which lake is ... 3.5° 0' 16° 30' And to the S. one divergent to the river Daras, at two positions - - 20° 0' 17° 0' and ---.... 21° 0' 17° 0' In the Latin. . - . . 21° 0' 17° 0' aud 21° V Z° 30' NIGEIR. it should be remembered that the word (ktpotttj, translated " divergent," simply indicates the point of junction of two streams, without any reference to the course of their waters. At present, our ac- quaintance with the Quorra is too limited to iden- tify any of its divergents; and even were there data, by which to institute a comparison, the imperfection of Ptolemy's information will probably leave these particulars in obscurity. After having stated that the Geir and Nigeir are the two principal rivers of the interior, he describes the one, as yoking together (iin^evyvvav') the Garamantic Pharanx with Mt. Usargala ; and the latter, as uniting in the same way Mt. llandrus with Mt. Thala. It is plain that he considers them to be rivers beginning and ending in the interior, without any connection with the sea. If two opposite branches of a river, rising in two very distant mountains, flow to a common receptacle, the whole may be described as joining the two mountains. Of the general direction of the current of the Nigeir there can be no doubt, as the latitudes and longitudes of the towns on its banks (§§ 24 — 28) prove a general bearing of E. and W. ; and from its not being named among the rivers of the W. coast (§ 7), it must have been supposed to Qow from W. to E. The lake Libye, to which there was an E. divergent, though its position falls 300 geog. miles to the NW. of Lake Tschad, may be presumed to represent this, the principal lake of the interior; it was natural that Ptolemy, like many of the moderns, should have been misinformed as to it.s position, and communication of the river with the lake. It is now, indeed, know^l that the river does not communicate with Lake Tschad, and that it is not a river of the interior in Ptolemy's sense ; that its sources are in a veiy dilferent latitude from that which he has given; and its course varies con- siderably from the enormous extent of direction to the E., which results from his position of the towns on its banks. But recent investigations have shown that the difierence of longitude between his source of the river and the W. coast is the same as that given by modern observations, — that Thamondacaj^ta (Qafj.uv5dKai'a, § 28), one of his towns en the Nigeir, coincides with Timbuktu, as laid down by 1^1. Jomard from Caillie', — that the length of the course of the river is nearly equal to that of the Quorra, as far as the mountain of Kong, with the .addition of the Skadda or Shary oi Funda, — while Mt. Thala is very near that in which it may be supposed that the Shadda has its origin. In the imperfect state of our information upon the countries between Bornu and Darfiir, it would be hazardous to identify the lakes Chelonides and Nuba. In comparing Ptolemy's description of the central countiy between the Nile and Nigeir, there are reasons for concluding that he had acquired an obscure knowledge of it, similar to that which had reached Europe before the discoveries of Denham, Clapperton, and Lander. The other great river, the Geir or GiR (Feip, § 13), is the same as the river called Misseldd by Brovne, and Dm Teymain, in Arabic, by Burckhardt ; while the indigenous name Bjyr recalls that of Ptolemy, and which takes a genei'al course from SE. to NW. Burckhardt adds, that this country produces ebony, which agrees with what is stated by Claudian {Idyll, in Nilum, 19), w-ho, as an African, ought to be an authority, though, like an African, he con- founds all the rivers of his country with the Nile; but, in another passage {L Consul. Sfilich. i. 252), he represents the Gir as a separate river, rivaUing i
 * In the iaterior of Libya, says Plolemy, the two