Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/475

 OASES. charieh, is the nearest of these desert-islands to the frontiers of Aegvpt, and nearly due N. from Oasis Magna. It lies in hit. 28°, a little below the parallel of the city Hermopolis in Middle Aegypt. There is a road to it from Fyoum, and its principal village is named Zabou. The soil is favourable to fruit; but there are no traces of its permanent occupation either by the Aegyptians or the Persians ; and its earliest monuments are a Koman triumphal arch, and the ruins of an aqueduct and hypogaea, containing sar- cophagi. In this Oasis was made the discovery of some ancient artesian wells. The description of the wonders of the Oases by an historian of the fifth century a. d. (Olympiudor. ap. Phot. Bib. p. 61, ed. Bekker) leaves no doubt of the existence of such artificial springs; but as their con- struction was unknown to the Greeks and Romans no less than to the Aegyptians, the secret of it was probably imported from the East, like the silkworm, at some period anterior to A. D. 400. Several of these wells have recently been discovered and reopened (Kussegger, lieisen, vol. ii. pp. 284, 399); and the deptb disclosed does not materially differ from that mentioned by Olympiodorus {supra'), viz., from 200 to .500 cubits. This far exceeds the bore of an ordinary well ; and the spontaneous rise of the water in a rushing stream shows that no pump, siphon, or machinery was employed in raising it to the surface. In this Oasis, also, alum abounds. (Kenrick, Aric. Egypt, vol. i. p. 74.) 5. Oasis Magna ('Gains fj.(ya.K7t, Ptol. iv. 5. § 27 ; V T^fiiiTr], Strab. xvii. p. 813; t] avai, Olympiod. ap. Phot. Bibl. p. 212, ed. Bekker), the Great Oasis, sometimes denou)inated the Oasis of Thebes, as its centre lies nearly opposite to that city, is called El- Khargch by the Arabs, from the name of its prin- cipal town. This, also, is the ttoAis 'Oocris and vrfdos jjiaKupoiv of Herodotus (iii. 26), and is meant when the Oases are spoken of indiscriminately, as by Joseplius (c. Apion. ii. 3). In the hieroglyphics its name is Heb, and in the Notitia Imperii Orient. (c. 143) its capital is termed Hibe. The Oasis Magna is distant about 6 days' journey from Thebes, and 7 from Abydos, being about 90 miles from the western bank of the Nile. It is 80 miles in length, and from 8 to 10 broad, stretching from the lat. of Tentyra, 25° N., to the lat. of Abydos, 26° 6' N. Anciently, indeed, owing to more extensive and regular irrigation, the cultivable land reached further N. The high calcareous ridge, which separates it fiom the Lesser Oasis, here be- comes precipitous, and girds the Oasis with a steep wall of rock, at the base of which the acacia of Egypt and the dhoum palm form thick woods. The Great Oasis must have received a Greek colony at an early period, since Herodotus (iii. 26) says that the "city Oasis" was occupied by Samians of the Aeschrionian tribe, who had probably settled there in consequence of their alliance with the Greek c-lonists of Gyrene (Id. iv. 152). Yet none of its numerous monuments reach back to the Pharaonic era. It was garrisoned by the Persians; for the names of Dareius and Amyrtaeus are inscribed on its ruins (Wilkinson, Mod. Egypt and Thebes, vol. ii. p. 367); but the principal buildings which re- main belong to the Macedonian, if not indeed to the Koniuu era. Its great temple, 468 feet in length, was dedicated to Amun-Ka. The style of its archi- tecture resembles that of the temples at Hermonthis and Apollinopolis Magna. Like other similar spots in the Libyan Desert, the Great Oasis was a place of OBRINGA. 459 banishment for political offenders (Dig. xlviii. tit. 22. 1. 7. § 4), and for Christian fugitives from the Pagan emperors. (Socrat. ii. 28.) At a later period it abounded with monasteries and churches. The Greater and the Lesser Oasis were reckoned as forming together a single noma, but by the Ro- man emperors were annexed to the prefecture of the Thebaid. (Phn. v. 9. s. 9, duo Oasitae; Ptoh iv. 5. § 6, oTs f6/xois Trpocrypd'pouTat at Svo OaaTrai ■ see Hoskins, Visit to the Great Oasis ; Lansles ^ Mem. sur les Oasis; Kitter, Erdkimde, vol. . p 964.) [W. B. D ] OAXES, OAXUS. [Axus.] OBILA ('QgiAa, Ptol. ii. 5. § 9), a town of the Vettones in Hispania Tarraconensis, the site of which it is difficult to determine, but it is supposed to be the modern Avila. (Hieron. de Vir. III. c. 121, and Fiorez, Esp. S. xiv. 3, ap. Ukert, vol. ii. pt. 1. p. 431.) Reichard, however, identifes it with OUva. [T. H. D.l OBILAE. [Marmaeica.] OBLIMUM, a place in Gallia Narbonensis, writ- ten Obilonna in the Table, on a road which passes through the Tarenlaise to the pass of the Alpis Graia, or Little St. Bernard. The site is uncertain, but the distance is n;arked iii. from Ad Publi- canos. [PuBLicANOs, Ad.] [G. L.] OBLIVIONIS FLUMEN, called also Limius, Liniias, Limaea, &c. [G.m.i^vecia, Vol. I. p. 933.] O'BOOA ('QgoKct, Ptol. ii. 2. §8), a river on the V. coast of Ireland, now the Boyne. [T. H. D.] OBKIMAS, a river of Plnygia, an eastern tribu- tary of the Maeander, had its sources, according to Livy (xxxviii. 15), on the eastern side of Jlount Cadmus, near the town of Asporidos, and fluwed in the neighbourhood of Apamea Cibotus (Plin. v. 29.) This is all the direct information we possess about it ; but from Livy's account of the expedition of Manlius, who had pitched his camp there, when he was visited by Seleucus from Apamea, we may srather some further particulars, which enable us to identify the Obrimas with the Sandulcli Chai. Manlius had marched direct from Sagalassus, and must have led his army through the plains of Dombai, passing in the rear of Apamea. Thus Seleucus would easily hear of the consul being in his neighbourhood, and, in his desire to propitiate him, would have started after him and overtaken him the next day (postero die.) ilanlins, moreover, at the sources of the Obrimas required guides, because he found himself hemmed in by mountains and unable to find his way to the plain of Metropolis. All this agrees perfectly well with the supposition that the ancient Obrimas is the modern Sandukli Chai (Yi.a.mci. Researches, ii. p. 172, &c.). Franz (Fiiii/ Inschriften, p. 37), on the other hand, supposes the Kodsha Chai to correspond with the Obrimas. Arundel! {Discov. in Asia Min. i. p. 231), again, believes that Livy has confounded the sources of the Marsyas and Maeander with those of the Obrimas. [L. S.] OBKINGA ('0§p(7«as)- Ptolemy (ii. 10. § 17) makes the Obringas river the boundary between Lower and Upper Germania. The most southern place in Lower Germania according to his map is Moguntiacum (Mokovtio/ci^j'), Mainz. He places in the following order the cities of Upper Germania, which are south of the Obringas: — Noeoinagus {Speier), Borbetomagus ( Worms), Argentoratum (Slrassbvrg), and so on. But Worms is north of Speier; and the relative position of these two places is therefore wrong in Ptolemy. He has also placed