Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume II.djvu/987

 SERENA, to Dacia Inferior, and made its capital. (Theodoret. Eist. Eccl. ii. 4.) It lay in a fruitful plain, at the spot where the sources of the Oescus united, and on the hicfh-ro^d from Naissus to Philippopolis, be- tween Meldia and Burburaca. (^Itin. Ant. p. 135; Itin. Hlerosol. p. 567.) From the time of Aurelian it bore on its coins the surname of Ulpia; probably because, when Dacia was relinquished, the name of tliat Dacian town was transferred to it, and its in- habitants, perhaps, located there. The emperor Maxiniian was born in its neighbourhood. (Eutrop. ix. 14, 22.) It was destroyed by Attila (Priscus, de Legal, p. 49), but shortly afterwards restored. In the middle ages it occurs under the name of Triad- itza (Tpia5iTfa,Niceph. Chron. Ann. Is. Angeli, iii. p. 214; Aposp. Gengr. in Hudson, iv. p. 43), which was perhaps its original Thracian appellation, and which is still retained in the dialect of the inhabitants. (See Wesseling, ad Itin. Ant. I. c.) Its extensive niins lie to the S. of Sophia. (Comp. Procop. de Aed. iv. I. p. 267, 4. p. 282 ; Hierocl. p. 654 ; Amm. Marc. xxxi. 16; Gruter, Inscr. p. 540. 2; Orelli, nos. 3548, 5013.) The Geogr. Rav. (iv. 7) incor- rectly writes the name Sertica, since it was derived from the Thracian tribe of the Serdi. It is called by Athanasius (ApoL contra Arianos, p. 154) SapSiii/ t:6is. [T. H. D.] SERE'NA, a town in Lower Pannonia, on the south bank of the Danube, on the road from Poeto- vium to Mursa. (/<. Ilieros. p. 562 ; Geog. Rav. iv. 1 9, where it is called Serenis ; Tab. Petit., where its na-ne is Serona.) It is thought to have occupied the site of the modern Moszlavina. [L. S.] SERES. [Serica.] SERE'TIUM {S.^periov, Dion Cass. Ivi. 12), a fortified town of Dalmatia, which with Rhaetimus was captured by Germanicus in the campaign of A.D. 7. [E. B.J.] SERGU'NTIA {-ZepyovvTia, Strab. iii. p. 162), a small town of the Arevaci on the Durius, in Hispania Tarraconensis. Ukert (ii.pt.i. p. 455) takes it to have been the 'ZapyavQa of Stephanus B. (s.v.) [T.H. D.] SE'RIA (2e>a, Ptol. ii. 4. § 12), a town of the Turdetani in Hispania Baetica, with the surname of Fama Julia. (Plin. iii. 1. s. 3.) It lay E. of the mouth of the Anas, and N. of the Baetis. [T.H.D.] SERIA'NE, a city of Syria mentioned in the Itinerary of Antoninus as xviii. II. P. distant from Androna, which was xxvii. M.P. from Calcis, cxxxviii. M.P. from Dolicha, now Doluc. (Itin. Ant. ■p'p. 194, 195.) Mannert thinks that it corresponds in situation with the Chalybon (XoAi/Soij') of Ptolemy (v. 15. § 17), which gave its name to a district of Syria Chalybonitis. It is certainly identical with the modern StVia, 2 long days SE. oi Aleppo, in the desert, the ruins of which were discovered and de- scribed by Pietro della Valle. (Mannert, Geographie, part vi. vol. i. p. 411.) [G. W.] SE'RICA (v •S.-t)pM7), Ptol. vi. 16. §§ 1, 3 4, 6, vii. 2. § 1, 3. § 1,5.§ l,viii. 24. §§ 1,5, 27. §2. &c.), a tract of countiy in the E. part of Asia, in- habited by the people called Seres. According to the description of Ptolemy, it was bounded on the W. by Scythia extra Imaum, on the NE. by an un- known land, on the E. by the Sinae, and on the S. by India. Pliny on the contrary (vi. 13. s. 15) seems to extend it on the E. as far as the coast of Asia, as he mentions an Oceanus Serious, and in another place (TJ. 1 7. s. 20) speaks of a promontory and bay. Modern opinions vary respecting its site; but SERICA. 967 the best geographers, as Rennell, D'Anvllle, and Heeren, concur in placing it at the NW. angle of the present empire of China. (See Yates, Tex- trinura Antiq. p. 232, note). The name of t^erica, as a country, was not known before the first century of our era, though there are earlier aecoutits of the people called Seres. It seems highly improbable, however, that they were known to Hecataeus, and the passage on which that assumption is founded occurs only in one MS. of Photius. They are first mentioned by Ctesias (p. 371, n. 22, ed. Biilir) ; but according to Mela (iii. 7) they were in his time known to all the world by means of their commerce. On the nothern borders of their territories were the more eastern skirts of the mountains Annibi and Auxacii (the Altai), which stretched as far as here from Scythia. In the interior of the country were the Montes Asmiraei, the western partof the l)a-Uri chain; and towards the southern borders the Casii Montes (now Khara, in the desert of Gobi), together with a southern branch called Thagurus, which trended towards the river Bautisus (Hoang-ho.) On the farther side of that river lay the Ottorocorras, the most eastern branch of the Emodi mountains, called by Ptolemy (vi. 16. § 5) to. ^.-rjpiKa. opt}. Among the rivers of the country, the same author (/6. § 3) names, in its northern part, the Oechardes (probably the Selenga), and, in tiie S., the Bautes or Bautisus (^Hoang-ho), which flowed towards the land of the Sinae. Pliny, however (I. c), mentions several other rivers, which seem to have been coast ones, as the Psitaras, Cainbari, Lanos, and Atianos, as well as the promontory of Chryse and tlie bay of Cyrnaba. Serica enjoyed a serene and excellent climate, and possessed an abundance of cattle, trees, and fruits of all kinds (Amm. Marc, xxxiii. 6. § 64; Plin. I. c). Its chief product, however, was silk, with which the inhabitants carried on a very profitable and most extensive commerce (Stiab. xv p. 693 ; Arist. Bist. Kat. v. 1 9 ; Virg. Georg. ii. 121; Plin. and Amm. II. cc. &c.). Pliny records (xi. 22. s. 26), that a Greek woman of Cos, named Pam- phila, first invented the expedient of splitting these substantial silken stuffs, and of manufacturing those very fine and veil-like dresses which became so cele- brated under the name of Coae vestes. Both Serica and its inhabitants are thought to have derived tiieir name from their staple product, since, as we le:irn from Hesychius (s. v. SJipes), the insect, from the web of which the brilliant stuff called holosericon was prepared, was named Ser (Stjp). (Comp. Klaproth, Sur les Nonis de la Chine in the Mem. rel. a I'Asie, iii. p. 264; and Tableaux Hist, de I'Asie, jip. 57 and 68.) It has been doubted, however, from tiie appa- rent improbability that any people should call them- selves Seres, or silkworms, whether the name of Seres was ever really borne by any nation; and it has been conjectured that it was merely a mercantile appella- tion by which the natives of the silk district were known. (Latham, in Class. Mus. vol. iii. p. 43, .seq.) Lassen (/jwZ. Alt. i. p. 321) has produced from the Mahabharata, ii. 50, as the real names of the Seres, those of Caka, Tukhara, and Kanka, who are re- presented as bringing just the same goods to market as are ascribed by Pliny (xxxiv. 14. s. 41) to the Seres, namely, wool, skins, and silk. Yet, though it may be allowed to be iirpmbable that a peojile .should have called themselves " Silkworms," yet it seems hardly less so that such an appellation should have been given them by foreigners, and that they should have been known by it and no other for a* 3 g 4