Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/404

 386 BELENDL BELENDI, a people of Aqoitania, mentioned by Pliny (iv. 19), whose name appears to bo pre- serred in that of Belmf a small place in the Landetf between Bordeaux and Bojfotme, The place is called Belinum in some old docaments, and the pas- sage of the river Pons Belini. Belm is on the small river Leyrtf in the department of Les Landes, which runs through tha dreary Landes into the Bastin dArceichon. [G. L.] BELE'RIUM, the Land's End, in Britain. Bele. nam is the form in Diodorus Siculus (v. 21). Ptolemy (ii. 3. § 3) has Boleriom ; specially stat- ing that Bolerium and Antivestaeum were synony- mous. [R. 6. L.] BELGAE. Caesar (B. G.ll) makes the Belgae, by which he means the country of the Belgae, one of the great divisions of Gallia. The Belgae were se- parated from their southern neighbours the Celtae by the Seme and the Mame (Matrooa), a branch of the Seine. Their boundary on the west was the Ocean; on the east and north the lower course of the Rhine. Caesar's Gallia extends as fiur as the outlets of the Rhine {B. G. iv. 10), and includes the Insula Batavorum [Batavobuh Ikmtla] ; but there is a debated pmnt or two about the outlets of the Rhine, which is better discussed elsewhere [Rhbmus]. Caesar does not fix the boundary of the Belgae between the source of the Mame and the Rhine; but as the Lingones and the Sequani seem to be the most northern of the Celtae in these parts, the boundary may have run from the source di the Mame along the Cote dOr and the FaucUlet to tha VoageM (Vosegua Mons); and the Voeegua was the boundary from the north bank of the Doubs (Dubis) to its termination in the angle formed by the jxmc- ture of the Nahe and the Rhine, near Bingen, with this exception that the Mediomatrid extended to the Rhine (J3. G. iv. 10). The people on the east of the Vosges were Germans, Yangiones, Neme- tes, Tribocd, who occupied the plain of Alsace, and perhaps somewhat more. (TaciL German. 28.) These three tribes, or a part o( each, were in the army of Arioristns. (Caes. B. G. L 51.) As to the Tribocd at least, their position on the left bank of the Rhine in Caesar's time, is certaiiL {B, G. iv. 10). Strabo (p. 194) speaks of them as having croased the Rhine into GaUia, without mentioning the time of this passage. The Nemetes and Vangiones may have settled west of the Rhine aAer Caesar's time, and this supposition agrees with Caesar's text, who does not mention them in B. G. iv. 12, which he should have done, if th^ had then been on the Gallic side of the Rhine. Caesar's military qwrations in Gallia did not extend to any part oi the country between the Moeel and the Rhine. The battle in which he defeated Ariovistns was probably fought in the plain of Alsace, north of Bftle; but Caesar certainly advanced no fdrther north in that direction, for it was unnecessary: he finished this German war by driving the Germans into the Rhine. Caesar gives to a part of the whole country, winch he caUs the country of the Belgae, the name of Bd- gium (JB. G. y. 12, 24, 85); a term which he might lorm after the fitthion of the Roman names, Latium and Samnium. But the reading " Belgio " is some- what uncertain, for the final o and the s may easily have been confounded in the MSS.; and though the MS& are in favour of ** Belgio " in v. 12, 25, they are in &vour of '* Belgis " in v. 24. The form " Belgio" occurs also in Hirtius (B. G. viu. 46, 49, 64), in the common texts. The form " Belgium," BELGAE. which would deddc the matter, does not occur m the Gallic war. But whether Belgium is a genuine fomi or not, Caesar uses dther Bielgium or Belgae, in a limited sense, as well as in the general sense of a third part of Gallia. For in v. 24, where he is de- scribing the podtion of his troops during the winter of the year b. a 54 — 53, he speaks of three legions bdng quartered in Belgium or among the Belgse, while be mentions others as quartered among the Morini, the Mervii, the Easui, tiie Remi, the Treviri, and the Eburones, all of whom are Belgae, in tlie wider sense of the term. The part designated by the term Bdgiuro or Belgae in v. 24, is the country of the Bdlovad (v. 46). In Hirtius (viii. 46, 47) the town of Nemetocenna (Arras), the chief place of the Atrebates, is placed in Belgium. The position of the Ambiani, between the Bellovad and the Atre- bates, would lead to a probable conclusion that the Ambiani were Bdgae; and this is confirmed by a comparison with v. 24, for Caesar placed three legions in Belgium, under three commanders ; and though he only mentions the place of one of them as bdng among the Bdlovaci, we may condude what was the posi- tion of the other two feoai the names of the Ambiani and Atrebates being omitted in the enumeration in V. 24. There waa, then, a people, or three peoples, spedally named Belgae, whom Caesar places between the Oise axul the upper basin of the SchMe, in the old French provinces of Picardie and Artois. We might be inclined to condder the Caleti as Bdgae» firom their podtion between the three Belgic peoplea and the sea; and some geogiaphers 8u]^rt this cob- dudon by a passage in Hirtius (viii. 6), but this passage would also make us conclude that the Au- lerd were Bdgae, and that would be false. In B. G. u. 4, Caesar enumerates the principal peoples in. the country of the Belgae in its wider sense, which, beddes those above enumerated, were: the Suesdones, who bordered on the Remi; the Me- napii in the north, on the lower Macu^ and bordering; on the Morini on the south and the Batavi on the north ; the CaleU, at the mouth of the Seine; the Ve- locasses on the Seine^ in the Vexin; the VeroBoandui, north of the Suesdones, in Vermandois, and the Aduatud on the Maas, and probably about the con- fluence of the Afaas sad. Sombre. The Condrud^ Eburtmes, Caeraed, and PBemani, who are also men- tioned in B. G. iL 4, were called by the genenU name of Gormani. They were all in the basin of the Maas, extending from Tongem, southwards, but chiefly on the east side of the Maasf and the Eburones ex- tended to the Rhine. The Aduatud were said to be Teutones and Cimbri (J3. (?. ii. 29.) Besides these peoples, there are mentioned by Caesar {B. G. ▼. 5) the Meldi, who are not the Meldi on the Seine, but near Bruges, or thereabouts; and the Batavi, in the Insula Batavorum. [Batavorum Insula.] The Segni, mentioned in B. G. vi. 32 with the Condrud, were probably Germans, and d- tuated in Namur. The Ambivareti {B. G. iv. 9, vii. 90) are of doubtM podtion. The Mediomatrid, south of the Treviri, were included in Caesar's Bdgae ; and also the Lend, south oS the MediamatricL The Paridi, on the Seine, were Cdtae. These are the peoples included in Caesar's Belgae, except some few, such as those mentioned in B. G. v. 89, of whom we know nothing. This division of Gallia comprehends part of the badn of the Seine, the badn of the Somme, of the Schelde, and of the Maas; and the basin of the Mosel^ which bdong9 to the basin of the Rhine. U