Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/439

 BORYSTHENES. Near the sea its waters mingled with lliose of the Hypamis (^Boug that ia, as the historian properly explains, the two rivers fell into a small lake (cos), a terra fairly applicable to the land-locked gnlf still called' the Lake of Dnieprovskoij just as the Sea of Azov also was called a lake. The hradland between the two rivers was called the Promontory of HippolaQs ('Ixir^Xca» fticp?}), and upon it stood the temple of Uie Mother of (he Gods, and beyond the temple, on the banks of the Hypanis, the celebrated Greek colony of the Borystheneitae [Olbia]. Though not to be compared with the Nile for the benefits it conferred on the people living on its shores, Herodotns regarded the Borysthenes as surpassing, in these respects, all other rivers; for the pastures on its banks were most rich and beautiful, and the cul- tivated land most fertile; its fish were most abundant ^nd excellent; it was most sweet to drink, and its stream was clear, while the neighbouring rivers were turbid; and at its mouth there were large salting- pits, and plenty of great fish for salting. (Comp. Scymn. Fr. 66, foil., ed. Hudson, 840, foil., ed. Mei- neke; Die Chiysost. Or. zxxi. p. 75; Eusfath. ad Dion. Perieg. 311; Plin. ix. 15. s. 17.) The only tributary which Herodotus mentions is the Panti- CAPES, fidling into the Borysthenes on its eastern side (iv. 54). He considered the Gerrhus as a branch thrown off by the Borysthenes (iv. 56 ; Ger- rhus). The account of Herodotus is, as usual, closely followed by Mela (ii. 1. § 6). As to the sources of the river, Herodotns declares that neither he nor any other Greek knew where they were; and that the Nile and the Borysthenes were the only rivers whose sources were unknown; and the sources were still unknown to Strabo (ii. p. 107, vil. p. 289). Pliny says that it takes its rise among the Neuri (iv. 12. s. 26; oomp. Solin. 15; Mart. Cap. vi.; Amm. Marc. xxii. 8. § 40). Ptolemy (iiL 5. § 16) assigns to the riVer two sources; the northern- most being SW. of M. Budinns, in 52° long, and 53° laL, by which he evidently means that which is still regarded as the source of the river, and which lies among the swamps of the Akauk hills N. of Smo- Unsk : the other branch flows from the lake Ama- docas, which he places In 53° 30' long., and 50° 20' lat. Some geographers suppose that this branch was the Beresina, which, being regarded by the Greeks us the principal stream, gave its name to the whole river, in the Hellenized form Bopv(r64yris ; but this view can hardly be reconciled with the relative positions as laiddown by Ptolemy, unless there be an error in the numbers. The statement of Herodotus, that the river was navigable for 40 days' sail from its mouth, is re- peated by Scymnus of Chios and other late writers (Scymn. Fr. 70, ed. Hudson, 843, ed. Meineke; Anon. Peripl. Pont. p. 8) ; but Strabo makes its navigable course only 600 stadia, or 60 geographical miles (vii. p. 306). The discrepancy may be par- tially removed by supposing the former statement to refer to the whole navigation of the river, which ex- tends from SmoUmk to the mouth, with an inter- ruption caused by a series of thirteen cataracts near Kidaekj below Kieff; and the latter to the unin- terrupted navigation below these cataracts; but still the difficulty remains, that the space last mentioned is 260 miles long; nor does it seem likely that He> xodotos was acquainted with the river above the cataracts. The month of the river is placed by Strabo at the ^. extremity of the Euxine, on Uic some meridian BOSPORUS CIMMERIUS. 421 with Byzantium, at a distance of 3800 stadia fixun that city, and 5000 stadia from the Hellespont: op- posite to the mouth is an island with a harbour (Strab. i. p. 63, ii. pp. 71, 107, 125, vii. 289, 306). Pliny gives 120 M. P. as the distance between its mouth and that of the Tyrns (^Dniester)^ and mentions the lake into which it falls (iv. 12. s. 26; see above). Ptolemy places its mouths, in the plural, in 57° 30' long, and 48° 30' hit. (iii. 5. § 6). He also gives a list of the towns on its banks (§ 28). Dionysius Periegetes (311) states that the river falls into the Euxine in front of the promontory of Criu-Metopon, and (542) that the island of Leuce lay opposite to its mouth. [Lruce.] In addition to the statements of Herodotus re- specting the virtues of the river,- the later writers tell us that its banks were well wooded (Dio Chry- sost. /. c. ; Amm. Marc. /. c); and that it was remarkable for the blue colour which it assumed in the summer, and for the lightness of its water, which floated on the top of the water of the Hypanis, except when the wind was S., and then the Hypanis was uppennost (Ath. ii. p. 42 ; Aristot. ProhL xxiii. 9; Plin. xxxi. 5. s. 31.) The later writers call it by the name of Danapris, and sometimes confound it with the Ister (Anon. Per. PonL Eux. pp. 148, 150, 151, 166; Gronov. pp. 7, 8, 9, 16, Hudson): indeed they make a con- fusion among all the rivers from the Danube to the TanaTs, which proves that their knowledge of the N. shore of the Euxine was inferior to that pos- sessed in the classical period. (Ukert, Gtogr. vol. iii. p. 191.) A few minor particulars may be found in the following writers (Marcian. Herac. p. 55; Priscion. Perieg. 304, 558; Avien. Dtseript. Orb. 721). Respecting the town of the same name, and the people Borystheneitae, see Oldia. [P. S.] BOSARA (B(^apa)^ a town of the Sachalitae (Ptol. vi. 7), at the south»«ast of Arabia, near the Didymi Montes. [See Ba3A.] Forstor finds it in Maeora^ a little to the south.of Ras-el-Hoit (Arabia^ voLii. p.182.) [G.W.] BO'SPORUS CIMME'RIUS (B6<nropos Kififil- pioff Herod. iv. 12, 100; KifAfi(puc65y Strab.; Polyb.: Strait of Yeni Kale)^ the narrow passage connecting the Palus Maeotis with the Euxine. The Cimme- rians, to whom it owes its name (Strab. vii. p. 309, xi. p. 494), are described in the Odyssey (xi. 14) as dwelling beyond the ocean-stream, immersed in dark- ness, and unblest by the rays of Helios. This people, belonging portly to legend, and partly to his- tory, seem to have been the chief occupants of the Tauric Chersonese {Crimea)^ and of the territory between that peninsula and the river Tyias (Dmes- ter when the Greeks settled on these coasts in the 7th century b. c. (Grote, Hist, of Greece, voL iii. p. 313.) The length of the strait was estimated at 60 stadia (Polyb. iv. 39), and its breadth varied from 30 (Polyb. I. c.) to 70 stadia. (Strab. p. 310.) An inscription discovered on a marble column states sea on the ice, and that the distance from Tmtttarat' can^Taman) to Kerttch was 9,384 fathoms. (Jones, TraveUf vol. ii. p. 197.) The greater part of the channel is lined with sand-banks, and is shallow, as it was in the days of Polybius, and as it may always be expected to remain, from the crookedness of the passage, which pix'vents the fair rush of the stiram from the N., and favours the sccnmulation of de- posit. But the soundings deepen as the passitgo K E 3
 * that in the year 1068, Prince Gleb measured the