Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 1.djvu/441

 bosp6rus thracius. ii. 1. § 2.) Before this it had been called Tl6pos Op^icios. (Apollod. I, c.) Afterwards the natives (rare it the name of Mvfftos B6anopos, (Dionjs. ap, Strab. xiL p. 566.) Finall/ the epithet Sp4icios came into use. (Strab. L c; Herod, iv. 83 ; Eustath. ad Diom^, Perieg. 140.) Sometimes rb aT6fm rod ndrrov. (Xenoph.; Strab.; Poljb.) So also the Latin writers Os Ponticum (Tac. Ann. ii. 54), Os Poiiti (Gic. Verr. ii. 4, 58), and Ostium Ponti (Gic Tvge. L 20> Pomponius Mela (L 19. § 5) calls it " canalis," and divides it into the strait " faaces " and the month ^ os." Its modem name is the Channel of Constanimople^ in Turkish Boghas, IL Phytieal Features. — The origin of the Thra- cian Bosporus has attracted attention from the earliest times; among the ancients the commonly received opnion was, that the Euxine had been originallj separated from the Mediterranean, and that this chumel, as well as that of the Hellespont,, had been made by some violent efibrt of nature, or by the so-called deluge of Deucalion. (Diod. v. 47 ; Plin. vi 1 ; c<xnp. Arist« Meteorolog. L 14, 24.) The gedogical appearances, which imply volcanic action, confirm this cnrrent tradition. Clarke {Tra- veU, vol. ii.) and Androesy ( Vogcige h VEmbouchure de la Mer Noire, ou Essai sur le Boiphore) have noticed the igneous diaracter of the rocks on either side of the channeL Strickland {Geol. Traiu. 2nd series, vol. v. p. 386), in his paper on the geo- Itigy of this district, states that these pyrogenous rocks, consisting of trachyte and trachytic oonglome" rate, protrude through beds of slate and limestone, which, from the fossils they contain, he assigns to the Silurian system. The prevailing colour of these rocks is greenish, owing to the presence of copper, which gave the name of Gyaneae to the weather- beaten rocks of the Symplegades. (Daubeny, Vol- canot, p. 335.) This channel forms, in its windings, a chain of seven lakes. According to the law of all atuaries, these seven windings are indicated by seven promontories, fanning as many corresponding bays OD the opposite coast; the projections on the one shore being similar to the indentations on the other. Seven currents, in different directions, follow the windings of the coast. Each has a counter current, and the water, driven with violence into the separate bays, flows upward in an opposite direction in the other half of the channel. Tiiis phenomenon has been noticed by Pdybius (iv.43); he describes " the current as first striking against the promontory of Hennaenm. From thence it is deflected and forced against the opposite side of Asia, and thence in like manner back again to that of Europe, at the Hes- tiaean promontory, and from thence to Bous, and finally to the point of Byzantium. At this point, a small part of the stream enters the Horn or Port, while the rest or greater part flows away towards Chalcedon." Rennel (Comp. Geog. yo.u. p. 404), in his discussion upon the harbour current of Con stantinople, remarks that it is probable Pdybins was not altogether accurate in his descripticm of the in- dented motions of the stream, or where he says that the outer current flows toward Chalcedon. The stream in a crooked passage is not (as Polybius supposes) bandied about from one point to another, but is rather thrown oflf fipom (me bay to the bay on the opposite side, by the agency of the intermediate point. Herodotus (iv. 85) makes the length of the Bos- porus to be 120 stadia, but does not state where it begins or ends. Polybius (iv. 39) assigns to it the BOSPORUS THRACIUS. 423 same lengUi; this seems to have been the general computation, the measurement being made from the New Castles to as far as the town of Chalcedon. (Milman's Gibbon, vol. iii. p. 5 ; comp. Menippus, ap. Steph, B. ». v. XaXieffiew.) The real length appeans to be about 17 miles. The breadth is va- riously estimated by different writers. Strabo (ii. p. 125; comp. vii. p. 319) seems to say the narrow- est part is 4 stadia broad, and Herodotus (I. c ) makes the width the same at the entrance into the Euzine. But Polybius (iv. 43) says the narrowest part is about the Hermaoan promontory, somewhere midway between the two extremities, and computes the breadth at not leas than 5 stadia. Pliny (iv. 24) says that at the spot where Dareius joined the bridge the distance was 500 paces. Chesney {Ea- ped. Euphrat, voL i. p. 326) makes out the width at the narrowest point, between Rumili-HUdr and AnaddU-Hiadr, to be about 600 yards. Further onwards the channel varies in breadth, from 600 or 700 yards to about 1000 yards, and at the gate of the Seraglio it extends as far as 1640 yards. The two great continents, though so slightly removed from one another, are not, it seems, as Phny (vi. 1) states, quite within the range of the human voice, nor can the singing of the buds on one coast, nor the barking of dogs on the other, be heaid. With r^aid to the well-known theory of Polybius as to the choking up of the Black Sea (Euxeinus), it may be observ^, that the soundings which have been made in this strait show a great depth of water. {Joum. Geog. Soc. vol. i. p. 107.) UL Hiitory and AtOiquUie*, — The pressuig for • ward by the Hellenic race towards the east about twelve centuries before our aera, when regarded as an historical event, is called the Expedition of the Argonauts to Colchis. According to Humboldt {Cornioa, vol. ii. p. 140, Eng. trans.), the actual reality, which in this narration is clothed in a my- thical garby or mingled with ideal features to which the minds of the narrators gave birth, was the ful- filment of a national deaure to open the inhospitable Euxine. In accordance with this, the names of many of the places of the two opposite coasts bear evidence to their supposed connection with this period of Grecian adventure, while the crowd of temples and votive altars which were scattered in such lavish profusion upon the richly wooded banks of the strait dbplayed the enterprise or the fSears of the later mariners who ventured on the traces of the Argo- nauts. The Bosporus has been minutely described by Dionysius of Byzantium, the author of an ivd- irov5 Bo€nr6poVy about A. D. 190 (Hudson, G^. Minor, vol. iii.), and by P. Gylllus, a French tra- veller of the 16th century (Gronovii Thesawrus, vol vi. p. 3086), Toumefort ( Voyage au Levant, Lettre XV.), and Von Hammer (^Conatantinopel und die Bo$porm). A. The European CoatL 1. AiAKTEiox {Funduldu), an altar erected to Ajax, son of Telamon, and the temple of Ptolemaens Philadelphus, to whom the Byzantines paid divine honours. (Dionys. B.) 2. Petra Thbrmastis {Beschiktasche or Cradle Stone), a rock dUstinguished for its form ; the road- stead near this rock was formerly called Pkktecori- cox, or Anchorage of the Fifiy-oared Ships. Not far from this was the Jasonium, called by the later Greeks Diplokion, or double column, and the laurel grove. (Comp. Steph. B. s. v. Aa^i^.) E E 4