Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography Volume I Part 2.djvu/207

 948 GALLIA TBAKS. fMi6«), which has its soarce in the coontry of the Celti and at the city Pjrene, in its conrse divides Europe into two equal parts/' and ** that the Celti are out of the Pillars of Hercules, and that they border on the Cyne»i, who are the remotest inhabitants of Europe to the west," it is clear that he was entirely ignorant of the geography of Northern and Western Europe. Nor does he mend the matter when he says, in another place (iv, 49), that the *' Istrus flows through the whole of Europe, rising in the country of the Celti, the remotest people towards the setting of the sun, after the Cynetes, that dwell in Europe." It is the uniyersal practice of all who write and speak of distant places of which they know nothing, to suppose them indefinitely removed from the writer or speaker, but near to one another. Ignorance makes all the unknown meet in a point of indeterminate posiUon. Even when we come to the time when Gallia was protty well known to the Greeks and Romans, there is a great deal that is erroneous m their geographical notions which it would take many words to correct. A great part of our labour in comparative geography consists in determining what are the countries, mountains, rivers, and phioes which they designated by certain names: but if we attempt to correct all the erroneous notions which they attached to such names, we shall under- take akbour of infinite extent; nor shall we be able to correct it onnpletely, for geographical knowledge always admits of improvement. With their imper- fect means and imperfect maps, the Greeks and Ro- mans were not bad geographers. They were often better than many modem historical writers, who have much superior means at their command. The chief ancient authorities for Gallia are few. They are: Caesar^s Gallic War; Strabo (lib. iv.), who used Caesar, but got much from Posidonius, who had travelled in Gallia; MeU (ii.7,andiii. 2); ^ Pliny (iii..4, and iv. 17 — 19)H.and Ptolemy who made a map of Gallia, not very^rrect. His parti- cular merit, as D*AnviIle obseiTes, condsts in having assigned a chief town, and sometimes two, to each people; for without his a&sistanoe we should be less accurately acquainted with the names of the ca]»tals, since in the period after Ptolemy the original names of the chief cities were replaced by those (^ the se- veral peoples of which they were the capitals. Thus, Caesarodunum, the chief town of the Turones, be- came Turones {Tows) ; Avaricum, the chief town of the Bituriges, became Bituriges {Bourffet) ; and Andematunum, the chief town of the Lingones, be- came Lingones {Lathes). From the historians we obtain incidental informa- tion — from Polybius, Tacitus, Appian, Dion Caasius, and some little on the later period from Ammianus Maroellinus; something also from Ausonius, Sidonius ApoUinaris, and the description of the Mediterranean coast called that of Festus Avienus. Something is got from the Notitia Imperii for the later period. But the most valuable information is obtained from the Roman Itineraries. The Itinerary named that of Antoninus, and the Table generally named the Theodosian, extend to all parts of Gallia. There is also a route very pMrticularly described in the Itine> rary from Bnrdigala (^Bordeaugf) to Jerusalem, which runs through the southern parts of Gallia to the Alps. The Roman remains in Chillia are very numerous, particularly in the Provincia or the basin of the Lower Rhone, and they often give information which we find in no writers. The French have a very lai^ge number of valuable works on the history and GALLU TRANS. Roman antiquities of theur coontiy; and tbej tinue to add to them. The first description of Gallia that we have, b bj the man who conquered it, the Roman proeonsnl Caesar. His description is brief, after hb Cadikxi. It is founded chiefly on his own observatioD; bat for the parts of Gallia, Germania, and Britannia of which he knew nothing, we may infer that be in- quired of the *' mercatores " or bold traders who car- ried their wares among barbarous tribes, though hia good sense would make him nse thor infonnatko cautiously. He also used the Greek writers, and particuUirly the geographer Eratosthenes, as we see from his own words (jB. G, vi. 24). An instance will show that the knowledge of these fceognjhen was not very exact. Hipparehus (Strab. pp. 106, 115), who lived in the second centurj bdrora ths Christian aera, placed Massilta {MarseUle) and By- zantium in the same parallel; and he did this on the authority of Pytheas of Massilia, who says that the proportion of the gnomon to its shadow is the same in both places. We see, from this and other passages, that the Greeks of Massilia were the au- thorities for the earlier knowledge of Gallia. Stzabs disputes the accuracy of this statement, and proves, in his way, that Byzantium is much farther iiortli than Massilia. But Strabo also was mistaken, Car Byzantium is about 41° N. lat and Massilia is north of 43°. Hipparehus also supposed C«ltace to ex- tend so &r north that the sun never set at the sum- mer soktice; a great mistake (Strab. pu 75), whidli is corrected by Strabo. Caesar (B, G, iv. 10) fixes the norihem limit of Gallia at the outlets of the Rbenus. It is useful to examine the boundary of this ex- tensive country, as the inquiry will show the nature of the mistakes which the ancient geographers made. They used to determine their htitudes with toke- rable accuracy by ascertaining the length of the longest day at various places, which they measured (Strab. p. 133; Ptol.) by the hours of the equinox, when the night and day are equaL Their methods for the longitude were of course very rude, and here they fail. The part of Gallia that they were best acquainted with was the coast of the Mediterranean. We do not know the earliest boundary between the SE. part of Gallia and I^guria; nor can we suppose that there was one. The boundary in the time of Augustus between Gallia and Italia was the river Varus {Var), The boundary at the eastern ex- tremity of the Pyrenees was the Fromontorium Py- renaeum, or Cap CrmiXf which projects into the sea south of Portus Veneris {Pari Vaidre). The most southern Gallic town along the eastern pass of the Pyrenees, in the country of the Sardones, was Cervaria. [Cervaria.] From the month of tiw Var to the delta of the Rhone the coast of GaHia presents an irregular convex outline to the Mediter- ranean. The interior is a hilly country, which ex- tends to Massilia. Between Massilia and Naf1x», which Strabo (p. 106) knew to be in nearly the same latitude, the coast forms a bay called GalUcos Sinus or MaKalioticus. Strabo considered this bay to be divided into two bays by the hill Setion (a ne^ cessary correction <rf' the false reading Siyier), whidi term comprehends also the island Blascon. [Blas- co:i.] The coast fratn the mouth of the Rhone to the country at the foot of the Pyrenees is flat The whole length of this coast from the Var to Cap Creux is about 500 English miles; and it was wdl known to the ancient geographers. . ^