Page:EB1911 - Volume 26.djvu/762

Rh as the Persian period: the Greek text is quite discrepant. Thapsacus was the crossing-place of Darius Codomannus, before and after his defeat (Arrian ii. 13), and of Alexander (iii. 7), and in Strabo’s time it was the usual crossing-place (xvi. 1, 21); but Tiglath-pileser I. and Assur-nasir-pal crossed considerably farther north, and we have no reason to suppose that they were not simply following the practice of those early times; and we do not know when the custom of crossing at Thapsacus which the Hebrew text of the passage in 1 Kings may presuppose sprang up. Xenophon’s army had to be content with fording the stream. Alexander, however, effected his crossing (Arrian, iii. 7) by two connected bridges (of boats?), and it was from this place that later he had the material for his fleet sent down (Arrian vii. 19; Strabo xvi. 741) to Babylonia. His successors must also have valued the place, for according to Pliny (v. 87) it bore later the name of Amphipolis, perhaps bestowed on it (Steph. Byz., Appian Syr. 57) by Seleucus I., although the name, like so many others, probably failed to win acceptance; and in the time of Eratosthenes the position of Thapsacus had become so central that he chose it as the point from which to make his measurements for all Asia (Strabo ii. 79, 80), and in the time of Strabo himself it was there that goods were embarked for transport down the Euphrates (Q. Curt. x. 1), and landed after having come by stream from lower districts (Strabo xvi. 1, 23). After Pliny the city is not again mentioned.

After various attempts at identification (see Ritter, Erdkunde) it has apparently been correctly identified by J. P. Peters (Nation, May 23, 1889) and B. Moritz (Sitz.-Ber. d. Berl. Akad., July 25, 1889). The name may survive in Kal’at Dibse, “a small ruin 8 m. below Meskene, and 6 m. below the ancient Barbalissus.” See J. P. Peters, Nippur, 196 ff.

 THAPSUS, a low peninsula, now known as Magnisi, joined by a narrow isthmus to the mainland of Sicily, about 7 m. N.N.W. of Syracuse. The founders of Megara Hyblaea settled here temporarily, according to Thucydides, in the winter of 729–728, but it seems to have remained almost if not entirely uninhabited until the Athenians used it as a naval station in their attack on Syracuse early in 414 A number of tombs were excavated in 1894, containing objects belonging to a transitional stage between the second and third Sicel period, attributable roughly to 1000–900, and with a certain proportion of Mycenean importations.

 THAR AND PARKAR, or, a district of British India in the Sind province of Bombay. Area, 13,941 sq. m. The district is divided into two portions. The western part, called the “Pat,” is watered by the Eastern Nara and the Mithrau canals, which constitute the sole water-system of the district, and the presence of water has created a quantity of jungle and marsh; the other part, called the “Thar,” is a desert tract of rolling sand-hills, running north-east and south-west, composed of a fine but slightly coherent sand. To the south-east of Thar is Parkar, where there are ranges of rocky hills, rising to 350 ft. above the surrounding level, and open plains of stiff clay. This portion contains the ruins of several old temples. The climate is subject to considerable extremes in temperature, being excessively hot in the summer and very cold in winter, the cold increasing as the sand-hills are approached. In 1901 the population was 389,714, showing an increase of 22 per cent. in the decade. The principal crops are millcts, rice, wheat, oil-seeds and cotton. Cultivation largely depends upon the control of the water which comes down the canals and occasionally causes flood. Salt is found in two or three places. The western border of the district is entered by the narrow-gauge railway from Hyderabad to Shadipalli, connected with the North-Western main line by a bridge across the Indus at Kotri, and with the Rajputana system at Jodhpur. Umarkot, the administrative headquarters of the

district, is on the edge of the desert. Pop. (1901) 4924. It is historically interesting as the birthplace of the emperor Akbar in 1542.

Very little is known of the early history of the district. The Soda Rajputs, said to be descendants of Parmar Soda, are supposed to have come into this part of Sind about 1226, when they quickly displaced the rulers of the country, though, according to other authorities, they did not conquer the country from the Sumras, the dominant race, before the beginning of the 16th century. The local dynasty of the Sodas succumbed to the Kalhoras about 1750, since which period the district has been subject more or less to Sind. The Talpur mirs succeeded the Kalhoras, and built a number of forts to overawe the people, who were lawless and addicted to robbery. On the British conquest of Sind in 1843 the greater part of the district was made over to Cutch, but in 1856 it was incorporated in the province of Sind. In 1859 a rebellion broke out, which was quickly suppressed.

 THARANDT, a town of Germany, in the kingdom of Saxony, romantically situated on the Wilde Weisseritz, 9 m. S.W. of Dresden, on the Dresden-Reichenbach railway. Pop. (1905) 2967. It has a Protestant church, a hydropathic establishment, and the oldest academy of forestry in Germany (founded by Heinrich Cotta in 1811) with about sixty students. Tharandt is a favourite summer resort of the people of Dresden, one of its principal charms being the magnificent beech woods which surround it.

 THARGELIA, one of the chief Athenian festivals in honour of the Delian Apollo and Artemis, held on their birthdays, the 6th and 7th of the month Thargelion (about the 24th and 25th of May). The name, which was derived by the ancients from  (“to reap the land”), is more probably connected with  (cf. Lat. torreo, tustus), signifying the produce of the earth “baked” by the sun. Essentially an agricultural festival, the Thargelia included a purifying and expiatory ceremony. While the people offered the first-fruits of the earth to the god in token of thankfulness, it was at the same time necessary to propitiate him, lest he might ruin the harvest by excessive heat, possibly accompanied by pestilence. The purificatory preceded the thanksgiving service. On the 6th a sheep was sacrificed to Demeter Chloë on the Acropolis, and perhaps a swine to the Fates, but the most important ritual was the following. Two men, who were called  or , the ugliest that could be found, were chosen to die, one for the men, the other (according to some, a woman) for the women. On the day of the sacrifice they were led round with strings of figs on their necks, and whipped on the genitals with rods of figwood and squills. When they reached the place of sacrifice on the shore, they were stoned to death, their bodies burnt, and the ashes thrown into the sea (or over the land, to act as a fertilizing influence). The whipping with squills and figwood was intended to stimulate the reproductive energies of the , who represented the god of vegetation, annually slain to be born again. It is agreed that an actual human sacrifice took place on this occasion, replaced in later times by a milder form of expiation. Thus at Leucas a criminal was annually thrown from a rock into the sea as a scapegoat: but his fall was checked by live birds and feathers attached to his person, and men watched below in small boats, who caught him and escorted him beyond the boundary of the city. Similarly, at Massilia, on the occasion of some heavy calamity (plague or famine), one of the poorest inhabitants volunteered as a scapegoat. For a year he was fed up at the public expense, then clothed in sacred garments, led through the city amidst execrations, and cast out beyond the boundaries. The ceremony on the 7th was of a cheerful character. All kinds of first-fruits were carried in procession and offered to the god, and, as at the Pyanepsia (or Pyanopsia),  (branches of olive bound with wool), borne by children, were affixed by them to the doors of the houses. These branches, originally intended as a charm to avert failure of the crops, were afterwards regarded as forming