Page:Origin of metallic currency and weight standards.djvu/127

 of the Danube, we see that by this route there was complete communication between the Black Sea and the Adriatic. In later times we know that active trade was carried on with all Northern Italy from Marseilles along by the Ligurian shore, for the coinage of Massalia, and the barbarous imitations of it struck by the peoples of what was afterwards known as Cisalpine Gaul, formed the currency of that region until the Roman Conquest. But once more the Book of Wonderful Stories comes to our aid: "They say that from Italy into Keltiké, and the land of the Keltoligyes and Iberians, there is a certain road called that of Herakles, by which if any journey, whether Greek or native, he is protected by those who dwell along it, that he may suffer no wrong. For those in whose vicinity the wrong is done have to pay the penalty." Here we have a clear instance of a well-defined caravan route, connected by Greek tradition with the name of Herakles, which was placed under a kind of taboo, so that all travellers could use it with impunity. We may then conclude that as from Central Asia there was unbroken communication with Northern Italy, so likewise from Northern Italy there was from remote ages a definite trade route into Gaul and Spain, and that these routes were in turns connected with the great routes which lead from the Mediterranean to the Baltic and North Sea.

Barbarous imitation of Drachm of Massalia.