Page:Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus.djvu/344

 from Harmozon, the promontory of Carmania, the opposite headland, which the natives call Maces, is easily seen.

11.  When the strait between these capes is passed, and the water becomes wider, they are navigable up to the city Teredon, where, after having suffered a great diminution of its waters, the Euphrates falls into the sea. The entire gulf, if measured round the shore, is 20,000 furlongs, being of a circular form as if turned in a lathe. And all round its coasts are towns and villages in great numbers; and the vessels which navigate its waters are likewise very numerous.

12. Having then passed through this strait we come to the gulf of Armenia on the east, the gulf of Cantichus on the south, and on the west to a third, which they call Chalites. These gulfs, after washing many islands, of which but few are known, join the great Indian Ocean, which is the first to receive the glowing rising of the sun, and is itself of an excessive heat.

13. As the pens of geographers delineate it, the whole of the region which we have been speaking of is thus divided. From the north to the Caspian gates it borders on the Cadusii, and on many Scythian tribes, and on the Arimaspi, a fierce one-eyed people. On the west it is bounded by the Armenians, and Mount Niphates, the Asiatic Albani, the Red Sea, and the Scenite Arabs, whom later times have called the Saracens. To the south it looks towards Mesopotamia, on the east it reaches to the Ganges, which falls into the Southern Ocean after intersecting the countries of the Indians.

14.  The principal districts of Persia, under command of the Vitaxae, that is to say of the generals of the cavalry, and of the king's Satraps, for the many inferior provinces it would be difficult and superfluous to enumerate, are Assyria, Susiana, Media, Persia, Parthia, the greater Carmania, Hyrcania, Margiana, the Bactrians, the Sogdians, the Sacae, Scythia beyond Mount Emodes, Serica, Aria, the Paropanisadae, Drangiana, Arachosia, and Gedrosia.