Page:The Periplus of the Erythræan Sea.djvu/145

 early Hebrew annals.) For 12 miles the hero had to make his way through dense darkness; at length he came to an enclosed space by the sea-shore where dwelt the virgin goddess Sabitu; who tells him that "no one since eternal days has ever crossed the sea, save Shamash, the hero.

But Gilgamesh is directed to Arad-Ea, the sailor of Per-napishtim, who is in the forest felling a cedar. Him he asks to ferry him across to the "Isle of the Blest." After cutting 120 timbers 60 cubits long (surely not "oars," as the translation has it, but rather logs for an inflated raft) and smearing them with pitch,

which may have been Bab el Mandeb, and at the "Isle of the Blest" where dwelt Shamash-Napishtim, great-grandfather of Gilgamesh.

The island Pa-anch of the Egyptian tale is obviously the same as the incense-land Panchaia of Virgil (Georgics, I, 213), and the tale itself indicates that Socotra was an important center of international trade not far from the time of Abraham. Here the occasional navies of Egypt met the peoples of Arabia and Africa and the traders of India, from the Gulf of Cambay and perhaps in greater numbers from the active ports in that ruined sea of past ages, the Rann of Cutch (the Eirinon of §40); a condition not changed at the time of the Periplus, when the inhabitants were a "mixture of Arabs and Indians and Greeks," not yet when Cosmas Indicopleustes visited the place, noting its conversion to Christianity, and observing that the Greek element was planted there by the Ptolemies. Marco Polo (III, 32) found still "a great deal of trade there, for many ships come from all quarters with goods to sell to the natives. A multitude of corsairs (called Bawarij, from Cutch and Gujarat) frequent the island; they come there and encamp and put up their plunder for sale; and this they do to good profit, for the Christians of that island purchase it knowing well that it is Saracen or Pagan gear."

The names Pa-anch and Panchaia Glaser would connect, as already notes with such others as Pano and Opone, the land of Punt and the Puni or Phoenicians, whose sacred bird was likewise connected with Panchaia. Pliny gives the story (X, 2):

"The Phoenix, that famous bird of Arabia... the size of an eagle, and has a brilliant golden plumage around the neck, while the