Page:The geography of Strabo (1854) Volume 1.djvu/281

 B. iv. c. i. $ 3. GAUL. THE NARBOXNAISE. 267 which hitherto we have only mentioned in a summary man- ner. And, first, of the Narbonnaise. 3. The configuration of this country resembles a parallel- ogram, the western side of which is traced by the ^Pyrenees, the north by the Cevennes ; as for the other two sides, the south is bounded by the sea between the Pyrenees and Mar- seilles, and the east partly by the Alps, 1 and partly by a line drawn perpendicularly from these mountains to the foot of the Cevennes, which extend towards the Rhone, and form a right angle with the aforesaid perpendicular drawn from the Alps. To the southern side of this parallelogram we must add the sea-coast inhabited by the Massilienses 2 and Salyes, 3 as far as the country of the Ligurians, the confines of Italy, and the river Var. This river, aswe'Iiave said before, 4 is the boundary of the Narbonnaise and Italy. It is but small in summer, but in winter swells to a breadth of seven stadia. From thence the coast extends to the temple of the Pyrenaean Venus, 5 which is the boundary between this province and Iberia. Some, how- ever, assert that the spot where the Trophies of Pompey stand is the boundary between Iberia and Keltica. From thence to Narbonne is 63 miles ; from Narbonne to_Nemauau^ 6 88 ; li. from Nemausus through Ugernum 7 and Tarusco, to the hot * *t waters called Sextiae 8 near Marseilles, 53 ; 9 from thence to Q  Antipolis ancf the"" river Yar, 73 ; making in the total 277 miles. Some set down the distance from the temple of Venus to the Var at 2600 stadia ; while others increase this number by 200 stadia; for there are different opinions as to these distances. As for the other road, which traverses the [coun- 1 We shall see in the course of this book, that under the name of Alps Strabo includes the different mountain-chains separated from the range of Alps properly so called. This accounts for his extending those moun- tains on the west as far as Marseilles, and on the east beyond Istria. 2 The Marseillese. 3 The Salyes inhabited Provence. we have said before " are evidently interpolated. 5 This temple was built on Cape Creus, which on that account received the name of Aphrodisium. Many geographers confound this temple with the portus V'eneris, the modern Vendres, which is at a short distance from Cape Creus. 6 Nimes. " Beaucaire. 8 Aix. 9 Gosselin, who considers that the former numbers were correct, enters at some length on an argument to prove that these 53 miles were 62, and differs also in computing the succeeding numbers.
 * As Strabo has made no previous mention of this river, the words " as