Page:The geography of Strabo (1854) Volume 1.djvu/486

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472
STRABO.
CASAUB. 307.

common in the neighbourhood of the embouchure of the Palus Mæotis;[p 1] for the passage from Panticapæum,[1] across to Phanagoria,[2] is at times performed in waggons, thus being both a sea passage[3] and an overland route [as the season may determine]. There are also fish which are taken in the ice by means of a round net called a gangama, and especially a kind of sturgeon called antacæus,[4] nearly the size of a dolphin. It is related that Neoptolemus, the general of Mithridates,[5] defeated the barbarians during summer-time in a naval engagement in this very strait, and during the winter in a cavalry action. They say that about the Bosphorus the vine is hidden away in the earth in winter, great mounds of mould being piled over it [to preserve it from the frost]. They also report that the heats are excessive, [this may be accounted for in several ways,] perhaps men’s bodies not being accustomed to them, feel them the more; perhaps the plains are at that time unrefreshed by winds; or perhaps the thickness of the air is heated to a great degree, similar to the way in which the misty air is affected in times when a parhelion is observed.

It appears that Ateas,[6] who carried on war against Philip,[7] the son of Amyntas, had the rule over most of the barbarians of these parts.

19. After the island[p 2] situated opposite the mouth of the Dnieper, in sailing towards the east, we arrive at the cape of the Course of Achilles.[8] The district is quite bare, notwithstanding that it is termed a wood. It is sacred to Achilles. Then we arrive at the Course of Achilles, a low peninsula; for it is a certain tongue of land about a thousand stadia in length, running out towards the east, and its width is but two

  1. ↑ Panticapæum, now Kertsch or Wospor in Europe.
  2. ↑ Phanagoria was on the Asiatic coast of the Bosphorus.
  3. ↑ We entirely agree with Kramer in favouring Coray’s emendation of πλοῦν for πηλόν, the reading of MSS.
  4. ↑ Herodotus, book iv. chap. 53, says this fishing was carried on in the Dnieper. Ælian, de Natur. Animal, book xiv. chap. 26, refers it to the Danube.
  5. ↑ Strabo has before alluded to this fact, book ii. chap. i. § 16, p. 114.
  6. ↑ Lucian, in Macrob. § 10, spells his name Anteas, and relates that he was killed in this war when upwards of 90 years of age.
  7. ↑ Father of Alexander the Great.
  8. ↑ M. Gossellin identifies this as Cape Czile.
  1. ↑ The Strait of Zabache, or Iéni-Kalé.
  2. ↑ The Island of Berezan.
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