CORNEIX UNrVERSIXY LIBRARIES ITHACA, N. Y. 14853 JOHN M OLIN LIBRARY GA304.R52"b57""'*''"'' '■'""^ olin 3 1924 029 955 428 The original of tliis bool< is in tlie Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924029955428 S^ BRAITHET P^'^' LLEWELYN m ^^>-" FEWSTLR, r? i 1 ! MEDIEVAL GEOGKAPHY AN ESSAY IN ILLUSTRATION OF THE HEEEFOED MAPPA MUNDI THE EEV. W. L. BEVAN, M.A. VIOAE OP HAT AUTHOB OF THE 'STUDENT'S MANUALS OP ANCIENT AND MODERN QEOGKAPHY ' THE EEV. H. W. PHILLOTT, M.A. PR.ffiLECTOR OP HEREFORD CATHEDBAIi AND RECTOR OF STANTON-ON-WTE LONDON E. STANFOED, CHAEING CEOSS I '/ y'^ HEREFORD \, '■ E. K. JAKEMAN. JOSEPH JONES. 1873 uf 30^- B57 97 Priniidhy R. & R. Clahk, Edinhurgh. PREFACE. The present Essay owes its existence to the recent publication of a lithographed facsimile of the well-known Mappa Mundi in Hereford Cathedral. The promoters of that work under- took to supply the purchasers of it with an explanatory com- mentary, for the benefit of those who might lack either the time or the taste for unravelling the mysteries of Mediaeval Geography. Some delay has occurred in the ^fulfilment of this engagement from the necessity of providing the authors of the commentary with copies of the map for the preparation of their work, but the subscribers will, it is hoped, be com- pensated for the delay by its greater completeness. The original design has been enlarged by the addition of an Introduction which deals with the general principles of Mediaeval Geography, and the various appliances at hand for its study ; it is of a somewhat discursive character, and intended rather to incite others to a further study of the subject, than to supply them with a complete manual. The authors of the Essay disclaim all pretension to special qualifications for the task they have undertaken. They have not, previously to this, had occasion to direct their attention to Mediaeval Geography, and they have laboured under some disadvantage from the difficulty of obtaining access to rare works connected with mediaeval literature. Doubtless there are many scholars in this country who have made Mediaeval PEEFACE. Geography their special study ; and the authors of this Essay •will be fully compensated for their labour if it should have the effect of drawing attention to a somewhat neglected sub- ject, and of eliciting from some such persons as these a more complete work than the present one. The objects which the authors of the Essay have proposed to themselves, have been not only to give a complete transcript of the contents of the map, and to identify and explain (where necessary) the meaning of the names and legends, but further to ascertain the sources whence the cartographer drew his materials, and thus to present the reader with a picture of the literary appliances in vogue among geographers of the 13th century. They cannot pretend that their researches have been completely successful ; some names have defied all attempts at identification, and the originals of the legends are in some instances still unascertained ; but these cases are exceptional, and will not, it is to be hoped, produce an un- favourable opinion as to the zeal of the authors. Should any of their readers be able to supply the lacunce in the identifi- cations of the names, it would be regarded as a favour if they would communicate their views to either of the authors. In transcribing the names and legends, it was decided, after some deliberation, that it would be better to resolve the abbreviations which were so commonly used in writing Latin at the period of the map, but at the same time to retain the peculiarities of orthography, and in aU cases to give the ipsis- sima verba of the cartographer. Wherever the sense of a passage is impaired by his mistakes, corrections have been introduced in brackets and with a different type. A table of PEEFACE. the chief peculiarities in the orthography of the period has been introduced at the end of the Introduction, page xlvii. The authors regret that they have been unable to throw much light on the history of the Pictorial Illustrations of the map ; whether these are to be regarded as original designs, or whether they are copies from earlier representations of the same subjects, is a point on which they are not prepared in all cases to offer an opinion ; at all events, they have not always suc- ceeded in tracing back the designs to earlier docuinents. It would also be an interesting subject (but one not altogether within the scope of the present publication), to trace the genealogy of similar illustrations in a downward direction, and to see how far they may have been derived from a common source. Those who possess the earlier editions of Mandeville's Travels, will not fail to observe the strong family likeness in the illustration of the Sciopodes, who shaded themselves from the sun's rays by interposing the ample expanse of their single foot, as given in that work and in the Hereford map. The Nurem- berg Chronicle (1493) contains (fol. 12) numerous illustrations in common with our map, such as the Cynocephales, or dog- headed race, the single-footed race, the men with the heads between their shoulders, the Ambari (of the map) with their feet turned backwards, the men with an orifice instead of a mouth, the Pannotii with enormous ears, the men with huge under-lip, the Satirii with cloven feet and goats' horns, the Pigmies, and the horse-footed race. In Munster's Cosmo- grwphia Universalis (1574) these illustrations re-appear, with the exception of the Ambari, together with illustrations of the Unicorn, the Giants, and the Phcenix. PEEFACE. While the authors have jointly revised the whole of the work, it may be explained that the Eev. H. W. Phillott has contributed the chapters on Asia, — II., III., and IV., with portions of chapter V. (pp. 102-103, 108-110), and the notice of the Bestiaries in the Introduction (p. xxxiii.) ; and that the Eev. W. L. Bevan has written the remainder of the work, comprising the Introduction, and chapters I., V., VI., VII., VIII., and IX. The thanks of the coUaborateurs engaged on the Hereford Map (including under this head the Eev. F. T. Havergal and Mr. Haddon, whose attention was more particularly directed to the production of the facsimile), are due to many friends who have kindly aided them with advice and assistance. They desire to specify more particularly the Eev. S. Clark, who has been prevented by a press of literary engagements from taking a larger share in the work ; Dr. Bull, who has given much practical advice ; the Eev. T. T. Smith, who aided in deciphering the names on the map with the microscope ; Mr. Eichard Sims, of the British Museum, for information on literary topics ; and Mr. W. H. Weale, of Bruges, for his supervision of the engravers and printers during the progress of the work there. In addition to these acknowledgments of the whole body of the coUaborateurs, the authors of the Essay desire to express their special obligations to the Eev. F. T. Havergal for his unwearied attention to the points on which they have sought his advice and assistance during the pre- paration of their work. Three photographic illustrations of the following objects are introduced into the work : — (1.) The miniature "Psalter" PEEFACE. map iu the British Museum. (2.) A portion of the origiual Mappa Mundi, given for the purpose of testing the accuracy of the facsimile. (3.) The recently executed facsimile of the Mappa Mundi, which may be found useful for reference, particularly by those who have not at hand the facsimile itself. The two last have been skilfully executed by Messrs. Ladmore, photographers, Hereford ; and it may not be out of place to mention that these artists have published copies of the facsimile, of the following sizes and prices : — 13 in. x 11, at 8s. 6d. ; 11 in. X 9, at 6s. ; and 5| in. x 4|, at 2s. A list is appended of the names of those who have kindly supported the undertaking by purchasing copies of the fac- simile ; a few copies remain on hand, and may be procured from the Eev. F. T. Havergal, The College, Hereford. November 1873. LIST OF SUBSCRIBEES TO THE FACSIMILE OF THE HEREFORD MAPPA MUNDI. Anthony, Charles, Esq., Hereford. Arkwright, J. H., Esq., Hampton Court, Herefordshire. Aston, J. C, Esq., Withington, Hereford. Bain, Mr. J., 1 Haymarket, London. Baker, Key. Sir Henry, Bart., Monkland. Baldwin, Alfred, Esq., Bewdley. Beauchamp, Eight Hon. Earl, Madresfield. Beddoe, H. C, Esq., Hereford. Benson, Rev. E. W., D.D., Lincoln. Birchall, J. D., Esq., Bowden Hall, Gloucester. Birmingham Free Library. Blackbume, Kev. J., Leamington. Bodenham, E. L., Esq., Hereford. Bothamley, Rev. H., Bath, 2 copies. Bowell, W., Esq., Hereford. Bristol Public Museum and Library. Brooks, CunUffe, Esq., M.R, Grosvenor Square, London. Bull, H. G., Esq., M.D., Hereford. Cambeidgb, St. John's College. Capper, Rev. D., Lystone Court, Hereford. Chadwick, E., Esq., Pudlestone Court, Herefordshire. Chatfield, Rev. A. W., Much Marcle. Clive, Rev. Archer, Whitfield, Herefordshire. Clive, Mrs. George, Perrystone, Ross. Glutton, Rev. J., Hereford. Cooke, W. H,, Esq., Q.C, Wimpole Street, London. LIST OF SUBSCEIBEES. Corbett, J., Esq., Stoke Manor, Bromsgrove. Crane, Mrs. Henry, Oakhampton, Stourport. Creed, R., Esq., Church Row, Hampstead. Davies, Rev. James, Moorcourt, Kington. Davies, Llewellyn, Esq., Wavertree, Liverpool. Devonshire, His Grace the Duke of, Devonshire House, London. Dixon, Rev. R., High School, Nottingham. Dobson, Mrs. "W., Oakwood, Bath. EwiNG, "W., Esq., Glasgow. Feilden, Colonel, Dulas Court, Hereford. Field, Cyrus, Esq., America. Foley, Right Hon. Lady EmUy, Stoke Edith Park, Hereford. Freer, Mrs., St. James's, West Malvern, 2 copies. Godwin, Mr. W., Lugwardine. Gore, Mrs. Ormsby, Oswestry. Guise, Sir W., Bart., Elmore Court, Gloucester. Habeeshon, W. S., Esq., Bloomsbury Square, London. Hadow, S. B., Esq., Great Malvern, 2 copies. Harcourt, Lady Frances, Weobley (deceased). Harding, Lieutenant-Colonel, Barnstaple, Devon. Herbert, Major-General the Right Hon. Sir P. E., M.P., K.C.B., Styche, Market Drayton. Hereford, Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of. Hereford, Hon. and Very Rev. the Dean of. Hereford Cathedral, Custos and Vicars of. Hill, Rev. H. T., Felton. Holliday, J. R., Esq., Birmingham. Holt, H. F., Esq. Hoskyns, C. W., Esq., M.P., Harewood, Ross. Hutchinson, C. S., Esq., Longworth, Hereford. Jbbb, Rev. J., D.D., Hereford. Jenkins, H. J., Esq., Holmer, Hereford. Johnson, Mrs., Eigne, Hereford. Jones, Mr. Joseph, Hereford. LIST OF SUBSCEIBEES. Key, Kev. H. Cooper, Stretton Sugwas. Kmglit, J. B., Esq., Downton Castle, Ludlow. Knowles, James, Esq., Olapham. Labmoee and Son, Messrs., Hereford. Lawrence, Rev. W. E., Ewyas Harold. Lee, J. E., Esq., Carleon, Newport. Lewis, Eev. Sir G. F., Bart., Harpton Court, Radnorshire. Lincoln, Dean and Chapter of. Lingen, Charles, Esq., Hereford. Liverpool Free PuhUc Library. London, Society of Antiquaries. GmldhaU Library. — — ^ London Library. ■ Sion College Library. Longmans and Co., Messrs., London. Lucas, F., Esq., Trinity Place, London. Manchbstek, Chetham's Library. Public Free Library. Martin, G. C, Esq., Hereford. Martin, Major W., Brompton Crescent, London. Murray, John, Esq., Albemarle Street, London. NiBLETT, J. D., Esq., Gloucester, 2 copies. Nichols, J. Gough, Esq., Holmwood Park, Dorking. Nott, Mr. James, Great Malvern. OusELEY, Rev. Sir F. Gore, Bart., Tenbury. Ouvry, F., Esq., Society of Antiquaries, London. Oxford Union Society. Palmer, Rev. P. H., Woolsthorpe, Grantham. Partridge, Mrs. Otto, Easton Court, Tenbury. Phayre, Sir A. P., C.B., K.C.S.I. Rankinb, J., Esq., Bryngwyn, Hereford. Reynolds, J. J., Esq., Hereford. Reynolds, Miss, 21 Cobham Road, Bristol. RoweU, J. W., Esq., Newton Abbot, Devon. Russell, Mrs., Streatham Hill. LIST OP SUBSCEIBEES. Save and Sele, Eigtt Hon. and Ven. Loed, Hereford. Scott, Sir G. Gilbert, E.A., Spring Gardens, London. Shaw, GUes, Esq., Winterdyne, Bewdley. Slatter and Eose, Messrs., Oxford. Smith, Rev. 0. L., Little Canfield, Chelmsford. Smith, Eev. T. T., Thiuxtone. Smith, Vassar, Esq., Gloucester. St. John, Eev. H. F., Leeds. Tebbs, H. v., Esq., Westhnry-on-Trym. Temple, Eev. H., Leeds. Tyssen, J. E., Esq., Brighton. Vaux, W., Esq., Union Society, Oxford. Venables, Eev. E. Lister, Lysdinam Hall, Builth. Walker, J. S., Esq., Malvern WeUs. Ward, C, Esq., Clifton. Wasborough, S., Esq., Clifton. Wharton, Eev. J. C, WUlesden, Middlesex. Wilson, S., Esq., Hereford. WUton, Eev. T. C, Toy, Eoss. Wood, E. H., Esq., Crumpsall, Manchester. Woodhonse, J. S., Esq., Holmer. Wnrtzbnrg, J. H., Esq., Leeds. TABLE OF CONTENTS. INTRODUCTION. PAGE § 1. Enumeration of treatises on mediaeval geography — Want of a complete work on this subject ■ ix § 2. The Latin and Arabian schools of geography contrasted. Origin of the divergence between them — Prejudicial effects of Patristic authority on the Latin school — Influence of the Arabian on the Latin school x § 3. Peculiarities of mediaeval geography — Oentrality of Jeru- salem xiii § 4. Effect of the centrality of Jerusalem on the arrangement of the map of the world - xiv § 5. Extent of the habitable world as known to mediaeval geo- graphers — Erroneous view as to the Caspian Sea — Belief in the existence of other continents - xv § 6. Various forms of mediaaval maps — circular, quadrangular, oval, ovoid, and the form indicated on the " Matthew Paris " maps - - 1 _ xvii § 7. The ocean and its chief gulfs as represented in mediaeval maps xix § 8. The orientation of mediaaval maps — The East generally at the head of the map xx § 9. The Terrestrial Paradise — Belief in its continued existence xx § 10. Incompatibility of the mediaeval system with accurate carto- graphy — The scientific subordinated to the historical and romantic elements — Predilection for the marvellous — Con- nection between this and false etymology xxi § 11. Materials with which mediaeval cartographers fiUed their maps. (1.) Biblical — Leading events of the Old and New Testaments — Belief in the contemporaneous existence of Gog and Magog. (2.) Classical — Gross ignorance and carelessness of mediaeval cartographers — Views as to the course of the TABLE OF CONTENTS. PAGE Nile. (3.) Legendary — The Alexandrian Eomance — St. Brandan — Prester John. (4.) Contemporaneous — ^Almost entirely confined to Europe, and even there very imperfect xxiii-xxviii § 12. Brief notices of the leading authorities in vogue among mediseval geographers — Pliny, Pomponius Mela, Antonini Itinerarium, Solinus, Orosins, Macrobius, Priscian, Marcianus Capella, Isidorus, and .ffithici Gosmographice — Notices of Cosmas Indicopleustes and Geographus Eavennas xxvui-xxxii § 13. Brief notices of mediseval authors and works bearing on geography — Bede, Dicuil, Imago Mundi, Alexandrian Eo- mance, Eoger Bacon, Gervase of Tilbury, Ealph Higden, Paulus Diaconus, Eabanus Maurus, Adam of Bremen, and ly^arino Sanuto — Bestiaria and Herbaria xxxii § 14. Notes on mediseval maps preserved in Great Britain — (1.) Anglo-Saxon map of the 10th century, in the British Museum. (2.) Map of the 12th century at St. John's College, Oxford. (3.) The " Imago Mundi " map of the 1 2th century, at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. (4.) The " Apocalypse " map of the 12th century, in the British Museum. (5, 6.) The " Matthew Paris " maps of the 1 3th century, at the British Museum and Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. (7.) The " Psalter " map of the 1 3th century, at the British Museum. (8.) Maps in Brunetto Lattini's Livre du Tresor at the Bodleian Library, Oxford. (9-16.) The "Higden" maps of the 14th century, at the British Museum ; the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh ; Corpus Christi College, Oxford ; Corpus Christi College, Cambridge; and Winchester College. (17.) Map of the 15th century at the College of Arms, London xxxiv-xlv CHAPTEE I. General Characteristics of the Hereford Map — Life of its Author, Ricardus de Bello — Date of the Composition — Sources from which the Materials were drawn — History of the Map — Its Literary History — Its Dimensions, and the Materials used in drawing it — Description of the Illustrations surrounding the Map— The Four Quarters of the World— The Table of the Winds — The Inscription " Mors " — The Ocean — The General Arrangement and chief Divisions of the Map 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS. CHAPTER II. ASIA. PAGE Boundaries — Terrestrial Paradise — The Dry Tree — India — Golden Mountains — Pigmies — Avalerionpar in Mundo — Palimbothra — Mons Malleus — Taprobane and the Islands of the Indian Ocean — Gangines — Monoculi — Ganges — Tile — Mons Tima- vus — Animals attributed to India 25 CHAPTER III. ASIA — Continued. Bactria — Hunni — Scythia and Serica — ^Eonese Insulse — Olchi — ■ Mons Molans — Gog and Magog — Sogdiana — Samarkand^ Islands of the Northern Ocean — Hyperboreans — Turks — Scythotauri Scythse — Arimaspi — ^Albani — Colchis — Caspian Gates 45 CHAPTER IV. ASIA — Gontinued. Asia Minor — Armenia — Media — Persia — Assyria — Mesopotamia — Syria — Phoenicia — Palestine — Arabia — ^Nubia — ^Egypt 6 6 CHAPTER V. AFRICA. Boundaries — Dimensions — Lybia Cyrenensis — Pentapolis — Tri- politana — Africa Propria — Numidia — ^Mauritania — ^Atlas and Astrixis — The Western Nile — Ethiopians — Islands of the Western and Southern Oceans 90 CHAPTER VI. MEDITERRANEAN AND EUXINE SEAS. Mediterranean Sea and its subdivisions — Gades and the Pillars of Hercules — Balearic Isles — Sardinia, Corsica, and the adjacent Isles — The Liparean Islands — Sicily — Crete and the adjacent Isles — Isles of the Adriatic Sea — Cyclades — Mene and Cano- pus — Rhodes, Euboea, Cyprus, etc. — Isles placed in the Euxine Sea -^W TABLE OF CONTENTS. CHAPTER VII. EUROPE. PAGE General Description — Spain — Italy — Istria and Libumia — Greece — ^Macedonia — Illyricum and Dardania — Thrace — Mcesia — Dacia — Bulgarii — Alani 122 CHAPTER VIII. EUROPE — Continued. Gallia — Germania — Rsetia — Noricum — Pannonia — Hungari — Sarmatse — Sclavi — Dani — ^Noreya — Cynocephales — Gryphse — The Seven Sleepers — Islands of Northern Ocean 140 CHAPTER IX. THE BRITISH ISLES. Britannia — AngUa— WaUia — Scotia — Hibemia — Man — Insnla Avium — Insula Arietum — SviUsB 163 Index 175 INTRODUCTION. § 1. The primary object of the present publication is to supply an exposition of the famous " Mappa Mundi " of Hereford Cathedral, which has been recently made available for geographical students through the admirable /acsimite of it published in 1872. But before entering upon our subject it seems desirable, nay, almost essential to an intelligent comprehension of it, that we should furnish our readers with a brief rSsum^ of the distinctive principles of mediseval carto- graphy, so that they may at once be placed at the stand-point whence such a map should be viewed. Preliminary matter of this kind would have been superfluous if we could have referred the reader to any publication in our own language devoted expressly to the subject ; this, however, we are imable to do. Mediseval geography has indeed received some degree of attention in works which treat of the general history of geography. We may specify, among others, the Introduc- tion to Playfair's System of Geography, Hugh Murray's Encyclopaedia of Geography, Kerr's Collection of Voyages and Travels, vol. 18, and, more particularly, Cooley's Maritime and Inland Discovery (Lardner's Oyclo- psedia), the first volume of which contains some interesting references ■to mediseval maps (see book iii. cap. 2). But it did not fall within the scope of these works to deal exhaustively with mediseval carto- graphy -J and an essay on this subject, by one fully competent to deal with it, still remains a desideratum in our geographical literature. On the Continent a considerable amount of attention has of late years been given to the subject. Lelewel's Geographie du Moyen Age, and Santarem's Histoire de la Gosmographie et de la Gartographie, are most valuable contributions to the history of mediseval geography ; and the magnificent Atlases of Jomard, Monumens de la Giographie, and San- tarem. Atlas de Mappemondes et de Portulans, together with the more unassuming series of maps which accompanies Lelewel's essays, supply the students with facsimiles of the maps themselves. JBut these works, particularly the costly Atlases of Jomard and Santarem, are probably b X INTRODUCTION. known to few persons except professed geographers; nor can the essays of Lelewel and Santarem be regarded as altogether meeting the requirements of the case.* The present writer does not pretend to be able to supply the deficiency : he simply draws attention to wants which wiU probably be recognised by all who are interested in the subject. § 2. In the use of the term " Mediaeval," in the following pages, we must at the outset beg our readers to understand that we are not dealing with the whole subject of geography in the Middle Ages, but with one branch of it only — namely, the Latin or Ecclesiastical school of geography. Contemporaneously with this there existed another school of a very different character — the Arabian — which does not further fall under our cognisance than as it influenced the Latin school in the later centuries of the mediaeval period. The two schools present a remarkable contrast, the Arabic being scientific, speculative, progress- ive ; while the Latin was traditional, stereotyped, full of unrealities and anachronisms, and bound in the trammels of ecclesiastical authority. The divergence between these schools dates from a very early period of Christian literature. We need hardly remind our readers that, before the close of the true classical age, geography had been placed on a sound scientific basis by the successive investigations of Eratos- iihenes, Geminus, Marinus, and, above all, Ptolemy. The sphericity of the earth, the possibility of calculating its size, the belief in the existence of inhabited lands on the opposite side of the globe, the observation of the relative positions of places on the earth's surface, partly by means of astronomical observation and partly by measurements of the intermediate distances, and the art of recording the results on maps by the aid of lines of latitude and longitude — these were among the valuable discoveries which the Greek geographers bequeathed to posterity. Much, of course, remained to be done, and the completion of the work depended on the recognition of past discoveries, and an adherence to the lines of investigation thus laid down. The Arabs * Since writing the atove, we have met with the following corroborative remarks by M. Vivien de Saint-Martin in the V Annie QiograpMgue for 1872, p. 417 : — " Mais quand nous donnera-ta-on, sous une forme k la fois concise et appropri^e aux etudes gen^rales, une histoire complete de la cartographie de cette pdriode, accompagn^e de copies artistiquement reduites des principaux monu- ments conserves dans nos collections ? Cette reuvre reviendrait de droit 5, un de nos savants qui a fait de cette ^tude en quelque sorte son domaine, et qui mieux que persoune est prepard k mettre en pleine lumiire ce chapitre de I'histoire girA- rale de la science. Tout le raonde aura nommd M. d'Avezac." AEAB AND LATIN SCHOOLS OF GEOGEAPHY. xi adopted this course : they brought astronomy to bear on geography ; they established observatories ; they measured an arc of a great circle of the earth; they studied Ptolemy;* they applied themselves to define with accuracy the positions of places on the earth's surface ; they recorded on their maps the discoveries of travellers ; and thus geography became in their hands a living science. With what ardour they followed it up, may be judged from the simple fact that Abulfeda cites no fewer than sixty authors, many of whom lived in the thirteenth century (Daunou, L'Mtat des Zettres, p. 205). It fared otherwise with geography within the realm of the Christian Church. The Fathers imagined that they had detected certain discrepancies between the discoveries of science and the language of Holy Writ. The particular point on which their suspicion fastened was the existence of the Antipodes. It was assumed that no communication was possible, or had ever been possible, between our own continent and other quarters of the globe. Even if other continents existed, they were supposed to be cut off from our own by an ocean rendered impassable from its lying under a tropical zone of insupportable heat. On this assumption it was, of course, impossible that a population could have been derived from the stock of Adam ; and, consequently, the whole theory of its existence was opposed to the language of Holy Writ, which throughout assumes that God " hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth'' (Acts xvii. 26). Lactantius, in the 4th century, was carried by his zeal for the truth so far as to impugn the theory as a physical impossibility, and to deny the sphericity of the earth t (Institut. iii. 24). St. Augustine, whUe equally determined in his rejection | of the Antipodes, is more cautious in the statement of his reasons : he argues that, even if the world be spherical, it does not follow that there should be land on the opposite side of it ; and even if there be land, it does not foUow that it should be inhabited ; nay, * The work entitled RasiTi el Arsi, which served as the text-hook for Arabian geographers, was » translation of Ptolemy's geographical work made in the 9th century. It appears to have differed in various particulars from the original (Lelewel, ii. 20). i" ** Ineptum credere esse homines quorum vestigia sint superiora quam capita aut ibi quae apud nos jaoent inversa pendere ; fruges et arhores deorsum versus crescere hujus en'orem philosophis fuisse quod existimarent rotundum esse mundum." J ' ' Quod vero et Antipodas esse fabiilautur, id est, homines a contraria parte terrse ubi sol oritur quando occidit nobis, adversa pedibus nostris calcare vestigia, nulla ratione oredendum est.' xii INTEODUCTION. inasmucli as none could cross from this side to that, it must needs be uninhabited {De Civ. Dei, xvi. 9). The dictum of so illustrious a doctor was conclusive. Other writers adopted similar views, and in the 6th century an Egyptian monk, Oosmas, surnamed Indicopleustes, wrote a learned treatise for the express purpose of disproving the sphericity of the earth. The prejudicial effects of this line of treat- ment did not stop here. Geography was henceforth forced into the mould of a pseudo-orthodoxy ; and the language of the Bible, as interpreted by the Fathers, became the test of truth in regard to cosmology : scientific processes were discouraged, and all zest for discovery was quenched by the announcement that there was little or nothing to discover : in short, the ecclesiastical view impressed the stamp of finality on geographical science, and both writers and map-makers fell into a narrow groove, to which they adhered until they were forced out of it by the grand discoveries of the 15th and 16th centuries. The tenacity with which the patristic doctrine was maintained is well exhibited in the treatment which Columbus experienced. His proposal to circumnavi- gate the world was referred to a council of divines at Salamanca, who pronounced it to be not only chimerical but even profane ; as being contrary to Scripture and the opinions of the Fathers, particularly Lactantius and Augustine (Irving's Life of Cohimhus, book ii. cap. 3). Yet at that time a breach had been already made in the mediseval theory by the progress of maritime discovery : navigators had pene- trated into the torrid zone, and had reported it to be not impassable : and thus the very groundwork of the difficulty which the Fathers had experienced had been removed. It may be a matter of surprise that the Arabian system should have co-exist^ side by side with the Latin, and yet have exercised so little iniluence over it. The inhabit- ants of Western Europe came in contact with the Arabians in Spain, in the Holy Land during the period of the Crusades, and more parti- cularly in Sicily, where one of the most illustrious of their geographers, Edrisi, lived and worked under the patronage of Koger, Count of Sicily, in the middle of the 12th century. We do indeed meet with occasional notices which show that the Arab system was not wholly unknown. Our own enlightened countryman, Roger Bacon, had evi- dently made himself acquainted with it. In his Opus Majlis, completed in 1267, he speaks of Arym, the most important point in the construc- tion of an Arab map, and he shows himself acquainted with its position on the earth's surface and its use in the study of geography (pp. 141, 146) : he was also familiar with lines of latitude and longitude, and CENTEALITY OF JEEUSALEM. xiii particularly notes that the Latins had not yet adopted the system (pp. 140, 141). With regard to this latter topic, he refers to the Almagest of Ptolemy and the treatise of Alfragan, which was founded on the Almagest (p. 140) ; and it may be conjectured that he was incited to the study of these works by the use which Arab geographers had made of them. The geographical work of Ptolemy had not yet been rendered accessible to the general body of students by being translated into Latin ; it may, nevertheless, have became known through the Arabic version of it ; for there appear to have been a fair number of scholars in Europe in the, 13th century who were acquainted with the Arabic language (Daunou, L'itat, etc. p. 238). Santarem names the close of the 12th centuiy as the period when Arabian influence was first felt in the study of geography (iii. Intr. p. 18), and he gives an instance in which Arym or Aryne is noticed by a Latin writer as far back as 1110 (iii. 311). The amount of influence thus gained was not, however, sufiicient to afi'ect the Latin system. That system was indeed entirely incompatible with scientific principles. Nothing less than a revolution was required ; and this revolution was efiected partly by the revival of the study of Ptolemy, whose geography was translated into Latin in 1405 (Lelewel ii. 123), and partly by the progress of maritime discovery. § 3. Foremost among the peculiarities of mediaeval geography we must place the opinion that Jerusalem occupied the central point of the habitable world. Whether the tenet was originally based on the language of Scripture, or whether the language of Scripture was applied in confirmation of a preconceived opinion, we are unable to decide. At all events, it is not the only instance in which men have conferred honour on their holy places by regarding them as occupying the central boss or umbilic of the habitable world : it was thus that the Greeks regarded their Delphi,* the Hindoos their Merou, the Persians their Kangdiz, and the Arabs their Aryne (Lelewel, i. 34 ; Santarem, iii. 312). It was not unnatural that the Jews, and still more the Christians, should attribute the same property to Jerusalem, which for centuries had been the focus of their aspirations, their anxieties, and their most devoted exertions. Scripture seemed to sanction this feeling. We find the following passages quoted for the purpose : — Ezek. v. 5, " This is Jerusalem ; I have set it in the midst of the nations round about her." (CeUarius Not. Orb. Ant. i. 11) ; Ps. Ixxiv. 12, which * S/iipaKos xSovbs, Find. Pyth. vi. 3 ; cf. Soph. CEd. Tyr. 480; Msik. Choeph. 1034. ; xiv INTEODUCTION. in the "Vulgate runs thus : — " Operatus est salutem in medio term " (Gerv. Tilb. Ot. Imp. i. 10 ; Ssewulf in Bohn's Early Travels, p. 38) ; and again, Ezek. xxxvlii. 12, where the Hebrew word tabiir "the midst of the land," is rendered in the Vulgate "umbilicus terrae." (D. Kimchi, quoted by OeUarius, I. c.) The interpretation set on these passages appears to have been based on St. Jerome's comment on Ezek. v. 5, though his words go no further than to show that Judsea was centrally placed in reference to the surrounding countries. Moses of Chorene, in the middle of the 5th century, is the earliest geographer (as far as we have been able to ascertain) who asserts the literal, or, as we may term it, the mathematical centrality of Jeru- salem (Geog. § 1 7). Isidore, in the 6th century, who was the leading authority in mediaeval geography, speaks of Jerusalem as " imibiHcus regionis totius" (Oriff. xiv. 3, § 21), and the same expression is used by Eabanus Maurus in the 9th century (Be Univ. xii. 4). Marino Sanuto, in the 14th century, describes Jerusalem as " punctus cir- cumferentise," and exaggerates the historical claims to centrality by representing Judsea as having been the seat of each branch of the human race, and the favoured scene of God's manifestation in the works of creation and redemption in the past, and of final judgment in the future {Sec. Fid. Gruc. iii. 1). Mediseval cartographers gave efiect to these views by placing Jerusalem as nearly as possible in the centre of the map ; and this remained the custom until the middle of the 15 th century, when Fra Mauro was compelled to shift the centre somewhat to the eastward, in order to find room for the enlargement of Asia, consequent on the discoveries of Marco Polo and others. § 4. Assuming that Jerusalem occupied the central point of the habitable world, and taking into regard its position on the western verge of Asia and in the line of the Mediterranean, it followed — (1) that Asia held one-half of the world ; (2) that its length from east to west must equal the length of Europe; and (3) that Europe and Africa must be equal, or nearly equal, to each other, the Mediterranean forming the line of division between them. The first of these points is expressly asserted by geographical writers. " Orbem dimidium duae tenent, Europa et Africa ; alium vero dimidium sola Asia,'' says Isidore (Orig. xiv. 2, § 3) : and so we read in the Alexandrian Romance composed in the 1 3th century : — " At Asyghe al so muchul is So Europe and AfTryh, Y wis" (11. 55-6). The world was thus symmetrically divided into three parts, and this DIVISIOISrS OF THE WOELD. xv arrangement is not only embodied in the general structure of mediaeval maps, but it is expressly set forth in smaU sketch-maps consisting of a circle divided into an upper and lower half, the latter being sub- divided by a semi-diameter at right angles to the former — the upper half representing Asia, the two lower quadrants Europe and Africa. Such maps assumed the form of a T inscribed in an O, and it appears from some lines quoted by Col. Yule from Del Dati's poem La Sfera (3d stanza), that it was usual to describe them by that title (Marco Polo's Travels, i. 152). Such a sketch-map occurs in Brunetto Latini'a Livre dv, Tresor (Bodl. Lib., Oxford) ; other examples are represented in Lelewel's Atlas, plates 6 and 7. In estimating the correctness of these proportions in themselves, as well as the correctness with which they are exhibited in maps, it must be remembered that Egypt was assigned not to Africa but to Asia. The preponderating size of Asia is accounted for by Gervase of Tilbury on scriptural grounds, inasmuch as it was in his view the exclusive inheritance of Shem, the first-bom (Ot. Imp. ii. 2). The symmetrical division of the world was somewhat marred in the eyes of geographers by the subdivision of the second moiety, and it was a moot question whether Europe and Africa should not be regarded as a single continent. Gervase brings Scripture to bear on this point, and decides in favour of three divisions, on the ground that Ham and Japhet had their separate domains as well as Shem (Ot. Imp. ii. 2). This view is occasionally exhibited in the sketch-maps, which substitute the names Shem, Ham, and Japhet, for Asia, Africa, and Europe. § 5. The habitable world was limited within a circle drawn from Jerusalem as its centre, and with a radius equalling the distance thence to the Strait of Gibraltar. It was only at this latter point that the limit of the Old World was really known. Here was " The strait pass where Hercules ordain'd The houndaries not to be o'erstepp'd by man, " beyond which lay " the deep ilUmitable main,'' " the unpeopled world," of which the learned as yet knew nothing (Dante, Inferno, xxvi. 99, 106, 114 : Gary's transl.) Eastward the limit was fixed at the mouth of the Ganges, which, in accordance with the view of Orosius, was supposed to discharge itself into the Eastern Ocean. In this direction, therefore, mediaeval geography, as it stood towards the close of the 13th century, had not only not advanced beyond the point at which Ptolemy left it, but had actually receded : nor was it until xvi INTRODUCTION. a considerable interval after Marco Polo's adventurous journey that his discoveries were recorded on maps. Southward, again, the habit- able world was confined within narrow limits. Inasmuch as, according to the accepted theory, the torrid zone was occupied by an impass- able ocean, the coastline of Africa and Asia could not be carried south of the Tropic of Cancer.* In point of fact, it was supposed to sweep round with an easy curve from the Strait of Gibraltar to the Indian Ocean, and mediaeval geographers accepted the views of Solinus (56, § 6) and Juba (Plin. vi. 175) as to an easy maritime route connecting the Atlantic with the Indian Ocean— a felicitous error perhaps, inas- much as it encouraged the hopes of navigators that the shores of India might be thus reached ; whereas Ptolemy, by converting the Indian Ocean into an inland sea, rendered such a step impossible. North- wards, mediaeval geography had receded in Asia. The Caspian Sea was again converted into an arm of the Northern Ocean — an error which appears indeed in Pliny (vi. 36), Solinus (17, § 3), and Orosius (i. 2), but which finds no place in the Greek geographers, with the exception perhaps of Strabo (xi. p. 519). This sea remained the northern limit of Asia in mediaeval geography until the middle of the 13th century, when its true character was revealed by Eubruquis. Cartographers, nevertheless, adhered to the traditional belief for another 150 years — ^the earliest map (as far as we know) which ex- hibits it as an inland sea being that in the Borgia Museum (Santa- rem, iii. 272). Yet Eoger Bacon, living before the close of the 13th century, was perfectly well acquainted with Eubruquis' discovery {Op. Maj. p. 143). From the Caspian Sea the coast line of Asia sloped round to the mouth of the Ganges, thus shutting out the vast expanse of northern and eastern Asia. In Europe geography had somewhat advanced. Alfred the Great had incorporated with his translation of Orosius an account of the travels of Ohthere and Wulfstan, and most mediaeval maps indicate some acquaintance with Norway, Sweden, and Denmark. Iceland and the Faroe group also appear on the stage, side ■■' The siguiflcance of the entry referring to Malleus Mens in the Hereford map seems to have escaped the observation of the majority of medifeval geographers. That mountain must have lain, as Roger Bacon perceived {Op. Maj. p. 144), under the equator ; for the shadows fell alternately north and south for periods of six months (Solin. 52, § 13). Indeed, Roger Bacon thought that inhabitants from the neighbourhood of the Tropic of Capricorn had reached Em-ope, referring to the embassy from Ceylon to the Emperor Claudius. His conclusion is borne out by Pliny's statement ( " umbras suas in nostrum ccelum ; uon in suum, " vi. 87), but the statement itself is devoid of foundation. FOEM OF THE WOELD. xvii by side with the " Ultima Thiile " of classical geography. If we proceed to inquire whether mediBeval geographers conceived that there were other continents besides the one on which they themselves lived, the answer must be given in the affirmative. The "Apocalypse" map in the British Museum distinctly recognises the existence of land to the south of the Indian Ocean — uninhabited, however, on account of its proximity to the sun. The same feature is exhibited in a similar map at Turin (Lelewel, Atlas, pi. 7), and again in a planisphere of the 14th century (Santarem, iii. 102). But the belief in the existence of land in that quarter did not carry the belief in the existence of inhabitants, as the addition of the word "fabulose" to the notice of the Antipodes in the Turin map clearly shows. The question as to the land was deprived of the interest in the assumed absence of a population, and hence, though the sphericity of the earth was an accepted belief,* little speculation was raised as to the character of its surface on the oppo- site side to our own quarter. Probably the majority acquiesced in the view of Macrobius (In Somn. Scip. ii. 9), that there were four such worlds as our own symmetrically distributed over the four quarters of the globe. We have thus stated the limits of the habitable world as known at the close of the 13th century. The discoveries of Carpini, Eubruquis, and Marco Polo, filtered slowly into the maps of the 14th century, and did not receive full justice until the middle of the 15th century, when they were exhibited in the celebrated map of Pra Mauro. § 6. The form of the habitable world, as depicted in mediaeval maps, varied ; but the prevailing usage was in favour of the circle, as being more in consistency with the centrality of Jerusalem. Occa- sionally the quadrangular shape was adopted, as in the map of Cosmas Indicopleustes, the Anglo-Saxon map of the British Museum, the Matthew Paris maps, and, with some modification, the " Apocalypse ''■ map in the British Museum. The selection of this form may have been based on too literal an acceptation of those passages of Scripture which speak of the " four comers " of the earth. At all events, it does not happen to have been supported by any definite theory as to the * " Corpus autem terrse sphericum est," says the inscription on the 'Matthew Paris' maps. "Hujus flgnra est in modum pilse, rotunda; sed ad instar ovi, elementis distincta. Ovum quippe exterius testa undique amhitur, testa albu- men, albumine vitellum vitello gutta pinguedinis includitur. Sic mundus undi- que ccelo ut testa circiundatur : coelo vero purus aether ut albumen, astheri turbidus aer ut vitellum, aeri terra nt pinguedinis gutta includitur." (Imago Mundi, cap. 1 ; cf. Ot. Imp. i. 1, where the. same comparison is used.) xviii INTRODUCTION. real shape of the world. Modifications of the circular — oval or ovoid — were also used— the former in the case of the " Imago Mundi " map at 0. 0. C, Cambridge, and some of the " Polychronicon " maps, which we shall hereafter specify— the ovoid, in the form of a vesica piscis, in three of the " Polychronicon " maps. Santarem (iii. pp. 82, 83) thinks that these forms were selected to represent certain theories of the ancient Greek philosophers. We see no ground for this. The varia- tion from the circular to the oval may have been a mere matter of convenience, and the modification of the oval into the ovoid may have arisen from the symbolism attached to the vesica piscis in Christian art. At all events, if any deeper reasons existed for the selection of these forms, we should be inclined to refer them, not to the views of Thales and Posidonius, but to the authority of Priscian's Periegesis — a work of great popularity in the middle ages — according to which the world would resemble two cones united at their bases.* Yet so little attention was paid to this view, that the Anglo-Saxon map, which is prefixed to a copy of the Periegesis, assumes a quadrangular shape. The circular form, on the other hand, commended itself to carto- graphers as harmonising best with the centrality of Jerusalem, and perhaps also with the etymological meaning of "orbis,'' as noticed by Isidore.t We have to notice yet another form, theoretically more correct than any of the above, which is noticed in the curious inscrip- tion on the " Matthew Paris " maps. We are there told that the world in its truest form resembles an extended military cloak (chlamys extensa). The chlamys consisted of a central square with gears or wings added to it, which gave it, when extended, a considerably greater width at the bottom than at the top, rendering it (as the inscription proceeds to say) almost triangular {triaiiguloA-is fere), the difierence between it and a perfect triangle consisting (as we suppose) in the absence of the apex, the triangle being (as it were) truncated. The comparison with the " chlamys extensa" is no doubt borrowed from Macrobius,J who in turn * " Si placet Europes quoque me tibi dioere formam. Hand taceam similis Libyse est Ast ambas uuam si terras esse putemus Assimulent conum laterum compagibus sequis " (259-265). " Ast Asise fines ambarum linea monstrat Et formam, contra positanim in imagine coni " (614, 615). t " Orbis a rotunditate circuli dictus quia aicut rota est" (Orig. xiv. 2, § 1). t " Denlque veteres omnem liabitabilem nostram extentaj chlamydi simile esse dixerunt" (De Somn. Sclp. ii. 9), where Macrobius is commenting on Cicero's description " angusta verticibus, lateribus latior " (De RepuUica, vi. 20). THE OCEAN. xix borrowed it from Strabo (ii. p. 113). The form intended closely resembles that of the maps which illustrate the views of Strabo and Ptolemy. We are told in the inscription that this form was exhibited in a map which was deposited in the Court of Exchequer at West- minster, and which was copied by Matthew Paris ("in ordine Matthsei de Parisio "). Unfortunately neither of these maps survives. § 7. The ocean is depicted in mediseval maps as a narrow band encircling the earth, like the ocean " river " of Homeric geography. It was thus that the cartographers gave effect to the representations of Isidore and other writers.* Gervase of TUbury states that this circular arrangement was held to be indicated in the language of Gen. i. 9 : — "Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear ;f and the treatise called Imago Mundi quotes to the same effect Ps. civ. 6 : — " Who coveredst it with the deep as with a garment," — the ocean being as it were only the rim of the subjacent world of waters. We need not assume that mediasval writers adopted the Homeric theory as to the narrowness of the ocean, though the maps appear to express it. The river-Uke aspect which it assumes in their maps simply arises from the absence of all motive for extending its width. The general opinion doubtless was that the habitable world was, as Cicero J expresses it, a " small island " surrounded by a vast expanse of ocean (see Augustine, § ^p. CI. iii. 199, ordo nova). In the middle ages the favourite legend of St. Brandan must have contributed to enhance the estimate of its size. From the ocean four inland seas are described as penetrating deeply into the interior of the world — viz. the Mediterranean, the Red Sea, the Per- sian Gulf, and the Caspian Sea, which last (as we have already noticed) was held to be an ocean gulf. These four gulfs are con- * " Undique enim Oceauus circumfluens ejus in ciroulo amMt fines" (Isidore, Orig. xiv. 2, § 1). "Quod in circuli mode [Oceanus] ambiat ortiem" (Eabanus Maurus De Univ. xi. 3). "Molem terras ambit Oceanus in modum circuli" (Hig- den, Polychron. i. 9). "Haec in circuitu Oceano, ut limbo cingitur, ut scribitur, Abyssus sicut vestiraentum amictus ejus" {Imago Mundi, i. 6). t " Sunt qui dicunt terram ut centrum in medio circumferentise omni parte asqualiter ab extremitatibus distautem marl circumcingi atque concludi, secundum Ulud tertiae diei, congregavit aquas sub firmamento in unum et apparuit arida ; subsidit enim terra ut centrum" {Ot. Imp. i. 13). X " Oninis enim terra quge colitur a nobis, parva qusedam insula est, " etc. (Rep. vi. 20). § "Sicut in universe orbe terrarum, quje tanquam omnium quodamniodo maxima est insula, quia et ipsam ciiigit oceanus.'' XX INTEODUCTION. spieuous objects in mediaeval maps from the time of Cosmas down- wards. Tlie Baltic and the Bay of Biscay are also introduced into the Hereford map, but as objects of minor importance. § 8. The orientation of mediaeval maps is peculiar. While modem map-drawers place the north at the head of the map, our predecessors in the middle ages, with few exceptions,* placed the east in that position. Biblical considerations decided them in favour of this arrangement. The primeval abode of man was in the east : the Terrestrial Paradise stiU remained there — an object of the deepest interest to the religious sentiment of the middle ages. What more natural than that the place of honour should be assigned to it in the map, particularly as that accorded with the historical method which forms so prominent a feature in mediaeval cartography ? The map of the world was intended to picture forth the fortunes of the human race, and Paradise, as form- ing the starting-point in the stream of time, occupied the head of the map. The cartographer was probably further influenced by the pro- minence assigned to the east as one of the "gates of the sun,"t as compared with the north, which could not be deiined with the same accuracy. § 9. The Terrestrial Paradise, to which we have referred in the preceding paragraph, forms a constant feature in mediaeval maps, the most notable exception being the Anglo-Saxon map in the British Museum, in which it is not entered. Not the slightest doubt was entertained as to its being an existing contemporaneous fact. Higden devotes along chapter in his Polychronicon (i. 10) to the discussion of various questions connected with the subject under the three heads of — An sit; Ubi sit ; and Qualis sit. Mandeville (cap. xxx.) informs us that he had not visited it himself on account of his unworthiness, but he describes it at length on the information of trustworthy persons. Gervase of Tilbury, in his Otia Imperialia, i. 10, also gives a description of it. J These views were based on opinions entertained by the * Santarem (il. p. 65 of preface) notes three exceptions down to the close of the 14tli century : in two of these the west is placed at the head, and in the third the south. To these we may add the map of Brunetto Latuii, in which the south is placed at the top. At a later period we hare the large map of Fra Mauro similarly arranged. The interesting map of Pierre d'Ailly in 1410, on the other hand, places the north at the top (Lelewel, Atlas, pi. 22). + Isid. Ong. xiii. 1, § 7 ; iEthicus, cap. 18. t Est ergo locus amcenissimus lougo terrse marisque tractu a nostra habitahili regione segregatus ; sic excelsus ut usque ad lunarem globum attingat unde et aquae diluvii ad locum hunc non pervenerunt. TEEEESTEIAL PAEADISE. xxi Fathers (Augustine, Basil, and Ambrose) as to the continued existence of Paradise; but the authority on which mediaeval cartographers chiefly leant was Isidore, whose statement* as to the fiery wall is portrayed in the Hereford map. Authorities were not wholly agi-eed as to the position of Paradise, but the prevailing opinion was in favour of the extreme east. In a small sketch-map of Brunetto Latini it is placed in the north ; and according to another theoiy it lay beyond the torrid zone, and was thus inaccessible to man {Ot. Imp. i. 10). The four rivers oT Paradise were identified with the Euphrates, Tigris, Nile, and Ganges of true geography ; and the difficulty as to the widely remote sources of these rivers was solved by assuming that the rivers on leaving Paradise were submerged and reappeared at those points. Cosmas, who placed Paradise beyond the Ocean, adopted the theory that the rivers retained independent courses under the sea. The belief in the Terrestrial Paradise and its rivers held its ground until dissipated by the progress of discovery. Columbus him- self was not free from the delusion, and when he encountered the flood of the river Orinoco in the Gulf of Paria, he thought that it could be none other than the fount of Paradise (Irving's Life of Columbus, book x. cap. 4). For further particulars on this subject we refer our readers to a note in the appendix to the work just quoted, and also to Baring Gould's Curious Myths, pp. 250-266. § 10. The general arrangement of a mediaeval map, as described in the foregoing paragraphs, was evidently inconsistent with geographi- cal truth, inasmuch as it furnished the cartographer with no means of ascertaining the true position of places on the map, or of correctly delineating the directions of natural objects, such as seas, mountains, and rivers. He was bound by conventional rules to a certain mode of dealing with the space at his command, these rules being quite inde- pendent of any foundation in geographical facts. We do not of course mean to imply that there is any impropriety in drawing a circular map of a hemisphere with Jerusalem for its centre, or, as it would be technically expressed, "on the plane of the horizon" of Jerusalem. The specific fault in the mediaeval map was that it made Jerusalem the centre of the habitable world — that it consequently fixed the form and the limits of that world — and that it forced lands and seas into * " Septus est undique romphsea flamma, id est, muro igneo aocinotus, ita ut ejus cum ccelo pene jungatur incendium" {Orig. xiv. 3, § 3). And so Gervase of Tilbury, " Inadibilis homini'bus quia igneo muro usque ad coelum oiuctus" {Ot. Imip. ii. 3). xxii INTEODUCTION. spaces that were not adapted to their true form or size. The use of parallels and meridians was absolutely incompatible with such a system of map-drawing. Hence the " chaos of error and confusion " which characterises medieeval maps. Hence the distortion of outlines, and the gross displacement of towns and countries. The radical defect in the method vitiated the whole treatment of the subject, and compelled map-makers to rely on precedent rather than on the data supplied by reliable authorities. Possibly, indeed, they did not aim at geographical so much as at historical representation. A map was an " estoire " (to borrow the expression used by the author of the Hereford map) i.e., an illustrated * record, and its oflBce was more to delineate objects of popular interest than objects of scientific value. The taste of the age ran in favour of the marvellous, t and the mappa mundi was to a considerable extent addressed to the illustration of this department of literature. Let any one compare the Hereford map with the Eomanoe of King Alexander, and he cannot fail to see the close resemblance in the spirit, and even in the special features, of the two documents. In short, a mediaeval mappa mundi, to be duly appreciated, must to a great extent be regarded as an illustrated romance. This predilection for the marvellous is exhibited in the natural history of a mediaeval map. Our readers will hereafter observe how large a portion of the Hereford map is occupied with descriptions of human monstrosities, mythical animals, birds and beasts of strange aspect, famous lakes and wells, and plants of noteworthy properties. If it be asked what gave rise to these various fancies, we must attribute a certain proportion of them to spurious etymology. The tales were evolved out of the names and their supposed meanings. Thus the legend of the men with four eyes arose, as Pliny himself perceived, out of the name Nisytos (H. N. vi. 194). Thus, again, our Isle of Thanet rose to a world-wide celebrity through the derivation of the name from the Greek word thanatos, "death:" whence was evolved the story that its soil was fatal to serpents (Isidore, Orig. xiv. 6, § 3 ; Solinus 22, § 8). Nor was the ' The modem French applies the expression "historier" in the same sense, " enjoliver cle clivers petits omements." — Littr6's Diet. t Mr. Cooley aptly illustrates tMs point by quoting the regulations made by William of Wiokham for the students of New Coll., Oxford : — " When in the winter, on the occasion of any holiday, a fire is lighted for the fellows in the great hall, the fellows and scholars may, after their dinner or their supper, amuse themselves in a suitable manner with singing or reciting poetry, or with the chronicles of different kingdoms and the wonders of the world." — Afnritime and Inland Dis- eovery, Bk. iii. cap. 2. CONTENTS OF MEDIEVAL MAPS. xxiii effect of spurious etymology confined to such matters as this : the idea that the island Canaria was occupied by huge dogs originated in etymological error ; and we may draw attention to a peculiar feature in the Hereford map connected with Oardia, a town on the Thracian Chersonese, which is represented as occupying a heart-shaped peninsula, the name being derived from the Greek Icardia " heart " (Solin. 10, §20). § 11. Passing on to the materials with which mediaeval maps were usually filled, we may classify the entries under the foUowing heads : — (1) Biblical; (2) Classical; (3) Legendary; (4) Contemporaneous. 1. Biblical. — In addition to the representation of Paradise and its four rivers, already noticed, the leading events of Old Testament history were duly commemorated : — the Ark resting on the mountains of Ararat ; the Tower of Babel ; the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah ; the sojourn in Egypt, of which the Pyramids were regarded as a memorial, their ordinary designation being "Joseph's Bams;" the passage of the Eed Sea; the wanderings in the Desert; and the partition of the Promised Land among the twelve tribes. The above subjects supplied matter for pictorial representation. Due promi- nence was also given to places associated with the events of the New Testament — Bethlehem, Nazareth, Samaria, and, above all, Jerusalem. The countries in which the Apostles preached are also occasionally noticed. We have yet to notice a Biblical subject which took its place in the legendary lore of the middle ages as an existing fact of most serious import : we allude to the belief that the Gog and Magog of prophecy were stOl existing, and only restrained from overwhelming other nations by an immense barrier thrown up by Alexander the Great, who thrust them back to the shores of the Northern Ocean, and there by divine interposition closed them up in a peninsula, whence in the latter days they should burst forth to carry desolation and rapine throughout the fairest regions of Christendom. The anticipation of this dread event overshadowed Western Europe in the 13th century to such a degree, that even so enlightened a man as Koger Bacon recom- mends the study of geography with a view to ascertain the time when, and the quarter whence, the outbreak should come (Op. Maj. p. 142). The words of Ezekiel xxxix. 2, coupled with Rev. xx. 8, supplied the Scriptural basis for this theory. jEthicus (Hieronymus) was the leading authority among the Latins for the details connected with the interposition of Alexander the Great (caps. 32, 39). The same ideas were, liowever, widely spread among the Orientals, as we may gather xxiv INTEODUCTION. both from the notices in the Koran (xviii. 93 ; xxi. 96), and from the letter reputed to have been sent by Prester John to the Emperor Manuel Commenus (1143-1180), in which the incarcerated nations are enumerated by name (Baring-Gould Curious Myths, p. 40). The vividness of the belief is illustrated by the fact that an eastern Khalif, living in the early part of the 9th century, sent out an expedition to discover the ramparts of Gog and Magog ; the result of which is recorded by the Arabian geographer Edrisi (D'Anville Hist. Acad. Iiv- script. xxvi. 210-220, Wharton, Hist. Engl. Poetry ; Dissert. 1, p. 14, note e). From these circumstances, Gog and Magog, with the enclosing rampart, became a stock subject among mediaeval cartographers. 2. Classiml. — To this head we may refer the bulk of the names which occur in mediaeval maps. The classical geography is not that of Strabo or Ptolemy, but of Orosius, and the epitomists of Pliny, such as Solinus and Capella. The political divisions of Asia, Africa, and Southern Europe, are almost exclusively those of ancient times. The same may be said of the towns. Classical nomenclature extends even into Gaul and the British Isles, side by side with more modem designations. The names of mountain-ranges and rivers are naturally given in their classical garb, as Latin was still the language of litera- ture. The spots of special fame in classical literature live again in mediaeval maps. Troy and Carthage vie in importance with Eome and Jerusalem. The Labyrinth of Crete, the Colossus of Khodes, the Pillars of Hercules, the Oracles of Delphi and Ammon, Calypso — these are among the objects on which the attention fastened, apparently as though they were still existing. With this predilection for classical subjects, it is difficult to comprehend the astounding ignorance and carelessness of mediaeval cartographers. The delineation of Greece and the arrangement of its localities in the Hereford map are beyond all conception. Delphi is confounded with Delos ; Thermopylae is an inland range ; and Corinth stands wholly away from any symptom of its isthmus ! So again in other quarters — Patmos is transported into the Black Sea ; Gades is represented as a large island in the middle of the Straits of Gibraltar ; Calpe and Abyla change places, the former being transported to Africa ; the Syrtes are apparently placed inland ; the Paotolus flows into the Euxine,- and so forth. In one important particular the mediseval cartographer may be absolved from blame in respect to his erroneous representation. In most maps the Western Nile forms a conspicuous object. The idea to which these give expression is, that the mysterious river rose in Western Africa, near CONTENTS OF MEDIEVAL MAPS. xxv the ocean, and in a course broken by more than one subsidence, traversed the whole breadth of the continent, finally emerging as the Nile of Egypt. This is the view entertained by Orosius, i. 2, and Solinus, 32, § 2, both of whom in this matter follow Pliny, v. 51-53, in his report of Juba's explorations in Central Africa. It was not the first time that such an opinion had been entertained. Herodotus had heard of a great river in this quarter, which he surmised to be the upper course of the Nile (ii. 33). The Latin geographers were probably not aware that Ptolemy, and after him the Arabs, enter- tained more correct views as to the sources of the Nile. Marino Sanuto (1320) is the only one (as far as we know) of the Latin cartographers, who distinguishes the Nile from the river of Central Africa. 3. Legendary. — The legendary or mythical geography of the middle ages was partly derived from classical sources, and was partly of con- temporaneous origin. To the former head we may refer the monstrosi- ties in human form which were supposed to tenant the remote regions of the earth, particularly the interior of Africa, such as the men with four eyes, the men witb no proper mouths, the seiapodes who used their single foot as an umbrella, etc., etc. The belief in the existence of such creatures was justified by St. Augustine (De Civ. Dei, xvi. 8), and was hence generally accepted in the Christian church. The geo- graphical treatises of the middle ages, such as the Imago Mundi, give descriptions of these deformities, borrowed from Solinus and Pliny, and the Alexandrian Eomance contributed largely to popularise the belief by associating them with the achievements of Alexander the Great. To this latter source we may attribute various other particulars of a later date connected with the life of Alexander, such as the legend of the Trees of the Sun and Moon, introduced into the " Psalter " map and the Rudimentum Novitiorum map of the lith century (Santarem, iii. 239) ; and the parallel legend of the Dry Tree, introduced into the Hereford map, and into that of Bianco, 1436 (Santarem, iii. 380). Passing on to the myths of purely mediaeval origin, we may notice that in more than one instance they were productive of good, inas- much as they furnished incitements to geographical discovery. This was particularly the case with the beautiful legend of St. Brandan, which we shaU have occasion to notice in connection with the For- tunatse Insulse in the Hereford map. Suffice it here to say that St. Brandan was an Irish Monk of the 6th century, who undertook a voyage in search of the terrestrial Paradise, and after many adven- xxvi INTRODUCTION. tures found an island that corresponded in beauty and fertility with the pictures which the imagination drew of Paradise. The tale of his voyage became very popular in the 12th and following centuries, and no doubt was entertained as to the existence of such an island, appearing occasionally as a bright phantom in the distant horizon, but ever eluding the search of the mariner. Several expeditions were sent out by the Portuguese for the express purpose of discovering its position, and even so late as 1755 the name of the island is entered on a chart to the westward of Ferro. Whether the fancied glimpses of the island were the effect of pure imagination, or whether they arose from the natural phenomenon called the Fata Morgana, it is im- possible to decide. It may be surmised, however, that spurious etymology may have been at the bottom of the delusion ; one of the Fortunate Islands was known by the name Aprositus, and this, inter- preted as a Greek word, would mean the " unapproachable." * (For further particulars we refer our readers to Irving's Columbus, Append. No. XXV.) Just as the legend of St. Brandan led to maritime ex- ploration in the Western Ocean, so did the mystery that gathered round Prester John rouse an interest in respect to Central Asia. The first rumour of Prester John dates from the middle of the 12th century, when he was mentioned by the Bishop of Gabala. It is now tolerably well ascertained that the potentate referred to was the founder of the Kara Khitai empire, whose official title of Gurkhan may have been so pronounced as to be mistaken for the Greek form of the name John. The Prester John of the later half of the 12th century, of whom Eubruquis and Marco Polo speak, was another Kerait chief, whose proper name was Ung Khan (Yule's Marco Polo, i. 206, ffi). The cartographical notices of Prester John date from the early part of the 14th century. In the larger " Polychronicon " map, his empire is placed in lower Scythia, within the limits of Europe, but in the map of Marino Sanuto, in further India, which accords better with the historical notices. By a strange freak its locale was subsequently transferred from Central Asia to Abyssinia, where it is duly placed in the Borgia map (cire. 1400), in Bianco's (1436), and in Leardo's (1448); the map in the Pitti Palace at Florence (1417) being the only one of this period which retains him * To this part of the legend reference is made in the following passage from the 0(ia Imperialia, ii. 11 : — " Cunotis gratissima sed paucis nota, quae aliquando casu inventa, postea diu quaesita, non est reperta, ideoque dicitur perdita. Ad hanc tradunt Brandinum, virum sanctum, Oceani exploratorem, tandem devenisse." coisrTEisrTS or medieval maps. xx^a in his old quarters (Santarem, iii. 10, 195, 295, 333, 390, 436). We have finally to notice the legend of the Seven Sleepers, which appears in the Hereford map, and the legend of St. Patrick's Purgatory, which appears in the larger " Polychronicon " map ; neither of these, how- ever, exercised much influence on geographical study. 4. Contemporaneous. — From what has been already said, it may be inferred that the amount of contemporaneous geography in mediaeval maps comes within a small compass. In this respect, cartography did not keep pace with the age. The various historical annals, and even the geographical treatises, contrast favourably with maps in regard to accuracy and range of knowledge. Taking the Hereford map as a sample, we find in the whole of Asia only a solitary indication of advancement, in the use of the modern form Samarcand for the ancient Maracanda. In Africa not a single new name occurs. In the Mediterranean, the modern Palermo, instead of the ancient Panormus, is the only noticeable feature. In Europe there is naturally some advance. We meet with names unknown in ancient geography — the Eussians, Hungarians, Danes, Norway, the territorial subdivisions of France and Germany, the names of German towns on the Weser and the Elbe, and of places of ecclesiastical or political note, such as Compostella, in Spain, Mont St. Michel, in France, Martinsberg (Sabarria), in Hungary, Gran, in the same country, Augsburg, Prague, and others ; together with a fair sprinkling of names in the British Isles. But the omissions are striking. There is nothing to indicate any acquaintance with the commercial routes of the Venetians and Genoese ; nor yet with those of the Hanse towns, which had nevertheless attained to great power in the middle of the 1 3th century j nor, again, do we meet names specifically attributable to the Crusaders. It is almost as difficult to account for the insertion of some names as it is for the 'omission of others ; and the general impression conveyed to our minds is one of inaccuracy, carelessness, and ignorance. We have said that maps did did not keep pace with treatises, and we might support this by a comparison of the Hereford map with the somewhat earlier work of Koger Bacon, in whose Opus Majus we find mention of Damietta, Cairo (Kayr), the Volga (EthUia), Bagdad (Baldac), Turkey (Turkia), Esthonia, Livonia, Courland, Prussia, Tartars, Cathay, Prester John (pp. 151, 157, 168, 169, 170, 173), not to speak of many modern names of ancient places. The discoveries of Kubruquis, which were familiar to Bacon, are very imperfectly indicated in the maps of the xxviii - INTEODUCTION. 14th century. The true character of the Caspian Sea is first given in Marino Sanuto's map (1320), and in the same map we have notices of Cathay (Ghrna), and of the great Khan under the quaint title of Mag%%s Ganis. Similar entries also occur in the Chronieon map of the same date (Santarem iii. 151, 152). Bagdad first appears {we believe) in the Borgia map, and Cairo in Leardo's map (Santarem iii. 282, 388). § 12. A brief account of the sources whence mediaeval carto- graphers drew their materials may not be unacceptable to oiu: readers. We are able to discover these sources, partly from the statements of the cartographers themselves, and partly from the evidence furnished by the names and legends. A list of authorities which Higden professes to have used in the composition of his Poly- chronicon supplies some interesting information as to the literary appliances of the 14th century for historical and geogralphical studies. On the latter subject the authorities most in vogue were the follow- ing, which we have arranged in chronological order :■ — Pliny, a.d. 23-79. — The Historia Natiiralis of this author is the mine whence perhaps two-thirds of mediaeval geography has been either directly or indirectly derived. The original was not consulted so much as the compilations of Solinus, Marcian Capella, and others. We need give no description of a work so well known to scholars, and which falls within the domain of classical rather than mediaeval literature. PoMPONius Mela, a native of Spain, contemporaneous with Pliny, and the author of a treatise entitled De Situ Orbis, the earliest work in Latin literature devoted exclusively to geography. In this (i. 1.) we find the first notice of the opinion, which afterwards became so prevalent, as to an impassable zone intervening between our world and the " alter orbis " of the Antichthons in the temperate zone of the southern hemisphere. Antonini Itineeaeium. This work owes its designation to Antoninus Caracalla, in whose reign (a.d. 198-217) it was originally compiled, though it evidently underwent revisions down to the time of Diocletian (292-305). Its value as a topographical description of the Eoman Empire is incalculable. The authorship has been attributed to Julius Honorius, and others, but on no evidence. It may rather be regarded as an ofScial document, drawn up by various hands. In the middle ages copies of the Itinerary were bound up with the Cosmographia of jEthicus, under the title of "-(Ethicus cum Itinerariis AUTHOEITIES FOR MEDIEVAL GEOGEAPHY. xxix suis." There is an excellent critical edition of this work by Parthey and Finder (Berlin, 1848). SoLlNUS, the author of a work entitled Collectanea Berum Memora- bilium. Of his personal history nothing is known ; but he probably lived about the middle of the third century after Christ. The title of his work sufficiently bespeaks its contents. It is a description of the most noteworthy places and objects in the world, compUed chiefly from Pliny, but in part also from Mela, and methodically arranged in geographical order. No work was more popular in the middle ages. Mommsen's edition (Berlin, 1864,) is serviceable for critical purposes. Oeosius, the author of a historical work entitled Historiarum adr- versus Paganos libri VII., but more commonly known as the Ormista, which probably originated in the abbreviation. Or. m. ist,, for Orosii mundi historia. Orosius was a native of Spain, and flourished in the early part of the fifth century. He was personally acquainted with Augustine and Jerome, and he wrote his history in the interests of Christianity, to disprove the assertion that the miseries under which the world then suffered were peculiar to that age, and consequently the result (as the Pagans alleged) of the Christian religion. He devotes the second chapter of his first book to a geographical description of the world. The popularity of the work in the middle ages is attested by the fact that King Alfred translated it into Anglo-Saxon. The geographical chapter forms part of the Oosmographia ^thici, and wag widely studied. The Cambridge " Imago Mundi " map, and the Here- ford map, illustrate his views, the latter expressly stating as much. Macrobitjs, " the grammarian," a writer of the early part of the fifth century, one of whose works, entitled Commentarius ex Cicerone in Somnium Scipionis, consists of a treatise on cosmology, which was largely studied in the middle ages, and which contributed much to establish the view that the torrid zone was impassable. Priscian, the famous grammarian, who flourished about the middle of the 5th century, the author of a Latin translation of the Periegesis of Dionysius, which was used as a geographical text-book for school- boys in the middle ages. The date of Dionysius himself is uncertain, some placing him in the first century after Christ, others as late as the 4th century. The poem is written in hexameter verses, and contains a description of the world as then known. Both the original work and Priscian's translation will be found in MuUer's Oeog. Gn-mci Min., vol. ii. Maeoianus Capella, a native of Carthage, who flourished pro- XXX INTEODUCTION. bably towards the close of the 5th century, the author of an encyclo- psedic work in nine books, of which the sixth, nominally devoted to geometry, contains an abstract of geography. The work was largely used in the middle ages. IsiDOKUs, sumamed Hispalensis {i. e. of Seville), to distinguish him from others of the same name, Bishop of Seville from 600 to his death in 636 — a man of vast erudition for the age in which he lived. He left behind him a large number of works, the most important of which is an encyclopaedic compilation entitled Originum sive Etymologi- arum lihri XX., of which the fourteenth contains a description of the world, with sundry etymological notices. jEthici Oosmogeaphia. — Two wholly distinct works pass under this title, and the questions connected with their origin and contents have given rise to a large amount of erudite discussion, which has not resulted in unanimity. One of these works has been long familiar to the learned : it consists of two treatises, the first of which, entitled " Expositio," is identical with the Excerpta JuUi Honorii, while the other, entitled Alia totius orhis descriptio, is identical vsdth the geo- graphical chapter in the work of Orosius, to which we have already referred. Julius Honorius, the orator, may be identified with Julius the orator, of whom Oassiodorus makes mention in Div. Led. c. 25, as having written a geographical work answering to the description of the one before us. In this case he must have lived before the close of the 5 th century after Christ. His manual describes the world according to its quaAripartita continentia, the materials being arranged on the principle of a fourfold division, corresponding to the four oceans. It consists of a diy list of names of seas, mountains, rivers, towns, &c., the rivers alone being described at any length. The second treatise "Alia descriptio " adopts the mode of description according to its tripartita continentia, the three continents being made the basis of the arrangement. Whether ^Ethicus was the true name of the compilei- of the Gosmographia, remains uncertain : nothing, at aU events, is known of his history. We pass on to the other work, entitled " Mthici Istrici Gosmographia" This professes to be a record of the travels of a " philosopher " named iEthious, a native of Istria, whose own work, written in the Greek language, is non-existent, but of which a breviarium or abstract was made in Latin by one Hieronymus, who is entitled a " presbyter." One of the questions that has arisen concerns this abbreviator — whether he is to be identified with St. Jerome 1 If so, the treatise must at all events have been in existence at the end of AUTHORITIES FOR MEDIEVAL GEOGRAPHY, xxxi the 4th century of our era. It has indeed been argued, from internal evidence, that the travels took place towards the end of the 3rd century. The identification of Hieronymus with St. Jerome is, however, open to much doubt ; and there are those who regard the whole treatise as a mediseval compiLation dating from the 8th century, to which period existing manuscripts carry us back. To give even a rlsum$ of the arguments pro and con would carry us far beyond our limits. We must refer those interested in the question to the elaborate disquisitions of Pertz (De Cosm. Ethici., Berlin, 1853), Wuttke (Die Kosm. des Istrici Aithicos, Leipzig, 1854), and D'Avezac (MSm. Acad, des Inscr., Paris, 1852), or to the more concise Epilogue on the subject in Lelewel's Geograpliie, vol. iv. The treatise was much studied in the middle ages, and is several times quoted by Eoger Bacon in his Opus Majus. The author of the Hereford map quotes jEthicus by name in regard to the isle Sirtinice, and also borrows largely from him in his description of the peoples of northern Asia. In addition to the above we add, for the sake of completeness, notices of two geographical writers whose works do not appear to have been much known to mediaeval writers, — viz., Oosmas, and the anony- mous Kavenna geographer. CosMAS, surnamed " Indico-pleustes," from his fame as a navigator of the seas connected with the Indian Ocean, was an Egyptian monk of the early part of the 6th century. He composed a work entitled Topographia Christiana, the object of which was to overthrow the re- ceived opinion as to the spherical form of the earth, and to prove that it was really a flat plain of rectangular shape, with a length from E. to W. twice as great as its breadth from K to S., and surrounded by the ocean, beyond which lay the Terrestrial Paradise and the lands which the antediluvian population had occupied. His work contains some geographical information, amid a large amount of useless matter. The treatise has been published by Montfaucon in his Collect. Nova Patnim, vol. ii. Geogeaphus Eavennas. The writer described as the Kavenna Geographer (his work being anonymous), was a so-called " philosopher " of the 7th century, residing at Eavenna. His manual contains lists of names, with occasional notes interspersed, and with a general preface, describing the circuit of the world according to the position of the sun at each hour of the day and night. It is confusedly drawn up, and abounds with errors both of geography and orthography. His cosmo- graphical views appear in part to have resembled those of Oosmas, xxxii INTEODUCTION. for he thought the ocean was bounded on its outer rim by lofty mountains. He differed however from Cosmas in regard to the position of the Terrestrial Paradise, which he believed to be in the extreme east, beyond India, from which it was separated by a vast desert. There is a modern edition of this work by Parthey and Finder (Berlin, 1860). § 13. The geographical treatises of the middle ages are little else than r^chauff^s of the works enumerated in the foregoing section. Geography was treated as a branch of cosmology, and it is rarely that we meet with any work devoted expressly to descriptive geography. The following authors and works may be cited in connection with the history of geography in our own country : — Beda (672-735), whose cosmologioal views are expressed in the treatises, De mundi ccelestis terraeqiie constitutione, and De elementis Philosophias. DiCTJiL, an Irish monk, in the early part of the 9th century, author of a manual entitled D& Mensura Orbis TerrcB, chiefly compiled from Pliny, but containing some contemporaneous information as to Sjrria, Egypt, and Iceland. Imago Mundi, a treatise composed in the 12th century, and generally attributed to Honorius of Autun, but also to Anselm of Canterbury, with whose works it is printed (Cologne, 1573), and again to Henry of Huntingdon. In the copy belonging to C. C. C, Cambridge, the authorship is claimed by one Henry, a canon of Maintz. No work was more popular in the middle ages. A rythmical version of it in French, by Gautier of Metz (1245), was largely used. The geographical information is comprised in caps. 8-20 of Book i. The Alexandrian Eomance, a poem which enjoyed great popu- larity throughout Europe in the 13th and 14th centuries, based upon the work of the pseudo-Callisthenes, which made its appearance towards the close of the 4th century. The romance appears to have assumed its present form in Persia, whence it was introduced into Europe by means of a translation made by a Greek of Constantinople in 1070. A Latin version is noticed by Gfraldus Cambrensis. About 1200 a French version appeared, of which there is a splendid copy in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. The English version was made from the French. It is given in Weber's Metrical Romances, vol. i. KoGBE Bacon (1214-1292), a man far in advance of his age in geography as in other matters. In his Opus Majus, he classes MEDIEVAL GEOGEAPHICAL WEITEES. xxxiii geography under mathematics, and gives a tolerably full description of the world, extending from p. 134 to p. 177 of Jebb's edition (Venice, 1750). Geevase of Tilbury, a monk of the 13th century, author of the Otia Imperialia, a work addressed to Otho IV., Emperor of Ger- many, with whom Gervase stood in such high favour that he was appointed Marshal of the kingdom of Aries (Biocf. Brit. Liter., ii. 285). His work consists of three parts {Decisiones), of which the second con- tains a geographical sketch in caps. 2-12, and 21-23. This work wiU be found in Leibnitzii Script. Ber. Brims, i. 881-1004 (Hanover, 1710). Eaiph Higden (died 1363), a monk of Chester, author of the Polychronicon, the first book of which (caps. 5-34) contains a tolerably full description of the world. Vv''e may further mention the following writers as illustrating in various ways the subjects of mediaeval geography : — Pauius Diaconus, the latter part of the 8th century, who gives a description of Italy in his work De Gestis Langobardorum, which may be found in Muratori's Ital. Ber. Script, vol. i. Rabanus Maxtetts, 9th century, the author of an encyclopaedic work, De Universo, composed at Maintz, in 22 books, of which the eleventh and two following bear upon geography. Adam of Bremen, 11th century, whose treatise De Situ Daniae is our chief authority for the geography of northern Europe. It may be found in Lindenborg's Script. Ber. Germ. Septentr. (Frankfurt, 1630). Maeino Sanuto, 14th century, the author of the Seereta Fidelium Crucis, to which is appended a brief geographical mianual, Ulustrative of his map. It may be found in Bongarsius's Gesta Dei per Francos (Hanover, 1611). The illustrated Natural History of mediaeval maps — a department in which the Hereford map is particularly rich — was probably derived from the Bestiaeia and Heebaeia of that period. Several of these works survive in our public libraries, and are interesting for their spirited and frequently very exact delineations of animals and plants. The descriptions are founded (as the references of the authors show) on the treatise of an unknown writer of great antiquity, cited under the name of Physiologus, to whom reference is made by Chaucer [Cant. Tales, 15,277). Whether this is a generic term for "natural- xxxiv INTEODUCTION. ist," or whether it indicates any particular person, is uncertain. Some authorities are disposed to identify " Physiologus " with Chry- sostom, others with Origen. Specimens of Bestiaries are published in the splendid work of MM. Oahier and Martin, Melanges d' ArcUologie, vol. ii. Bestiaries were occasionally composed in modern languages ; a French poem on this subject, by Philippe de Thoun, may be found in Wright's Mediceval Popular Science, and an English Bestiary in the Early Text Society's series, 1872, edited by Mr. Morris. § 14. Our concluding section will be devoted to an enumeration of the mediaeval Mappce Mundi existing in this country, together with rough notes on their character and contents, designed partly to Ulus- trate the bearing of these maps on the composition of the Hereford map, and partly to assist persons in the inspection of the maps them- selves. It wUl be seen that England is comparatively rich in art- treasures of this nature ; she possesses certainly some of the most interesting maps yet known, such as the Hereford map, the Anglo- Saxon map, the Cambridge " Imago Mundi " map, the beautiful miniature " Psalter " map, and the larger " Polychronicon " map. We place them as nearly as possible in their chronological order. 1 . Anglo-Saxon map of the 10th century, prefixed to a copy of Priscian's Periegesis, in the Library of the British Museum. (Cotton MS. Tib. B. V.) This highly interesting map is 84 inches long and 7 inches hroad, and of rectangular shape. Jerusalem stands considerably away from the centre of the map towards the south, in consequence of the Mediterranean Sea expanding in that dii'ection. In the B. Taprobane (Ceylon) occupies the place usually assigned to the terrestrial Paradise, at the head of the map ; at the opposite point, in the W., stand Gades and the Pillars of Hercules. The ocean is more varied in its outline than is usual in mediseval maps ; it is for the most part coloured gvey, but the Eastern (Indian) Ocean with the Persian Gulf and the Eed Sea are painted red, in conformity with the ancient name, Eryilwmum Mare. The Nile is drawn in three section,?, the highest named Dora, terminatiug in a submergence "hie arenis mergitur," the middle and longer section rising in a lake and having a similar termination, and the lower section representing the Nile of Egypt. Names are not always affixed to the objects delineated. This is particularly the case with the mountain ranges and rivers of 'Europe, with regard to which it may be said that the few names that do occur are (with the exception of Tanais flmi. and the Monies Riphei) a source of pei-plexity, the others being Yparur, probably intended for the Hypanis (Boug), DanuUus fluvius, which is assigned not to the Danube, but to a, river more in the position of the Hebrus, and Barciminacius assigned to a river in Spain. The pictorial illustrations consist of a spirited picture of a lion in the N.E. of Asia, with the legend Hie abundant Uones ; Mons Aureus, the MEDIEVAL MAPS. xxxv " golden mouutam,'' where the pigmies fought with the cranes for the precious metal ; the Ark (Area Noe) resting on the mountains of Armenia ; the Pillars of Hercules, and the following towns : In Asia — Babylon, Cesarea Philippi, Vociisa civitas near the Black Sea, Tharso Cilicie (Tarsus), Sierusalem, a town near the Nile with a name which reads like Gertie, and Alexandria in Egypt, which was included in Asia. In Africa — Cartago Magna, and another town unnamed. In Europe — Roma, Salerna, Luna, Taca (? Luca), Padua (the name is also read Pavia), Ravenna, Oonstantinopolis. In Britain — Lundona and Wintona ; and in Ireland a town with an undecipherable name, probably intended for Armagh. The majority of the names entered can be readily recognised as belonging either to Biblical or classical geography. The folloiiring points are worthy of notice as characteristic of medissval geography : — " Gog et Magog," to the west of the Caspian Sea, which is represented as a gulf of the Northern Ocean ; Turchi, ad- jacent to Gog and Magog ; Gryphorum gens ; Bulgari, between the Danube and the Northern Ocean; " Dacia ubi et Gothia" for Denmark, the name Daci being commonly used for Dani ; (?) Sclavi (the name is read Selacii) ; together "with some names in Northern Europe which are peculiar to this map, viz. : — (?) Slesne (per- haps intended for Saxony), Nerocorren (in the position of Norway), and Sud hryttas (" South Britons ") for Brittany. Iceland is also introduced under the name Island. Hungary is described as Eunnorum gens. We may further notice the volcano in Africa, near the top of the map, " Hie dieitur esse mons semper ar- dens; " the Cinocephales, " dog-headed " men, in the S.W. of Africa (in the Hereford map they are placed in Northern Europe) ; and Mmis Mespenis, near the ocean. Many of the inscriptions are diEBcidt to decipher. For the assistance of those who have the opportunity of referring to the original map, or to the copies of it in the atlases of Jomard, Santarem, and Lelewel, or again to the description of it by Santarem (ii. 47—76), we make the following suggestions — The inscription on Taprobane should be read " habet X eimtates ; Ms in anno messes (Santarem reads " mense ") etfruges. The name near the Persian Gulf we suspect to be Eudemon (i.e. Arabia Felix), as in the Hereford map, and not " Cademoci." Mons Fasga probably means Pisgah. " Voeusa civitas," near the Black Sea, reminds us of "Decusa civitas" in the Imago Mundi and Hereford maps. For "Mocipia" we read Jsauria. The entries near the head of the map Mons Farthan, Bilon fluvius, and Nilluit we cannot explain ; the second applies to the Ganges, and may be intended for " Pison ; " nor can we account for the entry " PentapoUs,^' with the adjacent " C'ertie," near the Nile, nor yet for the name " Philefica" (perhaps " PhiUstia ") in the same quarter. The inscription in Africa, near Carthage, should be read by the light of Isidore, Orig. xiv. 5, § 8 : — " Zeugis regio ipsa est et (vera) Africa .... sed nlteriora bestiis et serpentibus plena," though we can- not make out the whole of these words on the map : Santarem reads " Fruges regionis ipsas et Africanorum fores leo abripit bellum serpentibus plena." In the same part of the map we suggest Musita, as in the Hereford map, as the name of the river near Carthage, southward of the middle Nile ; " Eic oberrant Gangines JSthiopes," as in Orosius, instead of "Hie aberrant Hesperides ..Ethiopes," as in Santarem ; and in the same quarter " Mons Climax," for his " Mons Denax," in ac- cordance with the statement of Oros. i. 2 ; and for "Calcarsum," which Santarem cannot identify, Calearsxt-s, the lake mentioned by Orosius as on the border of Asia and Africa. We cannot decipher the inscription in the W. of Africa, near the ocean, xxxvi INTRODUCTION". tut we suspect it refers to Atlas (not "Caiiles," as Sautarem reads it), and that it alludes to the legend told by Solinus, 24, § 10 " Silet per diem," etc. A little higher up is an inscription taken from Orosius " Gentes Aulolum contingentes (or perhaps " pervagantes ") usque ad Ooeanum.'' In Europe the name Napersiha, near the Euxine, is puzzling ; there is an undecipherable inscription on Iceland, and a name on Britain, " March pergus," "which we cannot explain. 2. A map of the 12th century in a MS. (No. xvii.) dated 1110, in the Library of St. John's Coll., Oxford. This is a circular map, with a diameter of about 6^ inches. It is of a very imperfect character, and exhibits wonderful mistakes ; but it has its peculiar features, which entitle it to notice. It is constructed on the principle of the T in the O (see p. xv.) ; and the centrality of Jerusalem is conspicuously displayed by inscribing Hierusalem in large letters on the horizontal line of the T. But the cartographer did not apparently regard the upright line as indicating the division between Europe and Africa ; for he has drawn the name Europe on both sides of the line, and has relegated Africa to the lower comer of the map. The terrestrial Paradise does not appear. The entries of names are scanty, and these mostly Biblical. The distribution of the human race among the sons of Noah is indicated in the following inscriptions, the number 72 being substituted for the 70 of the Mosaic table, as in the Otia Imp. of Gervase of Tilbury, ii. 1 : — " Quod (? quo sc. Asia Major) sunt septuaginta due gente arte." " De Sem xxvii." " De Jafeth XV. " ' 'De Cham gentes xxx. " Armenia, with Noah's ark, is transposed to the south of Asia. Achaia (in the position of India), Csesarea, Ephesus, and Athens, are noticed in connection with the labours of St. Andrew, St. Peter, St. John, and St. Paul respectively. ' ' Cimtas refugii " is an entry peculiar to this map. The only names that occur in Europe are Terra Macedonie, Campania, Moma, Italia, Tuscia (Tuscany), TiMs (Tiberis) fl., Mons Ethna, Sicilia, and Kartago Magna, whether in mistake for Carthago Nova we cannot say. Con- staniinopoUs is placed in Asia. Britannia, Eihernia, and TMile, appear in the far north. 3. A map of the 12th century, in the Library of Corpus Christi CoU., Cambridge, in a MS. (No. lxvi.) containing the Imago Mundi, and some historical tracts, by Henry, a Canon of Maintz. This map has a special interest for us in consequence of the remarkable ooui- cidences between it and the Hereford map. The authorship ;of the work is claimed in the prologue by Henry, a Canon of the Cathedral Church of Mamtz, who dedicates it to the Emperor Henry V., 1106-1125, the husband of Matilda, daughter of Henry I. of England, and gives as the date of his work the year in which the mamage of the Emperor took place, — 1110. We are unable to discover any clue as to who this Canon of Maintz may have been. There is no doubt, however, that the MS. was written by an English hand, probably one of the Dur- ham ecclesiastics, and that it was owned by an English monastery, for at the head of the map we read " Liber Sancte Marie de Salleia " — the Latinised form of Sawley, in Craven, Yorkshire (Dugdale, Monasticon, v. 510), From the character of the handwriting the MS. would be assigned to the latter part of the 12th MEDIEVAL MAPS. xxxvii century, — say 1180. Whether the Canon of Maintz intended to claim the author- ship of the treatise "Imago Mundi," or simply the general composition of the whole work (his words are "hunc librum edit"), is more than we are able to say. It has been already mentioned that tlieimag'O Mundi is assigned most commonly to Honorius, but also to Anselm and Henry of Huntingdon. The map is of oval form, 9 inches long by 7^ broad, the spandrels between the curves and the. angles of the page being occupied by figures of angels. The execution of the map is very good — the outlines varied and firmly drawn, and the writing, though small, particularly neat and legible. The pictorial illustrations are not numerous. The ocean forms a surrounding belt, with a very varied out- line in the north of Europe and Asia : and herein lies one of the most marked coincidences between this and the Hereford map, particularly as regards the posi- tion and the outline of the Baltic Sea, the Scandinavian peninsula, the country of the Cinocephales, the peninsula of the Hyperboreans, the Caspian Sea, the penin- sula of Gog and Magog, and the further coast-line to Paradise ; together with the islands adjacent to these coasts, viz. Taraoonta, Rapharrica, the two islands Bizse and Crisolida (which are drawn, but not named), Abalcia, and Tylos. So again, southward of Paradise, the position and outline of the Persian Gulf and Red Sea, with the island Ceylon between them. In short, the whole outline of the world, including the British Isles and the adjacent portions of Europe, is precisely the same in the two maps. The Mediterranean Sea forms, as usual, the most conspicuous object in the map. The peninsular form of Italy is more developed in this than in the Hereford map ; but there is the same widening of the sea at its eastern extremity, the same projecting horns to represent the angles of the Levant, the same elongation of the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov (Mare Cimmerium), and the same approximation of it to the Northern Ocean. The Nile presents another object of comparison. The author of the Cambridge map adopts the theory of the Western Nile, which we have already noticed in the Anglo-Saxon map, and draws it in three sections, — a short one, springing from a lake (Nitidis Locus) near the Atlantic ; then a long stretch commencing with a large lake {Lacus Maximus), and nmning parallel to the Southern Ocean to a second point of submergence (Hie mergitur) ; and, lastly, the Nile of Egypt, spring- ing from a fount, Fiatus fons Niti, near the Red Sea, penetrating the Monies Nibim, and flowing to a S. W. direction to the Mediterranean. The exact correspondence of the Hereford map in these respects, extending in some cases to the inscriptions, e.g. " Fialus fons Nili, " is very noteworthy. But there is one featiire which is, as far as we know, strictly peciiliar to these two maps, namely, the introduction of the lake and river of Triton as an affluent of the middle section of the Nile, fiowtng in a S.W. direction from the neighbourhood to which the Arce PhUenorum are transported. There is in this respect a community of error in the two maps, possibly due to the mistake in reference to the position of the Arte Philenorum, which ought to have been placed on the Mediterranean Sea, and which were not so very far remote from a river of Triton flowing into that sea. In the delineation of the mountain chain, the author of the Cambridge map has followed Orosius in drawing a long chain of mountains in the interior of Africa. These form a conspicuous featm-e in the Hereford map, and are there named Euzaree Montes. These are followed, more E., by the Monies Ethiopie. xxxviii IlSrTRODUCTION. Mount Atlas (Mons Athlas) is represented "by a height near the Atlantic, and further S. is Mons Hesperus, which formed the promontory Hesperium Cornu, or Hesperuceras, on the Atlantic coast. We may further advert to the following features : — The range in the B. of Asia, answering to the Osco and Caucasus of the Hereford map, the mountam-helt girding Bactria, the position of the Caspise Portse, and the line of mountains in Syria, including Lebanon, — in all which the two maps are in accordance. The rivers of Asia form another peculiar feature. Proceeding eastward from the Persian Gulf we meet with the Indus, the Eydaspes, the Acesines, and the Hypanis, the three last being in reality rivers of the Punjab, which ought to join the Indus, hut which are represented as quite independent of it. Then, on the other side of Paradise, towards the N., comes the Ganges, flowing in a due easterly direction, and then, in order, the Oetogorra, the Acheron, the Oxus, flow- ing into the Caspian, and two rivers, not named, on the western side of that sea. In these respects there is a close correspondence with the Hereford map, as also in the mode of depicting the Jordan as made up of two streams, named Jor and Dan; and again in the wonderful blunder of making the Pactolus run into the Euxine. The Euphrates and Tigris are duly entered, together with a river join- ing their upper courses, named the Cdba, perhaps intended for the Chaboras or Chebar. The boundary between Asia and Africa is fixed at a range W. of the Nile, where we read the inscription Terminus Asie et Afnce. The range is named Caiabaihmus, which is thus transferred from the coast of Marmarica to the inte- rior. The range is not named In the Hereford map, but it is represented, and with a similar inscription, referring to the boundary of the continents. The limit between Asia and Europe is not specified, and in this omission the Hereford map is in accordance. We further draw attention to these additional coincidences : In Asia — Enos, a town just outside the gate of Paradise ; the Aurei Monies, already noticed in the Anglo-Saxon map ; Cotonare Portus, on the Indian Ocean ; Alons Sephar, also on the Indian Ocean, near the Persian Gulf ; the towns Pages, JVisa, Camite (?Lamit!e, as in Hereford map, "principes Persidis"); Gog et Magog gens im- munda; gens Hyperhorea, sine morio et discordia; Apteroplion (the Pterophoron of Solinus, XV. § 20), foUowed by an undecipherable inscription, in which the word " Rifei " may be detected, in reference to its position " sub Eiphieis mon- tibus," as in the Hereford map ; hie habitant Griff e homines neguissimi ; Oynoce- phales, adjacent to the Northern Ocean ; Amazonia; Caspie Porte; Rinocorwra, on the border of Egypt ; Mons Ardens, in the E. angle of Africa, as in the Anglo- Saxon map ; Monies Nibie, in the course of the Nile, which is represented as pass- ing through the Porte Nibie; Mero'e insula, depicted as a complete island between two arms of the Nile ; Canopus, depicted as an island, and Mene, placed opposite the mouth of the Nile, as described in Imago Munfii ; the Trogodite, near the Middle Nile ; the river Lethon, in Cyrenaica, introduced in consequence of the effects attributed to its waters of producing forgetfulness ; Ippone Regius, the see of St. Augustine ; and Septem Montes (as in A. S. map), to which an undue im- portance was attached by medieval geographers. In Europe — Gallacus and Danus, tributaries of the Bbro, the former answering to the Gallego, the latter a pecu- liar name, unknown in ancient geography; Auxona fl., in the position of the MEDIEVAL MAPS. xxxix Somme, or perhaps of the Schelde, but the name is that of the Aisne, a tributary of the Seine ; Mare Venetum, the upper part of the Adriatic ; Cardia, introduced on pseudo-etymological grounds, as exhibited in the Hereford map, its site being shaped like a heart; Retia Major and Minor, the classical divisions being E. Prima and Secunda ; Saharria S. Martini [i. e. ' ' Sabarria, the birthplace of St. Martin"); Dacia et Russia; Sarmathce,'ia the position of Bohemia, or perhaps Hungary ; Sinus Germaniens, (Baltic Sea) ; Saxonia (Saxony) ; Terminus Banc- rum et Saxonmn, in the same position as in the Hereford map; and Noreya (Norway). Islands. — Britannia and Sibernia, drawn, but not named, the latter elongated towards Spain, in accordance with Orosius's desoi'iption ; the Orcades, also un- named ; (?) Island (Iceland) ; Ganzmu, near Norway, a very peculiar name, for which we cannot account ; in the Hereford map it is placed in Norway itself as a mountain; Terraconta, Rapharrica, and Abalcia, three islands mentioned in .^hicus ; Tylos, near Paradise; and Tapbana {= Taprobane or Ceylon), near the Persian Gulf. In the Mediterranean, Cqnopus and Mene, already noticed, and Pathmos, placed by itself at the head of the arm of the sea near Syria, as though to indicate the completeness of the banishment to which St. John was condemned. The following objects are pictorially figured ; and here, again, the coincidences with the Hereford map are striking : — In Africa, the basilisk, as a bird seated in the angle between the Triton and the Nile ; Arse Philenorum as three artificial altars in the interior of Africa, though they were really sandhills on the shore of the Mediterranean ; the temple of Jupiter Ammon as a, building of horse-shoe form ; the Monasteries of St. Antonine in the Ethiopian desert, near the subsidence of the middle Nile ; the Pyramids as a bam-like structure, in strict accordance with their mediseval designation, " Horrea Josephi ; " and the pepper forest (" Siha Piperis "), near the Eed Sea. In Asia, the rampart closing the peninsula, to which Gog and Magog were relegated, consisting of a wall and altars. In Europe, the church of Santiago in Spain, and connected with it a roughly drawn Pharos, evidently intended for the Perona {SI Padron) of the Hereford map. We have a few indications of contemporaneous geography in this map, such as Roem, as an abbreviated form of Eotomagum (Eouen), Parisiis, and Pictavis, in France ; in Germany, Saxonia, Sa/xones, Frisones, and Magontia (Maintz), which, oddly enough, is transported from the Ehine to the Moselle ; in Scandinavia, Noreya ; and Pisa in Italy. The map is described by Santarem in an appendix to vol. iii. pp. 463-498. Some of his readings admit of emendation, probably from the circumstance that he worked! from a copy and not from the original. We suggest Tuscia for "Fosca;" Bruttii, for"Brucis;" S. Martini, for "Sojaram," the words to be attached to Sabarria, which by the way we identify with Martinsberg, rather than with Stein-am-Anger ; Mosella, for "Bassel;" Crisoroas, for "Emsoruas;" Cotonare, for "Conconare;" Sephar, for "Schig;'' Msa,foT "TJsa;" Oamite, for "Chayrce; " Deserta, for "Slyota ;" Tednus (= Cydnus), for "Temus;" Antiochia,ioT " Ania. ;" Ardens, for"Aroeni;" hicmergitur, for "hicnigritia;'' Perchenissa ( ? = Proconnesus), for " Polsemilsei ; " and Oanamu, for " Ganimur." xl INTEODUCTION". 4. Map of the 12th century, in a MS. in the British Museum (Add. No. 11,695), containing a commentary on the Apocalypse. This map -was executed in Spain, and differs in many material points from the other maps entered on our list. In the printed catalogue of the British Museum it is stated that it exhibits the ideas of the Arabian geographers. In what respects it does so we are unable to explain ; the style of illustration and the general execution of the map are undoubtedly peculiar : but we do not perceive in the geographical features anything that seems to us distinctively Arabian. The map is of nearly rectangular form, the angles being rounded off : its length from N. to S. is 18 inches ; and its breadth 15 inches. The east is placed at the head. Jerusalem is considerably E. of the centre. Paradise, with the figures of Adam and Eve, is drawn on a larger scale than usual. The Mediterranean is represented by an upright band, containing islands, and from its upper end an ann projects at right angles to the northern ocean, to form a division between Asia and Europe. A second arm diverges from this, in its mid course, towards the W., thus forming a kind of island or peninsula, in which stand the inscriptions " Monies Mifei," and Gotia unde GoUi. The Nile rises near Atlas, and flows in a con- tinuous stream to the Mediterranean, which it reaches by a sharp curve in its lower course. The Mare Rubrum is distinguished from the Southern Ocean, and is represented as a belt lying under the torrid zone, and forming a separation between our world and that of the Antichthons, on which is inscribed Desertwm terra mcina soli ah a/rdore incognitum nobis. The map is described by Santarem (ii. 107-126.) The entries of names are comparatively few, and belong almost exclusively to ancient geography. The names of the mountains are in some cases peculiar, e.g. Mons Aguilo in N.E. Asia; Mons Sauceranus in eastern Asia ; duo Alpes contrarii sibi in Western Africa, whether intended for the Pillars of Hercules, we cannot say : " Alpes " is clearly used as a generic term for mountains, as in the ease of Alpes Galliarum. With the exception of the Nile, no rivers are entered ; we doubt Sautarem's reading of a name in Spain as iatended for " Fluvius Italicus : " it looks more like laimus. The names Spania and Olisihona (Lisbon) are noticeable : so also the mention of the Bosphorani (Bisforiani), perhaps borrowed from the Ravenna geographer; Tantutos (the Isle of Thanet) ; and the notice of the Phcenix (hie abee fenix) in Arabia. 5, 6. Two maps of the middle of the 13th century, in MSS. of the " Flores Historiarum " of Matthew Paris ; one of them in the British Museum (MSS. Cotton, Nero, D. v.), the other in the Library of Corpus Ohristi OoU., Cambridge. These two maps are very similar to each other, but not (we believe) absolutely identical. They are roughly drawn, of quadrangular shape, 14 laches long by 94 broad, the same size as the leaf of the MS., the edge of which represents the line of the ocean. The most interesting feature in these maps is the inscription, to which we have already made reference (p. xviii.), in coimection with the shape of mediaeval maps, and which brings to light the circumstance that there was a map MEDIEVAL MAPS. xli publicly exhibited (as we may suppose) in the King's Exchequer at Westminster. It further records the existence of three other maps, which have perished, viz. : — the map of Eobert of Melkely, the map of Waltham Abbey, and the map of Matthew Paris. The Latin of the inscription is somewhat obscure, but we hope we are right iu supposing that the map before us is not the one which is referred to as "in ordine Matthaei de Parisio." The concluding sentences are foimded, as already stated, on a passage in Macrobius. The inscription runs thus : — " Sum- matim facta est dispositio Mappa Mundi Magistri Eob. de Melkeleia et Mappa Mundi de Waltham. Mappa Mundi domini regis quod est In camera sua apud Westmonasterium flguratur in ordine Matthei de Parisio. Verissimum autem figuratur in eodem ordine quod est quasi clamis extensa. Talis est scena nostre partis habitabilis secundum pHlosophos scilicet quarta pars terre qui est triangularis fere : corpus autem terre sperioum est." ' In the delineation of physical features, the chief peculiarity is the broad arm which projects westward from the Euxine Sea, and which seems intended for the Danube. The Palus Mseotis is singularly represented by two lakes, entitled Meotis PaZudes inferiores, near the Northern Ocean, iato which they discharge their surplus waters by a river. Numerous rivers are entered in Europe, but the only names that occur are Rodanus (Rhone), Danuhiws, assigned to a river flowing into the Atlantic, and Aple, probably intended for the Albis or Elbe. The various por- tions of the Mediterranean are named, viz. : — Mare Tyrrhenv/m; M. Adriaticwm, assigned to what we should be disposed to regard as the Ionian Sea ; M. Vene- torwm, at the head of the Adriatic ; and M. Grecmn (the JSgaan). The maps contain numerous entries that savour of contemporaneous geography, such as Mwmgaria Major and Bungaria Minor, Polonia (Poland), Austria, Saseoniat Bavaria, Theutonia, Thmmgia, Alemania, Francia, FUmd/ria, Burgundda, Brittannia (Britanny), Normannia, Braiantia and Braibe (duplicate entries for Brabant), Hollandia twice over, Dacia (Denmark), and Suesoia (Sweden), together with the towns Cokmia (Cologne), Janua (Genoa), Bisa, Venetia, Bononia (Bologna), and Mediolanvm (Milan). Two names in Northern Europe, one of which, between Braibe and HoUandia, reads like Swen, the other between Bra- bantia and Suescia, like Iplandia or Splandia, we cannot explain. We may further notice Gades Herculis, written partly in Europe and partly in Africa — Gades being here used as eqidvalent to Coliunnse ; Pontos insula uM Ovidius exul, represented as an island in the Euxine, the true spot of the poet's exile being Tomi in Mcesia ; Arimaspi et Qryphes, in the extreme N., the former being the one-eyed people commemorated by Herodotus, iv. 27, as contending with the griffins for gold ; CoUhbs, represented as an island in the Euxine ; Path- mos, in" a horn of the Mediterranean ; and JerapoUs (Hierapolis), with the notice Hie predicamt PMippus Apostolus, that being the reputed place of his later labours, and of his burial. The map is described by Santarem, ii. 254-272. 7. A map of the 13th century, in a Psalter in the Library of the British Museum (MS. No. 6806). This map is remarkable for its artistic execution. From the character of the handwriting it may be assigned to the latter part of the 13th century. It is of a circular form, vrith a diameter of about 3^ inches. Its existence does not appear xlii INTEODUCTION. to have teen known to the Continental geographers, as we find no notice of it either m gantarem's or Jomard's works : for this reason it has heen selected as the frontispiece of the present essay. The illnistrations of the map deserve special notice. Above the map there is a half figure of our Saviour, with two angek in the act of incensing him ; helow it are two dragons facing each other. On the reverse of the page the Saviour again appears ahove the circle, and his feet are represented below the circle, placed on the necks of the dragons, and crushing them to the ground. A border surrounds the page, which, in point of design, is almost identical with that of the Hereford map ; and another very remarkable point of resemblance in the two maps is the introduction of a belt of illustrations in the southern part of Africa, depicting the peculiar races of that region, among them the two figures of the men with their eyes in their breasts and in their shoulders. These figures should be examined by the aid of a magnifying glass. The ocean is represented as a belt of equal breadth surrounding the eatth. In a concentric band outside the ocean the various winds are introduced ; each being represented by a head, as in the Hereford map. The titles of the winds, from Paradise roimd by the north, are — Subsolanus, VuUwr, Aquilo, Septentrio, Circms, Chorus, Zephyrus, Africanus (Africus), Libonothus, Auster vel Nothius, JEwrono- thus, and (?) Ewrus (this last being illegible). The Mediterranean presents the same general form as in the maps already described, with a considerable expansion on the side of Asia, and the same two horns to represent the eastern projection between Asia Minor and Egypt. The Euxine is brought, as usual, too close to the Northern Ocean. The Adriatic is fairly represented. Paradise occupies the post of honour at the extreme east, and exhibits the peculiarity of five rivers issuing from it, the author having entered the Ganges as well as the Pison. Within the inclosure of Paradise are the portraits of Adam and Eve, separated by an object which looks like a stem of a tree, the device on the summit being, however, not sufllciently distinct to be identified. Can this be intended for the Arbre Sec, as described in the legend quoted by Col. Yule {Marco Polo, ii. 397) : — " In the midst of Paradise he beheld a glorious fountain, from which flowed forth four rivers .... and over the fountain rose a Great Tree, with vast roots, but bare of bark and leaves." Two belts form somewhat conspicuous objects on the map, — one in Northern Asia, inclosing the region about the Caspian, and probably designed to signify the district where Gog and Magog were confined ; the other in Western Africa, which bears the inscription Terra Arenosa et sterilis, and is in- tended for the desert which inclosed Mauritania and Numidia on the S. The mountains and rivers introduced are as follows : In Asia — the Tigris, which flows direct from Paradise to the Indian Ocean ; the Euphrates, which enters a chain of mountains W. of Paradise, apparently named M. Orcatoten, and, emerging thence, flows to the Persian Gulf ; Eral or Mtal, a river rising in Arme- nia, and flowing into the Northern Ocean, probably intended for the Ethel or Volga ; Montes Riphei, on the border of Europe ; the Jordan, made up of the two branches Jor and Dan, and flowing through the Stannum (= Stagnum) Gennosar (= Gen- nesareth) Tiberiadis, into the Mare Mortuum ; Mons lAbanus ; and a river called Hiner, flowing into the jEgsean Sea. In Africa — the Nile (Nilus flumen), of which the Egyptian section alone, with its seven mouths, is given, perhaps be- cause that part of the map in which its western section lay was occupied by the illustrations already noticed ; a chain of mountains, the Monies Nibie of the MEDIEVAL MAPS. xliii Hereford map, crossing the upper Nile ; two islands inclosed in the Nile, Meroe, and that on which Bahylonia was supposed to stand, as in the Hereford map ; and Mons Atlas, near the Atlantic Ocean. In Europe — Moris Suevus, as in the Here- ford map, where it stands near the Baltic ; the Danube (Danuiius), with several afflu- ents ; the Rhine, drawn but not named ; and so also the Don, on the frontier of Asia. The entries of names which belong more especially to the province of mediaeval geography are as follows : In Asia — Arbor Solis and Arbor Lunce, the Trees of the Sun and Moon, outside Paradise, towards the S. [This entry is deserving of special notice : the Hereford map notices the Tree of the Sim under the title "Arbor balsami est arbor sicca," the latter title being another name for the Tree of the Sun ; but the Tree of the Moon is unmentioned. The two trees, with the title Oraculum solis et lune, appear in a map of the 12th century. (Brit.Mus. Add. MS., No. 10,049.) The trees again appear in the map of Lambertus, but without the titles (Santarem, ii. p. 189). The larger map of Higden probably indicates their existence by the inscription " Arbores conserti quibus locutus est Alexander," and the same entry occurs in the Borgia map (Santarem iii. 282). There is an interesting note on this subject by Layard in the appendix to Santarem's 3d. vol.] Arce Idberi et colinue (? columnae) Herculis in the position of the "Ara3 Alexandri" of the Hereford map, near the Indus, such altars being attributed both to Bacchus and Alexander (Solln. 49, § 4) ; Pcdi- bothra, a town of India, near Patna ; Albania Superior and Inferior, in N.B. of Asia (compare the Albanorum Eegio of the Anglo-Saxon map), the country being Introduced on accoimt of the supposed origin of the name ; Amazones hie manent, in the same quarter ; Cyropolis, otherwise caUed Cyreschata, a town on the Jax- artes in Sogdiana, famous for the siege it sustained from Alexander the Great ; it is placed near the Caspian Sea ; TheodosiopoUs, a town in Armenia, noticed by Prooopius and the Ravenna geographer, but on what account entered in this map we cannot divine ; Mons exeelsus iibi diabolus statuit Dominwm, the mountain on which the devil tempted our Lord ; Puteus Josephi, the well in which Joseph was placed by his brethren ; Oalcidonia (Chalcedon), in Asia Minor ; and Are Alex- andri, near the border of Europe. In Africa — Orrea Josephi (the Pyramids), below which, and apparently con- nected with it, is the puzzling ^inscription Presuli duo manent ; Monasterium Sancti Petri, St. Peter being here substituted for St. Antonine ; Damiete (Dami- etta), a town well known in connection with the Crusades ; Taphnis, on the west- em arm of the NOe, the Vulgate form of Tahpanhes (Jer. xliii. 7) ; Oliopolimi probably Heliopolis ; Polutivm (Pelusium) ; Mathabres, the Natabres of the Here- ford map ; Zeitgis, as in Hereford map, the name being attributed to a towui though properly belonging to a province. Islands off Africa — Gorgades, occupied by Gorgons (Solin. 56, § 10), and (?) Tacoma. In Europe — Galicia, as " province of Spain ; Eguiiania (Aquitania) ; Nor- mjannia ; Parisiis ; Achaia ; Constantinopolis ; Sunga/ria ; Sclaveni Occidentales, a very peculiar entry, the Slaves in question being placed near the Black Sea ; and Golonia (Cologne). Islands off the coast of Europe — Britannia ; Wallia ; Hibernia ; Norvegia, (Norway), represented as an island ; Ipborea (? Hyperborei, who are always represented as in the extreme N. "beyond the north wind," but generally on the continent, and not on an island) : In the Mediterranean — Calipso, transfeiTed from the coast of Italy to that of Palestine. xHv INTEODUCTION. The foUowing names need no comment : In Asia — Armenia, Eyrcania, Asia Minor, Ninus (Nineveli), Turris (Babel), Elam (= Persia) in Palestine, Jerusa- lem, Tcyrrens Gedron, Bethlehem, Aearon, Azotiis, Gesarea, Betheida (? Bethsaida), Aniioehia, (in Syria), and Lachis, near the last-mentioned town (? Lachish in Southern Palestine) In Africa — Ethiopia, Egyptus, Memphis, Alexandria (a second entry which looks like " p-lexandria," may te a duplicate of the one just mentioned, the p. meaning portm), Berenice, GetuUa, Qa/rama, the capital of the Garamantes, Are Philenorum, Cartago, ani Mauritania. In Europe — Eis- pania, G. Nerhona (Gallia Nartonensis), LwgolMnensis, Boma, Macedonia, Greda, placed N. of Macedonia, Larissa, Dalmatia, Sarmatia, north of the Danube, and Sitia (Scythia). The following entries we are unable to identify: In Asia — Lazarmn or Jazarom to the 1. hand of Paradise ; Segio Con in the same quarter ; Nisapi, near Arbor Lunse ; Peliopolis (? Persepolis) on Euphrates ; Corotaim, near the Lake of Tiberias (in the position of Capernaum) ; Spartan, in Northern Asia, W. of Hyrcania. In Africa — Saltabri, on the NUe, opposite to Babylonia. In Europe — Unizonia (? Aragonia) in Spain ; Synaria or Eyngaria (? Sabaria), apparently on the Drave ; Euscito, between Mens Suevus and the Black Sea ; Oleiis, placed between two affluents of the Danube ; Ala, si town on a branch of the Rhine ; Saxronia or Lutonia, a town N. of Cologne ; a name on a peninsula of the Northern Ocean, perhaps intended for Dacia (Denmark) ; Ar-uni-phor (? Apterophon) an island off the Amazonian country, in Asia ; and Ahairair (? Abalcia) opposite Hyrcania. At the back of the map there is a brief manual of geography, perhaps ia- tended as a key to the map, with the names of the provinces and some of the towns. The contents of each continent occupy the same space as the continent itself on the map, the upper half being devoted to Asia. As frequently happens, the manual does not altogether accord with the map. We find in it, for instance, the names Wasconia (Gascony), Pictavia, Neustria, Francia, Allemannia, Saxonia, Goiia, Wadelia (? Vandalia) and Bulgaria, none of which appear in the map. The name Spartan, which we have |not been able to identify, is mentioned as a city of Hyrcania, and the curious name Jazarom, or, as it reads in the manual, Thazarom, is given as a city of India, together with Sagasla, which is also un- known to us. 8. Three maps of the 13th century (cire. 1280) m a copy of Bnmetto Lattini, Lime du Tresor, in the Bodleian Library, Oxford. (MS. Douce, No. 319.) Two of these maps occur in the table of contents, and are small circular sketch- maps, about two inches in diameter, one illustrating the cardiaal points and divi- sions of the world, with the inscriptions Oriant, Septentrion, Occident, Midi, Aisse la grant (Asia Major), Europe, and Aufrig ; while the other illustrates the position of the ten'estrial Paradise, which is represented as a quadrangular in- closure beyond the ocean, on the north side of the world, with the inscriptions Paradis Terrestre, Septentrion, Oriant, and Occident. The third map is in the body of the work, circular, with a diameter of 7 inches, with the south at the MEDIEVAL MAPS. xlv head of the map. No names are entered on it. The Mediterranean Sea is depicted with a remarkahle degree of accuracy. The execution of the map is very good, and the colours are very vivid. 9.-16. Maps of the 14th century, in copies ot Kigden's Polychronicon ; three in the British Museum (Old Eoyal Library MSS. 14, c. ix. and xii.) ; and the others in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh, and the Libraries of Corpus Christi CoU., Cambridge, Corpus Christi Coll., Oxford, and Winchester CoU. One of these maps stands out from the rest In regard both to size and amount of geographical matter. It is contained in the first MS. above mentioned, and la of oval form, with diameters of 1 foot 6 inches and 1 foot 14 inch ; it is described at length by Santarem (ill. 1-60). Of the smaller maps, one is drawn on the back of this larger one ; it is of oval form, 11 inches by 84 inches, and is also described by Santarem (iii. 60-81). A second may be found in the other copy of the Polychronioou (14, c. xii.) ; this is of an ovoid form, resembling the Vesica Piscis, about the same size as the other, and is described by Santarem (iii. 82-94). A third, belonging to the Advocates' Library, is of oval form, and is somewhat smaller than the one of similar shape in the British Museum. The examples at C. C. C, Cambridge, and C. C. C, Oxford, are also oval, and the one at Winchester College is ovoid. The larger map resembles the Hereford map in respect to the number of legends (according to Santarem, 11. Inir. p. liii, they amount to 90), introduced into it ; but the execution of the map is very inferior, and the writing is difficult to read, at all events for a novice at such work. The entries of special interest are those which refer to the Tartars, in connection with Scythia Inferior and Armenia ; Prester John as king of the Tartars ; Christianity in Abyssinia (gens Arabea Mhiops) ; the Saracens in Spain, and the legend of St. Patrick's Purgatory. A few fresh names are introduced from contemporaneous geography — Hanaldia (Hainault), Selandia (Zealand), Prussia, Franconia, Westphalia, and Thwringia. Norway and Sweden are represented by islands (Norwegia and Suedia), as also Denmark (Dacia), and, according to Santarem, Jutland, which he identifies with the Wittland of the map ; but (?) is not this rather the Witland of King Alfred's Orosius, or if not Witland (which is placed E. of the Vistula, where Samland now stands), Weonothland, which Forster identifies with Fiinen ( Voyages in the North, p. 70) ? In other respects the geography is as antiquated as ever. The Caspian Sea is still represented as an arm of the Northern Ocean. The rivers of Paradise still reappear as the Nile, the Ganges, etc. The Amazons, the one-eyed Cyclopes, and aU the other deformities, are commemorated. Isidore and Solinus stUl hold their place as the leading authorities in geography. The inscriptions are for the most part correctly transcribed by Santarem, but the one with regard to Wales, which Santarem reads as "WaUia de religione quiis Eomanorum," should rather be Wallia de religuiis Trojanorum, referring to the legend of Brutus. The smaller maps contain, generally speaking, the same names as the larger one but the legends are omitted. The maps vary very much ia character, but there is a strong family likeness in them. None of them will compare in point of execu- xlvi INTRODUCTION. tion with the smaU " Psalter " map, or with the Camhridge." Imago Mimdi " map. It is a peculiarity in them that the Mediterranean Sea is thrown considerably to the S., Africa being thus contracted in width, and Jerusalem being misplaced re- latively to the Mediterranean, in the endeavour to preserve its centrality. In the Winchester map the physical features are not delineated at all. In the Edinburgh map the line of the Mediterranean Sea is but slightly varied ; in the Oxford map, on the other hand, it is throughout indented with bays. Elvers and mountains are occasionally named, but their courses are not depicted. 17. A circular map of the 15th century, m a MS. entitled "Pedi- gree of the Saxon Kings," in the Library (Arundel, 53) of the College of Arms, London. This map, though small (having a diameter of only about 4J inches), and of little geographical interest, is peculiar for the large amount of pictorial illustra- tions on its surface. It is subdivided in the usual manner, by a horizontal band passing through the centre of the circle, and a perpendicular band dropped' from the centre to the lower curve of the circle. The only names entered are tliose of the continents — Asia, Affrica, and JEuropa; the two last being transposed! from their proper positions. Asia is covered with edifices, situated on eminences rising one above the other. Africa is represented as a land of forests and wild beasts, among which we may distinguish stags, lions or tigers, and serpents. Europe resembles Asia in being covered with buildings on eminences. Some of the buildings in Asia have an ecclesiastical character, and in Europe there is an edifice crowned with a dome. Below the map there is a picture of the Tower of Babel. The above list (it must be observed) does not include other than complete maps of the world. The list might be enlarged by maps of separate countries, and again by itineraries ; but these hardly come within the scope of our inquiry. We may mention, however, two maps, which together are well nigh tantamount to a map of the world, and which occur in a MS. of the 12th century, being a copy of S. Hieronymi De Hebraieis Qumstionibus, in the British Museum. (Add. MS. 10,049.) OETHOGEAPHY OF HEEEFOED MAP. xlvii NOTE ON THE OETHOGEAPHY OF THE HEEEFOED MAP. Tte following deviations from the standard orthography of the Latin language may be observed in the Latin MSS. of the thirteenth century : — cfor qu, as cotidie /or quotidie. {/or ph, as Panesii /or Phanesii. y /or i, as Ysidonis /or Isidorus. p/br b, as optimiit/or obtinuit. cb/or h, as michi for mlhi. e/or 86, as insnle /or instdse. mp/or m, as dainpnum/or danmum. tb /or t, as Atblas /or Atlas, ngn /or gn, as rengnum /or regnum. The letters c and t are formed so exactly alike that it is impossible to distinguish which is intended. CHAPTEE I. jt General Characteristics of the Hereford Map— Life of its Author, Eicardus de Belle — Date of the Composition — Sources from which the Materials were drawn — History of the Map — Its Literary History — Its Dimensions, and the Materials used in drawing it — Description of the Illustrations sur- rounding the Map— The Four Quarters of the World— The Tahle of the Winds — The Inscription " Mors " — The Ocean — The General Arrangement and chief Divisions of the Map. The Heeefoed Map may be regarded as a pre-eminently typical specimen of mediseval cartograpliy, inasmuch as it combines in itself most of the features which have been noticed in our prefatory remarks as characteristic of the maps of that period. In respect of size, indeed, it stands apart from its class, and is only surpassed by Fra Mauro's celebrated map, which belongs to the middle of the 15 th century, and which we should be inclined to describe, not as a true mediaeval map, but as belonging to the period of transi- tion immediately preceding the grand discoveries of the Portuguese. In point of execution, in the amount and the elaborateness of the pictorial illustrations, and in the orna- mentation of its framework, the Hereford Map far surpassed anything that had preceded -it. So also with regard to the large amount of material — geographical features, and descrip- tive legends — ^with which its surface is wellnigh covered. We may also note that in all points which constituted the orthodoxy of geography in that age, the author proved him- self a true son of the Church. The rejection of all that savoured of scientific geography, the circumscribed area of the habitable world, the centraLity of Jerusalem, the terres- A 2 AUTHOE OF THE MAP. trial paradise, the orientation, the servile adherence to anti- quated geographical treatises, the anachronism of the whole thing, and the sore lack of all critical and even grammatical accuracy, these characteristics are displayed to the full iu the Hereford Map. Viewed in a strictly geographical aspect, as a representation of the world at the time of its execution, the map would not repay any one for the time spent in its study. Viewed, on the other hand, as a literary monument, on which is registered the position of learning towards the close of the 13th century, the map will be found worthy of examination. The author of the map reveals his name in the Norman- French* inscription at the left-hand lower angle of the map. "Eul M cest tstaixz ont ©u ogront on Urroitt ou ijeront Orient a 3\iesn m titytz Jic iticfjarti tit llaHringfjam z "Hz iLafforlr egt pite %i lat fet z compasse %i ioiz en zz\ li seit tione/' The general purport of these lines is weU conveyed in the following translation by the Eev. G. F. Townsend : — " May all wlio this faire historie,t Shall either hear, or read, or see, Pray. to Jesus Christ hi Deity, * Norman-French was at this period the language of the upper classes in England. Higden, who died in 1363, complains that they were hrought up to the use of it from their very cradles, and ohliged to use it in the schools in construing Latin (Polychronicon, i. 59). Trevisa, the earliest translator of the Polychronicon, adds a note, to the effect that in his day (1385) the custom was changed, and that English had taken its place in the schools. t "Historic" is hardly an adequate rendering of "estoire," which refers rather to the pictorial illustrations, and is more closely represented hy " story," in its old sense, e.g., " storied windows." LIFE OF DE BELLO. 3 Richard of Haldingliam and Lafford to pity, That to him for aye be given The joy and happiness of heaven." Lafford is the old form of Sleaford, a town in Liacolnshire, and is still retained as the title of a prebendal stall in Liacoln Cathedral. Haldingham represents the modern Hold- ingham, a hamlet in the parish of Sleaford. By the aid of contemporary documents we are enabled to identify the " Eichard de Haldingham e de Lafford " of the map with one "Eicardus* de BeUo," who held the prebend of Lafford for several years previous to 1283. His name supplies the only indication (and that not a conclusive one) as to his birthplace. The editor of Bishop SwinfieMs Household Boll connects the name with Battle, in Sussex (p. 2 0, note a) — a derivation which receives a certain amount of confirmation from the fact that he is designated in the Eoll " Eicardus de la Batayl," as well as "Eicardus de Bello." Archdeacon Trollope, on the other hand, connects the name with Belleau, a village near Alford in Lincolnshire, deeming his early con- nection with Lincoln Cathedral to be in favour of this view. The name " De Bello " is not altogether unknown to mediaeval archaeologists. There was a famous architect of this name, John de Bello, contemporary with our cartographer, who erected five of the twelve crosses which marked the resting- places of Queen Eleanor's body on its passage from Lincoln- shire to London (Archceologia, xxix. 182). The first historical notice of Eichard de BeUo represents him as holding the post of treasurer in Lincoln Cathedral {Harleian MSS., Brit. Mus., No. 6954, /o. 30&). The date of this notice is uncertain, but probably lies between 1250 and 1260. We find him stni retaining this post, which constituted him one of the * It was" by no means unusual in the 13th century for a person to pass by more than one name (Lower, Family Nome-mlature, p. 34). 4 LIFE OF DE BELLO. greater officers of the cathedral, in 1276 {Harleian MSS. 6950, /o. 118; Le Neve Fasti Ecdes. Anglic, ii. 88). At tliis latter period he was also prebendary of Lafford, and in that capacity we find him presenting Henricus de Swinderhy to the vicarage of Lafford. The connection between the parish of Lafford and Lincoln Cathedral was of early date, the manor having been presented by William the Conqueror to Eemigius, the first Norman bishop of Lincoln. The pre- bend of Lafford was also probably founded at the same period, and was endowed with the great tithes of that portion of the parish in which Holdingham is situated, and which were exchanged in 1797 for 500 acres of land in the same quarter. It was for this reason, probably, tliat the carto- grapher styles himself as " de Haldingham " — a title nowhere accorded to him in the contemporary ecclesiastical documents, where he passes as " de Lafford," simply. The vicarage of Lafford was founded at the time when Eichard de BeUo was prebendary; and it was in the capacity of patron that he presented Henry of Swinderby {Harl. MSS., 6950, /o. 956; Trollope, Sleaford and the Wapentakes of Maxwell, etc., pp. 140, 141). Eichard de Bello's connection with Lincohi Cathedral appears to have terminated in 1283, when he resigned his prebend (Le Neve, ii. 160). In 1289 we find him in attendance on Bishop Swinfield of Hereford, and evidently on familiar terms with him. Three notices of him occur in Swinfield! s Household Roll, the first of which records the present to him of a haunch of venison at Bosbuiy near Ledbury, where the Bishop was then staying, and the other two refer to payments made by the steward to his garcio or menial servant (see entries in the EoU for Nov. 17, 1289, and Dors. § 33, 35, pp. 20, 161, 158, of Camden Society's edition). His connection with Hereford Cathedral did not commence until 1306, when he was appointed to the pre- DATE OF MAP. 5 bend of Norton (Le Neve, i. 518). In the interval he had been successively appointed, in 1293, to the rectory of Stoke Talmage in Oxfordshire {Earl. MSS. 6951, /o. 32), and in 1298 to the prebend of Grantham Australis in Sarmn Cathedral, from which he was collated within a few months to another prebend in the same church {Harl. MSS. 6951, fo. 32, 32&). In 1312 he was promoted to the Arch- deaconry of Berks, in the diocese of Sarum (Le ISTeve, ii. 633). In 1313 he was deputed, in conjunction with Adam de Orleton, to represent Bishop Swiafield at a provincial council held in the chapter-house of St. Paul's Cathedral, London (Eeg. Swinfield, /. 1865; see Boll, p. 151, Note). Nothing further is heard of him, and he probably died shortly after. Evidently he was an ecclesiastic of considerable note, and a man who had seen something of society. It is sup- posed that the mounted figure at the right-hand lower corner of the map is intended for the author himself, as he might have been seen going out hunting, attended by a forester fully equipped and holding one or more greyhounds in a leash. Whether the words "^aSS0 abatit" are addressed by the rider to the forester, as the attitude of the former seems to indicate, or whether they had a deeper significance as a motto, we are unable to decide. The map was probably drawn before the author resigned his prebend at Lincoln. The mere circumstance that he describes himself as " de Haldiugham et Lafford " implies this. Had he drawn it at Hereford he would surely have called himseK " de Norton ;" while in the interval between his resignation of the one and his acceptance of the other appointment, he would have signed himseK as " Eichard de BeUo." The map itseK furnishes some presumption in favour of its having been drawn at Lincoln rather than at Hereford. Let any one compare the pictorial illustrations of the two 6 DATE OF MAP. places — Lincoln represented by a magnificent edifice, sur- mounting by successive stages the elevation on which its cathedral stands ; Hereford by a meagre and unfinished out- line — the contrast surely favours the presumption that he ■would not have paid so poor a compliment to Hereford if he had been living there at the time. Whether the notice of Clee Hill, alone among the mountains of England, carries any weight in the argument, we must leave to the judgment of our readers. On the one hand, it may be said that the fame of Clee Hill would not, in all probability, have reached Lincoln in those days ; on the other hand, it seems almost inconceivable that a person living at Hereford would have had the audacity to delineate Clee Hill as a mountain of such imposing dimensions, and ■ still less as containing the soiuces of the Severn and the Dee. Our notion is, that the mountain was introduced on purely cartographical grounds, to fiU up the interval between the Severn and Dee, and thus to mark the boundary between England and "Wales ; having done this, the author may have added the name subsequently to his taking up his abode at Hereford. The character of the handwriting furnishes a more reliable indication, and we be- lieve that we are expressing the opinion of competent judges when we say that the handwriting betokens the period before rather than after the year 1300. In fixing the date of the map at about 1275 we are aware that we contravene the opinion of a distinguished French savant, who has placed it some forty years later. M. D'Avezac, in an essay *' devoted to this special point, relies on historical arguments drawn from certain entries in the map itself. He points, in the first place, to the inscrip- tion, "Kexminus Jrancie et BursunUte," which, com- * Sur la Miqipc/Honde Historiie, etc., a paper read before the Geogi'aphical Society of Paris in 1861. DATE OF MAP. 7 mencing near Paris, stretches across the Saone and the Ehone to the line of the Alps, leaving Lugdunum {Lyons) on the left hand, and Vienna (Vienne) on the right hand, each at some distance from the inscription. M. D'Avezac assumes that the inscription is placed in special reference to these two towns, and that it is intended to indicate a period when Lyons had been attached to France, while Vienne still re- mained outside its limits — thus bringing the date to not earlier than 1313, and not later than 1349. We regret that we cannot coincide in this conclusion, for the following reasons : — (1.) The general character of the map does not favour the idea that its author was closely interested in current events, or that he intended to give expression to these on his map. (2.) The inscription in question covers so much ground that it is difficult to define the precise locality to which it refers ; the probability, however, is, that it refers to a hill on the course of the Saone, intended, perhaps, for the Cote dJOr. (3.) But further, Lugdunum is strangely misplaced in the map, and, if transferred to its right position, would be on the same side of the inscription as Vienne. (4.) Lastly, if the design of the cartographer had been as M. D'Avezac assumes, we should have expected to find the inscription so arranged as to bring Lyons on the same side as France, and Vienne on the opposite side; the reverse, however, is the case. Having arrived at the period 1313-1349, M. D'Avezac narrows the limit by a reference to the entry " JlatttiriE," which he takes to indicate a political separation of Flanders from France. Such a separation took place temporarily between 1313 and 1320, and within these limits he selects 1314, that being the year signalised by the march of the King of France against the Count of Flanders. The whole force, however, of this argument turns upon the question, whether 8 AUTHOEITIES CITED IN THE MAP. the entry of Flandria implies political separation. It may simply be a territorial designation ; and when we find other provincial names entered where no such separation was im- plied — e.g. Campania (Champagne) and Anemia (Auvergne), we hesitate to attribute an exceptional significance to Flandria. Though ourselves unconvinced by the very ingenious argument which M. D'Avezac has adduced, we have deemed it respectful both to himself and to our readers that his view should be fully stated, together with our reasons for dissent- ing from it. We are inclined to assign the map to about the year 1275; and perhaps if M. D'Avezac had been supplied with the information which is at our command respecting the life of De BeUo, he would have arrived at the same conclusion. The authorities whence De Bello drew his materials are in some cases specified on the document itself. They are as foUows : — 1. Orosius, mentioned in the title of the map, " Descriptio Orosii de Ormesta Mundi sicut interius ostenditur." 2. SoKnus, cited in the inscriptions referring to the Ganges, the psittacus, and other objects. 3. Isidore, cited in the description of the monoceros. 4. Marcian Capella, cited in the inscription relating to the hot region beyond the snowy belt in Eastern Asia. 5. ^thicus, or Ethnicus, cited in reference to the isle Sirtinice, in the Indian Ocean. The above authors have been severally noticed in the Introduction. Even if no express mention had been made of them, there would have been no difficulty in identifying them from the internal evidence of the map. We may succinctly say that Orosius supplied the materials as to the outline of the world, the position of the Ganges, the course SOUECES OF IlSrrOEMATIOISr. 9 of the Nile, and the names of several of the mountain ranges of Asia and Africa. SoKnus supplied the information as to the mirabilia — the marvels and monstrosities of the remoter parts of the world. From Isidore come the etymological entries, the representation of the terrestrial paradise, and a considerable amount of geographical matter as regards the political divisions of Asia and Africa. Capella's influence is more especially noticeable in respect to the islands of the Mediterranean, ^thicus is the authority (as already noticed) for the northern regions of the world, as also for the isle Sirtinice, in the Southern Ocean. In addition to these, there is internal evidence that the author of the map applied directly to Pliny for the dimensions of countries, where such are noticed. This is clear from several passages, but particularly the one referring to the size of Gaul, which is derived verbatim from Pliny, iv. 105. Jithicus, the compiler of the Cosmograpliia, probably supplied the information as to the survey of the world com- menced by Julius Cassar, and which forms the subject of the illustration at the left-hand corner of the map. Lastly, the influence of Antonini Itinerarium can be readily detected in regard" to the topography of JSTorthern Africa. To these eight works we can trace back the bulk of the contents of the map. We are unable, indeed, to assert that our cartographer referred in all cases to the original works. He may, of course, have borrowed them second-hand from some of the manuals in vogue at that period. Nor do we wish to imply that the above were the only original works on which he relied; he drew the legend as to the seven sleepers from Paulus Diaconus, De Gestis Langobardorum ; the description of Constantinople (apparently) from WiUiam of Malmesbury, Be Gestis Begum; and various topics from 10 HISTORY OF MAP. the Alexandrian Romance. He further made use, no doubt, of previously existing maps. The remarkable coin- cidences between his map and the " Imago Mundi " map at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, have been already noticed in the Introduction. The coincidences with the " Psalter " map are also noteworthy, though they refer not so much to the contents as to the ornamentation of the work. Lastly, we may assume that he had at hand a Bestiarium and a Herbarium, whence to obtain the materials for the Natural History. The early history of the map is not known. It may be assumed that its author brought it with bim from Lincoln about 1289, and either presented it- during his lifetime, or bequeathed it, to the Cathedral Church of Hereford. It is supposed to have served at one time as an altar-piece in one of the chapels, and at another time to have been suspended in the south choir aisle near Bishop MayoVs monument, where some old iron clasps seem suited to receive it. There is also a tradition that during the Civil Wars it was secreted under the wooden floor of Bishop Audle/s chantry. There is no improbability in any of these statements, and the last receives some confirmation from the construction of the floor of the chantry, which was removed in 1860, and which seemed to offer facilities for the secretion of articles. The earliest historical notice of the map with which we are ■ acquainted is by the herald Thomas Dingley, who {cire. 1682) records that he saw the map in the library: "Among other curiosities in this library are a map of ye world drawn on vellimi by a monk." (Dingley, Camd. Soc, p. clx.) From the library it was removed in 1830 to the Treasury Eoom, and thence, in 1863, to its old position near Bishop Mayow's monument in the south choir aisle, where it may now be seen. Considering its age, and the neglect with which LITEEAEY HISTOEY. 11 it has been treated in past centuries, it is wonderful that the map should be in so good a state of preservation. The only- wilful damage done to it consists of a series of scratches over the edifice which represents Paris, and which might have been perpetrated by some over-patriotic Briton at a time when feeling ran high against France. The removal of the "two doors with guilded and painted letters and figures," which Dingley notices, occiirred in comparatively modern times, but under what circumstances is not known. These doors are depicted in the title-page of Carter's Ancient Architecture (1796) ; portions of the old hinges still remain. In 1855 the map was sent up to the British Museum, where it was most carefully cleaned and repaired under the immediate superintendence of the late Sir F. Madden, Keeper of the MSS. Since that period it has been treated with the most reverential care. A sheet of plate-glass was placed over it ta 1863, and new folding-doors in 1868 ; nor has it sus- tained the least damage from the frequent examinations it has undergone ra connection with the present undertaking. The last topic of a preliminary character on which we have to touch, is the literary history of the map. We shall presently detail what has been done in our own country. Meanwhile, let it suffice to say that down to the present time no attempt has been made in this country either to reproduce the entire map, or to give an adequate description of its contents. It is with a feeling of deep humiliation that we have to acknowledge ourselves forestalled in both these departments by foreign geographers. The map itself has been reproduced in its full dimensions by Jomard in his magnificent mediaeval atlas {Monumens de la Giographie. Paris, 1855); and a tolerably complete description of it is given in the second volume of Santarem's Gosmograpliie et Cartographic du Moyen-Age, pp. 288-434; Paris, 1850. 12 LITEEAEY HISTOEY. Valuable as these works are, they are not altogether satis- factory. We believe that both Jomard and Santarem laboured under the disadvantage of never having seen the map itself They worked from the copy made for the Bibliotheque Nationale of Paris, which was itself not taken directly from the map, but from the copy made for the London Geographical Society. These copies are confessedly im- perfect, and the imperfections affect the published works. To 'this we must add that Jomard's fac-simile is broken up into six sheets, so that it cannot be seen as a whole ; that it is not coloured ; and, lastly, that his atlas is so bulky and expensive as to be inaccessible to the majority of our readers. Santarem's work is of great value as a general manual of mediaeval cartography; but he frequently fails in his ex- position of geographical details, apparently because he lacked either the time or the patience for the needful research, Nor does he appear to have always succeeded in identifying the sources whence the cartographers drew their materials. To a certain extent the present commentary labours under the same defects ; but, at all events, we trust that we have made a step in advance of our predecessors. Next to San- tarem we must mention another continental savant, Lelewel, as having given a general description of the map and its contents in his Giographie du Moyen Age, 4 vols., Brussels, 1852 (vol. iv. pp. 141, 161); this, however, is so meagre as to require no further notice. M. D'Avezac's essay on the date of the map has been already fully discussed .(pp. 6-8). "We may complete our list of continental comments by stating, on the authority of Santarem, ii. 295, that Laborde gives a fac-simile of that portion of the map which contains Palestine and Arabia in his Examen Giographigue de I'Exode, 1841; and that Hommaire de HeUe has a notice of the map in his Steppes de la Mer Caspienne, iii. 352, 1844. In SIZE OF MAP. 13 our own country we have to notice (1) the description of the British Isles, with a copy of that portion of the map which relates to them, in Gough's British Topography, 1780; (2) a fac-simile of the same portion of the map drawn by Mr. B. Tucker, and accompanied with twelve pages of letterpress by Mr. Saxe Bannister, dealing with the general subject of mediaeval geography, the whole being entitled Brief Descrip- tion of the Hereford Map, 1849; (3) an essay by Mr. T. Wright (N^o. XIII. of his Essays on Archceological Subjects, 1861), also dealing rather with the general subject of mediaeval geography than with the Hereford Map in par- ticular, though some description of it is given in pp. 15-17 ; and, lastly, a more complete and particular account than any of the above, by Mr. Havergal in his Fctsti Serefordenses, pp. 160-170. The copy of the map in the possession of the Geographical Society was made in 1831 by Mr. T. Ballard. A complete photograph was made in 1869, but many portions of this are very indistinct. The map is drawn on a remarkably iine sheet of vellum, 6 5 inches by 5 3, which must originally' have been some- what larger, inasmuch as its edges have evidently been pared. The material is still in a thoroughly sound con- dition, the chief defect being a series of small holes in a line at the base of the upper compartment, which probably arose from the map having been at some period folded up at that point. The vellum is stretched over a framework of oak, square at the bottom and pointed at the top, the angle being surmounted by a bold crocketed canopy, terminating in a large finial, all carved in wood. The total height of the frame- work is 8 feet, and its width 64 inches, the map itself forming a circle with a diameter of 52 inches. The materials used in drawing the map were: — (1.) A deeply black ink for the outlines and the bulk of the inscrip- 14 INSCEIPTION EOUND THE MAP. tions. (2.) Vermilion colour for the capitals and some of the more important names. (3.) Gold-leaf for some of the largest letters. (4.) A deep mineral blue for the rivers. (5.) And a vegetable colour, probably green, for the seas, and many of the lakes and fountains. This last has been converted by age into a dark brown. The vermilion has also occasionally disappeared. An ornamental border foUows the line of the framework, the lower part consisting of a zig-zag pattern (similar to that of the " Psalter " Map), with a device of a floral character in the interstices, and star-shaped flowers at the angles ; while the upper part or pointed summit represents the interlacing tendrils of a vine or some such plant. Immediately inside the edging comes an inscription which records the names of the commissioners — Theodotus, Xeno- doxus, and Polyclitus^appointed by Julius Caesar (according to the statement in the introductory part of the Gosmogrcuphia of ^thicus) to survey the Eoman world. The inscription runs thus:— " a SuUo €tmxz otiis tettarum mettrt cejjtt, ^ i^tcoUoxa omnis ortens titmmsus est. % ©Eotroto septmtrton rt occticns ijtmmsus t%U % ^oltcUto mcrtlttana pars itmensus est/* in the received text of ^thicus no mention is made of the west; but some of the MSS. assign this quarter to a fourth com- missioner, named Didymus. In the above inscription it win be observed that this quarter is assigned to Theodotus, in addition to the north. There is in reality no foundation what- ever for the statement that Caesar undertook such a survey at all. It should rather have been attributed to the Emperor Augustus, who ordered such a survey in connection with the census referred to in Luke ii. 1 (Tacit. Ann. i. 11 ; Cassiodor. Var. iii. 52). Some of the results of this survey have pro- bably been preserved to us in the numerous quotations which ILLUSTEATIONS EOUND MAP. 15 Pliny makes from the Commentaries of Vipsanius Agrippa. Our cartographer having followed the Cosmographia in the above inscription, combines, apparently without the smallest perception of any inconsistency, the more correct version which attributes the work to Augustus, and which he proba- bly found in Isidore {Orig. v. 3 6, § 4) ; he accordingly gives a pictorial representation of the Emperor seated on his throne and crowned with a tiara, delivering his written orders to the three commissioners, whose names and portraits are duly given: — "\xz iTt otiizm uni&frsum tt tit omttt ^jus contmmtta xdzxiz atr smatum, zX air istam confc mantram %uiz scrtpto stsillum mzmn apposui" — the seal, in the form of a vesica, being duly represented, with the inscription, " -i- S» ^Uflustt ^csatts Impcratoris," surrounding a central device of a hand holding a branch. In support of this the words of St. Luke are quoted from the Vulgate: — "iLttcas ttt e&bauseli0 > €xtit Jtictum ab ^ugusto (SLzmxz «t tegcrtfierrtur tuttttosus oriis/' The figures and inscriptions just noticed occupy the " spandrU. " on the left-hand side of the map, where also is found the Norman-French inscription already quoted (p. 2). The corresponding spandril on the right-hand side is occupied by the figures of a horseman and forester, which have also been noticed (p. 5), together with the title of the map, which runs thus : — "JBescrtptto ©rosii tiz ©rncsta [Ormesta] munlii sicut mtErius ostentiitur/' The lower spandrils being thus occupied, the irregularly- shaped space above the map is filled up with an elaborate representation of the great Day of Judgment. In the centre appears the figure of our Saviour, surrounded b)y the clouds of glory, displaying the stigmata on his uplifted hands, and 16 ILLUSTEATIONS EOUND MAP. exclaimiug, " dSctt testimonium meum." Angels adore him amid the clouds, and at a lower level stand a pair drawn on a larger scale, as though in the foreground, one holding the crown of thorns, the other the nails. At his feet is a group of four figures, the most prominent being the Virgin Mary, who exposes her breasts, and exclaims to her son — " Feici &eu fij man pij tittizint la pele rijare pretstes : (B its mamelettes ttont leit tit Virgin queistesj (Epj merct tte touf si com uos memes Ueistes: %z mai ant m'ai ftant Sau&cusse me fetstes/' In the forms of modern French this would run nearly thus : — ■ " Voici, beau fils, mon pis dedans laquelle chair prttes ; Et les mamelles dont lait de Virgin querites ; Ayez merci de tous, si comme vous meme dutes,- Qui moi out servi, quand Sauveresse me fttes." The general sense of these lines is conveyed in the following free translation, given in the Gentleman's Magazine, No. ccxiv. 1863 : — " Eegard, my son, the flesli of which thou'rt made ; Behold the breasts on which thou once wast laid : On all who worship us pray pity take, Who me revere, who me their Saviouress take." Behind the Virgin is a kneeling figure of a woman hold- ing up a crown, apparently waiting the command to place it on the Virgin's head. Two angels aid in the Virgia's supplication. On the right hand of the Saviour an angel proclaims through a trumpet the invitation to the blessed : — " ILe&ej = si ijetttrej a joie pariuraWe," " Arise, and come to everlasting joy." QUAETEES OF THE WOELD. 17 which is responded to by a group of joyful saints, some rising with alacrity from their graves, others, already risen, advancing with crowns on their heads ; an angel grasps the leader by the hand and aids him in the ascent. On the left hand of the judge are the lost, on whom the sentence of eternal punishment is passed by the mouth of an angel, through a trumpet as before : — "ILe&Ef = si allej in-fu "at enttx mtMz" "Eise and depart to heU-fire prepared" [? "estable" = "6tabli"]. An avenging angel, with drawn sword, executes this sentence, and demons drag away the victims to the jaws of heU, here represented by the head of a fierce monster. The letters JH © 3^ S are disposed round the world at its four angles, and are attached to the rim of the map by figures which seem intended to represent loop-shaped liga- tures. The design of the author was, no doubt, to impress the mind of the beholder with a becoming sense of the transitoriness of aU the grand and interesting objects which he has delineated — much in the spirit of the well-known lines: — " The clond-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces,- The solemn temples, the great globe itself ; Yea, all which it inherits, shall dissolve, And Leave not a rack behind." Two concentric bands or circles surround the planisphere, the outer one containing the division into the four quarters (Climata, Mundi, Isid. Etym., xiii. 1), E., W., N., and S. ; and the inner one a table of the winds. The names of the four quarters are inscribed in their proper positions : — ©rims, ©ccitretis, Scptentria, and JSeritito, East and 18 TABLE OF THE WINDS. West — the two "gates of the sun," as they were termed (Isid. I.e.; ^thicus, i. 18) — are placed at Paradise and the Strait of Gibraltar respectively. North and south, to which alone the term ■' cardines " was assigned, as being the ends of the axis on which the earth revolves (Isid. I.e.), are not defined by any special objects ; and this is worthy of remark, inasmuch as the islands which are identified with the points by ^thicus (i. 19, 21), namely, Eifarrica in the K and Syrtinice in the S., are introduced into the map at some distance off from the cardinal points. The Table of the Winds contains the twelve-fold division introduced by Timosthenes, the admiral of Ptolemy PhUa- delphus (B.C. 285-247), and subsequently adopted by the Greeks and Eomans, and by mediaeval geographers, who in this matter were probably guided by the authority of Isidore. The position and character of the several winds, together with occasional explanations of their names, are given ia the legends which we append below. These are chiefly compiled from the works of Isidore, the explanations of names being taken from his Orig. xiii. 11, and the characters of the winds from his treatise De Natura Berum, § 3 7. The deri- vations of the names Eurus and Vulturnus, and the descrip- tion of Euro-nothus, come from some other quarter, which we have been unable to identify. Isidore distinguished four cardinal winds, Septentrio, Subsolanus, Notus, and Favonius. The other eight are distributed as subordinate winds among the four quadrants, just as in the map. The four cardinal winds are personified by grotesque squatting figures, and the subordinate winds by the heads of animals. Perhaps we shall best represent the ideas of our cartographer if we follow the order observed in the Be Natura Berum, grouping the winds as follows : — TABLE OF THE WINDS. 19 I. Septenteio. 1. Septentrto a scptem stellts nomen amplt, qui frifiiius tt siccus est ct factt arilia friflora et siccat nu&cs. 2. Circius, qui et STraccas [Thrascias], facit nu6cs et grantiinum caagulationc [coaguiationes] ijictus ct (lircius C0 quoli in circuto jungitur cum Cljoro. 3. ^quilo, qui ct Boreas Iticitur, gclitius ct siccus ; non triscutit nubcs, set [sed] aquas stringit. II. Oeiens. 1. Su6soIanus, bctttus ©cciicnti contrarius : Su6= solanus tiictus quia sub sole oritur; qui rt ^ppolitcs [Apeiiotes] ticitur : qui tcmiJorales plu&ias latissimas fiacit. 2. aEltUrnUS [Vulturnus], qui ct e:aleaS [Caecias] Ijicitur Ijissolbit cuncta atquc Uesiccat : iictus SElturnus* quia flans in alto ijatet potcs- tatem quasi TOltur [Vuitur]. 3. ^urus contrarius ffifjoro : a sinistro Nolans t iueo Jjictus ®urus CO quo [quod] mor&o afficiatj Jjomincs mergcntro in mortem ct extramam [extremum] oricutcm nutilius irrigans. III. Meeidies. 1. duster contrarius Septcntrioni : bocatus a& l)aurientiis aquis quarum profusione terram * Isidore's explanation of the name Vulturnus is " quod alte tonat " (Orig. ziii. 11, § 6). + (?) "flans ; '' the reading in Isidore is " veniens." t Isidore's explanation is " quod ab eoo flat." 20 TABLE OF THE WINDS. muntiat ; qui est calltHus et ijumilius, Mmt= neus, gmerans nulies et plu&ias : et solbtt flores. 2. €urus5i^ot!)us ""' tlat a tiextris ^ustri : tullilim nimis, et aqua [aquam] ex marmore Euere factt et irrigat aquts omnia et Irissolfait : contrarius eCircio : tiictus nottjus eo quoli facit amtcttts.t 3. <^usttxMfxmB, contrarius ^quiloni, liictus est ^uster=^fricus quolr per Mricam currit. IV. OCCIDENS. 1. Jabonius tiictus est eo quob germina fobeat et ati maturitatem pertiucat : W et Eepljtrus : rigore [rfgorem] jiemis relaxat ; flores pros bucit. 2. ^fricus, qui et 3Lipsis [Lips] litcitur : generans tempestates et plubias latisstmas ; facit sonitus tonitruum et Mgurum nisus [add, "et fuiminum"] impulsus. 3. Cijorus qui et ^grcstis [Argestesj] • fians in oriente, nuiiilosus, in gntiia serenus : itieo Itictus Cj^orus est quotr omnium bentorum sptritus§ conclutrat. The ocean is depicted as surrounding the known world » This wind is more usually called " Euroauster. " The name " Em'onotus " appears as a, v. I. in Isidore Nat. Eer. + " Amictus " was probably suggested by " humectus," which appears in the explanation which Aulus Gellius, 11. 22, gives of the Greek name v6tos. t The form " Agrestis " is reprobated by Isidore (Orig. xiii. 11, § 10) as a vulgar error. It is, nevertheless, the received reading in the De Nat. Mer. § The reading in the Orig. is "circulum." The explanation turns wholly on the order in which the names occur — Chorus coming last in Isidore's de- scription. This order is, of course, purely arbitrary ; neither Pliny ii. 119, 120, nor Aulus Gellius, ii. 22, observe the same order. THE OCEAN. Si on all sides. It can hardly be assumed that our cartographer intended to represent the true form or full dimensions of the ocean. He may well have believed, as the majority of medi- aeval cosmographers did, that it stretched far away to the south, and formed an impassable barrier between the known world and the uninhabited lands of other quarters of the globe. But it was sufficient for his purpose to describe it as a band of undefined width, girdling the earth-island on all sides. The southern half of the ocean, from the Strait of Gibraltar to the Terrestrial Paradise, has a fairly equable breadth, the only interruption in the course of its outline being the Arabian Sea, with its two well-known gulfs, the Eed Sea and the Persian Gulf, which are represented as forming two forks very similar to those at the head of the Eed Sea. The sea and its two gulfs are coloured red, in accordance with the name (Erythreeum or Eubrum Mare) assigned to it in ancient geography, and of which the two gulfs were consi- dered as parts (Sohn., 33, § 1 ; 54, § 12). The names of these seas are not iaserted in the map. The isle of Tapro- bane (Ceylon) forms a prominent object in this part of the map. The northern moiety of the ocean is for the most part of irregular outline. The section adjacent to Spain forms an exception to this description, as it curves equally round from the Strait of Gibraltar to the SitlUS ^quitaiticUS {Bay of Biscay). Thence it protrudes considerably inland, so as to allow room for the British Isles. The English Channel and North Sea form a continuous line, and are unduly con- tracted in point of width. An inlet between the rivers Ems and Weser may possibly represent the Gulf of Dollart, which was formed by an irruption of the sea in 1277. The ^itlUS ©CTtltatltCUS {Baltic Sea) foUows, but without any attempt to delineate its distinctive form; then the Scandinavian peninsula, divided into two portions by a projecting arm of 22 AREAJSTGEMENT OF MAP. the sea. Immediately to the eastward of this is another peninsula occupied by the fabulous Cincocephales, and pro- bably intended for a part of Eussia. The northern coast of Asia, -which commences at this point, is drawn in accordance with the peculiar views of mediseval geographers. The Caspian, JEare (CaSpiUtn, may be noticed as projecting in a southerly direction from the Northern Ocean, and terminat- ing in an easterly elongation, somewhat resembling a shoe. Immediately eastward of it is the large peniasula in which Alexander the Great was supposed to have shut up Gog and Magog. Westward, between the Caspian and Scandinavia, is a considerable peninsida, which is assigned as the abode of the happy Hyperboreans. About midway between the Caspian and Paradise the two promontories named Boreiun and Samara form the portals of a gulf of considerable size, which has no representative in true geography. At the extreme east the coast-line projects westward, so as to allow room for the Terrestrial Paradise, which is here represented as an island. The general arrangement of the map is in accordance with the accepted tenets of mediaeval geography. Jerusalem forms the centre of the circle. The east is placed at the head, the Terrestrial Paradise occupying the place of honour at the " janua Solis." The Strait of Gibraltar forms the correspond- ing point in the west. The Mediterranean Sea, §&3XZ §&Z'iiitZXXUntU.VXt stretches hence half-way up the map, and at its upper end has a long northerly extension, which includes the whole series of semi-inclosed seas between the main body of the Mediterranean and the Black Sea — namely, the .^gfean, the Hellespont, the Propontis, and the Bosporus. The easterly extension of the Mediterranean (the Levant) is represented by two tapering arms or horns, between which lie Syria and Palestine. The Mediterranean at its upper DIVISIONS OF THE WOKLD. 23 extremity divides the world into moieties, and sub-divides the lower moiety into imequal halves. We thus obtain a natural division for the three continents — Asia occupying the upper half, Europe and Africa the lower half, to the left and right hand of the Mediterranean respectively. The name ^StE is duly inscribed on its division, but (BuXOTjfU and ^ffrtca have been transposed, probably through care- lessness, but possibly to convey the notion occasionally expressed, that Africa was not a separate continent, but a sub-division of Europe. (Oros. i. 2 ; Isid. Orig. xiv. 2, § 3 ; Higden, i. 50.) At all events, our cartographer perfectly well knew the true position of the two continents. At the Strait of Gibraltar he has placed the inscriptions SC^nttttWS d^Urope and EzXXainUS ^Wcitt in their right positions, and he has marked the boundary between Africa and Asia, WttmiViUS 'ES^Z tt ^UxiCZ, in the place usually assigned to it in mediaeval geography — namely, to the westward of Egypt, which was included in Asia. Certain objects are introduced into the map for the express purpose of defining the boundary between these two continents. The chain of mountains which lies adjacent to the inscription above given is no doubt intended for Catabathmus, inasmuch as it is so named in the " Imago Mundi " map ; it is, of course, grievously misplaced, inasmuch as its proper position is on the coast of the Mediterranean. Orosius (i. 2) describes the boundary as starting from Paraetonium, on the borders of Egypt and Alexandria ("a finibus.iEgypti uxbisque Alexandrise ubi Parethonium civitas sita est "), and then passing through Catabathmos (" per loca quse Catabathmon vocant ") ; and this confused statement goes far to justify the error of the map. Orosius further specifies two boundary marks, both of which are entered in the map, viz. : CaStra ^lexatllrrt JSlagni, and 3LaCUS CaleatSUS JirofuntliSSimUS. These objects 24 BOUNDAEY OF EUROPE. must be placed between Parsetonium and Ammonimn. From Lake Calearsus the boundary -line was continued south to the ocean. The boundary between Europe and Asia is not specified ; probably because the name of the Don (Tanais), which was deemed the boundary in ancient times, has been omitted, the cartographer having apparently misunderstood the language of Orosius (i. 2), who says of the Tanais, " Meeotides auget paludes," and having assigned to the river the name jnu&iuS JHcottljegi, "with the addition of ^al; U'titS, in the lower course of the river. The " Arse Alex- andri," which are entered in the map somewhat E. of the Fluvius Meotides, are associated by Orosius (1. c.) with the course of the Tanais, and with the boundary. Following the order which mediaeval geographers adopted in their descriptions of the world, we commence with the continent of Asia. CHAPTEE II. ASIA. Boundaries — Terrestrial Paradise — The D17 Tree— India — Golden Mountains — Pigmies — Avalerion par in Mwndo — Palimbotlira — Mons MaUeus — Taprobane and the Islands of the Indian Ocean — Gangines — Monoculi — Ganges — Tile — Mons Timavus — Animals attributed to India. The boundaries of Asia have been already sufficiently defined in the preceding chapter ; we shall therefore proceed at once to a description of the various objects presented to our view on that continent. The Terrestrial Paradise occupies, as was usual in mediaeval maps, a conspicuous position at the head of the map, or, in other words, at the extreme easterly point of the habitable world. The views entertained on this sub- ject in the middle ages have been noticed in the Introdnction, § 9. In the Hereford map Paradise is represented as an island of circular form, surrounded by a strong and lofty wall, from the top of which flames burst forth (Isid. xiv. 3, 3). Within it are the four rivers, CHufrateS, STtgrtg, PljtSOU, and ffiiotT ; figures of Adam and Eve in the act of eating the forbidden fruit ; and a tower representing the gates of the garden, ^arallisi porte. Immediately below are figures, with the legend (iJExpulSiO ^1(0 Ct ^ija ; and above them a tree with two branches, ar60C fealsattti i [i. e.) axbOX sicca* This legend seems to be compounded of more than one story. 1. With the metrical romance of Alexander, or at least with the tradition on which it was founded, our author was 26 ASIA. probably acquainted. In this Alexander is represented as visiting a forest in India, in which grew trees of wondrous size (cf. Virg. Georg. ii. 123), distilling balsam. Farther on was a mystic tree, which tore neither leaves nor fruit, whereon sat the Phoenix. Farther on still he meets with the trees of the sun and moon, from one of which, as from an oracle, he learned his own destiny. 2. Marco Polo, in his travels of the 13 th century, men- tions a plain in Persia (near enough to India for legendary purposes), in which grew the Tree of the Sun, Arlte Sol, which " we Christians," he says, " caU the dry tree, Arhre Sec." 3. Sir John Mandeville, in the 14th century, mentions as if he had seen, though this is of little consequence, the famous oak, or rather terebinth, near Mamre, which is men- tioned by Eusebius, and which S. Jerome says that he had seen ; " the whiche," says Mandeville, " men clepen the drye Tree. And thei saye that it hath been there sithe the be- ginninge of the world, and was sumtyme grene, and bare leves, unto the tyme that oure Lord dyede on the cros, and thanne it dryede, and so dyden aUe the Trees that weren thanne in the worlde." 4. The Peutinger Table names a point in India where " Alexander responsum accepit usquequo Alexander" 5. To these statements may be added the passage in Ezek. xvii. 24, as suggesting the notion, however erroneous in its development, of a perennial dry tree ; perhaps also the mention by Josephus of balsam trees at Engedi, near the Dead Sea ; and lastly, the Christian legend, that the wood of the dry tree supplied the material for our Saviour's cross ; " so that," to use the words of the Golden Legend, " the cross by which we are saved came of the tree by which we were damned," — a legend to which is probably due the name of a street in Paris, Bue de I'Arbre Sec, not far from the Sainte ASIA. 27 Chapelle, in which the wood of the true cross was deposited by King Louis IX., its founder. Now, although our author could not have been acquainted with Marco Polo's explorations, and as he was prior in date to Sir John MandevUle, the foregoing data wiU enable us to understand something of the process of confusion by which (a) the dri/ tree finds its place near Paradise, (&) on the confines of India, (c) how it obtained its double name and bifurcated form of arior halsami and arbor sicca. (Yule, Marco Polo, i. 1 2 6 ; Weber, Metr. Bom. i. ; Morley, Eng. Writers, p. 681; DxhAg^, Hist, of Fiction, ii. Ill; MandeviUe, p. 68, ed. Halliwell ; Bordeaux PUgrim, p. 282 ; Hieron. de Situ et Norn. vol. ii. pp. 862, 890; Euseb. Vit. Const, iii. 51; Demonstr. Evang. v. 9, 7 ; Isid. xiv. 3, 2, xvii. 7, 3 8 ; Spruner, Atlas, PL 28 ; Early Trav. pp. 7, 45 ; Golden Legend, by Caxton, pp. 5, 67.) The word Jtliia, in gold letters, runs across the map India, from KE. to S.E. On the left (N.) side, below Paradise, is (l!fn0S CtbitaS antiquiSSima (Gen. iv. 17) ; on the right the giants, ©igantCS (Gen. vi. 4). Below them comes jFlxiJjiUS gppaixiS, the Hyphasis, sometimes called Hypanis, Sutledge (Dionys. Per. 1155; Solinus, 52, 7; Strabo,xv. 697, 698) ; and parallel with it flubiUS paStHa, a branch of the same river, which runs in a N.E. direction, but whose name, though inviting more than one etymology, affords no trust- worthy clue to its identity. Above the Hypanis is prO= munctorium aligartramana, Peomontoeium Caiigaedamna, which Orosius mentions as near the mouth of the Ganges, and at the N.E. of the island Taprobane. It may per- haps represent the promontory Calligicum of Ptolemy, but is vastly out of its proper place. (Ores. i. 2 ; Ptol. vii. 1, 11.) Then comes Cotomare portUS, CoTTONAEA of Pliny and Solinus, Cottiara of Ptolemy, now probably Cochin (Plin. 28 ASIA. India, vi. 105 ; Sol. 54, 8 ; Ptol. vii. 1, 9 ; Diet, of Geog. i. 698) ; and portus patalug, ifamu spiraticts scelerifeus (portus Patalus infamis piraticis sceleribus). This is clearly Pataie of Pliny, Patalene of Mela and Ptolemy, the triangular district between Cutch and Kurrachee, credited by our author with the ill fame of pirates, whom Pliny and Solinus locate at Zvmaris, mentioned below. (Plin. vi. 184; Mela, iii. 7; SoUn. 54, 8; Ptol. vii. 1, 55, 59.) Beyond Patalus is the figure of an elephant with a castle on his back, and adjoining it the legend Enllta tllitttt ettam elcjjfjantcs maxtmos, quorum lientes £&ur esse crrtitur, quttius IxCbzi (indi) turrtbus impositts in ielliS UtUUtUr, which seems to be founded on Isidore. (Plin. viii. 27 ; Isid. xii. 2, 14, 15.) Eetuming to the joint mouth of the rivers f^gpauiS and ^aSttia, we find a range of gilded mountains, surmounted by two dragons, and the words mOTXtCS aurCOS a iraCOTttbUiS CUStOtlit (custoditos), founded, as it seems, on the words of ^thicus, but derived from very early tradition. (Herod, iii. 116; ^sch. Prom. v. 806; PI. vii. 10; Hieron. ^p. 125, 3; ^thic. 105.) Below them are the ^tgiUft CUftitalcS homines (Isid. xi. 3, 26), who stand upon mOtlteS ^tltlie (Indiae), according to the descriptions of Pliny and Solinus. (Plin. vi. 70; Sol. 52, 15.) Following thePASMA, we meet with ^tCCaS andJSucrfala, NiCEA and Bucephala, two towns founded by Alexander near the river Hydaspes, and beyond them ^xtt ^XtXKX^Xi, denoting the twelve altars set up by him to mark the ter- mination of his expedition, and the commencement of his unwUling return. (Arr. Ex^. v.; Solin. 45, 10 ; 52, 7.) A little farther is the figure of a bird, intended for a parrot, with a descriptive legend from Solinus (52, § 43): — SoliUUS, ^ntita mtttit abem spttacum [psittacum] : colore birtUi : ASIA. 29 torque JJUntCeO. The blunder in the name of the bird may India. be due either to a marginal reading, syptacus, in Solinus (see App. p. 245), or to the form which appears in ^thicus (cap. 106), n-sxaeij, psiptacus. Eeturning to the Monies Indice, we find two rivers, which subsequently coalesce, the ^ceSttieS {CJienal) and the l^gliaSpeS {Jhelum). Both of them rise in mountains, in a region described as EmgtlUW CtapfjiS XZ^m qui [Eegnum Cleophidis regin£e, quae] ^lexanUtUm SUSCeptt* The queen here referred to is the same of whom we shall hear again under the name of Cleopatra. Between the two rivers is the figure of a crocodile or aUigator, with the word |LaC0ttUS, which creature Arrian and Pliny mention as aboundiag in the Indus. (Arr. Exp. v. ; Plin. vi., § 75.) Just beyond this we find mention of the realm of Porus and Abisares, two Indian kings with whom Alexander contended in the neighbourhood of the Hydaspes (Arr. Exp. v. ; Curt. viii. 1 2, 1 3, ix. 1) : — l^etTgTlUttt [Eegnum] pijort ti ^trisarts qui tiecerta&eruut cum maguo ^In- an"Ciro« Parallel with the Hydaspes is the Indus (^tttlUS), having two head-streams, one rising in mountains belonging to the group already mentioned as JSoutCS ^nlji0, and the other in a range called JHOTtS .Sepijar, which may perhaps be taken to represent the " Mount of the East " of Gen. x. 30. l^ear the source of the former stream is a town, with a superscription which seems to read as follows: — 3£lananll0 amptlt Citca ^racusiam cifaitatem seramts tmposuit, which should pro- bably be thus mended, Etymandeo amni cieca Aeachosiam . . . Semiramis imposuit. It is founded on the following passage in Solinus : — Arachosiam Erymaniho amni impositam Semira- mis condidit. The river adjoining this town is perhaps in- tended for the Erymanthus, more commonly called Etymand- 30 ASIA. India, rus, for which a corrupt v. I. had rimando, corrupted in the third degree, as above, into ranando. Solinus means to say that Semiramis placed the town Arachosia in the midst of the river Erymanthus or Etymandrus. Pliny, whom Solinus follows, says that Semiramis founded Arachosia, and that some called it Cophen, and he mentions the Erymanthus as flowing through the province of Arachosia. The Etymandrus is probably the Helmund, which flows S.W. from the moun- tains of Cabul into the lake Hamoon, and not into the Indus as the map seems to express; but the river Cophen or Cophes, the Gahul, flows into the Indus, running in a direction from N.W. to S.E. How the town Arachosia came to be called Cophen it is difficult to say. (Plin. vi. § 92 ; Solin. 54, 2 ; Did. of Geogr. i. 184.) At the source of the other head stream we have a town which is said to have been destroyed by Cyrus, ffiaSSica Cibitas quam CirUS leStrUXit, The place intended is no doubt Capissa, which Pliny says was destroyed by Cyrus. It perhaps answers to Peshawur, but it is unlikely that this point was reached by him. (Plin. vi. § 92 ; Solin. .54, 2 ; Did. Geogr. i. 505.) Between the Hydaspes and the Indus are figures of two birds, probably intended for eagles, with an inscription, ^Ualerion, par in tnunlJO. This may perhaps be founded on Pliny, who, in speaking of eagles, mentions one, the melanaetos, or black eagle, which, though the smallest in size, is pre-eminent in strength, and therefore called Valeria (from valeo). It dwells in mountains ; and further on he says that a pair of eagles, par aquilarum, require a large tract of country to support them. But the notion of the aualerion, as expressed in the map, is directly derived from the old bestiary books, which teU us that the Alerion is a bird, rather small, yet larger than an eagle, and that in the whole ASIA. 31 world there is only one pair. They live sixty years, and India. then lay two eggs, on which they sit sixty days and nights. When the shell is biirst the parents fly to the sea, accom- panied by all other birds, and drown themselves therein. The other birds then return and nnrse the young ones till they can fly. (Plin. x. §§ 6, 14 ; Cahier et Martin, MSlange^ SArcMologie, vol. ii. p. 162.) The eagle, according to an eastern tradition, is in the habit of flying so close to the sun as to become extremely hot, and to cool himself dives into the sea, where he becomes renewed in youth and plumage. This he does every ten years until his hundredth year, when having dropped into the sea as usual, he dies. (Kimchi, from Saadia, an Arabian writer on Ps. cui. and Is. xl ; ap. Bochart, iii. pp. 166, 169. See also Epiphanius, Physio- logics, 6.) In a triangular space, two of whose sides are mountains, we have an inscription referring to the kingdom of Cleopatra, queen of Mazagae, a town situate among the Daedalian mountains, and whose interview with Alex- ander is recorded by Curtius, Justin, and Orosius, from which last author the statement of the map is probably derived : Inter ©rtaltos montes rengnunt Cleopatrc regine que ^lexanlrrUltt SUSCepit. Ptolemy mentions a town called Daedala, between the Hydaspes and the Viadhyan mountains, and the name of the town has perhaps given rise to that of the mountains. (Ptol. viii. i. 49; Curt. viii. 10, 19, 22; Oros. iii. 19.) Next comes a figure representing, as it seems, a female soldier, and an inscription taken from Solinus (52, S 15) : ^anliea gens ^ntiie a femtnts regttur. Adjacent to this figure is a town set in a frame, with an inscription taken in substance from Isidore (xv. 1, § 6) : — |^uam pSTysam] ct&ttatem ©tonisius pater conUilrit; replens earn IL. 32 ASIA. India. mtUbUS fjOttlinUttt. Beyond this comes a mountain, with an inscription from Solinus (52, § 16), IHonS SofaiS acer= merOS [Jovi sacer Mercs] Ijicitur ttl CUJUS SpeCU nUtritUttt iLifterum patrcm ^[ntii beteres aftnant [adfiimant]. Passing a nameless affluent of the Indus we come to an angular range of mountains, enclosing an inscription representing the substance of passages from Pliny and Solinus, in close connection with the subject of the next article, which it wUl be convenient to consider first. This is a town on the Indus, with an inscription taken almost verbatim from Solmus (52, § 12), ^o66rota [Pahmbothra] ctbitas quam inf)a6itant ^^rasia gens |[nbte baliiiisstma quorum xtx WE peiitum rt equitum m zt clepfjatitorum FIeI COtitlie [quotidie] alj StipCtttlium ijOCat. The town here alluded to, Palimbothra, mentioned by Ptolemy as a royal city, by Arrian and Strabo as the principal city of India, and by the Alexandrian Komance as Polybote, answers to the city of Patna, whose Sanscrit name was Pataliputea. Between Palibothra and Mons Meros, a range of moun- tains is depicted, representing Mons Malleus, with the follow- ing inscription: — ©JUS fiCorcttta tixzK ilHallcum moutcm Jjatritant : cuius umbre ab [ad] aquilonem cabunt Ijseme, ab aUStrUttt fStatC. Eeference has been already made to this mountain in the Introduction (p. xvi.) The legend in the map is founded on Solinus, who says, ultra Faliloth- ram mons Maleus, in quo umbrae Jiieme in septemtriones, cestate in austros cadunt, vicissitudine hac durante mensilus senis. Pliny, speaking of a tribe called Suari, says, quorum mons Maleus, and then describes the alternation of the shadows. The reader will notice Pliny's expression quorum mons Maleus, with which the map agrees more closely than with the text of Solinus. But what was the gens Corcina of ASIA. 33 the map ? The name can hardly be intended to denote the India. Suari, still less the Prasian nation. The Peutinger Table, however, names a town Coesania, not far from the mouth of the Ganges, on which Palimbothra was situate, which may perhaps have suggested a transfer of its name to that of a people. But its equivalent is not known. (Ptol. vii. i. 73 ; Strabo, xv. p. 702 ; Plin. vi. § 68, 69 ; Solin. 52, 12, 13 ; Weber, Bom. vol. i. v. 4889.) Beyond Palimbothra, on the sea coast, are JHottS .Scpf)ar, Brcpanum jjromunctortum (promontonum) and Ztmarim JlOrtUS, aJl of them names connected with the sea voyage be- tween Egypt and India. Sephab, which was perhaps intended by our author as a repetition or continuation of the " Mount of the East" mentioned above, had an equivalent in a town of that name on the Arabian peninsula, described by Arrian, Pliny, and Ptolemy, as a " metropolis." Deepanum, otherwise called Lepteacea and the " Indian promontory," was on the W. shore of the Eed Sea ; and ZiMAKis, so called by Solinus. but by PHny MuziEis, was a commercial port on the coast of India, now probably Mangalore, and was considered danger- ous on account of the pirates. (Plin. vi. | 104, 175 ; Solin. 54, 8 ; Ptol. iv. 5, 14; vi. 7, 41 ; vii. 1, 8 ; Diet, of Bible, iii. 1197; Did. Geogr. ii. 380.) In the scarlet bifurcation, which represents the Eed Sea, Islands Persian Gulf, and Indian Ocean, we have a large triangu- iJi lar island, intended for Ceylon, with an inscription mainly ^ ^^"^ . p . Ocean. borrowed from Isidore, xiv. 6, § 12, to the effect that it has two summers, two winters, and two springs in each year, and that the further part of the island abounds in elephants and dragons. In this latter point our cartographer has somewhat improved on Isidore, by converting his hedice into dragons. The notice of the ten cities comes from Orosius, i. 2. With regard to the form of the name Taphana, for Taprobane, we c 34 ASIA. Islands may compare Ta;pbana in the map of Henry of Mayence. in The inscription runs thus : — Captatia [Taprohane] ittSUla oSri gntiic suftjacens aU eurum ex quo ©ccauus Eniicus itxcipit; fjairt in anno tiuas estates et tiuas tiemes et his floriius faemat, Si ulterior pars elep^antis et Xiraconiftus plena: Ijaliet et % cibitates. The wild animals are duly displayed, with the title IBracOUeS J as also is the river, which Isidore describes as intersecting the island. Near Taphana are the islands Crise, Srgire, ©p!)ir, and JFrontliSia, Of these Cheyse and Aegyee are men- tioned by Pliny as islands near the mouth of the Indus; by Mela, Cheyse as near the promontory Tamus, probably Cape Negrais, in Burmah ; Aegyre as near the mouth of the Ganges. Ptolemy describes a silver region, Aegyea, and a " golden chersonese," and also an island lahadiou, whose capital was Argyra. Perhaps, on the whole, Chryse may be taken as representiag Sumatra, and Argyre, Java, or the Burmese territory. But both of these, together with Ophie, which Higden calls an island, represent collectively the gold and silver region of the East, so often mentioned in Scrip- ture, and whose position, little known to the people of the West, is placed by the mediaeval geographer at a group of islands, a position which seems to give a sort of certaia definiteness to what is in itself uncertain. jll^OnljiSta stands for Apheodisia, alSiera, ia the Persian G-ulf. Between Taphana and the next article is introduced an island called CiprUS. which seems to have found its way here from the list of islands of the Eastern Ocean, given by Julius Hono- rius, but for what reason is not apparent. It might probably represent Sippara, a town mentioned by Ptolemy, on the W. side of India, but this seems hardly probable. Lelewel thinks it is intended for Capraria, one of the Fortunate ASIA. 35 Islands; but as Capraria appears farther on, this does not Islands seem likely. (Plin. vL § 80, 111 ; Solin. 52, 17 ; 54, 13 ; i^ Ptol. vii. 1, 16 ; Isid. xiv. 3, 5 ; 6, 11 ; Jul. Honor, p. 10 ; Jj^^^^ Higden, 1, 11 ; Clark, Bible Atlas, p. 37, seq) Eeturning to the mainland of India, we find the Ganges India. taking its rise in a range of mountains called ©SCO, and emptying itself into the ocean by two mouths forming a delta. In a space between these mountains and another range called Caucasiis is a tree with figures of long-robed, red-girdled natives, busily employed in gathering the fruit, with the name ffiattfltttCS above them. This name comes from -.Ethicus, and is found in Ptolemy as GtANGAJTi, though these lived near the mouth of the river. The name is probably confused with the Aganginae of Ptolemy, who dwelt in Lybia. They probably represent the GtANGAHID^, a name which Isidore says denotes their neighbourhood to the Ganges, whose name, again, comes from Gaitgaeus, a king of India. Orosius informs us that the Ganges rises in the mountain range called Oscobaees, where grows the plant called Laser. The name Oscobaees, which Isidore writes Oscobeigis, probably represents the Oxian Mountains of Ptolemy and Strabo, dividing Scythia from Bactria, and though the Ganges does not rise in them, their position, as well as those assigned to CaUCaSUS, Paropamisus (mOtltCS ^aropattitateS), and Imaus (monS 2Dtltta&US)) is not unfairly represented in the Map. The Caucasus here named is of course the Hindoo Koosh, or Indian Caucasus. The name Caucasus was given, as Arrian tells us, by the soldiers of Alexander's army, in compliment to their leader, though unwittingly they underrated its value, for the mountain range which they so called was really far in advance of the true Caucasus between the Caspian and Black Seas, and much more distant from his and their own home. The tree, whose fruit the Gangines are so busily 36 ASIA. India, gathering, cannot be tlie Laser, or Laserpitium, which is a shrub only, and not a tree, but is no doubt intended to illus- trate the inscription from Solinus, which is given below. (Ptol. iv. 6, 23 ; vii. 2, 13; Oros. i. 2; .^thic. 57, 106; Arr. Ea^. iii. v.; Isid. ix. 2, 41; xvii. 9, 27; Plin. vi. § 65 ; xxii. § 101 ; Solin. 49, 6 ; 52, 8.) A little above the tree is CatirUStnia, and on the other side of the mountain '^ItXB.VitSXidL CtbttaS, two names for the same town, Alexandria, founded by Alexander, ia the country of the Cadrusi, and due to a misunderstanding, as it seems, by Solinus, of the passage in which Phny mentions it. Solinus calls it. Cadrusium. (Plin. vi. § 92 ; SoIlq. 54, 2 ; Diet. Geogr. i. 463.) Near these towns is an inscription founded on a passage in Solinus, descriptive of a peculiar people living near the sources of the Ganges, probably the Gangines already de- scribed : — Siolmus : ffiangis fontem qui acolunt i solo biJjunt otjore jjomorum sil&estrium; qui si fttorm SCnSerint, Statim moriuntur. The story comes from Megasthenes, who says that these people, whom he calls aanfioi, mouthless, live on the smell of roast meat and the scents of fruits and flowers, and are so much annoyed by bad smells, especially in camp, that they scarcely survive them. It has been suggested that he mistook a Sanscrit name resembling ^ffro/io/ in sound, and invented the story to explain the word. Pliny, in his account of them, omits the roast meat, but says that they carry the apples with them on their journeys, for bad smells easily deprive them of life, graviore odore haud difficulter exanimari. Solinus and Sir J. MandeviUe improve upon this, and say that they die " anon." The stooping figure in the picture is doubtless inhaling his daily food, but he is plainly doing so carefully, lest " The quick effluvia, darting through his brain," ASIA. 37 he should India. " Die of a rose in aromatic pain." (Megasth. /ra^r. 29; Plin. viii. §25; Solin. 52, 29; Sir J. Mand. p. 297; Lardner, Cycl. Geogr. i. p. 67.) After passing the tttOntCS }jaropattitat0S we encounter a figure engaged in screening himself from the solar heat with his own leg and foot. He has indeed but one leg, but it is a leg of great and varied ability. Wot only does it, when "stuck stiffly out," like Miss Kilmansegg's "precious leg," serve as a natural parasol, but it is also an instmment of rapid locomotion. Solinus derived the legend from Pliny, and he from Ctesias, who wrote in the 5th century B.C., but never saw India. The MonocoU, or Sciapodes, whom Pliuy describes, are mentioned by Scylax of Caryanda, who wrote a little before the age of Alexander, and also by Megasthenes, to whom they were described by the philosophers (Brahmins). The inscription, borrowed substantially from Solinus, stands thus: — ^|aott0nilt [MonocoH]: gunt Itx ^ixUia sinsuUs crurilius pernici celeritate t{m u6t ijrfenUi S0 belint a calor0 solis plantarum suarum magnttutitne o6ums bratltur* The reader will notice the change of monocoli (one-legged) into monoculi (one-eyed). Sir John MandeviUe has described this marvel of creation, but places him in Ethiopia, a country frequently confounded with India, as a fruitful mother of marvels. He says, "In that contree ben folk, that han but foot : and thei gon so fast, that it is marvaylle: and the foot is so large that it schade- wethe alle the Body azen the Sonne, whanne thei wole lye and reste hem." Schwanbeck, the German editor of Megasthenes, thinks that the Monocoli were described to Megasthenes under their Sanscrit name Scapddas, fiov6mSi{ (one-footed), and that he, with a pardonable pun, changed the 38 ASIA. India, name into iiKumSig (swift-footed). The origiaal of the story- was probably some animal of the monkey tribe, developed by natural selection into the Monocolus man ; or perhaps the whole story is a perversion of the Indian use of umbrellas, noticed by Arrian. {Megwih. frac/. 29, pp. 67, 116 ; Ctesias, p. 378, ed. Baehr.; Aristoph. Pax. 1554; Phn. vii. | 23; Solin. 52, 29; Isid. xi. 3, 23 ; MandeviUe, Trav. p. 157; Philolog. Mus. i. 245 ; Arr. Ind. p. 540.) Beyond the Monocolos figure the Ganges divides itself into two streams, forming an island or delta, within which is an inscription made up from two passages in Solinus, who says that the least breadth of the Ganges is eight miles, and the greatest nineteen miles ; that the river makes an island, whose king can send out 4000 cavalry and 50,000, not 80,000, infantry soldiers. (SoHn. 52, 7,11): — SolmUS: minima ffiangis latituto jjra vim passuum, maxima px Sei patrt, Bern Ganges insulam facit cuius xtx mm milta militum [equitum] et Ciii pettitum* Opposite the N.W. mouth of the Ganges a second Mount Caucasus appears, placed within an island called SDilc, fruitful in all good things. The island which this denotes, Tylos, in the Persian Gulf, is placed by Solinus in India. The in- scription is taken in substance from Solinus, in a passage upon which foUows closely an account of Mount Caucasus, to which circumstance perhaps is due its position within the island of Tile. (Sohn. 52, 49, 50; Isid. xiv. 3, 5; Aug. Civ. D. xxi. 5, 1.) North of the branch of the Ganges first mentioned, is an inscription descriptive of the length of India, the variety of the nations Kving within its limits, and its natural products, as follows : — ffiatlCfCS. ©CCiCS SCJJs ties cmtraa rt IL millia passuum longituljo Inliie tenet, teste Solino, Etem f eibitatum et Iri&ersissimo [e], gentes monstruoso bultu, ritu, et Jjafiitu bario, plus ASIA. 39 quam crelit posstt, ©emmarum et metallorum alttu= india. entia mm pmculo tottus Qtnexis iesttarum rt serpm= ttum quae omnia jiotius legratia sunt quam ptnflmtia. This is taken from several passages in Solinus, — the dis- tances from 54, 10 ; the 5000 cities from 52, 4 ; the variety of races and dresses in substance from 52, 19; the personal appearance of the natives from 52, 27 ; and the abundance of precious stones from 52, 53-62. Adjoining this, on the left, is a sort of triangular com- partment, enclosed between j^oUS CaUCaSUS on one side and JHonS STima&US on the other, divided by a river, and ending in a mountain with the words, promunctOtium .Samara, it contains also the following — (1.) An inscrip- tion, Inllia que (quas) Untm facit ; (2.) A representa- tion of foliage, with the words, ^allantrj jsil&as ptpcrcas ijaftent ; (3.) A town called CrtStoaS, These names and descriptions seem to be founded on passages in Orosius and Solinus. The former says that the Mons Imaus, for which a V. I. has Timavxts, is at the extreme E., where the Caucasus terminates, and where the river Cheysoeehoas, and the pro- montory Samaea, are met by the Eastern Ocean. The pro- montory Samara may perhaps represent Sumatra, called Samara by Marco Polo, or a place in the silver Chersonese called Sambra. The river may be the river called by Ptolemy Oichardus, and by Orosius, OdacJiordis ; but respecting the town Ceistoas little can be offered in the way of suggestion beyond a similarity in name to Chrysorrhoas, a river mentioned by Orosius. The pepper woods are described by Solinus, after Pliny, as frequent on the S. side of the Caucasus, and are also mentioned by Cosmas Indico-Pleustes and Isidore, but who the Pallandae may be it is difficult, if not impossible, to say. Ptolemy mentions a tribe called Fulindce on the N.W. side of India, a town called Palanda, and also a river, called 40 ASIA. India. Palandes, in the Golden Chersonese ; and it must he added that the whole compartment has an appearance of being intended to represent India beyond the Ganges, with the exception that it is situate on the W. instead of the E. side of that river. (Ptol. vi. 15, 2; vii. 1, 64; 2, 3, 5, 25; Oros. 1, 2; Solin. 52, 50; Cosm. Indie, iii. p. 336, ed. Montf. ; Isid. xvii. 8, 8.) Before quitting India we have to notice some articles relating to its zoology ia other parts of the map. In the part which adjoins Ethiopia we have — (1.) An animal in- tended for a rhinoceros, though putting forth a speed which that animal does not usually possess. Above it is a super- scription, altered and abridged from Solinus : — SoUtlUS X En gntita nascitur J^inosccros cut color 6uxeus; in narihus cornu unum mucroncm cxcitat quum aibersuiS clcpljantcs prcUatur; per [par] tpsis in longitutiine, lircbior cruritius, naturaltter album pctcns, quam solam intClligit ictiiUS SUiS pcr&iam. This description, founded upon Pliny, and which agrees almost word for word with Diodorus, who followed Agatharchides, is substantially correct. The rubbing of the horn against rocks seems to indicate the habit of the animal in wallowing on the ground like a pig. His way of fighting with the elephant is correct in itself, and agrees with the description of Strabo, though there is no real foundation for the statement of habitual enmity between the two animals. (Plin. viii. 71; Diod. Sic. iii. 35; Strabo, xvi. p. 774; Solin. 30, 21.) (2.) Below this comes a description of the Monoceeos, or unicorn, which Isidore identifies with the rhinoceros, but which our author appears to have regarded as distinct. The term unicorn, which, though not invariable as regards the species, may be applied justly to the most common sort of Indian rhinoceros, has been transferred in our English Bible ASIA. 41 to denote an animal of a totally different kind. Solinus, India. following Pliny pretty closely, calls the monoceros atrocissi- mus . . . monstrum mugitu horrido, equina corpore, el&phanti pedihus, cauda suilla, capite cervino, cornu d media fronte . . . splendore mirifico, ad magnitudinem pedum guattuor - . . vivus non venit in Tiominum, potestatem, et interimi guidem potest capi non ■potest. (Plin. \dii. § 76 ; Solin. 52, 39.) This description is founded on that of Ctesias concerning the Indian ass, but with an augmentation of the horn from two to four feet. Aristotle also describes this animal as a unicorn, with a horn in the centre of his forehead. The late J. C. Bahr, editor of Ctesias, thought that he meant to describe a rhinoceros, but the description by no means fully answers to this opinion. The name rhinoceros occurs first in Agathar- chides, about 150 B.C., and some of the animal's habits described iu the preceding article were evidently unknown both to Ctesias and Aristotle. The description of Agathar- chides is followed by Diodorus, circ. a.d., who does not mention the unicorn. Strabo, A.D. 20, briefly notices the unicorn as a homed horse, said by Megasthenes to' be found in India, but he describes the rhinoceros from the description of Artemddorus, confirmed by his own observation. Pliny and Solinus, as we have seen, regard the two animals as distinct, and both are described separately by Cosmas Indico-Pleustes about 535 a.d. Figures of both, taken from MSS. either at first or second hand, are given in Montfaucon's edition of Cosmas. His rhinoceros has two horns, and he says that he had seen the animal, both alive and dead, in Ethiopia — i.e. probably in Abyssinia. The monoceros he says that he had not seen, but made his drawing from bronze statues in the palace of the king of Ethiopia. He identifies it with the animal mentioned in Numb, xxiii. 22, and Pss. xxii. 21, xxix. 6. In aU these passages the LXX. version, which 42 ASIA. India. Cosmas quotes accurately, renders tlie Hebrew word by monoceros. In tbe first of them the Vulgate has rhinoceros, and in the two last unicornis. "With this exception Isidore appears to be the earliest writer who regards the two animals as identical, and also to be one of the first to introduce the story of the maiden, unknown to Cosmas a century before, which found so much favour in later times, and which appears in the Bestiaries, with illustrations, in some of which the deluded animal is represented as reposing in aU confidence in the lap of a lady, while the treacherous hunter, in fuU armour, stabs him from behind. This is described in the map in a legend borrowed from Isidore: — ©giltoruS iu libro 3EHE etijtmologiarum [Etymoiogiarum] capitulo M. Sicut asserunt qui naturas animalmm scrtpsErunt. f^ttic monoccrott trtrgo jjuclla proponitur, que feenietiti siuum a|in:tt ; in quo ille omni ferocitate Ijeposita capui [caput] ponit, sic que sojjoratus, &elut( [velut] iuermis CajjitUt, The monoceros is also described in the Alex- andrian Eomance — " A best there is, of more log, That is y-cleped monoceros." The figure of the monoceros, as given in Montfaucon from Cosmas, is like that of an antelope, with a horn rising straight upwards from his forehead. This resembles what used to be regarded in Europe as the horns of unicorns, but which are really tusks of the narwhal, monodon monoceros, a native of arctic, and perhaps antarctic, but not tropical, seas ; and it is worthy of remark that Pietro della VaUe, after mentioning Pliny's description of the monoceros, says that Captain Woodcock, an arctic voyager, had told htm that he had met with unicorns near Greeidand. Whether the original, from which the horns of the statues which Cosmas saw were ASIA. 43 imitated, was one of these tusks, cannot be ascertained, nor India. what the animals were which Montfaucon says the Jesuit missionaries in Abyssinia, who had reared them, re- garded as unicorns. The whole story is perhaps a com- posite one, and the narwhal's tooth has been fitted to the head of some goat-Kke animal, whose pair of horns, in a side- long position, has appeared to a distant observer like a single one. (Ctes. § 25 ; Agatharch. ap. Phot. Bill. 250, p. 455 ; Arist. Part. Anim., iu. 2, 7 ; Strabo, xv. p. 710 ; Cosm. Indie, xi. p. 335, ed. Montf. ; Isid. xii. 2, 12, 13 ; Geographia Uni- versalis, p. 25; P. d. VaU. ii. 491; Weber, Bom. i. v. 65, 38; Brit. Mus. Bihl. Beg. xii. F. 13; Earl. MSS. 3244; Cahier et Martin, Md. d'Arch. ii. 220 ; Yule, Marco Bolo, ii. 234.) (3.) In Egypt, on the borders of Arabia Petrsea, there is a pictorial representation of a fabulous animal called Eale, with an inscription taken substantially from SoUnus, as foUows : — Solmus : <&^z nascitur in ^ntia, equina corpore, caulia depijanti, nigro colore, maxillas caprinas prrferens iSoi. Maxiiiis apmgnis), comua ultra cubttalem longa, tteque mim rigent, scU mobcntur ut usus mgtt preliatitii, quorum cum uno pugnat, alter rcpUcat* Some of the verbal alterations in the above inscription proceed from the Geographia Universalis, or from the Bestiaries ; but what animal possesses this convenient method of simul- taneous defence and offence is perhaps not to be ascertained. Pliny says it was as large as a hippopotamus. It may be the beast called by Cosmas, who says he had eaten of its flesh, CJioerdaphus, whose teeth weighed 13 lbs. each. (PKn. viii. 73 ; Solin. 52, 35 ; Geogr. Univ. p. 25 ; Bibl. Eeg. Brit. Mus. xii. F. 1 3 ; Cosmas, Indicopl. p. 336, ed. Montf) (4.) To these we have to add a fabulous animal, the Mantichoea, with a human head and a leonine body, re- 44 ASIA. India, puted to be a native of India, but transposed in the map to tbe north of Caucasus. This is described in a legend taken from Soiinus, as foUows : — .Solmus : IHatiticora ttascitur in ^ntiia, tripUca timttum otainz, facie Ijominis, glaucis oculis, sattguineo colore, corpore leonitto, cautia scor= piOttiS, faoce Sibilla. SoUnus adds that it has a particular relish for human flesh. The picture given by Ctesias, from whom Pliny derived his description, is even more frightful still, especially as to the tail. This is furnished, he says, with at least three stings, which the creature is able to pro- ject at an enemy like darts, and so venomous as to cause instant death. But he says nothing about the vox sibila and its imitative powers. It must be allowed that our cartographer, perhaps in compassion to his readers, has diminished the terrors of the tail, which, though defiant in attitude, appears nevertheless to be destitute of scorpionic sting. The writer of the Geographia Universalis adds that his speed is swifter than a bird's flight, and that with his shrill voice he is able to go up and down the scale. (Ctes. 6 ; Plin. viii. 75 ; Solin. 52, 37; Geogr. Univ. p. 25.) Near this animal is a nameless tree, which seems to be intended to represent an Indian fig-tree, /cms Indica (Plin. xii. 23). CHAPTEE III. ASIA — Continued. Bactria — Hunni — Soythia and Serica— Eonese Insulse— Olchi — Mons Molans — Gog and Magog — Sogdiana — Samarkand — Islands of the Northern Ocean — Hypertoreans — Turks — Scythotauri Soy thse — Arimaspi — Albani — Col- elds — Caspian Gates. QXTITTING India we proceed to the countries lying on the Baetria, the N. and N.W., and at the source of the Ganges we find 3Sactr{a, enclosed between two branches of the Cau- casus, the upper part of the river 33acttUS, whose name appears below, and the tttOnteS iSetttamaU. Of these the river Bactrus is said to have given its name to the very ancient, but now much decayed town 3SacttUtlt, Balkh. The moxmtains are called by Orosius mons Memae- MALi, and are said by him to divide the Hyrcanians from the Parthians. They probably represent an outlying branch of the Paropamisus, perhaps the range called by Ptolemy the Sariphian mountains in Margiana ; but the origin of the name Memarmali does not appear. The Bactrian district is chiefly occupied by the figure of a camel having two humps, as a Bactrian camel ought to have, with an inscription from Isidore: — iSacttta camelos tairt fortisstmos, nunquam pCljeS attfrCUtfS. TMs is founded on SoHnus, who says that the Bactrian camels are distinguished from the Arabian by having one hump only, whereas the Arabian have two, a statement directly contrary to the fact, as well as to the authority of Aristotle and PHny. He is followed in his mistake, in increased measure, by Isidore ; but our author has 46 ASIA. Baetria. judiciously preferred to represent his camel with his proper number of humps. (Arist. H. Anim. ii. 1, 24 ; Plia. vi. § 48 ; viii. § 67 ; Solin. 49, 1, 9 ; ^thic. § 109 ; Isid. xii. i. 35 ; xiv. 3, 30 ; Ptol. vi. 10, 5 ; Sari. MSS. 3244.) Hunni. Following the mOtlteS ©SCO, continued in mOTliS Ettlta; &US, we find, in a space enclosed between these mountains and a nameless river, which may perhaps represent the river Ottoro- gorra of Orosius, a town called ^UCaSafriS, and further on ©CtortcirUS CibitaS, None of these can be identified with any certainty, though the Alexandrian Eomanee mentions Nicosar, or ISTygusar, "prince of Nynguen," and Octiatus "Darie's odame," Darius's brother-in-law, and possibly our cartographer may have thought it his duty to give local habi- tations to these illustrious chiefs. (Weber, A. B. w. 2079, p. 2081, 2273.) Just above is the inscription ^Ultttt Sttfl^, the Huns, who are said to have proceeded from the neighbourhood of the Caucasus. (Ptol. vi. 1 6, 8 ; Oros. i. 2 Amm. Marc. xxxi. 3 ; Isid. ix. 2, 66.) Scythia We now come to the great region occupying the N.E. ^^^ and centre of Asia, inhabited by the Seres, and by various ■ races of semi-mythical character, comprised under the general name of Scythians. Beginniug at the E, we find a river, flu&iuS BottaS, emptying itself into the sea at a place called ptotUUltC; tOtiUttt 33ot0Uttt* These names denote the flumen Boeeum, and the promontoeium Boeeum of Orosius, both being rather suggestive than indicative of the unknown northern ocean, which ^thicus mentions under the name oceanus horricus. (Oros. i. 2; ^thic. § 31, 60.) The river Boreas appears to rise in a range of mountains without a name. In the space enclosed by the river, the mountains, and the ocean, are three inscriptions. (1.) The first expresses the sense of a passage in Pliny, followed by ASIA. 47 Solinus, to the effect that a great part of Asia suffers from Scythia extreme cold, and has consequently large tracts of desert ^^^ Sat*! c*fii land, and that the Scythians inhabit the country which reaches from the north to the beginning of the warm and genial east. The inscription stands thus : — 3^ic itlittUtU ortentts tstM, uii immengas esse nibes Jlarctanus et SoUllUS iltCUTlt* Marcian CapeUa says that the Caspian Sea pours itself into the Scythian Ocean in confinio ortus mstivi ; and in another passage, that where the course of the Caspian lies towards the Eastern Ocean, there are at the beginning profundae nives, and afterwards a great desert. (Plin. vi. §§ 33, 34; Sohn. 17. 1 ; Marc. Cap. §§ 665, 693.) (2.) The second inscription, taken from Solinus, refers to a group of islands, the inhabitants of which were reputed to live on the eggs of sea birds : — CBotteS tttSUlaS qUt infjafittatlt omnts (oYis) marinarum a&ium Jjibunt. (Piin. iv. § 95 ; Mela, iii. 6 ; Solin. 19, 6.) (3.) The third inscription records that from this point, as far as the Maeotides paludes, the country is called by the general name of Scythia: — ^ft \}m usque atj Jleotities palluies generalit [er] Sttljia [Scythia] lltCttUt* The islands of the Ooeones were situate, according to Xenophon of Lampsacus, quoted by Pliny, in the great northern sluggish sea, which Hecatseus called the Amalchian, and the habits ascribed to their inhabitants no doubt resemble in some degree those of some of the northern sea islands ; but it would be in vain to seek for any precise equivalent to ^Otie or ^Ottee tttSUle of the Map, which Eonee appear just opposite the first of the foregoing inscriptions, insula. (Plin. iv. § 95 ; Solin. 19, 6 ; Tacitus, Germ. 44, 46 ; Mela, iii. 6.) In the same neighbourhood, viz., in the dark and frozen ocean, lying round the shores of the unknown North, we find other mythical islands, some of them inhabited by mythical 48 ASIA. Bonee monsters, so long believed in by Europeans ; (1) the island of insTile. tjie horse-hoofed men: — SjJOpolJCS (hippopodes) cpiltOS pebeg ijafitnt J (2) that of the pfjaneSii (Fanesii), called Auryalyn in the Alexandrian Eomance, a bat-like race, who, whenever they covered themselves at aU, were wont to use the membranes of their ears as wrappers : — ^{jatlfSit memtranis aurtum suarum tegtiutur; (3) the vast island ^Ibatta, distant three days' sail from the shore of Scythia : — ^Itratta insula est tmmeusa, ab quam trttiuo mbu gatUr a litore .ScitljariS (Scytharum). All these are mentioned by Pliny on the authority of Pytheas. The last was called by him Basilia, by Phny Baltia, and by Solinus Abalcia. The Fanesii are called by Mela and Isidore Panoti and Panotii, All-ears. The idea may have been suggested by the manner in which the ladies of the Uzbek Tartar race arrange their dress, so as to present an appear- ance of this kind. (PUn. iv. § 9 5 ; Mela, iii. 6 ; Sohn. 1 9. 6 ; Isid. xi. 3, 19, 24 ; S. Jer. Ep. 77, 8 ; Morley, p. 681. Wood, Trav. to Source of Oxus, p. 144.) Eeturning to the mainland, below the mountains from which proceeds the river Boreas, there is an inscription, 5^ if jJOSt ni&CS lottga llJSCrta, indicating the wide desert region near the centre of Asia, to the N". and W. of China, which has Seres, ^^en mentioned above; and below this, SctCS ptttlli ijOttttTli (homines) post trescrta occurruitt a qtti&us serica &fstt= Jttftlta tttittUtXtUt. The name Seres, Chinese, appears first in Ctesias, though with little or no accuracy of knowledge respecting them. Their silk is mentioned by Aristotle, but the name of the people does not appear again till the time of VirgH. (Ctes. fr. 22, p. 371 ; Virg. Georg. ii. 121 ; PUn. vi. § 54; Mela, iii. 7; Isid. xiv. 3, 29 ; Yule, Marco Polo, ii. 415.) Below this comes the river BOftltatOlt, called by ^thi- ASIA. 49 eus Beomaeon. It probably indicates one of the great Scythia.. northern rivers, but can hardly be identified with any one. Not far from it is the city ("CljOOliSSitlta, built by Magog, son of Japhet. An envious rent in the parchment has de- stroyed the next word or two, but the inscription ends with describing the nation referred to as the most cruel of all the Scythian tribes : — 2Er6S djOOUSStme qUEttt Etiificabit ilEagag filius lapfjet all atlje cruieltssime grttteS Sitljarum* The city is said by iEthicus to have been built on the heights of the OlcM, in the far north, surrounded by the river Beomaron, between the Caspian Sea and the !N"orthern Ocean, and further, that he himself spent a year there. The name Olchi perhaps represents the Colchi, with whose name the regio Golica of PHny is probably connected. -(Ethicus says that it was besieged by Alexander for a long time, and taken after some loss on his side. The capital of the land of Magog is called in the Alexandrian Eomance Taracun, and its inhabitants are described as the most bar- barous of human beings — " . ... that vile cotmtreye That is y-hote Taracun." — 5970. It was taken by Alexander with great difficulty. The legend of the Map appears to rest upon these two stories, which may perhaps be regarded as representing the victories of Alex- ander over the Scythians. (Arr. Hxp. iv. ; ^thic. Ixvi. §60; Plin. vi. § 15 ; Morley, p. 680 ; Weber, Metr. Rom. i.) Opposite the island Albatia is a mountain, JHojtS ilttolatlS, This may be intended to denote the barrier mountain (moles) which obstructed the way to Taracun, of which we shall soon hear. (Morley, p. 681; Weber, i. 6160.) Or it may represent the mountain Chelion, on which, after offering sacrifices, immolatis hostiis, Alexander D 50 ASIA. Soythia. excogitated his plan of enclosure. Mons Molans would thus be the Mount of Sacrifice. " He took barounes mony on, And bent to a hil cleputh Celion, And ther, on Sarsynes wise, Maden offering and sacrefyse." We come now to two inscriptions which express the substance, and in some places the words, of several passages, more or less consecutive, in ^thiciis, describing the country and the truculent race of Magog, and their incarceration by Alexander. The iirst paints the horrors of the chmate, and its intolerable cold, caused by the piercing wind called lizo. It further states that the country is occupied by a most vile race, given to habits of extreme barbarity, who eat human flesh and drink men's blood — the accursed race of Cain ; and how the Lord shut them up, through the agency of Alexander; for an earthquake took place, and in the king's sight mountains fell upon mountains all around them. Where the mountains failed, he enclosed them with an im- penetrable wall, which took him a year and four months to bmld. Then comes a picture of the wall with four towers, and a second inscription, to the effect that the enclosed race are believed to be the same as the Anthropophagi of Solinus, among whom he reckons the Essedones. They will hereafter break out in the time of Antichrist, and carry persecution throughout the world. " No Cometh they thennes ay Till hit come to domesdaye." The text of these inscriptions stands thus: — ©ttlltia ijorrfiilta plus qttam txttii potest % frigus intollerafiite : omnt tempore bentus acerrimus a montilrus qttam iitcole ftijo &ocant. I^ic sont [sunt] Jjomines truculenti nimts, ASIA. 51 ijumatiis camitius bzsttntzs, cruorem potantes, Ulii soythia. Caini maktiicti. f^os inclusit ©ominus per magnum ^IcxanUrum ; nam terre motu facto in conspectu prtn= ctpis monies super monies in circuitu eorum ceciUerunt : ufti monies Ireerani, ipse eos muro insolufiili cinxit. Isii inclusi itiem esse cretiuntur qui a Solino ^niro= popfjagi Utcuntur, inter quos et ^ssetiones numerantur : nam tempore ^nticfjristi erupturi et omni munljo perse^ cutionem illaturi. In this account the reader vnU. perceive the confused mixture of sacred, profane, and purely legendary history. Its sources are the Book of the Apocalypse, and the authen- tic history of Alexander, as perverted by Eastern tradition. The stoiy of Alexander and the wall is mentioned by S. Jerome. It appears in the Koran, but had long before found its way into Western Europe, and the Alexandrian Eomance, so often mentioned, was its legitimate descendant. The cannibal propensities ascribed to the Scythian race are mentioned by Herodotus, and afterwards by Mela and Soli- nus. The reader will also learn and appreciate the deriva- tion of the word ftijO, the name for the cold N.E. wind so acutely felt from time to time in Europe, and known in French as the vent de Use, which our Map-maker, following his authority ^thicus, assures us is derived from the speech of the Mongolian race, so much dreaded in Europe in the 13th century. (Eev. xx. 2, 8, 9 ; Herod, iv. 106; Mela, ii. 1 ; SoHn. 15, 13 ; Isid. ix. 2, 132 ; ^thic. 38, 41 ; Sale, Kor. c. xviii. p. 247 ; Weber, vol. i. 6188 ; Morley, p. 681 ; Diez, Lex. Etym. p. 54.) Near the above inscription are the towns : — SereS CifeitaS, the supposed capital of the Seric region mentioned by Ptolemy, Julius Honorius, and Isidore, but what place is intended by them is uncertain (Ptol. vi. 16, 8 ; Isid. xiv. 52 ASIA. Sogdi- 3, 9; ^thic. Cosmog. p. 12 ; Yule, Marco Polo, i. 203); ana, &c. ^aSpiS Cl&ttaS, whose equivalent may perhaps be found in the town Heraclea, in the country of the Caspii, built by Alexander, and afterwards called Achais (PUn. vi. § 48 ; SoUn. 48, 4) ; and ^atlUa OJjptllUm SoflUtanOrUm, a town mentioned by Pliny, near which Alexander erected altars to commemorate the terminus of his expedition, but whose site is unknown. (Plin. vi. § 49 ; Solin. 49, 3 ; Ptol. vi. 12, 4.) Near it are the words Sogtriam tX JBacJje getlteS. The latter, mentioned by Virgil as indomiti Dahm, lay between Sogdiana and the Caspian Sea, and were subdued by Alex- ander. (Curt. viii. 3, 16 ; Oros, i. 2 ; Virg. JEn. viii. V28.) A little higher up we meet with the iuscription l^iicaitt IjiC Ijafeitattt. The people referred to, the Hyrcani, reaUy lived on the south shore of the Caspian Sea, and are ia fact so placed iu the map by a duplicate entry of the name. The cartographer has thought it right to associate them with the sources as well as with the mouth of the Oxus : for, just above, he has represented the Oxus issuing from a lake, with the inscription ©XUS flubiUS. Above the Oxus is the city Satttarcait, Samaekaot), the Maracanda of Arrian and Ptolemy. The form in which the name appears indicates some information from the East inde- pendent of the sources usually resorted to by our carto- grapher, and is the same as is found in Marco Polo, though it could not have been derived from him. (Arr. Exp. Al. ui.; Ptol. vi. 11, 9 ; Yule, Marco Polo i. 170.) Just below is a figure of a pelican's nest, with the pelican wounding his own breast to feed the young ones, who are opening their mouths to receive the blood. The words of the superscription, pro pulliS SCttlilO tntijt cor, express the story concerning the pelican, which relates that the mother kills her yoimg ones either by kisses or, as S. Augustine says, by blows, and mourns ASIA. 53 for them during three days, after which time the male bird Hyr- wounds himself in the breast and revives the brood with the cania. blood which issues therefrom. It is as old as the 4th century, and appears in the works of S. Epiphanius and also of S. Augustine, though he by no means requires us to accept the story as certain. It is told also by Isidore, and its aptitude for an ecclesiastical signification doubtless caused it to be adopted in heraldry, under the device of the "pelican in her piety." {Hofm. Lex.; S. Aug. in Ps. ci. (cii.) 6, vol. 4, p. 1299; Epiph. Physiol. 8; Isid. xii. 7, 26; Harl. MSS. 3244; Cahier et Martin, ii. 136.) On the left of this is a figure of a monster, with a bird's beak and semi-human limbs, with the superscription CtCOttf QtvXtB, a race whose name has been applied as a description of their personal appearance. Their proper country is Thrace, but they are mentioned by Pliny and SoHnus as placed by some between the north and India. (Plin. vi. § 55; SoHn. 51, 1.) The river Oxus, having been joined by the Bactrus, which our cartographer has perhaps confounded with the Icarus mentioned by Phny as faUing into the Oxus, enters the Caspian Sea, ©gtia ©Xi flxtlttttltS. This sea, according to Strabo and others, but not Ptolemy, was an inlet from the great Northern Ocean. (Strab. xi. p. 507; Mela, i. 2 ; Plin. vi. §§ 36, 52 ; Sohn. 17, 3 ; Oros. i. 2 : Ptol. vii. 5, 4.) A second inscription, referring to the mouths of the Oxus, re- cords that the Hyrcanians live at them, and describes their character in accordance with Solinus : — l^ircaitt ©xi flU: minis [ostia] ][)a6ent, gens silbis aspera, feta tisriius, COpioSa immanibUS feriS* it is not known that the Hyrcani ever held the mouths of the Oxus ; but they held the coast of the Caspian, not very far from the spot where the Oxus once discharged itself into that sea, and not, as now, into the Sea of Aral. In illustration of the abundance 54 ASIA. Hyr- of tigers in Hyrcania, the cartographer gives a picture of cania. that animal, with an inscription describing how the hunters succeeded in getting away safe with the cuhs by placing a mirror in the path of the pursuing tigress : — SigttS itStta quum catulxtm suuvx captum jjcrcipit conctto cursu pergequitur cum catulo fuflientem, at tile Mods equi cursu in fugam properans speculum ei projtctt ct U6cr Cijatlit* The speed of the tigress in her pursuit to recover her lost cubs is described by Solinus, PHny, and Mela. The two last tell us how the hunter is obhged sometimes to abandon one cub, in order to escape her fury, and secure the rest ; but they do not mention the expedient of the mirror, which is described by S. Ambrose, and alluded to by Claudian, and followed in the later Bestiaries. The passage from S. Ambrose is as follows : — uhi vacuum raptce sdbolis cuhile reperit, ilico vestigiis rwptoris insistit . at ilk . . . eqiw vecfus fugaci videns tamen velocitate ferce sere posse prceverti .... ubi se contiguam viderit, sphceram de vitro projicit, at ilia imagine sua luditur et sobolem putat. revocat impetum colligere fosfum desiderans. Claudian, speak- ing of the Hyrcana mater pursuing the robber of her cuhs, says, " Jam jamque hausura profundo Ore virum, vitresa tardatur imagine fonnse." (Plin. viii. § 66 ; Mela. iii. 5 ; Solin. 17, 6 ; S. Am- brose, Hexaem. vi. 4; Claudian, Rapt. Pros. iii. 268; Cahier et Martin, Melanges d'Arch. ii. p. 140 ; Harl. MSS. 3244. At the junction of the Caspian Sea with the Northern Ocean are two islands, BtJCS and CrtSClilja, which it is difficult, if not impossible to identify. Whether the former name represents in any way the Byce palus at the head of the Palus Mseotis, or the river Bizes, Buces, or Byixm, SoiaS, and Sppamtta CtbttaS* Of these names Sobas indicates the kingdom of Zobah (Vulg. Soba, 1 Sam. xiv. 47 ; 2 Sam. viii. 3, x. 6) ; and Appamna stands for Apamea in SjTia (SoHn. 40, 7 ; Isid. XV. 1, 15.) Beyond is fitomagena (Solin. 37, 1 ; Isid. xiv. 3. 17), a district of Syria. Eeturning to the left, we find, next to the monster Ugolopes, ^nttOCfjia Ct&itaS, Antioch of Syria, placed upon a river which in the Map is called flu&tUS ^ZXnUS. This latter name is difficult to explain : Antioch reaUy stood on the Orontes, but the course assigned to the Fernus on the Map places it rather in the position of the Pyramus. A somewhat similar mistake occurs in the map of Henry of Mayence, where it is named Tednus. On the bank of this river stands MoNS Casius, with an inscription referring to its height, which was much exaggerated by classical geo- graphers : — Jlons ffiasstus tiz quo btictur gloiius solts atifjuc quarta ijigilia noctis. (Piin v. 80; Soiin. 36, 3.) Just above this is ^{)entciS probmcta, Phcenigia, and near it ffloUS %iiimU8, In Phoenicia is 3Laotliciam, Laodicea of Syria, on the sea coast, not rightly in Phoenicia ; ^rcijaS, referred to in Gen. x. 1 7, and mentioned by Isid. ix. 2, 24; Itin. 148; and Itin. Sieros. 583, 2 (see also Travels of "Willibald, Early Trav. p. 14) ; then a nameless town, which may be Aradus, mentioned by Isidore in the same article as Archas ; and then the foUowiag places : Kxi- JJOUS, 33erttXlS, and, very much out of its place, ^carOlt, which last stands for Ekron (Josh. xv. 11), where the Vulg. has Accaron. (Hieron. de situ, vol. ii. p. 869 (146); Bing- ham, Ant. iii. pp. 70, 205.) Just beyond Acaron comes in the mountain range of ASIA. 11 3Li6atXUS, following which, upwards, we come by a bend to Syria. JHonS ®alaaut!), Mount Gilead, which is called in 1 Mac. V. 9, 17, and elsewhere, G-alaad and Galaaditis, on the east side of the Jordan. Upon Mount Gilead, greatly out of its place, is IBatHaSCUS* From its extremity rises tOrtJttS 3Iab0tij, the brook Jabbok, or, as it stands in the Vulg. Jeboc, running into the Jordan. Just above this is ^tttOUltC, denoting the territory of the Ammonites, of which the Jabbok was the boundary. (Deut. iii. 1 6) ; and near it a nondescript animal, entitled |HatSOlt 6eStta tranStnUtata* it has two webbed feet, and two with toes or claws, a formation which justly entitles it to the epithet transmutata ; but what creature is intended, whether a chamseleon, or the animal called by Pliny tarandrus and by Solinus parandrus, which changes its colour at pleasure, but which they say has horns, it is not easy to say. (PHn. viii. 124, ix. 85; Solin. 30, 25.) ISTear this is JKoallite and ^etta ri&itaS ^tabt, the city of Petra. (Plin. vi. 144; Bing. iii. 61.) Near this, fluijiUS 'l^rttOtt 0t CibttaS, the town Aboee, and river Aenon. Pent. iv. 48 ; Josh. xii. 2.) Then mOttS &tix (Gen. xxxvi. 8), TOOnS JFaSga, Mount PiSGAH (Deut. iii. 27, iv. 49), and, on the other side of the Arnon, a female figure, very forlorn- looking, with the words uxor 3Lot!) tttutata in petram salts (Gen. xix. 26), and mOttS ^ftamU, mount Abakim (Numb, xxvii. 12). Eeturning to Mount Libanus, we find the double source of the Jordan, foTtS Kor, Joe, and fottS ©att, as was an- ciently believed to be the case. (Isid. xiii. 21, 18; see Eobinson, Bibl. Bes. iii. 412.) The river expands itself into the Sea of Galilee, VXWCe <3'K\iltt, and after receiving the brook Jabbok, ends in the Dead Sea, ^WCZ iWortUUttt, having on its surface SotlOm C, and ©omor C, In the V8 ASIA. region between the river and Mount Gilead is ©ecapoltS regiO a tecem cibitatiiUS tlicta. The towns are repre- sented, but no names given. We now enter the Holy Land itself, and below the source of the Jordan is an inscription a JBatX USqUC alj aSeersaftee cm passuum longitulitnc, which appears to be taken from S. Jerome. (Hieron. ad Bard. Ep. 129, vol. i. p. 1134 (972).) Then come (Cesam ^fltUpt, Caita ©alito, and a boundary line running down to an angle with the mountains. At the opening between this angle and monS ffiarmElUS is EtrUS, Tyee ; and in the tribe of ©an, Efjolotttatlra, Ptolemais, lope, Joppa, and IB tog; polls, formerly Lydda, one of the places visited by S. Paula. (Hieron. Ep. 108, 8, and Ep. 129; Anton. Itin. 150, 3.) SatUptlta follows : Pliny says that two places bear this name. The Itinerary mentions Jamnia, and the Peu- tinger Table both this and Joppa. Jamnia is mentioned in 1 Mac. X. 69. It answers to Jdbneel. (Josh. xv. 11 ; Phn. V. 68; Ptol. V. 16, 2; Ant. Itin. 150, 4.) Then come ^SCalOtX Ct&itaS, and ^CtUa, which perhaps answers to Azotus. (Acts vui. 40.) Eeturning to the tribe of Dan, we find next to it '^StX, and within its enclosure J^OtltTt, famous in Maccabsean history. (1 Mac. ii. 1 ; ZuaUardo, Viagg. p. 248.) Next to this is the half tribe of Manasseh, iimiljta triftus JHanassc, containing mons ®f raim, placed rightly enough. Between this and Asher are the names Ealiulon and ^gSacar, and in the portion so named mons Ea&or, with fl, torrens Cison (Kishon) flowing from it, a connection suggested by comparison of Judg. iv. 12 with V. 21, and not incorrect in fact. (Hieron. Ep. 108, 13, de situ, p. 887 (187); Judg. iv. 12, Vulg.) Above Mount Tabor is Nazarbt and jlHalJtan, What place is intended by the latter is not clear, but it may per- ASIA. 79 haps be intended for the land of Madian, mentioned in Palestine. Judith ii. 25, as a name belonging to Palestine, though de- noting the region properly called Midian. Eetuming to the boimdary line of the tribe of Judah we find terra lulja, with Betijel at the left (JST) extremity of it, and at the right (S) 33rtf)lfEltt, pictoriaUy depicted so as to represent the birthplace of our Lord, containing, as it seems, a bed. To the right (S) of this is Cuja, G-aza, which is spelt Caza in. a. v. I. of the Itinerary {Itin. 151, 2) ; and @grara, which, from its situation, is probably Gerar (Gen. xx. 1), called Gerara in 2 Chr. xiv. 13, where, in later times, there was a famous monastery. It is men- tioned by S. Jerome as the metropolis of Palestine, and is here represented as within ^alSttftiattt* (Hieron. de situ, p. 898 (215).) Above these, in a circular form, is the city of Jerusalem, Jerusalem Ctbitag SerUSaletIt, placed as the centre of the world (see Introduction, p. xxii., and Isid. xiv. 3, 2 1), with lUOtXS ffl^al= baric, and a figure of our Lord on the Cross, which bears the " title," on which may be indistinctly read ^ajarrtlj* South of this is balUS SoSapJ), the vaUey of Jehoshaphat ; above it JHottS ©It&rtt, and above this again Salem, e Gest. Long. i. 11), and again ^thicus, who phales. specifies the isle Munitia as their abode (cap. 28). Adam of Bremen (cap. 228) says that they lived about the shores of the Baltic, that they were the male offspring of the Amazons, and had their heads between their shoulders.* The '' Imago Miindi " map places them in the same quarter as the Hereford map. Eeferring to these people, Eimbert maintained that they belonged to the human race, and cited in support of his view the fact that on the roU of martjo^s stood the name of Christoforus, a Cynocephalite, who died in 284 {Acta Sanctorum, 25 Julii). Wuttke suggests that the notion originated in the use of hoods made out of the skins of animals, such as are worn by the Lapps and Finns (AitMJcos. Pref , p. 1 9) ; Santarem, that it refers to the custom of driving dogs (iii. Pref., p. 22); but we think it more probable that the idea is due to some peculiarity of language, which might be likened to the barking of dogs (" cum verbis latrant in voce," Adam of Bremen). However this may have been, there can be no doubt that mediaeval * The popular view as to these hybrid creatures is conveyed in the follow- ing passage from the " Eomaunce of Kyng Alisauuder " : — " Another folk there is biside Houndynges men clepeth them wide. From the brest to the grouude Men hy ben, abouen houudes Berking of houndes hy habbe. Her honden withouten gabbe Ben y-shuldred as an fysshe And clawed after hound, i-wisse." " Another folk is bysyde this That beon y-cleped cenophalis. Non of heom never swynkith As eche of other mylk drynkith. No schule they ete elles, y avowe So longe so they libbe mowe." (11. 4962-9, 61318-23.) EUEOPE. 161 writers seriously believed in the existence of the Cynoce- Cynoce- phales ia the neighbourhood of the Baltic, probably iu Pliales. Finland. Katramm's letter, which refers to the statements of Eimbert, is priated in Dumont's Histoire Critique, vi. 188. (Wuttke, Pref. p. 21 ; Lelewel, iv. 11, wofe.) Adjacent to the Cynocephales we observe a man leading Gryphse. a horse, over the back of which is thrown the skin of a man to serve as a saddle. The custom thus illustrated of con- verting the sMns of slaughtered enemies into trappings for horses, was attributed by Solinus, 15, § 3, to the Geloni; but by an oversight, which we cannot account for, our cartographer has transferred the credit of this barbarous custom to the Gryphee or Grifones : — |§tC i)a6itant ®rtSte [Griffe] ijomitics Ttequisstmi : nam inter cetera facmora ettam ijc cuttijus ijostium suorum tegummta sibi et equiS SUiS faCtUttt. The first clause of this legend accords with the one in the " Imago Mundi " map — " Hie habitant Griffe homines nequam." The Anglo-Saxon map places the " Gryphorum gens '' ia the same locality. The belief in the existence of these human Gryphse is founded on the authority of uEthicus (cap. 31), who places them in the extreme north, in the position of the Ural Mountains. Their country is described as aboundiug ru wild animals and miaerals but deficient in agricultural products, and the people as skilled in the working of metals. These statements serve to con- nect the mediaeval Gryphse with the myth of the gold-guarding griffins of Herodotus (iii. Ill, iv. 27). In the l^orthern Ocean, adjacent to Scandinavia, a group Orcades of islands is introduced, consisting of — (1.) The Orkneys, Insulee. ©rcaUeS insulee IIHEIEE ; the number thirty-four beiug in accordance with Orosius, i. 2, who says that only fourteen of them were inhabited; the real number being fifty-six, of which about half are now inhabited. The Orkneys were subject to L 162 EUEOPE. Orcades Norway down to 1468. (2.) The Faroes, $dXtiZ, wMcli were InsTilee. discovered by the Normans in 861, and were constituted a diocese in the province of Bremen, (3.) Iceland, ^Slatll), colonised by the Norwegians in the latter part of the 9th cen- tury, and down to 1264 the seat of an independent State, with a literature of its own, the fame of which had spread to the universities of western Europe. It was connected eccle- siastically with the province of Bremen until 1151, when it was transferred to that of Drontheim. (4.) Thule, SEltttlta SDtIf, as in Solinus, 22, § 9. Whether our cartographer attached any definite idea to the title we cannot say; if he did, it could hardly refer to any other group than the Slietlands. Dicuil records the visit of some ecclesiastics to Thule, in terms which are more applicable to Iceland than to any other place {De Mens. Orb. 7, § 2). /// CHAPTEE IX. THE BEITISH ISLES. Britannia^-Anglia — Wallia— Scotia— Hibemia— Man— Insula A.vium— Insula Arietum — SvlUse. OuE concluding Chapter wiU be devoted to that portion of Britan- the map which excites the keenest interest in the majority niese In- of our readers — the British Isles. If justification were ®^^" needed for the order we have followed, we might cite the authority of old Higden, who, in his geographical descrip- tion, reserves Britain for the last, coming to it "tanquam ad speciem specialissimam " " as un to a specialite most speciaUe " {Polychron. i. 3). It might fairly be anticipated that in this part of the map we should at length be rid of all antiquated authorities, and meet with a sound piece of contemporaneous geography, free of aU mistakes and imper- fections. The sequel will prove that even here our carto- grapher does not wholly shake off his allegiance to Orosius, as witness his notice of the Velabri and Luceni in Ireland — that he does not steer clear of gross mistakes, as witness in particular his transfer of Caen (Cadan) to Devonshire — and that the geographical details are faulty to a remarkable degree. In one respect we must in charity suppose that his mode of expression was not intended to be literally accepted. He could hardly have supposed that the river Tweed ran from sea to sea, or that there was a channel connecting the Bristol and English Channels in the neighbourhood of Glastonbury, or yet that the Severn and Dee had their sources in Clee Hill. It may have been understood that 164 THE BRITISH ISLES. Britan- these were conTentional modes of showing the boundaries niese In- -between the natural divisions of the country. The same feature may be noticed in the map of the pseudo Eichard of Cirencester {Be situ Brit), and it has been surmised that Bertram borrowed the peculiarity from the Hereford map. The British Isles are drawn on a scale out of all pro- portion to the other parts of the map, the effect of this being that the relative positions of places on the opposite sides of the English Channel and the North Sea are incorrectly given, and that the seas themselves are much curtailed of their fair proportions. The southern point of Ireland approximates to Spain, and in this our cartographer may have designed to illustrate the views of Phny, iv. 102, and Orosius, i. 2, though the latter allows a spatiosum intervallum between the two. The EngUsh Channel and Forth Sea are represented by a narrow channel of equable breadth; Winchester is brought opposite to Nantes ; the mouth of the Thames to that of the Seine ; Lincoln to Cambrai ; and Aberdeen to the mouth of the Ems. The outhne of England is grievously marred by the omission of the protrusion S. of the Wash, as well as by the very slight difference in direction between the eastern and the southern coasts. The shape of Wales is rouglily delineated, but the fact that Conway and St. Davids are brought close together detracts from our estimate of this quarter of the map. The general form assigned to Britain very much accords with the description of Giraldus Cam- brensis, as quoted by Higden, i. 40 : — " Oblonga est et amplior in medio quam in extremis." The islands are distinguished by their ancient names as Btttannia Insula and f^ttiernta ; and the sub-divisions of the former as ^tiglta, TOalUa, and ScOtta ; to which we may perhaps add (on the authority of Gervase of Tilbury, ot. Imp. ii. 10), Conuit)ta» THE BRITISH ISLES. 165 Commencing with a review of the physical geography of Anglia. England, we find that the only hill noticed is the one in which the Severn and Dee are represented as having their sources, and which is named lEottS €lm, no doubt in reference to Clee Hill, which forms a conspicuous object in the south of Shropshire. We have already (page 6) offered the only explanation, and that a doubtful one, for the dis- tinction accorded to this really unimportant hill.* The rivers are given with tolerable accuracy, but the forms of the names are in some cases peciiliar. The name Avon, for instance, is given as ^nC, in respect to the Hampshire and Northamptonshire rivers, the former rather in the position of the Itchen, and the latter now known as the Nen, though the name Avon was applied to it down to the time of Drayton's Polyolhion. We may compare with this form the names Aune and Ehen, which are regarded as variations of Avon. It will be observed that the branches of the Hiunber are depicted with a degree of accuracy which implies personal acquaintance with that part of the country. Commencing from the S. we meet with the S^atttOr, the ^X0, the ee, the Sabxina, Severn, with the W^iz, Wye, and the ^Jjett, Avon. The Great Ouse is the most serious omission in the list of rivers. * According to Goiigt (British Topog. i. 65) a similar entry occurs in Matthew of Paris's map in the Library of C. C. C. Cambridge, and here again no other hill is named. 166 THE BEITISH ISLES. Anglia. The channel which isolates the Isle of Thanet is clearly marked, and the island is apparently designated IK'ZXiZtiZB, A fictitious interest attached to this island from the idea that the name was derived from the Greek word 6avaros " death," and that it was so called because its soil, wherever carried, proved fatal to serpents. It is first noticed on this account by Solinus, 22, § 8, but without any reference to the etymology of the name. Isidore (xiv. 6, § 3), quoting the words of Solinus, adds " Dicta Thanatos a morte serpentum." The treatise Imago Mundi gives the name as Athanatis, evidently from a misreading of SoIlqus, whose words "at Tanatus," are in some MSS. combined into " attanitis ; " and it mentions this island apparently as being as noteworthy as Britannia, Anglia, and Hibernia. Bede, and after him Higden, i. 44, repeat the tale of Solinus. The island is noticed in the " Apocalypse " map, under the name' Tantutos. {Introduction, p. xl.) Three sub-divisions of Anglia are noticed, viz. : — ^or= ttUftia, Cornwall, which may, however, as already stated, have been regarded as distinct from Anglia; ILitttfESKga, frequently used by the old chroniclers for Lincolnshire {e. g. Higden, i. 47, Lyndisia), though the title is now restricted to a portion of that county ; * and ^0t!jUtlt6a, Northumber- land. In the selection of towns the cartographer has been guided by ecclesiastical rather than commercial considera- tions. N"ot only are most of the episcopal towns noticed, but even some monasteries, while various important places of trade, such as Bristol, Yarmouth, Lynn, Grimsby, and Scar- borough, which were of sufficient importance to send repre- sentatives to the parliament held at Acton Burnell in * The same root, "Lind," lies at the hottom of Lincoln = MivM colonia, and Lindaey = lAnd's eye or island. THE BEITISH ISLES. 167 1283/'- are omitted from the list. We may also notice the AngUa. omission of the episcopal cities Chichester, Norwich (then an important place), and Sarum. The omission of these three towns is the more noticeable, inasmuch as they are mentioned m a stanza of Latia verses which appears to have been much in vogue iu the 12th and 13th centuries, as supplying a list of the episcopal towns at the former period. They are quoted by Henry of Huntingdon (circ. 1140), as follows : — Testes Londinise ratibus, Wintonia Baccho, Hereforda grege, Wirecestria fruge redundans, Batha lacu, Salesbira feris, Cantuaria pisoe, Eboracum silvis, Excestria clara metallis, Norvicium Dacis, Hiberuis Cestria, Gallis Cicestrum, Norwageniis Dunehna propinquans. Testis Lincolise gens infinita decore, Testis Ely formosa situ, Eoucestria visu. t * Oidy twenty towns besides London were invited to send representatives to Acton Bumell, and these twenty " may consequently be supposed to bave been at that time the most considerable in England" (Hallam, Middle Ages, iii. 46, note). Of the episcopal towns the list includes Norwich, but excludes Chichester, Ely, Bath, Sarum, Durham, and Kochester. Of the non-episcopal towns on the list, the map mentions Nottingham, Northampton, Colchester, and Shrewsbury. "We are not aware of any dcuta by which to calculate the populations of the towns at the date of the map ; but about a century later, in 1377, a capitation tax was levied on the laity, and from the returns of this tax it has been ascertained that the towns stood in the following order in point of population, exclusive of Chester and Durham, which, as being in palatine counties, are not included : — London, York, Bristol, Plymouth, Coventiy, Nor- wich, Lincoln, Salisbury, Lynne, Colchester, Beverley, Newcastle-on-Tyne, Canterbury, St. Edmund's Bury, Oxford, Gloucester, Leicester, Shrewsbury, Yarmouth, Hereford, Ely, Cambridge, Exeter, "Worcester, Kingston-upon- HuU, Ipswich, Northampton, Nottingham, "Winchester, Stamford, Newark, "Wells Ludlow, Southampton, Derby, Lichfield, Chichester, Boston, Carlisle, Eochester Bath, Dartmouth (Macpherson, Annals of Commerce, i. 583). + These lines are thus rendered by Robert of Gloucester in his Chronicle (p. 6 of Hearne's edit. 1724) :— In ye centre of Canterbury mest plente of fysch ys, And mest chase a boute Salesburi of wylde bestes y wys. 168 THE BEITISH ISLES. Anglia. Carlisle is not mentioned in the above list, inasmuch as the see was not founded until 1133, probably after the lines were composed. The addition of this completes the seven- teen sees as enumerated by Eobert of Gloucester. The right of Chester to a place on the list is very questionable. Peter, the first Norman Bishop, transferred the see from Lichfield to Chester in 1075, but his successor re-transferred it to Coventry about 1090, and from that time Chester ceased to be an episcopal see, though the Bishops occasionally styled themselves Bishops of Chester. Wells had lost even the title of an episcopal town from the time when John de ViUula (1088-1124) transferred the see to Bath, until the adoption of the duplicate title "Bath and Wells," about 1140. Returning to the map we find the following places noticed : — S^OtllJOTlia, London, which is represented by a castellated structure of fair proportions. ©XEfOlj, Oxford, in the 13 th century the seat of a university second in fame only to that of Paris (HaUam, Middle Ages, iii. 525). (JTolceStria, Colchester, already noticed as one of 'the towns represented at Acton Burnell. I^orfjatltott, Northampton, another of the same class of towns. ©Ig, represented as on an island in the ISTen, which thus does service (we presume) for the fens of the eastern counties. ILittCOltt, with its cathedral duly At London schippes mest, and wyn at Wyncestre. At Herford sohep and orf, and fruyt at 'Wmoestre. Metel, as led and tyn, in ye oontre of Excestre. Euerwik of fairest wode, Lynoolne of fayrest men, Ely of fairest place, of fairest sigMe Eoucestre. Euene agein Fraunce stode ye centre of Chiehestre, ' Norwiche agein Denemaic, Chestre ageyn Irlond, Duram ageyn Nonvei, as icli understoude. Thre wondres titer beth in Englond, none more y not That water of Bathe ys that on, that ever ya yliclie hot. Etc. THE BEITISH ISLES. 169. depicted on an elevation rising from the left bank of tlie AngUa. river Witham. .SnOtmflfjam, the original form of Notting- ham; this form had fallen into disuse by the 13th century, as far as we have been able to judge, so that its appearance on the map is peculiar ; the town was one of those repre- sented at Acton BurneU. (Eftoracum, Ycn^ii. 33eulacum, BeverUy, famed for the shrine of "St. John of Beverley;" the peculiar form of the name in the map arises, we suspect, from the omission of a mark of abbreviation over the third letter, the insertion of which would convert the name into Beverlacmn. Ittrcfjam, a priory of no great fame, founded 1121 by Walter L'Espec, situated on the Derwent, six miles below Malton, in the east Eiding of Yorkshire; we can suggest no reason why it should have been selected for notice by our cartographer. CaStO (= CaStcllo) i^O&O, Newcastle-on-Tyne, a place of military importance in the wars with Scotland : it is pictorially represented by a castle. ffl^atlxta, Carlisle ; the form of the name is peculiar ; * the Eoman name was Luguvallum or Lugubalum, which has been condensed into the second syllable of the name Carlisle, the first being the Cymric preiix indicative of a Eoman station. ©UtEttt, Durham, with its cathedral church appro- priately placed on a Mil. Cjgttia, Chester, noticed perhaps on the score of its ecclesiastical associations, referred to above (page 1 6 8), but stUl better entitled to bo entered for its com- mercial importance, which led to its being represented at Acton BumeU. ^COilfgftitt, Shrewsbury, one of the towns represented at Acton BurneU, owing much of its importance to its position in reference to the Welsh border. TOltCCSt, Worcester, an episcopal see. fl^fotlj, Hereford, mentioned on the same ground; attention has been already (page 6) drawn to the very meagre outline of the cathedral. ©karUtH, * The copies of Higden give the forms Caerliell, Caerlie, Carliel (i. 48). 170 THE BEITISH ISLES. Anglia. evidently intended for Gloucester, though the name is peculiar; the earliest Latin form is Clevum (Anton. Itin. 485), or Glebon {Geog. JBaven. 31); it was famed for its abbey, and was otherwise important as a fortress and as a place of com- merce. 28ati)0, an episcopal see (as already stated) at the period of the map. @lcgltOttta, Glastonbury, the seat of the most famous monastery in Britain, and the reputed burial- place of King Arthur, a circumstance which must have attracted much interest to it about the period of the map, in consequence of Edward I.'s visit (in 1276) to view the remains. ^XCESttia, Emter, an episcopal see, and the capital then, as now, of the south-west. CatOtt, Caen, which has been, by a strange Munder, transferred from the southern to the northern side of the channel ; " Cadan " is one of several intermediate forms between the Latin Cadomum (or the vernacular name which that represents, perhaps Gadom), and the modern Caen ; the only explanation that we can offer for the mistake in its position is, that the two great religious foundations in that town, the Ahhaye aux Dames and the Ahlaye aux Hommes, were endowed with valuable estates in England, and that the name of Caen was more than usually familiar to the ears of Englishmen (see Britten's letterpress to Pugin's Normandy, 4to. 1828). TOiUtOTia, Winchester, which still retained a considerable amount of the importance it possessed under the early Norman kings. l3o6u or IBoilia, no doubt intended for Dover ; the place is called Dubris in the Itinerary (473), but this title was exchanged in the Middle Ages for forms more nearly approximating to the modern one ; the place is pictorially represented by a castle on the coast-line, the distinctive feature which led to the insertion of the name in the map. CatXtUtta, Canter- bury (the earlier name, Durovernum, was superseded about the middle of the 12 th century by Cantuaria, both forms THE BEITISH ISLES. 171 being used by William of Malmesbury) ; Canterbury was AngUa. not only an ecclesiastical metropolis but a place of general importance. i^OUCCSttta, Bochester (the Durobrivse of the Itinerary, and the Eofa of William of Malmesbury, which we presume to be a modification of the radical part of the LatiQ name " brivae "), an episcopal see, but not otherwise of much importance. In WaUia, the mountainous character of the surface is WaUia. represented by a chain of heights on the western coast, and by the lofty summit of ,Stiai00l(OtT-, Snowdon : the name occurs in Peter Langtoft's Chron. (ii. 240, Hearne's ed.) as a district name, answering to our Snowdonia. Three towns only are named Camarijatt, Cuntocg, and Sit ©abt ; the latter the most famous of the Welsh sees, and the two former military stations in the wars between Edward I. and the Welsh, and the sites of two most famous castles founded by him. In Scotia the Go-amjoians are described under the name Scotia. JKutlCtij, which is (we beHeve) stiH current as. the iadi- genous name of the district ; m point of sound the name strictly accords with that of the British (Cymric) word Mynydd " mountain," but whether this or a Graelic synonym lies at the root of the name we do not pretend to say. The name 3L0Utl)iatt, Lothian, occurs as a provincial title ; the form Loudonia occurs in the Buik of the Chronicles, ii. 423. The towns noticed are 33eri)JiC, an important fortress in the period of the Scottish wars ; 2^oJteS6urg, Boxburgh, another border fortress of importance ; S>X. ^XitiX, St. Andrews, an episcopal see, and a place of great sanctity, as the reputed depository of the bones of St. Andrew (Higden, i. 37); ffiiCtl&Utsft, ^* ^^^ period rising to the position of the chief town, though not as yet constituted the capital; (^TthttaS &* Solb*' -P^'"^^' iiii