Book 6 ,   (Geography of the world)

 

The following verses are important because in it he uses the word Azanium (Azania). He is one of the only few classical authors to use the name.

 

108 However, this sea is divided into two bays. The one to the east is called the Persian Gulf, and according to the report of Eratosthenes measures 2500 miles round. Opposite is Arabia, with a coastline 1500 miles in length, and on its other side Arabia is encompassed by the second bay, named the Arabian Gulf; the ocean flowing into this is called the Azanian Sea. The width of the Persian Gulf at its entrance some make five and others four miles; the distance in a straight line from the entrance to the innermost part of the Gulf has been ascertained to be nearly 1125 miles, and its outline has been found to be in the likeness of a human head.

 

153 Out at sea off this coast lies the island of Ogyris, famous as the burial-place of King Erythras; its distance from the mainland is 125 miles and it measures 112 miles round. Equally famous is a second island in the Azanian Sea, the island of Dioscuridu, lying 280 miles away from the extreme point of Cape Syagrus.

 

The remaining tribes on the mainland situated further south are the Autaridae, seven days' journey into the mountains, the Larendani and Catapani tribe, the Gebbanitae with several towns, of which the largest are Nagia and Thomna, the latter with sixty-five temples, a fact that indicates its size.

 

172-178 Next come the Azanian Sea, the cape whose name some writers give as Hippalus, Lake Mandalum, Colocasitis Island, and out at sea a number of islands containing a large quantity of turtle. The town of Sacae, the island of Daphnis, Aduliton, founded by slaves from Egypt who had run away from their masters. [173] Here is very large trading centre of the Trogodytae and also the Ethiopians - it is two days' sail from Ptolemais; they bring into it a large quantity of ivory, rhinoceros horns, hippopotamus hides, tortoise shell, apes and slaves. Beyond the Ploughmen Ethiopians are the islands called the Isles of Aliaeos, and also Bacchias and Antibacchias, and Stratioton. Next there is a bay in the coast of Ethiopia that has not been explored, which is surprising, in view of the fact that traders ransack more remote districts; and a cape on which is a spring named Cucios, resorted to by seafarers; [174] and further on, Port of Isis, ten days' row distant from Aduliton, and a centre to which The Trogodytae's myrrh is brought. There are two islands off the harbour called the False Pylae, and two inside it called the Pylae, on one of which are some stone monuments with inscriptions in an unknown alphabet. Further on is the Bay of Abalitos, and then Diodorus's Island and other uninhabited islands, and also along the mainland a stretch of desert; the town of Gaza; Mossylites Cape and Harbour, the latter the port of export for cinnamon. This was the farthest point to which Sesostris led his army. [175] Some writers place one Ethiopian town on the coast beyond this point, Baragaza.

 

Juba holds that at Cape Mossylites begins the Atlantic Ocean, navigable with a north-west wind along the coast of his kingdom of the Mauretanias as far as Gades; and his whole opinion must not be omitted at this point in the narrative. He puts forward the view that the distance from the cape in the Indian territory called in Greek Lepte Acra, and by others the Drepanum, in a straight course past Burnt Island to Malichas's Islands is 1500 miles, from there to the place called Sceneos 225 miles, and on from there to the Island of Adanus Island 150 miles - making 1875 miles to the open sea. [176] All the rest of the authorities have held the view that the heat of the sun makes the voyage impossible; moreover actual goods conveyed for trade are exposed to the depredations of an Arabian tribe living on the islands: who are called the Ascitae because they make rafts of timber placed on a pair of inflated ox-hides and practise piracy, using poisoned arrows. Juba also speaks of some tribes of Trogodytae called the Jackal-hunters, because of their skill in hunting, who are remarkable for their swiftness, and also of the Fish-eaters, who can swim like creatures of the sea; also the Bangeni, Zangenae, Thalibae, Saxinae, Sirecae, Daremae and Domazenes. [177] Juba states moreover that the people inhabiting the banks of the Nile from Syene as far as Meroë are not Ethiopian but Arabian tribes and also that Heliopolis, which in our description of Egypt we spoke of as not far from Memphis, had Arab founders. The further bank also is by some authorities taken away from Ethiopia and attached to Africa. (But they lived on the banks for the sake of the water.) We however shall leave this point to the reader to form his own opinion on it, and shall enumerate the towns on either bank in the order in which they are reported, starting from Syene.

 

Book 8 (Animals)

26

At the present day hunters for the sake of their tusks shoot them with javelins in the foot, which in fact is extremely soft. The Trogodytae on the frontier of Ethiopia, whose only food is elephant meat obtained by hunting, climb up trees near the elephants' track and there keep a look out for the last of the whole column and jump down on to the hind part of its haunches; the tail is grasped in the man's left hand and his feet are planted on the animal's left thigh, and so hanging suspended, with his right hand and with a very sharp axe he hamstrings one leg, and as the elephant runs forward with its leg crippled he strikes the sinews of the other leg, performing the whole of these actions with extreme rapidity. Others employing a safer but less reliable method fix great bows rather deep in the ground, unbent; these are held in position by young men of exceptional strength, while others striving with a united effort bend them, and as the elephants pass by they shoot them with hunting-spears instead of arrows and afterwards follow the tracks of blood.

 

Note this passage is important because it is the only indication in literature that the hunter-gatherers before the coming of the Bantu lived in a much larger part of Africa

 

Book 12 (Botany)

4

But Herodotus assigned it (Ebony) rather to Ethiopia, and said, that every three years the Ethiopians were wont to pay, by way of tribute, unto the kings of Persia, 100 billets of the timber of that tree (that is, Ebene), together with gold and ivory; and, again, from Syene (which confined and bounded the lands of our empire and dominion) as far as to the island Meroe, for the space of 996 miles, there is little ebony found : and that in all those parts between there be few other trees to be found, but date trees, which peradventure may be a cause that Ebene was counted a rich tribute and deserved the third place, after gold and ivory.

 

42

When talking about Cinnamon.

Cinnamon has probably been known in the Mediterranean since the second millennium BC. Herodotus describes it as being used in mummification and Ezekiel mentions it as one of the commodities handled by the Tyrian trading network. Classical authors are unanimous in regarding it as a product of Africa and it was not handled by the routes described in the Periplus except in so far as it was injected into them at Opone (Mogadishu) and Mosullan (Berbera) from the East African coast. In fact however in classical times, cinnamon was only produced in Southern China, and northern South East Asia, its later center of production in Ceylon not then having been developed. A passage in Pliny the Elder explains that cinnamon was brought to Africa by merchant sailors. These sailors were Indonesians who would influence the east coast of Africa for many centuries and whose descendents still live in Madagascar.

 The wild cinnamon tree's origin is in the eastern Himalayas. At least from the early bronze age it became a cultivated plant in China. The Indonesians exported it to Java paying for it with cloves from the spice islands. In Java they later also started cultivating it. From there they brought it to east Africa passing by the southern tip of India. So starting another place where later cinnamon would grow.   

 

All these tales, however, have been evidently invented for the purpose of enhancing the prices of these commodities. Another story, too, bears them company, to the effect that under the rays of the noon-day sun, the entire peninsula exhales a certain indescribable perfume composed of its numerous odours; that the breezes, as they blow from it, are impregnated with these odours, and, indeed, were the first to announce the vicinity of Arabia to the fleets of Alexander the Great, while still far out at sea.

All this, however, is false; for cinnamomum, or cinnamum, which is the same thing, grows in the country of the Æthiopians,3 who are united by intermarriages with the Troglodytæ. These last, after buying it of their neighbours, carry it over vast tracts of sea, upon rafts, which are neither steered by rudder, nor drawn or impelled by oars or sails. Nor yet are they aided by any of the resources of art, man alone, and his daring boldness, standing in place of all these; in addition to which, they choose the winter season, about the time of the equinox, for their voyage, for then a south easterly wind is blowing; these winds guide them in a straight course from gulf to gulf, and after they have doubled the promonotory of Arabia, the north east wind carries them to a port of the Gebanitæ, known by the name of Ocilia.4 Hence it is that they steer for this port in preference; and they say that it is almost five years before the merchants are able to effect their return, while many perish on the voyage. In return for their wares, they bring back articles of glass and copper, cloths, buckles, bracelets, and necklaces; hence it is that this traffic depends more particularly upon the capricious tastes and inclinations of the female sex.