this place, whatever the Greek fables say on the subject. The Phonicians, who frequented these coasts, carried thither, with their commerce, the worship of their Hercules. "The temple of Hercules, which is seen near the pillars," says Appian", "appears to me to have been founded by the Phoenicians; and this god is still adored there, after the manner of that people. This is not the Theban Hercules, but that of the Tyrians." This is also the opinion of Arrian, and is consistent with probability.

IX. 18.

women.

Τινα ̓́Εχιδναν. A monster. M. Pelloutier' calls this monster 'Siren.' But Homer represents the Sirens as very lovely The scholiasts give them wings, as does Servius' and Hyginus. But the same Hyginus3 also says, that their lower parts, i. e. their feet, were like those of fowls, and in this he is confirmed by Fulgentius.

Diodorus Siculus speaks also of this monster1, and describes it as Herodotus does; but he makes it to have been a mistress of Jupiter, by whom he had Scythes,' who became celebrated, and gave his name to the nation.

19. Ἐπεὶν γένωνται τρόφιες. When they shall be grown up. On this passage consult the learned note of Valckenaer, to which nothing need be added. I take this opportunity, however, of correcting Hesychius at the word τρόφις : instead of εὖ τεθραμμένος, we should read ἐκτεθραμμένος, which is a very trifling alteration. Εὖ τεθραμμένος signifies 'well fed, fattened;' EKTE0paμμévos, 'adult.'

Πικροὶ γὰρ αὐτοῖς ἥξετ ̓ ἐκτεθραμμένοι.

6 When you shall have reached the age of puberty, you will come and punish them.' 'Venietis enim acerbi istis, adulti.'

Χ. 20. [Έτι καὶ ἐς τόδε φιάλας ἐκ τῶν ζωστήρων φορέειν Σκύθας. Even at the present day the Scythians carry phials at their belts. A small statue or figure of amber was found at Kertch a few years ago, which was thought to illustrate this passage. It represented a man in the Scythian dress, holding in one hand a quiver full of arrows, and in the other a drinking-cup shaped like a horn.]

ΧΙ. 21. Θάψαι τὸν δῆμον τῶν Κιμμερίων παρὰ ποταμὸν Τύρην. The people of the Cimmerians buried them at the river Tyras. The Greek says merely, the Cimmerians; but as the whole nation is not

7 Appian. de Rebus Hispanicis, p. 425.

8 Arrian. Exp. Alex. II. xvi. p. 151. Histoire des Celtes, vol. I. p. 136.

9

1 Ad Eneid. V. 864.

2 Fab. cxli. p. 248.

3 Hygini Fab. cxxv. p. 222.
4 Diod. Sic. II. xliii. p. 155.

5 Eurip. Suppl. 1222.

6 M. de Blaremberg, Notice sur quelques Objets d'Antiq. 1822. pp. 14—18.

intended, but only one of the factions into which it was divided, it is as well to mark the distinction.

It should seem from this passage, that the country occupied by the Cimmerians extended westward as far as the Tyras or Dniester.

XII. 22. Kiμμépia Teixea. The cities of Cimmerium. Teixos signifies a city or a castle. See notes, book III. xci. and book IV. cxxiv. I call this city Cimmerium, in the singular, after Pliny.

23. Πορθήμια Κιμμέρια. Cimmerian Porthmia. I have met with persons who, attending only to the original signification of this word, which means a ferry or passage,' have had no conception that it was also the name of a town, where there was a convenient passage across the Cimmerian Bosphorus'. Any one who should translate Trajectum ad Rhenum' into French, by trajet sur le Rhin,' (or in English,' passage across, up, or down the Rhine,') instead of 'Utrecht,' would incur the risk of being laughed at.

[The Cimmerian Fort (reixɛa) is supposed to have occupied the site of the modern Eski-Krim: the Ferry was near the mouth of the Mæotis.]

XIII. 24. Οὗτος δὲ ἄλλος λεγόμενος λόγος. This other story that is told. This passage appears to me to have no reference to the narration of Aristeas, but to the following words at the commencement of xi. "They also relate another, to which I willingly subscribe."

In the time of Herodotus there were four opinions on the history of the Scythians. The first, that of the Scythians themselves; it is mentioned in v. The second, that of the Pontic Greeks, which commences in viii. and continues to the end of x. The third was common to the Greeks and the Barbarians, and was adopted by Herodotus; it is given in xi. and xii. The fourth is that of Aristeas of Proconnesus, which commences xiii.

25. 'Apioréns ȧvýρ Пρoкovνýσws. Aristeas of Proconnesus. He wrote the 'Arimaspia,' an epic poem in three books, upon the war of the Arimaspi with the Griffons. Longinus has quoted six verses, which, in the opinion of that celebrated critic, are more remarkable for florid ornament, than for grandeur or sublimity.

Tzetzes' has preserved six other verses of this poem, which the reader will perhaps not be displeased to find quoted here. "The Issedones, proud of their long hair, have for their neighbours, on the northern side, a numerous people, brave and warlike, rich in horses, and in herds of oxen and sheep; they have but one eye in their lovely foreheads; their hair is thick. They are the strongest of all men." nysius of Halicarnassus looked on this poem as wholly imaginary.

2

7 Strabo, XI. p. 756, a ; Plin. H. N. VI. vi.

Anonym. Peripl. Pont. Eux. ii. tom. III. ed. Gail, p. 208.

9 Longin. de Sublim. x. p. 40.

1 Tzetzes, Chiliad. vii. 688.

Dio

2 Dion. Hal. de Thucyd. Jud. xxiiii. p. 238. lin. 19, &c.

26. Xpvσopúλakaç гpúraç. The Griffons which guard the gold. These are not a people, as some writers have supposed, but a fabulous animal. "We observe on each side of Minerva's helmet," says Pausanias 3, a Griffon. Aristeas of Proconnesus says, in his verses, that they are always at war, on account of their gold, with the Arimaspi, who live beyond the Issedones; that the gold which the Griffons guard shoots up from the earth; that the Arimaspi are a people who from their birth have but one eye; that the Griffons are animals resembling the lion, but with the beak and the wings of an eagle."

27. 'Yπεрßopéшv. The Hyperboreans. Olen of Lycia, a poet and a diviner, is the first who makes mention of this people. He speaks of them in a hymn upon Achæia, who came from the Hyperboreans to Delos. The Abbé Gedoyn has confounded this woman with Achaia, a country of the Peloponnesus.

28. Ἐπὶ τῇ νοτίη θαλάσσῃ. The sea-coast towards the south. Could we expect probability in the works of an author so justly decried as Aristeas, we might remark, that he here means the coast of the Euxine Sea, near the Tauric Chersoneus, which is in fact towards the south, as regards the Issedones, the Arimaspi, &c.

XIV. 29. Φάντα συντυχεῖν τέ οἱ ἰόντι ἐπὶ Κυζίκου. Saying that he met him (Aristeas) going to Cyzicus. Plutarch no doubt supposed that the pretended death of Aristeas occurred in some other place than Proconnesus, as he makes out that he was met by travellers on the road to Crotona. The same author adds, immediately afterwards, the story of a certain Cleomedes of Astypalea, who, being pursued, threw himself into a large chest, which he shut down upon himself. After many vain efforts to unclose the chest, it was finally broke open; but Cleomedes was not found either dead or alive. Pausanias relates the same story. There would be no end to quoting such tales, whether from ancient or modern writers.

6

XV. 30. Μετὰ τὴν ἀφάνισιν τὴν δευτέρην ̓Αριστέω ἔτεσι τεσσεράκοντα καὶ τριηκοσίοισι. Three hundred and forty years after the second disappearance of Aristeas. "Aristeas of Proconnesus' lived about the 50th Olympiad, that is to say, 580 B. C." This is founded upon Suidas and some other authors, who place it in the 1st year of the 50th Olympiad; but, according to the account of the Metapontines, he must have lived long before the 1st Olympiad, as he re-appeared * 340 years after he had disappeared for the second time. Herodotus, however, does not fix the date of his third appearance.

9

Tatian makes Aristeas more ancient than Homer. However this

may be, in the time of Aulus Gellius' his works either were, or were believed to be, extant.

31. 'Iraλwrέwv povvotoi. The only people of the Italiots. There is the same difference between the 'Iraλıraι and the 'Iraλoì, that there is between the Σικελοί and the Σικελιῶται. The Ἰταλοὶ and the Σικελοὶ were the ancient people of Italy and of Sicily; the 'Iraλira and the ZIKEλiraι were the Greeks who had established themselves in those countries. See Stephanus of Byzantium 2.

32. Kópak. A crow. Pliny3 relates this story a little differently. It was the soul of Aristeas which quitted his body, and appeared under the form of a crow. “Aristeæ etiam visam (animam) evolantem ex ore in Proconneso, corvi effigie, magna, quæ sequitur, fabulositate."

33. Πέριξ δὲ αὐτὸν δάφναι ἑστᾶσι. Laurel trees surround him. It appears that these were not natural trees, but manufactured in bronze *. Why has not Herodotus noticed this fact? It is probable that they were originally natural trees, but that when these perished, they were replaced by others in bronze.

XVI. 34. "Oσov μèv Яμets åтpεkéws, &c. As much as we could learn with certainty. "Notwithstanding some ambiguities and apparent contradictions," says the learned Major Rennell," which we find in the geographical description of Scythia, it is certain that Herodotus bestowed great attention on the subject. From the solemn declaration that he makes in the beginning, we may suppose that he intended it to make a considerable impression. It has seldom happened that a traveller who derived his information concerning the geography of so extensive a country from sources so casual, has produced a description comprising so many circumstances in accordance with the truth."

The Callipida,

XVII. 35. [Καλλιπίδαι-ἐόντες Ἕλληνες Σκύθαι. who are Scythian Greeks. These people probably occupied the western bank of the Dnieper, but the great diversity of opinions among those who have attempted to settle definitively all the details of our author's geography, warns us not to think of forcing a precise construction on statements which are often vague and incorrect. Eichwald changes the name to Callippidæ, so as to render it significant (having handsome horses); but there is little value to be attached to a sense thus obtained at a venture. The same writer supposes that the name of the people dwelling above the Callipida,-the Alazones, oi 'AλaLoves-was not a Scythian proper name, but a Greek epithet, signifying 'the Wanderers.']

1 Noct. Att. IX. iv. vol. I. p. 535.

2 Steph. Byz. voc. Eikeλía.

3 Plin. Hist. Nat. VII. lii. vol. I.

p. 407, lin. 19.

Athen. Deipnos. XIII. viii. p. 605, c.

7

5 The Geographical System of Herodotus, p. 81.

6 Alte Geogr. p. 299, note.
7 Ibid. p. 297.

36. [Τούτων δὲ κατύπερθε οἰκέουσι Νευροί. Αbove these dwell the Neuri. Beyond the Alazones were the Scythians, styled 'tillers,' Σκύθαι ἀροτῆρες, who probably occupied the western part of the fertile tract now called the Ukraine. Above these again were the Neuri, whose seat appears to have been in the north of Poland, bordering on Lithuania. The river Vilia, on which Wilna stands, is said to be still called Neris in Lithuanian.]

XVIII. 37. [Τοὺς Ἕλληνες οἱ οἰκέοντες ἐπὶ τῷ Ὑπάνι ποταμῳ καλέουσι Βορυσθενεῖτας· σφέας δὲ αὐτοὺς, Όλβιοπολίτας. Whom the Greeks dwelling at the river Hypanis call Borysthenita, while they call themselves Olbiopolite. It thus appears that the Greeks dwelling at the Hypanis, were the inhabitants of Olbiopolis or Olbia, a Milesian colony founded about 655 A. c. This city rose to great prosperity, which continued till the destructive irruptions of the Goths towards the beginning of the third century. Olbia stood on the right bank of the Hypanis (Bug), about six miles above the junction of that river with the Borysthenes (Dnieper), near the village of Ilinsky, and about 70 miles from Odessa, which has succeeded to its commercial importance. The site of the ancient city now bears the name of Stomogil, or the Hundred Mounds, from the numerous sepulchral tumuli scattered around. A decree of the Olbiopolita has been found', in which allusion is made to the Miλnves, or half-bred Greeks, dwelling in the vicinity, an expression which illustrates our author when he calls the Callipidæ, Scythian Greeks.]

38. 'Avôpopáyoɩ. Androphagi. To what I have said in the Geographical Table may be added, that they have the Melanchlani on the east, the Neuri on the south-west, and that they occupy the Palatinate of Volhinia, which now forms a part of Russia.

ΧΙΧ. 39. Ψιλὴ δὲ δενδρέων πᾶσα αὕτη γῆ πλὴν τῆς Ὑλαίης. All this country, excepting the Hylæa, is without trees. "Yλn, whence the name Hylæa, signifies a forest.'

6

[The tract here called Hylæa, or woodland, is that part of the Steppe between the Dnieper and the Sea of Asoph, which the Nogay Tatars now call Yambogluk. It is at present quite destitute of wood, though the traditional memory of a great forest still remains in the country.]

ΧΧ. 40. Ταῦτα δὴ τὰ καλεύμενα Βασιλήα. The country of what are called the royal Scythians. It is thus that I explain rà кaλɛúμɛva Βασιλήϊά ἐστι. Others have rendered it by the abode of the kings of Scythia; but a few lines lower down, and likewise in lvi., Herodotus speaks distinctly of these royal Scythians.

8 See Heeren's Ideen, I. ii. p. 276. Choix de Médailles Antiques d'Olbiopolis, &c.

1 Köppen, Nordgestäd. d. Pontus, pp. 92-95.