CHAPTER II
PYTHEAS OF MASSALIA
THE VOYAGE TO THULE
Among all the vague and fabulous ideas about the North that prevailed in antiquity, the name of Pytheas stands out as the only one who gives us a firmer foothold. By his extraordinary voyage (or voyages ?) this eminent astronomer and geographer, of the Phocæan colony of Massalia (now Marseilles), contributed a knowledge of the northern countries based upon personal experience, and set his mark more or less upon all that was known of the farthest north for the next thousand or fifteen hundred years. Even though later writers like Polybius and Strabo declared themselves unwilling to believe in his “incredible” statements, they could not neglect him.[37]
Pytheas wrote at least one work, which, if we may believe Geminus of Rhodes, was called “On the Ocean”; but all his writings have been lost for ages, and we only know him through chance quotations in much later authors (chiefly Strabo and Pliny) who have not even read his work themselves, but quote at second hand; and several of them (especially Polybius and Strabo) tried to represent him as an impostor and laid stress upon what they thought would make him ridiculous and lessen his reputation.[38] The scraps of information we possess about him and his voyages have thus come down on the stream of time as chance wreckage, partly distorted and perverted by hostile forces. It is too much to hope that from such fragments we may be able to form a trustworthy idea of the original work, but nevertheless from the little we know there arises a figure which in strength, intelligence, and bold endurance far surpasses the discoverers of most periods.
Personal circumstances and date of the voyage
Of Pytheas’s personal circumstances we have no certain information, and we do not even know when he lived. As he was unknown to Aristotle, but was known to his pupil Dicæarchus (who died about 285 B.C.), he was probably a contemporary of Aristotle and Alexander, and his voyage may have been undertaken about 330-325 B.C. So little do we know about the voyage that doubts have been raised as to whether it was really a sea-voyage, or whether a great part of it did not lie overland. Nor do we know whether Pytheas made one or several long journeys to the North. According to a statement of Polybius, Pytheas was a poor man: for he finds it (according to Strabo, ii. 104) “incredible that it should be possible for a private individual without means to accomplish journeys of such wide extent.” If it be true that he was poor, which is uncertain, we must doubtless suppose that Pytheas either had command of a public expedition, fitted out by the merchants of the enterprising city of Massalia, or that he accompanied such an expedition as an astronomer and explorer. At that time the city was at the height of its prosperity, after it had expelled the Carthaginians, as the result of the successful war with them, from the rich fisheries of the Iberian coast, and had also succeeded in establishing commercial relations there, whereby its ships were able to sail out beyond the Pillars of Hercules; a thing which cannot have been so easy for them during the former sea-supremacy of Carthage in the western Mediterranean, which was re-established in 306 B.C., whereby the western ocean again became more or less closed to the Massalians. It is very probable that the flourishing city of Massalia desired to send out an expedition to find the sea-route to the outer coasts of the continent, from whence it was known that the two important articles of commerce, tin and amber, were obtained. But it is evident that Pytheas had more than this business motive for his journey. From all that we know it appears that with him too the object was to reach the most northern point possible, in order to find out how far the “œcumene” extended, to determine the position of the Arctic Circle and the Pole, and to see the light northern nights and the midnight sun, which to the Greeks of that time was so remarkable a phenomenon.
Astronomical measurements
We know that Pytheas was an eminent astronomer. He was the first in history to introduce astronomical measurements for ascertaining the geographical situation of a place; and this by itself is enough to give him a prominent position among the geographers of all times.
By means of a great gnomon he determined, with surprising accuracy, the latitude of his own city, Massalia,[39] which formed the starting-point of his journey, and in relation to which he laid down the latitude of more northerly places.