[145] (p. 183). Paulus Orosius.—[Here we must note the omission of the name of Diodorus Siculus among the authors cited by Azurara, especially as he is, among all the ancient historians, the one who has left us the most important and circumstantial account of the Nile. The first Latin version of Diodorus by Poggio only appeared in 1472, nineteen years after Azurara had finished this chronicle. The works of Orosius were held in high estimation among the learned of the Middle Ages. This writer was born at Braga in Lusitania, agreeably to the opinion of some authors. (See Fr. Leam de St. Thomas, bened. lusit. I, ii, p. 308; and Baronius, an. 414.) His work, Historiarum adversus Paganos, which begins with the creation of the world and comes down to the year 316 of Jesus Christ, was printed for the first time in 1471, that is, eighteen years after Azurara had finished his Chronicle, but during the Middle Ages copies of this work were so multiplied that even in England the book was to be found in the hands of the Anglo-Saxon people (see Wright, Essay on the State of Literature and Learning under the Anglo-Saxons, p. 39), a detail which affords one proof the more of the literary relations between the Spanish peninsula, and the peoples and nations of the North in the first centuries of the Middle Ages.]—S. See Dawn of Modern Geography, pp. 353-5.
[146] (p. 184). Mossylon Emporion (Mossille Nemporyo).—[Azurara alters the name. The passage to which the Chronicler refers is the following:—Et Ægyptum superiorem fluviumque Nilum, qui de litore incipientis maris Rubri videtur emergere in loco qui dicitur Musilon Emporium, not Mossile Nemporyo. (Orosius, Bk. i, vi.)]—S. On this Emporion, see Bunbury's Ancient Geography, vol ii, pp. 692; Solinus, ch. lvi.
[147] (p. 184). Josepho Rabano.—[This is the celebrated author of the history of the Jews, Flavius Josephus, whose work was first composed in Syriac and afterwards in Greek. It was so much esteemed by the Emperor Titus that he ordered it to be put into the public library. The first Latin translation which was printed, according to some bibliographers, was in 1470, seventeen years after this Chronicle was finished.]—S.
[148] (p. 184). Meroë.—[On this African island the reader can consult Ptolemy, iv, 8; Herodotus, ii, 29; Strabo, Bks. xvii-xviii; and, above all, Diodorus Siculus, i, 23, etc. The Master Peter quoted by Azurara is the famous Petrus Aliacus, or de Aliaco (d'Ailly), in his book Imago Mundi, finished in 1410: a book which had a great vogue in the fifteenth and even in the sixteenth century.]—S. Cf. also Pliny, H. N., ii, 73; v, 9; Cailliaud, L'isle de Meroe.
[149] (p. 184). Gondojre.—[According to our belief the reading should be Gondolfo. This writer had travelled in Palestine, and his life is (to be found) written in Anglia Sacra, tom. ii].—S. The Master Peter mentioned just before is rather a doubtful case. He is possibly the writer of the eleventh-century treatise "Contra Simoniam," etc., or the "Magister Scholarum" of the thirteenth, usually called the "Master of Stommeln."
[150] (p. 185). Crocodiles.—Here we have an original MS. note.—[This is an animal, as Pliny relateth, which breedeth in the Nile, and whose custom and nature is to live by day on land and by night in the water; in the water to feed on the fish upon which it liveth and maintaineth itself, and on the land to sleep and refresh itself. But when it cometh out in the morning to the bank, if it findeth a boy or a man it quickly killeth him, and it is said that it swalloweth them whole. And it is a very evil and very dangerous beast.]
Compare other original notes of MS. written in the same character on pp. 7, 8, 13, etc. On the Nile and its crocodiles and other wonders, as conceived by mediæval writers, we may also compare Solinus, ch. xxxii.
On Azurara's reference to Cæsarea (Cherchel) immediately preceding, Santarem remarks as follows:—[This is Julia Cæsarea, now Cherchel, as is proved by various Roman inscriptions discovered there lately, and communicated to the Institute of France (Royal Academy of Inscriptions) by M. Hase. This city was one of the busiest of the ancient Regency of Argel.]
[151] (p. 188). Dog Star (Canicolla).—Here we have an original MS. note.—[This star, as saith the interpreter of Ovid, giveth its name to the Dog Days, which are those days which begin on July 5th and finish on September 5th. And this name came from a bitch which guarded the body of Icarus, when he was slain by the reapers, as Master John of England relateth. And he relateth that because that bitch guarded faithfully the body of its lord, it was numbered among the signs; and because it was a little bitch, the Dog Days took this name of theirs in this form, "Canicullus" for "Cam," or "Canicolla" for "Cadella." And because that bitch of Icarus was poisoned with the stench of its master, who lay dead and already stank, therefore did that star become also a poisonous one; and therefore does the sun still poison when it passeth through that sign, and so do the rays of the sun then poison the meats on earth. Wherefore those thirty-two days which the sun taketh in passing through that sign, are held by physicians to be days hurtful to the health of the body.] [John of England is John Duns Scotus, Franciscan friar, called Doctor Subtilis, one of the chief philosophers of the Middle Ages, and Professor in Oxford (see Wadding, Vita J. Duns Scoti, doctoris subtilis, published in 1644).]—S.
[152] (p. 188). Ellice and Cenosura.—Here we have another manuscript note.—[These are the two poles, to wit, Arctic and Antarctic. And the interpreter of Ovid saith that each one of these two signs are called Arcom, and that Arcom is a Greek word, and signifieth what in Latin is meant by Ursi, and in the Portuguese language by Ursas; and that, besides, by each of these signs we call the North.]