At the distance of another ten days' journey from the Garamantes is another hill of salt and water, around which a people live who are called Atarantes; they are the only race we know of who have not personal names. For the name Atarantes belongs to them collectively, and to each one of them no name is given. They curse the sun as he passes over their heads, and moreover utter against him the foulest invectives, because he consumes by his scorching heat, the men themselves and their country. Afterward, at the end of still another ten days' journey, there is one more hill of salt and water, and men live round it, near a mountain called Atlas; it is narrow and circular on all sides, and is said to be so lofty that its top can never be seen; it is never free from clouds, either in summer or winter. The inhabitants say that it is the Pillar of Heaven. From this mountain the men derive their appellation, for they are called Atlantes. They are said neither to eat the flesh of any animal, nor to see visions. As far, then, as these Atlantes, I am able to mention the names of the nations that inhabit this ridge, but not beyond them. This ridge, however, extends as far as the pillars of Hercules, and even beyond; and there is a mine of salt in it at intervals of ten days' journey, and men dwelling there. The houses of them all are built of blocks of salt, for in these parts of Libya no rain falls; walls being of salt could not of course stand long if rain did fall. The salt dug out there is white and purple in appearance. Above this ridge, to the south and interior of Libya, the country is a desert, without water, without animals, without rain, and without wood; and there is no kind of moisture in it.
Westward of lake Tritonis, the Libyans are no longer nomads, nor do they follow the same customs, with respect to their children, as the nomads are accustomed to do; for the nomadic Libyans, whether all I am unable to say with certainty, but many of them, when their children are four years old, burn the veins on the crown of their heads, with uncleaned sheep's wool; and some of them do so on the veins in the temples; to the end that humors flowing down from the head may not injure them as long as they live: and, for this reason, they say they are so very healthy, for the Libyans are in truth the most healthy of all men with whom we are acquainted. But I simply repeat what the Libyans themselves say. From the Libyan women the Greeks derived the attire and ægis of Minerva's statues; for, except that the dress of the Libyan women is leather, and the fringes that hang from the ægis are not serpents, but made of thongs, they are otherwise equipped in the same way; and, moreover, the very name proves that the garb of the Palladia comes from Libya; for the Libyan women throw over their dress, goats' skins without the hair, fringed and dyed with red. From these goats' skins the Greeks have borrowed the name of Ægis. And the howlings in the temples were, I think, first derived from there; for the Libyan women practise the same custom, and do it well. The Greeks also learnt from the Libyans to yoke four horses abreast. All the nomads, except the Nasamonians, inter their dead in the same manner as the Greeks; these bury them in a sitting posture, watching when one is about to expire, that they may set him up, and he may not die supine. Their dwellings are compacted of the asphodel shrub, interwoven with rushes, and are portable.
To the west of the river Triton, Libyans who are husbandmen next adjoin the Auses; they are accustomed to live in houses, and are called Maxyes. They let the hair grow on the right side of the head, and shave the left; and bedaub the body with vermilion: they say that they are descended from men who came from Troy. This region, and all the rest of Libya westward, is much more infested by wild beasts and more thickly wooded than the country of the nomads; for the eastern country of Libya, which the nomads inhabit, is low and sandy, as far as the river Triton; but the country westward of this, which is occupied by agriculturists, is very mountainous, woody, and abounds with wild beasts. For amongst them there are enormous serpents, and lions, elephants, bears, asps, asses with horns, and monsters with dogs' heads and without heads, who have eyes in their breasts, at least as the Libyans say, together with wild men and wild women. None of these things are found among the nomads, but others of the following kind: pygargi, antelopes, buffaloes, and asses, not such as have horns, but others that never drink; and oryes, from the horns of which are made the elbows of the Phœnician citherns; in size this beast is equal to an ox; and foxes, hyænas, porcupines, wild rams, dictyes, thoes, panthers, boryes, and land crocodiles about three cubits long, very much like lizards; ostriches, and small serpents, each with one horn. These, then, are the wild animals in that country, besides such as are met with elsewhere, except the stag and the wild boar; but the stag and the wild boar are never seen in Libya. They have three sorts of mice there; some called dipodes, or two-footed; others, zegeries, this name is Libyan, and means the same as the word signifying hillocks in Greek; and hedgehogs. There are also weasels produced in the silphium, like those at Tartessus.
The Zaveces adjoin the Maxyan Libyans; their women drive their chariots in war. The Gyzantes adjoin them; amongst them bees make a great quantity of honey, and it is said that confectioners make much more. All these paint themselves with vermilion, and eat monkeys, which abound in their mountains. Near them, the Carthaginians say, lies an island called Cyraunis, two hundred stades in length, inconsiderable in breadth, easy of access from the continent, and abounding in olive trees and vines. In it is a lake, from the mud of which the girls of the country draw up gold dust by means of feathers daubed with pitch. Whether this is true I know not, but I write what is related; it may be so, however, for I have myself seen pitch drawn up out of a lake and from water in Zacynthus; and there are several lakes there, the largest of them is seventy feet every way, and two orgyæ in depth; into this they let down a pole with a myrtle branch fastened to the end, and then draw up pitch adhering to the myrtle; it has the smell of asphalt, but is in other respects better than the pitch of Pieria. They pour it into a cistern dug near the lake, and when they have collected a sufficient quantity, draw it off from the cistern into jars. All that falls into the lake passes under ground, and appears again upon the surface of the sea, which is about four stades distant from the lake. This account given of the island may probably be true. The Carthaginians further say, that beyond the pillars of Hercules there is an inhabited region of Libya; when they arrive among these people and have unloaded their merchandise, they set it in order on the shore, go on board their ships, and make a great smoke; the inhabitants, seeing the smoke, come down to the sea, deposit gold in exchange for the merchandise, and withdraw to some distance from the merchandise; the Carthaginians then, going ashore, examine the gold, and if the quantity seems sufficient for the merchandise they take it up and sail away; but if it is not sufficient, they go on board their ships again and wait; the natives then approach and deposit more gold, until they have satisfied them; neither party ever wrongs the other; for they do not touch the gold before it is made adequate to the value of the merchandise, nor do the natives touch the merchandise before the other party has taken the gold.
OLIVE TREES.
No part of Libya appears to me so good in fertility as to be compared with Asia or Europe, except only the district of Cinyps; for the land bears the same name as the river, and is equal to the best land for the production of corn; nor is it at all like the rest of Libya; for the soil is black, and well watered with springs, and it is neither affected at all by drought, nor is it injured by imbibing too much rain, which falls in this part of Libya. The proportion of the produce of this land equals that of Babylon. The land also which the Euesperides occupy is good; for when it yields its best, it produces a hundred-fold; but that in Cinyps three hundred-fold. The district of Cyrene, which is the highest of that part of Libya which the nomads occupy, has three seasons, a circumstance worthy of admiration; for the first fruits near the sea swell so as to be ready for the harvest and vintage; when these are gathered in, the fruits of the middle region, away from the sea, swell so as to be gathered in, these they call uplands; and just as this middle harvest has been gathered in, that in the highest part becomes ripe and swells. So that when the first crop has been drunk and eaten, the last comes in. Thus harvest occupies the Cyrenæans during eight months. This maybe sufficient to say concerning these things.
The Persians once upon a time, sent against the city of Barce, laid siege to it for nine months, digging passages under ground that reached to the walls, and making vigorous assaults. Now these excavations were discovered by a worker of bronze, carrying a bronze shield round within the wall, and applying it to the ground within the city: in other places to which he applied it, it made no noise, but at the parts that were excavated, the metal of the shield sounded. The Barcæans, therefore, countermining them in that part, slew the Persians who were employed in the excavation. When much time had been spent, and many had fallen on both sides, and not the fewest on the side of the Persians, Amasis, general of the land forces, had recourse to the following stratagem: Finding that the Barcæans could not be taken by force, but might be by artifice, he dug a wide pit by night, laid weak planks of wood over it, and on the surface over the planks he spread a heap of earth, making it level with the rest of the ground. At daybreak he invited the Barcæans to a conference; they gladly assented, thinking that at last they were pleased to come to terms: and they made an agreement of the following nature, concluding the treaty over the concealed pit: "That as long as this earth shall remain as it is, the treaty should continue in force; and that the Barcæans should pay a reasonable tribute to the king, and that the Persians should form no new designs against the Barcæans." After the treaty the Barcæans, confiding in the Persians, went freely out of the city, and allowed any one of the Persians who chose to pass within the wall, throwing open all the gates. But the Persians, having broken down the concealed bridge, rushed within the wall: having not fully kept their oath. The Persians reduced the Barcæans to slavery and took their departure. But king Darius gave them a village in the district of Bactria, to dwell in, and the name of Barce was given to this village, which was still inhabited in my time, in the Bactrian territory.
[20] Herodotus means that south of the equator the sun was in the north.