[26] Cf. The Orient Question, Appendix C (by Prince Lazarovich-Hebelianovich, New York, 1913).
[27] Cf. Baicoianu, op. cit., p. 14. See also for an illuminating discussion of this same subject La Question du Danube, Histoire Politique du Bassin du Danube; Études des divers régimes applicables à la navigation du Danube (by G. Demorgny, Paris, 1911).
[28] A venerable legend has it that Achilles met here the shade of Helen of Troy whom he had loved in life, by hearsay, although he had never seen her.
[29] These alleged appearances of Achilles and the Dioscuri, referred to by Arrian, were evidently the lambent electrical discharges known as St. Elmo’s Fires. They are also called corposant, Helena, and, when in pairs, the Dioscuri—namely, Castor and Pollux.
[30] Tristia, Lib. III, Elegia, III.
[31] Tristia, Lib. II, Elegia, IX.
[32] For the various names of the Euxine or Black Sea, cf. The Book of Ser Marco Polo, Vol. I, p. 3 (trans, by H. Yule, London, 1903); Cathay and The Way Thither, Vol. II, p. 98 (printed for the Hakluyt Society, London, 1913).
[33] So paramount from the twelfth to the fifteenth century was the commerce of Genoa and Venice that an Italian writer does not hesitate to declare that, “during four centuries, the Genoese and Venetians were the arbiters of the destinies of Europe; that they alone thronged the trade-routes of Asia and Africa; that they alone controlled the commerce of these continents; that they alone civilized their barbarous inhabitants and dispelled the darkness of the Middle Ages.” Nuova Istoria della Repubblica di Genova, del Suo Commercio e della Sua Letteratura dalle Origini all’ Anno 1797, Vol. I, p. 7 (by Michel-Giuseppe Canale, Florence, 1858).
In marked contrast to this division of the commerce of the world between Genoa and Venice, the Venetian author, Fabio Mutinelli, would claim a mercantile monopoly for his countrymen. “To them alone,” he writes, “are earth and sea equally open; they alone are the channel of all the riches and the furnishers of all the world which poured into their hands all the money which it possessed.” Del Commercio dei Veneziani, p. 126 (Venice, 1835).
For interesting accounts of the Euxine trade routes during the period in question the reader may consult with profit Histoire du Commerce de la Mer Noire (by Elie de la Primaudaie); Le Danube, Chap. II (by C. I. Baicoianu, Paris, 1917); Intercourse Between India and the Western World from the Earliest Times to the Fall of Rome (by H. G. Rawlinson, Cambridge, England, 1916); Travels of Marco Polo, Vol. I, Bk. I, Chap. IX (by Henry Yule, London, 1903). This masterly work is specially valuable for its numerous maps indicating the routes of Marco Polo, as well as those of the elder Polos through Asia. See also Geschichte des Levantehandels im Mittelalter, Vol. II, pp. 76, 78, 158 ff. (by Wilhelm Heyd, Stuttgart, 1879).