| metres. | |
| From the middle of Syene to Luxor in the ancient territory of Thebes | 218,900 |
| From Luxor to Becous situated at the point of the Delta | 727,500 |
| From Becous following the Damietta branch to that city | 234,000 |
| ————— | |
| 1,180,400 |
This measure reduced to mean degrees of the earth equals 637° 25´, and represents 5312 stadia of 500 (to the degree). I certainly did not expect to find such an agreement between the new and the ancient measures. The periodic rising of the Nile, I think, must have produced, since the time of Eratosthenes, some partial changes in the windings of the river; but we must acknowledge that these changes, for greater or for less, compensate one another on the whole.
We observe, moreover, as I have already often observed, that the use of the stadium of 500 to the degree is anterior to the Alexandrine school; for at the time of Eratosthenes the stadium of 700 was more particularly made use of in Egypt. Gossellin.
[795] Although generally described as an island, it was, like Mesopotamia, a district included between rivers: the city Meroë was situated in lat. 16° 44´.
[796] Tacazze.
[797] Bahr-el-Azrek, or Blue river.
[798] See b. xvi. c. iv. § [8], and Herod. ii. 30, who calls the Sembritæ, Automoloi, that is, persons who had voluntarily quitted their abode.
[799] The Nile valley was parcelled out into a number of cantons, varying in size and number. Each of these cantons was called a nome (νομὸς) by the Greeks, “præfectura oppidorum” by the Romans. Each had its civil governor, the Nomarch, who collected the crown revenues, and presided in the local capital and chief court of justice. Each nome too had its separate priesthood, its temple, chief and inferior towns, its magistrates, registration and peculiar creed, ceremonies and customs; and each was apparently independent of every other nome. At certain seasons, delegates from the various cantons met in the palace of the Labyrinth, for consultation on public affairs (b. xvii. c. i. § 37). According to Diodorus, the nomes date from Sesostris. But they did not originate from that monarch, but emanated probably from the distinctions of animal worship; and the extent of the local worship probably determined the boundary of the nome. Thus in the nome of Thebaïs, where the ram-headed deity was worshipped, the sheep was sacred, the goat was eaten and sacrificed: in that of Mendes, where the goat was worshipped, the sheep was a victim and an article of food. Again, in the nome of Ombos, divine honours were paid to the crocodile: in that of Tentyra, it was hunted and abominated: and between Ombos and Tentyra there existed an internecine feud.
Ardet adhuc Ombos et Tentyra: summus utrinque Inde furor vulgo, quod numina vicinorum Odit uterque locus, cum solos credat habendos Esse deos, quos ipse colit. Juv. xv. 35. The extent and number of the nomes cannot be ascertained. They probably varied with the political state of Egypt. See Smith, art. Ægyptus.
[800] See b. xvi. c. ii. § [24].
[801] In the text ὀστράκινα πορθμεῖα “earthen-ware ferry boats.” The translation is not literal, but a paraphrase.