[CRITICAL ESSAY ON THE SOURCES OF INFORMATION.]
THE views of the ancient Mediterranean peoples upon geography are preserved almost solely in the ancient classics. The poems attributed to Homer and Hesiod, the so-called Orphic hymns, the odes of Pindar, even the dramatic works of Æschylus and his successors, are sources for the earlier time. The writings of the earlier philosophers are lost, and their ideas are to be found in later writers, and in compilations like the Biographies of Diogenes Laertius (3d cent. a.d.), the De placitis philosophorum attributed to Plutarch, and the like. Among the works of Plato the Phaedo and Timaeus and the last book of the Republic bear on the form and arrangement of the earth; the Timaeus and Critias contain the fable of Atlantis. The first scientific treatises preserved are the De Caelo and Meteorologica of Aristotle.[330] It is needless to speak in detail of the geographical writers, accounts of whom will be found in any history of Greek and Roman literature. The minor pieces, such as the Periplus of Hanno, of Scylax of Caryanda, of Dionysius Periegetes, the Geography of Agatharcides, and others, have been several times collected;[331] and so have the minor historians, which may be consulted for Theopompus, Hecataeus, and the mythologists.[332] The geographical works of Pytheas (b.c. 350?), of Eratosthenes (b.c. 276-126), of Polybius (b.c. 204-122), of Hipparchus (flor. circ. b.c. 125), of Posidonius (1st cent. b.c.), are preserved only in quotations made by later writers; they have, however, been collected and edited in convenient form.[333] The most important source of our knowledge of Greek geography and Greek geographers is of course the great Geography of Strabo, which a happy fortune preserved to us. The long introduction upon the nature of geography and the size of the earth and the dimensions of the known world is of especial interest, both for his own views and for those he criticises.[334] Strabo lived about b.c. 60 to a.d. 24.
The works of Marinus of Tyre having perished, the next important geographical work in Greek is the world-renowned Geography of Ptolemaeus, who wrote in the second half of the second century a.d. Despite the peculiar merits and history of this work, it is not so important for our purpose as the work of Strabo, though it exercised infinitely more influence on the Middle Ages and on early modern geography.[335]
The astronomical writers are also of importance. Eudoxus of Cnidus, said to have first adduced the change in the altitude of stars accompanying a change of latitude as proof of the sphericity of the earth, wrote works now known only in the poems of Aratus, who flourished in the latter half of the third century b.c.[336] Geminus (circ. b.c. 50),[337] and Cleomedes,[338] whose work is famous for having preserved the method by which Eratosthenes measured the circumference of the earth, were authors of brief popular compilations of astronomical science. Of vast importance in the history of learning was the astronomical work of Ptolemy, ἡ μεγάλη σύνταξις τῆς ἀστρονομίας, which was so honored by the Arabs that it is best known to us as the Almagest, from Tabric al Magisthri, the title of the Arabic translation which was made in 827. It has been edited and translated by Halma (Paris, 1813, 1816).
Much is to be learned from the Scholia attached in early times to the works of Hesiod, Homer, Pindar, the Argonautica of Apollonius Rhodius (b.c. 276-193?), and to the works of Aristotle, Plato, etc. In some cases these are printed with the works commented upon; in other cases, the Scholia have been printed separately. The commentary of Proclus (a.d. 412-485) upon the Timaeus of Plato is of great importance in the Atlantis myth.[339]
Much interest attaches to the dialogue entitled On the face appearing in the orb of the moon, which appears among the Moralia of Plutarch. Really a contribution to the question of life after death, this work also throws light upon geographical and astronomical knowledge of its time.
Among the Romans we find much the same succession of sources. The poets, Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Tibullus, Lucretius, Lucan, Seneca, touch on geographical or astronomical points and reflect the opinion of their day.[340]
The first six books of the great encyclopaedia compiled by Pliny the elder (a.d. 23-79)[341] contain an account of the universe and the earth, which is of the greatest value, and was long exploited by compilers of later times, among the earliest and best of whom was Solinus.[342] Equally famous with Solinus was the author of a work of more independent character, Pomponius Mela, who lived in the first century a.d. His geography, commonly known as De situ orbis from the mediæval title, though the proper name is De chorographia, is a work of importance and merit. In the Middle Ages it had wonderful popularity.[343] Cicero, who contemplated writing a history of geography, touches upon the arrangement of the earth’s surface several times in his works, as in the Tusculan Disputations, and notably in the sixth book of the Republic, in the episode known as the “Dream of Scipio.” The importance of this piece is enhanced by the commentary upon it written by Macrobius in the fifth century a.d.[344] A peculiar interest attaches to the poems of Avienus, of the fourth century a.d., in that they give much information about the character attributed to the Atlantic Ocean.[345] The astronomical poems of Manilius[346] and Hyginus were favorites in early Middle Ages. The astrological character of the work of Manilius made it popular, but it conveyed also the true doctrine of the form of the earth. The curious work of Marcianus Capella gave a résumé of science in the first half of the fifth century a.d., and had a like popularity as a school-book and house-book which also helped maintain the truth.[347]