Cashmir, Ecbatana, and, Peucela, on the Indus.
According to these accounts, it appears to have gone directly east in about 36° N. latitude to Ecbatana, the capital of Media, and thence to the Caspian gates, through which everything coming from the west necessarily passed. On the north lay the Hyrcanian mountains; on the south an impenetrable desert; and on one portion of the route there was the narrow defile, about eight Roman miles in length, which Pliny describes as having been cut through the rocks.[225] From the Caspian Pass, the road led with various considerable turns till it reached Peucela on the Indus. From Alexandria in Ariis (Herát), and Ortospanum (Kâbul), other routes turned off into Bactriana, and thence proceeded into Great Tatary and Central Asia.[226] As there was considerable commercial intercourse between the neighbouring inhabitants of the city of Bactra (Balkh) and of Upper India, another route ran due north to Marakanda (Samarcand); and Heeren is of opinion that caravans traversed the desert from Badakhshan to Serica (China), and from that country to the Ganges.
Earliest land and sea combined routes.
Herodotus relates that from the Greek establishments on the Black Sea there were commercial routes through Central Asia, over the Ural Mountains to the country of the Calmucks of Great Tatary.[227] These different highways will be found laid down on a map, which has been prepared for reference (see [Frontispiece]), wherein will also be found the courses adopted by the vessels of ancient times in the navigation of the Asiatic seas, which, as far as can now be ascertained, was chiefly confined to the Arabian and Persian Gulfs, and the Indian Ocean. The periodical winds in these gulfs when once ascertained, rendered navigation comparatively easy, but, in navigating the Indian Ocean at the time of Alexander’s expedition, the monsoons were either not generally known to extend across the Indian Ocean, or were not made available to any great extent. Voyages, in the days of Herodotus, and for three centuries afterwards, were almost wholly of a coasting character.
Commercial efforts of Alexander in the East, and the impetus he gave to the development of the trade with India, by the erection of Alexandria, B.C. 331.
Although Alexander endeavoured, when he took possession of Babylonia, to remove the obstructions by which the Persians had blockaded the river Tigris, and, by this and other means, hoped to restore the maritime commerce they had destroyed, he was only partially successful; hence, subsequently, the great bulk of the sea-borne trade between the Western and Eastern world reverted to the Arabian Gulf, and, with a few unimportant deviations, continued in that route until the Portuguese successfully doubled the Cape of Good Hope. For some time, however, after his death this new trade was materially retarded by the anarchy which occurred on that event; nor did it thoroughly revive until Ptolemy Philadelphus established an embassy on the coast of Hindustan, and, at the same time, built the port of Berenice, on the Red Sea, at the eastern end of the great commercial road from Coptos on the Nile.
Ptolemy, son of Lagos and father of Philadelphia, as soon as he had taken possession of Egypt, established the seat of his government in Alexandria, entering readily into the schemes which had led Alexander, a few years before, to lay the foundations of that city. With a rapidity truly astonishing, merchants from all parts flocked to the new city, so that in a space of time incredibly short the commerce of the East came to be carried on in the channel which the sagacity of Alexander had anticipated for it.
By a prudent exercise of authority, by many acts of liberality, and, above all, by the fame of a mild and judicious administration, Ptolemy drew so many inhabitants to this place that it soon became one of the most populous and wealthy cities in Egypt. Ptolemy had possessed, as he well deserved, the confidence of the great conqueror more perfectly than any of his other officers; hence he knew better than any of them that Alexander’s chief object in founding Alexandria was to secure the advantages arising from the trade with India. His long and prosperous reign enabled him to carry out this purpose with great success; while his general attention to the requirements of a wide maritime commerce is exemplified by his construction of the celebrated Pharos, at the mouth of the harbour of Alexandria, of which mention has already been made.
From Alexandria the course of trade with the East seems to have at first passed to Arsinoe, the present Suez, but the difficulties and dangers of the navigation of the northern extremity of the Red Sea, led to the formation by Ptolemy Philadelphus, on its western shores, of the harbour of Myos Hormus, as well as the more important roadstead of Berenice, whereby direct communication with the outer ocean was greatly facilitated, and due advantage could be taken of the prevailing winds within the Straits. Goods were conveyed by the Nile to Coptos, and were thence transported over land by caravans to Myos Hormus, or Berenice. To render these routes more easy and endurable during many days’ march through torrid deserts, Philadelphus sought out the needful springs, and established caravanserais at these necessary halting places. Pliny[228] and the Itinerary of Antonine[229] give a list of them; and it is worthy of record, that Belzoni recognized traces of many of these routes when he visited that country.[230]
Time of the departure of the fleets.