[782] Cosmas, op. cit., xi. White slaves, especially beautiful females for concubinage, were among the most important exports to India; Pseud-Arrian, op. cit., 49. One Eudoxus tried to reach that country by rounding West Africa with a cargo of choir girls, physicians, and artisans, but twice failed; Strabo, II, iii, 4. In the time of Pliny the Empire was drained by the East yearly to the amount of £800,000 in specie; Hist. Nat., xii, 41. Statues and paintings were also exported from the Empire; Strabo, XVI, iv, 26; Pseud-Arrian, op. cit., 48; Philostratus, Vit. Apol., v, 20. The import of precious stones, etc., may be conceived from the statement that Lollia Paulina appeared in the theatre wearing emeralds and pearls to the value of £304,000; Pliny, op. cit., ix, 58.
[783] Cosmas, op. cit., ii.
[784] Malchus, p. 234; Theophanes, an. 5990. The island was taken by the Scenite (tent-dwelling) Arabs under Theodosius II, but was recovered by Anastasius.
[785] Ibid.
[786] Antoninus Martyr, Perambulatio, etc., 38, 41 (trans. in Pal. Pilgr. Text Soc., ii). The martyr, however, is a liar, as he professes to have produced wine from water at Cana, unless some brother monk in copying has been anxious to enhance his reputation. Clysma is now Suez.
[787] Rhinocolura, near Gaza, was the depôt for this trade in the time of Strabo (XVI, iv, 24).
[788] Strabo, XVII, i, 45; Pliny, Hist. Nat., vi, 26; Pseud-Arrian, op. cit., passim. Cosmas does not mention Berenice, but it was flourishing in the time of Procopius (De Aedific., vi, 2).
[789] Strabo, XVII, i, 45; Pliny, op. cit., vi, 26.
[790] Strabo, XVI, iv, 24; XVII, iv, 10, et seq. There was a canal from the Red Sea to the Nile, but it silted up too rapidly to be permanently used. In Roman times Trajan last reopened it; see Lethaby and S., op. cit., p. 236, for monographs on this subject.
[791] Notitia Or., X, XII; Cod. Theod., X, xx, xxi, xxii, and Godefroy’s commentaries; Cod., XI, viii, ix, x.