 | 10. Of the Circuit of Africa. The Spirit of the Laws |  |
21.10. 10. Of the Circuit of Africa.
We find from history that before the discovery of the mariner's compass four attempts were made to sail round the coast of Africa. The Phoenicians sent by Necho [71] and Eudoxus, [72] flying from the wrath of Ptolemy Lathyrus, set out from the Red Sea, and succeeded. Sataspes [73] sent by Xerxes, and Hanno by the Carthaginians, set out from the Pillars of Hercules, and failed in the attempt.
The capital point in surrounding Africa was to discover and double the Cape of Good Hope. Those who set out from the Red Sea found this cape nearer by half than it would have been in setting out from the Mediterranean. The shore from the Red Sea is not so shallow as that from the cape to Hercules' Pillars. [74] The discovery of the cape by Hercules' Pillars was owing to the invention of the compass, which permitted them to leave the coast of Africa, and to launch out into the vast ocean, in order to sail towards the island of St. Helena, or towards the coast of Brazil. [75] It was, therefore, possible for them to sail from the Red Sea into the Mediterranean, but not to set out from the Mediterranean to return by the Red Sea.
Thus, without making this grand circuit, after which they could hardly hope to return, it was most natural to trade to the east of Africa by the Red Sea, and to the western coast by Hercules' Pillars.
The Grecian kings of Egypt discovered at first, in the Red Sea, that part of the coast of Africa which extends from the bottom of the gulf, where stands the town of Heroum, as far as Dira, that is, to the strait now known by the name of Babelmandel. Thence to the promontory of Aromatia, situate at the entrance of the Red Sea, [76] the coast had never been surveyed by navigators: and this is evident from what Artemidorus tells us, [77] that they were acquainted with the places on that coast, but knew not their distances: the reason of which is, they successively gained a knowledge of those ports by land, without sailing from one to the other.
Beyond this promontory, at which the coast along the ocean commenced, they knew nothing, as we learn from Eratosthenes and Artemidorus. [78]
Such was the knowledge they had of the coasts of Africa in Strabo's time, that is, in the reign of Augustus. But after the prince's decease, the Romans found out the two capes Raptum and Prassum, of which Strabo makes no mention, because they had not as yet been discovered. It is plain that both those names are of Roman origin.
Ptolemy, the geographer, flourished under Adrian and Antoninus Pius; and the author of the Periplus of the Red Sea, whoever he was, lived a little after. Yet the former limits known Africa to Cape Prassum, [79] which is in about the 14th degree of south latitude; while the author of the Periplus [80] confines it to Cape Raptum, which is nearly in the tenth degree of the same latitude. In all likelihood the latter took his limit from a place then frequented, and Ptolemy his from a place with which there was no longer any communication.
What confirms me in this notion is that the people about Cape Prassum were Anthropophagi. [81] Ptolemy takes notice [82] of a great number of places between the port or emporium Aromatum and Cape Raptum, but leaves an entire blank between Capes Raptum and Prassum. The great profits of the East India trade must have occasioned a neglect of that of Africa. In fine, the Romans never had any settled navigation; they had discovered these several ports by land expeditions, and by means of ships driven on that coast; and as at present we are well acquainted with the maritime parts of Africa, but know very little of the inland country, the ancients, on the contrary, had a very good knowledge of the inland parts, but were almost strangers to the coasts. [83]
I said that the Phoenicians sent by Necho and Eudoxus under Ptolemy Lathyrus had made the circuit of Africa; but at the time of Ptolemy, the geographer, those two voyages must have been looked upon as fabulous, since he places after [84] the Sinus Magnus, which I apprehend to be the Gulf of Siam, an unknown country, extending from Asia to Africa, and terminating at Cape Prassum, so that the Indian Ocean would have been no more than a lake. The ancients who discovered the Indies towards the north, advancing eastward, placed this unknown country to the south.
Footnotes
In the months of October, November, December, and January the wind in the Atlantic Ocean is found to blow north-east; our ships therefore either cross the line, and to avoid the wind, which is there generally east, they direct their course to the south: or else they enter into the torrid zone, in those places where the wind is west.
The sea to which we give this name was called by the ancients the Gulf of Arabia; the name of Red Sea they gave to that part of the ocean which borders on this gulf.
Ibid. Artemidorus settled the borders of the known coast at the place called Austricornu; and Eratosthenes, Cinnamomiferam.
See what exact descriptions Strabo and Ptolemy have given us of the different parts of Africa. Their knowledge was owing to the several wars which the two most powerful nations in the world had waged with the people of Africa, to the alliances they had contracted, and to the trade they had carried on with those countries.
| 10. Of the Circuit of Africa. The Spirit of the Laws | |