balli, and on the shores of the Euxine were the Scythæ. But under the reigns of Angustus and Tiberius it was reduced to a Roman province, under the names of Mœsia Superior, nearer to Pannonia, and Inferior, nearer to Thrace. The center of Moesia was called Dacia CisDanubiana, or Dacia Aureliani, by the Emperor Aurelian, when he abandoned the province beyond the Danube called Dacia Trajani. In Moesia Superior, Singidunum, at the mouth of the Save, is now Belgrade. East of it, Viminiacum was another important city. Somewhat East of this was Taliatis; after which began the province of Dacia Cis-Danubiana. Near this place also was a ridge of rocks, forming a cataract in the Danube, remarkable as thought to be the spot where the Danube changes its name, the Eastern part of it being called the Ister by the antients, as the Western was the Danubius. A little East of this place was the famous Pons Trajani, or bridge built by the Emperor Trajan across the Danube, to pass into his province of Dacia. Its ruins still remain. It was 3325 English feet in length.* Below it is Ratiaria, the antient metropolis of Dacia, and Nicopolis, built by Trajan to celebrate his victories over the Dacians, and memorable also for the defeat of the Christian army and flower of French nobility, by Bajazet, A. D. 1393. In the interior is Naissus, now Nissa, the birth-place of Constantine the Great, and South East is Sardica, the metropolis of Dacia, and celebrated for a Christian council. In

* The longest bridge now existing in Europe is the Pont de Saint Esprit, built in the twelfth century, across the Rhone, on 30 arches, between Montelimar and Orange, which is said to be 3197 English feet in length: that of Prague is 1812, Tours 1422, Westminster 1279.

Mœsia Inferior was Marcianopolis, the capital, so called from Marciana, the sister of the Emperor Trajan. Under the mouths of the Danube was the city of Tomi, now Tomeswar, or Baba, to which Ovid was banished. On the Northern bank of the Danube was the vast province of Dacia, comprehending part of Hungary, Transylvania, Wallachia, and Moldavia. The lazyges, a Sarmatian tribe, separated them from Pannonia. The Daci and Geta were two nations associated in language and territory, and the Geta were of Scythian origin. It is not necessary to enter into a particular account of them, or of many places which might have been enumerated in this chapter, but which, having a special reference only to the lower ages of the Eastern Empire, are purposely omitted in a treatise which professes only to give a sketch of classical Geography.

The remainder of Europe, north of the Danube, we have already seen was called Sarmatia. It is unnecessary to enter into much detail on the subject of these barbarous and almost unknown tribes. On the shores of the Baltic, were the Venedi, perhaps in part of Livonia; above the Daci were the Bastarnæ and Peucini; on the shores of the Palus Mæotis, were the lazyges and Roxolani; North are the Budini, Geloni, and Agathyrsi. The Borysthenes of the antients, which flows into the Pontus Euxinus, is the Dnieper; the Hypanis, called also Bogus, is the Bog; the Tanais is corrupted into the Don; and the Rha is the Volga, which flows into the Caspian Sea. The Borders of the Euxine, from the Ister to the Borysthenes, were called by the antients Parva Scythia, and by the moderns Little Tartary. Beyond the Borysthenes was the Cher

sonesus Taurica, (which preserves its name still in the city of Cherson,) so called from the Tauri, a Scythian nation, who conquered it from its antient possessors the Cimmerii. This was the scene of the Iphigenia in Tauris of Euripides. The narrow straight which joins the Palus Mæotis, or Sea of Azoph, to the Pontus Euxinus, was called the Cimmerian Bosphorus. The principal city here was Panticapæum, a Greek colony, called also Bosporus, now Kerchè. The extreme Southern point of the Chersonesus Taurica was called Criu Metopon, or the Ram's Forehead, nearly opposite to Sinope in Asia Minor.

CHAPTER IX.

GRÆCIA ANTIQUA.

THE most general name for Greece among the natives themselves was Hellas; and the people were called Hellenes; but even this term did not comprize the inhabitants of Macedonia and Epirus. The poets, however, used, by synecdoche, to put the names of several small tribes for the whole body of the nation. The most usual term in Homer* is Achæi and Danai,

* The word Hellenes occurs only once in Homer, Iliad II. 648.; where it is used, not as a generic, but a specific name of the inhabitants of that part of Thessaly called Hellas; and, what is also remarkable, the word Græcia was not legally recognised by the Romans, who, from their having subdued the last bulwark of Grecian liberty, the Achæan confederacy, reduced Greece into a Roman province called Achaia. Afterwards, when the Romans overthrew Perses they formed his dominions into the proconsular province of Macedonia. The name of Græcia, however, was sufficiently familiar among the Romans in writing and conversation.

and sometimes Argivi. They were also called Pelasgi, from an antient nation of that name in Thessaly; Iones, Dores, and Æoles, from the inhabitants of particular districts. Attica was the original seat of the Ionians, the Peloponnese the principal seat of the Dorians, and Thessaly the original country of the Eolians.

The lowest part of Greece, below the Sinus Corinthiacus and Sinus Saronicus, was called the Peloponnese, from Πέλοπος νῆσος, the island of Pelops. It was most antiently called Ægialea, from Ægialeus, Apia, from Apis, Pelasgia, from Pelasgus, its more antient Kings; but took the name of Peloponnese, from Pelops, the son of Tantalus, who reigned there. It was very nearly an island, being connected with the rest of Greece only by the narrow isthmus of Corinth. The modern name of Peloponnese is Morea, from the mulberry trees which grow there, having been introduced for supplying silkworms. The first province on the Eastern side, under the Sinus Saronicus, is Argolis; and below it is Laconia; on the western side, opposite to Laconia, is Messenia; above it is Elis; along the Sinus Corinthiacus is Achaia; and in the middle is Arcadia.