Copy 1, Volume 1

Indian antiquities: or, dissertations relative to the antient geographical divisions, the pure system of primeval theology, the grand code of civil laws, the original form of government, the widely-extended commerce, and the various profound literature of Hindostan: compared, throughout, with the religion, laws, government, and literature, of Persia, Egypt, and Greece. The whole intended as introductory to the history of Hindostan. Upon a comprehensive scale / [Thomas Maurice].

Thomas Maurice

Date:: 1800-12 [vol. I, 1806]

Credit: Indian antiquities: or, dissertations relative to the antient geographical divisions, the pure system of primeval theology, the grand code of civil laws, the original form of government, the widely-extended commerce, and the various profound literature of Hindostan: compared, throughout, with the religion, laws, government, and literature, of Persia, Egypt, and Greece. The whole intended as introductory to the history of Hindostan. Upon a comprehensive scale / [Thomas Maurice]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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J [ 137 ] And again, in the eighth Eclogue Israarus aut Rhodope auf extremi Garamantes f — Where Servius his commentator explains the word extremi,” by adding, quasi a consor- tio communitatis remoti.” Horace, too, ilnder the impression of the same sentiments, calls the Indians extremes,” and “ hand ante doma- biles.” Many other passages might be adduced, if necessary, from various authors, to prove what obscure and erroneous notions prevailed among the antients concerning India and its inhabitants. It was not until the expedition of Alexan- der, described with such accuracy by Arrian and with such elegance by the more orna- mental pen of Quintus Curtius, that this re- mote region became more particularly known to the Greeks. Of how little genuine informa- tion upon this point, even they were previously in possession, is evident from the gross mistake into which that prince, who was by no means an inattentive observer of nature, nor unaccom- panied, we must suppose, by men of science in his Indian incursion, unaccountably fell in imagining, on his arrival at the Indus, that he * Eclogue viii. 1. 4+, t The Garamantes were a barbarous nation, situate on the confines of Ethiopia Propria. hud

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