Volume 2

A dictionary of Greek and Roman geography / by various writers ; edited by William Smith.

Date:
1873
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A dictionary of Greek and Roman geography / by various writers ; edited by William Smith. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    scribed by Mariti {Viaggi^ vol. i. p. 204), situated to the south of Leucosia, at the foot of Mount Olympus. [E. B. J.] IDIMIUM, a town in Lower Pannonia, on the east of Sinnium, according to the Pent. Tab.; in the Ra- venna Geographer (iv. 19) it is called Idominium. Its site must be looked for in the neighbourhood of Munvicza. [L. S.] IDIMUS, a town of uncertain site in Upper Moesia, probably on i\xQ3Ioraioa in Servia. (/^. Ant. 134; Tab. Pent.') [L. S.] IDISTAVISUS CAMPUS, the famous battle- field where Germariicus, in a. d. 16, defeated Ar- ininius. The name is mentioned only by Tacitus (Ann. ii. 16), who describes it as a “campus me* dius inter Visurgim et colles,” and further says of it, that “ ut ripae fluminis cedunt aut prominentia mon- tium resistunt, inaequaliter sinuatur. Pone tergum insurgebat silva, editis in altum ramis et pura humo inter arborum truncos.” This plain between the river TFe^er and the hills has been the subject of much discussion among the modem historians of Germany, and various places have been at different times pointed out as answering the description of Tacitus’ Idistavisus. It was formerly beheved that it was the plain near Vegesack, below Bremen ; more recent writers are pretty unanimous in believ- ing that Germanicus Avent up the river Weser to a point beyond the modern town of Minden, and crossed it in the neighbourhood of Ilausberge, Avhence the battle probably took place between Haus- herge and Rinteln, not far from the Porta Vestphalica. (Ledebur, Land u. Volk der Bructerer, p. 288.) As to the name of the place, it used to be believed that it had arisen out of a Roman asking a German what the place was, and the German answering, “ It is a wiese” (it is a meadow) ; but Grimm (Deutsche Mythol. p. 372. 2nd edit.) has shown that the plain was probably called Idisiaviso, that is, “ the maiden’s meadow” (from idisi, a maiden). [L. S.] IDO'MENE (’iSoyLiej/Tj, Ptol. iii. 13. § 39 ; Ido- menia. Pent. Tab.)^ a town of Macedonia which the Tabular Itinerary places at 12 M. P. from Stena, the pass now called Demirkapi, or Iron Gate, on the river Vardhdri. Sitalces, on his route from Thrace to Macedonia, crossed ]\It. Cercine, leaving the Pae- ones on his right, and the Sinti and Maedi on his left, and descended upon the Axius at Idomene. (Thuc. ii. 98.) It probably stood upon the right bank of the Axius, as it is included by Ptolemy (/. c.) in Emathia, and was near Doberus, next to which it is named by Hierocles among the towns of Consular Macedonia, under the Byzantine empire. (Leake, North. Greece, vol. iii. p. 444.) [E. B. J.] IDO'MENE. [Argos Amphilochicum.] IDRAE (iSpat, Ptol. iii. 5. § 23), a people of Sarmatia Europaea, Avhose position cannot be made out from the indications given by Ptolemy. (Scha- farik, Slav. Alt. vol. i. p. 213.) [E. B. J.] I'DRIAS (’iSptds), according to Stephanus B. (s. V.'), a town in Caria which had formerly borne the name of Chrysaoris. Herodotus (v. 118) de- scribes the river Marsyas as flowing from a district called Idrias ; and it is conjectured that Straloniceia, founded by Antiochus Soter, was built on the site of the ancient town of Idrias. (Comp. Leake, Asia Minor, p. 235 ; see Laodiceia.) [L. S.] IDU'BEDA (’iSovSeSa, misspelt by Agathemerus ’Ij/5ou§aA5a, ii. 9: Sierra de Oca and Sierra de Lorenzo'), a great mountain chain of Hispania, running in a SE. direction from the mountains of the Cantabri to the Mediterranean, almost parallel to the Ebro, the basin of which it borders on the W. Strabo makes it also parallel to the Pyrenees, in conformity Avith his view of the direction of that chain from N. to S. (Strab. iii. p. 161; Ptol. ii. 6. §21.) Its chief offsets were: — M. Caunus, near Bilbilis (Martial, i. 49, iv. 65), the Saltus Man- LiANUS (Liv. xl. 39: probably the Sierra Molina), and, above all, M. Orospeda, Avhich strikes off from it to the S. long before it reaches the sea, and which ought perhaps rather to be regarded as its principal prolongation than as a mere branch. [P. S.] IDUMAEA (’I5ou/ia?o), the name of the country inhabited by the descendants of Edom (or Esau), being, in fact, only the classical form of that ancient Semitic name. (Joseph. Ant. ii. 1. § 1.) It is other- wise called Mount Seir. (Gen. xxxii. 3, xxxvi. 8; Deut. ii. 5; Joshua, xxir. 4.) It lay between Mount Horeb and the southern border of Canaan (Deut. i. 2), extending apparently as far south as the Gulf of Akaba (Deut. ii. 2—8), as indeed its ports, Ezion-geber, and Eloth, are expressly assigned to the “ land of Edom.” (2 Chron. viii. 17.) This country w.as inhabited in still more ancient times by the Horims (Deut. ii. 12, 22), and derived its more ancient name from their patriarch Seir (Gen. xxxvi. 20; comp. xiv. 6), as is properly maintained by Reland, against the fanciful conjecture of Josephus and others. (Palaestina, pp. 68, 69.) The Jewish historian extends the name Idumaea so far to the north as to comprehend under it great part of the south of Judaea; as Avhen he says that the tribe of Simeon received as their inheritance that part of Idumaea which borders on Egypt and Arabia. (Ant. V. 1. § 22) He elsewhere calls Hebron the first city of Idumaea, i. e. reckoning from the north. (B.J. iv. 9. § 7.) From his time the name Idumaea disappears from geographical descriptions, except as an his- torical appellation of the country that was then called Gebalene, or the southern desert (g Kara ixearjg.- €piav eprj/xos, Euseb. Onom. s. v. AlAct/i), or Arabia. The historical records of the Idumaeans, properly so called, are very scanty. Saul made Avar upon them; David subdued the whole country; and Solomon made Ezion-geber a naval station. (1 Sam. xiv. 47, 2 Sam. viii. 14; 1 Kings, xi. 15, ix. 26.) The Edomites, however, recovered their national inde- pendence under Joram, king of Judah (2 Kings, xiv. 7), and avenged themselves on the Jews in the cruelties which they practised at the capture of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar. (Psalms, cxxxvii. 7.) It was probably during the Babylonish cap- tivity that they extended themselves as far north as Hebron, where they Avere attacked and subdued by Judas Maccabaeus. (1 Maccab. v. 65—68; Joseph. Ant. xii. 8. § 6.) It was on this account that the whole of the south of Palestine, about Hebron, Gaza, and Eleutheropolis (Beit Jebrin), came to be designated Idumaea. (Joseph. B. J. iv. 9. § 7, c. Apion. ii. 9 ; S. Jerom. Comment, in Obad. ver. 1.) Meanwhile, the ancient seats of the children of Edom had been invaded and occupied by another tribe, the Nabathaeans, the descendants of the Ishmaelite patriarch Nebaioth [Nabathaei], under which name the country and its capital [Petra] became famous among Greek and Roman geographers and historians, on which account their description of the district is more appropriately giv'en under that head. St. Jerome’s brief but accurate notice of its general features may here suffice; — “ Omnis australis regio Idumaeorum de Eleuthero-