Volume 1
A dictionary of Greek and Roman geography / by various writers ; edited by William Smith.
- Date:
- 1873
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A dictionary of Greek and Roman geography / by various writers ; edited by William Smith. Source: Wellcome Collection.
61/1140 (page 39)
![these cantons was called a nome (ySfias) by the Greeks, praefectura oppidorum by the Komans. Each had its civil governor, the Nomarch (yo^ap- . ^os), who collected the crown revenues, and presided in the local capital and chief comrt of justice. Each nome, too, had its separate priesthood, its temple, chief and inferior towns, its magistrates, registration and peculiar creed, ceremonies, and customs, and each was apparently independent of every other nome. At certain seasons delegates from the various cantons met in the palacfe of the Labyrinth for con- sultation on public afiairs (Strab. p. 811). Accord- ing to Diodorus (i. 54), the nomes date from Sesostiis. But they did not originate with that mon- arch, but emanated probably from the distinctions of animal worship; and the extent of the local worship probably determined the boundary of the nome. Thus in the nome of Thebais, where the ram- headed deity was worshipped, the sheep was sacred, the goat was eaten and sacrificed: in that of Mendes, where the goat was worshipped, the sheep was a victim and an ai-ticle of food. Again, in the nome of Ombos, divine honours were paid to the croco- dile; in that of Tentyra, it was hunted and abomi- nated; and between Ombos and Tentyra there existed an internecine feud. (Juv. Sat. xv.) The extent and number of the nomes cannot be ascer- tained. They probably varied with the political state of Egypt. Under a dynasty of conquerors, they would extend eastward and westward to the Ked Sea and Libyan deserts: under the Hyksos, the Aethiopian conquest, and the times of anarchy subse- quent to the Persian invasion, they would shrink within the Nile-valley. The kingdoms of Sais and Xois and the foundation of Alexandria probably multiplied the Deltaic cantons: and generally, com- merce, or the residence of the military caste, would attract the nomes to Lower Egypt. According to Strabo (pp. 787, 811), the Labyrinth, or hall of the Nomarchs, contained 27 chambers, and thus, at one period, the nomes must have been 27 in number, 10 in the Thebaid, 10 in the Delta, and 7, as its name implies, in the Heptanomis. But the Heptanomis, at another period, contained 16 nomes, and the sum of these cantons is variously given. From the dodecarchy or government of 12 Idngs, and from Herodotus’ assertion (ii. 148) that there were only 12 halls in the Labyrinth, we are disposed to mfer, that at one time there were only 12 of these cantons, and that there were always 12 larger or preponderating nomes. According to the lists given by Pliny (v. 9. § 9) and Ptolemy, there must have been at least 45 nomes; but each of these writers gives several names not found in the other, and if we should add the variations of the one list to the other, the sum would be much greater. There was, under the Macedonian kings, a sub- division of the nomes into toparchies, which was probably an arrangement to meet the fiscal system of the Greeks. (Herod, ii. 164; Diod. i. 54; Strab. x\ni; Cyrill. Alex, ad Isaiam, xix. 2; Epiphan Haeres. 24. § 7.) The following list of the principal Nomes will illustrate the variety of these territorial subdivisions as regards religious worship. A. Nomes of the Delta. The most im- portant were: — 1. The Menelaite; chief town Canobus, wdth a celebrated temple and oracle of Serapis (Strab. p. 801; Pint. Is. Osir. c 27.) 2. The Andropolite; chief town Andj-opolis. 3. The Sebennytic; capital Pachnamunis (Ptol.), worshipped Latona. 4. The Chemmite (Herod, ii. 165); capital Buto. Its deity was also called Buto, whom the Greeks identified with Leto. Ptolemy calls this canton 4»0evdT7js, and Pliny (v. 9) Ptenetha. 5. The Onuphite; chief town Onuphis. (Herod, ii. 166.) 6. The Phthemphuthite; capital Tava. (4>dejU- (povQ\ vo/xds, Ptol.; Phthempha, Plin. v. 9.) 7. The Saite; chief city Sais, worshipped Neith or Athene, and contained a tomb and a sanctuary of Osiris. (Herod, ii. 170; Strab. p. 802.) Under the dynasty of the Saitic Kings this was the principal of the Deltaic cantons. 8. TheBusirite; capital Busiris, worshipped Isis, and at one epoch, according to Hellenic tradition at least, sacrificed the red-coloured men who came over the sea, i. e. the nomades of Syria and Arabia (Herod, i. 59, 33, 165; Strab. p. 802; Pint, de Is^ et Os. p. 30.) 9. The Thmuite; chief town Thmuis (Herod, ii. 168), afterwards incorporated with the following: 10. The Mendesian; capital Mendes (Herod, ii. 42, 46; Diod. i. 84), worshipped the goat Mendes, or the horned Pan. 11. The Tanite; chief towm Tanis. (Herod, ii. 166; Strab. p. 802.) In this nome tradition afiSrmed that the Hebrew legislator w'as bom and educated. 12. The Bubastite; capital Bubastus, contained a noble temple of Bubastis or Artemis. (Herod, ii. 59, 67, 137.) 13. The Athribite; capital Athribis, where the shrewmouse and crocodile were held in reverence. 14. The Heliopolite, west of the Delta, and sacred to the sun, from whom its capital Heliopolis (On) derived its name. (Herod, ii. 9; Diod. v. 56; Joseph. Ant. ii. 3.) 15. The Heroopolite; chief town Heroopolis, a principal seat of the worship of Typhon, the evil or destroying genius. Besides these the Delta contained other less im- portant nomes, — the Nitriote, w’^here the Natron Lakes, Nitrariae (Plin. v. 9) were situated; the Letopolite (Strab. p. 807); the Prosopite; the Leon-* topolite; the Mentelite; the Pharbaethite; and the Sethraite. B. Nomes of the Heptanomis. The most important w’ere :— 1. The Memphite, whose chief city Memphis w^as the capital of Egypt, and the residence of the Pha- raohs, who succeeded Psammetichus b. c. 616. The Memphite Nome rose into importance on the decline of the kingdom of Thebais, and was itself in turn eclipsed by the Hellenic kingdom of Alexandria. [Memphis.] 2. The Aphroditopolite; chief town Aphrodito- polis, was defeated to Athor or Aphrodite. 3. The Arsinoite, the Fayoom, celebrated for its worship of the crocodile, from which its capital Crocodilopolis, afterwards Arsinoe, derived its name. [Arsinoe.] The Labyrinth and the Lake of Moeris were in this canton. 4. The Heracleote, in which the ichneumon was worshipped. Its principal town was Heracleopolis Magna. 5. The Heraiopolite, the border nome between Middle and Upper Egypt. This was at a very early period a flourishing canton. Its chief city Hermopolis stood near the frontiers of the Heptii-](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b24872441_0001_0061.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
