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.
90/1140 (page 68)
![rocco and Algier, and was an equally important frontier in ancient times. The next point of refer-. ence is a headland at about 4° E. long., the site of the ancient city of Saldae. E. of this, again, some- AVhat beyond 6° E. long., is another fi’ontier river, the Ajmpsaga (Wady el Kebir): further on, near 8° E. long., another river, the Rubricatus (^Wady Seibous), at the mouth of which stood Hippo Re- gius (^Bonah); and, about 1° further E., the river 1'uscA (^Wady-ez-Zain). The last great river of this coast, W. of the great turning point (C. Bon), is the Bagradas (3fajerdah), falling into the sea just below C. Farina, the W. headland (as C. Bon is the eastern) of the great Gulf of Tunis, near the centre of which a rocky promontory marks the site of Carthage. Lastly, let us note the bottom of the great gulf called the Lesser Syrtis, at the S. ex- tremity of the E. coast already noticed, with the neighbouring great salt-lake of Al-Sibicah, the an- cient Pains Tritonis, between 33° and 34° N. lat.; N. and NW. of which the country is for the most part desert, as far as the SE. slopes of the Atlas cliain. The country immediately around the, lake itself forms the E.-most of a series of oases, which stretch from E. to W. along the S. foot of the Atlas chain, and along the N. margin of the SahSra, and thus mark out a natural S. frontier for this portion of N. Africa. In the earliest times recorded, the whole N. coast of the continent W. of Egypt was peopled by various tribes of the great Libyan race, who must be care- fully distinguished from the Ethiopian or negro races of the inteiior. S. of the Libyan tribes, and on the N. limits of the Sahara, dwelt the Gaetuli and Garamantes, and S. of these, beyond the desert, the proper Ethiopians or negroes. The Libyans were of the Caucasian family of mankind, and for the most part of nomade habits. At periods so early as to be still mythical to the Gi'eeTcs, colonists from the W. coiists of Asia settled on the shores of Africa, and especially on the part now treated of. Sallust hits preserved a curious tradition respecting the ear- liest Asiatic colonists, to which a bare reference is enough (Jugurth, 18). The chief colonies were those of the Phoenicians, such as Hippo Zarytus, Utica, Tunes, Hadrumetuji, Leftis, and above all, though one of the latest, Carthago. In these settlements, the Phoenicians estabhshed themselves as traders rather than conquerors; and they do not seem to have troubled themselves about bringing the native peoples into subjection, except so far as was needful for their own security. Carthage, which was built on the most commanding position on the whole coast, gradually surpassed all the other Phoe- nician colonies, and brought them, as allies, if not as subjects, to acknowledge her supremacy. She also founded colonies of her own along the whole coast, from the Straits to the bottom of the Great Syrtis. The question of the extent and character of the Car- thaginian dominion belongs to another article [Car- thago] ; but it is necessary here to advert briefly to its condition when the Romans first became ac- quainted with the country. At that time the proper territory of Carthage was confined within very naiTow limits around the city itself. The sea-coast W. and S. of C. Bon, as far as the river Rubricatus and Hippo Regius on the W. and a point K. of Hadru- metum (about 36° N. lat.) on the S., and the parts inland along the river Bagradas, and between it and the sea, appear to have formed the original territory of Carthage, coiTesponding nearly to the region after- wards known as Zeuqitana, but reaching fiirthei along the VV. coast, and not so far inland on the SW. This, or even ’ess, was the extent of country at first included by the Romans under the name of Africa, and to this very day it bears the same name, Frikiah or Afrikeah. It is remarkable that, neither in the wars of Agathocles nor of the Romans with Carthage in Africa, does any mention occur of mihtary opera- tions out of this limited district. But still, before the wars with Rome, the territory of Carthage had received some accession. On the E. coast, S. of 36° N. lat., flourishing maritime cities had been established, some — as Leptis and Hadrumetum — even before Carthage, and some by the Cartha- ginians. These cities were backed by a fertile but narrow plain, bounded on the W. by a range of mountains, which formed the original Byzacium, a district, according to Pliny, 250 Roman miles in circuit, and extending S.-wards as far as Thenae, opposite the island of Cercina (in about 34° 30' N. lat.), where the Lesser Syrtis was considered to be- gin. This district had been added to the possessions of the Carthaginians, and Polybius (iii. 23) speaks of their anxiety to conceal it from the knowledge of the Romans, as well as their commercial settlements further along the coast, called Emporia. This word, Emporia, though afterwards used as the name of a district, denoted at first, according to its proper meaning, settlements established for the sake of com- merce ; and it appears to have included all the Phoe- nician and Carthaginian colonies along the whole coast from the N. extremity of the Lesser Syrtis to the bottom of the Greater Syrtis. Any possession of the E. part of this region, in a strictly tenitorial sense, w'ould have been worthless from the nature of the countiy, but the towns were maintained as cen- tres of commerce with the inland tribes, and as an additional security, besides the desert, against any danger from the Greek states of Cyrenaica. Such was the general position of the Cartha- ginian dominion in Africa at the time of the Punic Wars; extending over their own immediate territory to about 80 miles S. of the capital, and along the E. coast of Tunis and isolated points on the W. part of the coast of Tripoli. The whole inner district in the central and SW. parts of the later province of Africa was in the possession of the Libyan tribes, whose services as mercenaries Carthage could obtain in war, but whom she never even attempted to sub- due. These tribes are spoken of by Greek and Latin writers under a general name which describes their mode of life as wandering herdrnen, No^dSes, or, in the Latin form, Numidae. They possessed the country along the N., coast as far W. as the Straits; but those of them that were settled to the ■ W. of the river Mulucha were called by another I name, Mavpoi, perhaps from a greater darkness of, complexion, and, after them, the Romans called theii country W. of the Mulucha Mauretania; while.^ that E. of the Mulucha, to the W. frontier of Car-iJ thage, and also SW. and S. of the Carthaginian | possessions as far as the region of the Syrtes, was] included under the general designation of Numidia. < In this region, at the time of the Second Punic War, two tribes were far more powerful than all the rest, namely, in the W.and larger portion, between the rivers Mulueha and Ampsaga, the Massaesylii, occupying the greater part of the modem Algier; and E. of them, from the river Ampsaga and round the whole inland frontier of Carthage, the Massyiai, the residence of whose chieftain, called by the Romans](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b24872441_0001_0090.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
