Volume 1

Opus majus / edited, with introduction and analytical table by John Henry Bridges.

  • Roger Bacon
Date:
1897-1900]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Opus majus / edited, with introduction and analytical table by John Henry Bridges. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by Royal College of Physicians, London. The original may be consulted at Royal College of Physicians, London.

    519/608 (page 319)
    vulgatus est, satis conveniens est aliquid notabile recitari de eo. Oritur autem de paradiso, ut scriptura refert, sed ubi erumpat nostrum habitabile, aestimatur diversimode a diversis. Verisimile tamen est quod in littore incipientis maris rubri in Aethiopia oritur, secundum quod affirmat Orosius in libro de Ormesta Mundi ad beatum Augustinum, et Seneca tertio Naturalium1 satis concordat. Nam refert Neronem impera- torem misisse duos centuriones ad explorandum Nili ortum, et cum venirent ad primum regem Aethiopum fuerunt per eum instructi et adjuti, ut reges caeteri Aethiopiae darent eis conductum. Et tandem venerunt ad paludes vadosas et her- bosas, quarum magnitudo ignorabatur ab incolis: de qua etiam certificanda desperabant. Nam neque navigio propter aquae parvitatem potuerunt homines explorare; nec humus limosa potuit pondus hominis sustinere. Credebant igitur incolae ibi esse caput Nili: Et ideo quod Plinius dicit Nilum oriri in finibus occidentis juxta montem Atlantem non procul a mari, non est credendum. Duplex enim testimonium fortius est hic quam singulari, et experientia Neronis principis mul- tum operatur. Deinde fluvius Africanus tendit in regionem, quae Libya Aegyptia dicitur, ad immensum lacum2, quo finitur, sicut dicit Orosius. Et ad hoc est quod paradisus est in oriente. Et ideo verisimilius est quod Nilus erumpat in oriente quam in occidente; nec est unus et idem fluvius Africae et Nilus, licet 1 This reference is to Nat. Quacst. vi. 8. The marshes are in all probability those found by modern explorers on the White Nile above its junction with the Sobat in 90 N. Ptolemy describes this river as formed 2° south of the equator, by the junction of two rivers flowing from two lakes still further south. He describes also the Astapus, answering to the Blue Nile, which joined the main stream 40 30' south of Meroe and originated in Lake Coloe, now known as the lake Tzana in Abyssinia. [Bunbury, vol. ii. pp. 612 -13.] The views of Aristotle as to the inundations of the Nile, which had been carefully studied by Bacon, though with his usual independence, will be found in Frag. 212 and 213. In De Animalibus, lib. viii. cap. 12, he speaks of the marshes of the Upper Nile ; and in Meteorol. i. cap. 13 he alludes to its origin in the Silver Mountain. The passage in Post. Analyt. ii. cap. 13, as to the lessen- ing of the flow at the end of the month, does not seem to represent any real opinion held by him. 2 There was great confusion in antiquity, and throughout the middle ages, as to the connexion of the Nile with other African rivers; nor, indeed, was it A river in Africa flows into a vast lake with which the Nile may be connected.