Celebrated Travels and Travellers, Part 1.: The Exploration of the WorldVerne, Jules
History
Celebrated Travels and Travellers, Part 1.: The Exploration of the World
Verne, Jules
Discoveries in geography; Explorers; Voyages and travels
It is said that Nearchus became governor of Lysia and Pamphylia, but
in his leisure time he wrote an account of his travels, which has
unfortunately perished, though not before Arian had made a complete
analysis of it in his Historia Indica. It seems probable that
Nearchus fell in the battle of Ipsu, leaving behind him the
reputation of being a very able commander; his voyage may be looked
upon as an event of no small importance in the history of navigation.
We must not omit to mention a most hazardous attempt made in B.C.
146, by Eudoxus of Cyzicus, a geographer living at the court of
Euergetes II, to sail round Africa. He had visited Egypt and the
coast of India, when this far greater project occurred to him, one
which was only accomplished sixteen hundred years later by Vasco da
Gama. Eudoxus fitted out a large vessel and two smaller ones, and
set sail upon the unknown waters of the Atlantic. How far he took
these vessels we do not know, but after having had communication
with some natives, whom he thought were Ethiopians, he returned to
Mauritania. Thence he went to Tiberia, and made preparations for
another attempt to circumnavigate Africa, but whether he ever set
out upon this voyage is not known; in fact some learned men are even
inclined to consider Eudoxus an impostor.
We have still to mention two names of illustrious travellers, living
before the Christian era; those of Caesar and Strabo. Caesar, born
B.C. 100, was pre-eminently a _conqueror_, not an _explorer_, but we
must remember, that in the year B.C. 58, he undertook the conquest
of Gaul, and during the ten years that were occupied in this vast
enterprise, he led his victorious Legions to the shores of Great
Britain, where the inhabitants were of German extraction.
As to Strabo, who was born in Cappadocia B.C. 50, he distinguished
himself more as a geographer than a traveller, but he travelled
through the interior of Asia, and visited Egypt, Greece, and Italy,
living many years in Rome, and dying there in the latter part of the
reign of Tiberius. Strabo wrote a Geography in seventeen Books, of
which the greater part has come down to us, and this work, with that
of Ptolemy, are the two most valuable legacies of ancient to modern
Geographers.
CHAPTER II.
CELEBRATED TRAVELLERS FROM THE FIRST TO THE NINTH CENTURY.
PAUSANIAS, 174; FA-HIAN, 399; COSMOS INDICOPLEUSTES, 500; ARCULPHE,
700; WILLIBALD, 725; SOLEYMAN, 851.
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