a distance of 555 miles; Agrippa, however, increases the length by sixty miles. The distance thence to Macron Tichos, or the Long Wall, previously mentioned, is 150 miles; and, from it to the extremity of the Chersonesus, 126.
On leaving the Bosporus we come to the Gulf of Casthenes[1], and two harbours, the one called the Old Men's Haven, and the other the Women's Haven. Next comes the promontory of Chrysoceras[2], upon which is the town of Byzantium[3], a free state, formerly called Lygos, distant from Dyrrhachium 711 miles, — so great being the space of land that intervenes between the Adriatic Sea and the Propontis. We next come to the rivers Bathynias and Pydaras[4], or Athyras, and the towns of Selymbria[5] and Perinthus[6], which join the mainland by a neck only 200 feet in width. In the interior are Bizya[7], a citadel of the kings of Thrace, and hated by the swallows, in consequence of the sacrilegious crime of Tereus[8]; the district called Cænica[9], and the colony of Flaviopolis, where formerly stood a town called Cæla. Then, at a distance of fifty miles from Bizya, we come to the colony of Apros, distant from Philippi 180 miles. Upon the coast is the river Erginus[10]; here formerly stood the town of Ganos[11]; and Lysimachia[12] in the Chersonesus is being now gradually deserted.
At this spot there is another isthmus[13], similar in name to the other[14], and of about equal width; and, in a manner
- ↑ Between Galata and Fanar, according to Brotier.
- ↑ Or Golden Horn; still known by that name.
- ↑ The site of the present Constantinople.
- ↑ These rivers do not appear to have been identified.
- ↑ The present Silivri occupies its site.
- ↑ An important town of Thrace. Eski Erekli stands on its site.
- ↑ Now Vizia, or Viza.
- ↑ He alludes to the poetical story of Tereus, king of Thrace, Progne, and Philomela. Aldrovandus suggests that the real cause of the absence of the swallow is the great prevalence here of northern winds, to which they have an aversion.
- ↑ So called probably from the Thracian tribe of the Cænici, or Cæni.
- ↑ Now called Erkene, a tributary of the Hebrus.
- ↑ All that is known of it is, that it is mentioned as a fortress on the Propontis.
- ↑ Hexamila now occupies its site.
- ↑ The isthmus or neck of the Peninsula of Gallipoli, or the Dardanelles.
- ↑ That of Corinth. They are both about five miles wide at the narrowest part.
