The voyage of Nearchus from the Indus to the Euphrates, collected from the original journal preserved by Arrian, and illustrated by authorities ancient and modern ... / By William Vincent, D.D. To which are added three dissertations: two, on the acronychal rising of the Pleiades, by Dr. Samuel Horsley and by Mr. William Wales and one by Mr. de la Rochette, on the first meridian of Ptolemy.

  • Vincent, William, 1739-1815.
Date:
1797
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The voyage of Nearchus from the Indus to the Euphrates, collected from the original journal preserved by Arrian, and illustrated by authorities ancient and modern ... / By William Vincent, D.D. To which are added three dissertations: two, on the acronychal rising of the Pleiades, by Dr. Samuel Horsley and by Mr. William Wales and one by Mr. de la Rochette, on the first meridian of Ptolemy. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    cane and filk ^“5 are ail exprefsly mentioned in a paflfage which he adduces from Nearchus ; and however the Greeks or Romans be- came afterwards acquainted with thefe commodities, the firft know- ledge, or at leaft the firft hiftorical account of them, is certainly to be attributed to the Macedonians. None of thefe articles had ever been brought into Greece, or any part of Europe, by fea, and few of them ha.d ever been feen unlefs by accident ; on thefe, however it is evident, Axlexander depended for the foundation of the com- merce he meditated, and for the introdudlion of thefe he was now planning the communication which was to perpetuate the inter- courfe between Europe and the Eaft Indies. At this day, when we view the caufe, we may deem lightly of a Sugar. os TtSf'l ZC^hoif^OJV OTl 'TTOik^Cri fJLt'hi,, OJV [AYi Qvcroo'i, This''afTertion, Strabo (691) quotes exprcfsly from Nearchus. He fpeaks aiio of canes from which honey is made, though without bees. 1 do not know that Saccharum is ufed by any author prior to Pliny and Diofcorides, lib. xxii. 8. Saccha- I'um et Arabia fert, fed laudatius India. See Salmalius Plin. Ex. vol. ii. et feq. who has a long differtatiou upon the fubjecl, and imagines Pliny’s Saccharum, as well as that of Diofco- rides, to be manna; yet feems to diflinguifli the KuXafAoq of Nearchus as the true fugar- cane. Sacar appears to be a word of Arabick extradlion. Silk. The palTage in Strabo is not ex- prefs ; but having mentioned cotton before* he adds, roiavra, rcc bh. riva:v (phoictjv ^ocivofABvr,^ ^vjaa, Velleraque ut foliis depedant tenuia Seres, Virg. The Critical Reviewers, Odober 1791, p*. 126, interpret this of cotton, as does Sal- mafius, p. 298. and p. 998 ; they call the Seres, inhabitants of Bocharia, and Sir-hend, Sermda on the Indus, the flaple for filk. effedls, without adverting to the voyage which required fo much When in Sogdiana, Alexander was in the neighbourhood of Bocharia; but the men- tion of by Strabo is incidental to India; and if it were not for a pail’age in Arrian, which feems to relate to the lame quotation from Nearchus, I (hould not hefjtate to refer this exprelTion of Strabo’s to filk. Arrian fays, k-U^CiTTBp XByEi Xim T« a,7ro tccv &C. &C. Indio. I have fince learnt, that the Reviewers follow the authority of d’Anville EciairciT. ; but that great geographer’s error is, confulting fimilarity of found in names too much. When the locality is eflabliihed, refemblance of found is a ffrong confirmation, but to fix locality by found is beginning at the wrong end. I can- not help thinking, however, that the mention of Seres and Ssrica in allufion to cotton is always error orconfufion ; for we rnufl obferve, that filk, when it came to be known and cha- raderifed, was always Serica; while the knowledge of cotton or vegetable wool is as old as Herodotus at leaf!:, in Greece. The filk-worm is firft defcribed by Paufanias Eliac, fub fine. Gibbon, vol. iv. p. 72, from d’An- ville Eclair. Chambers’s Didionary, &c, ' preparation