A

SHORT SYSTEM

OF

CLASSICAL GEOGRAPHY.

PART I.

INTRODUCTION.

T

SECTΙΟΝ Ι.

The Antiquity of GEOGRAPHY.

HE study of Geography appears to have been diligently cultivated in the earlier ages of the world. The ancient Egyptian priests, the Babylonians and Chaldeans, not only taught it, but tranfmitted it to posterity, wrapped up in hieroglyphics, symbols, enigmas, and fables.

Homer is supposed to have first introduced this science into Greece *. In his poems he has given us an exact description of that country, mentioned particularly its cities, mountains, and plains, and traced out the courses of its rivers, with Asia Minor, and the nations bordering on the Hellespont.

• Strabo.

B

The

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The first among the ancient Philosophers who attempted to delineate the earth in the form of a map, was Anaximander *, the successor of Thales, the celebrated founder of the Ionic School: and Socrates is said to have shewn to his scholar Alcibiades, a chart or map, on which was drawn the earth, divided into land and water. Varro tells us, that the Romans had hung up in the temples of Tellus, tables or maps of the earth.

This is a fufficient proof of the great industry of the Ancients, in cultivating this most useful science; without which the intercourse of nations with each other, and the various revolutions in states by wars, conquests, and migrations, would be obfcure and unintelligible.

- SECTION II.
The Figure of the EARTH.

WILD and extravagant were the notions the
Ancients had with regard to the Figure of the

earth.

Those of the earliest times supposed it to be one large extensive plane; the Heavens above it, in which the fun, moon, and stars appeared to move daily from east to west, they conceived to be at no great distance from it; and Hell as spread out at an equal depth all under the furface of itt: others, as absurdly, taught that it was concave; some, again, that it was oblong, or a parallelogram; and others, that it was quadrangular.

The form of a semi-circle we find ascribed to it by Crates; and that of a round table by Hipparchus.

* Γῆς καὶ θαλάσσης περιμεῖρού πρωλος εγραψεν. Diog. Laertius. + Hence they had passages that were supposed to lead directly to Hell, in every country; as the lakes of Avernus and Amsanctus for Italy. " It is indifferent to me (says Anaxagoras) where you bury me, for my journey to the other world will be just the fame."

The form of a fling was given to it by Posidonius; and Leucippus resembled it to a drum.

Such were the idle dreams of the old philosophers; which were in time confuted by the assistance of mathematical learning, and the experience of travellers, navigators, and astronomers; by which the spherical figure of the earth has invincibly been demonftrated *.

SECTION III.

The Peopling and Division of the EARTH.

THE earth was once in a confufed and defolate state; but by divine Providence, in the space of fix days, reduced into an habitable world: cloathed with trees, shrubs, plants, and flowers, and stocked with various kinds of animals.

Sixteen hundred and fifty-fix years after the earth was made and inhabited, it was overflowed and destroyed by a deluge of water; so that a general destruction and devastation was brought upon the earth and all things in it, mankind, and every living animal; excepting Noah and his family, who, by a fpecial care of God, were preserved in a certain ark or vessel, with such kinds of living creatures as he took in with him.

After these waters had raged for some time on the earth, they began to leffen and shrink; they retired by degrees into their proper channels and caverns within the earth; and the mountains and fields began to appear, and the whole habitable earth in that form and shape we now fee it.

Thus perished the old world, and the present arofe from the ruins and remains of it!

Noah, when he came forth of the ark, fettled in Mefopotamia, and before his death, divided the world among his three fons, giving to Shem, Afia; to Ham, Africa; and to Japhet, Europe.

* See this explained and delineated in Turner's Modern Geo

graphy, p. 2.

The defcendants of Shem settled from Media westward to the sea-coast of Aram or Syria. His fons were Elam, Ashur, Arphaxad, Lud, and Aram. I. ELAM possessed the country now called Persia. From him it had the names of Elyme and Elymais.

II. ASHUR fettled on the west or north-west of Elam in Affyria, called likewife after him Ashur, at present Cardestan.

III. ARPHAXAD peopled Chaldea.

IV. LUD is fuppofed to have wandered as far as Lydia.

V. ARAM and his descendants inhabited Armenia, Mesopotamia, and Syria. From his son Uz, a tract about Damascus, the Stony and Defert Arabia, was called the Land of Uz.

The second son of Noah, HAM, removed into Egypt, which, in Scripture, is often called the Land of Ham. The fons of Ham were CusH, MIZRAIM, CANAAN, and PHUT.

I. CUSH, his eldest son, possessed Arabia. II. MIZRAIM and his defcendants inhabited Ethiopia, Lybia, Egypt, and the neighbouring countries.

III. CANAAN and his posterity fettled in Phænicia, and the Land of Canaan, lying on the east and foutheast of the Mediterranean sea. This was the land afterwards promised to Abraham, which he and his posterity accordingly enjoyed, and was then the Land of Ifrael and Judah.

IV. PHUT, the youngest fon of Ham, planted himself in the western parts of Africa, on the Mediterranean, in the country of Mauritania, whence this country was called the Region of Phut, in St. Jerome's time.

The Scripture leaves us very much in the dark, as to the country where Japhet, the eldest son of Noah, fettled. All we can collect upon this occasion is, that he retired with his descendants to the north of the countries planted by the children of

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Shem.

Shem. His sons were GOMER, MAGOG, MADAI, JAVAN, TUBAL, MESHECH, and TIRAS.

I. GOMER, the eldest son of Japhet, was the father of the Gomerites, called by the Greeks, Galatians; who were the Gauls of Afia Minor, inhabiting part of Phrygia.

The families of Gomer soon grew very numerous, and sent divers colonies into several parts of Europe. They first settled at the lake Maotis, and so gave the name of Bosphorus Cimmerius to the streight between it and the Euxine sea. These, in time, spreading by new colonies, along the Danube, settled in the country called from thence Germany, whose ancient inhabitants were the Cimbri, so called of the Cimmerians. From Germany, they afterwards spread themselves into Gaul, where they were originally called Gomerites, then by the Greeks Galata, and at last Gauls.

From the colonies of Gaul or Germany, came the first inhabitants of this our isle of GREAT BRITAIN.

II. MAGOG, the second son of Japhet, was the father of the Scythians; from whose descendants, migrating over Caucasus, it is supposed the Russians and Moscovites sprung.

III. MADAI, it is generally agreed, planted Media, and the Medes are called by his name in Scripture.

IV. JAVAN settled in the south-west part of Afia Minor, about Ionia. He had four children, ELISHA, TARSHISH, KITTIM, and DODANIM.

1. ELISHA peopled the most considerable isles between Europe and Asia; for they are called in Scripture the Ifles of Elisha; and the sea itself might be called Hellespont, as if it were Elishpont, or fea of Elisha.

The defcendants of Elisha passing over into Europe, were called Hellenes, and their country Hellas, and afterwards Greece.

2. TARSHISH gave name to Tarsus, and all Cilicia, of which it was the capital. It seems also to have been the Tarshish to which Jonas thought to flee from the prefence of the Lord.

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3. KITTIM