Public-domain ebook
by Strabo
Language: en4,186 downloads on Project Gutenberg
Subjects
In: Travel Writing·History - Ancient
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #44886.
The Geography of Strabo, Volume 3 presents the final third of the ancient Greek geographer’s monumental work, rendered in a literal English translation and supplemented with scholarly notes. The volume opens with a transcriber’s note explaining that city names have been standardized for consistency, followed by a detailed preface that situates Strabo’s life in the Augustan era, outlines his extensive travels, and describes his methodological blend of personal observation and reliance on earlier sources. The introduction also clarifies the book’s purpose, providing essential geographical and historical information for officials, while noting the author’s Stoic background, his admiration for Homer, and his cautious treatment of mythic accounts such as Atlantis.
Strabo’s prose, mediated through the careful translation of H. C. Hamilton and W. Falconer, retains the straightforward, unadorned style of the original Greek, punctuated by occasional scholarly commentary on textual corruptions and measurement units. Readers who relish classical scholarship, ancient cartography, or the intellectual climate of the early Roman Empire will find this volume rewarding, especially those interested in how a learned traveler of the first century BC synthesized geography, history, and philosophy for a bureaucratic audience.
The opening · free to read
2. No. 1393 of the catalogue. On this codex Brequigny chiefly depended for his edition. Montfaucon says that it is of the 12th or 13th century; Kramer, however, judging from the character of the handwriting and contractions, maintains that it belongs to the end of the 13th or beginning of the 14th century. It contains the whole seventeen books of the Geography, and was written in the East (not, however, by the same hand throughout), and brought from Constantinople to Paris by the Abbé Servin in 1732, to whom it had been presented by a Greek named Maurocordato. Collated by Villebrune for Falconer, and partly by Kramer.
3. No. 1408 contains the seventeen books, and appears to have been written towards the end of the 15th century. In general, the geography of Strabo is divided by transcribers into two parts, the first containing nine books, the second, the last eight; but in this codex there is a blank leaf inserted between the 10th and 11th books, from which it would appear that there was also another division of the work, separating the subjects, Europe and Asia. Partly collated by Villebrune for Falconer.
4. No. 1394. This contains the seventeen books, and is very beautifully written, and illuminated with arabesque designs. It was made by the order of Lorenzo the Magnificent; and its date, therefore, is after the middle of the 15th century. Collated, as before, by Villebrune.
5. No. 1396 contains the whole seventeen books, and was probably written about the end of the 15th or the beginning of the 16th century. The division of the work is into ten books and seven books. In the beginning, it is stated to be “the gift of Antony the Eparch to Francis the great and illustrious king of France.” Partly collated by Kramer.
6. No. 1395 contains the whole seventeen books, and served for the Aldine edition of Strabo. The handwriting of this codex is excellent, but the order of the words is arbitrarily changed, and there are frequent omissions, sometimes even of whole lines: it is corrupt beyond description, and among the worst we possess. Collated in some parts by Kramer.
No. 1398, written about the end of the 15th century. It contains the epitome of the first ten books, by Gemistus Pletho, and the last seven books entire. It is a copy of No. 397, in the Library of St. Mark, Venice. Collated by Villebrune.
No. 1329 of the catalogue. This codex dates from the beginning, probably, of the 14th century, and is remarkable for being the work of thirteen different transcribers. It is much to be lamented, that the greater part of it is lost; it begins from the end of the 12th book only, and a part of the last leaf of the 17th book is also destroyed; what remains to us surpasses all others in correctness of the text. The whole has been collated for the first time by Kramer.
No. 174 is of the 15th century, and contains the seventeen books: the first nine books are written by one transcriber, the last eight by another hand. The first nine books have been collated by Kramer.
No. 173 contains the first ten books, and is of the middle of the 15th century. It is badly and incorrectly written. The last seven books, which would complete the codex, are, as Kramer conjectures from the paper and handwriting, in the Library of the Grand Duchy of Parma. From a note in Greek at the end of the 10th book, it appears to have been brought to Rome A. D. 1466. Books 1, 2, 4, and 5, collated by Kramer.
No. 81 is tolerably well and correctly written. It contains the last eight books, and is of the end of the 15th century. It appears to be a copy of, or served as a copy to, the codex in the Laurentian Library, No. 19. Partially collated by Kramer.
Medicean Codices, in the Laurentian Library, Florence:
Codex 5 is elegantly and correctly written; it is of the beginning, probably, of the 15th century, and contains the first ten books. The 8th and 9th books are not entire; passages are curtailed, and much is omitted, to which the attention is not drawn, the lines being run on without spaces left to mark omissions. Errors of the first transcriber are corrected by a later hand, and noticed in the margin or between the lines. Collated by Bandini for Falconer, and almost the whole by Kramer.
Codex 40 contains the first ten books; a copy, probably, of the former. It was written after the middle of the 15th century.
Codex 15 is of the middle of the 15th century, and contains the last seven books. It is not in any way remarkable.
Codex 19, written at the end of the 15th century. It contains the last eight books, and resembles No. 81 of the Vatican. Collated by Bandini for Falconer.
No. 377 of the catalogue contains the first twelve books, and is written in the 15th century. Formerly the property of Cardinal Bessarion.
No. 378 contains the seventeen books, of which the first twelve are apparently copies of the above, No. 377; the remaining five are transcribed from some other codex. This was, also, formerly the property of Cardinal Bessarion.
No. 640 contains the last eight books. It was written, as appears from a note A. D. 1321, by different hands. A great part of the 14th book is wanting; eight blank pages are left for the completion of it; but this was not done by the transcriber to whom this portion was assigned. It is placed by Kramer in the first class of manuscripts, and was wholly collated by him.
No. 379 is of the 15th century. It contains the Epitome of Gemistus Pletho of the first ten books, and the whole of the last seven books. It is the codex which served for the copy, No. 1398, in the Imperial Library at Paris. Formerly the property of Cardinal Bessarion.
No. 606 contains the last eight books, and was written towards the end of the 15th century. It contains nothing which is not to be found in other manuscripts.
Codices in the Ambrosian Library, Milan:
Codex M. 53 contains all but book ii., and is of the 15th century. The books are not written on paper of the same size, nor in consecutive order, although by the same hand. Book ii. is to be found in Codex N. 289, together with portions of other authors, written by a different transcriber, no doubt with the intention of completing this codex. According to Kramer, the first ten books are copied from Codex 5 of the Medici MS. The 13th, 14th, 12th books (the order in which they stand) from the Medici MS. 19, and the 11th, 15th, 16th, 17th, from the Medici MS. 15. Partly collated by Kramer.
Codex G. 53 contains the seventeen books, and is of the end of the 15th century. Five leaves at the beginning, and two at the end, are destroyed by damp, traces of which are to be seen throughout. Partly collated by Kramer.
In the Library of Eton College is a codex containing the first ten books; it was written at Constantinople. Kramer, who, however, did not see it, conjectures that the Medici MS., Codex 15, containing the last eight books, was formerly united to it, and completed the whole work. Collated for Falconer.
In the Library of the Escurial is a codex completed, as we are informed by a note at the end, A. D. 1423. Collated by Bayer for Falconer.
The Madrid Library possesses a codex written in the latter part of the 15th century, containing the seventeen books.
In the Library at Moscow is a codex containing the seventeen books; it was written at the end of the 15th or beginning of the 16th century. The first nine books resemble the Paris Codex, No. 1397; the last eight, the Venetian Codex, No. 640. It came from one of the monasteries of Mount Athos, and was not destroyed, as Groskurd suspects, in the great fire of 1812, but is still to be found in the Library of the Holy Synod, under No. 204 (Matt. ccv.), as I am informed by the Archimandrite Sabba, who dates from the Kremlin, April 4th, 1857.
A codex also is yet to be found in one of the monasteries of Mount Athos. From the accounts of learned travellers (Zacharias, Reise in den Orient, and Fallmerayer, in the Allgem. Zeitg. 5 Jun. 1843), it contains nothing which can supply the deficiencies of those MSS. with which we are acquainted.
Besides the above codices, there exist four epitomes of the Geography of Strabo, of which,
1. The Epitome Palatina, in the Heidelberg Library, is the oldest of all MSS. of this work. It is probably of the beginning of the 10th century, although Dodwell places it between 976 and 996. The codex from which it was copied appears to have been perfect, and contained the whole of the 7th book, which is imperfect in all other codices. It is, however, to be regretted that the author did not confine himself to following the text of Strabo; he has not only indulged in curtailing, transposing, and changing the words and sentences of the original, but has sometimes also added expressions of his own.
2. The Vatican Epitome is of more value than the preceding; the extracts are more copious, the author seldom wanders from the text of Strabo, and in no instance inserts language of his own. The codex which served as the basis for the Epitome contained the 7th book entire, and from this and the Palatine Epitome Kramer collected the fragments of the last part of the 7th book, which appear for the first time in his edition (see vol. i. of the Translation, p. 504). This codex was written in the middle of the 14th century, and has suffered much by time and carelessness; several leaves are lost, and lines of the text at the top and bottom of the pages have been cut off in the binding.
3. The Parisian Epitome, on which no great value is placed by Kramer.
4. The Epitome of Gemistus Pletho, referred to above, is of great value, and held in the highest estimation by all editors.
The first appearance of Strabo’s work in print was a Latin translation by Guarini, of Verona, and Gregorio of Tiferno. Of this, thirteen editions were printed, the first in 1469 or 1471, the twelfth in 1559, and the last in 1652. It is not known from what manuscripts the translation was taken, nor whether they now exist; but, though the translation itself is barbarous, and in many passages erroneous, its fidelity to the original is so apparent, that all editors to the present time have consulted it as a manuscript.
The first edition of the Greek text was printed at Venice by Aldus in 1516, and was taken from so corrupt a manuscript that Coraÿ compares it to the Augean stable. The second edition was a repetition of the Aldine, accompanied by the Latin translation of Guarini, and was published by Hopper and Heresbach, at Bâsle, in 1549. The third edition, by Xylander, in 1570, was also a repetition of the text of Aldus; but a new Latin translation accompanied it. The fourth and fifth editions, which do not essentially differ, were published in 1587 and 1620, by Isaac Casaubon. He collated for his edition four manuscripts, which he obtained from his father-in-law, H. Stephens, and was the first to add a commentary; but it is not known what manuscripts were made use of. The edition of Almeloveen, 1707, being a reprint of Casaubon, with notes, and an edition commenced by Brequigny, Paris, 1763, but not continued beyond the first three books, can scarcely be placed among the number of new editions. Brequigny left a French translation in manuscript and notes in Latin, which were consulted by the French translators.
The book keeps going
Reading is free forever. Sign up and watch scenes appear while you read.
Scenes Storieta drew for other classics.
New illustrated classics
Once or twice a month: the latest books to get full character casts, scene art, and free comic editions. No account needed.
