420 pliny's natural history. [Book V. 



miles across, and 150 in circumference, according to Claudius 

 Caesar. Other writers say that it is forty schceni in length, 

 making the schcenum to be thirty stadia ; hence, accord- 

 ino" to them, it is 150 miles ^ in lensrth and the same in 

 breadth. 



There are also, in the latter part of the course of the Nile, 

 many towns of considerable celebrity, and more especially 

 those which have given their names to the mouths of the 

 piver — I do not mean, all the mouths, for there are no less 

 than twelve of them, as well as four others, which the people 

 call the False Mouths'. I allude to the seven more famous 

 ones, the Canopic^ Mouth, next to Alexandria, those of Bol- 

 bitine'', Sebennys^ Phatnis^ Mendes'', Tanis^, and, last of all, 

 Pelusium^ Besides the above there are the towns of Butos^'^, 



1 Its real dimensions were something less than 300 stadia, or thirty 

 geogi'aphical miles long, and rather more than 150 stadia wide. 



2 Or " Pseudostomata." These were crossed in small boats, as they 

 were not navigable for ships of burden. 



3 In the Pharaonic times Canopus was the capital of the nome of 

 Menelaites, and the principal harbour of the Delta. It probably owed 

 its name to the god Canobus, a pitcher full of holes, with a human head, 

 which was worshipped here with pecuHar pomp. It was remarkable for 

 the number of its festivals and the general dissoluteness of its morals. 

 Traces of its ruins are to be seen about tln-ee miles from the modem 

 Aboukir. 



* Corresponding to the modern Easchid or Eosetta. It is supposed 

 that tliis place was noted for its manufactory of chariots. 



* The town of Sebennys or Sebennytum, now Samannoud, gave name 

 to one of the nomes, and the Sebennytic Mouth of the Nile. 



6 Or the Pathinetic or BucoUc Mouth, said to be the same as the 

 modern Damietta Mouth. 



' The capital of the Mendesian nome, called by the Arabs Ochmoun. 

 This mouth is now known as the Deibeh Mouth. 



^ Now called Szan or Tzan. The Tanitic Mouth, which is sometimes 

 called the Saitic, is at the present day called Omm-Faredje. 



9 Its ruins are to be seen at the modern Tineh. This city in early 

 times had the name of Abaris. It was situate on the eastern side of the 

 most easterly mouth of the Nile, which, after it, was called the Pelusiac 

 Mouth, about two miles from the sea, in the midst of morasses. Bemg 

 the frontier city towards Syria and Arabia it was strongly fortified. It 

 was the birth-place of Ptolemy the geographer. 



^0 Butos or Buto stood on the Sebennytic arm of the Nile near its 

 mouth, on the southern shores of the Butic Lake. It was the chief seat 

 of the worship of the goddess Buto, whom the Greeks identified with 

 Leto or Latona. The modern Xem Kasir occupies its site. 



