100 : The Atlantic 



Ptolemy was the author of the last of the classical geographies and 

 it was his work that was later used and accepted by the Renaissance 

 scholars. Unfortunately, Ptolemy followed Posidonius, giving the 

 earth's circumference as 18,000 miles. This had far-reaching effects 

 on the knowledge and history of the Atlantic Ocean before the great 

 Age of Discovery in the fifteenth century. Before the discovery of 

 America people knew fairly accurately about the size of Europe and 

 the Near East, and roughly about the distances to India and other 

 parts of the Far East. When they subtracted these distances from 

 18,000 miles it gave them a very erroneous figure for the distance they 

 would have to travel sailing westward to arrive at China, Japan or 

 India. No doubt Columbus was following this line of reasoning in 

 establishing his belief that he could quite easily reach the Indies by 

 sailing westward across the Atlantic. 



The Romans consolidated the Mediterranean world and in the 

 process of doing so built serviceable ships both for conducting their 

 wars and also for transporting goods on the Mediterranean. Toward 

 the end of the Roman Empire Rome itself did not raise enough agri- 

 cultural products to supply its large population. Each year great 

 quantities of grain were transported from Egypt and from other col- 

 onies. It is said that the annual imports of grain from Egypt ran to 

 as much as 20,000,000 bushels and a great number of vessels must 

 have been employed in this trade. 



The Romans, however, did not venture on the far-flung ocean voy- 

 ages such as are reported by Pythias' voyage or the voyages in the 

 Indian Ocean connected with Alexander's campaign in India. 



The Romans seem to have made a very limited use of ships along 

 the Atlantic shores of Europe. When Caesar was sweeping north- 

 ward in Europe and was carrying out the campaigns in Gaul, he was 

 marching by land and depending mostly on land transport. When he 

 commenced the invasion of England he assembled a considerable fleet 

 of ships for the short crossing of the English Channel. Some of these 

 he collected from his local enemies and some were built under his 

 directions, just as he did when he required a bridge or a road. He 

 speaks particularly of the ships of the Veneti which seem to have 

 been able craft as far as their sailing ability is concerned. No doubt 

 they were a product of that long history of sailing in northern waters 

 to which we have already alluded. Caesar's vessels were able to con- 

 quer the ships of the Veneti with the methods developed in galley 

 warfare in the Mediterranean, that is by ramming them, by grap- 

 pling, by cutting their rigging and boarding them in hand-to-hand 



