Before Chrift 607, 35 



dnd thus he put his kingdom in a fair way of being the center of the 

 trade of the world, if he could have fubdued the hatred of his fubjecls 

 to the fea. Having fuppofed the probability of Africa benig furround- 

 ed by the fea, excepting the ifthmus whereby it is joined to Afia, he 

 projeded a voyage of difcovery to afcertain the trurh, and to explore 

 the coafts of that continent. For fuch an arduous naval undertaking 

 he engaged Phoenician navigators, who failed from the Red fea, and 

 coafting along the fliore of Africa, returned by the Mediterranean, and 

 in the third year from their departure arrived in the Nile. During this 

 voyage, when the proper feafon for fowing came on, they made a tem- 

 porary fettlement on the land, and fowed their corn. Then, after re- 

 pairing their fhips, and getting in their harveft, they proceeded on their 

 voyage. This circumftance fliows, that, though Egypt has in all ages 

 been one of the fineft corn countries in the world, neither the Egyp- 

 tians nor the Phoenicians underftood tlie method of preferving corn at 

 fea, or of preparing bread for long keeping. Another mofl important 

 circumftance is related by Herodotus, to whom we are indebted for the 

 knowlege of this voyage. He fays, that the feamen reported, they had 

 feen the fun on their right hand, that is on the north fide of them, 

 when they were in the fouth parts of Africa. This, he very honeflly 

 tells us, he does not believe : and fome lucceeding writers, on the 

 ftrength of his incredulity, which betrays the ignorance of one of the 

 moft knowing of the Greeks, have confidered the voyage as entirely 

 fabulous. But the very circumftance, urged againft the veracity of the 

 voyage, eftabliHies it beyond the poflibility of contradiction : for it may 

 well be doubted, whether even the Phoenicians were then fufficiently 

 acquainted with the fyftem of the univerfe to know from theory the 

 poliibility of going to the fouthward of the fun, or to be able to in- 

 vent fuch a ftory, had it not been true *. \Herodot. L. ii, c. 159 ; L. iv, 

 c. 42] And this was unqueftionably the very firft circumnavigation of 

 Africa recorded in hiftory, and the only well-authenticated one, till 

 Gama, above 2,000 years after, again afcertained, that Africa is not 

 joined to a fuppofed fouthern continent. 



The brief narrative of this voyage leads to a conjedure, which may 

 almofl be received as a certain truth ; that the trade between Arabia 

 and Egypt was ftill carried on by caravans only, and that the Egyptians 

 liad no maritime intercourfe, either adive or paflive, with the Arabians. 

 If they had had any fuch intercourfe, they could not have been en- 

 tirely ignorant of their nautical fcience and voyages, and Necos would 



• As the truth of tliia voyage has been called gins with the reign of Pfammitichus. See Hero- 

 in qncftion in antient and modotn times, it may be d'.t. L. u, c. 154. Some err as far on the other 

 proper to obferve, that, befijes the impofTibility fide, and fuppofe that Solomon's velTels were ia 

 of its being fabricated, it was performed in the the practice of circumnavigating Africa, and that 

 dear period of the Egyptian hiltory, which be- it evea became a common voyage. 



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