A. D. 353. 209 



Arabia ; and that one of his fea ports, fituated in the diflridt of Adane 

 on the Ocean, was called the Roman emporium *, and another, at the mouth 

 of the Perfian giilf, the Perjian emporium, from the fubjedls of the Roman 

 and Perfian empires trading to them. Among the prefents fent by the 

 Roman emperor to the king of the Homerites there were two hundred 

 horfes of the noblefl: breed of Cappadocia, conveyed in veffels conftru6l- 

 ed for the purpofe f . [Philojiorgii Hijl. cedes. L. iii, c. 4.] 



353 — It was cullomary now (and how long before we know not) to 

 hold an annual fair about the beginning of September at Batnae, a town 

 of Macedonian origin, lying eafl from Antioch, and near the banks of 

 the Euphrates. It was attended by great multitudes, for the purpofe of 

 dealing with the opulent merchants of the place, and others aflembled 

 from all quarters, in goods brought from India and other countries by 

 land and by water %, as we learn from Ammianus Marcellinus, [Z,. xiv] 

 who mentions an attempt of the Perfians to plunder it. 



That diligent and judicious writer, who deferves to be called a geo- 

 grapher as well as an hillorian, gives a defcription of the countries be- 

 yond the eaftern limits of the Roman empire in his twenty-third book, 

 wherein he informs us, that the long route of the merchants trading to 

 the famous nation of the Seres lay through a village called Lithinos- 

 Pyrgos (the tower of ftone), and along the ranges of mountains called 

 Afcanimia and Comedus §. He does not tell us of what country thefe 

 merchants were, but it is probable that they were fubjefts of the Roman 

 empire. Eaft from the River laxartes (Sibon), fays Ammianus, and 

 furrounded by a vafl: circuit of lofty mountains, lies the extenfive and 

 fertile country of the Seres, bounded on the weft by the Scythians, on 

 the north and eafl: by deferts covered with fnow, and on the fouth by 

 India and the Ganges ||. He proceeds to defcribe the Seres as a fedate 



* This is fiippofed the emporliim called Arabia chart's Geog. facr. col. 175, Z'n^ Hicro%o'icon, col. 



Felix in the Periplus of the Erythraean fea, but I IC9, and in Gothofred's Dijfertatton on Plnlojhrgms. 



know not whether the identity is futiiciently ella- \ ' Terra mariqiie,' hy land and by fni. But the 



blilhed. town is far from the Mediterranean, the neareft 



•j- It may be an inquiry worth the inveftigation fea : nor is it clofe upon the Euphrates, which, 



of the naturalift, whether thefe Cappadocian horfes however, is the only navigable channel by which 



were the progenitors of the famous Arabian breed. Indian goods could be conveyed to it. The land 



It is pretty evident that Arabia was not dillinguifh- conveyance was probably by the caravans of rner- 



ed for the qnahty of its horfes in eaily times. See chants, of whofe route in the centra] part of Afia 



above, p. 165 note, where I have obfcrved that the he gives us a flight notice in his geography of that 



horfes of Cappadocia were highly elleemed in Tyre continent. 



and Perfia. They were no lels pretious in the eyes J' Thefe feem the ranges now called Hindoo- 



of the Roman emperors, who did not permit even kho and Cuttore. See RnncU's Map of the court' 



confuls to poffefs * the divine animals'' of the firll tries befaven the Ganges and the Cajpianfea. 



quality, or pureft breed, of Cappadocia. In Ihort, || This defcription anfwers that part of Tartaiy 



they were then, what the Arabian horfes of the containing the country now called Little Bucbaria 



tnonaki Jhaduhi breed, purer than milk, are in the or Mognllftan. [|See R nnell's Map as above, and 



prefent day, the very bell of their kind. The many the third J'eBion of Im Memoir, p. 198.] The fitua- 



quotations in fupport of the fupetior excellence of tion alio agrees tolerably well, making due allow- 



tlie antient Cappadocian horfes, which it would be ance for the imperfeftion of antient geography, 



improper to introduce here, may be feen in Bo- with the great city of Thina in the Petiplus of the 



Erythijjjn 



Vol. I. D d 



