BOOK III. V. 77-vi. 80 



Balearic islands, formidable in warfare with the 

 sling," have been designated by the Greeks the 

 Gymnasiae. The larger island, Majorca, is 100 

 miles in length and 475 in circumference. It contains 

 towTis of Roman citizen colonists, Palma and Pollenza, 

 towns with Latin rights, Sineu and Tucis ; a treaty 

 town of the Bocchi, no longer existing. The smaller 

 island, Minorca, is 30 miles away from Majorca ; 

 its length is 40 miles and its circumference 150 ; 

 it contains the states of lamo, Sanisera and Port 

 Mahon. Twelve miles out to sea from Majorca is 

 Cabrera, treacherous for shipwrecks, and right off 

 the city of Palma He the Malgrates and Dragonera 

 and the small island of El Torre. 



The soil of Iviza drives away snakes, but that of 

 Colubraria breeds snakes, and consequently that 

 island is dangerous to all people except those who 

 bring earth from Iviza; the Greeks called it 

 Snake Island. Iviza does not breed rabbits either, 

 which ravage the crops of the Balearics. The sea is 

 full of shoals, and there are about twenty other small 

 islands ; off the coast of Gaul at the mouth of the 

 Rhone is Metina, and then the island named Brescon, 

 and the three * which the neighbouring people 

 of Marseilles call the Row of Islands because 

 of their arrangement, their Greek names being 

 First Island, Middle Island, also called Pomponiana, 

 and the third Ilypaea ; ncxt to these are Iturium, 

 Phoenica, Lero,*^ and opposite Antibes Lerina,"^ 

 on which according to local tradition there was once 

 a toAvn called Berconum. 



VI. In the Ligurian Sea, but adjoining the Tuscan, Corsica and 

 is the island of Corsica, the Greek name of which is fj^nds. 

 Cyrnos ; it Ues in a line from north to south, and is 



59 



