BOOK VI. Mi. 3o-.\iv. 33 



the Caucasus among the Gurdinian Mountains are the 

 V^aUi and the Suani, races never yet quelled, who 

 nevertheless work gold-mines. After tlicse, right 

 on to the Black Sea, are a largc number of tribes of 

 Charioteers and then of Achaei. Such is the present 

 state of one of the most famous regions in the workl. 

 Some authoritics have reported ihe distance 

 between tlic Black Sea and tlie Caspian as not more 

 than 375 miles, while Cornelius Nepos makes it 250 

 miles: by such narrow straits is Asia for a second 

 time " beset. Claudius Caesar gives the dis- 

 tance from tlie Straits of Kertsch to the Caspian Sea 

 as 150 miles,* and statcs that Seleucus Nicator at 

 the tune when he was killed by Ptolcmy Ceraunus 

 was contempkiting cutting a channel through this 

 isthmus. It is practically certain that the distance 

 from the Gates of the Caucasus to the Black Sea is 

 200 niiles. 



XIII. The islands in the Black Sca are the Planc- njack Sea 

 tae,<^ otherwise named the Cyaucae or Symplegadcs, '^*''""''*- 

 and then ApoUonia, called Thynias to distinguish 



it from the island'' of the same name in Europe — 

 it is a mile away from the mainhmd and three 

 miles in circurnference — and opposite to Pharnacea ^ 

 Chalceritis, called by the Greeks the Isle of Ares 

 and sacred to the god of war ; they say that on it 

 there were birds which used to attack strangers with 

 blows of their wings. 



XIV. Having now com])k>ted our description of the Haces mmh 

 interior of Asia let us in imagination cross tlie llipaean ^^j^ ""^^ 

 Mountains and proceed to the right along the shores 



of the Ocean. Tliis washes the coast of Asia towards 

 three points of the compass, under the name of Scy- 

 thian Ocean on the north, Eastern Ocean on the east 



361 



