INFLUENCE OP THE ROMAN EMPIRE. 187 



valltj^ of the Hoang-ho westward to the Don and the Danube, 

 and the opposite tendencies of these currents, which at first 

 brought the different races into antagonist conflict in the north- 

 ern parts of the Old Continent, ended in establisliing friendly 

 relations of peace and commerce. It is when considered from 

 this point of view that great currents of migration, advancing 

 like oceanic currents between masses which are themselves 

 unmoved, become objects of cosmical importance. 



In the reign of the Emperor Claudius, the embassy of Ra- 

 chias of Ceylon came to Rome by way of Egypt. Under 

 Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (named An-tun by the writers of 

 the history of the dynasty of Han), Roman legates visited the 

 Chinese court, having come by sea by the route of Tunkin. 

 We here observe the earliest traces of the extended intercourse 

 of the Romans with China and India, since it is highly prob- 

 able that the knowledge of the Greek sphere and zodiac, as 

 well as that of the astrological planetary week, was not gen- 

 erally diffused until the first century of our era, and that it was 

 then effected by means of this intercourse between the two 

 countries.* The great Indian mathematicians Warahamihira, 

 Brahmagupta, and perhaps even Aryabhatta, lived at a more 

 recent period than that under consideration ;t but the elements 

 of knowledge, either discovered by Indian nations, frequently 

 in different and wholly independent directions, or existing 

 among these ancient civilized races from primitive ages, may 

 have penetrated into the West even before the time of Dio- 

 phantus, by means of the extended commercial relations exist- 

 ing between the Ptolemies and the Caesars. I will not here 

 attempt to determine what is due to each individual race and 

 epoch, my object being merely to indicate the different chan- 

 nels by which an interchange of ideas has been effected. 



The strongest evidence of the multiplicity of means, and 

 the extent of the advance that had been made in general in- 

 tercourse, is testified by the colossal works of Strabo and Ptol- 

 emy. The gifted geographer of Amasea does not possess the 

 numerical accuracy of Hipparchus, or the mathematical and 



* See Letronne, in the Observations Critiques et Archiologiqnes tftir 

 les Representations Zodiacales de V Antiquity, 1824, p. 99, as well as his 

 /ater work, Sur VOrigine Grecqiie des Zodiaques priteiidus Egyptiem. 

 1837, p. 27. 



t The sound inquirer, Colebrooke, places Warahamihira in the fifth, 

 Brahmagupta at the end of the sixth century, and Aryabhatta rather in- 

 definitely between the years 200 and 400 of our era. (Compare Holtz. 

 mann, Uebei- den Qriechischen Ursprung des Indischen Thierkreiiet 

 !841, 8. 23.) 



