374 APPENDIX C. 



Of Eoman writers Pliny is the only one from whom any 

 positive information as to the geography of this part of Africa 

 is to be gained ; but even this is very limited.' He complains 

 that the reports as to the region beyond the narrow limits 

 within which Roman power was established in his day were 

 most fallacious, and censures the Eoman authorities for indo- 

 lently giving circulation to mendacious stories, instead of 

 investigating the truth for themselves. In his day Sala (modern 

 SaUee) was the most southern of the Eoman settlements in 

 Marocco. He describes it as 'a town standing on a river of 

 the same name, on the confines of the desert {solitudinibus 

 vicinum), which was infested by herds of elephants, and still 

 more by the tribe of the Autololes, through whose territory lay 

 the way to the great mountain of Africa, the many-fabled 

 Atlas.' It appears elsewhere that Pliny had access to the 

 manuscripts left by Juba, which, unfortunately, have not come 

 down to posterity. That accomplished prince appears to have held 

 control over the whole territory of Marocco as far as the base of 

 the Atlas. It is to these lost pages of Juba that we probably owe 

 the only fragment of moderately correct information as to South 

 Marocco which is to be found in Pliny's work.^ The river 

 Asana, whose mouth is said to be 150 Eoman miles beyond 

 Sala, is doubtless the Anatis of Polybius, and the Oum-er-bia 

 of the Moors. The next river, which he calls Put, is the 

 Tensift. The distance assigned for the interval between the 

 mouth of the Put and the Atlas is excessive ; but not largely 

 so if Agadir be intended, that being the first place on the coast 

 from which the high summits of the Atlas are habitually 

 visible. The statement as to the existence of remains of vine- 

 yards and palm-groves about the ruins of ancient dwellings 

 seems to lend probability to the belief that the Carthaginian 



' I am indebted for information as to several passages in Pliny's 

 writings to my friend, Mr. B. Bunbury, who will doubtless throw 

 further light on the subject in an important work, ' An Historical View 

 of Ancient Geography ' which he is preparing for publication. 



' ' Indigenas tamen tradunt in ora ab Sala CL m. p. flumen Asanam, 

 marine haustu sed portu speclabile: mox amnem quem vocant Fut: 

 ab eo ad Dyrin (hoc enim Atlanti nomen esse eorum lingua convenit) 

 CC m. p., interveniente flumine oui nomen est Vior. Ibi fama exstare 

 circa vestigia habitat! quondam soli vinearum palmetormnque re- 

 liquJas.' 



