8 PLINY'S KATUEAL HISTOEr, [Book VI. 



CHAP. 4. THE EESION OF THEMISCTEA, AITD THE NATIONS 



THEEBIN. 



The river Iris brings down to the sea the waters of the 

 lyous. In the interior is the city of Ziela," famous for the 

 defeat of Triarius«» and the victory of C. Caesar.^' Upon the 

 coast there is the river Thermodon, which rises at the fortified 

 place caUed PhanarcEa,'" and flows past the foot of Mount 

 Amazonius." There was formerly a town of the same_ name 

 as the river, and five others in all, Amazonium, Themisc^, 

 Sotira, Amasia, and Comana," now only a Manteium. (4.) We 

 find here the nations of the Genetse,'* the Chalybes,'^ the town 

 of Cotyorum," the nations of the Tibareni and the Mossyni, 

 who make marks upon thfeir bodies," the people called Macro- 

 Amazons. At the mouth of the Thei-modon was a city of the same name, 

 which had been destroyed by the time of Augustus. It is doubtful whe- 

 ther the modern Thermeh occupies its site. 



" The same place apparently as is mentioned in the last Chapter under 

 the name of Zela. 



^ Valerius Triarius, one of the legates of Lucullus, in the war against 

 Mithridates. Plutarch tells us that Lucullus was obliged to conceal 

 Triarius ftom the fury of his troops. 



'5 Over Phamaces, the son of Mithridates. 



'" Now called the Thermea. 



" Still called Mason-Dagh. 



f^ He alludes to Comana, in Pontus, the site of which is now called 

 Gumenek, near to which, on the Tocat-su, the modern name of the Iris, 

 Hamilton found some remains of a Koman town, and part of a bridge ap- 

 parently of Koman construction. The language of Pliny seems to imply 

 that it had become in his day nothing beyond a manteium or seat of an 

 oracle. 



'* Strabo speaks of a promontory called Genetes ; and Stephanns By- 

 zantinus mentions a river and port of the same name. 



'» Strabo places the Chaldei, who, he says, were originally called Cha- 

 lyhes, in that part of the country which lies above Pharnacia (the modem 

 Kerasunt). 



™ Or Cotyora. According to Xcnophon, this was a colony of Sinope, 

 which furnished supplies for the Ten Thousand in their retreat. The 

 place was on a bay called after the town. Hamilton, in his Researches, 

 &c., Vol. i., is of opinion that Cotyorum may have stood on the site of 

 Ordou, where some remains of an ancient port, out out of the solid rock, are 

 still visible. He remarks, however, that some writers suppose that Cotyora 

 was the modern bay of Pershemhah, which is more sheltered than Ordou. 

 Cotyora was the place of embarkation of the Ten Thousand. 



" Similar to what we call tatooing. Parisot suggests that these people 



