50 .■-:^^^"'^^ ESSAY ON THE' '' 



in any Sanscrit book, yet from the context it is certainly admissible. 

 This- has an obvious affinity with the Tartessus of the ancients, which 

 they placed at random j beyond the coltimns of Hercules, as usual. If 

 we find a town thus called, at the mouth of the river Bcetis, it was pro- 

 bably from its being the emporium or staple for ra^rchants, to and from 

 the real Tdr-dcsa or Tartessus. 



The existence of a town called TartessuSy at the mouth of the river 

 Bcstisy is very uncertain; Strabo speaks of it in a very doubtful manner. 

 " It seems," says he, *' that the ancients called the river Bcetis Tartessus, 

 '* They say that there was a town of the same name, and that the coun- 

 ** try about it was c^edTartessisr The river flov/ed fram the silver 

 peak, and Stesichorus jumbles together, the silver mountain, the river 

 Tartessus,. and the island o£ Erytheia,w\xic\i Eratosthenes calls properly 

 enough Tartessis. Tartesis , from Tdrdes'a, signifies the silver country, as 

 Erytheia from Aryateya., Arganthonfus, or the silver king, reigned 

 over Tartessis: aiid the kings of the silver island are called Rdpa-d'hara 

 in the Vrzhat'Cat'hdr and. their wives Hemalatdy the golden creepers, 

 and their daughters Rupa-latd, or the silver creepers^ 



The White Island is said, in the Purdn'as, but more particularly in the 

 Trai-iocya-derpan'a, to be in the tiram tir, or borders of the White Sea^ 

 or Cdicdad'hi the sea of Gaxa or Pluto; that is to say, reckoning 

 from the continent: for Fajra or Fadra,. Scotland, is said, in the same 

 book, to be on the other tir or border. The compiler of the above trea- 

 tise says, that,- by the tir of the White Island, we must understand a 

 space of eighteen yojanas, or 88|- miles. This is to be understood all 

 along the sea shores, and both within the land, and without at sea ; so 

 that every island at sea, or distri(5l on shore, within these limits, is said t^ 



