Chap. 75.] 
SHADOWS. 
107 
CHAP. 75. (73.) — WHE^r akh wheee theee aee no 
SHADOWS. 
It is likewise said, that in the town of Syene, which is 
5000 stadia south of Alexandria \ there is no shadow at noon, 
on the day of the solstice ; and that a well, which was sunk 
for the purpose of the experiment, is illuminated by the sun 
in every part. Hence it appears that the sun, in this place, 
is vertical, and Onesicritus informs us that this is the case, 
about the same time, in India, at the river Hypasis^. It is 
well known, that at Berenice, a city of the Troglodytse, and 
4820 stadia beyond that city, in the same country, at the 
town of Ptolemais, which was built on the Red Sea, when 
the elephant was first hunted, this same thing takes place 
for forty-five days before the solstice and for an equal length 
of time after it, and that during these ninety days the shadows 
are turned towards the south ^. Again, at Meroe, an island 
in the Nile and the metropolis of the Ethiopians, which is 
5000 stadia from Syene, there are no shadows at two periods 
of the year, viz. when the sun is in the 18th degree of Taurus 
and in the 14th of Leo^. The Oretes, a people of India, have 
a mountain named Maleus^, near which the shadows in sum- 
6th book, ch. 39, makes the shadow at Ancona -^-^ greater than the gnomon, 
while, in Yenetia, which is more northerly, he says, as in the present 
chapter, that the shadow and the gnomon are equal in length. See the 
remarks of M. Alexandre in Lemaire, ut supra. 
^ This would be about 625 miles. Strabo, ii. 114, and Lucan, ii. 587, 
give the same distance, which is probably nearly correct. Syene is, 
however, a little to the north of the tropic. 
2 This remark is not correct, as no part of this river is between the 
tropics. For an account of Onesicritus see Lemaire, i. 203, 204. 
3 " In meridiem umbras jaci." M. Ajasson translates this passage, "les 
ombres tombent pendant quatre-vingt-dix jours sur le point central du 
meridien." ii. 165. But I conceive that Holland's version is more cor- 
rect, "for 90 days' space all the shadows are cast into the south." i. 36. 
The remarks of M. Alexandre are to the same effect ; " ut bis solem 
in zenitho haberet (Ptolemais), Maii mensis et August! initio ; interea 
vero, solem e septemtrione haberet." Lemaire, i. 393. 
^ About 625 miles. 
* These days correspond to the 8th of May and the 4th of August 
respectively. 
^ There is considerable uncertainty respecting the identity of this moun- 
tain ; our author refers to it in a subsequent part of his work, where it is 
