266 
l^Ll^ r S KATUBAL HISTOBT 
[Book III. 
The coast of lUyricum is clustered with more than 1000 
islands, the sea being of a shoaly nature, and numerous 
creeks and sestuaries running with their narrow channels 
between portions of the land. The more famous are those 
before the mouths of the Timavus, with warm springs^ that 
rise with the tides of the sea, the island of Cissa near the 
territory of the Istri, and the Pullaria^ and Absyrtides^, so 
called by the Greeks from the circumstance of Absyrtus, 
the brother of Medea, having been slain there. Some islands 
near them have been called the Electrides"^, upon which 
amber, which they call "electrum," was said to be found; 
a most assured instance however of that untruthful- 
ness^ which is generally ascribed to the Greeks, seeing 
that it has never yet been ascertained which of the islands 
were meant by them under that name. Opposite to the lader 
is Lissa, and other islands whose names have been already 
mentioned^. Opposite to the Liburni are some islands 
called the Cratese, and no smaller number styled Liburnicse 
and Celadussse^. Opposite to Surium is Bavo, and Brattia^, 
^ Now called the Bagni di Monte Falcone. See B. ii. c. 106. 
2 Now called Cherso and Osero, off the Iliyrian coast. Ptolemy 
mentions only one, Apsorrus, on which he places a town of that name 
and another called Crepsa. The Pullaria are now called Li Brioni, in 
the Sinus Flanaticus, opposite the city of Pola. ^ See p. 258. 
^ In B. xxxvii. c. 11, he again mentions this circumstance, and states 
that some writers have placed them in the Adriatic opposite the mouths 
of the Padus. Scymnus of Chios makes mention of them in conjunction 
with the Absyrtides. This confusion probably arose from the fact pre- 
viously noted that the more ancient writers had a confused idea that the 
Ister communicated with the Adriatic, at the same time mistaking it pro- 
bably for the Yistula, which flows into the Baltic. At the mouth of this 
last-mentioned river, there were Electrides or " amber-bearing " islands. 
^ " Yanitatis." ^ Crexa, G^issa, and Colentum, in c. 25. 
^ According to Brotier, these are situate between the islands of Zuri 
and Sebenico, and are now called Kasvan, Capri, Smolan, Tihat, Sestre, 
Parvichj Zlarin, &c. Some visiters however suggest that there were 
no islands called Celadussse, and that the name in Phny is a corruption of 
Dyscelados inPomponiusMela; which in its turn is supposed to have been 
invented from what was really an epithet of Issa, in a Kne of Apollonius 
Rhodius, B. iv. 1. 565. 'To-crd re SvaiceXadoSj "and inauspicious Issa." 
See Brunck's remarks on the passage. 
^ Now Brazza. According to Brotier the island is still celebrated 
for the delicate flavour of the flesh of its goats and lambs. Issa is now 
called Lissa, and Pharia is the modern Lesina. Baro, now Bua, Hes off 
