364 
pliitt's kattjeal histoet. 
[Book ly. 
torj, wMle many call it the Promontory of Olisipo, from 
the city^ near it. This spot forms a dividing line in the 
land, the sea, and the heavens. Here ends one side^ of 
Spain ; and, when we have doubled the promontory, the 
front of Spain begins. (22.) On one side of it lie the JN'orth 
and the Grallic Ocean, on the other the West and the Atlantic. 
The length of this promontory has been estimated by some 
persons at sixty miles, by others at ninety. A considerable 
number of writers estimate the distance from this spot to 
the Pyrenees at 1250 miles ; and, committing a manifest 
error, place here the nation of the Artabri, a nation 
that never^ was here. Por, making a slight change in the 
name, they have placed at this spot the Arrotrebse, whom 
we have previously spoken of as dwelling in front of the 
Celtic Promontory. 
Mistakes have also been made as to the more celebrated 
rivers. Prom the Minius, which we have previously men- 
tioned, according to Varro, the river ^minius^ is distant 
200 miles, which others^ suppose to be situate elsewhere, 
and called Limsea. By the ancients it was called the " River 
of Oblivion," and it has been made the subject of many 
fabulous stories. At a distance of 200 miles from the 
Durius is the Tagus, the Munda^ lyii^g between them. 
The Tagus is famous for its golden sands ^. At a distance 
a very curious error. He mentions a promontory called Artabrum as 
the headland at the 'N. W. extremity of Spain ; the coast on the one side of 
it looking to the north and the GraUic Ocean, on the other to the west and 
the Atlantic Ocean. But he considers this promontory to be the west 
headland of the estuary of the Tagus, and adds, that some called it 
Magnum Promontorium^ or the " Grreat Promontory," and others OHsi- 
ponense, from the city of Ohsipo, or Lisbon. He assigns, in fact, all the 
west coast of Spain, down to the mouth of the Tagus, to the north, 
coast, and, instead of being led to detect his error by the resemblance of 
name between his Artabrum Promontorium and his Arrotrebse (the 
Artabri of his predecessors, Strabo and Mela), he perversely finds fault 
with those who had placed above the promontory Artabrum, a people of 
the same name who never were there. 
^ On the site of which the present city of Lisbon stands. 
2 See note in the preceding page. ^ See note 
^ See note in the preceding page. 
^ Among these is Pomponius Mela, who confounds the river Limia, 
mentioned in the last chapter, with the ^minius, or Agueda. 
^ !Now the river Mondego. ^ See B. xxxiii. c. 21, 
