Naturalis historia 6.69

6.69

ab his in interiore situ Monaedes et Suari, quorum mons Maleus, in quo umbrae ad septentrionem cadunt hieme, aestate in austrum, per senos menses. septentriones eo tractu semel anno adparere, nec nisi quindecim diebus, Baeton auctor est; hoc idem pluribus locis Indiae fieri Megasthenes. austrinum polum Indi Diamasa vocant. amnis lomanes in Gangen per Palibothros decurrit inter oppida Methora et Chrysobora.

But more famous and more powerful than any nation, not only in these regions, but throughout almost the whole of India, are the Prasii, who dwell in a city of vast extent and of remarkable opulence, called Palibothra; from which circumstance some writers have given to the people themselves the name of Palibothri, and, indeed, to the whole tract of country between the Ganges and the Indus. These people keep on daily pay in their king's service an army, consisting of six hundred thousand foot, thirty thousand horse, and nine thousand elephants, from which we may easily form a conjecture as to the vast extent of their resources. Behind these people, and lying still more in the interior, are the Monedes, and the Suari, among whom is a mountain known as Maleus, upon which the shadow falls to the north in winter, and to the south in summer, six months alternately. In this district the Constellation of the Greater Bear is seen at only one period in the year, and then but for fifteen days, according to what Bæton states. Megasthenes, however, informs us that the same is the case also in many other localities of India. The South Pole is by the Indians called Diamasa.

The river Jomanes runs into the Ganges through the territory of the Palibothri, between the cities of Methora and Chrysobora. In the regions which lie to the south of the Ganges, the people are tinted by the heat of the sun, so much so as to be quite coloured, but yet not burnt black, like the Æthiopians. The nearer they approach the Indus, the deeper their colour, a proof of the heat of the climate. After leaving the nation of the Prasii, we immediately come to the Indus; in the mountains of the Prasii a race of Pygmies is said to exist. Artemidorus says that between these two rivers there is a distance of two thousand one hundred miles.