Pliny the Elder, Natural History 6.92: Ariana and the satrapies; Nearchus' voyage; the sea route to India and Muziris; annual drain of 50 million sesterces

6.92

Haec conperta de Taprobane. quattuor satrapiae, quas in hunc locum distulimus, ita se habent. a proximis Indo gentibus montana. Capisene habuit Capisam urbem, quam diruit Cyrus. Arachosia cum flumine et oppido eiusdem fiominis, quod quidam Cufim dixere, a Samiramide conditum. amnis Erymandus, praefluens Parabesten Arachosiorum. proximos his a meridie ad partem Arachotarum faciunt Dexendrusos, a septentrione Paropanisidas, Cartana oppidum sub Caucaso, quod postea Tetragonis dictum. haec regio est ex adverso Bactriae, Ariorum deinde cuius oppidum Alexandria, a conditore dictum, Sydraci, Dangalae, Parapinae, Cataces, Mazi; ad Caucasum Cadrusi, oppidum ab Alexandro conditum.

Thirty advisers are provided for him by the people, and it is only by the advice of the majority of them that any man is condemned to capital punishment. Even then, the person so condemned has a right of appealing to the people, in which case a jury consisting of seventy persons is appointed. Should these acquit the accused, the thirty counsellors are no longer held in any estimation, but are visited with the greatest disgrace. The king wears the costume of Father Liber, while the rest of the people dress like the natives of Arabia. The king, if he is found guilty of any offence, is condemned to death; but no one slays him; all turn their backs upon him, and refuse to hold any communication or even discourse with him. Their festivals are celebrated with the chase, the most valued sports being the pursuit of the tiger and the elephant. The lands are carefully tilled; the vine is not cultivated there, but of other fruits there is great abundance. They take great delight in fishing, and especially in catching turtles; beneath the shells of which whole families find an abode, of such vast size are they to be found. These people look upon a hundred years as a comparatively short life. Thus much have we learned respecting Taprobane.

CHAP. 25.—THE ARIANI AND THE ADJOINING NATIONS. We will now proceed to give some further particulars relative to the four Satrapies, of which we have postponed further mention till the present occasion.
(23). After passing the nations in the vicinity of the Indus, we come to the mountain districts. The territory of Capisene formerly had a city, called Capisa, which was destroyed by Cyrus. Arachosia has a river and a city of the same name; the city was built by Semiramis; by some writers it is called Cophen. The river Erymanthus flows past Parabeste, which belongs to the Arachosii. Writers make the Dexendrusi come next, forming the boundary of the Arachotæ on the southern side, and of the Paropanisadæ on the north. The city of Cartana lies at the foot of Caucasus; in later times it has been called Tetragonis. This region lies over against that of the Bactri, who come next, and whose chief city is Alexandria, so called from the name of its founder. We then come to the Syndraci, the Dangalæ the Parapinæ, the Catuces, and the Mazi; and then at the foot of Caucasus, to the Cadrusi, whose town was built by Alexander.
Below all these countries, is the line of coast which we come to after leaving the Indus. Ariana is a region parched by the sun and surrounded by deserts; still, however, as the face of the country is every here and there diversified with well-shaded spots, it finds communities grouped together to cultivate it, and more especially around the two rivers, known as the Tonberos and the Arosapes. There is also the town of Artacoana, and the river Arius, which flows past Alexandria, a city founded by Alexander; this place is thirty stadia in extent. Much more beautiful than it, as well as of much greater antiquity, is Artacabane, fortified a second time by Antiochus, and fifty stadia in breadth. We then come to the nation of the Dorisdorsigi, and the rivers Phar- naracotis, and Ophradus; and then to Prophthasia, a city of the Zaraspades, the Drangæ, the Evergetæ, the Zarangæ, and the Gedrusi; the towns of Pucolis, Lyphorta, the desert of the Methorgi, the river Manais, the nation of the Acutri, the river Eorum, the nation of the Orbi, the Pomanus, a navigable river in the territories of the Pandares, the Apirus in the country of the Suari, with a good harbour at its mouth, the city of Condigramma, and the river Cophes; into which last flow the navigable streams of the Saddaros, the Parospus, and the Sodanus. Some writers will also have it that Daritis forms part of Ariana, and give the length of them both as nineteen hundred and fifty miles, and the breadth one half of that of India. Others again have spread the Gedrusi and the Pasires over an extent of one hundred and thirty-eight miles, and place next to them the Ichthyophagi Oritæ, a people who speak a language peculiar to themselves, and not the Indian dialect, extending over a space of two hundred miles. Alexander forbade the whole of the Ichthyophagi to live any longer on fish. Next after these the writers have placed extensive deserts, and then Carmania, Persia, and Arabia.