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afterwards becoming acquainted with those towards the west,
styled them Kelts and Iberians; sometimes compounding the
names into Keltiberians, or Keltoscythians, thus ignorantly
uniting various distinct nations; so I affirm they designated
as Ethiopia the whole of the southern countries towards the
ocean. Of this there is evidence, for Aeschylus, in the Pro-
metheus Loosed, note thus speaks:
There [is] the sacred wave, and the coralled bed of the Erythraean
Sea, and [there] the luxuriant marsh of the Ethiopians, situated near
the ocean, glitters like polished brass; where daily in the soft and tepid
stream, the all-seeing sun bathes his undying self, and refreshes his weary
steeds.
And as the ocean holds the same position in respect to the
sun, and serves the same purpose throughout the whole southern region, note he note therefore concludes that the Ethiopians inhabited the whole of the region.
And Euripides in his Phaeton note says that Clymene was
given
To Merops, sovereign of that land
Here the poet merely describes them as the common stables
of the Morning and of the Sun; but further on he tells us
they were near to the dwellings of Merops, and in fact the
whole plot of the piece has reference to this. This does not
therefore refer alone to the [land] next to Egypt, but rather
to the whole southern country extending along the sea-coast.
28
Which from his four-horsed chariot first
The rising sun strikes with his golden rays;
And which its swarthy neighbours call
The radiant stable of the Morn and Sun.
Ephorus likewise shows us the opinion of the ancients respecting Ethiopia, in his Treatise on Europe. He says, If the whole celestial and terrestrial globe were divided into four parts, the Indians would possess that towards the east, the Ethiopians towards the south, the Kelts towards the west, and the Scythians towards the north. He adds that Ethiopia is larger than Scythia; for, says he, it appears that the country of the Ethiopians extends from the rising to the setting of the sun in winter; and Scythia is opposite to it.
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Strabo, Geography (English) (XML Header) [genre: prose] [word count] [lemma count] [Str.].