ix.] ERATOSTHENES' MAP. 181
the inhabited world in a parallelogram the sides of which just
touched its extremities, and then drew across it eight parallels
of latitude and seven meridians of longitude, including the two
just mentioned, at irregular distances from one another, these
distances being determined by the situation of the chief points
whose position had been ascertained either by scientific observa-
tions or by the reports of travellers. The spots through which
the parallels were drawn were, beginning from the south, the
Cinnamon Region, Meroe, Syene, Alexandria, Rhodes, the Troad,
the mouth of the Borysthenes, and Thule; while those that were
crossed by the meridians were the Pillars of Hercules, Carthage,
Alexandria, Thapsacus on the Euphrates, the Caspian Gates, the
mouth of the Indus, and that of the Ganges. He shape of the
treated the inhabited world as an island, and made inhabited
it in shape an irregular oblong, the extremities of
which tapered off to a point both to east and west, the lines of
coast converging on the one side towards the land of the Coniaci
at the furthest extremity of India, on the other towards the
Sacrum Promontorium in Spain. His authorities for this outline
were—towards the south-west probably the Periplus of Hanno,
towards the south-east the voyage of Nearchus, towards the
north-east the writings of Patrocles, and towards the north-west
Pytheas. Ignoring the prevailing division into three continents,
he divided this area into a northern and a southern portion, the
limit between which was formed by the Mediterranean Sea and
the Taurus mountains, i.e. the range which intersected the whole
of Asia, For purposes of description he intro-
duced a further subdivision of this into sphragides
or ' seals1'—a term, which reminds us somewhat of
the actae of Herodotus, and is not less enigmatical than that
expression. It was intended to designate sections of the earth's
surface \ but even the principle by which these were determined
is not clear, since they do not seem to have corresponded through-
out either to geometrical partitions or to territories marked by
natural boundaries. Our means of judging of this point, how-
ever, are very limited, since Strabo's account of them, on which
we have to depend, is confined to a part of the continent of Asia,
1 Strabo, a. I. ia folL