XL] NARRATIVE OF THEOPHANES. 221 mouth ; in addition to which we are informed that the Araxes, which flowed from the mountains of Armenia, reached the sea in its neighbourhood, but did not join its stream, as it does at the present day1. The variations which are found in ancient authors with regard to this last point afford a curious subject of specula- tion. The statement of Theophanes is repeated by Mela2, whereas Pliny8, though with some reserve, and Appian4 affirm that those rivers met before entering the sea. Plutarch, again5, mentions both views without pronouncing between them, while Ptolemy6 says that the Araxes discharged its waters, partly into the Caspian Sea, and partly into the Cyrus. The last of these notices has been employed as a means of reconciling the others, and the conclusion has not unreasonably been drawn, that the change in the course of the Araxes, which caused it to communicate with the Cyrus, commenced early in the Christian era, and that for a considerable time that river continued to flow both through its old and its new channel. Theophanes' account of the customs and manner of life of the tribes that inhabited this area of country is also highly valuable. Of these the Iberi were the most civilised, for they possessed towns and markets, and had tiled roofs to their houses and some pretence to architecture in their dwellings. The population was divided into . four classes, of which the first was the royal caste, which furnished the leaders both at home and in war; the second 1 Strabo, ii. 3. a; n. 4. 2 ; in the latter of these passages, after the mouth of the Cyrus has been described, it is said, ir\i}fflov 3k KCU 6 'A/wjfys l/ijSdXXet. 2 3- 40, 41- 8 H. N., 6. 26; Araxes... ut plures existimavere, a Cyro defertur in Caspium mare. * Mithr.i 103; T&V Ktipvov vvrapfo, os 5<65«ra