jan 1, 24 - Strábōn "Geography"

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§ 2.5.20 But the Ionian Gulf is part of what is now called the Adriatic Sea. The right side of this sea is formed by Illyria, and the left by Italy up to its head at Aquileia. It reaches up towards the north-west in a narrow and long course; and its length is about six thousand stadia, while its greatest breadth is twelve hundred stadia. There are numerous islands in this sea: off the Illyrian coast the Apsyrtides, and Cyrictica, and the Liburnides, and also Issa, Tragurium, Black Corcyra, and Pharos; and off the Italian coast the Diomedeae.

§ 3.2.13 Thirdly, the wanderings of Aeneas are a traditional fact, as also those of Antenor, and those of the Henetians;​ similarly, also, those of Diomedes, Menelaus, Odysseus, and several others.

§ 4.4.1 Of the Belgae, there are, first, the Veneti who fought the naval battle with Caesar... It is these Veneti, I think, who settled the colony that is on the Adriatic (for about all the Celti that are in Italy migrated from the transalpine land, just as did the Boii and Senones), although, on account of the likeness of name, people call them Paphlagonians.​ I do not speak positively, however, for with reference to such matters probability suffices

§ 4.6.9 Directly after these people come the peoples that dwell near the recess of the Adriatic and the districts round about Aquileia, namely, the Carni as well as certain of the Norici; the Taurisci, also, belong to the Norici. But Tiberius and his brother Drusus stopped all of them from their riotous incursions by means of a single summer-campaign; so that now for thirty-three years they have been in a state of tranquillity and have been paying their tributes regularly. Now throughout the whole of the mountainous country of the Alps there are, indeed, not only hilly districts which admit of good farming, but also glens which have been well built up by settlers; the greater part, however (and, in particular, in the neighbourhood of the mountain-crests, where, as we know, the brigands used to congregate) is wretched and unfruitful, both on account of the frosts and of the ruggedness of the soil. It was because of scarcity, therefore, of both food and other things that they sometimes would spare the people in the plains, in order that they might have people to supply their wants; and in exchange they would give resin, pitch, torch-pine, wax, honey, and cheese — for with these things they were well supplied. Above the Carni lies the Apennine Mountain,​ which has a lake that issues forth into the River Isaras,​ which, after having received another river, the Atagis,​ empties into the Adriatic. But there is also another river, called the Atesinus,​ which flows into the Ister from the same lake. The Ister too, in fact, takes it beginning in these mountains, for they are split into many parts and have many peaks; that is, from Liguria, up to this point, the lofty parts of the Alps run in an unbroken stretch and then break up and diminish in height, and in turn rise again, into more and more parts, and more and more crests. Now the first of these is that ridge, on the far side of the Rhenus and the lake,​ which leans towards the east — a ridge only moderately high, in which, near the Suevi and the Hercynian Forest,​ are the sources of the Ister. And there are other ridges which bend round towards Illyria and the Adriatic, among which are the Apennine Mountain above-mentioned and also the Tullum and Phligadia, the mountains which lie above the Vindelici, whence flow the Duras and Clanis and several other torrential rivers which join the stream of the Ister.

§ 4.6.10 And further, the Iapodes​ (we now come to this mixed tribe of Illyrii and Celti)​ dwell round about these regions; and Mount Ocra​ is near these people. The Iapodes, then, although formerly they were well supplied with strong men and held as their homeland both sides of the mountain​ and by their business of piracy held sway over these regions, have been vanquished and completely outdone by Augustus Caesar. Their cities are: Metulum, Arupini, Monetium, and Vendo. After the Iapodes comes Segestica, a city in the plain, past which flows the River Saüs,​209 which empties into the Ister. The situation of the city is naturally well-suited for making war against the Daci. The Ocra is the lowest part of the Alps in that region in which the Alps join the country of the Carni, and through which the merchandise from Aquileia is conveyed in wagons to what is called Nauportus (over a road of not much more than four hundred stadia); from here, however, it is carried down by the rivers as far as the Ister and the districts in that part of the country; for there is, in fact, a river​ which flows past Nauportus; it runs out of Illyria, is navigable, and empties into the Saüs, so that the merchandise is easily carried down to Segestica and the country of the Pannonii and Taurisci.​ And the Colapis​ too joins the Saüs near the city;​ both are navigable and flow from the Alps. The Alps have both cattle and wild horses. Polybius says that there is also produced in the Alps an animal of special form; it is like a deer in shape, except for its neck and growth of hair (in these respects, he says, it resembles a boar), and beneath its chin it has a sac about a span long with hair at the tip, the thickness of a colt's tail.

§ 4.6.12 Polybius further says that in his own time there was found, about opposite Aquileia in the country of the Noric Taurisci,​ a gold mine so well-suited for mining that, if one scraped away the surface-soil for a depth of only two feet, he found forthwith dug-gold,​ and that the diggings were never deeper than fifteen feet; and he goes on to say that part of the gold is immediately pure, in sizes of a bean or a lupine, when only the eighth part is boiled away, and that although the rest needs more smelting, the smelting is very profitable; and that two months after the Italiotes joined them in working the mine, the price of gold suddenly became a third less throughout the whole of Italy, but when the Taurisci learned this they cast out their fellow-workers and carried on a monopoly. Now, however, all​ the gold mines are under the control of the Romans. And here, too, just as in Iberia,​ in addition to the dug-gold, gold-dust is brought down by the rivers — not, however, in such quantities as there.

§ 4.7.1 Afterwards, when the Romans conferred on the Italians the privileges of equal citizenship, and thought fit to extend the same honour to the Cisalpine Galatae and Heneti, they comprised the whole under the general denomination of Italians and Romans; they likewise founded amongst them numerous colonies

§ 5.1.1 At some late time or other after the Romans had shared with the Italiotes the equality of civil rights, they decided to allow the same honour both to the Cisalpine Galatae​ and to the Heneti [Veneti],​ and to call all of them Italiotes as well as Romans, and, further, to send forth many colonies amongst them, some earlier and some later, than which it is not easy to call any other set of colonies better.

§ 5.1.3 But immediately at the base of the Alps there lies a considerable plain, with its length and its breadth about equal, namely, two thousand one hundred stadia; its southern side is shut in both by the seaboard of the Heneti and by those Apennine Mountains which reach down to the neighbourhood of Ariminum and Ancona; for these mountains, after beginning in Liguria, enter Tyrrhenia, leaving only a narrow seaboard, and then, withdrawing into the interior little by little, when they come to be opposite the territory of Pisa, bend towards the east and towards the Adriatic until they reach the regions round about Ariminum and Ancona, there joining in a straight line the seaboard of the Heneti. Cisalpine Celtica, accordingly, is shut in by these boundaries

§ 5.1.4 Cispadana is all the part that lies next to the Apennine Mountains and Liguria, while Transpadana is the rest. The latter is inhabited by the Ligurian and the Celtic tribes, who live partly in the mountains, partly in the plains, whereas the former is inhabited by the Celti and Heneti. Now these Celti are indeed of the same race as the Transalpine Celti, but concerning the Heneti there are two different accounts: Some say that the Heneti too are colonists of those Celti of like name​ who live on the ocean-coast; while others say that certain of the Heneti of Paphlagonia​ escaped hither with Antenor from the Trojan war, and, as testimony in this, adduce their devotion to the breeding of horses — a devotion which now, indeed, has wholly disappeared, although formerly it was prized among them, from the fact of their ancient rivalry in the matter of producing mares for mule-breeding. Homer, too, recalls this fact: "From the land of the Heneti, whence the breed of the wild mules." Again, Dionysius, the tyrant of Sicily, collected his stud of prize-horses from here, and consequently not only did the fame of the Henetian foal-breeding reach the Greeks but the breed itself was held in high esteem by them for a long time.

§ 5.1.8 But Opitergium, Concordia, Atria, Vicetia, and other small towns like them are less hemmed in by the marshes, though they are connected with the sea by small waterways. It is said that Atria was once an illustrious city, and that the Adriatic​ Gulf got its name therefrom, with only a slight change in the spelling.​Aquileia, which is nearest of all to the recess of the Gulf, was founded by the Romans as a fortress against the barbarians who were situated above it; and there is an inland voyage thither for merchant-vessels, by way of the River Natiso, for a distance of more than sixty stadia.​ Aquileia has been given over as an emporium for those tribes of the Illyrians that live near the Ister;​ the latter load on wagons and carry inland the products of the sea, and wine stored in wooden jars,​ and also olive-oil, whereas the former​ get in exchange slaves, cattle, and hides. But Aquileia is outside the boundaries of the Heneti. The boundary between the two peoples is marked by a river flowing from the Alps, [none of the Isonzo, Tagliamento, Sile, Piave​ meet conditions] which affords an inland voyage of as much as twelve hundred stadia to the city of Noreia,​ near which Gnaeus Carbo clashed to no effect with the Cimbri.​ This region has places that are naturally well-suited to gold-washing, and has also iron-works. And in the very recess of the Adriatic​ there is also a temple of Diomedes that is worth recording, "the Timavum"; for it has a harbour, and a magnificent precinct, and seven fountains of potable waters which immediately empty into the sea in one broad, deep river.​ According to Polybius, all the fountains except one are of salt water, and what is more, the natives call the place the source and mother of the sea. But Poseidonius says that a river, the Timavus, runs out of the mountains, falls down into a chasm, and then, after running underground about a hundred and thirty stadia, makes its exit near the sea.

§ 5.1.9 It is an historical fact, however, that among the Heneti certain honours have been decreed to Diomedes; and, indeed, a white horse is still sacrificed to him, and two precincts are still to be seen — one of them sacred to the Argive Hera and the other to the Aetolian Artemis. But some mythical elements, of course, have been added:​ namely, that in these sacred precincts the wild animals become tame, and deer herd with wolves, and they allow the people to approach and caress them, and any that are being pursued by dogs are no longer pursued when they have taken refuge here. And it is said that one of the prominent men, who was known for his fondness for giving bail for people and was twitted for this, fell in with some hunters who had a wolf in their nets, and, upon their saying in jest that if he would give bail for the wolf, and agree to settle all the damage the wolf should do, they would set the wolf free from the toils, he agreed to the proposal; and the wolf, when set free, drove off a considerable herd of unbranded horses and brought them to the steading of the man who was fond of giving bail; and the man who received the favour not only branded all the mares with a wolf, but also called them the "wolf-breed" — mares exceptional for speed rather than beauty; and his successors kept not only the brand but also the name for the breed of the horses, and made it a custom not to sell a mare to outsiders, in order that the genuine breed might remain in their family alone, since horses of that breed had become famous. But, at the present time, as I was saying,​ the practice of horse-breeding has wholly disappeared. After the Timavum comes the seaboard of the Istrii as far as Pola, which belongs to Italy. Between the Timavum and Pola lies the stronghold of Tergeste, at a distance of one hundred and eighty stadia from Aquileia. As for Pola, it is situated in a harbour-like gulf which has isles with good mooring-places and with fruitful soil; it was founded in early times by those Colchians who were sent forth in quest of Medea, but failed in their undertaking and thus condemned themselves to exile: "which a Greek would call 'the city of the exiles,' " as Callimachus has said, "but their tongue hath named it Polae."​ The Transpadane districts, then, are occupied both by the Heneti and by the peoples who extend as far as Pola; and, above the Heneti, by the Carni, the Cenomani, the Medoaci, and the Symbri;​ of these peoples, some were once enemies of the Romans, but the Cenomani and the Heneti used to help the Romans in their battles

§ 5.1.11 For Marcus Lepidus and Gaius Flaminius were consuls together;​ and, upon subjugating the Ligures, the latter constructed the Flaminian Way​ from Rome through Tyrrhenia and Ombrica as far as the regions of Ariminum, and the former the succeeding road that runs as far as Bononia, and from there, along the base of the Alps, thus encircling the marshes, to Aquileia. Now the boundary of all this country which we call Cisalpine Celtica

§ 7.1.5 The country of the Rhaeti adjoins the lake for only a short distance, whereas that of the Helvetii and the Vindelici, and also the desert of the Boii, adjoin the greater part of it. All the peoples as far as the Pannonii, but more especially the Helvetii and the Vindelici, inhabit plateaus. But the countries of the Rhaeti and the Norici extend as far as the passes over the Alps and verge toward Italy, a part thereof bordering on the country of the Insubri and a part on that of the Carni and the legions about Aquileia.

§ 7.5.2 the Iapodes, a tribe which is at the same time both Celtic and Illyrian. And thence, too, flow rivers which bring down into Segestica much merchandise both from other countries and from Italy. For if one passes over Mount Ocra​ from Aquileia to Nauportus,​ a settlement of the Taurisci, whither the wagons are brought, the distance is three hundred and fifty stadia, though some say five hundred. Now the Ocra is the lowest part of that portion of the Alps which extends from the country of the Rhaeti to that of the Iapodes. Then the mountains rise again, in the country of the Iapodes, and are called "Albian."​ In like manner, also, there is a pass which leads over Ocra from Tergeste,​ a Carnic village, to a marsh called Lugeum.​ Near Nauportus there is a river, the Corcoras,​ which receives the cargoes. Now this river empties into the Saüs, and the Saüs into the Dravus, and the Dravus into the Noarus​near Segestica. Immediately below Nauportus the Noarus is further increased in volume by the Colapis,​ which flows from the Albian Mountain through the country of the Iapodes and meets the Danuvius near the country of the Scordisci. The voyage on these rivers is, for the most part, towards the north. The road from Tergeste to the Danuvius is about one thousand two hundred stadia.

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