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I

CHAP. quity had described the advantages of a fituation, XVII. from whence a feeble colony of Greeks derived the command of the fea, and the honours of a flourishing and independent republic 2.

Defcrip

tion of
CON

STANTI-
NOPLE.

The Bofphorus.

If we furvey Byzantium in the extent which it acquired with the auguft name of Conftantinople, the figure of the Imperial city may be represented under that of an unequal triangle. The obtufe point, which advances towards the east and the fhores of Afia, meets and repels the waves of the Thracian Bofphorus. The northern fide of the city is bounded by the harbour; and the fouthern is washed by the Propontis, or fea of Marmara. The bafis of the triangle is opposed to the west, and terminates the continent of Europe. But the admirable form and divifion of the circumjacent land and water cannot, without a more ample explanation, be clearly or fufficiently understood.

The winding channel through which the waters of the Euxine flow with a rapid and inceffant course towards the Mediterranean, received the appellation of Bofphorus, a name not lefs cele

Polybius, 1. iv. p. 423. edit. Cafaubon. He obferves that the peace of the Byzantines was frequently disturbed, and the extent of their territory contracted, by the inroads of the wild Thracians.

2 The navigator Ryzas, who was tyled the fon of Neptune, founded the city 656 years before the Chriftian Zra. His followers were drawn from Argos and Megara. Byzantium was afterwards rebuilt and fortified by the Spartan general Paufanias. See Scaliger Animadverf. ad Eufeb. p. 81. Ducange Conftantinopolis, 1. 7. part i. cap. 15, 16. With regard to the wars of the Byzantines against Philip, the Gauls, and the kings of Bithynia, we fhould truft none but the ancient writers who lived before the greatnefs of the imperial city had excited a spirit of flattery and fiction.

brated

4

brated in the hiftory, than in the fables, of an- CHAP. tiquity. A crowd of temples and of votive al- XVII. tars profufely fcattered along its fteep and woody banks, attefted the unfkilfulness, the terrors, and the devotion of the Grecian navigators, who, after the example of the Argonauts, explored the dangers of the inhofpitable Euxine. On thefe banks tradition long preserved the memory of the palace of Phineus, infefted by the obscene harpies *; and of the sylvan reign of Amycus, who defied the fon of Leda to the combat of the Ceftus ". The freights of the Bofphorus are terminated by the Cyanean rocks, which, according to the defcription of the poets, had once floated on the face of the waters; and were destined by the gods to protect the entrance of the Euxine against the eye of profane curiofity. From the Cyanean rocks to the point and harbour of Byzantium, the

3 The Bofphorus has been very minutely defcribed by Dionyfius of Byzantium, who lived in the time of Domitian (Hudson Geograph. Minor. tom. iii.), and by Gilles or Gyllius, a French traveller of the XVIth century. Tournefort (Lettre XV.) seems to have used his own eyes and the learning of Gyllius.

4 There are very few conjectures fo happy as that of Le Clerc (Bibliotheque Universelle, tom. i. p. 148.), who supposes that the harpies were only locufts. The Syriac or Phoenician name of those infects, their noify flight, the flench and devaftation which they occafion, and the north wind which drives them into the fea, all contribute toform the striking resemblance.

5 The refidence of Amycus was in Afia, between the old and the new caflles, at a place called Laurus Infana. That of Phineus was in Europe, near the village of Mauromole and the Black Sea. See Gyllius de Bofph. 1. ii. c. 23. Tournefort, Lettre XV.

6 The deception was occafioned by feveral pointed rocks, alternately covered and abandoned by the waves. At prefent there are two small islands, one towards either fhore that of Europe is dif tinguished by the column of Pompey.

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CHAP. winding length of the Bofphorus extends about XVII. fixteen miles', and its moft ordinary breadth

may be computed at about one mile and a half. The new castles of Europe and Asia are constructed, on either continent, upon the foundations of two celebrated temples, of Serapis and of Jupiter Urius. The old caftles, a work of the Greek emnperors, coinmand the narrowest part of the channel, in a place where the oppofite banks advance within five hundred paces of each other. These fortreffes were reftored and ftrengthened by Mahomet the Second, when he meditated the fiege of Conftantinople': but the Turkish conqueror was most probably ignorant, that near two thoufand years before his reign, Darius had chofen the fame fituation to connect the two continents by a bridge of boats. At a fmall distance from the old castles we difcover the little town of Chryfopolis, or Scutári, which may almost be confidered as the Afiatic fuburb of Conftantinople. Bofphorus, as it begins to open into the Propontis, paffes between Byzantium and Chalcedon. The latter of those cities was built by the Greeks,

The

7 The ancients computed one hundred and twenty ftadia, or Afteen Roman niles. They measured only from the new cafiles, but they carried the ftreights as far as the town of Chalcedon.

8 Ducas Hilt. c. 34. Leunclavius Hift. Turcia Mufulmanica, 1. xv. p. 577. Under the Greek empire these caftles were used as ftate prifons, under the tremendous name of Lethe, or towers of oblivion.

9 Darius engraved in Greek and Affyrian letters on two marble columns, the names of his fubject nations, and the amazing numbers of his land and fea forces. The Byzantines afterwards tranfported thefe columns into the city, and ufed them for the altars of their tutelar deities. Herodotus, 1. iv. c. 87.

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a few years before the former; and the blindness CHA P. of its founders, who overlooked the fuperior ad- XVII. vantages of the oppofite coaft, has been stigmatised

by a proverbial expreffion of contempt

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The harbour of Conftantinople, which may be The port. confidered as an arm of the Bofphorus, obtained, in a very remote period, the denomination of the Golden Horn. The curve which it defcribes might be compared to the horn of a stag, or as it should feem, with more propriety, to that of an ox". The epithet of golden was expreffive of the riches which every wind wafted from the most distant countries into the fecure and capacious port of Conftantinople. The river Lycus, formed by the conflux of two little ftreams, pours into the harbour a perpetual fupply of fresh water, which ferves to cleanse the bottom, and to invite the periodical fhoals of fifh to feek their retreat in that convenient recefs. As the viciffitudes of tides are scarcely felt in those feas, the constant depth of the harbour allows goods to be landed on the quays without the affiftance of boats; and it has been obferved, that in many places the largest veffels may reft their prows against the houses,

10 Namque artiffimo inter Europam Afiamque divortio Byzan tium in extremâ Europâ pofuere Græci, quibus, Pythium Apolli. nem confulentibus ubi conderent urbem, redditum oraculum est, quærerent fedem cæcorum terris adverfam. Eâ ambage Chalcedonii monstrabantur, quod priores illuc advecti, prævifâ locorum utilitate pejora legiffent. Tacit. Annal. xii. 62.

1 Strabo, 1. x. p. 492. Most of the antlers are now broke off; or, to speak lefs figuratively, most of the receffes of the harbour are filled up. See Gyll. de Bofphoro Thracio, 1. i. c. 5.

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CHAP. While their fterns are floating in the water 2. XVII. From the mouth of the Lycus to that of the har

The Propontis.

bour, this arm of the Bofphorus is more than feven miles in length. The entrance is about five hundred yards broad, and a strong chain could be occafionally drawn across it, to guard the port and city from the attack of an hoftile navy

13

Between the Bofphorus and the Hellefpont, the fhores of Europe and Afia receding on either fide inclose the sea of Marmara, which was known to the ancients by the denomination of Propontis. The navigation from the iffue of the Bofphorus to the entrance of the Hellefpont is about one hundred and twenty miles. Those who fteer their weftward courfe through the middle of the Propontis, may at once defcry the high lands of Thrace and Bithynia, and never lofe fight of the lofty fummit of Mount Olympus, covered with eternal fnows 14. They leave on the left a deep gulf, at the bottom of which Nicomedia was feated, the imperial refidence of Diocletian; and

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12 Procopius de Edificiis, 1. i, c. 5. His defcription is confirmed by modern Travellers. See Thevenot, part i. . i. c. 15. Tournefort, Lettre XII. Niebuhr Voyage d'Arabie. p. 22.

13 See Ducange, C. P. 1. i. part i. c. 16. and his Obfervations fur Villehardouin, p. 289. The chain was drawn from the Acropolis near the modern Kiosk, to the tower of Galata; and was fupported, at convenient diftances by large wooden piles.

14 Thevenot (Voyages au Levant, part i. 1. i. c. 14.) contracts the measure to 125 finall Greek miles. Belon (Observations, 1. ii. c. 1.) gives a good description of the Propontis, but contents him. felf with the vague expreffion of one day and one night's fail. When Sandys (Travels, p. 21.) talks of 150 furlongs in length as well as breadth, we can only fuppofe fome mistake of the prefs in the text of that judicious traveller.

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