Thence to palestine

Communication from Puteoli to Alexandria was maintained direct across sea. ‘The prevalent summer wind in the east Medi- terranean waters was westerly ; and the ships ran in a direct course from the south of Italy to the Egyptian coast, keeping at the outset well out south from the Italian coast, in order to avoid the land winds and to get into the steady Mediterranean currents of air.

The pilots or sailing-masters had acquired great skill in these long voyages, and could make their harbour with almost unerring accuracy: they are compared by Philo to skilful charioteers driving ROADS AND TRAVEL (IN NT) their teams of horses. Such a service required also careful study of the seasons and the winds. Experience showed that there were seasons when the winds could be reckoned upon with confidence, and others when the long voyage was unsafe or impossible.

The important period to notice is that of the Etesian winds; and it is doubtful whether the direct voyage was hazarded (as a rule) except when they were blowing. In the year A.D. 38, when Agrippa was eager to go quickly from Rome to occupy his kingdom in northern Palestine, he was advised to wait for the Ktesian winds, and then sail direct to Alexandria and thence cross to Palestine. He reached Alexandria in a few days,* arriving apparently early in August. This passage of Philo (in Flac.

5) is extremely impor- tant for the system of communication with Syria and Egypt. In the open Mediterranean Sea and the Levant the Etesian winds are said to have blown from the north-west steadily for forty days after 20 July (or thirty days from 1 August); and at this season it was ditticult for news from the Kast to reach Rome (Tac. Hist. li. 98); and the Etesian winds prevented a voyage from Alexandria to Italy (Cxsar, de Bell. Civ. iit. 107),t or from Rhodes to Athens (Cicero, ad Att. vi.

7). They began to blow each day towards noon, but never earlier in the morning. There is much difference among the ancients as to the direction and duration of the Etesian winds; but the diversity is due doubtless to the facts that (1) they vary in different seas, (2) any regularly recurring time of fairly steady wind was Etesian (i.e. annual).

The statements as to the Etesian winds drawn from the ancient writers (see the quotations in Facciolati and Forcellini’s Lexicon) are entirely confirmed by modern meteorological experience, except that ‘the north-west winds prevail in the summer months’ generally, and not exclusively during the forty days from July 20. These winds prevail in that season ‘throughout the whole of the Mediterranean, but mostly in the eastern half.

’ In fact it is probable that, to the sailors of the Alexandrian Roman fleets, the Etesian winds meant simply the summer winds, and roughly corresponded to the period of open sea from the end of May to the middle of September. The statements restricting the number of days during which the winds blow are probably taken from Greek writers who were speaking more of the ZEgean Sea. t But Agrippa had to wait some little time for a ship.

The delay is explained by Philo as due to waiting on the winds; but in all probability this is not quite a complete account. It was necessary also to wait until a fleet of ships wasready. Singlo vessels did not venture on the long sea course. The reason why the long voyage was made by a whole fleet in company was, doubtless, safety. One ship could aid another. There is, of course, a good deal of exaggeration in Philo’s account of the certainty with which the ships reached their goal.

A single ship could not be certain of making directly the harbour of Alexandria after being six or eight days out of sight of land; and might easily miss Egypt altogether and sight Cyrene on the one hand or Syria on the other. But with a large fleet sailing with a widely extended front, the ships keeping within signalling distance of one * The expression dAlyats nuwépacs must not be pressed too closely ; it is opposed to the long coasting passage (see p.

879b), and probably indicates a period of 15 to 20 days; see below. + [ere the Etesian winds are spoken of as blowing in early October ; but this is due to the disorder of the Roman calendar, Cwsar reached Alexandria on 8 Oct.; but this date was really equivalent to late July or early August. + See the excellent diseussion, with quotations from modern experience at sea, in James Smith, Voyage and Shipwreck of St. Paul, pp.

64, 76 ff ROADS AND TRAVEL (IN NT) another, the experience of one would guide the others; when the ship on the extreme right came in sight of the Cyrenaic or Lgyptian coast, it would signal accordingly, and the news would spread to the extreme left immediately ; or if, on the other hand, after having run far enough, the ship on the right had not sighted any land, or that on the left of the fleet had sighted Crete,* this would show that all had taken too northerly a course; and sailing directions would be signalled over the whole fleet.

Similarly, the westward-going vessels tried to sail in a body, as we see from Seneca, EHpist. Mor. 77, 1. But exceptions occurred on this route, if vessels were belated and obliged to make the voyage alone (as in Ac 278 2811), It is not to be supposed that all the corn vessels sailed in one single fleet at the same time.

‘There could not possibly be facilities for loading nearly all the vessels simultaneously ; and it would have been an absurdly wasteful method for the first to wait until the last were loaded. Beyond a doubt, there must have been several successive companies, which sailed together: when a certain number were ready they would start. Moreover, it is known that even single corn ships were occasion- ally engaged on a voyage, as we have seen in the preceding paragraph.

A dedicatory inscription, erected by the master of a corn ship which was evidently wintering in the harbour of Phoenix, is quoted by James Smith (Voyage and Shipwreck of St. Paul, p. 261; also in CLL iii. 3). It cannot be supposed that a passage on govern- ment vessels was allowed to every one, any more than that the Imperial postal service by land was open to every one.

In the latter case it is known that no one could use the Imperial service without a diploma signed by the Emperor (who made a rule of entrusting a certain number of diplomata to governors of provinces, which the governors gave to persons travelling on public service, and to some others in exceptional circumstances).

t But, natur- ally, officers on government service, like the cen- turion in Ac 2791, took advantage of an Imperial corn ship with full authority ; and it is evident from the language of Ac 27!!

that in such a case the centurion was in supreme command of the vessel as the highest officer of the Imperial service on board, and, after consulting with the sailing- master and the captain and with any other per- sons whom he chose, settled how far the ship was to go and when it was to be laid up for the winter (St. Paul the Traveller, p. 324).

As regards the time which news from Rome took to reach Egypt, a much exaggerated idea of the speed of communication has been propagated by Friedlander (Sittengeschichte Roms, ii. p. 31), and has been incautiously quoted from him as the foundation of their argument by many modern scholars.

{ This distinguished scholar infers from Pliny and Diodorus that ships frequently sailed from the Sea of Azoff to Alexandria in fourteen days, and from Rhodes to Alexandria in four; and that on a fortunate voyage a ship could reach Marseilles in twenty days from Alexandria, and Alexandria in seven days from Utica or in nine days from Puteoli (Pliny, Nat. Hist. xix. 1; Diodor. iii, 34: see als» below, § vi.)

These, if correctly recorded, must have been quite exceptional voyages, and cannot be used as examples of ordinary life. But when Agrippa sailed from Puteoli, as above * This must have been common, for the lofty Cretan moun- tains are visible far out at sea; probably it may have been the usual intention to get bearings by sighting Crete.

+ Pliny apologized to Vrajan tor permitting his own wife to use the public service with a /ip/oma in a case of pressing haste, + So, for example, von Rohden in Panly-Wissowa ( Realencyel. j.2. p, 2621), and against him Wilcken (@riech. Ostraka, i. p. 199). ROADS AND TRAVEL (IN NT) 97 described, in A.P. 88 (probably in July, possibly as early as June),* he reached Alexandria in a few days (é6Nyais vorepov Hucpars, Philo, in Flac. 5), before any news of his elevation had reached the East.

This seems to imply a very short voyage ; but Philo is of course speaking comparatively, and we need not suppose that he means less than ten days, but rather even a little more than ten. Still this seems to be a case in which the time from Rome to Alexandria can hardly have exceeded twenty days.

With this as a siandard, it must be inferred that in the open season it would be a tedious and unfortunate voyage which failed to bring passengers and news from Rome to Alex- andria under twenty-five days.

The speed with which the news of a grave Im- perial event like the death or accession of an Emperor reached the provinces would be the test of extremest ordinary speed, There can be no doubt both that such news would be carried by quick special messengers faster than ordinary travellers would go, and that the State messengers would travel at a fairly uniform speed (except so far as winds or storms favoured or prevented them). Yet the statistics collected by Wilcken (Griech. Ostraka, i. p.

799 ff.) vary in a very perplexing way. But this variation is more in appearance than in reality. Setting aside mere examples of the ignorance in small villages or remote towns of events at Rome,t we find that probably sixty to sixty-five days was-an ordinary period for news of such great events to penetrate from Rome to Egypt. A good example is afforded at the accession of Pertinax (1 Jan. A.D.

198): the prefect of Egypt issued at Alexandria instructions with regard to the cele- bration of that important event (éml rq edruxeorary Baowd(e)la).t It cannot be supposed that any time was lost in such a case. The instructions are dated 6 March, and the news is not likely to have been then more than a day old. At that season, there- fore, in the slowest and most difficult time for travelling, the news travelled from Rome to Alex- andria in sixty-four days.

The route by which messages of this kind were transmitted will be considered hereafter: see below, §§ ix. xii. But, on the other hand, there are cases of much more rapid transmission ; as, for example, the ac- cession of Galba was known officially in Alexandria within twenty-seven days.

§ This speed, however, was due to the fact that Galba was proclaimed on 9 June, and at that season news would come by the direct sea route from Puteoli to Egypt, whereas the clearest examples of news of such events tak- ing about sixty days to arrive in Egypt belong to the winter or spring. We have seen that the direct sea route to Alexandria was hardly ventured upon except between 27 May and 15 September. y. VOYAGE FROM ALEXANDRIA TO ROME.

— The voyage from Alexandria to Rome was a much more difficult and tedious matter than the voyage from Rome to Alexandria, owing to the pre- valence during summer of westerly winds in the * Ships ready to sail from Puteoli in June must doubtless have started from Alexandria in the previous year (like St. Paul’s ships); those which started from Alexandria at the very be- ginning of the open season would not be able to sail from Puteoli till the end of July. See below, § vi.

+ Mere carelessness must also be allowed for in remote places: thus Nero’s death was matter of current knowledge in Elephantine within fifty-seven days; and yet on the fifty-eighth day a document was dated in Thebes by his reign (though Thebes must have received the news before Elephantine). Again, in (villages of the city) Arsinoé the accession of Pertinax (1 January) was currently known on 19 May, but ignored on 2 June: it was known in the Fayum before 1 April. Wileken (loc. cit.)

also gives examples of an Emperor ignored in common documents five or even eight months after his accession, + Berl. Gr. Urkunden, No, 646, Wileken, le. p. 802. § There is no evidence as to the exact time occupied in trans- mission, except that it was less than twenty-seven days (Wilcken, loc. cit. ; CLG 4957). 380 ROADS AND TRAVEL (IN NT) ROADS AND TRAVEL (IN NT) Mediterranean. The ships had to help themselves by the uncertain and fitful breezes on the coasts.

Now it was unsafe to keep too southerly a course owing to the great quicksands, Syrtes, on the African coast: even if the winds permitted, ships could not venture from Alexandria on a course which would keep them near the Cyrenaic shore lest the wind might shift round towards the north and drive them too far south (Ac 271’), They were compelled to take a northerly course, keeping as much to the west of north as the wind would allow.

Thus they might fetch the Lycian coast, or, in very favourable circumstances, possibly ships might even make the Rhodian or Cretan coast ; but it may be regarded as absolutely certain that they could never attempt a course across sea from the Egyptian coast direct to Italy or Sicily. Rather they would make for the south-east end of Crete—at the best—though with the prevailing west or north-west winds such a course could rarely have been sailed.

In ordinary circum- stances, the usual aim of ships from Alexandria undoubtedly was to reach the Lycian coast, keep- ing west of Cape Akamas in Cyprus; but some- times they made too much leeway, and failed to clear the western point of Cyprus. In the former case the harbour of Myra was, apparently, the usual point to which ships ran (Ac 212).

In the latter case ships seem to have run for the Syrian coast, perhaps because the south coast of Cyprus was dangerous from its shallow and harbourless character. Examples of voyages northwards from Alexandria are given below: on the voyage south from Rhodes to Alexandria, see p. 382», After reaching some point on the south coast of Asia Minor the westward-bound ship was obliged to work along the coast from point to point, taking advantage of the land breezes.

Dion Chrysostom in his second Oration at Tarsus speaks of the fitful and uncertain character of those breezes, compar- ing to them the policy of a city governed for brief periods by a succession of magistrates.* Not a moment could safely be lost in taking advantage of such a breeze, lest it should fall again, or change its direction, before the ship got past the promontory ahead. The progress along the coast in this part of the voyage was necessarily slow, and sometimes exceedingly tedious. St.

Paul’s ship took fifteen days from Cesarea to Myra (Ac 27° [Western text]). This part of the voyage frequently ended with the harbour of Rhodes. Vespasian touched at Rhodes on his voyage from Alexandria to Rome in A.D. 70.¢ So did Philotimus on his way from Cesar in the East to Cicero at Brundisium in July, B.o. 47 (see footnote on p, 3874). Herod the Great sailed in winter from Alexandria by the Pamphylian coast and Rhodes to Rome by way of Brundisium in B.c. 40, and in B.

C, 14 touched at Rhodes on his voyage from Csarea to the Black Sea,t as did St. Paul when making the reverse voyage (Ac 21!) Gregory of Nazianzus in the 4th cent. sailed from Alexandria to Greece, keeping under (i.e. south and west of) Cyprus, and reached Rhodes apparently on the twentieth day (Carm. de vita sud, 128 ff.; de rebus suis, 8312; Or. xviii. 31). The ship on which St.

Paul sailed for Rome is not stated to have touched at Rhodes, and the ex- pression that it came over against Cnidus (Ac 277) suggests that it kept north of Rhodes as if intend- ing to cross among the Cyclades to Malea. Lucian’s Ship, also, sailed north of Rhodes. * Oomep ob Tois amoyelots, "aAAoV SE Tots ad TOY yvodwr TVvEeviLaoL mA€oVTES, XXXiy, 36, p, 424. He had probably experi- enced these winds on the voyage back from Alexandria, + Josephus, BJ vir. ii. 1; Suet. Vesp. 7; Dion Cass, Ixvi.

9; Zonaras, xi. 17, He landed at Brundisium. + Josephus, Ant, x1v. xiv. 2f.; BJ1. xiv. 3; Ant. xvi. ii. 2.

After reaching the south-western extremity of Asia Minor the ships ran down to the eastern promontory of Crete, Salmone, and proceeded to work along its south coast in the same way as before (Ac 277-18), This was the safe course, in preference to the north side of Crete, because there, if a north wind came sweeping down the /Egean, the ship would be in danger of being driven on the coast, which has few harbours.

* On the south coast there was not the same danger of running ashore, partly because the harbours were more numerous, and still more because the south winds in this sea are much more gentle, as a rule, than the north winds. f Only one piece of evidence (see below) known to the present writer describes the voyage between Crete and the Italian coast.

But the course of such a voyage is indubitable: the ships would take an opportunity of running for the south point of Cythera, and thence off Zakynthos and across the mouth of the Adriatic to the south coast of Italy, usually to Hydruntum (Jtin. Mar. p. 489). They would not shrink from running direct to Italy if the wind at any moment were from the north.

An ancient fleet could safely run from Cythera or Zakynthos for the wide angle between Italy and Sicily ; the ships on the wings would guide the whole fleet by signal. The evidence of Lucian in the beginning of his dialogue, Navigiuwm, is clear: the corn ships in ordinary course sailed across from the south-west of Crete to sight Cythera;+ but they sometimes missed their course under the influence of southerly winds and got into the Avgean Sea.

There is not in the #gean or the Adriatic the same prevalence of westerly winds in summer as in the Levant and the open stretch of the Medi- terranean. Northerly and southerly winds are more characteristic of those seas; and therefore this part of the voyage would in general be much more easily accomplished than the preceding part.

Hence in a favourable voyage the runs from Alex- andria to Myra, and from Crete to Rhegium and thence to Puteoli, would not be slow; but, even at the best, a considerable time would necessarily be spent on the coasting voyage from Myra to the west end of Crete. It is noteworthy that this wide stretch of sea between Crete and Italy, being affected by the prevalent winds of the Adriatic, was called by the sailors Adria (Ac 272").

We note also that west- ward-bound ships kept well to the north in this part of the sea to catch the Adriatic winds, while eastward-bound ships must have kept more to the south in order to profit by the general Mediter- ranean current of air setting for the Syrian coasts and the hot deserts behind them (see § iv.) On the other hand, in unfavourable times, if the ship failed to clear Akamas, or did not get suit- able winds west of Crete, all three parts of the voyage might be tedious.

The scene in which Lucian’s dialogue, Navigium, is laid is most prob- ably taken from a real event. The ship failed to clear the point of Akamas on the seventh day from Alexandria, and, after being driven to Zidon, and on the tenth day from Zidon § reaching the Cheii- * SucA‘uevos (Eust.), which does not mean (as some scholars have understood) that there was no harbour on the north coast, but only that they were too few. + It is different in the Adriatic, where, as Horace (Od. i. 3.

15) says, the south wind is the arbiter, t eu rnv Kpyjrnv degcav AaBovras, vrep TOY Madea mAEVoarTas, 76 (i.e. before the seventieth day from Alexandria) eivat év *IraAiqa. A glance at the map shows with perfect certainty how this must be interpreted. § The exact course is mentioned: the ship sailed through the Aulon or channel between Cyprus and the Cilician-Pamphylian coast, the same course as St. Paul’s ship took.

That conrse was necessarily and invariably followed by westward-bound ships from the Syrian harbours, ' season, ROADS AND TRAVEL (IN NT) narrowly escaped sinking, and thereafter had a run of bad luck south of Crete, and was finally driven by southerly winds into the Ajgean, and had to put into the Pireus after a voyage of 70 days. vi. ‘TIME BETWEEN ALEXANDRIA AND ROME, —From this voyage, as described by Lucian, com- bined with the statement in Ac 27°, that St.

Paul’s ship reached Myra on the fifteenth day from Cesarea, we can state with very considerable accuracy the fair time to Myra from Alexandria as nine days, and from Zidon as twelve to thirteen. ‘Now two days was ample time from the Straits of Messina to Puteoli (Ac 281%), when the wind favoured ; and ten to twelve days must be allowed from Crete to the Straits.

This leaves thirteen to eighteen days for the coasting voyage from Myra to the west extremity of Crete, in the passage described in the next paragraph as a favourable one. Gregory of Nazianzus took twenty days to Rhodes (say ten to Myra, and ten from Myra to Rhodes) ; this is a little slower. Examples of the average length of passage from . Alexandria to Rome are difficult to get, as most. of those which are mentioned are exceptional and tedious voyages.

But the following may be taken ‘as probably a fair average voyage in the best No. 27 of the Berlin Greek Papyri is a Jetter written from Rome on 2 August, towards the end of the 2nd cent., by a sailor or officer on an Alexandrian ship. He mentions that he ‘came to land’ on 30 June, finished unloading on 12 July (perhaps in Puteoli),* and reached Rome on 19 July.

Now the ship cannot be supposed to have left Alexandria long before 26 May, for the statement of Vegetius about the period when the sea was fully open was almost certainly inspired by the rules for the Alexandrian corn ships. If the ship in question sailed in the first fleet it would probably be ready to start on the first day of open sea, and the voyage would have occupied thirty-six days.

But, further, the ships would probably be ready to take advantage of a favourable opportunity some days before the 26th, for it cannot be supposed that the day was fixed with absolute precision (Ac 28"), The voyage in this case, therefore, may be taken as lasting prob- ably about forty days; and we must understand that it was a favourable passage.

In this argu- ment we have assumed that the ship arrived as one of a fleet and not as a single stray ship ; but it may fairly be assumed that stray ships came in at unusual times, very early or late, and that a ship reaching Puteoli on 30 June was sailing in the ordinary course. Probably this was near the ordinary time for the first fleet of the year to arrive, as described by Seneca (Hpist. Mor. 77, 1), in a year when the voyage was very good.

As a rule, vessels with a heavy cargo like corn did not unload at Puteoli, but went on thence to Ostia, whereas valuable cargo was discharged at Puteoli and carried to Rome by land.

On the other hand, Lucian, in the passage quoted above, says that the ship which he describes, at the time when it was forced to put into the Pireus by stress of weather on the seventieth day from Alex- andria, ought in ordinary course to have been already in its harbour in Italy if it had not been driven astray into the Aigean Sea.t This seems to imply that the voyage to Italy just mentioned was an unusually quick one.

Had forty days been * If we assume that he started as soon as unloading was fin- ished, Puteoli would be certain. The Berlin editor gives wndév avaro\cAvoGar: read pydévav avod., ‘that none of the corn- traders has got leave to depart.’ tit would appear probable that this ship, which sighted Akamas on the seventh day from Alexandria, was on the ex- treme right of the fleet. It would signal the others, but was itself too far east to be able to clear the promontory.

donian Islands (east of Myra), it met a storm, ROADS AND TRAVEL (IN NT) 38] about the usual length, Lucian would naturally have said that his Ship should have been already Jor a long time in an Italian harbour on the seventieth day. Accordingly, we conclude that, when not de- tained unduly, fifty days was a more common length ot passage from Alexandria to Rome. It would be roughly divided thus— 6 days to Akamas in Cyprus. >» Myra. », Rhodes (Gregory’s time). », west end of Crete.

13 », the Straits. 1 day in the Straits. 2 days to Puteoli. When a ship was delayed beyond sixty or seventy days the passage would begin to be considered an unfortunate one; but no anxiety would be felt, for it must often have been the case that ships were earried far from their course,* and detained even till the following year. Phoenix, in the south-west of Crete, was evidently a common harbour for lag- gard ships to spend the winter in (Ac 27!2; also p.

379"): it was convenient as being near to the west end of the island, so that ships could there be on the outlook for promise of a fair passage across the wide sea to Cythera and Italy.

There can hardly be any doubt (though no proof formally exists or could be expected) that the remarkably early Christianization of Crete was due to the ships from Alexandria and Syria hav- ing occasionally to winter there, Such a result was natural when crew and passengers were doomed to remain for some months in harbour, On the other hand, the many voyages along the coasts of Pamphylia and Lycia appear to have produced little or no effect, for those provinces seem to have been.

less affected by Christianity in the early centuries than any other part of Asia Minor. The reason, doubtless, was that passengers in ships on the coast- ing voyage could never count on an hour’s delay. The fitful land winds might change or begin or end at any time, and the passenger was bound to the ship.t Only those who have had the experi- ence can realize how absolutely prohibitive this uncertainty is as regards any intercourse with the country along which the coasting voyage leads.

Pamphylia or Lycia could not be Christianized in the same way as Crete, but only by deliberate and intentional missionary effort such as that of Ac 12}. vii. VOYAGES TO ASIA, THE HGEAN AND EUXINE SEAS, PALESTINE AND EGypT.—During the rest of the year, except the open season, the voyage to Egypt was made by way of the coasts of Asia Minor and Syria—the same route that war vessels would take even in the very height of summer.

Caligula intended to sail by that course, vid Brundisium, when he thought of going to Egypt. This was the more luxurious though the slower route, as he could rest quietly on land every night (Philo, de Leg. 33, cf. in Flac. 5). Smaller vessels or ships of war never ventured on such long sea courses as were needed in the voyages hitherto described, but kept closer to the shore. Only the large, heavily-built merchant vessels were suited for such a voyage (Philo, de Leg.

33); they alone had sufficient spread of canvas, or strength of build, or storage room, to go a long voyage and remain out of sight of land for a number of days. The war ships were slighter in construction, moved in a more agile way, and were not dependent on the wind or able to make such use of the wind, for they trusted chiefly to oars. * Lucian’s Ship carried to the Pirewus; two to Malta, Ae ggl.11, + Cf. Dion Chrysostom as quoted on p.

380%, note *, 382 ROADS AND TRAVEL (IN NT) The voyages made by the south coast of Asia Minor are naturally similar in many respects to voyages between Rome and the ports of the /igean Sea or the Euxine. ‘These also may therefore be suitably noticed at this point. Pu- teoli was the chief harbour of this trade in the Roman Republican times and the first century after Christ. When Delos was the great centre and market of the gean, before the massacre of Roman traders by Mithridates in B.C.

88, Pute- oli was called Lesser Delos.* When Delos was destroyed, no other harbour of the Agean was heir to its greatness, and Puteoli became more important than ever. It was crowded with traders and settlers from all the Eastern lands and har- bours. ‘These brought their religion with them ; and Puteolanian inscriptions reveal a mingled, strange picture of foreign deities, cults, and socie- ties and traders (see the interesting article by M.

Dubois on ‘Cultes et Dieux & Pouzzoles’ in Mélanges @ Histoire et d’Archéologie, 1902, p. 23). From Puteoli thus started, and to it came in, a vast body of trade. After the completion of the great works by which Trajan improved the har- bour, Portus Augusti, at the mouth of the Tiber, which Claudius had planned and in part made, that port supplanted Puteoli to a considerable ex- tent as the emporium of the Eastern trade.

But in New Testament times it claimed most of that trade, though some part (especially the heaviest goods) always went direct to Ostia without break- ing bulk at Puteoli. All sbips trading between one or other of these harbours and any part of the Hast passed through the Straits of Messina. Beyond that, there were the three lines—one keeping well south to seek Alexandria, one keeping as near the line to Cythera as was possible, but often tending north- wards towards Zacynthos.

The ships from and to the Azean kept north of Cythera, rounding Cape Malea. Trading vessels coming from Egypt and Syria kept south of Cythera: as to those which were going to Egypt or Syria, it is probable that they kept north of Cythera and through among the Cyclades: such at least was Jerome’s course— see the end of this section. Doubtless, war vessels and small trading ships always kept north of Cythera, and crept on from harbour to harbour and island to island.

Thus a very large number of vessels must constantly have been passing and repassing through the southern Greek waters. There can be no doubt that all, or almost all, heavy merchandise travelled by this route between Rome and the Agean or Black Sea harbours. The alternative route by Corinth required transship- ment and transportation across the Isthmus of Corinth, which would have seriously added to the cost of freight.

In earlier times, when Cape Malea was an object of dread to sailors in small ships, the trouble of the Isthmus crossing might be incurred in carrying goods, but the Roman merchant ships seem to have lost the old dread: on a gravestone at Hierapolis in Phrygia we read that a certain Zeuxis had rounded Cape Malea seventy-two times.

Though Nero revived the old scheme of a ship canal through the Isthmus, he was probably impelled more by the tradition than by any real apprehension felt in his own time; and the canal would not produce any great saving in hours of voyage except to ships from (and to) the Adriatic, or Epirus, or Acarnania.

These facts, or the disturbed state of the Empite soon after, caused the scheme to be abandoned; and there was no good reason to bring about its resumption by a later Emperor, though Herodes Atticus talked about, it. * Paulus ex Festo, xi. p. 91, s.v. ‘Minorem Delum,”’ quoting the phrase from Lucilius, as iii. 94 (Lachmann). ROADS AND TRAVEL (IN NT) Ephesus was the great harbour of the Asian produce, though Smyrna vied with it; and other harbours also were used, such as Miletus, Caunos, etc.

But most ships seem to have put in at Ephesus, even though bound to other ports; and it became a custom for the Roman governors of Asia to land first there. This custom was finally recognized and made compulsory by a formal enactment of the Emperor Antoninus Pius.

The enactment probably sprang from some complaint on the part of the great rival cities, Smyrna and Pergamus; and the Imperial rescript marked and confirmed the recognition (perhaps originating from Hadrian) of Ephesus as the capital of Asia. Ephesus was de facto the capital of the province long before it was formally recognized as such by the Imperial law.* Passengers, also, as well as goods went some- times by this route to the Asian coast. Pliny the younger went in this way in August A.!)

111 to Ephesus, and experienced contrary winds. ‘There he changed ship, and went on northwards in small coasting vessels to his Bithynian province. Trade with the Black Sea harbours followed the same route as far as Ephesus, and then went on through the Hellespont and the Thracian Bos- porus. At Ephesus it met the line of ships trading between the north gean or Euxine har- bours and Syria or Kgypt.

This latter line of ships was now far less important than it had been under the Greek kings in the last centuries B.C, when Canon Hicks thinks it safe to assert that daily ships ran on the line.t The causes stated above prevented such trade on any great scale between the provinces of the Eimpire. Still there was an appreciable trade, and Diodorus (iii.

34) gives a statement of the length of voyage from the Sea of Azoff to Crete and Egypt (which, as we saw reason to think, conveys a very exaggerated idea of the swiftness of the voyage). t From this passage of Diodorus it is clear that the long over-sea voyage to Alexandria was made direct from Rhodes: with a westerly or north- westerly wind that was the natural line, and not any longer than the run from the Lycian coast.

With a west wind the ancient ships could hardly have reached Alexandria from Lycia on a direct course; now the object was to make Alexandria on a straight run. ‘Thus we see that there were three long lines common in the Levant voyages: (1) from Rhodes to Alexandria; (2) from Alex- andria past Akamas towards Myra, though the latter part of this voyage could not have been made on a straight course; (8) from Myra or Pa- tara to one of the Syrian harbours, as in Ac 21.

It is impossible that ancient ships ordinarily sailed from the Sea of Azoff to Crete in ten days. A voyage from Crete to Alexandria in four days is more credible, because ships could often have a continuous run with a steady breeze, and a lucky voyage might reach Alexandria in four days. But there is a great variety inevitable in the former part of the voyage—changes of direction, changes of wind, passing from sea to sea, and through the long narrow passages of the Bosporus and Darda- nelles.

Finally, the statement that ten days was the time from Alexandria up the Nile to Ethiopia is entirely inconsistent with the tendency of all the evidence that Wilcken has collected as to the length of time needed for even great Imperial events to become known in Upper Egypt (even though in many cases the indifference and carelessness of the peasants may account for their ignorance). In an admirable excursus to his posthumously * See vol. iii. art. Percamus, p. 751%.

+ See Paton and Hicks, /nscriptions of Cos, p. xxxiii. t Diodorus is more probably speaking of ships in his own time than quoting from some Greek account of older voyages, ROADS AND TRAVEL (IN NT) published Commentary on First Peter, Dr. Hort traces the course of the messenger who carried that letter from Rome to a harbour on the south coast of the Black Sea: he considers that Sinope was the harbour, but Amastris seems more prob- able.

Sinope was no longer so important a har- bour under the Romans as it had been in older times: Amastris surpassed it, and bore the title Metropolis Ponti. Moreover, if the messenger had landed at Sinope, he would naturally have visited Cappadocia before Galatia, whereas Dr. Hort has rightly argued that the strange order of enumeration of the provinces is due to the order of the messenger’s journey.

He landed at Amastris, visited Pontus first, then passed through North Galatia to Cresarea and perhaps Tyana, and thence through South Galatia to Asia, and finally reached Bithynia. It may be added to Dr.

Hort’s examination of the facts, that the journey in its eastern part prob- ably corresponds to the actual order in which Christianity spread; that is to say, the new re- ligion was carried by ship to the Bithynian and Pontic harbours, and thence spread south into the northern and north-eastern regions of the province Galatia, including inner Pontus * and the north of Cappadocia.

‘Thus we find that this new thought and teaching, ‘floating free on the currents of communication across the Empire,’ spread first directly along the great tracks that led to Rome, as every free and natural movement. of thought necessarily did owing to the circumstances of that period, and from that centre was redirect.d to the outlying parts of the Empire.

As Christianity spread from Syria and Cilicia through the Cilician Gates, it did not radiate out west and north and north-east, but passed along the great route that led by Ephesus, Corinth, and the sea-way, or by Troas and Philippi and the overland way, to Italy. It is extremely difficult to get even an approxi- mate idea of the time required on these courses between Rome and the various eastern provinces.

There was no rule possible in this case, such as we could determine roughly in the direct Alex- andrian passages, and as we shall be able to deter- mine more accurately in the overland postal route (see $ix.) ‘The ships generally were merchant vessels, liable to minor variations in their course according to the conditions of the carrying trade, and sometimes waiting in harbours for some time to unload or take in fresh cargo, as in Ac 20. Thus their voyages were evidently slow, as a rule.

Probably they were generally much smaller than the Alexandrian ships, and some would not ven- ture to do more tban make short runs from har- bour to harbour or point to point, in the ancient Greek fashion: the last class of vessels had more reason to dread Malea than the better built traders.

Even war vessels, which were compara- tively independent of winds, evidently required much longer time for the eastern voyage than the large Alexandrian trading vessels, Statistics as to the time which despatches during the Republican period, or private letters under the Empire, required to reach a distant destination on this course, are of little value as indications of the rate of travel: there was no regular postal ser- vice, and the letter-carriers were liable to many delays and interruptions.

Hence the recorded facts vary widely. Friedlander (p. 31) quotes two cases of letters from Syria addressed to Cicero in Rome : one, dated 31 Dec., took over a hundred days in delivery ; the other, dated 7 May, hardly over * See the article Pontus in vol. iv., where emphasis is laid on the important, but often neglected, distinetion between Pro- vineia Pontus on the coast (which was united with Bithynia) and mediterraneus Pontus (a kingdom at first, in Prov.

Galatia till about 106, thereafter in Proy. Cappadocia). ROADS AND TRAVEL (IN NT) 383 fifty :* presumably the latter was carried straiylit through, while the other was carried by a messenger who was detained on the way. ‘The slow letter was sent during the worst season of the year, the quick letter during the best ; but in the case of iand travelling (if either went in that way), the season ought not to make any serious difference.

Both were sent by men of high standing, who could * command all the resources of the State for quick transmission ; but the period was disturbed, and the machinery of government was dislocated and liable to stoppages. The quick letter travelled at much the same rate as the Imperial postal service organized by Augustus (see below, § ix. ), taking only a few days more than Imperial despatches probably required. The slow letter perhaps went by ship. A.

business letter written in Puteoli on 23 July, A.D. 174, was delivered in Tyrea hundred and seven days later,+ though it was sent in the most favour- able season for sailing. This letter would not be transmitted by the Imperial service, but by private agents, travelling doubtless by ship.

It couid hardly have been sent by one of the large ships running direct to Alexandria, but was more probably sent on a trading vessel which went by Cape Malea and the Asian coast, and probably spent time in vari- ous harbours. St.

Jerome sailed in August from Portus Augusti, by Malea, through the Cyclades, by the Asian coasts and Cyprus to Syrian Antioch, whence he went on to Jerusalem, which he reached in winter ; { this voyage was made along the same route by which the letter to Tyre travelled, but seems to have been quicker.

With similar variation in speed, letters from Rome in Cicero’s time reached Athens—in one case arriving on 14 October in twenty-one days, in another case in forty-six days during July and August: § the former is mentioned as showing great activity on the part of the messenger; the latter, though so slow, came in the most settled season of the year. viii. OVERLAND ROUTE AND IMPERIAL PostT-