Restat iter c?lo: c?lo tentabimus ire; / Da veniam c?pto, Jupiter alte, meo=--There remains a way through the heavens; through the heavens we will attempt to go. High Jupiter, pardon my bold design. _Ovid, in the name of D?dalus when he escaped from the labyrinth on wings._
"And their army shall come and overthrow all, whereat the king of the South being moved with choler, shall come forth and fight with him and conquer,"--Ptolemy Philopator against Antiochus the Great at Raphia--"and his troops shall become insolent, and his heart shall be lifted up,"--this Ptolemy desecrated the temple--Josephus--"and he shall cast down many ten thousands, but he shall not be strengthened by it.
I have always read that the world, both land and water, was spherical, as the authority and researches of Ptolemy and all the others who have written on this subject demonstrate and prove, as do the eclipses of the moon and other experiments that are made from east to west, and the elevation of the North Star from north to south.
"But out of a branch of her roots"--Ptolemy Euergetes was the son of the same father as Berenice--"shall one stand up in his estate, who shall come with an army into the land of the king of the north, and shall put all under subjection, and carry captives into Egypt their gods, their princes, their gold, their silver, and all their precious spoils, and shall continue many years when the king of the North can do nought against him."--If he had not been called into Egypt by domestic reasons, says Justin, he would have entirely ruined Seleucus.
In twelve whole figures the cosmography of the miniature world will be shown to you in the same manner as Ptolemy in his cosmography. And so I will divide it afterwards into limbs as he divided the world into provinces; then I will explain the function of the parts in every direction, and put before your eyes a description of the whole figure and substance of man as regards his movements by means of his limbs. And thus if it please our great author I will demonstrate the nature of man and his habits in the way I describe his form.
Absolutism tempered by assassination. A Cadmean victory.[807-2] After us the deluge.[807-3] All is lost save honour.[807-4] Appeal from Philip drunk to Philip sober.[807-5] Architecture is frozen music.[807-6] Beginning of the end.[808-1] Boldness, again boldness, and ever boldness.[808-2] Dead on the field of honour.[808-3] Defend me from my friends; I can defend myself from my enemies.[808-4] Extremes meet.[808-5] Hell is full of good intentions.[808-6] History repeats itself.[808-7] I am here: I shall remain here.[808-8] I am the state.[808-9] It is magnificent, but it is not war.[808-10] Leave no stone unturned.[809-1] Let it be. Let it pass.[809-2] Medicine for the soul.[809-3] Nothing is changed in France; there is only one Frenchman more.[809-4] Order reigns in Warsaw.[809-5] Ossa on Pelion.[809-6] Scylla and Charybdis.[810-1] Sinews of war.[810-2] Talk of nothing but business, and despatch that business quickly.[810-3] The empire is peace.[810-4] The guard dies, but never surrenders.[810-5] The king reigns, but does not govern.[810-6] The style is the man himself.[811-1] "There is no other royal path which leads to geometry," said Euclid to Ptolemy I.[811-2] There is nothing new except what is forgotten.[811-3] They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing.[811-4] We are dancing on a volcano.[811-5] Who does not love wine, women, and song Remains a fool his whole life long.[811-6] God is on the side of the strongest battalions.[811-7] Terrible he rode alone, With his Yemen sword for aid; Ornament it carried none But the notches on the blade.
Why expect that extraordinary virtues should be in one person united, when one virtue makes a man extraordinary? Alexander is eminent for his courage; Ptolemy for his wisdom; Scipio for his continence; Trajan for his love of truth; Constantius for his temperance.--_Zimmermann._
"For the king of the North"--Antiochus the Great--"shall return with a greater multitude than before,"--in the reign of the young Ptolemy Epiphanes--"and then a great number of enemies shall stand up against the king of the south, also the apostates and robbers of thy people shall exalt themselves to establish the vision; but they shall perish"--those who abandon their religion to please Euergetes, when he will send his troops to Scopas. For Antiochus will again take Scopas and conquer them.
"And in the end of years they shall join themselves together, and the king's daughter of the South,"--Berenice, daughter of Ptolemy Philadelphus, son of the other Ptolemy--"shall come to the king of the North to make peace between these princes"--to Antiochus Deus, king of Syria and of Asia, son of Seleucus Lagidas.
"And the king--Ptolemy son of Lagos,--of the south,"--Egypt,--"shall be strong,--but one of his princes shall be strong above him,"--Seleucus king of Syria,--"and his dominion shall be a great dominion,"--Appian says that he was the most powerful of Alexander's successors.
11:1. In the fourth year of the reign of Ptolemy and Cleopatra, Dositheus, who said he was a priest, and of the Levitical race, and Ptolemy his son brought this epistle of Phurim, which they said Lysimachus the son of Ptolemy had interpreted in Jerusalem.
5:21. And Simon went into Galilee, and fought many battles with the heathens: and the heathens were discomfited before his face, and he pursued them even to the gate of Ptolemais.
10:55. And king Ptolomee answered, saying: Happy is the day wherein thou didst return to the land of thy fathers, and sattest in the throne of their kingdom.
10:58. And king Alexander met him, and he gave him his daughter, Cleopatra: and he celebrated her marriage at Ptolemais with great glory, after the manner of kings.
10:57. So Ptolemee went out of Egypt, with Cleopatra his daughter, and he came to Ptolemais, in the hundred and sixty-second year.
9:29. But Philip, that was brought up with him, carried away his body: and out of fear of the son of Antiochus, went into Egypt to Ptolemee Philometor.
4:45. But Menelaus being convicted, promised Ptolemee to give him much money to persuade the king to favour him.
10:60. And he went honourably to Ptolemais, and he met there the two kings, and he gave them much silver, and gold, and presents: and he found favour in their sight.
16:11. Now Ptolemee, the son of Abobus, was appointed captain in the plain of Jericho, and he had abundance of silver and gold.
3:38. Then Lysias chose Ptolemee, the son of Dorymenus, and Nicanor, and Gorgias, mighty men of the king's friends.
1:19. And he made war against Ptolemee king of Egypt; but Ptolemee was afraid at his presence and fled, and many were wounded unto death.
After supper he conversed for half an hour with Mademoiselle Baptistine and Madame Magloire; then he retired to his own room and set to writing, sometimes on loose sheets, and again on the margin of some folio. He was a man of letters and rather learned. He left behind him five or six very curious manuscripts; among others, a dissertation on this verse in Genesis, In the beginning, the spirit of God floated upon the waters. With this verse he compares three texts: the Arabic verse which says, The winds of God blew; Flavius Josephus who says, A wind from above was precipitated upon the earth; and finally, the Chaldaic paraphrase of Onkelos, which renders it, A wind coming from God blew upon the face of the waters. In another dissertation, he examines the theological works of Hugo, Bishop of Ptolemais, great-grand-uncle to the writer of this book, and establishes the fact, that to this bishop must be attributed the divers little works published during the last century, under the pseudonym of Barleycourt.
11:22. And when he heard it, he was angry: and forthwith he came to Ptolemais, and wrote to Jonathan that he should not besiege the castle, but should come to him in haste, and speak to him.
12:48. Now as soon as Jonathan entered into Ptolemais, they of Ptolemais shut the gates of the city, and took him: and all them that came in with him they slew with the sword.
10:39. Ptolemais and the confines thereof, I give as a free gift to the holy places that are in Jerusalem, for the necessary charges of the holy things.
1:10. In the year one hundred and eighty-eight, the people that is at Jerusalem, and in Judea, and the senate, and Judas, to Aristobolus, the preceptor of king Ptolemee, who is of the stock of the anointed priests, and to the Jews that are in Egypt, health and welfare.
11:13. And Ptolemee entered into Antioch, and set two crowns upon his head, that of Egypt, and that of Asia.
10:12. For Ptolemee, that was called Macer, was determined to be strictly just to the Jews and especially by reason of the wrong that had been done them, and to deal peaceably with them.
11:8. And king Ptolemee got the dominion of the cities by the sea side, even to Seleucia, and he devised evil designs against Alexander.
11:24. And he took gold, and silver, and raiment, and many other presents, and went to the king to Ptolemais and he found favour in his sight.
16:16. And when Simon and his sons had drunk plentifully, Ptolemee and his men rose up, and took their weapons, and entered into the banqueting place, and slew him, and his two sons, and some of his servants.
11:18. And king Ptolemee died the third day after: and they that were in the strong holds were destroyed by them that were within the camp.
13:12. And Tryphon removed from Ptolemais with a great army, to invade the land of Juda, and Jonathan was with him in custody.
From the time the law of Copernicus was discovered and proved, the mere recognition of the fact that it was not the sun but the earth that moves sufficed to destroy the whole cosmography of the ancients. By disproving that law it might have been possible to retain the old conception of the movements of the bodies, but without disproving it, it would seem impossible to continue studying the Ptolemaic worlds. But even after the discovery of the law of Copernicus the Ptolemaic worlds were still studied for a long time.
While Menelaus thus the cares engross'd Of all those Chiefs, the shielded powers of Troy 'Gan move toward them, and the Greeks again Put on their armor, mindful of the fight. Then hadst thou not great Agamemnon seen Slumbering, or trembling, or averse from war, But ardent to begin his glorious task. His steeds, and his bright chariot brass-inlaid He left; the snorting steeds Eurymedon, Offspring of Ptolemy Piraïdes Detain'd apart; for him he strict enjoin'd Attendance near, lest weariness of limbs Should seize him marshalling his numerous host. So forth he went, and through the files on foot Proceeding, where the warrior Greeks he saw Alert, he roused them by his words the more.
10:1. Now in the hundred and sixtieth year, Alexander, the son of Antiochus, surnamed the Illustrious, came up and took Ptolemais, and they received him, and he reigned there.
11:16. And Alexander fled into Arabia, there to be protected: and king Ptolemee was exalted.
8:8. Then Philip seeing that the man gained ground by little and little, and that things for the most part succeeded prosperously with him, wrote to Ptolemee, the governor of Celesyria and Phenicia, to send aid to the king's affairs.
10:56. And now I will do to thee as thou hast written but meet me at Ptolemais, that we may see one another, and I may give her to thee as thou hast said.
13:25. But when he was come to Ptolemais, the men of that city were much displeased with the conditions of the peace, being angry for fear they should break the covenant.
5:55. Now in the days that Judas and Jonathan were in the land of Galaad, and Simon his brother in Galilee, before Ptolemais,
13:24. He embraced Machabeus, and made him governor and prince from Ptolemais unto the Gerrenians.
5:15. Saying, that they of Ptolemais, and of Tyre, and of Sidon, were assembled against them, and all Galilee is filled with strangers, in order to consume us.
15:16. Lucius, the consul of the Romans, to king Ptolemee, greeting.
21:7. But we, having finished the voyage by sea, from Tyre came down to Ptolemais: and saluting the brethren, we abode one day with them.
16:18. And Ptolemee wrote these things, and sent to the king that he should send him an army to aid him, and he would deliver him the country, and their cities, and tributes.
6:8. And there went out a decree into the neighbouring cities of the Gentiles, by the suggestion of the Ptolemeans, that they also should act in like manner against the Jews, to oblige them to sacrifice:
11:15. And when Alexander heard of it, he came to give him battle: and king Ptolemee brought forth his army, and met him with a strong power, and put him to flight.
12:45. Now, therefore, send them back to their own houses: and choose thee a few men that may be with thee, and come with me to Ptolemais, and I will deliver it to thee, and the rest of the strong holds, and the army, and all that have any charge, and I will return and go away: for this is the cause of my coming.
11:17. And Zabdiel the Arabian took off Alexander's head, and sent it to Ptolemee.
11:3. Now when Ptolemee entered into the cities, he put garrisons of soldiers in every city.
4:46. So Ptolemee went to the king in a certain court where he was, as it were to cool himself, and brought him to be of another mind:
10:51. And Alexander sent ambassadors to Ptolemee king of Egypt, with words to this effect, saying:
Fifth: As in the ordinary floating posture of the leviathan the flukes lie considerably below the level of his back, they are then completely out of sight beneath the surface; but when he is about to plunge into the deeps, his entire flukes with at least thirty feet of his body are tossed erect in the air, and so remain vibrating a moment, till they downwards shoot out of view. Excepting the sublime BREACH--somewhere else to be described--this peaking of the whale's flukes is perhaps the grandest sight to be seen in all animated nature. Out of the bottomless profundities the gigantic tail seems spasmodically snatching at the highest heaven. So in dreams, have I seen majestic Satan thrusting forth his tormented colossal claw from the flame Baltic of Hell. But in gazing at such scenes, it is all in all what mood you are in; if in the Dantean, the devils will occur to you; if in that of Isaiah, the archangels. Standing at the mast-head of my ship during a sunrise that crimsoned sky and sea, I once saw a large herd of whales in the east, all heading towards the sun, and for a moment vibrating in concert with peaked flukes. As it seemed to me at the time, such a grand embodiment of adoration of the gods was never beheld, even in Persia, the home of the fire worshippers. As Ptolemy Philopater testified of the African elephant, I then testified of the whale, pronouncing him the most devout of all beings. For according to King Juba, the military elephants of antiquity often hailed the morning with their trunks uplifted in the profoundest silence.
For the history of Cleopatra see ANTONIUS, MARCUS; CAESAR, GAIUS JULIUS; PTOLEMIES. The life of Antony by Plutarch is our main authority; it is upon this that Shakespeare's _Antony and Cleopatra_ is based. Her life is the subject of monographs by Stahr (1879, an _apologia_), and Houssaye, _Aspasie, Cléopâtre_, &c. (1879). Entry: CLEOPATRA
_Geography._--The writing of geographical books naturally began with the description of the Moslem world, and that for practical purposes. Ibn Khordadhbeh, in the middle of the 9th century, wrote a _Book of Roads and Provinces_ to give an account of the highways, the posting-stations and the revenues of the provinces. In the same century Ya'qubi wrote his _Book of Countries_, describing specially the great cities of the empire. A similar work describing the provinces in some detail was that of Qudama or Kodama (d. 922). Hamdani (q.v.) was led to write his great geography of Arabia by his love for the ancient history of his land. Muqaddasi (Mokaddasi) at the end of the 10th century was one of the early travellers whose works were founded on their own observation. The study of Ptolemy's geography led to a wider outlook, and the writing of works on geography (q.v.) in general. A third class of Arabian geographical works were those written to explain the names of places which occur in the older poets. Such books were written by Bakri (q.v.) and Yaqut (q.v.)[9] Entry: A
Tycho's principal work, entitled _Astronomiae Instauratae Progymnasmata_ (2 vols., Prague, 1602-1603) was edited by Kepler. The first volume treated of the motions of the sun and moon, and gave the places of 777 fixed stars (this number was increased to 1005 by Kepler in 1627 in the "Rudolphine Tables"). The second, which had been privately printed at Uraniborg in 1588 with the heading _De Mundi Aetherei recentioribus Phaenomenis_, was mainly concerned with the comet of 1577, demonstrated by Tycho from its insensible parallax to be no terrestrial exhalation, as commonly supposed, but a body traversing planetary space. It included, besides, an account of the Tychonic plan of the cosmos, in which a _via media_ was sought between the Ptolemaic and Copernican systems. The earth retained its immobility; but the five planets were made to revolve round the sun, which, with its entire cortège, annually circuited the earth, the sphere of the fixed stars performing meanwhile, as of old, its all-inclusive diurnal rotation (see ASTRONOMY: _History_). Under the heading _Astronomiae Instauratae Mechanica_, Tycho published at Wandsbeck, in 1598, a description of his instruments, together with an autobiographical account of his career and discoveries, including the memorable one of the moon's "variation" (see MOON). The book was reprinted at Nuremberg in 1602 (cf. Hasselberg, _Vierteljahrsschrift Astr. Ges._ xxxix. iii. 180). His _Epistolae Astronomicae_, printed at Uraniborg in 1596 with a portrait engraved by Geyn of Amsterdam in 1586, were embodied in a complete edition of his works issued at Frankfort in 1648. Tycho vastly improved the art of astronomical observation. He constructed a table of refractions, allowed for instrumental inaccuracies, and eliminated by averaging accidental errors. He, moreover, corrected the received value of nearly every astronomical quantity; but the theoretical purpose towards which his practical reform was directed, was foiled by his premature death. Entry: BRAHE
_History._--The first hint to reach Europe concerning the existence of habitable lands to the eastward of the Ganges is to be found in the writings of Pomponius Mela (A.D. 43) which speak of Chryse, or the Golden Isle, as lying off Cape Tamus--supposed to be the most easterly point in Asia--and over against the estuary of the Ganges. Thereafter there occur vague references to Chryse in the _Periplus of the Erythrean Sea_, &c., but the earliest trace of anything resembling first-hand knowledge concerning the peninsula of Indo-China and Malaya is revealed in the writings of Ptolemy, whose views were mainly derived from those of his predecessor Marinus of Tyre, who in his turn drew his deductions from information supplied to him by the mariner Alexander who, there is every reason to think, had himself voyaged to the Malay Peninsula and beyond. In the light of present knowledge concerning the trade-routes of Asia, which had been in existence for thousands of years ere ever Europeans attempted to make use of them, it is safe to identify Ptolemy's Sinus Perimulicus with the Gulf of Siam, the Sinus Sabaricus with the Straits of Malacca from their southern portals to the Gulf of Martaban, the Aurea Chersonesus with the Malay Peninsula, and the island of Iabadius or Sabadius--the reading of the name is doubtful--with Sumatra, not as has often been mistakenly attempted with Java. Although the first definite endeavour to locate the Golden Chersonese thus dates from the middle of the 2nd century of our era, the name was apparently well known to the learned of Europe at a somewhat earlier period, and in his _Antiquities of the Jews_, written during the latter half of the 1st century, Josephus says that Solomon gave to the pilots furnished to him by Hiram of Tyre commands "that they should go along with his stewards to the land that of old was called Ophir, but now the Aurea Chersonesus, which belongs to India, to fetch gold." After the time of Ptolemy no advance in knowledge concerning the geography of south-eastern Asia was made until Cosmas Indicopleustes, a monk and an Alexandrian Greek, wrote from personal knowledge between A.D. 530 and 550. His primary object was to prove that the world was built after the same shape and fashion as the Ark made by the Children of Israel in the desert; but he was able to show that the Malay Peninsula had to be rounded and thereafter a course steered in a northerly direction if China was to be reached. Meanwhile inter-Asiatic intercourse by means of sea-routes had been steadily on the increase since the discovery of the way to utilize the monsoons and to sail directly to and fro across the Indian Ocean (attributed to the Greek pilot Hippalus) had been made. After the decline of the power of Rome, the dominant force in Asiatic commerce and navigation was Persia, and from that time onward, until the arrival of the Portuguese upon the scene early in the 16th century the spice trade, whose chief emporia were in or near the Malay Peninsula, was in Persian or Arab hands. There is considerable reason to think, however, that the more frequent ports of call in the Straits of Malacca were situated in Sumatra, rather than on the shores of the Malay Peninsula, and two famous medieval travellers, Marco Polo and Ibn Batuta, both called and wintered at the former, and make scant mention of the latter. Entry: MALAY
EUCLID, Greek mathematician of the 3rd century B.C.; we are ignorant not only of the dates of his birth and death, but also of his parentage, his teachers, and the residence of his early years. In some of the editions of his works he is called _Megarensis_, as if he had been born at Megara in Greece, a mistake which arose from confounding him with another Euclid, a disciple of Socrates. Proclus (A.D. 412-485), the authority for most of our information regarding Euclid, states in his commentary on the first book of the _Elements_ that Euclid lived in the time of Ptolemy I., king of Egypt, who reigned from 323 to 285 B.C., that he was younger than the associates of Plato, but older than Eratosthenes (276-196 B.C.) and Archimedes (287-212 B.C.). Euclid is said to have founded the mathematical school of Alexandria, which was at that time becoming a centre, not only of commerce, but of learning and research, and for this service to the cause of exact science he would have deserved commemoration, even if his writings had not secured him a worthier title to fame. Proclus preserves a reply made by Euclid to King Ptolemy, who asked whether he could not learn geometry more easily than by studying the _Elements_--"There is no royal road to geometry." Pappus of Alexandria, in his _Mathematical Collection_, says that Euclid was a man of mild and inoffensive temperament, unpretending, and kind to all genuine students of mathematics. This being all that is known of the life and character of Euclid, it only remains therefore to speak of his works. Entry: EUCLID
The decorative value of hieroglyphic was fully appreciated in Egypt. The aim of the artist-scribe was to arrange his variously shaped characters into square groups, and this could be done in great measure by taking advantage of the different ways in which many words could be spelt. Thus _hs_ could be written [HRG: H*Hz:z], _hsy_ [HRG: Hz-i-i], _hs-f_ [HRG: Hz-z:f], _hs-n-f_ [HRG: Hz-n:f]. But some words in the classical writing were intractable from this point of view. It is obvious that the alphabetic signs played a very important part in the formation of the groups, and many words could only be written in alphabetic signs. A great advance was therefore made when several homophones were introduced into the alphabet in the Middle and New Kingdoms, partly as the result of the wearing away of old phonetic distinctions, giving the choice between [HRG: z] and [HRG: s], [HRG: t-T] and [HRG: ti], [HRG: m] and [HRG: M], [HRG: n] and [HRG: N], [HRG: w] and [HRG: W]. In later times the number of homophones in use increased greatly throughout the different classes, the tendency being much helped by the habit of fanciful writing; but few of these homophones found their way into the cursive script. Occasionally a scribe of the old times indulged his fancy in "sportive" or "mysterious" writing, either inventing new signs or employing old ones in unusual meanings. Short sportive inscriptions are found in tombs of the XIIth Dynasty; some groups are so written cursively in early medical papyri, and certain religious inscriptions in the royal tombs of the XIXth and XXth Dynasties are in secret writing. Fanciful writing abounds on the temples of the Ptolemaic and Roman periods. Entry: HRG