Beyond the Pillars of Heracles: The Classical World Seen Through the Eyes of its Discoverers

Archeology and ethnology can sometimes succeed in tracing, by inference, the movement of people from one region to another, long ago. But this sort of exploration, whether by peaceful migration or militant invasion, is not the theme of the present volume, which undertakes to rehearse the achievements of those individuals in antiquity whose explorations were of sufficient magnitude and daring to earn them the title of "Great," and which, through one chance or another, can still today be traced on the map and intelligibly set forth in print. Because of the restrictions thus imposed, this initial volume in the Great Explorers Series must confine itself to the comparatively small portion of the world that was literate in antiquity and was concerned to put itself on record in such matters as voyages of exploration by sea or land. Ages passed before it occurred to men that invisible speech, which dissipates itself even as it is uttered, may be transmuted into visible and enduring form by means of conventional graphic signs.