ed thefe people how to defend themselves against the incurfions of pirates. For this purpose they perfuaded them to unite, to build cities, and to fortify them. The Greeks were then enabled to inhabit the fea-coafts, and to apply to navigation.

The inhabitants of Attica, appear to have been the first who enjoyed this advantage. They owed it to Cecrops, who, at the head of an Egyptian colony, came and fettled in that country 1582 years before Chrift. There is room to believe, that this prince was either accompanied by a fmall fleet, or that he caused some ships to be built on a model of his making. We fee, in effect, that Cecrops used to fend to Sicily for the corn his colony wanted. It muft alfo be thought, that the Athenians had some naval forces at that time. Hiftory fays, that Erifichthon, fon of Cecrops, feized on the isle of Delos, 1558 years before Christ. Such an expedition could only fucceed by means of a certain number of fhips. Yet it does not appear that. these first enterprises had any confequences. Every thing, on the contrary, leads us to think, that the Athenians, after the death of Cecrops, neglected naval affairs, and loft fight of that important object. We fee, that, in the time of Thefeus, they were obliged to have recourfe to the failors and pilots of Salamin to conduct the ship that carried this hero into Crete. We will remark farther, that for many ages the Athenians had only one port, which was that of Phaleris, which, to speak properly, was nothing but a bad harbour.

Other people of Greece addicted themselves, about the fame ages, to navigation, and distinguished themselves greatly. Such were the inhabitants of the ifle of Egina, to whom ancient memoirs attribute the invention of that art. Such alfo were the inhabitants of Salamin, who

e Philocor. apud Strab. 1. 9. p. 09.; Thucyd. 1. 2. p. 108. See fupra, bock 1. chap. 4. art. 1. p. 16.

Tzetzes ex Philocor. ad Hefiod. op. v. 3. p. 13. edit. in 4to. 1603.

I

f Pauf. 1. 1. c. 31.; Eufeb. chron. 1. z. n. 90. p. 75.; Athen. 1. 9. p. 392.* according to the correction of Cafaubon, animadv. p. 673.; Syncell. p. 153.

8 Plat. in Thef. p. 7.

Heliod. fragm. p. 343.

J

Pauf. 1. 1. c. I. P.3

appear

appear to have excelled, in the heroic times, by their skill and experience in navigation *. We may alfo put the Argives in the number; and that not without good reason. The veffel in which Danaus came into Greece, has been celebrated by all the writers of antiquity, We are not ignorant, that this prince feized on the throne of Argos 1510 years before J. C.; but we may fay, that none of thefe people could be compared with the Cretans. Minos has been always looked upon by the ancients as the first Greek prince who had the empire of the fea". I speak of Minos the Second, who took fo bloody a vengeance of the Athenians for the murder of his fon Androgeos. This prince was able to equip a fleet strong enough to clear the fea of the pirates who infested it . This empire of the sea, of which antiquity gives the honour to Minos, muft only be understood of the fuperiority he had in the Cretan fea and the adjacent illes: that is to fay, that this prince having a great number of fhips in these parts, was there the most powerful. With regard to the maritime commerce of the Cretans, I do not find any thing of all that remains of antiquity, that can give us the leaft indications of it.

We fee fome traces of maritime expeditions in what the ancient mythology has preserved for us of the voyages of Bellerophon, of Perfeus, and of Hercules . But I doubt if these enterprises have been so extenfive as certain modern critics would perfuade us". The Greeks were then too ignorant in navigation. Although their writers have boafted greatly of the naval forces of Minos, yet we ought not to form a great idea of the fleet of this prince. The fhips which composed it, fcarce deferved that name.

m See fupra, p. 34.

Thucyd. J. 1. p. 4.; Herod. 1. 3. n. 122.; Arist. de repub. 1. 2. c. 10. ; Diod. 1. 4. p. 304; Strabo 1. 10. p. 730.

Plato de leg. 1. 4. p. 825.

P Thucyd. 1. 1. p. 4.

See les mem. de l'acad. des infcript. t. 7. h. p. 37. &c.

Id. ibid. p. 220, &c.

Rr 2

They

They had no fails. Dedalus is always looked upon in the Greek antiquity to have invented them, when he tried to find means to fly from the isle of Crete. This famous artist then found, fay they, the fecret of availing himself of the wind to haften the courfe of his fhip. By means of this new discovery, his fhip paffed fafely through the middle of Minos's fleet, without their being able to inclose him; the use and force of oars giving way to the activity of the wind, of which Daedalus had the advantager.

This knowledge had not then made a great progress among the Greeks. It appears, indeed, that after Dædalus they used fails; but they were ignorant of the art of managing them properly. Eolus, he who received Ulyffes on his return from Troy, paffed in Greece for the firft who had fhewn the failors to know the winds, and the manner of profiting by them, by turning the fails agreeably to their direction. Yet what can we think of these inftructions? At the time of Homer, that is to fay, about 300 years after the war of Troy, the Greeks only knew the four cardinal winds". Vitruvius and Pliny tell us, that these people were a long time ignorant of the art of fubdividing the intermediate parts of the horizon, and of determining a num ber of rhombs fufficient to serve the purposes of a navigation of fmall extent ".

The voyage which the Argonauts undertook to penetrate into Colchis, made the Greeks make fome progress in naval architecture. Till that time, by the confeffion of their best historians, these people only used barks and little merchant-veffels . Jason foreseeing all the dangers of the expedition he meditated, took extraordinary precautions to make it fucceed. He caused to be built at the foot of Mount Pelion in Theffaly, a fhip, which, for largenefs, and com

Plin. 1. 7. fect. 57. p. 418.; Pauf. 1. 9. c. 11. p. 732.

Diod. 1. 5. p. 336.; Plin. 1. 7. fect. 57. p. 416.; Servius ad Æneid. 1. 1.

V. 56.

" Odyff. 1. 5. v. 295,

Vitruv. 1. 1. c. 6.; Plin. 1, 2. fect 46. p. 96.

Diod. 1. 4. p. 285.

pleteness

pleteness of rigging, furpaffed all thofe that had been seen to that time. This was the firft fhip of war which went out of the ports of Greece. The fame of this armament being spread, all the most distinguished people of the nation would have a part in it, and imbarked under the conduct of Jafon, 1253 years before J. C.

It would be very fatisfactory to be able to penetrate into the motives and the object of an enterprise in which all Greece was interested. But the events of these remote times are so involved in fables, that it is very difficult to obtain the truth from them. We cannot determine exactly what the golden fleece was, of which the Argonauts propofed the conqueft. The fentiments of ancient authors are very much divided on this point. The voyage of the Argonauts was intended, according to fome, to draw from Colchis the treasures which Phryxus had carried there; others think, that the notion of the golden fleece arofe from the custom they had, in these countries, of collecting, by means of sheep-fkins, the gold which rolled down certain torrents. Varro believes that this fable owed its origin to a voyage undertaken by fome inhabitants of Greece, who went to look for fkins and other rich furs which Colchis furnished in abundance. According to this fentiment, which has been adopted by many modern critics, we fhould only look upon the expedition of the Argonauts as an enterprise formed by fome merchants affociated to make new difcoveries. I do not speak of the vifions of the alchymifts. Accustomed to find every where the fecret of the great work, they will have it, that the Argonauts undertook the voyage to Colchis, with a defign to

Diod. ibid.; Plin. 1. 7. fect. 57. p. 417.

■ See Herod. 1. 7. n. 197.; Diąd. 1. 4. p. 209.; Hygin. fab. 3; Palæphat. c. 31. p. 39.

Strabo, l. 11. p. 763,; Appian. de bell. Mithridat. p. 242. Near FortLouis, they ufe fuch fleeces to gather the gold powder, which the Rhine rolls down. When these skins are well filled, one may, by allufion, call them flee. çes of gold.

f De re ruft. 1. z. c. I.

Le Clerc b. univ. t. 1. p. 247; Mem. de Trev. Juin. 1702. p. 66.

bring from thence a book written on fheeps fkins, in which was contained the fecret of making gold,

Of all those who have tried to clear up this event, I think that Euftathius has given us the most just and most exact idea of it. He took it from an ancient hiftorian. The voyage of the Argonauts, according to this author, was at once a military and mercantile expedition. The object which they propofed to themselves, was to open the com merce of the Euxine fea, and at the fame time to fecure some establishments. To fucceed in this, they must have had a fleet and troops. Thus the armament of the Argonauts was composed of many ships, and they left colonies at Colchis. We find a proof of this in Homer and many other writers. Yet moft of the poets have only spoken of the fhip Argo, because, being the admiral of the fleet, that veffel carried the princes who afsisted in the voyage. The other objects of that enterprise do not equally interest poetry and the mufes.

I fhall not undertake to follow the Argonauts in their voyage. For want of fufficiently understanding naviga tion, their fleet was a long time on different coafts. They ran a great risk in the paffage of Cyanees or Symplegades. They formerly called fo a heap of rocks which fhew themfelves four or five leagues from the entrance of the Euxine fea. As they are very near each other, in proportion as you are diftant from them, or you approach to them, these rocks appear to join or to separate. The waves of the sea, which dash against them with impetuofity, raise a vapour, which, obfcuring the air, hinder the diftinguishing exactly the objects, and augment the illufion. At the time of the Argonauts, they believed these rocks moveable, and they imagined that they joined to deftroy fhips in their

↳ Suid. voce Aégas, t. 1. p. 525.; Anonym. Incred. c. 3. p. 86, i Ad Dionyf. Perieget. v. 689.

k Charax.

1 Iliad. 1. 5. v. 641. &c.; Plin. 1. 6. fect. 5. p. 395.; P. Mela, 1. 1. c. 19. P. 106.; Strabo, 1. 11. p. 758.; Euftath. loco cit.

Tournefort, voyage du Levant, t. 2. p. 149. &c.

paffage.