Periplus

A periplus was a special kind of old document used by sailors a long time ago. It listed important places like ports and landmarks along the coast, and it told how far apart they were. This helped captains of ships know what to expect when they traveled near a shore. Think of it like a map for the sea, but written down instead of drawn.

These documents were very useful for ancient sailors. They were like a logbook that guided ships from one place to another. Sometimes, the people who wrote them added extra notes about the places they visited, which helped others learn more about faraway lands.

The idea of a periplus goes back a very long way, even to the time of early Greek historians. Famous writers like Herodotus and Thucydides used information from these documents in their stories. So, peripli were an important way that people shared their knowledge of the world and helped others travel safely.

Variant

A word that means the same as "periplus" is "periplum." The writer Ezra Pound used this word in his poems to describe a journey or voyage. In one of his poems, he talks about the "great periplum" as the daily path of the Sun God, Helios. Pound also used "periplum" to describe how a sailor sees the coast, not like on a map, but as someone traveling by sea. Other poets have compared this idea to slowly watching a scene move past, like looking out of a moving car or train.

Etymology

The word periplus comes from the Greek word periplous, which means "a sailing-around". It is made from two parts: peri-, meaning "around" or "about", and plous, meaning "voyage". Ancient Greeks used this word in its simple sense, but it also came to mean a special kind of guide for sailors. People from ancient times, like the Phoenicians, Greeks, and Romans, used this word when they talked about navigating the seas.

Known peripli

Many important travel guides called peripli have been found by scholars. These guides listed ports and landmarks along coastlines, helping sailors know what to expect.

Carthaginian

• The Periplus of Himilco the Navigator, parts of which are kept in writings by Pliny the Elder and Avienius.
• The Periplus of Hanno the Navigator, a Carthaginian explorer who sailed along the coast of Africa from Morocco as far south as Senegal in the sixth or fifth century BCE.

Greek

• The Periplus of Scylax of Caryanda, who sailed down the Indus River to Suez under Darius I. Herodotus wrote about this trip, and others like Aristotle and Strabo also mentioned it.
• The Euthymenes wrote about West Africa around the sixth century, but his work did not survive.
• The Massaliote Periplus described trade routes along Atlantic Europe and was written by sailors from Massalia (now Marseille, France) maybe in the sixth century BCE.
• Pytheas of Massilia wrote On the Ocean in the fourth century BCE, but only pieces of it remain.
• The Periplus of Pseudo-Scylax is thought to be from the fourth or third century BCE.
• The Periplus of Nearchus recorded the area between the Indus and the Persian Gulf for Alexander the Great. Strabo and Arrian used his work.
• On the Red Sea by Agatharchides has pieces kept in writings by Photius.
• The Periplus of Scymnus of Chios dates to around 110 BCE.
• The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea was written by a Greek living in Alexandria in the first century CE. It describes the coast of the Red (Erythraean) Sea, starting at Berenice, and talks about the coast of India to the Ganges River and the east coast of Africa (called Azania). It also mentions the "monsoon winds" that help ships travel faster between India and the Red Sea. The Horn of Africa was called “the Cape of Spices,” and Yemen was known as the "Frankincense Country."
• The Periplus Ponti Euxini describes trade routes along the Black Sea, written by Arrian in the early second century CE.
• The Stadiasmus Maris Magni was written by an unknown author in the second half of the third century AD.

Rahnāmag

Persian sailors used special guide books called Rahnāmag to help them sail. These books listed ports, coastal landmarks, and the distances between them along the shores.

These old sailing directions date back to at least the 12th century. Some of them talked about the Indian Ocean and mentioned that it could be very difficult to leave, describing it as a "hard sea to get out of." They also warned about the "circumambient sea," where returning was thought to be impossible.

Tactic of naval combat

A periplus was also an ancient sea battle trick. Ships called triremes would try to go around the other ships to attack them from behind.