ere considered uninhabitable and unnavigable, on account of the extreme
cold. The torrid zone, lying beneath the track of the sun, or rather the
central part of it, immediately about the equator, was considered
uninhabitable, unproductive, and impassable, on account of the excessive
heat. The temperate zones, lying between the torrid and the frigid
zones, were supposed to be the only parts of the globe suited to the
purposes of life. Parmenides, according to Strabo, was the inventor of
this theory of the five zones. Aristotle supported the same doctrine. He
believed that there was habitable earth in the southern hemisphere, but
that it was forever divided from the part of the world already known by
the impassable zone of scorching heat at the equator. (Aristot., Met.,
ii., cap. v.) Pliny supported the opinion of Aristotle concerning the
burning zones. (Pliny, lib. i., cap. lxvi.) Strabo (lib. ii.), in
mentioning this theory, gives it likewise his support; and others of the
ancient philosophers, as well as the poets, might be cited, to show the
general prevalence of the belief.--Cicero, _Somnium Scipionis_, cap.
vi.; Geminus, cap. xiii., p. 31; ap. Petavii Opus de Doctr. Tempor. in
quo Uranologium sive Systemata var. Auctorum. Amst., 1705, vol. iii.]

[Footnote 34: See Appendix, No. X. (see Vol II)]

[Footnote 35: Barros, Dec. I., lib. iii., cap. iv., p. 190, says
distinctly, "Bartholomeu Diaz, e os de sua compantica per causa dos
perigos, e tormentas, que em o dobrar delle passaram che puyeram nome
Tormentoso." The merit of the first circumnavigation, therefore, does
not belong to Vasco de Gama, as is generally supposed. Diaz was at the
Cape in May, 1487, and, therefore, almost at the same time that Pedro de
Covilham and Alonzo de Payva of Barcelona commenced their expedition. As
early as December, 1487, Diaz himself brought to Portugal the account of
his important discovery. The mission of Pedro Covilham and Alonzo de
Payva, in 1487, was set on foot by King John II., in order to search for
"the African priest Johannes." Believing the accounts which he had
obtained from Indian and Arabian pilots in Calicut, Goa, Aden, as well
as in Sofala, on the eastern coast of Africa, Covilham informed King
John II., by means of two Jews from Cairo, that if the Portuguese were
to continue their voyages of discovery upon the western coast in a
southerly direction, they would come to the end of Africa, whence a
voyage to the _Island of