n, a flow which enters at the western part and forms this Sea
which we know, beginning at Gadira[1] and extending all the way to the
Maeotic Lake.[2] Of these two continents the one to the right, as one
sails into the Sea, as far as the Lake, has received the name of Asia,
beginning at Gadira and at the southern[3] of the two Pillars of
Heracles. Septem[4] is the name given by the natives to the fort at that
point, since seven hills appear there; for "septem" has the force of
"seven" in the Latin tongue. And the whole continent opposite this was
named Europe. And the strait at that point separates the two
continents[5] by about eighty-four stades, but from there on they are
kept apart by wide expanses of sea as far as the Hellespont. For at this
point they again approach each other at Sestus and Abydus, and once more
at Byzantium and Chalcedon as far as the rocks called in ancient times
the "Dark Blue Rocks," where even now is the place called Hieron. For at
these places the continents are separated from one another by a distance
of only ten stades and even less than that.

Now the distance from one of the Pillars of Heracles to the other, if
one goes along the shore and does not pass around the Ionian Gulf and
the sea called the Euxine but crosses from Chalcedon[6] to Byzantium and
from Dryous[7] to the opposite mainland,[8] is a journey of two hundred
and eighty-five days for an unencumbered traveller. For as to the land
about the Euxine Sea, which extends from Byzantium to the Lake, it would
be impossible to tell everything with precision, since the barbarians
beyond the Ister River, which they also call the Danube, make the shore
of that sea quite impossible for the Romans to traverse--except, indeed,
that from Byzantium to the mouth of the Ister is a journey of twenty-two
days, which should be added to the measure of Europe by one making the
computation. And on the Asiatic side, that is from Chalcedon to the
Phasis River, which, flowing from the country of the Colchians, descends
into the Pontus, the journey is accomplished in forty days. So that the
whole Roman domain, according to the distance along the sea at least,
attains the measure of a three hundred and forty-seven days' journey,
if, as has been said, one ferries over the Ionian Gulf, which extends
about eight hundred stades from Dryous. For the passage across the
gulf[9] amounts to a journey of not less than four days. Such, then, was
the size of the Roman