Strabo

StraboStrabo ("squinty") was a term employed by the Romans for anyone whose eyes were distorted or deformed. The father of Pompey was called "Pompeius Strabo". A native of Sicily so clear-sighted that he could see things at great distance as if they were nearby was also called "Strabo." (pronounced: /ˈstreɪboʊ/; Greek: Στράβων, Strabōn; 64/63 BCE – ca. 24 CE), was a Greek geographer, philosopher and historian.
==Life==
Strabo was born to an affluent family from Amaseia in Pontus (modern Amasya, Turkey),Geography Book XII Chapter 3 Section 15, "Amaseia, my fatherland". a city that he said was situated the approximate equivalent of 75 km from the Black Sea. Pontus had recently fallen to the Roman Republic, and although politically he was a proponent of Roman imperialism, Strabo belonged on his mother's side to a prominent family whose members had held important positions under the resisting regime of King Mithridates VI of Pontus.Pontus fell to the Roman general Pompey in 63 BCE and, after the murder or suicide of Mithridates VI of Pontus (otherwise known as Mithridates the Great), was broken up into smaller provinces in 64 BCE. Strabo in Book 12 Chapter 3 Section 41 states that the Romans took possession of Bithynia "a little before my time", setting the date of his birth to after 63 BCE.
Strabo's life was characterized by extensive travels. He journeyed to Egypt and Kush, as far west as coastal Tuscany and as far south as Ethiopia in addition to his travels in Asia Minor and time spent in Rome. Travel throughout the Mediterranean and Near East, especially for scholarly purposes, was popular during this era and was facilitated by the relative peace enjoyed throughout the reign of Augustus (27 BCE – 14 CE). He moved to Rome in 44 BCE, and stayed there, studying and writing, until at least 31 BCE. In 29 BCE, on his way to Corinth (where Augustus was at the time), he visited the island of Gyaros in the Aegean Sea. Around 25 BCE, he sailed up the Nile until reaching Philae,with prefect of Egypt Aelius Gallus, who had been sent on a military mission to Arabia after which point there is little record of his proceedings until 17 CE.
It is not known precisely when Strabo's Geography was written, though comments within the work itself place the finished version within the reign of Emperor Tiberius. Some place its first drafts around 7 CE, others around 18 CE. Last dateable mention is given to the death in 23 CE of Juba II, king of Maurousia (Mauretania), who is said to have died "just recently".Strabonis Geographica, Book 17, Chapter 7. He probably worked on the Geographyfor many years and revised it steadily, not always consistently. 
On the presumption that "recently" means within a year, Strabo stopped writing that year or the next (24 CE), when he died.
The first of Strabo's major works, Historical Sketches (Historica hypomnemata), written while he was in Rome (ca. 20 BCE), is nearly completely lost. Meant to cover the history of the known world from the conquest of Greece by the Romans, Strabo quotes it himself and other classical authors mention that it existed, although the only surviving document is a fragment of papyrus now in possession of the University of Milan (renumbered [Papyrus] 46).
==Education==
Strabo studied under several prominent teachers of various specialties throughout his early lifehe mentions all or most of his teachers as prominent citizens of their own respective cities at different stops along his Mediterranean travels. His first chapter of education took place in Nysa (modern Sultanhisar, Turkey) under the master of rhetoric Aristodemus, who had formerly taught the sons of the very same Roman general who had taken over Pontus.(see note 3.)this also highlights the international trend of the era that Greek intellectuals would often instruct the Roman elite Aristodemus was the head of two schools of rhetoric and grammar, one in Nysa and one in Rhodes, the former of the two cities possessing a distinct intellectual curiosity of Homeric literature and the interpretation of epics. Strabo was an admirer of Homer's poetry, perhaps a consequence of his time spent in Nysa with Aristodemus.Aristodemus was also the grandson of the famous Posidonius, whose influence is manifest in Strabo's Geography
Around the age of 21, Strabo moved to Rome, where he studied philosophy with the Peripatetic Xenarchus, a highly respected tutor in Augustus's court. Despite Xenarchus's Aristotelian leanings, Strabo later gives evidence to have formed his own Stoic inclinations.largely due to his future teacher Athenodorus, tutor of Augustus, In Rome, he also learned grammar under the rich and famous scholar Tyrannion of Amisus.thus completing his traditional education of Greek aristocracy; namely rhetoric, grammar, & philosophyTyrannion was known to have befriended Cicero and taught his nephew, Quintus Although Tyrannion was also a Peripatetic, he was more relevantly a respected authority on geography, a fact obviously significant, considering Strabo's future contributions to the field.
The final noteworthy mentor to Strabo is Athenodorus Cananites, a philosopher who had spent his life since 44 BCE in Rome forging relationships with the Roman elite. Athenodorus endowed to Strabo three important items: his philosophy, his knowledge, and his contacts. Unlike the Aristotelian Xenarchus and Tyrannion that preceded him in teaching Strabo, Athenodorus was Stoic in mindset, almost certainly the source of Strabo's diversion from the philosophy of his former mentors. Secondly, from his own experiences, he provided Strabo with information of regions of the empire that would never have told him otherwise.
==The Geography==
thumb|350px|Map of the world according to Strabo.
Strabo is most famous for his 17-volume work Geographica, which presented a descriptive history of people and places from different regions of the world known to his era.
Although the Geographica was rarely utilized in its contemporary antiquity, a multitude of copies are found throughout the Byzantine Empire. It first appeared in Western Europe in Rome as a Latin translation issued around 1469. The first Greek edition was published in 1516 in Venice.Geographie, Band 1, Strabo, S.17, Strabo, Karl Kärcher, Gottlieb Lukas Friedrich Tafel, Christian Nathanael Osiander, Gustav Schwab, Verlag Metzler, 1831. Isaac Casaubon, classical scholar and editor of Greek texts, provided the first critical edition in 1587.
Although Strabo cited the antique Greek astronomers Eratosthenes and Hipparchus, acknowledging their astronomical and mathematical efforts towards geography, he claimed that a descriptive approach was more practical, such that his works were designed for statesmen who were more anthropologically than numerically concerned with the character of countries and regions.
As such, Geographica provides a valuable source of information on the ancient world, especially when this information is corroborated by other sources.
Strabo is pro-Roman politically but culturally reserves primacy to Greece.Lawrence Kim Homer Between History and Fiction in Imperial Greek Literature 2010 p83 "... pro-Roman throughout the Geography.94 But while he acknowledges and even praises Roman ascendancy in the political and military sphere, he also makes a significant effort to establish Greek primacy over Rome in other contexts."
==Geology==
As quoted from Charles Lyell's Principles of Geology:
The very first written definition/discussion on the fossil formation (mentioning Nummulite quoted from A.M. Celâl Şengör).
One extraordinary thing which I saw at the pyramids must not be omitted. Heaps of stones from the quarries lie in front of the pyramids. Among these are found pieces which in shape and size resemble lentils. Some contain substances like grains half peeled. These, it is said, are the remnants of the workmen's food converted into stone; which is not probable. For at home in our country (Amasia), there is a long hill in a plain, which abounds with pebbles of a porus stone, resembling lentils. The pebbles of the sea-shore and of rivers suggest somewhat of the same difficulty [respecting their origin]; some explanation may indeed be found in the motion [to which these are subject] in flowing waters, but the investigation of the above fact presents more difficulty. I have said elsewhere, that in sight of the pyramids, on the other side in Arabia, and near the stone quarries from which they are built, is a very rocky mountain, called the Trojan mountain; beneath it there are caves, and near the caves and the river a village called Troy, an ancient settlement of the captive Trojans who had accompanied Menelaus and settled there.Strabo's Geography, XVII, 34
The very first written definition/discussion of volcanisim (Effusive eruption) observed at Katakekaumenē (modern Kula, Western Turkey) until Pliny the Younger witnessed to the eruption of Vesuvius on 24 August 79 CE in Pompeii 
…There are no trees here, but only the vineyards where they produce the Katakekaumene wines which are by no means inferior from any of the wines famous for their quality. The soil is covered with ashes, and black in color as if the mountainous and rocky country was made up of fires. Some assume that these ashes were the result of thunderbolts and sub‐ terranean explosions, and do not doubt that the legendary story of Typhon takes place in this region. Ksanthos adds that the king of this region was a man called Arimus. However, it is not reasonable to accept that the whole country was burned down at a time as a result of such an event rather than as a result of a fire bursting from underground whose source has now died out. Three pits are called “Physas” and separated by forty stadia from each other. Above these pits, there are hills formed by the hot masses burst out from the ground as estimated by a logical reasoning. Such type of soil is very convenient for viniculture, just like the Katanasoil which is covered with ashes and where the best wines are still produced abundantly. Some writers concluded by looking at these places that there is a good reason for calling Dionysus by the name (“Phrygenes”)”Strabo's Geography, XIII, 628;XIV, 650).
==Notes==
== Editions ==
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* Strabo's Geography in 3 volumes translated by H.C. Hamilton, ed. H.G. Bohn, 1854-1857 (vol 1, vol 2, vol 3 at Google Books)
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== Bibliography ==
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==External links==
*The Geography (Loeb Classical Library, H. L. Jones translation)
*Biography of Strabo
Category:Ancient Greece
Category:Authors
Category:Turkey