Geography

​We have said somewhere that opposite Anemurium, a promontory of Cilicia Tracheia, lies the promontory of the Cyprians, Cape Crommyon, at a distance of three hundred and fifty stadia. For those sailing thence, having now the island on the right and the mainland on the left, the voyage is towards the north and the east, and towards the Cleides, a straight sail of seven hundred stadia. In the interval is Lapathus, a city having an anchorage and shipyards, founded by the Laconians and Praxandros, opposite to which is Nagidus; then Aphrodisium, where the island is narrow, for the crossing over to Salamis is seventy stadia; then the Achaean Beach, where Teucer first put in, he who founded Salamis in Cyprus, when he was banished, as they say, by his father Telamon; then Carpasia, a city having a harbor, situated opposite Cape Sarpedon; and from Carpasia there is a crossing of an isthmus of thirty stadia to the Carpasian islands and the southern sea; then a promontory and a mountain, and the ridge is called Olympus, having a temple of Aphrodite Acraea, closed to women and invisible to them. Near it lie the Cleides, and also several other islands, then the Carpasian islands, and after these Salamis, whence came Aristus the historian; then Arsinoe, a city and a harbor; then another harbor, Leucolla; then Cape Pedalium, above which lies a rugged, high, trapezoidal hill, sacred to Aphrodite, to which from the Cleides is six hundred and eighty stadia; then a gulf-like and rugged coasting voyage for the most part to Citium, which has a closed harbor; from here came Zeno, the founder of the Stoic sect, and Apollonius the physician; from here to Berytus is one thousand five hundred stadia. Then Amathus, a city, and in between a small town called Palaea, and a breast-shaped mountain, Olympus; then the peninsular Curias, to which from Throni is seven hundred stadia; then the city Curium, having an anchorage, a founding of the Argives. Now, therefore, one may observe the carelessness of the poet who composed this elegiac couplet, of which the beginning is: “Sacred to Phoebus, running through many a wave, We came, the swift deer, to escape the bows,” whether it is Hedylus or whoever else; for he says that the deer started from the Corycian ridge and swam from the Cilician shore to the Curian shores, and he adds: “A countless wonder for men to perceive, how through the trackless flood we ran with the spring Zephyr,” for from Corycus there is indeed a coasting voyage to the Curian beach, but not with the Zephyr, nor with the island on the right or on the left, and there is no sea-crossing. At all events, the starting-point of the westerly voyage is Curium, which looks towards Rhodes, and immediately there is a promontory from which they cast those who have touched the altar of Apollo; then Treta and Boosoura and Palaepaphos, situated about ten stadia above the sea, having an anchorage and an ancient temple of the Paphian Aphrodite; then Cape Zephyria, having an anchorage, and another Arsinoe likewise having an anchorage, a temple, and a grove; and a little way from the sea is also Hierokepia. Then Paphos, founded by Agapenor, having both a harbor and well-constructed temples; it is distant sixty stadia on foot from Palaepaphos, and they make a festival-procession along this road annually to Palaepaphos, men and women together assembling also from the other cities. Some say that from Paphos to Alexandria is three thousand six hundred stadia. Then after Paphos is Acamas; then towards the east after Acamas is the voyage to the city of Arsinoe and the grove of Zeus; then the city of Soloi, having a harbor, a river, and a temple of Aphrodite and Isis. It was founded by Phalerus and Acamas, Athenians; and the inhabitants are called Solioi. From here came Stasanor, one of the companions of Alexander, a man deemed worthy of high command; and in the interior above it lies the city Limenia; then Cape Crommyon.