Εμφανίζονται 4 τίτλοι με αναζήτηση: Πληροφορίες για τον τόπο στην ευρύτερη περιοχή: "ΠΑΔΟΣ Ποταμός ΙΤΑΛΙΑ" .
ΠΑΔΟΣ (Ποταμός) ΙΤΑΛΙΑ
A river of Northern Italy, in Gallia Transpadana, noticed by Pliny
among the affluents of the Padus which join that river on its left or northern
bank. (Plin. iii. 19. s. 23.) It is still called the Lambro, and rises in a small
lake called the Logo di Pusiano (the Eupilis Lacus of Pliny), from whence it flows
within 3 miles of Milan, and enters the Po about midway between the Ticino and
the Adda. Sidonius Apollinaris contrasts its stagnant and weedy stream (ulvosum
Lambrum) with the blue waters of the Addua. (Ep. i. 5.) The Tabula as well as
the Geographer of Ravenna give a town of the name of Lambrum, of which no trace
is found elsewhere. It is probably a corruption of a station, Ad Lambrum, at the
passage of the river of that name, though the Tabula erroneously transfers it
to the S. side of the Padus. (Tab. Pent.; Geogr. Rav. iv. 30.)
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited July 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Eridanus (Eridanos) was the name given by the Greeks to the Padus
or Po, the great river of Northern Italy. The appellation was adopted from them
by the Roman poets, and hence is occasionally used even by Latin prose writers.
(Virg. Georg. i. 481; Ovid. Met. ii. 324; Propert. i. 12. 4; Martial, iii. 67.
2; &c.) But there is good reason to believe that the name was not in the first
instance applied to the Padus, but belonged to quite a different region of Europe,
and was some time before it acquired the signification in which it was afterwards
employed. The name of the Eridanus appears in the earliest Greek authorities inseparably
connected with the well-known fable of the sisters of Phaethon, and the trees
that wept tears of amber. This myth appears to have been already known to Hesiod
(Hygin. 154; Hesiod, Fr. 184. ed. Markscheffel), who in his extant works notices
the Eridanus among the Greek rivers of the world (Theog. 338): but we have no
idea of the geographical position which he assigned it. The current opinion in
the days of Herodotus appears to have been that the Eridanus was a river in the
more westerly regions of Europe, but flowing into the sea on the north of that
continent. (Herod. iii. 115.) The historian, however, rejects this notion, and
treats both the name and existence of the Eridanus as a mere fiction of the Greek
poets: a view adopted at a much later period by Strabo (v. p. 215). The vagueness
of the notions entertained concerning its situation is farther proved by the fact
that, according to Pliny, Aeschylus spoke of the Eridanus as a river of Iberia,
and identified it with the Rhodanus. (Plin. xxxvii. 2. s. 11.) According to Hyginus,
Pherecydes was the first who identified the Eridanus with the Padus. (Hygin. 154.)
Euripides evidently adopts the same view, as he connects the former river with
the shores of the Adriatic (Eur. Hipp. 737); and this opinion seems to have become
gradually established among the Greeks. Scylax, writing about the middle of the
4th century B.C., distinctly places the river Eridanus in the land of the Veneti,
and there is no doubt that the Padus is the river which he meant. (Scyl. p. 6.
§ 19.) The same view was henceforth adopted by all the geographers except Strabo,
who, not choosing to admit the identity of the two rivers, rejects altogether
the Eridanus as a mere fiction, as well as the islands of the Electrides, supposed
to be situated at its mouth (Strab. v. p. 215; Pol. ii. 16; Scymn. Ch. 391-397;
Plin. iii. 16. s. 20, xxxvii. 2. s. 11; Dionys. Per. 289-293; Diod. v. 23; Paus.
i. 3. § 6, v. 14. § 3.)
The real fact appears to be, that the name of Eridanus was originally
applied by the Greeks to a great river in the north of Europe, on the shores of
which amber was produced, and of which some vague report had reached them through
means of the traders who brought the amber itself from the shores of the Baltic
to the head of the Adriatic. It is idle to inquire what the river really meant
was; whether the Oder or Vistula, at the mouths of which amber is now found in
the greatest quantity, or some other river of the N. of Germany. The name Eridanus
is evidently closely connected, if not identical, with that of Rhodanus, and it
is probable enough that Rhenus is only another form of the same word. (Latham,
Germania, p. 13.) Hence, in the vague geographical notions of the early Greeks,
one great river was easily confounded with another. Aeschylus, as already mentioned,
identified the Eridanus and Rhodanus: while Apollonius Rhodius, writing at a much
later period, but evidently following some earlier poet, describes the two rivers
as arms of the same great stream, another portion of which flowed into the ocean.
(Apoll. Rhod. iv. 596, 627, 628.) Amber appears to have been brought in very early
times (as it still was in the days of Pliny) overland from the shores of the Baltic
to those of the Adriatic; here it was purchased by the Phoenicians and early Greek
traders: whence it came to be regarded, by a very natural error, as a production
of the country, and the name of the Eridanus being inseparably connected with
the production of amber, the Greeks gave the name to the great river that forms
so conspicuous a feature of this part of Italy. The gum. like nature of the substance
itself evidently gave rise to the fable of its distilling or exuding from trees,
which was afterwards applied by the poets and mythographers to the poplars that
adorned the banks of the Padus, now assumed to be the true Eridanus. (Cluver.
Ital. pp. 390-393; Wernsdorf, Exc. ii. ad Avien. Or. Marit.)
The origin and history of the connection between the Eridanus and
Padus have been given at some length, on account of its important bearing on the
progress of ancient geography: the geographical account of the latter river and
its tributaries is given under the head of Padus.
Several ancient writers placed near the mouth of the mythical Eridanus
certain islands which they called the Electrides Insulae (Elektrides uesoi), on
the shores of which it was said that much amber was found, from whence their name
was derived. But as there are in fact no islands in this part of the Adriatic,
except those actually formed by the mouths of the Padus, Strabo and Pliny reject
altogether the existence of the Electrides as fabulous, while other writers seem
to have sought them among the numerous groups of islands which line the opposite
shore of the Adriatic. (Strab. v. p. 215; Plin. xxxvii. 2. s. 11.) As much of
the amber collected in the Baltic is really found in the islands at the mouths
of the great rivers, it is not impossible that some obscure tradition of this
fact may have given rise to the name of the Electrides, which were subsequently
transferred, together with the Eridanus itself from the Baltic to the Adriatic.
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited September 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Padus (Pados: Po), the principal river of Northern Italy, and much
the largest river in Italy altogether. Hence Virgil calls it fluviorum rex (Georg.
i. 481), and Strabo even erroneously terms it the greatest river in Europe after
the Danube. (Strab. iv. p. 204.) It has its sources in the Monte Viso, or Mons
Vesulus, one of the highest summits of the Western Alps (Plin. iii. 16. s. 20;
Mel. ii. 4. § 4). and from thence to the Adriatic has a course of above 400 miles.
Pliny estimates it at 300 Roman miles without including the windings, which add
about 88 more. (Plin. iii. 16. s. 20.) Both statements are beneath the truth.
According to modern authorities its course, including its windings, is calculated
at 380 Italian, or 475 Roman miles. (Rampoldi, Diz. Topogr. d'Italia, vol. iii.
p. 284.) After a very short course through a mountain valley it descends into
the plain a few miles from Saluzzo, and from thence flows without interruption
through a plain or broad level valley all the way to the sea. Its course from
Saluzzo, as far as Chi vasso (through the district of the ancient Vagienni and
Taurini), is nearly NE ; but after rounding the hills of the Monferrat, it turns
due E., and pursues this course with but little variation the whole way to the
Adriatic. The great plain or valley of the Po is in fact one of the most important
physical features of Italy. Bounded on the N. by the Alps, and on the S. by the
Apennines, both of which ranges have in this part of their course a general direction
from W. to E., it forms a gigantic trough-like basin, which receives the whole
of the waters that flow from the southern slopes of the Alps and the northern
ones of the Apennines. Hence, as Pliny justly observes (l. c.), there is hardly
any other river which, within the same space, receives so many and such important
tributaries. Those from the north, on its left bank, are the most considerable,
being fed by the perpetual snows of the Alps; and many of these form extensive
lakes at the points where they first reach the plain; after quitting which they
are deep and navigable rivers, though in some cases still very rapid. Pliny states
that the Padus receives in all thirty tributary rivers, but it is difficult to
know which he reckons as such; he himself enumerates only seventeen; but this
number can be increased almost indefinitely, if we include smaller streams. The
principal tributaries will be here enumerated in order, beginning from the source,
and proceeding alone the left bank. They are: 1. the Clusius (Chiusone), not noticed
by Pliny, but the name of which is found in the Tabula; 2. the Duria commonly
called Duria Minor, or Dora Riparia ; 3. the Stura (Stura); 4. the Orgus (Orco);
5. the Duria Major, or Bantica (Dora Baltea), one of the greatest of all the tributaries
of the Padus ; 6. the Sesites (Sesia) ; 7. the Ticinus (Ticino), flowing from
the Lacus Verbanus (Lago Maggiore); 8. the Lamber or Lambrus (Lambro), a much
less considerable stream, and which does not rise in the high Alps; 9. the Addua
(Adda), flowing from the Lacus Larius or Lago di Como; 10. the Ollius (Oglio),
which flows from the Lacus Sebinus (Lago d'Iseo), and brings with it the tributary
waters of the Mela (Mella) and Clusius (Chiese); 11. the Mincius (Mincio), flowing
from the Lago di Garda, or Lacus Benacus. Below this the Po cannot be said to
receive any regular tributary; for though it communicates at more than one point
with the Tartareo and Adige (Athesis),the channels are all artificial and the
bulk of the waters of the Adige are carried out to the sea by their own separate
channel.
On the southern or right bank of the Padus its principal tributaries
are: 1. the Tanarus (Tanaro), a large river, which has itself received the important
tributary streams of the Stura and Bormida, so that it brings with it almost all
the waters of the Maritime Alps and adjoining tract of the Ligurian Apennines
; 2. the Scrivia, a considerable stream, but the ancient name of which is unknown;
3. the Trebia (Trebbia), flowing by Placentia; 4. the Tarus (Taro); 5. the Nicia
(Enza); 6. the Gabellus of Pliny, called also Secia (Secchia); 7. the Scultenna
now called the Panaro; 8. the Rhenus (Reno), flowing near Bologna. To these may
be added several smaller streams, viz.: the Idex (Idice), Silarus (Sillaro), Vatrenus
(Plin., now Santerno), and Sinnus (Sinno), all of which discharge themselves into
the southern arm of the Po, now called the Po di Primaro, and anciently known
as the Spineticum Ostium, below the point where it separates from the main stream.
Several smaller tributaries of the river in the highest part of its course are
noticed in the Tabula or by the Geographer of Ravenna, which are not mentioned
by any ancient author; but their names are for the most part corrupt and uncertain.
Though flowing for the most part through a great plain, the Padus
thus derives the great mass of its waters directly from two great mountain ranges,
and the consequence is that it is always a strong, rapid, and turbid stream, and
has been in all ages subject to violent inundations. (Virg. Georg. i. 481; Plin.
l. c.) The whole soil of the lower valley of the Po is indeed a pure alluvial
deposit, and may be considered, like the valley of the Mississippi or the Delta
of the Nile, as formed by the gradual accumulation of mud, sand, and gravel, brought
down by the river itself and its tributary streams. But this process was for the
most part long anterior to the historical period; and there can be no doubt that
this portion of Italy had already acquired very much its present character and
configuration as early as the time of the first Etruscan settlements. The valley
of the Padus, as well as the river itself, are well described by Polybius (the
earliest extant author in whom the Roman name of Padus is found), as well as at
a later period by Strabo and Pliny. (Pol. ii. 16; Strab. iv. pp. 203, 204, v.
p. 212; Plin. iii. 16. s. 20.) Considerable changes have, however, taken place
in the lower part of its course, near the Adriatic sea. Here the river forms a
kind of great delta, analogous in many respects to that of the Nile; and the phenomenon
is complicated, as in that case, by the existence of great lagunes bordering the
coast of the Adriatic, which are bounded by narrow strips or bars of sand, separating
them from the sea, though leaving open occasional channels of communication, so
that the lagunes are always salt and affected by the tides, which are more sensible
in this part of the Adriatic than in the Mediterranean. (Strab. v. p. 212.) These
lagunes, which are well described by Strabo, extended in his time from Ravenna
to Altinum, both of which cities stood in the lagunes or marshes, and were; built,
on piles, in the same manner as the modern Venice. But the whole of these could
not be fairly considered as belonging to the Delta of the Padus; the more northerly
being formed at the mouths of other rivers, the Athesis, Meduacus, &c., which
had no direct or natural communication with the great river. They all, however,
communicated with the Padus, and with one another, by channels or canals more
or less artificial; and as this was already the case in the time of Pliny, that
author distinctly reckons the mouths of the Padus to extend from Ravenna to Altinum.
(Plin. l. c.) From the earliest period that this tract was occupied by a settled
people, the necessity must have been felt of embanking the various arms and channels
of the river, for protection against inundation, as well as of constructing artificial
cuts and channels, both for carrying off its superfluous waters and for purposes
of communication. The earliest works of this kind are ascribed to the Etruscans
(Plin. l. c.), and from that time to the present day, they have been carried on
with occasional interruptions. But in addition to these artificial changes, the
river has from time to time burst its banks and forced for itself new channels,
or diverted the mass of its waters into those which were previously unimportant.
The most remarkable of these changes which is recorded with certainty, took place
in 1152, when the main stream of the Po, which then flowed S. of Feerara, suddenly
changed its course, and has ever since flowed about 3 miles N. of that city. Hence
it is probable that all the principal modern mouths of the Po, front the Po di
Goro to the Po di Levante, were in ancient times comparatively inconsiderable.
Polybius (ii. 16) describes the Padus as having only two principal
mouths, which separated at a place called Trigaboli (the site of which cannot
be determined); the one of these is called by him Padoa (Padoa), and the other,
which was the principal channel, and the one commonly navigated, he calls Olana
or Holana (Holana). This; last is in all probability the channel still called
Po di Volano, which until the great inundation of 1152, above noticed, was still
the principal mouth. of the Po. The other is probably the southernmost branch
of the river, which separates from the preceding at. Ferrara, and is carried at
the present day by a wholly artificial channel into the sea at Primaro, from whence
it derives the name of Po di Primaro. Its present mouth is about 15 miles N. of
Ravenna; but it seems that in the days of Pliny, and probably in those of Polybius
also, it discharged itself into the lagunes which then surrounded Ravenna on all
sides. Pliny terms it Padusa, but gives it also the name of Fossa Augusta, from
its course having been artificially regulated, and perhaps altered, by that emperor.
(Plin. iii. 16. s. 20.) The same author gives us a detailed enumeration of the
mouths of the Padus as they existed in his day, but from the causes of change
already adverted to, it is very difficult, if not impossible, to identify them
with certainty.
They were, according to him: 1. the Padusa or Fossa Augusta, which
(he adds) was previously called Messanicus: this has now wholly ceased to exist.
2. The Portus Vatreni, evidently deriving its name from being the mouth of the
river Vatrenus, which flowed from Forum Cornelii, just as the Po di Primaro is
at the present day called the mouth of the Reno. This was also known as the Spineticum
Ostium, from the once celebrated city of Spina, which was situated on its banks.
It was probably the same with the modern Po di Primaro. 3. Ostium Caprasiae. 4.
Sagis. 5. Volana, previously called Olane: this is evidently the Olana of Polybius,
and the modern Po di Volano; the two preceding cannot be identified, but must
have been openings communicating with the great lagunes of Comacchio. 6. The Carbonaria,
perhaps the Po di Goro. 7. The Fossio Philistina, which seems to have been an
artificial canal, conveying the waters of the Tartarus still called Tartaro, to
the sea. This cannot be identified, the changes of the mouths of the river in
this, part being too considerable. The whole of the present delta, formed by the
actual mouths of the Po (from. the Po di Goro to the Po di Levante), must have
been formed since the great change of 1152; its progress for some centuries back
can be accurately traced; and we know that it has advanced not less than 9 miles
in little more than two centuries and a half, and at least 15 miles since the
12th century. Beyond this the delta belongs rather to the Adige, and more northern
streams, than to the Po; the next mouth being that of the main stream of the Adige
itself, and just. beyond it the Porto. di Brondolo (the Brundulus Portus of Pliny),
which at the present day is the mouth of the Brenta.1
The changes which have taken place on this lin of coast are due not
only to the pushing forward of the coast-line at the actual mouths of the rivers,
but to the filling up of the lagunes. These in ancient times extended beyond Ravenna
on the S.; but that city is now surrounded on all sides by dry land, and the lagunes
only begin to the N. of the Po di Primaro. Here the lagunes of Comacchio extend
over a space of above 20 miles in length, as far as the mouth of the Po di Volano;
but from that point to the fort of Brondolo, where the Venetian lagunes begin,
though the whole country is very low and marshy, it is no longer covered with
water, as it obviously was at no distant period. It is now therefore, impossible
to determine what were the particular lagunes designated by Pliny as the Septem
Maria and indeed the passage in which he alludes to them is not very clear; but
as he calls them Atrianorum Paludes, they would seem to have been in the neighbourhood
of Adria, and may probably have been the extensive lagunes (now converted into
marshes) S. of Ariano. At a later period the name seems to have been differently
used. The Itinerary speaks of the navigation per Septem Maria [a Ravenna] Altinum
usque, so that the name seems here to be applied to the whole extent of the lagunes;
and it is employed in the same sense by Herodian (viii. 7); while the Tabula,
on the contrary,gives the name to a particular point or station on the line of
route from Ravenna to Altinum. This line, which is given in much detail, must
have been by water, though not so specified, as there never could have been a
road along the line in question; but it is impossible to identify with any certainty
the stations or points named. (Itin. Ant. p. 126; Tab. Peut.)
Polybius speaks of the Padus as navigable for a distance of 2000 stadia,
or 250 Roman miles from the sea. (Pol. ii. 16.) Strabo notices it as navigable
from Placentia downwards to Ravenna, without saying that it was not practicable
higher up: and Pliny correctly describes it as beginning to be navigable from
Augusta Taurinorum (Turin), more than 120 miles above Placentia. (Strab. v. p.
217; Plin. iii. 17. s. 21.) Ancient writers already remarked that the stream of
the Padus was fuller and more abundant in summer than in winter or spring, owing
to its being fed in great part by the melting of the snows in the high Alps. (Pol.
ii. 16; Plin. iii. 16. s. 20.) It is not till after it has received the waters
of the Duria Major or Dora Baltea, a stream at least as considerable as itself,
that the Po becomes a really great river. Hence, it is about this point (as Pliny
observes) that it first attains to. a considerable depth. But at the present day
it is not practicable for vessels of any considerable burden above Casale, about
25 miles lower down.
The origin of the name of Padus is uncertain. According to Metrodorus
of Scepsis (cited by Pliny, l. c.), it was a Celtic name, derived from the number
of pine-trees which grew around its sources. The etymology seems very doubtful;
but the fact that the name was of Celtic origin is rendered probable by the circumstance
that, according both to Polybius and Pliny, the name given it by the Ligurians
(the most ancient inhabitants of its banks) was Bodincus or Bodencus (Bodenkos,
Pol. ii. 16; Plin. iii. 16. s. 20), a name said to be derived from its great it
depth. It is well known that it was early identified it by the Greeks with the
mythical Eridanus and was commonly called by them, as well as by the Latin poets,
by that name, even at a late period. It may be added, that the poplar trees which
figure in the fable of Phaeton (in its later form) evidently refer to the tall
and graceful trees, still commonly known as Lombardy poplars, from their growing
in abundance on the banks of the Po.
1 Much curious information concerning the delta of the Po,
and the changes which this part of the coast: has undergone will be. found in
a, note appended to Cuvier's Discours sur les Revolutions de la Surface du Globe,
p. 75, 4to. edit. Paris, 1825.
This text is from: Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography (1854) (ed. William Smith, LLD). Cited September 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Total results on 28/3/2001: 45 for Eridanus, 6 for Eridanos.
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