The Pulse of Asia : vol.1 / 415 ページ（カラー画像）

0415	The Pulse of Asia : vol.1
アジアの鼓動 : vol.1

0415

The Pulse of Asia : vol.1

アジアの鼓動 : vol.1

supposed outlet was from the Aral gulf of the enlarged sea
along what has now become a line of lakes leading toward
the Irtysh River. The hypothesis lacks confirmation, but
the marked physical features upon which it is based may
have given rise to the Alexandrine idea of a northern pas-
sage leading to the Arctic Ocean. It is not likely, however,
that such an idea would prevail unless the Caspian had
stood at such a level that it almost or quite coalesced with
the Sea of Aral.

Another explanation of the Alexandrine error is possible.
When the Greeks inquired as to the northern shores of the
Caspian Sea, they would hear that the water stretched away
indefinitely to the north, where a narrow channel, the almost
motionless stream of the mighty Volga, up which ships can
sail for nearly two thousand miles, led far toward the Arctic
regions. Under the prevailing ideas as to the symmetrical
distribution of sea and land, the geographers would natu-
rally jump to the conclusion that the Caspian Sea was a gulf
of the ocean corresponding to the Persian gulf on the oppo-
site side. Such an error would be even more likely to spring
up, if the Caspian extended far to the north over the plains
of Russia, as the account of Herodotus suggests, discharg-
ing, perhaps, through the "Manych" to the Black Sea, as
it must have done if it were so expanded eastward that
the Oxus and Jaxartes rivers both entered it.

The Alexandrine idea of a northern outlet of the Caspian
Sea remained almost unchallenged for nearly five centuries,
until the days of Ptolemy. Diodorus of Sicily, B. C. 60, is
the only known author who, during this period, speaks of
the complete isolation of the sea, and he does so only inci-

国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト
『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ

引用情報

OCR読み取り結果

国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト 『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ

引用情報

OCR読み取り結果

国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト
『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ