late period. There is little doubt that it is the city meant by Diodorus (xiv. 78, where the editions have Zuéveov, a name certainly corrupt), which was reduced by Dionysius in B. C. 396, together with Morgantia and other cities of the Siculi. It is mentioned more than once by Cicero among the municipal towns of Sicily, and seems to have been a tolerably flourishing place, the inhabitants of which carried on agriculture to a considerable extent. (Cic. Verr. iii. 22, 43.) It is enumerated also by Silius Italicus among the cities of Sicily, and by Pliny among the stipendiary towns of that island. and its name is found also in Ptolemy. (Sil. Ital. xiv. 266; Plin. iii. 8. s. 14; Ptol. iii. 4. § 13.) This is the last notice of it that occurs: but there is no doubt that the modern town of Minéo retains the name, and probably the site, of Menaenum. It is situated on a lofty hill, forming part of a range which sweeps round from Palagonia to Caltagirone, and forms the boundary of a deep basin, in the centre of which is a small plain, with the volcanic lake now called Lago di Naftia, which is unquestionably the ancient Lacus Palicorum. No ruins are now extant at Minéo; but the coins of Menaenum, which are numerous, though only of copper, attest the consideration which it anciently enjoyed.

[E. H. B.]

CAME DA

COIN OF MENAENUM.

MENA'PIA (Mevanía, Ptol. vi. 11. § 8), a small place in Bactriana in the immediate neighbourhood of Eucratidia. It probably the same as that called MENAPILA by Ammianus (xxiii. 6). [V.]

MENA'PII, a people of North Gallia. In Caesar's time (B. G. iv. 4) the Menapii were on both sides of the lower Rhine, where they had arable farms, buildings, and small towns. The Usipetes and and Tenctheri, who were Germans, being hard pressed by the Suevi, came to the Rhine, surprised and massacred the Menapii on the east bank, and then crossing over spent the winter on the west side, and lived at free cost among the Menapii. The history of these marauders is told elsewhere. [USIPETES.] On the west side of the Rhine the Eburones were the immediate neighbours of the Menapii (B. G. vi. 5), and they were between the Menapii and the Treviri. The Menapii were protected by continuous swamps and forests. On the south and on the coast the Menapii bordered on the Morini. Caesar does not state this distinctly; but he mentions the Menapii (B. G. ii. 4) among the Belgian confederates next to the Morini; and the Menapii were said to be able to raise 7000 fighting men. As the Veneti sought the aid of the Morini and Menapii in their war with Caesar, we must conclude that they had ships, or their aid would have been useless (B. G. iii. 9). Caesar describes all Gallia as reduced to obedience at the close of the summer of B. C. 56, except the Morini and Menapii (B. G. iii. 28), who were protected against the Roman general for this season by their forests and the bad weather. The next year (B. C. 55), immediately before sailing for Britannia,

Caesar sent two of his legati to invade the country of the Menapii and those Pagi of the Morini which. had not made their submission (B. G. iv. 22). After his return from Britannia Caesar sent Labienus against the Morini with the legions which had been brought back from Britannia. The summer had been dry, and as the marshes did not protect the Morini, as in the year before, most of them were compelled to yield. The troops which had been sent against the Menapii under the two legati ravaged the lands, destroyed the corn, and burnt the houses; but the people fled to the thickets of their forests, and saved themselves from their cruel enemy. (B. G. iv. 38.)

In B. C. 53 Caesar himself entered the country of the Menapii with five legions unincumbered with baggage. The Menapii were the only Galli who had never sent ambassadors to Caesar about peace, and they were allies of Ambiorix, king of the Eburones, Caesar's enemy. Trusting to the natural protection of their country, the Menapii did not combine their forces, but fled to the forests and marshes, carrying their property with them. Caesar entered their country with his army in three divisions, after having with great rapidity made his bridges over the rivers, but he does not mention any names. The buildings and villages were burnt, and a great number of cattle and men were captured. The Menapii prayed for peace, gave hostages, and were told that their hostages would be put to death, if they allowed Ambiorix to come within their borders. With this threat Caesar quitted the country that he had ravaged, leaving Comm the Atrebat, one of his slavish Gallic tools, with a body of cavalry to keep watch over the Menapii. (B. G. vi. 5, 6.)

It appears from Caesar's narrative that this people had farins, arable land, and cattle; and probably ships. They were not savages, but a people with some civility. Caesar's narrative also leads us to infer that the Menapii on the coast bordered on the Morini, as Strabo (iv. pp. 194, 199) says. Pliny (iv. 17) also makes the Menapii and Morini conterminous on the coast, but he makes the Scaldis (Schelde) the northern limit of the Menapii; and he places the Toxandri north of the Schelde. D'Anville (Notice, fc., Nervii) attempts to show, against the authority of the ancient writers, that the Nervii extended to the coast, and consequently were between the Morini and the Menapii. But it is here assumed as proved that the Morini on the coast bordered on the Menapii, who in Caesar's time at least extended along the coast from the northern boundary of the Morini to the territory of the BATAVI. [BATAVORUM INSULA.]

Walckenaer proves, as he supposes, that the river Aas, from its source to its outlet, was the boundary between the Morini and the Menapii. The Aas is the dull stream which flows by St. Omer, and is made navigable to Gravelines. Accordingly he makes the hill of Cassel, which is east of the Aas, to be the Castellum Menapiorum of the Table. This question is examined under CASTELLUM MORINORUM. The boundary on the coast between the Morini and Menapii is unknown, but it may, perhaps, have been as far north as Dunkerque. As the Eburones about Tongern and Spa were the neighbours of the Menapii of Caesar on the east, we obtain a limit of the Menapii in that direction. On the north their boundary was the Rhine; and on the south the Nervii. Under Augustus some German peoples, Ubii, Sicambri [GUGERNI], and others

were removed to the west side of the Rhine. The Toxandri, who were settled in North Brabant, occupied the place of those Menapii who bordered on the Eburones. But the Menapii still maintained themselves on the west. Tacitus (Hist. iv. 28), in his description of the rebellion of Civilis, still speaks of the "Menapios et Morinos et extrema Galliarum." Part of the former territory of the Menapii was finally included in Germania Inferior, and the rest in Belgica. The name Menapii subsisted for a long time. Aurelius Victor (de Caesaribus, 39) calls Carausius "Menapiae civis;" and it appears in the middle ages. D'Anville observes that though the Notitia of the Empire mentions a body of soldiers named Menapii, we see no trace of this nation in any city which represents it; but Walckenaer (Géog. fc. vol. i. p. 460) contends that Turnacum (Tournai) was their chief place, to which place probably belong the Belgic silver medals with the legend DVRNACVS (Bast, Recueil, fc.) "In an act of Charles the Bald, A. D. 847, in favour of the abbey of St. Amand, which is south of Tournai, this abbey is said to be in territorio Menapiorum quod nunc Mempiscum appellant.'" We thus obtain, as it seems, a fixed point for part of the territory of the Menapii, which under the later Empire may have been limited to the country west of the Schelde.

It is observed that "though it is very probable that Caesar never advanced into the interior of Flanders, it is, however, certain that the Romans afterwards, if they did not absolutely make themselves masters of it, at least were there for some time at different epochs. Their idols, their Dei Penates, sepulchral urns, lamps, Roman utensils, and especially the medals of almost all the emperors, discovered in great numbers, are irrefragable evidence of this." (Bast, Recueil d'Antiquités Romaines et Gauloises, &c., Introduction.)

"Ancient earthen vessels have been found in great numbers all along the coast from Dunkerque to Bruges, which shows that the sea has not gained here, and refutes the notion that in the time of Caesar and Pliny this coast was neither inhabited nor habitable." (Walckenaer, Géog. fc. vol. i. p. 469.) An inscription found at Rimini, of the age of Vespasian, mentions the "Salinatores Menapiorum," or saltmakers of the Menapii.

If the position of the Meldi of Caesar has been rightly determined [MELDI], they were a Menapian people. There is nothing to show whether the Menapii were Galli or Germani. [G. L.]

MENAPILA [MENAPIA.]

MENDES (Mévons, Herod. ii. 42, 46. 166; Diod. i. 84; Strab. xvii. p. 802; Mela, i. 9 § 9; Plin. v. 10. s. 12; Ptol. iv. 5. § 51; Steph. B. s. v.: Eth. Mevdhotos), the capital of the Mendesian nome in the Delta of Egypt. It was situated at the point where the Mendesian arm of the Nile (Mevonotov σтóμa, Scylax, p. 43; Ptol. iv. 5. § 10; Mendesium ostium, Pliny, Mela, ll. cc.) flows into the lake of Tanis. Mendes was, under the Pharaonic kings, a considerable town; the nome was the chief seat of the worship of Mendes or Pan, the all-producing-principle of life, and one of the eight greater deities of Aegypt, and represented under the form of a goat. It was also one of the nomes assigned to that division of the native army which was called the Calasirii, and the city was celebrated for the manufacture of a perfume designated as the Mendesium unguentum. (Plin. xiii. 1. s. 2.) Mendes, however, declined early, and disappears in the first century A. D.; since both Ptolemy (l. c.) and Aristides (iii. p. 160) mention Thmuis as the only town of note in the Mendesian nome. From its position at the junction of the river and the lake, it was probably encroached upon by their waters, after the canals fell into neglect under the Macedonian kings, and when they were repaired by Augustus (Sueton. Aug. 18, 63) Thmuis had attracted its trade and population. Ruins, however, supposed to be those of Mendes, have been found near the hamlet of Achman-Tanah (Champollion, l'Egypte, vol. ii. p. 122.) [W. B. D.]

MENDICULEIA. 1. A town of the Ilergetes, probably Monzon. [Vol. II. p. 32, a.]

2. A town in the interior of Lusitania, on the bank of the Tagus. (Ptol. ii. 5. § 8, where some MSS. have Mevdikovλnta, others Mevdnkovλía.)

MENEDE'MIUM (Mevednov), a town in the western part of Pisidia, two miles west of Pogla. (Ptol. v. 5. § 6; Steph. s. v., who calls it a town of Lycia.) [L. S.]

MENELAI PORTUS (Μενελάϊος λιμήν, Herod. iv. 169), a harbour of Marmarica, situated to the W. of Paraetonium (Strab. i. p. 40, xvii. p. 838), and a day's voyage from Petras. (Seylax, 107, d.) Here, according to legend, the hero Menelaus landed (Herod. ii. 119); and it was the place where Agesilaus died in his march from the Nile to Cyrene, B. C. 361. (Corn. Nep. Ages. 8.) Its position must be sought on the coast of the Wady Daphnéh, near the Râs-al-Milhr. (Pacho, Voyage dans la Marmarique, p. 47.) [E. B. J.]

Delta, situated to SE. of the highroad between Alexandreia and Hermopolis, near the Canopic arm of the Nile. It derived its name from Menelaus, a brother of Ptolemy Lagus, and attained such importance as to confer the title of Menelaites upon the Canopic branch of the river. (Ptol. iv. 5. § 9; Strab. ib. p. 801.) [W. B. D.]

MENESTHEI PORTUS (¿ Meveσdéws λiμýv), a harbour of Hispania Baetica, between Gades and Asta. (Strab. iii. p. 140; Ptol. ii. 4. § 5; Marcian. p. 40.) In its neighbourhood was the oracle of Menestheus (Strab. I. c.), to whom, also, the inhabitants of Gades offered sacrifices. (Philostr. Vit. Apoll. v. 1.) The Scholiast on Thucydides (i. 12) | relates that Menestheus, being expelled by the Theseidae, went to Iberia. The harbour is probably the modern Puerto de S. Maria.

ΜΕΝΙΝΧ (Μήνιγξ, αι. Μήνιγξ), an island of the N. coast of Africa, to the SE. of the Lesser Syrtis. It is first described by Scylax (p. 48), who calls it BRACHION (Bpaxelwv), and states that its length was 300 stadia, while its breadth was something less. Pliny (v. 7) makes the length 25 M. P. and the breadth 22 M. P. Its distance from the mainland was about 3 stadia (8 stadia, Stadiasm. p. 455), and one day's sail from Taricheae. It was the abode of the "dreamy Lotos-eaters [LOTOPHAGI], for which reason it was called LoTOPHAGITIS (Awropayîris, Ptol. iv. 3. § 35; Awτоpάywv vñoos, Polyb. i. 39; comp. Strab. i. p. 25, ii. p. 123, iii. p. 157, xvii. p. 834; Pomp. Mela, ii. 7. § 7; Plin. l. c. ix. 60; Dionys. v. 180). The Romans first became acquainted with it, by the disastrous expedition of C. Sempronius Blaesus, B. C. 253. (Polyb. I. c.; comp. Zonar. viii. 14; | Oros. iv. 9.) It contained two towns, Meninx and Thoar, and was the birthplace of the emperors Gallus Trebonianus, and his son, Volusianus (Aurel. Victor, Epit. 31), when it was already known by the name of GIRBA. Jerbah, as the island is now called, produces the "lotus Zizyphus," a tree-fruit like beans. (Shaw, Trav. p. 197; Rennell, Geog. of Herod. vol. ii. p. 287; Barth, Wanderungen, pp. 263, 287.) [E. B. J.]

MENNIS (Curt. v. 1. § 16), a small town of Mesopotamia, at which Alexander halted in his march from Arbela to Babylon. Curtius stated that it was celebrated for its naphtha pits,-which indeed abound in that part of Asia.

[V.]

MENOBA (Plin. iii. 1. s. 3) or MENUBA (Inscr. ap. Florez, Esp. Sagr. ix. p. 47), a tributary of the river Baetis, on its right side, now the Guadiamar.

MENOSCA (Mŋvóσкa, Ptol. ii. 6. § 9; Plin. iv. 20. s. 34), a town of the Varduli, on the N. coast of Hispania Tarraconensis. Its site is uncertain. Some place it at St. Sebastian; others at St. Andre; and others, again, at Sumaya.

MENOSGADA (Mnvooyáða), a place in central Germany, not far from the sources of the Main (Moenus), from which it, no doubt, derived its name. (Ptol. ii. 11. § 29.) Its site is generally believed to have been that of the modern Mainroth, near Culmbach. [L. S.]

ME'NTESA. 1. Surnamed BASTIA (It. Anton. p. 402; Mentissa, Liv. xxvi. 17; Mévriσa, Ptol. ii. 6. § 59), a town of the Oretani in Hispania Tarraconensis, on the road from Carthago Nova to Castulo, and 22 Roman miles from Castulo. Pliny (iii. 3. 6. 4) calls the inhabitants "Mentesani, qui et Oretani," to distinguish them from the following.

2. A small state of the Bastuli, in Hispania Baetica. ("Mentesani, qui et Bastuli," Plin. l. c.; Inscr. Gruter, p. 384, 2; Florez, Esp. Sagr. v. p. 24.)

MENTONOMON, an aestuary or bay of the Northern Ocean, mentioned by Pytheas, upon which the Guttones dwelt, and at a day's sail from which was an island named Abalus, where amber was gathered. (Plin. xxxvii. 7. s. 11.) The same island is mentioned in another passage of Pliny (iv. 13. s. 27), as situated a day's sail from the Scythian coast. In Sillig's edition of Pliny this part of Scythia is called Raunonia; but some of the MSS. and older editions have Bannonianna or Bantomannia, which is apparently only another form of Mentonomon. The bay was no doubt on the Prussian coast in the Baltic. (Zeuss, Die Deutschen, &c. p. 269.)

MENTORES (Mévropes), a Liburnian tribe (Hecatae. Fr. 62, ed. Klausen; Plin. iii. 21. s. 25), off whose coast were the three islands called Mentorides, probably the same as the rocky islands of Pago, Osero, and Arbe. [E. B. J.]

MENU'THIAS (Mevovoiás, Steph. B.), an island off the E. coast of Africa. Ptolemy (iv. 8. § 2, comp. vii. 2. § 1) describes it as being adjacent (TapákеITα) to the Prom. Prasum; at the same time he removes it 5° from the continent, and places it at 85° long., 12° 30′ lat., to the NE. (and depivŵv avaтoλwv) of Prasum. The graduation of Ptolemy's map is here so erroneous, that it is impossible to make out the position of his island Menuthias, which some have identified with one of the islands of Zanzibar, or even with Madagascar. (Vincent, Navigation of the Ancients, vol. ii. pp. 174–185; Gosselin, Géographie des Anciens, vol. i. pp. 191, 195.) The simple narrative of the Periplus gives a very faithful picture of this coast,-barmonising with the statements of Ptolemy and Marinus of Tyre,-as far as the Rhaptus of the former (Govind, or the river of Jubah). Afterwards it thus proceeds (p. 9, ed. Hudson) :

"Thence" (from the Nova Fossa, "New Cut," or "Channel," or the opening of the coral reefs by Govind), "at the distance of two natural days' sail, on a course a little above Libs (SW.), Menuthias island occurs on the W. (the important words " Due West"-rap' avтǹν TǹY dúσ w—are arbitrarily altered in Blancard's edition to the opposite sense, with a view to force the author into agreement with Ptolemy; comp. Annot. ad Hudson. p. 68), about 300 stadia from the mainland, low, and covered with wood, with streams, plenty of birds of various kinds, and land-turtle. But, excepting crocodiles, which are harmless, it has no other animals. At this island there are boats, both sewed together, and hollowed out of single trunks, which are used for fishing, and catching turtle. Here, they take fish in wicker baskets, which are let down in front of the hollows of the rocks." It appears, therefore, that Menuthias was distant about two days' sail from Nova Fossa, or 60 or 80 miles from the river Govind, just where an opening in the coral reefs is now found. The coasting voyager, steering SW., reached the island on the E. side,-a proof that it was close to the main; a contiguity which perhaps is further shown by the presence of the crocodiles; though much stress cannot be laid upon this point, as they may have been only lizards. It is true, the navigator says that it was 300 stadia from the mainland; but as there is no reason to suppose that he surveyed the island, this distance must be taken

to signify the estimated width of the northern inlet separating the island from the main; and this estimate is probably much exaggerated. The mode of fishing with baskets is still practised in the Jubah islands, and along the coast. The formation of the coast of E. Africa in these latitudes-where the hills or downs upon the coast are all formed of a coral conglomerate, comprising fragments of madrepore, shell, and sand-renders it likely that the island which was close to the main sixteen or seventeen centuries ago, should now be united to it. Granting this theory of gradual transformation of the coast-line, the Menuthias of the "Periplus" may be supposed to have stood in what is now the rich garden-land of Shamba, where the rivers, carrying down mud to mingle with the marine deposit of coral drift, covered the choked-up estuary with a rich soil. (Cooley, Ptolemy and the Nile, London, 1854, pp. 56— 68.) [E. B. J.]

MERCU'RII PROM. ('Epμaía ăкpa, Ptol. iv. 3. §7; Pomp. Mela, i. 7. § 2; Plin. v. 3), the most northerly point of the coast of Africa, to the E. of the gulf of Carthage, now Cape Bon, or the Rás Addûr of the natives. [E. B. J.]

MERGABLUM, a town of Hispania Baetica, on the road from Gades to Malaca, now Beger de la Miel. (Mém. de l'Acad. des Inscr. xxx. p. 111.)

MERINUM. [GARGANUS.]

MERMESSUS (Μερμησσός or Μυρμισσός), α town in Troas or Mysia, belonging to the territory of Lampsacus, was celebrated in antiquity as the native place of a sibyl (Steph. B. s. v.; Paus. x. 12. §2; Lactant. i. 6, 12, where it is called Marmessus; Suid. s. v.); but its exact site is unknown. [L. S.] MEROBRICA. [MIROBRIGA.]

ME'ROE (Mepón, Herod. ii. 29; Diod. i. 23, seq. Strab. xviii. p. 821; Plin. ii. 73. s. 78. v. 9. s. 10: Steph. B. s. v.: Eth. Mepoaios. Mepovoios). The kingdom of Meroe lay between the modern hamlet of Khartoum, where the Astapus joins the true Nile and the influx of the Astaboras into their united streams, lat. 17° 40′ N., long. 34° E. Although described as an island by the ancient geographers, it was properly an irregular space, like Mesopotamia, included between two or more confluent rivers. According to Diodorus (i. 23) the region of Meroe was 375 miles in length, and 125 in breadth; but Strabo (xviii. p. 821) regards these numbers as referring to its circumference and diameter respectively. On its eastern side it was bounded by the Abyssinian highlands; on the western by the Libyan sands-the desert of Bahiouda. Its extreme southern extremity was, according to a survey made in the reign of Nero, 873 miles distant from Syene. (Plin. vi. 29. s. 33.) Eratosthenes and Artemidorus, indeed, reduced this distance to 625 and 600 miles. (Mannert, Geog. d. Alten, x. p. 183.) Within these limits Meroe was a region of singular opulence, both as respects its mineral wealth and its cereal and leguminous productions. It possessed, on its eastern frontier, mines of gold, iron, copper, and salt: its woods of date-palm, almond-trees, and ilex yielded abundant supplies of both fruit and timber for export and home consumption; its meadows supported large herds of cattle, or produced double harvests of millet (dhourra); and its forests and swamps abounded with wild beasts and game, which the natives caught and salted for food. The banks of the Nile are so high in this region, that Meroe derives no benefit from the inundation, and, as rain falls scantily in the north, even in the wet

season (Strab. xv. p. 690), the lands remote from the rivers must always have been nearly desert. But the waste bore little proportion to the fertile lands in a tract so intersected with streams; the art of irrigation was extensively practised; and in the south, where the hills rise towards Abyssinia, the rains are sufficient to maintain a considerable degree of fertility. The valley of the Astaboras (Tacazzé) is lower and warmer than the rest of Meroe.

Partly from its natural richness, and partly from its situation between Aethiopia and the Red Sea,-the regions which produced spice, and those which yielded gold-dust, ivory, and precious stones, Meroe was from very early times the seat of an active and diversified commerce. It was one of the capital centres of the caravan trade from Libya Interior, from the havens on the Red Sea, and from Aegypt and Aethiopia. It was, in fact, the receptacle and terminus of the Libyan traffic from Carthage, on the one side, and from Adule and Berenice on the other. The ruins of its cities, so far as they have been explored, attest its commercial prosperity.

The site of the city of Meroe was placed by Eratosthenes (ap. Strab. xvii. p. 786) 700 stadia, or nearly 90 miles, south of the junction of the Nile with the Astaboras, lat. 16° 44'; and such a position agrees with Philo's statement (ii. p. 77) that the sun was vertical there 45 days before the summer solstice. (Comp. Plin. vi. 30.) The pyramids scattered over the plains of this mesopotamian region indicate the existence of numerous cities besides the capital. The ruins which have been discovered are, however, those of either temples or public monuments, for the cities themselves, being built of palm-branches and bricks dried in the sun, speedily crumbled away in a latitude to which the tropical rains partially extend. (Ritter, Africa, p. 542.) The remains of Meroe itself all lie between 16° and 17° lat. N., and are not far from the Nile. The most southerly of them are found at Naga-gebel-ardan. Here have been discovered the ruins of four temples, built in the Aegyptian style, but of late date. The largest of them was dedicated to the ram-headed deity Ammon. The principal portico of this temple is detached from the main building,- an unusual practice in Aegyptian architecture,-and is approached through an avenue of sphinxes, 7 feet high, and also bearing the ram's head. The sculptures, like those of Aegypt, represent historical events,- Ammon receiving the homage of a queen, or a king holding his captives by the hair, and preparing to strike off their heads with an axe. At Woad Naja, about a mile from the Astapus, are the remains of a sandstone temple, 89 feet in length, bearing on the capital of its columns the figures and emblems of Ptah, Athor, and Typhon. These ruins are amidst mounds of brick, which betoken the former presence of an extensive city. Again, 16 or 17 miles west of the Astapus, and among the hollows of the sandstone hills, surrounded by the desert, are the ruins of ElMesaourat. Eight temples, connected with one another by galleries or colonnades, and divided into courts and cloisters, are here found. The style of architecture is that of the era of the Ptolemies.

On the eastern bank, however, and about 2 miles from the river, are found groups of pyramids, which mark the site of a necropolis and the neighbourhood of a city: they are 80 in number, and of various dimensions; the base of the largest being 63 feet square, of the smallest less than 12 feet. The

loftiest of these pyramids is about 160 feet in height. Some of these have evidently been royal tombs. None of the buildings of Meroe, indeed, can claim a remote antiquity. The sculptures as well as the pyramids bear the impress of the decline of Aegyptian art, and even traces of Greek architecture; and this circumstance is one of many indications that Meroe derived its civilisation from Aegypt, and did not, as has been supposed, transmit an earlier civilisation to the Nile valley. And yet it is not probable that Meroe received either its arts or its peculiar forms of civil polity from Aegypt, either entirely, or at any very remote epoch of time. Their points of resemblance, as well as of difference, forbid the supposition of direct transmission: for, on the one hand, the architecture and sculptures of Meroe betray the inferiority of a later age, and its civil government is not modelled upon that of the Pharaohs. One remarkable feature in the latter is that the sceptre was so often held by female sovereigns; whereas in Aegypt we find a queen regnant only once mentioned-Nitocris, in the 3rd dynasty. Again, the polity of Meroe appears to have been in great measure sacerdotal long after Aegypt had ceased to be governed by a pure theocracy. Yet, that the civilisation of Meroe was indigenous, the general barbarism of the native tribes of this portion of Libya in all ages renders highly improbable. From whatever quarter the ruling caste of this ancient kingdom may have come, it bears all the tokens, both in what we know of its laws, and in what is visible of its arts, of the presence of a conquering race presiding over a subject people.

The most probable theory appears to be the following, since it will account for the inferiority of the arts and for the resemblance of the polity of Meroe to that of Aegypt :

Strabo, quoting Eratosthenes (xvii. p. 786), says that the Sembritae were subject to Meroe; and again he relates, from Artemidorus, that the Sembritae ruled Meroe. The name of Sembritae, he adds, signifies immigrants, and they are governed by a queen. Pliny (vi. 30. s. 31) mentions four islands of the Sembritae, each containing one or more towns, and which, from that circumstance, are evidently not mere river-islands. but tracts between the streams which intersect that part of Libya-the modern kingdom of Sennaar. Herodotus, in whom is the earliest allusion to these Sembritae (ii. 30), calls them Automoli, that is voluntary exiles or immigrants, and adds that they dwelt as far above Meroe, as the latter is from Syene, i. e., a two months' voyage up the river. Now, we know that, in the reign of Psammetichus (B. c. 658-614), the military caste withdrew from Aegypt in anger, because their privileges had been invaded by that monarch; and tradition uniformly assigns Aethiopia, a vague name, as their place of refuge. The number of these exiles was very considerable, enough even if we reduce the numbers of Herodotus (ii. 31), 240,000, to a tenth-to enable warriors, well armed and disciplined, to bring under subjection the scattered and barbarous tribes of Sennaar. The islands of the Sembritae, surrounded by rivers, were easy of defence: the soil and productions of Merce proper would attract exiles acccustomed to the rich Nile valley; while, at the distance of two month's journey, they were secure against invasion from Aegypt. Having revolted from a king rendered powerful by his army, they would naturally establish a form of

government in which the royal authority was limited; and, recurring to the era when the monarch was elected by or from the sacerdotal caste, they apparently reorganised a theocracy, in which the royal power was so restricted as to admit of its being held by male or female sovereigns indifferently, for there were kings as well as queens of Meroe.

Again, the condition of the arts in this southern kingdom points to a similar conclusion. The pyramids scattered over the plains of Meroe, though copied from the monuments of the Nile valley, and borrowing names from early Egyptian dynasties, are all of a comparatively recent date; long, indeed, posterior to the age when the arts of Aegypt were likely either to be derived from the south, or to be conveyed up the river by conquest or commercial intercourse. The structures of Meroe, indeed, so far as they have been explored hitherto, indicate less a regular than an interrupted intercourse between the kingdoms above and below Syene. And when it is remembered that these monuments bear also many vestiges even of later Greek and Roman times, we may infer that the original Sembritae were, during many generations, recruited by exiles from Aegypt, to whom the government of their Macedonian or Roman conquerors may have been irksome or oppressive. Finally, the native tribes of Sennaar live principally on the produce of the chase; whereas the population of Meroe was agricultural. New emigrants from Aegypt would naturally revert to tillage, and avail themselves of the natural productiveness of its alluvial plains. The whole subject, indeed, is involved in much obscurity, since the ancient Meroe is in many parts inaccessible; partly from its immense tracts of jungle, tenanted by wild beasts, and partly from the fevers which prevail in a climate where a brief season of tropical rain is succeeded by many months of drought. From the little that has been discovered, however, we seem warranted in at least surimising that Meroe was indirectly a colony of Aegypt, and repeated in a rude form its peculiar civilisation. (See Heeren, African Nations, vol. i. Meroe; Cooley's Ptolemy and the Nile; Cailliaud, Isle de Meroe, &c.) [W. B. D.

MEROM. [PALAESTINA.]

MEROZ (Mep), a town of Palestine, mentioned only in Judges (v. 23), apparently situated in the vicinity of the battle-field, and in the tribe of Asher. The tradition of its site was lost as early as the time of Procopius of Gaza, who had attempted in vain to recover it. (Reland, Palaestina, s. v. p. 896.) [G. W.]

MERVA. [GALLAECIA, p. 934, a.] MERULA (Merula), a river of Liguria, mentioned only by Pliny (iii. 5. s. 7), who places it between Albium Intemelium (Vintimiglia) and Albium Ingaunum (Albenga). The name is still retained (according to the best maps) by a stream which flows into the Mediterranean near the Capo delle Mele, about 10 miles W. of Albenga, but more commonly known as the Fiume d'Andora, from the village of that name near its mouth. [E. H. B.]

MERUS (Mpos), a town of Phrygia, which is mentioned only in the ecclesiastical writers as situated in Phrygia Salutaris, on the south-east of Cotyaeum. (Hierocl. p. 677; Socrat. Hist. Eccles. iii. 15; Sozomen, v. 11; Constant. Porphyr. de Them. i. 4.) Some believe that the ruins near Dovaslán (commonly called Doganlu), of which Fellows heard (Discov. in Lycia, p. 134, &c.), belong to Merus, (Comp. Leake, Asia Minor, p. 24, &c.) [L.S.]