Book 34
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The road from Apollonia to Macedonia is called the The Via Egnatia. Via Egnatia, which has been measured in miles and marked out with milestones as far as Cypselus and the River Hebrus, a distance of five hundred and thirty-five miles. Reckoning eight and one-third stades to a mile, the number of stades will be four thousand four hundred and fifty-eight.Strabo reckons 8 stades to a mile, thus making the number of stades 4280. The exact calculation by Polybius’s reckoning is 4458 1/3 stades. The miles are Roman miles of 5000 feet; therefore, by Strabo’s calculation, the stade is 625 feet, by Polybius’s 600 feet. The distance is exactly the same whether you start from Apollonia or Epidamnus. The whole road is called the Egnatia, but its first part has got a name from Candavia, a mountain of Illyria, and leads through the town of Lycnidus, and through Pylon, which is the point on the road where Illyria and Macedonia join. Thessalonica half-way to the Hebrus form Apollonia. Thence it leads over Mount Barnūs, through Heracleia, Lyncestia, and Eordea, to Edessa and Pella, and finally to Thessalonica; and the number of miles is altogether two hundred and sixty-seven. . . . And the whole distance from the Ionian Gulf at Apollonia to Byzantium is seven thousand five hundred stades. . . .
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The circumference of the Peloponnesus, ifThe Peloponnesus. you do not follow the indentations, is four thousand stades. . . .
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The distance from Cape Malea to the IsterFrom C. Malea to the Danube. is ten thousand stades.Strabo, however, supports the measurement of Artemidorus—6500, explaining that Polybius is taking some practical measurement of a voyage, not the shortest. . . .
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On matters concerning the country between the Euphrates and India, Eratosthenes is a better authority than Artemidorus. . . .
