Kitap 3
4.10
Such is the whole sea-coast from the Pillars to the confines of the Iberians and Kelts. The interior of the country lying above, and included between the mountains of the Pyrenees and the northern side [of Iberia], as far as the Astures, is principally divided by two mountain chains; the one of these is parallel to the Pyrenees, and takes its commencement from the country of the Cantabri, terminating at the Mediterranean. This is called the Idubeda.The mountains of Burgos and Cuença, the Sierras of Oca, Lorenzo and Moncayo. The second, springing from the middle [of this first], runs towards the west, inclining however to the south and the sea-coast towards the Pillars. At the commencement it consists of bare hills, but after traversing the Plain of Spartarium, falls in with the forest lying above Carthage,Carthagena. and the regions round Malaca.Malaga. It is named Orospeda.The Sierra de Toledo. The river Ebro flows between the Pyrenees and Idubeda, and parallel to both these mountains. It is fed by the rivers and other waters carried down from [the mountains]. Situated on the Ebro is the city of Caesar Augusta,Saragossa. and the colony of Celsa,4elsa. where there is a stone bridge across the river. This country is inhabited by many nations, the best known being that of the Jaccetani.They occupied the northern half of Catalonia. Commencing at the foot of the Pyrenees, it widens out into the plains, and reaches to the districts around IlerdaLerida. and Osca,Huesca. [cities] of the Ilergetes not far distant from the Ebro. It was in these cities, and in Calaguris,Calahorra. a city of the Gascons, as well as those of TarracoTarragona. and Hemeroscopium,Denia. situated on the coast, that Sertorius sustained the last efforts of the war, after being ejected from the country of the Keltiberians. He died at Osca, and it was near to Ilerda that Afranius and Petreius, Pompey’s generals, were afterwards defeated by divusὑπὸ καίσαοͅος τοῦ θεοῦ, by the deified Caesar. We have adopted the Latin divus as the most suitable epithet for the emperor in an English version. Caesar. Ilerda is distant 160 stadia from the Ebro, which is on its west, about 460 from Tarraco, which is on the south, and 540 from Osca, which lies to the north.Gosselin here labours to reconcile these distances with the actual topography of those parts, but it is useless to attempt to make all the loose statements furnished by Strabo tally with the exact distances of the places he mentions by supposing the stadia to be so continually varied. Passing through these places from Tarraco to the extremities of the Vascons who dwell by the ocean, near PompelonPampeluna. and the city of OeasoGosselin is of opinion that this Oeaso, is not Ojarço near Fontarabia, but trunks it probable that Ea near Cape Machicaco is the site where it stood. situated on the ocean, the route extends 2400 stadia, to the very frontiers of Aquitaine and Iberia. It was in the country of the Jaccetani that Sertorius fought against Pompey, and here afterwards Sextus, Pompey’s son, fought against the generals of Caesar. The nation of the Vascons, in which is Pompelon, or Pompey’s city, lies north of Jaccetania.
