Geography in ancient states. History and culture of ancient India

1. Geographical ideas of the ancient East

Primitive man was already distinguished by keen observation and even the ability to make drawings of the area on skins, birch bark, and wood - prototypes of geographical maps. The primitive map as a way of transmitting geographic information apparently arose long before the emergence of writing. Already at the very early stages of his economic activity, primitive man entered into complex interactions with the natural environment. Research by archaeologists in recent years has shown that already at the end of the Paleolithic (ancient Stone Age), man destroyed the bulk of large mammals within the temperate zone of the northern hemisphere, thereby causing a kind of “first ecological crisis” in the history of our planet, and was forced from gathering and hunting to switch to farming.

The beginnings of scientific geographical knowledge arose during the period of the slave system, which replaced the primitive communal system and was characterized by a higher level of productive forces. The first division of society into classes arises and the first slave states are formed: China, India, Phenicia, Babylonia, Assyria, Egypt. As noted by V.T. Bogucharovsky, “during this period people began to use metal tools and use irrigation in agriculture; Cattle breeding developed on a large scale, crafts appeared, and the exchange of goods between different peoples expanded significantly. All this required a good knowledge of the area.

During this period, writing appeared, which made it possible to record and systematize accumulated knowledge. The oldest monuments of Chinese writing (Shanhaijing, Yugong, Dilichi) appeared in the 7th-3rd centuries. BC. They already have some geographical information. "Shanhaijing" contains a collection of myths, legends and travel descriptions. “Yugong” describes mountains, rivers, lakes, soils, vegetation, economic products, land use, tax system, transport (of China and areas inhabited by other peoples. One of the chapters of the book “Dilichhi” - “History of the Han Dynasty” gives information about nature , population, economy and administrative regions of China and neighboring states.

Chinese scientists have conducted a number of geographical studies. For example, Zhang Rong identified the relationship between water flow speed and runoff, on the basis of which measures to regulate the river were subsequently developed. Huanghe. The scientist Guan Zi described the dependence of plants on soil, groundwater and some other geographical factors. Pei Xu introduced six principles for drawing up geographic maps, using scale, orienting oneself, showing heights, etc. In addition, the Chinese in ancient times invented a compass and had instruments for determining the direction of the wind and the amount of precipitation.

India is also the oldest center of culture. The written monuments of the ancient Hindus, the so-called “Vedas,” dating back to the 2nd millennium BC, in addition to religious hymns, contain information about the peoples who lived in India and about the nature of these areas. The Vedas mention the rivers of Afghanistan (Kabul), describe the river. Indus, r. Ganges and Himalayan mountains. Hindus knew Ceylon and Indonesia. As V.P. points out. Maksakovsky, “in the 1st century. AD Hindus penetrated through the Himalayas and Karakoram into the southern regions of Central Asia. They discovered the upper parts of river basins originating on the northern slopes of the Himalayas - the Indus, Sutlej, Brahmaputra, and crossed the high deserts of Tibet and Tsaidam. From Bengal they passed to Eastern Burma."

The ancient Hindus had a good calendar. In treatises on astronomy dating back to the 6th century. AD, it is already indicated that the Earth rotates on its axis and that the Moon borrows its light from the Sun.

In the lower reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in the 4th and 3rd millennia BC. h. Sumerians lived who were engaged in agriculture and cattle breeding and traded with neighboring peoples. Apparently, they traded with Crete, Cyprus and sailed to the country of Elam, located on the coast of the Persian Gulf (Iran), as well as to India.

The Sumerian culture was inherited by the ancient Babylonians, who founded their own state, which existed until the 7th century. BC, in the middle reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. The Babylonians penetrated into central Asia Minor and may have reached the Black Sea coast. For some territories, the Babylonians compiled simple maps.

In the upper reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates from the end of the 3rd millennium BC. and until the end of the 7th century. BC. there was a state of the Assyrians, who subsequently conquered all of Mesopotamia and undertook military campaigns in Egypt, Syria, Transcaucasia and Iran.

The brave navigators of the ancient world were the Phoenicians, who lived on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Their main occupation was maritime trade, which was carried out within the entire Mediterranean Sea and captured the western (Atlantic) coast of Europe. On the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, the Phoenicians founded many cities, among which in the VI-V centuries. BC. Carthage especially advanced. I.Yu. Fatieva notes that “at the end of the 6th and first quarter of the 5th century. BC. The Carthaginians undertook a daring venture to colonize the west coast of Africa. We know about this event from an official written document that was in the temple of El in Carthage. It contains a decree on the organization of the expedition and a description of the journey along the coast of Africa.

The Phoenicians made a remarkable journey around Africa, which was undertaken by them on the orders of the Egyptian pharaoh Necho. This journey was later described by the Greek scientist Herodotus. The details of the description confirm the authenticity of the voyage, which was completed at the age of three. Every autumn, sailors landed on the shore, sowed grain, harvested crops and sailed on. During the journey, they saw the sun only on the right side. The Phoenicians skirted Africa from the south, moving from east to west, and, therefore, could see the sun in the north, i.e. on the right side at noon. This detail in Herodotus' story is evidence of a voyage around Africa.

M.S. Bodnarsky writes that “the ancient Egyptians knew Central Africa, sailed along the Red Sea to the country of Punt (the African coast from modern Massa to the Somali Peninsula) and visited South Arabia. In the east they had relations with the Phoenicians and Babylonians, and in the west they subjugated a number of Libyan tribes. In addition, the Egyptians traded with Crete."

Also, the Egyptians quite accurately determined the length of the year and introduced a solar calendar. The ancient Egyptians and Babylonians knew the sundial. Egyptian and Babylonian priests, as well as Chinese astronomers, established patterns of recurrence of solar eclipses and learned to predict them. From Mesopotamia the ecliptic is divided into 12 zodiac signs, the year into 12 months, the day into 24 hours, the circle into 360 degrees; the concept of "lunar week" was also introduced there. Modern numerical numbering originates from India.

At the same time, the ideas of the peoples of the Ancient East about nature, although they were based on real practical experience, in theoretical terms retained a mythological character. Back in the 3rd millennium BC. The Sumerians created myths about the creation of the world, the flood and paradise, which turned out to be extremely tenacious and were reflected in many religions. Astronomical observations at that time did not lead to correct views on the structure of the Universe. But the belief in the direct influence of heavenly bodies on the destinies of people led to the emergence of astrology (it was especially popular in Babylonia).

Ideas about the Earth were based on the direct perception of the surrounding world. So, as V.V. points out. Eaglet, “the ancient Egyptians saw the Earth as a flat, elongated rectangle surrounded on all sides by mountains. According to Babylonian myth, the god Marduk created the Earth in the midst of an initially continuous ocean. In a similar, albeit more poetic form, the origin of the Earth is depicted in the sacred books of the Indian Brahmins - the Vedas: The Earth arose from water and is like a blooming lotus flower, one of the petals of which forms India.

Thus, as an analysis of the literature has shown, geography arose in ancient times in connection with the practical activities of people - hunting, fishing, nomadic cattle breeding, and primitive agriculture. The first large slave-owning states appeared in the 4th millennium BC. among the agricultural peoples of Asia Minor, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Northern India and China. Their formation was facilitated by the position along large rivers (irrigation sources and waterways) and reliable natural boundaries - mountains and deserts. The first written documents were created, which give an idea of the geographical knowledge of the peoples of the ancient East, provide a description of the entire then known part of the Earth, contain brief descriptions of the territory of the state, etc.

2. Geographical ideas of ancient scientists

Among the geographical ideas of the ancient world, inherited by modern geography, the views of scientists of antiquity are of particular importance. Ancient (Greco-Roman) geography reached its peak in ancient Greece and Rome in the period from the 12th century to the 12th century. BC. to 146 AD This was due to the fact that Greece's position on the routes from Western Asia to the southern and western Mediterranean countries placed it in very favorable conditions for trade relations, and, consequently, for the accumulation of geographical knowledge.

The earliest written documents of the Greeks are the epic poems “Iliad” and “Odyssey” attributed to Homer, the recording of which dates back to the 8th-7th centuries. BC, but the events described in them took place approximately in the 16th-12th centuries. BC. From these poems one can get an idea of the geographical knowledge of the era. The Greeks imagined the Earth as an island shaped like a convex shield. They knew well the countries adjacent to the Aegean Sea, but had vague ideas about more remote areas. However, they knew the large rivers of the Mediterranean-Black Sea basin: Rion (Phasis), Danube (Ister), Po (Padue), etc.; and they also had some information about Africa and about the nomadic peoples who lived north of Greece.

In ancient Greece, attempts were made to compile geographical maps of the territory known at that time. The Greeks also tried to explain various natural phenomena from the point of view of natural science theories. The Greek thinker Parmenides (5th century BC) put forward the idea that the Earth is spherical. However, he came to this conclusion not through experimental data, but based on his philosophy of perfect forms.

As A.G. writes Isachenko, “Aristotle (IV century BC) in the treatise “On Heaven”, in “Physics” and “Metaphysics” gave the first reliable evidence in favor of this idea: the round shape of the earth’s shadow during lunar eclipses and a change in the appearance of the starry sky when moving from north to south."

Aristotle wrote many works of geographical content. One of the works is “Meteorology” - the pinnacle of the geographical science of Antiquity. In particular, it examines the issue of the water cycle with the participation of evaporation from the surface of reservoirs, cooling with the formation of clouds and precipitation. Precipitation that falls on the surface of the earth forms streams and rivers, the largest of which form in the mountains. Rivers carry their waters to the seas in a volume equal to the amount of evaporated water. That is why the sea level remains stable.

There is constant opposition between sea and land, which is why in some places the sea destroys the coast, in others new land is formed. On this occasion, Aristotle writes the following: “And since the sea always recedes in one place and advances in another, it is clear that throughout the entire Earth, sea and land do not remain by themselves, but over time one turns into the other.”

Aristotle concluded that there is a constant flow of water from the Sea of Azov towards the Mediterranean, since “the flow of the entire sea... depends on the depth and on the amount of river water... The fact is that more rivers flow into Pontus and Maeotis than into the other seas from Maeotis to Ponto, from Pontus to the Aegean, from the Aegean to the Sicilian, becomes noticeably deeper and deeper.”

Aristotle talked about “dry” evaporation (thermal radiation from the earth’s surface), about heat zones and winds, as a result of uneven heating of the earth’s surface, and gave a description of the 12-ray wind rose. Aristotle wrote about earthquakes, thunder, lightning, hurricanes, rainbows and other phenomena and the reasons for their formation.

In the book “Politics,” he examined the influence of natural factors on man and his behavior in a direction that later became known as “geographical determinism.” The state of nature, according to Aristotle, also influences the level of development of statehood: “Peoples living in countries with cold climates and in northern Europe are full of courageous character, but their intellectual life and artistic interests are less developed. Therefore, they retain their freedom longer, but are not capable of state life and cannot dominate their neighbors. On the contrary, the peoples inhabiting Asia are very intellectual and have artistic taste, but they lack courage; therefore they live in a subordinate and servile state. The Hellenic people, geographically occupying a sort of middle place between the inhabitants of northern Europe and Asia, combine the natural properties of both; she has both a courageous character and a developed intellect; therefore, it retains its freedom, enjoys the best state organization and would be able to rule over everyone if only it were united by one state system.”

The works of the greatest Greek scientist Herodotus (484-425 BC) were very important for the development of geography. The value of these works lies in the fact that they were compiled on the basis of his personal travels and observations. Herodotus visited and described Egypt, Libya, Phenicia, Palestine, Arabia, Babylonia, Persia, the nearest part of India, Media, the shores of the Caspian and Black Seas, Scythia (the southern part of the European territory of the USSR) and Greece.

Herodotus’s extensive work, created in the 5th century BC, did not immediately receive the name “History in Nine Books”. Two or three centuries after the death of the scientist, his book was divided in the Library of Alexandria into nine parts - according to the number of muses; Individual parts were named after them, and the entire manuscript as a whole was called “History in Nine Books”, or “Muses”.

This work tells about the Greco-Persian wars, and about distant lands, about many peoples, and about various customs and the art of people from different countries.

Herodotus's "History" is not only a generalizing historical and geographical work, but also one of the most important monuments of travel and discovery of the Earth. From it we learn about the travels of Herodotus himself through the countries of Europe, Asia, Africa and about other ancient journeys by land and sea, about which information would not have been preserved for posterity if the famous historian and traveler of antiquity had not told about them in his book “Muses” .

Let's get acquainted with two characteristic fragments from the fourth book of "History". The first of them describes the Borysthenes River - this is how Herodotus calls the Dnieper: “The Borysthenes is the largest of the Scythian rivers after the Istra [Danube] and, in our opinion, the richest not only among the Scythian rivers, but among all in general, except, however, the Egyptian Nile ; no other river can compare with this latter. But of the other rivers, the Borysthenes is the most profitable: it supplies the most beautiful and luxurious pastures for livestock, the most excellent fish in great abundance, its water tastes very pleasant, clean, while the rivers next to it have muddy water; excellent arable fields stretch along it or very tall grass grows in those places where grain is not sown; At the mouth of the river, salt collects by itself in huge quantities; in Borysthenes there are huge fish without a vertebral column, called antakai [sturgeons], which are used for salting, and many other things worthy of attention.”

Herodotus also reports that the region of the Scythian farmers extends along the Borysthenes [Dnieper] for a ten-day voyage. His ideas about the lands located upstream of the Borysthenes are vague: “... the only thing that is certain is that up to the region of the Scythian farmers, it [the Borysthenes] flows through the desert...”.

Regardless of any special purposes of historical research about ancient Scythia, it is interesting to read the description of the Dnieper made two and a half millennia ago.

Herodotus also sailed along the Pontus Euxine (Black Sea), visited Olbia - an ancient Greek city on the shores of the Dnieper-Bug estuary; visited the vicinity of Olbia, saw the northern Black Sea region. The above description of the Dnieper shows that he collected information about the middle Dnieper region; Only the area of the upper reaches of the Dnieper remained unknown to him.

Herodotus’s curious comparison of two geographical riddles: “Not only I, but, it seems, none of the Hellenes can determine the origins of either Borysthenes [i.e. Dnieper], nor the Nile.” Herodotus traveled up the Nile earlier, before he went to the lower reaches of the Dnieper. His work contains reflections on the causes of the periodic floods of the Nile and the mystery of the sources of this great river, about which “no one knows anything reliable.”

In order to better imagine the value of Herodotus’s work as a monument not only to his own wanderings, but also to other travels, let us turn to another fragment from the fourth book of the History, which preserves for us the memory of one of the most remarkable sea voyages of antiquity.

Herodotus reports on an expedition around Africa. The name Africa itself appeared much later; in Herodotus’s descriptions, Africa is called “Libya”: “Libya turns out to be surrounded by water, except for the part where it borders on Asia; the first to prove this, as far as we know, was the Egyptian king Necho” - these lines begin a short report about the amazing voyage.

It goes on to tell how Necho instructed the Phoenician navigators to sail around Libya by sea: “... He sent the Phoenicians on ships to the sea [Red Sea] with orders to sail back through the Pillars of Hercules [Straits of Gibraltar] until they entered the northern sea and arrived to Egypt, the Phoenicians sailed from the Erythraean Sea and entered the southern sea. When autumn came, they landed on the shore, and, no matter where they landed in Libya, they sowed the land and waited for the harvest; After harvesting the grain, they sailed on. So two years passed on the voyage; and only in the third year did they round the Pillars of Hercules and return to Egypt. They also said, which I don’t believe, but someone else might believe, that while sailing around Libya, the Phoenicians had the sun on the right side. So Libya became known for the first time.

The above lines are the only news about navigation, which, apparently, had no analogue in antiquity and the Middle Ages. In the works of geographers of different eras - from the ancients, most of whom doubted the reality of navigation or even categorically denied its possibility, to modern ones, whose opinions differ - there are many very different statements.

A. Humboldt drew attention to the importance of one of the arguments “for” more than a hundred years ago. Its essence boils down to the following. The most incredible thing about the voyage around Africa, from the point of view of ancient scholars, was that "the Phoenicians had the sun on their right side." Herodotus himself did not believe this either. After all, the expedition went around Africa from east to west, and any inhabitant of the Mediterranean countries knew that if the ship sails westward on the sea, then the sun is on the left along the ship, that is, it shines at noon from the south. The Phoenicians, on the other hand, allegedly saw the sun to the north - how can one believe such inconsistency? And Herodotus considered it necessary to add: “... which I do not believe, but someone else, perhaps, will believe.”

In order to believe the Phoenician sailors, one had to know that in the southern hemisphere of the Earth the sun at noon is actually visible in the north. So, as V.T. points out. Bogucharovsky, “the most serious argument that an ancient scientist could bring, who doubted the reliability of the amazing story about the voyage, became two millennia later the most compelling argument confirming the historical authenticity of the expedition of Phoenician sailors around Africa. The narrators could not come up with such a thing. And it was possible to see the sun at noon in the north only by sailing south from the equator.”

Thus, the main directions of geographical science originated in Ancient Greece. Already by the 6th century. BC. the needs of navigation and trade (the Greeks founded a number of colonies on the shores of the Mediterranean and Black Seas at that time) necessitated descriptions of the land and sea coasts. At the turn of the 6th century. BC. Hecataeus from Miletus compiled a description of the Oikumene - all the countries known to the ancient Greeks at that time. “Description of the Earth” by Hecataeus became the beginning of the regional studies trend in geography.

In the era of “classical Greece,” the most prominent representative of regional studies was Herodotus. His travels did not lead to the discovery of new lands, but contributed to the accumulation of more complete and reliable facts and the development of descriptive and regional studies in science.

The science of classical Greece found its completion in the works of Aristotle, who founded in 335 BC. philosophical school - Lyceum in Athens. Almost everything that was known about geographical phenomena at that time was summarized in Aristotle's Meteorology. This work represents the beginnings of general geoscience, which were isolated by Aristotle from the undivided geographical science.

The Hellenistic era (330-146 BC) dates back to the emergence of a new geographical direction, which later received the name of mathematical geography. One of the first representatives of this trend was Eratosthenes (276-194 BC). He was the first to quite accurately determine the size of the circumference of the globe by measuring the meridian arc (the measurement error was no more than 10%). Eratosthenes owns a large work, which he called “Geographical Notes,” using the term “geography” for the first time. The book gives a description of the Oikumene, and also discusses issues of mathematical and physical geography (general geoscience). Thus, Eratosthenes united all three areas under the single name “geography”, and he is considered the true “father” of geographical science.

Half a century after Eratosthenes, the ancient Greek astronomer Hipparchus introduced the names “geographical latitude” and “geographical longitude” into use, invented the astrolabe, and continued Eratosthenes’ research. What all this meant for the history of the discovery of the Earth is said with great expressiveness in the “History of Geography” by K. Ritter, although his figurative assessment of the merits of these two scientists of the ancient world is somewhat hyperbolic.

K. Ritter writes that “few inventions had a more beneficial influence on the fate of sciences and the welfare of peoples than those associated with the names of Eratosthenes and Hipparchus... From then on, the navigator could find his way back and forth in seas not yet visited, and depict it for posterity. The caravan could reach the goal of its journey along hitherto unknown paths, through the desert or an entire part of the world, to unknown countries. From then on, only posterity could take advantage of the geographical discoveries of their ancestors. The often forgotten or obscured position of lands and localities could now easily be found using a given figure and latitude and longitude.”

Not everything in this statement is indisputable. It overemphasizes the previous difficulties in determining the locations of lands and the ease of these determinations after Eratosthenes. However, even one and a half thousand years after the great geographers and astronomers of antiquity, travelers still did not have accurate methods for determining geographic longitude. This is precisely what is associated with the often repeated searches for “enchanted islands”, which either appeared, then again eluded the discoverers and, accordingly, disappeared from the map.

However, K. Ritter had every reason to single out the inventions of Eratosthenes and Hipparchus as significant in the history of human knowledge of the Earth. The modern network of geographic coordinates originates from a simple network on a map drawn by Eratosthenes. And in the writings of travelers, in the descriptions of new lands in the ship's journals of seafarers, numbers gradually take their place, changing many times along the way, numbers that cartographers eagerly await, degrees and minutes of geographic latitude and longitude.

Eratosthenes' "Geography" has not survived to this day. Its content is known from individual excerpts, from the statement of the scientist’s opinions and brief reviews of his work, which can be found in other ancient authors, especially Strabo. “Geography” gives a general outline of the history of knowledge about the Earth, talks about its shape and size, the size of the inhabited land, and individual countries that were known to the ancient Greeks at the turn of the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC.

Following Aristotle and other scientists who support the idea of the spherical shape of the Earth, Eratosthenes proceeds in his reasoning, as well as in his famous measurement of the size of the Earth, from the fact that the Earth is spherical. The statement of Eratosthenes is also connected with this, the meaning and importance of which became clearly clear one and a half thousand years later: “If the vastness of the Atlantic Sea had not prevented us, it would have been possible to sail from Iberia [the Iberian Peninsula] to India in the same parallel circle.”

Let us point out another work, which the author himself, Strabo, rightfully called “colossal”. He wrote: “Our work is, as it were, a colossal work that treats the great and worldly...”

“Geography”, or “Geography in Seventeen Books” - under such a laconic title, Strabo’s work was published countless times during the two thousand years that have passed since the time when it was written. Little is known about Strabo. He was a historian and geographer, visited different countries of the Mediterranean, wrote briefly about his travels in Geography, just a few phrases, in order to explain which lands he saw himself and which he knew from other people’s descriptions.

Strabo's work contains the most detailed collection of geographical knowledge of the ancient Greeks and Romans about the world. Eight books of “Geographies” are dedicated to European countries, six books to Asian countries and one book to African countries. “The Geography of Strabo” - the prototype of later regional studies books - does not, of course, belong to the literature of travel, but like the work of Geodotus, it also includes some valuable reports for science about remarkable travels of antiquity.

From Strabo we learn, for example, about the voyages of Eudoxus. Strabo himself did not believe the information about this voyage. He borrowed them from Posidonius, a historian and philosopher of the 1st century BC, whose geographical judgments are known mainly from Strabo. Having outlined the story of Posidonius, Strabo reproaches him for his fiction: “... this whole story is not particularly far from the inventions of Pytheas, Euhemerus and Antiphanes. Those people can still be forgiven, just as we forgive magicians for their inventions, because this is their specialty. But who can forgive this for Posidonius, a man very skilled in evidence and a philosopher. This turned out unsuccessfully for Posidonius.”

The above lines are unfair to both Pytheas and Posidodonius. But the merit of Strabo is that he considered it necessary to place in his book a story that seemed implausible to him. This is what is now known thanks to this about one of the oldest voyages to India, completed in the 2nd century. BC. by a certain Eudoxus from Cyzicus (an island in the Sea of Marmara).

Strabo writes: “Eudoxus, as the story goes, arrived in Egypt during the reign of Euergetes II; he was introduced to the king and his ministers and talked with them, especially regarding travel up the Nile... Meanwhile, the story continues, some Indian at that time was accidentally delivered to the king by the coast guard from the very depression of the Arabian Gulf. Those who brought the Indian said that they found him half dead alone on a ship that had run aground; who he is and where he comes from, they do not know, since they do not understand his language. The king handed the Indian over to people who were supposed to teach him Greek. Having learned Greek, the Indian said that, while sailing from India, he accidentally lost his course and, having lost his companions, who died of hunger, eventually reached Egypt safely. Since this story was received with doubt by the king, he promised to be a guide to the persons appointed by the king to sail to India. Among these persons was Eudoxus. Thus, Eudoxus sailed to India with gifts and returned with a cargo of incense and precious stones...”

Eudoxus' travels and adventures did not end there. The goods he brought were taken from him by King Everget, and after the death of Everget, he had the chance to set sail again to India, this time at the behest of Cleopatra. On the way back, the ship was carried by the winds to the south of Ethiopia.

The third voyage was unsuccessful. Regardless of this, the message that Eudoxus took to the open sea using constant winds is very important. It can be assumed that already on his first voyage to India, he learned from the “guide” - an Indian - about the monsoons of the Indian Ocean and how a ship should sail on the open sea with the help of these winds.

Travel from Greece and Egypt to India had been made before, long before Eudoxus. But such journeys - more by land than by sea - lasted a long time, about two years, and were an exceptional and difficult undertaking. And the monsoon helped the ship not to stay close to the shore, to cross the ocean and make the whole journey in a month or two.

Trade ships of the Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians increasingly set off along the sea route blazed by Eudoxus’ expedition. In the 1st century AD Even a detailed reference book for sailors was written in Egypt - “Periplus of the Erythraean Sea,” that is, “Navigation on the Indian Ocean.” In it we find a brief mention of the Greek navigator Hippalus, who “discovered” sailing to India “directly across the sea.” Nowadays it is difficult to establish definitively whether there is a connection between this mention and the story given in Strabo’s book about the travels of Eudoxus. Some modern researchers believe that Hippalus was a participant in the first voyage to India, which was made by Eudoxus. But the main content of Strabo’s “Geography” lies in detailed systematic descriptions of countries known to scientists of the ancient world.

A number of works concerning geography were written by the materialist philosopher Democritus. He traveled a lot and compiled a geographical map, which was used in the compilation of later maps. Democritus posed a number of geographical problems, which were subsequently dealt with by many scientists: the measurement of the then known landmass, and then the entire Earth, the dependence of organic life on climate, etc.

As noted by V.P. Maksakovsky, “for the development of geography in ancient Greece, the campaigns of Alexander the Great and sea voyages beyond the Mediterranean Sea were important. Among the latter, the voyage of Pytheas from Massilia (Marseille) is of greatest interest. Pytheas, having passed the Strait of Gibraltar, sailed along the coast of northwestern Europe and presumably reached Norway. Pytheas's notes mention thick fogs, ice and the midnight sun, which indicates the high latitudes he reached. It can be assumed that Pytheas circled Great Britain and saw Iceland.

Rome became the heir to the cultural conquests of Greece and Alexandria. It must be said that researchers know little about the major geographers and travelers of the Romans.

Thus, the largest ancient scientist of Roman origin is called Gaius Pliny Secundus the Elder (23-79), author of “Natural History” in 37 books - an encyclopedia of natural science knowledge of his time, compiled on the basis of a compilation of the works of two thousand authors, Greek and Roman. When describing, Pliny paid special attention to quantitative indicators, whether it concerned the size of a known part of the Earth or the distances between noticeable geographical objects.

Here is a fragment from the “Natural History” concerning the Sea of Azov: “Some say that the Meotian lake itself, receiving the Tanais River, which flows from the Rhipean Mountains and is the extreme border between Europe and Asia, extends in a circumference of 1406 miles, others - 1125 miles. It is known that the direct path from its mouth to the mouth of the Tanais is 275 miles.

Pliny notes the length and width of the Kerch Strait, the names of settlements on its shores. The peoples living in a particular area, their customs and occupations are listed everywhere. Also. Pliny knew of the "Nile Marshes", an area located south of a strip of desert inhabited by elephants, rhinoceroses and pygmies.

One of the greatest experts in the philosophical heritage of the Ionians and Epicureans was the famous scientist and poet Titus Lucretius Carus (99-55 BC). His poem “The Nature of Things” is an attempt to consider and explain all natural phenomena from the Universe to living organisms, to understand the secrets of birth, human thought and soul.

As A.B. writes Dietmar, “the poem consists of six books. The first and second contain the doctrine of the eternity and boundlessness of the Universe, the doctrine of atoms and their properties, the doctrine of the eternity of motion. The third and fourth talk about the unity of soul and body and about sensory sensations as a source of knowledge. The fifth and sixth books describe the world as a whole, individual phenomena and the causes that give rise to them, and give an idea of animals and humans, religion and social activities.”

In nature, everything changes, arises, disintegrates, is re-created. All things in their decomposition return to the state of primary matter in order to again take part in natural transformations. “If I see that the members and parts of the great world perish, then are born again, it means that our earth and the firmament also had a beginning and are destined to perish.”

For Lucretius, evolution and the acquisition of new properties is a self-evident property of matter. “Time...changes the entire nature of the world, and one state is always followed by another. The world does not stagnate in one position... From one state the earth passes into another. She has no former properties, but there is something that was not there before.

And all this happens without the participation of the gods and prior expediency. Lucretius concerns the origin of the Earth, various meteorological phenomena, the water cycle, the causes of thunder and lightning, earthquakes and many other phenomena.

Thus, Roman scientists created generalizing geographical works in which they tried to show all the diversity of the world they knew. The largest works of this type include the book of Pomponius Mela (1st century) “On the Position of the Earth”, or “On Chorography”.

As V.T. points out. Bogucharovsky, “Pomponius systematized information from the works of Herodotus, Eratosthenes, Hipparchus and other predecessor scientists. The description of the territories was not accompanied by significant original theoretical calculations. Pomponius divided the earth into five climatic zones: hot, two cold and two temperate and supported the hypothesis of the existence of a southern habitable zone inhabited by “antichthons” (anti-living).

The campaigns and wars of the Romans provided a lot of material for geography, but the processing of this material was carried out mainly by Greek scientists. The largest of them are Strabo and Ptolemy.

The mathematician and geographer Claudius Ptolemy, Greek by birth, lived in Egypt in the first half of the 2nd century. AD His greatest work was the creation of the “world system,” which dominated science for more than a thousand years. Ptolemy's geographical views are expressed in the book "Geographical Guide". He builds his geography on purely mathematical principles, first of all indicating the geographical definition of latitude and longitude of each place.

Ptolemy had more significant geographical material than Strabo. In his works, as M. Golubchik writes, “one can find information about the Caspian Sea, about the river. Volga (Ra) and r. Kame (Eastern Ra). When describing Africa, he dwells in detail on the sources of the Nile, and his description is in many ways similar to the latest research."

The works of Ptolemy summed up all the geographical knowledge of the ancient world, which was quite large. Geographers of the most developed countries of Western Europe until the 15th century. added almost nothing to the geographical knowledge that the Greeks and Romans had before the 3rd century. From the given examples of the most important geographical works of antiquity, two paths of development of geography are already outlined with sufficient clarity. The first way is a description of individual countries (Herodotus, Strabo). The second way is a description of the entire Earth as a single whole (Eratosthenes, Ptolemy). These two main paths in geography have survived to this day.

Thus, during the era of the slave system, significant geographical knowledge was accumulated. The main achievements of this period were the establishment of the spherical shape of the Earth and the first measurements of its size, the writing of the first major geographical works and the compilation of geographical maps, and, finally, the first attempts to give a scientific explanation of the physical phenomena occurring on Earth.

As a result of a theoretical analysis of the literature, it was revealed that the first large slave states appeared in the 4th millennium BC. among the agricultural peoples of Asia Minor, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Northern India and China. Their formation was facilitated by the position along large rivers (irrigation sources and waterways) and reliable natural boundaries - mountains and deserts. The first written documents were created, which give ancient ideas about the geographical knowledge of the peoples of the ancient East, describe a known part of the Earth, contain brief descriptions of the territory of the state, etc.

In the ancient world, two paths of development of geography are outlined. The first way is a description of individual countries (Herodotus, Strabo). The second way is a description of the entire Earth as a single whole (Eratosthenes, Ptolemy).

List of sources

1.Ancient geography / comp. M.S. Bodnarsky. - M.: Mysl, 1953. - 360 p.

.Ancient geography of the Mediterranean: electronic resource http: // www.mgeograf.ru.

3.Aristotle. Collected works. In 4 volumes: volume 3. Meteorology. - M.: Mysl, 1981. - 374 p.

4.Bezrukov, Yu.F. Physical geography of continents and oceans in questions and answers. In 2 hours. Part 1. Eurasia and the World Ocean. - Simferopol: TNU named after. IN AND. Vernadsky, 2005. - 196 p.

.Bogucharovsky V.T. History of geography / V.T. Bogucharovsky. - M.: Academic project, 2006. - 500 p.

.Brown L.A. History of geographical maps / L.A. Brown. - M.: Tsentropoligraf, 2006. - 480 p.

.Vavilova, E.V. Economic and social geography of the world / E.V. Vavilova. - M.: Gardariki, 2006. - 469 p.

.Herodotus. History in nine books / Herodotus. - St. Petersburg: Peter, 2005. - 274 p.

.Gilenso B.A. History of ancient literature. At 2 p.m. Part 1. / B.A. Gilenson. - M.: Academic project, 2009. - 270 p.

.Golubchik, M. History of geography / M. Golubchik, S. Evdokimov, G. Maksimov. - M.: SSU. - 2006. - 224 p.

.Democritus: electronic resource: http: // eternaltown.com.ua/ content/ view.

.James P. All possible worlds: a history of geographical ideas / P. James / ed. A.G. Isachenko. - M.: Gardariki, 2006. - 320 p.

.Ditmar A.B. From Scythia to Elephantine. Life and travels of Herodotus / A.B. Ditmar. - M.: Nauka, 2004. - 206 p.

.Ivanova N.V. Physical geography: methodological recommendations / N.V. Ivanova. - Samara: Samara Municipal Institute of Management, 2006. - 40 p.

.Isachenko A.G. Development of geographical ideas / A.G. Isachenko. - M.: Enlightenment, 1989. - 276 p.

.History of Ancient Rome: electronic resource: #"justify">. Kuznetsov V.I. Ancient China / V.I. Kuznetsov. - M. Ast-press, 2008. - 210 p.

.Maksakovsky V.P. Historical geography of the world / V.P. Maksakovsky. - M.: Academy, 2005. - 474 p.

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Early ideas about the structure of the world came to us from several ancient centers of civilization, where, thousands of years before our era, various writing systems arose and the first descriptions of the Earth were compiled. It was they who laid the foundation for the science of geography.

World of ancient civilizations

In ancient times, the first civilizations known to modern man arose in Eurasia. There are civilizations of the Ancient East (including) and Europe. Interaction between civilizations was facilitated by the invention of means of transportation by land and, more importantly, by sea. According to Thor Heyerdahl, ancient man raised a sail before he began to ride chariots.

Geographical knowledge in the civilizations of the East

The civilizations of the Ancient East are often called “river”, since they formed in areas irrigated by river waters. To determine the timing of different types of agricultural work, people there already mastered the art of astronomical observations several thousand years before our era. The agricultural peoples of the kingdoms of Mesopotamia (between the Tigris and Euphrates), North and China (4th-2nd millennium BC) left us their geographical knowledge. The Egyptians quite accurately determined the length of the year and developed a solar calendar. Egyptian and Babylonian priests, as well as Chinese astronomers, established the frequency of solar eclipses and learned to predict the dates of river floods. From Mesopotamia the division of the year into 12 months and the day into 24 hours has come down to us. To determine the direction of movement through deserts, the Chinese invented the first in the world.

In the states of the Ancient East, stone and metal processing, wood harvesting and processing developed. The development of crafts led to the emergence of the first cities in human history. They were founded back in the 4th millennium BC. At the same time, the first sea voyages began.

Ancient Egypt

The ancient Greek scientist Herodotus called Egypt “the gift of the Nile” back in the 5th century BC, and not by chance. Along the river bed, thanks to the silt carried by the water, fertile lands were formed. The Nile also served as the main transport artery. On it, boats, invented by the Egyptians even before the "epoch of the pyramids", floated deep into Africa. In the 15th century BC, Ancient Egypt reached its greatest power. During conquests and expeditions, the Egyptians got acquainted with new lands. The most famous was the Red Sea expedition to Punt (the eastern tip of Africa), equipped by Queen Hatshepsut (circa 1493 BC). Through the Mediterranean, the Egyptians traveled to the island of Crete, and across the Atlantic on papyrus boats, possibly to the coast of America.

Ancient India

Ancient Indian civilization arose in the 3rd millennium BC. Writing, original religions, culture, sciences, especially mathematics, astronomy, and medicine developed in India. Since ancient times, connections have been established with other civilizations of the East. The era of sea travel began early in India. Brave Indian sailors reached the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea, traveled through the expanses of the Indian and

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Natural and climatic conditions of Ancient India

India occupies the entire area of the Hindustan Peninsula, located in southern Asia. From the north, it is reliably protected by the highest mountain range in the world - the Himalayas, which protect the country from strong cold winds. The coast of India is washed by the warm waters of the Indian Ocean, the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea.

The largest arms of India are the Ganges and the Indus, thanks to which the soil in their valleys has always been very fertile. During the rainy season, these rivers often burst their banks, flooding everything around.

Due to its consistently hot and humid climate with high rainfall, rice and cane have long been grown in the country.

Rice. 1. Agriculture in Ancient India.

In ancient times, farmers had a hard time, because they constantly had to fight with lush tropical vegetation, reclaiming land for crops. Nature and people were very closely connected with each other, and this connection was reflected in the unusual culture of Ancient India.

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Since ancient times, the inhabitants of India have treated the water element with great respect. After all, thanks to water, it was possible to get a good harvest, and, therefore, the opportunity to survive in difficult conditions. Until now, the Indians sacredly revere the most full-flowing river of the country - the Ganges, and consider it sacred.

Features of the state

In the III millennium BC. e. on the Hindustan Peninsula there were two centers of Indian civilization - the largest cities of Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa. Most of the population was represented by Dravidians, who were known as excellent farmers.

In the first half of the 2nd millennium, Aryan tribes arrived on the territory of Ancient India. For several centuries, they settled on the peninsula, and gradually mixed with the locals, forming a single Indian people.

Each Aryan tribe had its own leader - a raja. At first they were elected, but over time, the board began to be inherited. The Rajas were interested in expanding their lands and strengthening their kingdoms, and therefore were in a state of continuous war with each other.

Rice. 2. Raja.

In Ancient India, there were two forms of courts: higher (royal) and lower (intracommunal). A party dissatisfied with the decision of a lower court could appeal to the king and close brahmanas to reconsider the case.

During this period, a religion called Brahmanism was formed, at the center of which was the god Brahma - the highest deity, the creator of the universe, the very first and most powerful among the gods in Hindu myths.

Under the influence of Brahmanism, the entire society in Ancient India was divided into social groups - varnas:

Brahmins - priests who lived in temples on income from sacrifices.
Kshatriyas - a caste of warriors who were excellent at wielding weapons, drove chariots, and were excellent horsemen.
Vaishya - farmers and artisans. Shepherds and traders also belonged to this varna.
Shudras - the lowest and most disrespected varna, consisting of servants.

Belonging to a varna was inherited and could not be changed in any way. Thus, social inequality crystallized even more strongly in the society of Ancient India.

Dharma, a set of rules necessary to maintain cosmic balance, was of great importance in Hindu religions. This is a righteous path, moral principles, the observance of which will help a person achieve enlightenment.

Culture of Ancient India

The most important achievement of the culture of Ancient India was the creation of an alphabetic letter consisting of 50 characters. Literacy was available only to brahmins, who guarded their knowledge very jealously.

The rich literary language Sanskrit, which means “perfect” in translation, was as if specially created for writing lyrical works. The most famous were the two great poems of the ancient world - the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, which had a huge influence on the development of Indian culture.

Scientific knowledge in the fields of medicine, mathematics, and chemistry has also received great development. Astronomy was especially well developed in Ancient India - already in ancient times, Indians knew that the Earth was spherical and rotated around its axis.

The art of Ancient India is, first of all, represented by unique architecture. The majestic palaces and temples were distinguished by incredibly meticulous decoration. Columns, gates and walls were decorated with carvings, gilded images of fruits, flowers and birds, many details were cast in silver.

Rice. 3. Temples in Ancient India.

Monasteries and temples were even built in caves. Ancient architects carved out vast corridors and halls in the mountains, monumental columns, which were then decorated with filigree carvings.

Theatrical art, which was a mixture of acting, poetry and dance, also received great development in Ancient India.

The works of ancient sculptors and painters were mostly of a religious nature, but there were also images and sculptures made on secular themes.

What have we learned?

When studying the topic “Ancient India” according to the 5th grade history program of the Ancient World, we learned where the ancient Indian state was located, what its natural and climatic features were. We found out how the stratification of society took place, what was the main type of activity of the population. We also got acquainted with the culture and religion of Ancient India.

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The universe of the "Vedas" was very simple: below - the Earth, flat and round, above - the firmament, along which the Sun, Moon and stars move. Between them is the airspace (anta-ricksha) where the birds, clouds and demigods are. This idea of the world has become more complex with the development of religious thought.

The explanations put forward for the origin and evolution of the world had nothing to do with science. But all the religions of India have accepted some cosmological concepts that are fundamental to Indian consciousness. They were strikingly different from the Semitic ideas that would long influence Western thought: the world is very old, in an endless process of cyclical evolution and decline; there are other worlds besides ours.

The Hindus believed that the world is shaped like an egg, Brahmanda, or the egg of Brahma, and is divided into twenty-one belts: the Earth is the seventh from the top. Above the Earth, six heavens rise above each other, corresponding to increasing degrees of bliss and not connected with the planets, as with the Greeks. Below the Earth was the Patala, or lower world, which included seven levels. The abode of nagas and other mythical creatures, it was by no means considered an unpleasant place. Below the patala there was purgatory - Traka, also divided into seven circles, each worse than the other, since it was a place of punishment for souls. The world was suspended in free space and presumably isolated from other worlds.

The cosmological scheme of the Buddhists and Jains differed from that just presented in many respects, but was ultimately based on the same concept. Both claimed that the Earth was flat, but at the beginning of our era astronomers recognized the fallacy of this idea, and although it continued to dominate religious stories, enlightened minds knew that the Earth was spherical. Some calculations of its size were made, the most recognized was the point of view of Brahmagupta (7th century AD), according to which the earth's circumference was calculated at 5000 yojanas - one yojana was equal to approximately 7.2 km. This figure is not so far from the truth, and it is one of the most accurate that was established by ancient astronomers.

This small spherical Earth, according to the ideas of astronomers, did not satisfy theologians, and later religious literature still described our planet as a large flat disk. Mount Meru rose in the center, around which the Sun, Moon and stars revolved. Meru was surrounded by four continents (dvipa) separated from the central mountain by oceans and named after the large trees that grew on the coast facing the mountain. In the southern continent where people lived, the typical tree was jambu, so it was called Jambudvipa. The southern part of this continent, separated from the others by the Himalayas, was the “land of the sons of Bharata” (Bharata-varsha), or India. Bharatavarsha alone was 9,000 yojanas in width, and the entire continent of Jambudvipa was 33,000 or, according to some sources, 100,000 yojanas.

To this fabulous geography were added other elements, no less fantastic. In the Puranas, Jambudvipa is described as a ring surrounding Mount Meru and separated from the neighboring continent of Plakshadwipa by an ocean of salt! This, in turn, surrounded Jambudvipa, and so on until the last, seventh continent: each of them was round and separated from the other by an ocean of some substance - salt, molasses, wine, ghee, milk, cottage cheese and pure water . This description of the world, striking more by the power of imagination than by reliability, was tacitly accepted by Indian theologians, but astronomers could not help but take it into account and adapted it to their model of the spherical Earth, making Measure the axis of the globe and dividing its surface into seven continents.

Oceans of oil and seas of molasses prevented the development of genuine geographical science. The seven continents are completely impossible to correlate with real areas of the earth's surface - no matter how much some modern historians try to identify them with regions of Asia. Only Alexandria, known from the first centuries of our era, and unclear references to the city of Ro-maka (Constantinople) found in astronomical works are reliable. But we are talking about practical knowledge that did not entail any research on the part of scientists.