Photius' Excerpt of Ctesias' Indica
Ctesias was a Greek physician who stayed at the court of the Persian king Artaxerxes II Mnemon from 404 to 398/397. He wrote several books about Persia and India. They are now lost but were quoted by ancient authors; consequently, we are able to judge their value as history (low) and as works of art (entertaining). The following text is an excerpt from the Indica by the Byzantine scholar Photius (c.815-897); the translation was made by J.H. Freese and was found at Tertullian.Org. Strikethrough text is believed to be interpolations.
Photius' excerpt of Ctesias' Indica
[1] Also read the same author's History of India, in one book, in which he employs the Ionic dialect more frequently.
In regard to the river Indus, he says that, where it is narrowest, it is seven, where it is widest, thirty-five kilometers broad.
[2] He declares that the population of India is almost greater than that of the whole world.
[3] He also mentions a worm found in this river, the only living creature which breeds there.
[4] Beyond India there are no countries inhabited by men.
[5] It never rains there, the country being watered by the river.
[6] He says of the pantarba, a kind of seal-stone, that 477 seal-stones and other precious stones, belonging to a Bactrian merchant, which had been thrown into the river, were drawn up from the bottom, all clinging together, by this stone.
[7] He also speaks of elephants which knock down walls, of little apes with tails four cubits long, and of cocks of very large size;
[8] of the parrot about as large as a hawk, which has a human tongue and voice, a dark red beak, a black, beard, and blue feathers up to the neck, which is red like cinnabar. It speaks Indian like a native, and if taught Greek, speaks Greek.
[9] He next mentions a fountain which is filled every year with liquid gold, from which a hundred pitcherfuls are drawn. These pitchers have to be made of earth, since the gold when drawn off becomes solid, and it is necessary to break the vessel in order to get it out. The fountain is square, sixteen cubits in circumference, and a fathom deep. The gold in each pitcher weighs a talent. At the bottom of the fountain there is iron, and the author says that he possessed two swords made from it, one given him by the king, the other by his mother, Parysatis. If this iron be fixed in the ground, it keeps off clouds and hail and hurricanes Ctesias declares that the king twice proved its efficacy and that he himself was a witness to it.
[10] The Indian dogs are very large and even attack lions.
[11] There are great mountains, from which are dug sardonyx, onyx, and other seal-stones.
[12] It is intensely hot and the sun appears ten times larger than in other countries; large numbers of people are suffocated by the heat.
[13] The sea is as large as that of Greece; it is so hot on the surface and to a depth of four fingers that fish cannot live near it, but keep on the bottom.
[14] he river Indus flows across plains and between mountains, where the Indian reednote grows. It is so thick that two men can hardly get their arms round it, and as tall as the mast of a merchant-ship of largest tonnage. Some are larger, some smaller, as is natural considering the size of the mountain. Of these reeds some are male, others female. The male has no pith and is very strong, but the female has.
[15] The martikhora is an animal found in this country. It has a face like a man's, a skin red as cinnabar, and is as large as a lion. It has three rows of teeth, ears and light-blue eyes like those of a man; its tail is like that of a land scorpion, containing a sting more than a cubit long at the end. It has other stings on each side of its tail and one on the top of its head, like the scorpion, with which it inflicts a wound that is always fatal. If it is attacked from a distance, it sets up its tail in front and discharges its stings as if from a bow; if attacked from behind, it straightens it out and launches its stings in a direct line to the distance of a thirty meter. The wound inflicted is fatal to all animals except the elephant. The stings are about a foot long and about as thick as a small rush. The martikhora is called in Greek anthropophagos,note because, although it preys upon other animals, it kills and devours a greater number of human beings. It fights with both its claws and stings, which, according to Ctesias, grow again after they have been discharged. There is a great number of these animals in India, which are hunted and killed with spears or arrows by natives mounted on elephants.
[16] Observing that the Indians are extremely just, Ctesias goes on to describe their manners and customs.
[17] He mentions a sacred spot in an uninhabited district, which they honor under the name of the Sun and the Moon. It is a fifteen days' journey from mount Sardo.
[18] Here the Sun is always cool for thirty-five days in the year, so that his votaries may attend his feast and after its celebration may return home without being scorched. In India there is neither thunder, lightning, nor rain, but winds and hurricanes, which carry along everything that comes in their way, are frequent. The sun, after rising, is cool for half the day, but for the remainder is excessively hot in most parts of the country.
[19] It is not the heat of the sun that makes the Indians swarthy; they are so naturally. Some of them, both men and women, are very fair, though they are fewer in number. Ctesias says that he himself saw five white men and two white women.
[20] In support of his statement that the sun cools the air for thirty-five days, he mentions that the fire which streams from Etna does no damage to the middle of the country through which it passes, because it is the abode of just men, but destroys the rest. In the island of Zacynthus there are fountains full of fish, out of which pitch is taken. In the island of Naxos there is a fountain from which sometimes flows a wine of very agreeable flavor. The water of the river Phasis, if allowed to stand a day and a night in a vessel, becomes a most delicious wine. Near Phaselis in Lycia there is a fire which never goes out, but burns on a rock both night and day. It cannot be extinguished by water, which rather increases the flame, but only by throwing earth upon it.
[21] In the middle of India there are black men, called Pygmies, who speak the same language as the other inhabitants of the country. They are very short, the tallest being only two cubits in height, most of them only one and a half. Their hair is very long, going down to the knees and even lower, and their beards are larger than those of any other men. When their beards are full grown they leave off wearing clothes and let the hair of their head fall down behind far below the knees, while their beard trails down to the feet in front. When their body is thus entirely covered with hair they fasten it round them with a girdle, so that it serves them for clothes. They are snub-nosed and ugly.
[22] Their sheep are no bigger than lambs, their oxen, asses, horses, mules, and other beasts of burden about the size of rams.
[23] Being very skillful archers, three thousand of them attend on the king of India.
[24] They are very just and have the same laws as the Indians. They hunt the hare and the fox, not with dogs, but with ravens, kites, crows, and eagles.
[25] There is a lake 140 kilometer in circumference, the surface of which, when riot ruffled by the wind, is covered with floating oil. Sailing over it in little boats, they ladle out the oil with little vessels and keep it for use. They also use oil of sesame and nut oil, but the oil from the lake is best. The lake also abounds in fish.
[26] The country produces much silver and there are numerous silver mines, not very deep, but those of Bactria are said to be deeper. There is also gold, not found in rivers and washed, as in the river Pactolus, but in many large mountains which are inhabited by griffins. These are four-footed birds as large as a wolf, their legs and claws resembling those of a lion; their breast feathers are red, those of the rest of the body black. Although there is abundance of gold in the mountains, it is difficult to get it because of these birds.
[27] The Indian sheep and goats are larger than asses, and as a rule have four young ones, sometimes six, at a time. There are neither tame nor wild pigs.
[28] The palm trees and dates are three times as large as those of Babylon.
[29] There is a river of honey that flows from a rock.
[30] The author speaks at length of the Indians' love of justice, their loyalty to their kings and their contempt of death.
[31] He also mentions a fountain, the water from which, when drawn off, thickens like cheese. If three obols' weight of this thick mass be crushed, mixed with water, and given to any one to drink, he reveals everything that he has ever done, being in a state of frenzy and delirium the whole day. The king makes use of this test when he desires to discover the truth about an accused person. If he confesses, he is ordered to starve himself to death; if he reveals nothing, he is acquitted.
[32] The Indians are not subject to headache, ophthalmia, or even toothache; to ulcers on the mouth, or sores in any other part of the body. They live 120, 130, 150, and some even 200 years.
[33] There is a serpent a span in length, of a most beautiful purple color, with a very white head, and without teeth. It is caught on the burning mountains, from which the sardonyx is dug. It does not sting, but its vomit rots the place where it falls. If it is hung up by the tail it discharges two kinds of poison, one yellow like amber, when it is alive, the other black, when it is dead. If one drinks only as much of the former as a grain of sesame dissolved in water, his brain runs out through his nose and he dies immediately; if the other poison is administered, it brings on consumption, which does not prove fatal for at least a year.
[34] There is a bird called dicaerus,note the size of a partridge's egg. It buries its excrement in the ground in order to hide it. If any one finds it and takes only a morsel of it about the size of a grain of sesame in the morning, he is overcome by sleep, loses consciousness, and dies at sunset.
[35] There is also a tree called parebus, about the size of an olive, which is only found in the royal gardens. It bears neither flowers nor fruit, and has only fifteen very stout roots, the smallest of which is as thick as a man's arm. If a piece of this root, about a span in length, be put near any body of matter, gold, silver, brass, stones, in fact, everything except amber, it attracts it; if a cubit's length of it be used, it attracts lambs and birds, the latter being generally caught