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οὐνόματα τριφάσια. For the continents cf. App. XIII. 5; there seems a trace of Greek contempt for women here and elsewhere in this chapter (e.g. εἰ μὴ ἀπὸ τῆς Τυρίης (§ 4)), which makes it clear how completely the real meanings of ‘Asia’ and ‘Europe’ were forgotten in H.'s time. ‘Asia’ is first used in Pindar (Ol. vii. 34), but the adjective in the well-known Ἀσίῳ ἐν λειμῶνι Καϋστρίου ἀμφὶ ῥέεθρα of Il. ii. 461; ‘Asius’ is also the name of two Trojans. ‘Europe’ occurs first in Hymn to Apollo, 250-1 (cf. 290-1), where it is used of the Greek mainland, as opposed to Peloponnese and the ‘seagirt islands’. The names seem to be derived from the Assyrian, ‘açu’ and ‘irib’ (perhaps cf. ἔρεβος), i. e. the ‘rising’ and the ‘setting’, and no doubt reached the Greeks through the Lydian traders (cf. § 3); we may perhaps compare the Assyrian names among the early Lydian kings (i. 7. 2 nn.).

No doubt ‘Asia’ and ‘Europe’ were first used of the opposite shores of the Aegean, and gradually extended, with the spread of geographical knowledge, to their respective hinterlands (cf. Kiepert, Anc. Geog. i. 17, E. T.).

οὐρίσματα. H. is here giving the ordinary ‘boundaries’ which he does not accept (ii. 16, 17 nn.).

οἱ δέ: making the boundary run north and south. As H. is quoting he calls the Tanais ‘Maeotic’ here (and nowhere else).

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