--Ta palaiotera saphos men eurein dia chronou pleithos adunata
ein ek de tekmeirion on epi makrotaton skopounti moi pisteusai
xumbainei ou megala nomizo genesthai oute kata tous polemous oute
es ta alla.--

Thucydides.




CHAPTER I

Introduction



Ancient History


The Mediterranean Sea with its various branches, penetrating far
into the great Continent, forms the largest gulf of the ocean,
and, alternately narrowed by islands or projections of the land and
expanding to considerable breadth, at once separates and connects
the three divisions of the Old World. The shores of this inland
sea were in ancient times peopled by various nations belonging in
an ethnographical and philological point of view to different races,
but constituting in their historical aspect one whole. This historic
whole has been usually, but not very appropriately, entitled the
history of the ancient world. It is in reality the history of
civilization among the Mediterranean nations; and, as it passes