Note 1445 — Chapter XII · REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY (continued 2)

The usual route from the Tyrrhenian Sea to the east, however, was through the Strait of Messina. Burkhard, an official of Frederick Barbarossa, tells us that during the war of 1162–1179 between the Sicilians and Genoa, Genoese ships used to make their way to Egypt as follows: through the strait between Corsica and Sardinia, thence past the west coast of Sicily, Pantellaria, and Malta to the north coast of Africa, “until they came in sight of the great stone lighthouse of Alexandria by day or of its light by night” (Burkhard, in: Mon. Germ. hist., Scriptores, vol. xxi, p. 236, cited by Schaube, Handelsgeschichte, 1906, p. 153).