Note 2376 — Chapter II

From Ericodes, now Alicudi, to Phœnicodes, now Felicudi, the distance given by the chorographer is the same as that set down by Ptolemy, and by far too much for that which, according to our charts, separates Felicudi from Salini, but tallies exactly with that to the island Panaria, so that the evidence, both of the chorographer and Ptolemy, seems to point to Panaria, not to Salini, as the ancient Didyma. Further, the 29 miles given in Strabo’s text as the distance from Didyma to Lipari, are reduced to 19 miles in the chart of Ptolemy, and even this last distance would be much too great for the interval which separates Salini from Lipari, but agrees with the distance from Lipari to Panaria, and seems likewise to confirm the identity of Panaria and Didyma. The 19 miles, from Lipari to Sicily, agree with Ptolemy and our charts. Ptolemy gives the equivalent of 44 miles as the distance between Sicily and Strongyle, while our modern maps confirm his computation. M. Gossellin observes that the 16 miles of the existing text of Strabo must be a transcriber’s error; but the construction of the text might very well allow the distance to be from Didyma to Strongyle, which would be nearly correct.