Note 3542 — BOOK V. AN ACCOUNT OF COUNTRIES, NATIONS, SEAS, TOWNS, HAVENS, MOUNTAINS, RIVERS, DISTANCES, AND PEOPLES WHO NOW EXIST OR FORMERLY EXISTED.

Syene was a city of Upper Egypt, on the eastern bank of the Nile just below the First Cataract, and was looked upon as the southern frontier city of Egypt against Æthiopia. It was an important point in the geography and astronomy of the ancients; for, lying just under the tropic of Cancer, it was chosen as the place through which they drew their chief parallel of latitude. The sun was vertical to Syene at the time of the summer solstice, and a well was shown there where the face of the sun was seen at noon at that time. Its present name is Assouan or Ossouan.