Histories

but we know that the soil of Libya [17,25] (nation), AfricaLibya is redder and somewhat sandy, and Arabian Peninsula [45,25] (region (general)), AsiaArabia and Syria [38,35] (nation), Asia Syria are lands of clay and stones.

This, too, that the priests told me about Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt, is a strong proof: when Moeris was king, if the river rose as much as thirteen feet, it watered all of Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt below Mit Rahina [31.25,29.85] (inhabited place), Giza, Upper Egypt, Egypt, AfricaMemphis.[*](Supposing this statement to be true, Moeris must have been king much more than 900 years before Hdt.: 900 years being much too short a period for a rise of eight cubits in the height of the Nile valley.) Moeris had not been dead nine hundred years when I heard this from the priests. But now, if the river does not rise at least twenty-six or twenty-five feet, the land is not flooded.

And, in my opinion, the Egyptians who inhabit the lands lower down the river than Birkat Qarun [30.666,29.466] (salt lake), Egypt, Africalake Moeris, and especially what is called the Delta—if this land of theirs rises in the same proportion and broadens likewise in extent, and the Nahr an- Nil [31.1,30.166] (river), AfricaNile no longer floods it—will forever after be in the same straits as they themselves once said the Greeks would be;