IEWS The Extraordinary Voyage of Pytheas Archaeology has shown an extensive the Greek, by Barry Cunliffe (Walker & rrade in wines and other luxuries along this Co., New York NY, 2002, 178 pp, illus, route from I tali an cities which used Massalia maps, nores, biblio, ISBN 0-80 27- 1393-9; as an entrepor. Pytheas would have been aware of this trade flowin g norrh as well as $24hc) The voyage of rhe ancienr mariner rhe up rhe nearby Rhone River to rhe Celric aurhor calls rh e "ever-fascinaring G reek" settlements in central France and beyond . Pytheas from Massalia (roday's M arseille) T he two great commodities these less adro Brirain and remore lands of norrhern vanced peoples could offer were-besides Europe was a formative experience in Eu- the long-accustomed traffic in slaves traded ropeans' awareness of rheir world. The away or captured in wars-tin and amber, voyage, underraken aro und both rare in the Medirerra.• nean wo rld . 330 BC, began a coherent Cunliffe's case for Pypicture of Europe. It was a rheas' use of the inland river srep that had reverberating consequences for hundreds ro ute rarher than rhe much of years ro come, though sevlonger and more hazardous e ral later commentators sea roure around Spain is found Pytheas' discoveries powerfully supported by the so fantastic rhat they rejected facr that Pyrheas makes scant th e idea that rh e voyage had mention of rhe imporrant been made at all. Carrhaginean seaports rangIt is to these large param... ing along the Iberian coast from Cadiz northward. T hi s eters of the sto ry char Barry Cunliffe, classicist, archaecontrasts sharply with his ologist and philoso ph er of intensely derailed descriphistory, addresses himself in Cunliffe 's calculation of tions of rin-minin g in Britain 's Cornwall-countelling rhe srory of rhe voy- Pytheas' route age, and in brief compass he tryside he definitely did visit limns in rhe civilizations of rhe ancienr and study. Pyrheas recorded that he travworld with striking color and clariry. The eled on foot and hi s inland journeys seem voyage becomes, in effect, a device to open to supporr C unliffe's hypothesis that he the European worlds of 2300 yea rs ago to made his way, either as a solitary traveler or roday's reader, as it opened rhose worlds to wirh a parry, via such local shipping as he readers of Pytheas' own day and after. co uld catch. Thus he fitted in to the existThe M edirerrean wo rld of 330 BC was ing patterns of rrade. at the apogee of rhe H ellenisric empire of In Cunliffe's wo rds, "Pyrheas had Alexander the Great, which spread Greek dem ys tifi ed rhe system, opening up for language and culture from Persia, rhe Le- orhers to develop furth er and to regularize. va nt and Egypr to rhe scattered G reek ciries Thereafter the corridor to the Atlantic of Sicily, sourhern I raly, and as far west as played an increasingly importanr part in M assalia, founded by colonisrs from the the western Mediterranean economy." Greek ciry of Phocaea aro und 600 BC. In It is because of the intense usefuln ess of Pyr heas' rime, 300 years later, ir was a cos- Pyrheas' voyage rhar historians and geogramopolitan center dominating rrade along phers in succeeding generations kepr citing rhe south coasr of France. Beyond this rhe his wo rk, often in extensive quorarions great sea power of Carthage held sway. from the original text now lost to us. In Today's scholars have wrestled with the sifting out the overlapping cirarions of problem of how Pytheas could sail th rough th ese later critics, C unliffe, one feels, gets Ca rrhaginean-controll ed waters ro pass us close ro the actual text of Pyrheas' book. rhrough th e Straits of Gibralrar into the The author draws nor just on literary Atlantic. C unliffe, however, offers rhe con- reco rds, but rhe silent res rimony of the vincingsolurion that he did nor go char way northern peoples Pyrheas enco untered and at all , bur by way of rhe River Aude to make observed. In Cunliffe's magisrerial work the shorr overland hike to the Garonne, Facing the Ocean, published in 2001 (Oxflowin g pasr today's Bordeaux into the Bay ford Universiry Press), he explored the of Biscay and rhe limitless, wild A tlanti c. interco nnected Neolithic and Bronze Age
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50
cultures of the seaboard peoples of northern Europe. His knowledge of the living patterns of these peoples who had been seafarers for centuries enables him to draw fascinating pi ctures of how rhese people lived and how Pytheas mighr have fared among them . C unliffe's deep and extensive knowledge of their li ves gives extraordinary color and veraciry ro rhe srory he rells. To anyone seized of mankind's enco unrer wirh rhe sea rhar enfolds our globe, C unliffe's exploration of Pyrheas and his wo rld is more than jusr readable, it is a grand and enthralling adventure in ancient seafaring. PETERSTAN FORD , EditoratLarge Martin Frobisher: Elizabethan Privateer, by James McDermott (Yale University Press, New H aven CT and Lo ndon UK, 2001 , 509pp, ISBN 0-300-0 8380-7;$3 5h c) Marrin Frobisher was one of Queen Elizabeth I's famous "sea dogs," both a compatriot and a rival of Sir Francis Drake. He commanded three English expeditions in search of rhe Norrhwesr Passage (and gold), caprained rhe largest ship in rhc English fleer against rhe Spanish Arm ada (leading a squadron from her and beating four galleases in a bloody fight rhar kept rhe Armada our of Portland harbor), earned his Q ueen's personal if somewhat grudging regard, and died of a wo und sustained in raking a Spanish forr in France in 1594. Both his career and his character were emblematic of his time. T he strength of rhis biography is less its rreatment of Frobisher than rhe context ir provides. Sixteenth-century England was a country in turmoil eco nomically, religiously and socially. The medieval order was gone, but the new order soon ro be provided by the stare was embryonic. Externally, England was beginning her rise from minor power to wo rld em pire. James McDermott captures rhis chaotic environment well, and adds subsran ti ally to our understa nding of it, especially as it affected English seafaring. Indeed , the pre-stare environ ment is ever more relevant to the 2 l st centu ry, a rime when rhe state is decli ning. Marrin Frobisher wo uld feel ar home in today's West Africa or Afghan istan, and perhaps also among the pirates who again infest the Sourh C hina Sea. The book's depiction of Frobisher himself is less satisfying. McDermott simply
SEA HISTORY 100, SPRING 2002