'The Exploration of the World' by Jules Verne describes all the explorations made in past ages, but also all the new discoveries which have of late years have greatly interested the scientific world. That is, from about 500 BC to about 1600 AD. Chapter I talks about the celebrated Travelers Before the Christian Era - Hanno, Herodotus, etc. It begins with the story of the first traveler of whom we have any account in history, Hanno, and Herodotus, who visited places like Egypt, Lybia, Ethiopia, Phoenicia, Arabia, Babylon, Persia, India, etc. describing each journey with its high points.
For example, Herodotus mentions about the population of India, that it is larger than that of any other country, and he divided it into two classes, the first having settled habitations, the second leading a nomadic life. "Those who lived in the eastern part of the country killed their sick and aged people, and ate them." He also mentions about attempts to circumnavigate Africa, a most hazardous one of which was made in B.C. 146, by Eudoxus of Cyzicus, a geographer. After many such adventures of the ancient days, Chapter II describes the celebrated Travelers From the First to the Ninth Century - like Pausanias, Fa-hian, Soleyman, etc. There is mention of the travels of Fa–Hian and the society, he saw. Whose observations of India, which he calls "a happy kingdom, where the inhabitants are good and honest, needing neither laws nor magistrates, and indebted to none for their support; without markets or wine merchants, and living happily, with plenty of all that they required, where the temperature was neither hot nor cold," reminded me of my history class. Says he, "This happy kingdom was India" The book also have extensive descriptions of other explorers, like those who visited Palestine during the first centuries of Christianity. Chapter IV is dedicated to Marco Polo, who during 1253-1324 took many a journey.
Thereafter, the book describes great and not so great feats undertaken by many, John and Sebastian Cabot, father-son duo, taking the lead. Says Sebastian Cabot, in a narrative preserved by Ramusio, "a great desire and a kind of ardor in my heart to do myself also something famous, and knowing by examining the globe, that if I sailed by the west wind I should reach India more rapidly, I at once made my project known to His Majesty, King Henry VII, who was much satisfied with it". 1493, John and Sebastian Cabot prepared the expedition at their own expense, and set out at the beginning of the year 1494, with the idea of reaching Cathay, and finally the Indies. Discoveries of John and Sebastian Cabot, with the Anglo–Russian Company did many expeditions, a notable one here being about the Land of the Seven Cities, or Brazil.
From the period of the taking of Malacca by Albuquerque, as the book says, the Portuguese conceived that a new world extended to the south of Asia. Their ideas were soon shared by the Spaniards, and henceforward a series of voyages were made on the Pacific Ocean, to search for a southern continent, of which, the existence appeared geographically necessary to counterbalance the immense extent of the lands already known.
To conclude, as the author puts it succinctly, "if all the travelers of whom we have just spoken are not strictly speaking discoverers, even if they did not explore countries unknown before, they all have, in various degrees and according to their ability or their studies, the merit of having rendered the countries which they visited better known."
This book is too interesting. There is mention of old cities of India and the world, and of known and unknown facets of the good old world. These and many other things in this book can add to what we already know about our history. I wonder why I have never come across a commentary of these early views, like that of the living style of people of the countries described. I also liked the reason, the author mentions, for many of the expeditions into far pacific; to investigate into how, the globe balances itself!
I have never come across these ideas in any of the later books. The world, it seems have taken a conscious decision to overlook these observations.
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