XVI. 3. The Columns of Hercules near Oceanos potamos or Istru.

In pre-historical antiquity, the Columns of Hercules had been a geographical reality. This was the general opinion of the ancient geographers and historians.

The positive fact that results from all these traditions is that the so-called Columns of Hercules were neither near the Iberian Ocean, which, until the 7^th century bc had been unknown to the Phoenicians and Greeks, nor near the Northern Sea or Baltic, which became known to the ancient world only since Cesar’s times.

They were near the archaic Ocean at the north of Thrace, the big river of the theogony, the place where take place the most remarkable deeds of the Pelasgian hero Hercules, in the blessed country of the Hyperboreans, rich in gold, rich in flocks, in miraculous herds and fabulous harvests, country towards which was directed the commercial navigation of the southern Pelasgians, Egyptians, Phoenicians and Greeks, since the most ancient times.

We will summarize here the main geographical sources regarding the Columns of Hercules, near Oceanos potamos or Istru.

According to Pindar, one of the most illustrious poets of Greece, the Columns of Hercules were in the legendary and remote country of the pious and happy Hyperboreans.

In one of his most beautiful odes, Pindar tells us about Hercules’ trip to the sources (or the cataracts) of Istru, in the country of the Hyperboreans, from whom he had requested an oleander (wild olive tree), to plant it near Jove’s temple at Olympia, to shade the holy altars of the divinities and to crown the virtuous men (Olymp. III. V. 11-19).

In the same ode, Pindar also mentions Hercules’ travel to the Istrian country, to Diana, the wonderful rider, and the Columns of Hercules, as an extreme limit for brave deeds (Olymp. III. V. 26, 45; Isthm. III. 30). Finally, Pindar tells us in other odes of his, that Hercules had erected these columns as famous markers for the extreme limits of navigation; and that the last reaches of travel on water and land were in the region of the Hyperboreans (Nem. III. V. 19-25; Pyth. X. v. 29-30).

So, according to the geographical notions expressed by Pindar, the Columns of Hercules, these extreme limits of navigation and heroic actions, were on Hyperborean territory (Cf. Boeckhius, Pindari Opera, II. 2. 140), the territory of the just, holy (Pindar, Pyth. X. v. 42), wise (Origenes, c. Cels. I. 16) and long lived people of the Istru, or the lower Danube.

We also find two important indications about the geographical situation of the Columns of Hercules with Herodotus. As this author tells us, the Greeks near the Euxine Pontos had positive information about the Columns of Hercules, which they said were outside the Euxine Pontos, near the big river named Oceanos (lib. IV. 8). And in another place Herodotus tells us about the Columns of Hercules as being located in the geographical region of the Istru.

“The Istru”, writes he, “begins its course in the lands of the Celts and flows through the middle of Europe, which it cuts in two parts. The Celts though, live beyond the Columns of Hercules, and are neighbours with the Cynesii, who are the most extreme people in the western parts of Europe. And the Istru flows into the sea near Istria, city which is inhabited by a Milesian colony” (lib. II. C. 33).

If the Columns of Hercules had been therefore situated on the southern parts of Iberia, between Africa and Europe, then neither the Greeks near the Euxine Pontos could have had in those times authentic knowledge about them, nor Herodotus could have written that the Celts lived beyond the Columns of Hercules, and finally, that beyond the Celts lived the Cynesii, the most extreme people in the western parts of Europe.

So, according with the geographical sources of Herodotus, the Columns of Hercules were not near the Iberian Sea, but in a continental region of Europe, near the Istru, on the eastern side of the Celts, or between the Celts and the Scythians, because, as Diodorus Siculus writes, the Celts were spread in more or less considerable large groups as far as Scythia (lib. III. 32. 1).

Another remarkable author from the 4^th century a.d., the Roman poet Avienus, born at Volsinium in Etruria, ex proconsul of Africa and Achaia, summarizes this way the geographical and astronomical ideas of the ancients regarding the Columns of Hercules:

“In the extreme parts of the (known) earth rise up to the sky the Columns of Hercules, of a longish shape. Here is the place called Gadir, here the superb craggy Atlas rises, here the sky turns around a strong axle, here the hub of the earth and the universe is surrounded by clouds” (Descriptio orbis terrae, v. 98-104).

Cardines Mundi on the Atlas mountain, called also axis boreus, axis hyperboreus, polus Geticus, were, as we saw in the previous chapter, in the western parts of the Black Sea, on the territory of Roman Dacia. The Columns of Hercules belonged therefore, according to the ancient astronomical and geographical theories, to the boreal region.

This was also the tradition of the Romans, but a tradition difficult to understand in the times of Drus Germanicus. He had tried to find the Columns of Hercules near the Northern Sea.

Finally, the Pelasgian tribes of Asia Minor had preserved until Pausania’s times a historical reminiscence about Geryon, the king rich in admirable herds, who lived near Oceanos potamos, or near the Columns of Hercules. “The Lydians” writes Pausanias (lib. I. 35. 7) “tell that Geryon, Chrysaor’s son, lived near the torrent called Oceanos potamos and that there was his seat, in a mountain gap”.

So we have a positive fact, confirmed by legends, traditions and geographical descriptions, that the famous Columns of Hercules were situated north of Thrace, near the big river called in the following epochs Oceanos potamos or Istru.

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