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cities on the Atlantic shore of what is now Morocco. Once this task was
completed, Hanno kept moving southwestward with a part of his fleet,
before turning south and following the African coast around to the Gulf of
Guinea and possibly as far as Cameroon. Hanno established trading posts
along the way. Upon his return to Carthage, he left an account of his
journey; this narrative later was given the name
Periplus
by the Greeks
(meaning ''a sailing around'').
7
The second of these fifth-century voyagers, Himilco, headed north, once
he had passed through the Pillars of Hercules. He followed the coastline of
modern Spain and France as far as Brittany before crossing over to south-
ern England and engaging in the tin trade. Upon returning home, he wrote
an account of his voyage, now lost, in which he told of a harrowing journey
and sea monsters. It may be that Himilco was deliberately playing up the
di≈culties he encountered to discourage rival Greek traders from ventur-
ing out along the Atlantic coastlines and discovering new trading partners.
If so, his dissimulation did not work.
Both of these expeditions, and the earlier circumnavigation of Africa,
were a testament to the sailing abilities of Mediterranean peoples of the
first millennium BCE. No doubt these sailors were also courageous, reso-
lute, and resourceful men, as all explorers must be; however, they need not
have been particularly good navigators. They felt their way along coast-
lines; they got back home by retracing steps. It is true that sailing ships
from this period were not as developed as they would become. For exam-
ple, a medieval caravel could sail a few points into the wind—a feat that
was beyond the ships of classical antiquity.
8
But the restriction to coastal
sailing was not due solely to the technical limitations of these sailing ships:
the mariners of antiquity—in this case, from the long maritime tradition of
North Africa and the Middle East—lacked the knowledge of navigation
that is required for open-ocean voyages.
7. Hanno's
Periplus
is lost, but his account survives in the writings of many classical
authors, including Herodotus, Pliny the Elder (a Roman from the first century CE, who also
tells us about Himilco, discussed in the next paragraph), and Arrian (from the second
century). Their works are widely available in translation. See also Lacroix (1998). There
are brief accounts of the Hanno and Himilco journeys in
Encyclopaedia Britannica
, s.vv.
''Hanno'' and ''Himilco.''
8. In the first millennium BCE the most maneuverable ships were war galleys. (Galleys
were used for war whereas sailing vessels were used for trade.) Galleys were unsuitable for
open ocean travel for fairly obvious reasons. They were open and thus prone to sinking in
rough seas. In addition, they required a large crew so could not travel far without revictual-
ing. See Denny (2009) for a technical history of the evolution of sailing ships.
