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To one going from the city of Bosporus to the city of Cherson, which is situated on the coast and has itself been subject to the Romans from of old, barbarians, 8.5.28 Hunnic nations, hold all the country in between. And two other towns near Cherson, called Cepoi and Phanaguris, were subject to the Romans both from of old and down to my time. These not long before some of the neighbouring barbarians captured and razed to the ground. 8.5.29 And from the city of Cherson to the mouths of the Ister River, which they also call the Danube, is a journey of ten days, but barbarians hold all the lands there. 8.5.30 The Ister River flows from the Celtic mountains, and going around the extremities of Italy and being carried toward the lands of the Dacians and Illyrians and the regions of Thrace, it empties into the Euxine Sea. All the country from this point as far as Byzantium belongs to the Roman emperor. 8.5.31 The circuit, then, of the Euxine Sea from Chalcedon to Byzantium 8.5.32 is somewhat as follows. As for how far this circuit extends, I cannot say everything with exactness, since barbarians, as has been told me, live there in such great numbers, and there is probably no contact between them and the Romans, except perhaps for what happens by embassy; for indeed even those who have previously attempted to measure these things 8.5.33 have not succeeded in stating anything with exactness. This, however, is evident, that the right side of the Euxine Sea, that is from Chalcedon to the Phasis River, is a fifty-two days’ journey for an unencumbered man; from which one might reasonably infer that the other portion of the Sea is not far from this measure. 8.6.1 Since we have arrived at this point in our account, it seemed to me not out of place to record what those skilled in these matters dispute among themselves concerning the boundaries of Asia and Europe. 8.6.2 For some of them say that the Tanais River divides these two continents, asserting that the divisions ought to be natural ones, and arguing that the sea, proceeding from the west, moves toward the eastern part, while the Tanais River, flowing from the north toward the south wind, passes between the two continents; and conversely, the Egyptian Nile, coming from the south toward the north wind, flows between Asia and Libya. 8.6.3 But others, taking the opposite view, maintain that this argument is not sound. For they say that these two continents are from the beginning divided by the strait at Gades which issues from the Ocean and by the sea which proceeds from there, and that the lands on the right of the strait and the sea have been named Libya and Asia, while all on the left has been called Europe, as far as the end 8.6.4 of the so-called Euxine Sea. And since this is so, the Tanais River, rising in the land of Europe, empties into the Maeotic Lake, and the Lake makes its outlet into the Euxine Sea, neither at its end nor indeed in the middle, but still farther on. 8.6.5 The left side of this Sea is reckoned as part of Asia; besides this, the Tanais River issues from the so-called Ripaean mountains, which are in the land of Europe, as even those who 8.6.6 wrote of these things of old agree. From these Ripaean mountains the Ocean happens to be very far away. Therefore all the lands behind them and the Tanais River must on both sides be European. 8.6.7 From what point, then, the Tanais begins to divide the two continents is not easy to say. But if some river must be said to divide the two continents, this 8.6.8 would be that Phasis. For running directly opposite the strait at Gades, it passes through the middle of the two continents, since the strait, issuing from the Ocean and forming this sea, has these continents on either side, while the Phasis, flowing approximately where the Euxine Sea ends, empties into the middle of the crescent, clearly continuing the division of the land from the sea. 8.6.9 These things, then, both sides propose as they contend. But that not only the former argument, but also this one, which we have just mentioned, has been embellished by length of time and by certain men