Book ii., chap. 3, § 32, = p.28, establishes the position of Thule:

“And above them (the Orkades) is the (island of) Thule, whose--

Western parts are in E. long. (Ferro?) 29° N lat. 63° The Easternmost being in ” ” 31° 40´ ” 63° ” Northernmost ” ” ” 30° 20´ ” 63° 15´ ” Southernmost ” ” ” 30° 20´ ” 62° 40´ And the Mid Isle in, ” ” 30° 20´ ” 63° “

The sixth book (chap. 16, § 1, = p. 113) tells us:

“Serica is bounded west by Scythia beyond the Imaus mountain, according to the line laid down; on the north by an unknown land on the parallel passing through Thule; on the east by regions also unknown, along the meridional line whose limits are:

“E. long. 180´´ N. lat. 63° ” 18° ” 35°”

Again we find (book vii., chap. 5, § 12, = p. 125):

“But the northern part is bounded by the parallel which is north of the equinoctial line 63 parts (_i.e._, N. lat. 63°), and this is described through Thule, the Island. So that the breadth of the known world is 76° 25´, or in round numbers, 80 degrees.”[13]

Lastly (book viii., chap, 3, § 3, = p. 131) we are told:

“But the (Island) Thule has its greatest day of twenty equinoctial hours, and from Alexandria it is distant two equinoctial hours to the west.”[14]

Thus Ptolemy’s Thule is a long narrow island, 160 by 35 miles, and his description, despite the times in which he wrote, is applicable rather to North Britain and even to Iceland, than to Scandinavia. He is consistent in his assertions: (1.) That Thule is an island; (2.) That its northernmost point extends to 3° 17´ south of the Polar circle (66° 32´); (3.) That it lies north of the Orcades.[15] Manifestly we cannot rely upon the longitudes, Ptolemy’s first meridian being still _sub judice_. The late Mr Hogg suggested[16] that the zero of longitude was not, as usually assumed, at Ferro in the Fortunate Islands (W. long. (G.) 24° 23´ 40´´ to 24° 34´), but at “S. Antonio, Cape Verd Islands” (read São Antão[17]) in W. long. (G.) 25° 2´ 40´´ to 25° 25´ 45´´--a change which would give in round numbers a difference of fifty miles.[18] Nothing more need be added upon this head. Pytheas and Eratosthenes evidently referred to Iceland; Mela did the same in making it front Bergen; Pliny heard of it when he relates that from Nerigos persons embark for Thule; and neglecting Ptolemy’s latitudes and longitudes, his description tallies best with Iceland.

III.

THULE, PART OF GREAT BRITAIN

Of Thule applied to some part of Great Britain we have a multitude of instances, which are ably and lengthily brought together by Sir Robert Sibbald.[19] Our writer begins by establishing the fact that the ancients connected the idea of darkness with the north.

“These places of Homer πρὸς ζόφον (ad caliginem), and οὐ γὰρ ἴδμεν ὅπου ζόφου (neque enim scimus ubi sit caligo), are by Strabo (ii. § 6) interpreted of the north, “Nescimus ubi sit Septentrio” (We know not where the north is).

He quotes Tibullus (nat. circ. B.C. 54; iv. 1, 154):

“Illic et densâ tellus absconditur umbrâ.”

And Pub. Papinius Statius (nat. circ. A.D. 61; Sylv., iii., Ad Claudiam Uxorem, v. 20):

“Vel super Hesperiæ vada caligantia Thiles.”

Again (Sylv., iv. 4, 62):

“----aut nigræ littora Thule.”

And again (Sylv., v. 1, 90, 91):

“----quantum ultimus orbis, Cesserit et refluo circumsona gurgite Thule.”

Strabo (book ii., chap. 4, § 8) is quoted to show by Pytheas, that Thule is “one of those islands that are called British,” and we have seen Strabo’s own opinion that it lies farther south than where the Massilian placed it. He quotes Catullus (B.C. 87; Ad Furium Carm., xii.):

“Sive trans altas gradietur Alpes, Cæsaris visens monumenta magni, Gallicum Rhenum, horribilesque ultimosque Britannos;”

and Horace (i. 35, 30):

“Serves iturum Cæsarem in ultimos Orbis Britannos;”

to show that the Britons were the northernmost people then known. Due use is made of Silius Italicus (nat. circ. A.D. 25; Punic, lib. xvii., 417, 418):

“Cœrulus hand alitur cum dimicat incola Thule, Agmina falcifero circumvenit arcta covino,”

for it appears from Cæsar’s Commentaries, that the bluish colour and the fighting out of hooked chariots were in use among the inhabitants of Britain. Pliny also (N. H., iv. 30) treats of Thule in the same chapter where he treats of the British Isles, “ultima omnium quæ memoratum est Thule.” Tacitus says (Agric. Vita, cap. x.) when the Roman navy sailed about Britain, “dispecta est et Thule.”[20]

‘Ireland, properly so called, was the first of the British Isles which got the name Thule, being the first that the Carthaginians met with as they steered their course from Cadiz to the west; and hence it is that Statius (Ad Claud. Uxor., lib. iii., v. 20) calls Thule ‘Hesperia,’ and it seems to be the same that is said by (the pseudo) Aristotle (Liber de Mirab. Auscult) to have been discovered by the Carthaginians when he speaks thus (lxxxv.):

“‘In the sea beyond the Pillars of Hercules, they say, the Carthaginians found a fertile island uninhabited, abounding in wood and navigable rivers, and stored with very great plenty of fruits (_fructibus_) of all sorts,[21] distant several days’ voyage from the continent.’

And Bochartus (Geog. Sac.) confirms this by what he observes, that an ancient author, Antonius Diogenes,[22] who wrote twenty-four books of the strange things (or Incredibilities) related of Thule,[23] not long after the time of Alexander the Great, had his history from the Ciparis Tables, dug at Tyre out of the tombs of Mantinea and Dercilis (Dercyllides), who had gone from Tyre to Thule, and had stayed some time there. But though this be the first Thule discovered by the Carthaginians, yet it is not that mentioned by the Roman writers, for they speak of the Thule which the Romans were in and made a conquest of, but it is certain they were never in Iceland properly so called.

“That they were in Thule appears from Statius (Sylv., v. 2, 54):

“‘----quantusque nigrantem Fluctibus occiduis fessoque Hyperione Thulen Intrârit mandata gerens.’

Now the father of Crispinus, to whom he writes, was Vectius Bolanus, governor of Britain, A.D. 69, under Vitellius (as Tacitus informs us), which is clearly proved by the same poet (Sylv., v. 2, 140-143):

“‘Quod si te magno tellus frenata parenti Accipiat-- Quanta Caledonios attollet gloria campos! Cum tibi longævus referet trucis incola terræ; Hic suetus dare jura parens.’

The words ‘Caledonios’ and’ trucis incola terræ’ clearly show that by Thule is meant the north part of Britain, which was then possessed by the Picts, designed by the name ‘Caledonios,’ and by the Scots, designed as ‘trucis incola terræ,’ the same epithet that Claudian (De Bell. Get., 416) gives to the Scots in these verses:

“‘Venit et extremis legio prætenta Britannis, Quæ Scoto dat fræna truci, ferroque notatas Perlegit exsangues Picto moriente figuras.’

And of this north part of Britain that verse of Juvenal (Sat., xv. 112):

“‘De conducendo loquitur jam rhetore Thule,’[24]

is also to be understood. Of this the best exposition is taken from Tacitus (Agric., xxi.):

“‘Jam verò principum filios, liberalibus artibus erudire, et ingenia Britannorum studiis Gallorum anteferre, ut qui modò linguam Romanum abnuebant, eloquentiam concupiscerent.’

“Claudian (De III. Consul. Honor., 52-56) yet more particularly gives the name of Thule to the north part of Britain:

“‘Facta tui numerabat avi, quem littus adustæ Horrescit Libyæ, ratibusque impervia Thule. Ille leves Mauros, nec falso nomine Pictos Edomuit, Scotumque vago mucrone secutus, Fregit Hyperboreas remis audacibus undas.’

And in these lines (De IV. Consul. Honor., 26-33):

“‘Ille, Caledoniis posuit qui castra pruinis, Qui medios Libyæ sub casside pertulit æstus, Terribilis Mauro, debellatorque Britanni Littoris, ac pariter Boreæ vastator et Austri. Quid rigor æternus cœli, quid sidera prosunt? Ignotumque fretum? Maduerunt Saxoue fuso, Orcades: incaluit Pictorum sanguine Thule: Scotorum cumulos flevit glacialis Ierne,’

where, by placing the Moors and Britons as the remotest people then known, and mentioning the Scots and Picts as the inhabitants of Thule and Ierne, he demonstrates clearly that Thule is the north part of the isle of Britain, inhabited by the Scots and Picts. For this Ierne, or, as some read it, ‘Hyberne,’ can no way be understood of Ireland properly so called; first, because Ireland can never deserve the epithet ‘glacialis,’[25] since, by the testimony of the Irish writers, the snow and ice continue not any time there; secondly, the Romans were never in Ireland, whereas, according to the above-mentioned verses, Theodosius passed over the Friths of Forth and Clyde, called by him ‘Hyperboreæ undæ,’ and entered Strathearn, which to this day bears the name Ierne; in which Roman medals are found, and the Roman camps and military ways are to be seen--the undoubted testimonies of their being there; and therefore is so to be understood in the same poet’s lines upon Stilicho (see De Laud. Stilich., lib. ii., 250-254), who was employed in the British war:

“‘Me quoque vicinis pereuntem gentibus, inquit, Me juvit Stilicho, totam cum Scotus Iernen Movit, et infesto spumavit remige Tethys. Illius effectum curis, ne tela timerem Scotica, ne Pictum tremerem.’

Now, Tethys in these verses, and the ‘undæ Hyperboreæ’ in the verses before mentioned, cannot be understood of the sea between Scotland and Ireland, for Ireland lies to the south of the Roman province, and the situation of the Scots’ and Picts’ country is to the north of it; for it was separated by the two Friths of Forth and Clyde from the Roman province, which clearly shows it was to be understood of them: the same thing that is also imported by the words ‘Hyperboreas undas’ and ‘remis;’ for these cannot be understood of the Irish Sea, which is to the south of the Roman province, and is very tempestuous, and cannot so well be passed by oars as the Friths of Forth and Clyde. And the same poet has put this beyond all doubt (in the verses before quoted, De Bell. Get., 416).

“For were it to be understood of the Irish Sea, then the wall and the ‘prætenturæ’ (_legio prætenta_) should have been placed upon the Scottish shore that was over against that country, which is called Strathearn now, and is the true Ierne not only mentioned by Claudian, but also by Juvenal in these verses (I. Sat., ii. 160):

“‘Arma quidem ultra Litora Juvenæ promovimus, et modò captas Oreadas, ac minimâ contentos nocte Britannos.’

“That this Thule was a part of Britain, the Roman writers seem to be very clear, especially Silius Italicus in the verses before quoted.

“But to make it appear which part of Britain the Thule was which is mentioned by the Romans, it will be fit to see to which part of Britain the epithets attributed by writers to Thule do best agree. First, then, it was a remote part, ‘ultima Thule,’ as if this were the remotest part of Britain; so Tacitus (Agric., xxx.) brings in Galgacus expressing it, ‘We, the uttermost bounds of land and liberty,’ etc. Then Thule was towards the north, and so was this country with respect to the Roman province; and, thirdly, it might deserve the name Thule (darkness), because of its obscure and dark aspect, it being in those days all overgrown with woods. Fourthly, the length of the day annexed to Thule: and, upon this account, it must be the country to the north and to the east of Ierne, by the verses of Juvenal before mentioned (V. Sat., xv. 112).

“Another property of Thule given by Tacitus (loc. cit.) is that about it is ‘mare pigram et grave remigantibus,’ which agrees indeed to the sea upon the north-east part of Scotland, but not for the reason that Tacitus gives, _i.e._, for want of winds, but because of the contrary tides which drive several ways, and stop not only boats with oars, but ships under sail.

“But Thule is most expressly described to be this very same country that we treat of by Conradus Celtes:

“‘Orcadibus quâ cincta suis Tyle et glacialis Insula.’

“This same epithet Claudian (see p. 15) gives to Ierne, when he calls it ‘Glacialis Ierne;’ and this Thule he makes to be encompassed ‘suis Orcadibus,’ which isles lie over-against it; and a little after he gives it the like epithet with ‘mare pigrum.’

“‘Et jam sub septem spectant vaga rostra Trionos Quà Tyle est rigidis insula cincta vadis.’

And afterwards he makes the Orcades to lie over-against this Thule, and seems to have in his eye the skerries and weels in Pictland (Pentland?) Frith in these lines:

“‘Est locus Arctoo quà se Germania tractu Claudit, et in rigidis Tyle ubi surgit aquis, Quam juxta infamos scopuli et petrosa vorago Asperat undisonis saxa pudenta vadis Orcadas has memorant dictas a nomine Græco.”[26]

“But the clearest testimony of all we owe to Arngrimus Jonas (Specimen Islandicum, A.D. 1593),[27] when he brings in the verses of Fortunatus (lib. viii., cap. 1), who sings of St Hilarion (ob. A.D. 372):

“‘Eloquii currente rotâ penetravit ad Indos, Ingeniumque potens ultima Thule colit.’

“And then reckoning up the several nations enlightened by him, he mentions Britain amongst the rest:

“‘Thrax, Italus, Scytha, Persa, Indus, Geta, Daca, Britannus.’[28]

“To which he adds, ‘From whence it may fairly enough be inferred that either Britain or (as Pliny will have it) some island of Britain was the _ultima Thule_.’ And afterwards, ‘To confirm the opinion of Pliny and his followers, who will have some of the British Isles, or particularly, that farthest in the Scottish dominions to be Thule, I must acknowledge that the history of the kings of Norway says the same thing, in the life of King Magnus, who, in an expedition to the Orcades and Hebrides and into Scotland and Britain, touched also at the Island of Thule and subdued it.’

“By all this, I think, it appears sufficiently that the north-east part of Scotland, which Severus the emperor and Theodosius the Great infested with their armies, and in which, as Boethius[29] shows us, Roman medals were found, is undoubtedly the Thule mentioned by the Roman writers; and this also, if we believe the learned Arngrimus Jonas, was meant by Ptolemy, where he saith, that, to the twenty-first parallel drawn through Thule by Ptolemy, the latitude answers to 55° 36´, so that our country in those ancient times passed under the name of Thule and Hibernia, and the ‘Hiberni et Picti, incolæ Thules’ are the same people who were afterwards called Scots.[30]

“I shall only add one remark more, and that is, that we need not have recourse for the rise of the name Scot, to the fabulous account of the monks who bring it from Scota, Pharaoh’s daughter, married to Gathelus; since without that strain, if it be granted that the country was once called Thule, which in the Phœnician language signifies ‘darkness,’ we have a very fair reason for the name Scotia, which signifies the same in the Greek tongue. And it is very well known that it was usual with the Greeks (who next to the Phœnicians were the best navigators) not only to retain the Phœnician name of the place, but likewise to give one in their own language of the same import; and since the learned Bochartus has very ingeniously deduced the Greek name of the whole island, Βρετανικὴ, from Bratanack and Barat anac,[31] in the Phœnician tongue signifying ‘a land of tin’ (which the Greeks not only reduced to their own termination, but likewise called the British isles[32] Κασσιτερίδες, that is, ‘lands of tin,’[33] which is the signification of the Phœnician and Greek names); we may take the same liberty to derive the Greek name Scotia from Phœnician Thule;[34] but this is so fully treated of in the ‘Scotia Antiqua,’ that I need say no more.”

To these authorities may be added Silius Italicus (lib. iii., 597), who manifestly places “unknown Thule” about Scotland:

“Hine pater ignotam donabit vincere Thulen Inque Caledonios primus trahit agmina lucos.”

R. Festus Avienus (Descr. Orb. Ter.), metaphrasing Dionysius, treats of Thule when speaking of Britain, and yet gives “the unknown island” an Arctic day:

“Longa dehinc celeri si quis rate marmora currat, Inveniet vasto surgentem gurgite Thulen; Hinc cùm plaustra poli tangit Phœbeïus ignis Nocte sub inlustri rota solis fomite flagrat Continuò clarumque diem nox œucula ducit.”

We have also the testimony of Richard of Cirencester (Ricardus Coronensis, ob. circ. A.D. 1401), who tells us (De Situ Britanniæ) that in the time of the later emperors, “Thule” was applied to Valentia or Valentiana, the district between the wall of Severus and the rampart of Antoninus, including the south part of Scotland, Northumberland, and a portion of Cumberland.

It might have been supposed that the distinct mention of the Orcades and Hebrides[35] by Pliny (N. H., lib. iv., cap. 30), and by Ptolemy (lib. ii., cap. 3, § 32, = p. 28), would have barred their claim to the classic title. This is far from being the case. John Brand (A Brief Description of Orkney, etc., Edin. 1701, Pinkerton, iii., p. 782), after quoting Claudian and Conradus Celtes, with others who call Thule “Britannicarum insularum septentrionissimam,” thus disposes of Iceland:

“I greatly doubt if ever the Romans had the knowledge of Iceland, their eagles never having come and been displayed to the north of Scotland or Orkney. ‘Imperii fuerat Romani Scotia limes,’ saith the great Scaliger. Ptolemy will have it to be among the Isles of Zetland; and Boethius, our historian (Boethius, in p. 740, also in p. 755, which quotes from his life of Mainus, king of Scots), distinguisheth between a first and a second Thule, calling Ila the first, and Louisa the second, which are reckoned among the isles called Hebrides. ‘Ptolemæus inter Schethlandicas insulas, quæ ultra Orchades sunt, ant proxime Norwegiam sitam vult, haud quaquam propter immensam intercapedinem intelligi potest, nos autem Ilam (Islay?) primam Leuisam (Lewis) Hebridum præstantissimam secundam Thulen vocamus.’ But I am inclined to think that although some might design a particular place by the Thule, yet generally by a synecdoche, usual with the Roman authors, they might denote all those places remote from them to the north, and especially Britain and the northern parts thereof, whither their arms did come.”

The Shetland claimants take another line of argument. Eutropius (A.D. 330-375, lib. vii.) makes the emperor Claudius, during his invasion of Britain (A.D. 43) annex the Orkneys: “Quasdam insulas etiam ultra Britanniam, in oceano positas, Romano imperio addidit, quæ appellantur Orcades.” Pliny, they say, endorses Pytheas Massiliensis, who writes that Thule is six days’ sail north of Britain. Tacitus (loc. cit.) declares that Agricola sailed round Britain, conquered the Orcades, and saw Thule. The latter cannot be the Orcades or Hebrides, because both are mentioned by Pliny, and as their northerly point is not so far north as Cape Wrath, they could hardly be described as “ultra Britanniam.” Caithness and other parts of Scotland are put out of court, since they are all to the south of Orkney, and therefore not beyond it. The Færoes and Iceland are excluded, because they were both too distant to be visited by the frail galleys of the Romans, unaided as they were, either by the compass or the science of navigation, and they could not possibly have been seen from Orkney. The same arguments apply to the Norwegian coast, which also is not an island, and is not situated north of Britain.

By this “process of elimination,” we are compelled to conclude that Shetland, and only Shetland, justifies the descriptions and allusions to the “Ultima Thule” contained in the Latin classics. It consists of islands which, viewed from afar, might be mistaken for one. It lies north of the Orkneys, from some parts of which Foula the Fair Isle, or the bluff of Fitfulhead, can be seen in clear weather. A passage of six days would be a fair average in the primitive barks of the Romans, who were never much distinguished for seamanship. The more positive proofs are the Roman coins found in the country, according to Dr Hibbert (Description of the Shetland Islands, Edin. 1822), and the ruins of a fortification in the island of Fetlar, which the same authority declares to be a Roman camp.

It need hardly be observed that all these arguments are insufficient, and that the utmost they prove is the determination by Agricola and his men, that the venerable Thule was part of the Shetlands. Probably they saw only the loom of land to the north, and identified it with the “period of earth.” Possibly they might have been swayed by the verbal resemblance of Foula, which may be seen from the Orkneys: it is evidently Fogla or Fugla-ey, and the same desire to clear up a foggy point of geography, which made Abyssinian Bruce discover the sources of the Nile in the fountains of the Blue River, found Thule in “Fowl-isle.”[36] The opinion, however, has found supporters. Gaspar Peucerus (De Terræ Dimensione) declares that the Ptolemeian Thule is to be recognised in the Shetlands, which he heard “the sailors call Thilensel” (Fugl-insel?). Cellarius (Geog. Ant., ii. 4) discovers Thule in the island of Hjaltland (Shetland), or in the Færoe group, “quæ in eâdem fere latitudinem sunt.” He is followed by Probus (Com. on Virgil,