Book 22
15.31
Then comes Syene,Modern Assouan. where at the solstice, to which the sun extends its summer course, its rays surround all upright bodies and do not allow their shadows to extend beyond the bodies themselves.That is, they cast no shadows. Macrobius, Somn. Scip. ii. 7, 15, limits this to eo die quo sol certain parter ingreditur Cancri, hora dies sexta; Strabo also limits the time to midday (xvii. 1, 48; L.C.L., viii. p. 129). At that time if one fixes a stake upright in the earth, or looks at a man or a tree standing anywhere, he will observe that the shadows are lost in the outer circumference of the figures. The same thing is said to happen at Meroë, a part of Aethiopia lying next to the equinoctial circle, where for ninety days the shadows fall on the side opposite to ours, for which reason those who dwell there are called Antiscii.From ἀντί, against, opposite, and σκιά, shadow. Ammianus means that the locality is so far south that the sun for a time casts shadows southwards; cf. Pliny, N.H. ii. 183, per eos dies xc in meridiem umbras iaci, the shadows are turned towards the south.
15.32
But since there are many such wonders, which extend beyond the plan of my little work, let me refer them to lofty minds, since I wish to tell a few things about the provinces.
16.1
In early times Egypt is said to have had three provinces: Egypt proper, Thebais, and Libya. To these later times have added two: Augustamnica being taken from Egypt, and Pentapolis from the dryer part of Libya.
