Ptolemais Theron
Ptolemais Theron (translated, "Ptolemais of the Hunts") was a marketplace on the African side of the Red Sea coast. According to Pliny the Elder (N.H. 6.34), Ptolemais was founded by Ptolemy Philadelphus, king of ancient Egypt, as a base to support hunting elephants. The early Ptolemies had seen the value of war elephants by the military strength of the Seleucids, and actively sought to capture them from the neighboring regions of Africa. Although these animals helped in the Battle of Raphia, they proved unstable and the African species were intimidated by the Asian species, which led to the Egyptians eventually abandoning the use of these animals in war. Unlike most of the stations the Ptolemies established to the south of their kingdom, Ptolemais had enough fertile land immediately around it to sustain it as a town. By the time the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea was written (c. AD 110), it had clearly declined in importance. The writer notes that it had "no harbor, and can only be reached by small boats" (ch. 3). The precise location of Ptolemais is still undetermined. The Periplus describes it as 3000 stadia south of the Moskhophagoi, and 4000 stadia north of Adulis; Pliny notes that Ptolemais was close to Lake Monoleus. G.W.B. Huntingford notes that Ptolemais has been identified both with the locales of Aqiq, and Suakin some 150 miles away, and notes that Suakin lay at the end of an ancient caravan route that links it to Barbar on the Nile. However, Stanley M. Burstein argues for Trinkitat, where he states that "classical architectural fragments" have been found. 1 Perhaps Ptolemais Theron most important importance was that its was known to a number of ancient writers (e.g. Pliny, Agatharchides of Cnidus) as a location where shadows vanished under the noontime sun in midsummer. Pliny claims that this peculiarity of Ptolemais led Eratosthenes to calculate the circumference of the Earth (N.H. 2.75, 6.34) -- although most modern accounts mention Syene instead of Ptolemais.
Notes
1. Stanley M. Burstein, Agatharchides of Cnidus, On the Erythraean Sea, p.144 n.2. (London: the Hakluyt Society, 1989).
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