rja.carnegie DeleteThis @excite.com wrote:
> Mike Schilling wrote:
> > "Malcolm" <regniztar DeleteThis @btinternet.com> wrote in message
> > news:dpcgsv$qu2$4@nwrdmz01.dmz.ncs.ea.ibs-infra.bt.com...
> > >>
> > > The Phonecians mounted an expedition round Africa.
> > > The ships sailed with wheat on board, and made the journey by
> > > disembarking, sowing crops, and thus providing enough food to live on
> > > indefinitely.
> > >
> > > They were accused of lying because they reported that the Sun set on the
> > > opposite side of the ship as they got further south.
> >
> >
> > That is a lie; it wouldn't set on the other side until they'd turned north
> > again..
>
> It's an error, it wasn't when they were heading south. The story is in
> Herodotus according to this suspicious-looking Web page:
> http://www.askwhy.co.uk/analogiesandconjectures/Americaphoen01.html
> Er... "Was America a Phoenician Colony?" Bear with me... Says there,
> "One of the details of the trip provided by Herodotus, which was
> considered absurd by his contemporaries, has served to establish the
> authenticity of the story. The Phoenicians stated that, as they sailed
> west around the tip of Africa, the sun was to their right: seamen from
> the Mediterranean who had not actually been to the southern hemisphere
> could not have imagined such a phenomenon."
>
> You can do it in summer as soon as you're across the tropic line, I
> think, but then the sun is directly overhead really so you can't tell
> which side it is. When you go futher south, it's conspicuous.
>
> In the ancient world, presumably you're finding north and south by the
> stars or by a magnetic compass.
>
> Maybe sceptics thought that the ship couldn't possibly be in the
> tropics, because of the fire belt around the equator.
Have you ever worn a fire belt around your waist?
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