A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 18 | Page 9

the women.
The earliest account we possess of traffic with Egypt, is to be found in the Old Testament, where we are informed, that the Midianites and Ismaelites traded thither as early as the time of Jacob.
Sesostris, who is generally supposed to have lived about 1650 years before Christ, is by most writers described as the king who first overcame the dislike of the Egyptians to the sea. That this monarch engaged in many enterprises both by sea and land, not only for conquest, but also for purposes of trade and colonization, there can be no doubt; though it is impossible either to trace his various routes, or to estimate the extent of his conquests or discoveries. The concurrent testimony of Diodorus and Herodotus assign to him a large fleet in the Red Sea; and according to other historians, he had also a fleet in the Mediterranean. In order the more effectually to banish the prejudices of the Egyptians against the sea, he is said to have instituted a marine class among his subjects. By these measures he seems to have acquired the sovereignty and the commerce of the greater part of the shores of the Red Sea; along which his ships continued their route, till, according to Herodotus, they were prevented from advancing by shoals and places difficult to navigate; a description which aptly applies to the navigation of this sea.
His expeditions and conquests in other parts of the globe do not fall within our object: one however must be noticed; we allude to the settlement of the Egyptians at Colchos. Herodotus is doubtful whether this was a colony planted by Sesostris, or whether part of his army remained behind on the banks of the Phasis, when he invaded this part of Asia. We allude to this colony, because with it were found, at the time of the Argonautic expedition, proofs of the attention which Sesostris had paid to geography, and of the benefits which that science derived from him. "Tradition," Gibbon observes, "has affirmed, with some colour of reason, that Egypt planted on the Phasis a learned and polite colony, which manufactured linen, built navies, and invented geographical maps." All the information we possess respecting these maps is derived from Apollonius Rhodius, and his scholiast: the substance of it is as follows: according to this poet,--Phineas, king of Colchos, predicted to the Argonauts the events which would accompany their return. Argus, one of the Argonauts, explained that prediction to his companions, and told them, that the route which they must keep was described on tables, or rather on columns, which an Egyptian conqueror had before left in the city of Oca, the capital of Colchis; on these columns, the whole extent of the roads, and the limits of the land and sea were marked out. An ingenious, and by no means an improbable inference, has been drawn from this circumstance: that if Sesostris left such columns in a part so remote from Egypt, it is to be supposed that they were more numerous in Egypt itself. In short, though on a point like this it is impossible to gain clear and undoubted testimony, we are, upon the whole, strongly disposed to coincide in opinion with Gibbon, that tradition has some colour of reason for affirming that the Egyptian colony at Phasis possessed geographical maps.
After the death of Sesostris, the Egyptians seem to have relapsed into their former dislike to the sea: they indeed sent colonies into Greece, and other parts; but these colonists kept up no relation with the mother country. Their commerce was carried on, as it had been before the time of Sesostris, by foreigners. The Old Testament informs us, that in the time of Solomon many horses were brought from Egypt: and, from the same authority, as well as from Herodotus and Homer, we learn that the Phoenicians carried on a regular and lucrative traffic with this country; and, indeed, for a long time, about this period, they were the only nation to whom the ports of Egypt were open. Of the navigation and commerce of the Red Sea they were equally negligent; so that while none of their ships were seen on it, it was covered with the fleets of the Syrians, Phoenicians, and other nations.
Bocchoris, who lived about seven hundred years before Christ, is represented by historians as having imitated the maxims of Sesostris, with respect to maritime affairs and commerce. Some of his laws on these subjects are still extant; and they display his knowledge of, and attention to, the improvement of his kingdom. By some of his immediate successors the ancient maxims of the Egyptians, which led them to avoid intercourse with strangers, were gradually done away; but it is to Psammeticus, historians ascribe the most decisive measures for rooting out this