Hamilton, William John: Researches in Asia Minor, Pontus, and Armenia: with some account of their antiquities and geology ; in two volumes (Band 1) (London, 1842)

•288

DERBKND BOURNOU.

[Chap. xvii.

laid by beds of compact peperite. The harbour itself, like
most ports in the Black Sea, is on the eastern side of the
promontory, and, although its distance from Samsun does
not agree with the accounts of the ancient geographers, I
think it not unlikely that Derbend represents the cape and
harbour of Ancon mentioned by Apollonius* and others.
It is the first headland to the east of Amisus, and the only
place before reaching the mouth of the Iris where a harbour
can exist, the whole coast from hence to Chalti Bournou, the
ancient Heracleum Promontorium, being one flat, unbroken,
sandy beach.

There is a great contradiction in the statements of ancient
writers respecting the distances on this part of the coast;
Marcian, who appears to have derived his information from
Menippus,f gives the following account:—

From Amisus to the Lycastus ... 20 stad.
„ the Lycastus to the Chadisius . 150 ,,
„ the Chadisius to the Iris ... 100 „

270;

while Arrian only gives 160 stadia as the whole distance
from Amisus to the Iris, and then 360 from the Iris to the
Heracleum Promontorium, which is decidedly too much.
At the extremity of Derbend Bournou, which is now covered
with bay-trees, a small stream falls into the sea between
two precipitous headlands, probably the Chadisius of the
ancients, though only twenty stadia from the Lycastus. On
the whole, the account of Arrian is the most correct; as the
160 stadia from Amisus to the Iris are very near the truth,
the only necessary correction being to suppose that the har-
bour and promontory of Ancon were at the mouth of the
Chadisius, not of the Iris.

Soon after reaching the shore we passed under the guns
or rather the embrasures of a small Turkish fort. From
thence to the banks of the Mers Irmak the country is

* Arg., ii. 3G9. f Steph. Byz. ad v. XaSiVia.