Michael Baizerman Author

Courtesy: John Carlton  https://www.quora.com/Why-don%E2%80%99t-modern-civilian-cargo-ships-also-use-sails-in-addition-to-engine-power-to-reduce-fuel-consumption   I am remodeling my old article titled "How Wide Spans the Ocean Sea".  It consists of two parts. The first section covers maritime explorations carried out during the VI and V centuries BCE; it was so vividly described by Herodotus. We refer to the Phoenician expedition which is reported to have circumnavigated Africa, as well as the exploits of Sataspes, Scylax of Caryanda, and Hanno the Navigator.     The other segment collects the views of classical and medieval geographers concerning the prospect of crossing the Atlantic Ocean that was believed to separate Spain (or, in another version, Marocco) from China and Japan.  These scholars discuss such issues as the existence of a landmass in between or an unbroken expanse of the deep blue. Among them, we find Aristotle, Eratosthe...

Hopefully, you are perfectly aware of it. However, back in time scholars would come up with educative guesses about the Earth's circumference. This is the story of various evaluations. I made an effort to convert ancient measures into modern ones to show you the margin of deviation. To do this, I blend all the known samples of these measures into a 'consensus value', which is the average meaning. I refer to the stadium, Arab mile, and Roman mile. I mention Eratosthenes, Posidonius, Pierre d'Ailly, Ahmad Al-Farghani, and Christopher Columbus.  You can read this story here  https://independent.academia.edu/BaizermanMichael This is the second chapter of my book, "The Enchanting Encounter with the East". You can also view chapter 1: What If the Earth is the Sphere. My website gets attention from people around the world with more than 250 hits. I intend to continue uploading other parts of my second book. Meanwhile, I decided to review my first ...

The concept of the spherical earth adopted by the classical geography included the division of our planet into five climatic segments that were assessed in relation to their habitation. The academics ruled out three latitudinal belts on behalf of their brutal weather conditions. However, they reckoned that the two remaining zones in the northern and southern hemispheres enjoyed the temperate climate and were fit for accommodation, even though their inhabitants would shun one another, sending no vital signs. No ship could stand a chance of crossing the uncharted ocean throughout the whole span of history. Likewise, no person could survive passing through the magic “firewall”, which was hovering over the equator and burning everybody who would dare to approach its fiery confines. Each part of the humankind would linger in the blissful ignorance of its counterpart. In his poem “Hermes”, Eratosthenes carols this image, placing both human populations face to face and foot to foot: ...

Phoenician cargo ship  Courtesy: https://wikis.engrade.com/phoenicianships  My fourth chapter deals with the issue of the dimensions of the ocean and the perspectives of navigation in the Atlantic.  I describe the voyages of ancient explorers from Egypt to West Africa (Sataspes, Hanno the Navigator) and from India to East Africa (Scylax). I also recount the views on crossing the Atlantic expressed by philosophers (Aristotle, Eratosthenes, Posidonius, Strabo, Seneca, Pierre d'Ailly), mapmakers (Henricus Martellus, Martin Behaim), and navigators (Christopher Columbus).  The chapter is accompanied by the table, Estimation of the Breadth of the Ocean Sea. This is an extract which refers to the voyage across Africa carried out by Phoenician mariners in the time of Pharaoh Necho: The first expedition, commissioned by Pharaoh Necho, who reigned at the turn of the seventh and sixth centuries BCE, set a task of exploring the confines of the Dark Conti...

Chapter 3 of my book focuses on the classical and medieval estimations of the length of the oikoumene. I'd like to share with you an extract where Strabo presents his ideas about the graphic representation of the known world and Eratosthenes offers his description of the "human planet". Another argument that flared up the ancient community of scholars referred to the extent of the oikoumene, i.e.” the world which we inhabit and know.” (2). Strabo imposed upon a geographer the primary task of understanding “our inhabited world-its size, shape, and character, and its relation to earth as a whole”. (3) To achieve this goal, an explorer had to focus on the “human planet”, omitting the fringes and unfamiliar regions: “the geographer undertakes to describe the known parts of the inhabited world, but he leaves out of consideration the unknown parts… as he does what is outside of it”. (4) The "blank spots" on the map, confined within unsettled territories of desert...