IMPORTANT SHORT NOTES OF GEOGRAPHICAL THOUGHT PART-1

Important Short Notes of Geographical Thought Part-1

Ø  After the Jews and Christians it was the Phoenicians who contributed to the advancement of geographical knowledge.

Ø  Phoenicians were the first repositories of geographical knowledge.

Ø  Homer believed the earth to be a place of circular form surrounded on all sides by the Ocean River.

Ø  Homer described the four winds coming from the four different directions as Bores, Eurus, Notus and Zephyrus.

Ø Thales and Anaximander are generally recognised as the founder of mathematical geography.

Ø  Hecataeus is known as the father of geography.

Hecataeus

Ø  Hecataeus gives a general survey of the world in his work-Ges-Periodos.

Ø The land situated to the north of Euxine (present Ukraine) had many Greek colonies.

Ø  Caspian Sea also known as Hyrcanian during the times of Hecataeus.

Ø  Herodotus did not have a clear idea and could not fix the northern limit of Europe.

Ø  Herodotus is the first geographer who regarded the Caspian as an inland sea.

Caspian Sea

Ø  Herodotus was the first scholar who divided the world and mass into three continents, namely Europe, Asia, and Libya (Africa).

Ø   This Scythian people as conceived by Herodotus were divided into several tribes.

Ø Herodotus gave a good account of the Royal Road joining the city of Sardis to Susa.

Sardis to Susa, Royal Road

Ø  Herodotus knowledge of Asia was mainly confined to the Persian Empire which sprawled over the whole of Western Asia with the exception of the Arabian Peninsula.

Ø  Eratosthenes may be regarded as the first scientific geographer.

Ø  Eratosthenes is famous for the correct measurement of the length of equator with the help of an indigenous Apparatus known as gnomon.

Ø  Eratosthenes also attempted to determine the distance of the sun and the Moon from the Earth.

Ø  Hipparchus was a Greek astronomer and method mathematician who discovered the precession of the equinoxes, calculated the length of the year to within six and half minutes.

Ø  Posidonius was an important Greek history and geography who lived shortly before the time of Christ.

Ø   Aristotle agreed with the calculation of his predecessors stating that the circumference of the earth is 40,00,000 stadia.

Ø   Aristotle explained the phenomenon of expansion of land in shallow sea and the formation of delta.

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