Arae Philaenorum and Automalax

Abstract

From antiquity down to the present century the shores of the Greater Syrtis (the modern Gulf of Sidra) have had the ill fame of constituting the most desolate and inhospitable part of the Mediterranean seaboard. Absence of landmarks, scarcity of water, and abundance of venomous serpents are all attested by the ancient writers, who spared no pains to paint as terrifying a picture as possible of this unhappy region. The child-devouring Lamia did well to select as her residence a cave in this very area, somewhere not far west of Automalax.Yet where horror is greatest there will heroism shine the most brightly, and we may recall that the Syrtic Gulf was the scene not only of the epic marches of Ophellas and of the younger Cato, but also of the supreme sacrifice of the Philaeni brothers, who gave their lives to secure for Carthage a favourable eastern frontier against the rival claims of Cyrene, and whose tombs later served to mark the political and cultural boundary between the eastern and western halves of the Roman Empire.