NOTI-CORNU

NOTI-CORNU (Νότου κέρας, Hanno, ap. Geogr. Graec. Min. p. 13, ed. Müller; Ptol. 4.7.6), a promontory on the W. coast of Libya. The Greek version of the voyage of Hanno gives the following statement:—On the third day after our departure from the Chariot of the Gods (Θεῶν ὄχημα), having sailed by those streams of fire (previously described), we arrived at a bay called the Southern Horn, at the bottom of which lay an island like the former, having a lake, and in this lake another island, full of savage people, the greater part of whom were women, whose bodies were hairy, and whom our interpreters called Gorillae. Though we pursued the men, we could not seize any of them; but all fled from us, escaping over the precipices, and defending themselves with stones. Three women were, however, taken.; but they attacked their conductors with their teeth and hands, and could not be prevailed upon to accompany us. Having killed them, we flayed them, and brought their skins with us to Carthage. We did not sail further on, our provisions failing us.A similar story is told by Eudoxus of Cyzicus, as quoted by Mela (3.9; comp. Plin. Nat. 5.1.) These fires do not prove volcanic action, as it must be recollected that the common custom in those countries—as, for instance, among the Mandingos, as reported by Mungo Park—of setting fire at certain seasons to the forests and dry grass, might have given rise to the statements of the Carthaginian navigator. In our own times, the island of Amsterdam was set down as volcanic from the same mistake. (Daubeny, Volcanoes, p. 440.) The Chariot of the Godshas been identified with Sagres;the distance of three days' sail agrees very well with Sherboro, to the S. of Sierra Leone, while Hanno's island coincides with that called Macauleyin the charts, the peculiarity of which is, that it has on its S. shore, or sea face, a lake of pure fresh water of considerable extent, just within high-water mark; and inside of, and close to it, another still larger, salt. ( Journ. Geog. Soc. vol. 2. p. 89.) The Gorillae, no doubt, belonged to the family of the anthropoid apes; the Mandingosstill call the Orang-Outanby the name Toorilla,which, as Kluge ( ap. Müller, l.c. ), the latest editor of Hanno, observes, might easily assume the form it bears in the Greek text.
[E.B.J]