ass through in order to cross the river, and
a strong guard-post is established there. Then after crossing over into
Cappadokia it is twenty-eight stages, being a hundred and four leagues,
by this way to the borders of Kilikia; and on the borders of the
Kilikians you will pass through two several gates and go by two several
guard-posts: then after passing through these it is three stages,
amounting to fifteen and a half leagues, to journey through Kilikia;
and the boundary of Kilikia and Armenia is a navigable river called
Euphrates. In Armenia the number of stages with resting-places is
fifteen, and of leagues fifty-six and a half, and there is a guard-post
on the way: then from Armenia, when one enters the land of Matiene, 41
there are thirty-four stages, amounting to a hundred and thirty-seven
leagues; and through this land flow four navigable rivers, which cannot
be crossed but by ferries, first the Tigris, then a second and third
called both by the same name, 42 though they are not the same river nor
do they flow from the same region (for the first-mentioned of them flows
from the Armenian land and the other 43 from that of the Matienians),
and the fourth of the rivers is called Gyndes, the same which once Cyrus
divided into three hundred and sixty channels. 44 Passing thence into
the Kissian land, there are eleven stages, forty-two and a half leagues,
to the river Choaspes, which is also a navigable stream; and upon this
is built the city of Susa. The number of these stages amounts in all to
one hundred and eleven.

53. This is the number of stages with resting-places, as one goes up
from Sardis to Susa: and if the royal road has been rightly measured as
regards leagues, and if the league 45 is equal to thirty furlongs, 46
(as undoubtedly it is), the number of furlongs from Sardis to that which
is called the palace of Memnon is thirteen thousand five hundred, the
number of leagues being four hundred and fifty. So if one travels a
hundred and fifty furlongs each day, just ninety days are spent on the
journey. 47

54. Thus the Milesian Aristagoras, when he told Cleomenes the
Lacedemonian that the journey up from the sea to the residence of the
king was one of three months, spoke correctly: but if any one demands
a more exact statement yet than this, I will give him that also: for we
ought to reckon in addition to this the length of the road from Ephesos
to Sardis; and I say accordingly that the whole number of furl