are amongst the
other people the Garamanti, who are almost always naked; to whom came
Cato with the people of Rome when flying from the dominion of Caesar.
Having marked out these three places upon this ball, one can easily
see how the Sun circles round it.
I say, then, that the Heaven of the Sun revolves from West to East,
not directly against the diurnal movement, that is, of the day and
night, but obliquely against that, so that its mid-circle, which is
equally between its Poles, in which is the body of the Sun, cuts into
two opposite parts the circle of the two first Poles, in the beginning
of Aries and in the beginning of Libra; and it is divided by two arcs
from it, one towards the North and one towards the South; the points
of these two said arcs are equi-distant from the first circle in every
part by twenty-three degrees and one point more, and the one point is
the tropic of Cancer, and the other is the tropic of Capricorn;
therefore it must be that Maria in the sign of Aries can see, when the
Sun sinks below the mid-circle of the first Poles, this Sun to revolve
round the Earth below, or rather the sea, like a millstone, of which
only one half of its body appears, and can see this come rising up
after the manner of the screw of a vine-press, so much so that it
completes ninety-one rotations, or a little more. When these rotations
are completed, its ascension is to Maria almost as much in proportion
as it ascends to us in the half-third, that is, of the equal day and
night; and if a man could stand in Maria, with his face always turned
to the Sun, he would see that Sun pass by on the right. Then by the
same way it seems to descend another ninety-one rotations, or a little
more, so much so that it circles round below the Earth, or rather sea,
not showing the whole of itself; and then it is hidden, and Lucia
begins to see it, which, the same as Maria, then sees it to ascend and
to descend around itself with the same number of rotations. And if a
man could stand in Lucia, with his face always turned towards the Sun,
he would see it pass to the left. Therefore, it is possible to see
that these places have in the year one day of six months' duration,
and one night of the same length of time; and when one has the day the
other has the night.
It must be also that the circle where the Garamanti are, as has been
said above, upon this ball, can see the Sun revolve precisely above
them, not after the fashion of a mill-
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