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Updated: August 6, 2024
A certain Christopher Columbus, a Ligurian, dispatched to those regions with three vessels by my sovereigns, pursuing the western sun above five thousand miles from Gades, achieved his way to the antipodes. Three and thirty successive days they navigated with naught but sky and water.
Compared with Gades and Tartessus, Belon was an insignificant settlement. Its name and coins mark it as Phoenician, but it was not possessed of any special advantages of situation. The modern Bolonia, a little south of Cadiz, is thought to mark the site. We have reached now the limits of Phoenician colonisation towards the West.
The affection of the province to Caesar proved so great and so favourable, that he received a letter from Gades, before he was far advanced on his march: that as soon as the nobility of Gades heard of Caesar's proclamation, they had combined with the tribune of the cohorts, which were in garrison there, to drive Gallonius out of the town, and to secure the city and island for Caesar.
During the time of these transactions, Hanno, the lieutenant-general of Mago, having been sent from Gades to the river Baetis with a small body of Africans, by tempting the Spaniards with money, armed as many as four thousand men; but afterwards, being deprived of his camp by Lucius Marcius, and losing the principal part of his troops in the confusion occasioned by its capture, and some also in the flight, for the cavalry pursued them closely while they were dispersed, he made his escape with a few attendants.
Certain ships of Gades that is our Cadiz driven by a great wind far into River-Ocean, met these weeds or others like them, distant parents of these. They were like floating islands forever changing shape, and those old ships sailed among them for a while. They thought they must have broken from sea floor and risen to surface, and currents brought other masses from land.
The estuary of the river formed a tolerably safe harbour for the Phoenician ships, and the valley down which the river flows gave a ready access into the interior. In Spain, outside the Pillars of Hercules, the chief Phoenician settlements were Tartessus, Agadir or Gades, and Belon.
To his twin brother, who was born after him, and obtained as his lot the extremity of the island towards the pillars of Heracles, facing the country which is now called the region of Gades in that part of the world, he gave the name which in the Hellenic language is Eumelus, in the language of the country which is named after him, Gadeirus.
At last the general himself, having procured some ships, for the sea was not at a great distance, left his army by night and effected his escape to Gades.
After his departure Gades, the oldest and last possession of the Phoenicians on Spanish soil, submitted on favourable conditions to the new masters.
This undesigned voyage of the Tyrian ship seems to have been made previous to the building of Gadir, or Gades. Perhaps they made other voyages to that region, but it was a custom of the Phœnicians to be very secret in regard to the methods and paths of their commerce.
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