The Pilgrimage of Symon Semeonis

confusion in the mind of chamber-geographers, both military and political, who do not understand mountains. They take for granted that a watershed is as a rule a racial and strategical frontier. Now, watersheds in many cases are not frontiers, except from the purely physical point of view. (The Pyrenees form a notable exception.) The racial and strategical frontier is apt to lie in the gorges. If you take the map of the Trentino and draw a line along the southern side of the Alps from the east end of the Oertler group through Meran and across the hills towards Brunecken you run nearly level with the racial frontier ; that is to say, a fair strategical frontier and the racial frontier are really the same. The Trentino problem is by no means insoluble. Napoleon dealt with it, and an approximation to a reasonable frontier was nearly reached in the negotiations between the Austrian and Italian governments which preceded the war. I have only one other passing note to add to Miss Newbigin's remarks, that is with regard to the way in which traffic came up from the Mediterranean. I doubt if much of it went over the Cote d'Or. Having come up the Rhone to Lyons, it crossed the hills to the valley of the Loire, and floated down the stream to Orleans. As long as the roads were bad traffic and travellers made all the use they could of river transport. The society is greatly indebted to Miss Newbigin for a very interesting and stimulating lecture, and for enabling us to hear the various Fellows and visitors who have given us their views on the subject. Whatever tends to bring the various considerations affecting the questions of delimitation to the front and helps us to introduce them into the minds of politicians must be useful both to the Society and to the nation. I am sure I unite all your suffrages in offering Miss Newbigin our best thanks for her lecture

Ancient history · Geography · Pilgrimage · Historical Geography and Cartography · History

• John Carter FSA (1748–1817)

  Open Access•Peter Lindfield, Peter N Lindfield•Visual Culture in Britain•2025

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