Panchaia (also Panchaea

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

: ) is an

island An island (or isle) is an isolated piece of habitat that is surrounded by a dramatically different habitat, such as water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, skerries, cays or keys. An island ...

, first mentioned by

ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

philosopher Euhemerus in the late 4th century BC. Euhemerus describes this place as home to a

utopia A utopia ( ) typically describes an imaginary community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book ''Utopia (book), Utopia'', describing a fictional ...

n society made up of a number of different ethnic tribes having a collective economy and his trip there in his major work ''

Sacred History Sacred history is the parts of the Torah narrative on the boundary of historicity, especially the Moses and Exodus stories which can be argued to have a remote historical nucleus without any positive evidence to the effect. Rabbi Neil Gillman, pr ...

'', only fragments of which survive. Fragments preserved by followers such as the later Greek historian Diodorus Siculus and 4th century AD Christian writer Eusebius of Caesarea describe Panchaia as a rational island paradise located in the

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by th ...

. Euhemerus went there by traveling through the

Red Sea The Red Sea ( ar, البحر الأحمر - بحر القلزم, translit=Modern: al-Baḥr al-ʾAḥmar, Medieval: Baḥr al-Qulzum; or ; Coptic: ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϩⲁϩ ''Phiom Enhah'' or ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϣⲁⲣⲓ ''Phiom ǹšari''; T ...

and around the

Arabian Peninsula The Arabian Peninsula, (; ar, شِبْهُ الْجَزِيرَةِ الْعَرَبِيَّة, , "Arabian Peninsula" or , , "Island of the Arabs") or Arabia, is a peninsula of Western Asia, situated northeast of Africa on the Arabian Plate ...

; in the island's temple of Zeus Triphylius he discovered a register of the births and deaths of the gods, proving they were merely historical figures. The island is also mentioned by

Lygdamus Lygdamus was a Roman poet who wrote in Classical Latin. Six of his elegies, addressed to a girl named Neaera, are preserved in the ''Appendix Tibulliana'' alongside the apocryphal works of Tibullus. He belonged to the literary circle around Marcus ...

(Tib. 3.2.23), one of the Tibullan elegists, as a rich place from which he will hope for gifts to his grave. Virgil called the Island "incense bearing, rich with sands" ("totaque turiferis Panchaia pinguis harenis" ''Georgics'' 2.139). Several islands may be probable locations, including

Socotra Socotra or Soqotra (; ar, سُقُطْرَىٰ ; so, Suqadara) is an island of the Republic of Yemen in the Indian Ocean, under the ''de facto'' control of the UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council, a secessionist participant in Yemen’s ...

Bahrain Bahrain ( ; ; ar, البحرين, al-Bahrayn, locally ), officially the Kingdom of Bahrain, ' is an island country in Western Asia. It is situated on the Persian Gulf, and comprises a small archipelago made up of 50 natural islands and an ...

References

Bibliography

* * * {{Greek religion Locations in Greek mythology Mythological islands