•26 JOURNEY FROM name which either town assumed after the loss of those which formerly distinguished them. Trkblis would have been known to the nations of Europe as the same name with that of Tripolis ; and they would naturally have written the term like that of the district, whenever there might have been occasion to mention it, Supposing this to be the case, we may fairly assume, that the name of Tripolis was never given by the ancients at all to either of the cities in question ; and that it is only, in fact, since the Mahometan conquest that the name of the district has been applied to them.

This appears to be more probable when we consider that the title of — The district of the three cities— as, Tripolis must be translated, would be a very unappropriate term for a single town, although it might be well applied to a department. Such an objection, however, would by no means appear to the Mahometan invaders of the country, who may certainly be imagined to have been ignorant of the language from which the word in question is compounded; and they would discover no reason why the former name of the district might not be a proper one for their new town.

We have not been at the pains to search minutely into this question, which would probably receive light from the writers of the Lower Empire ; and we offer the conjectures which we have hazarded above, in the absence of more decided information. At the same time, however, it may here be remarked, that the propriety of adopting the word Tripolis, which appears in the printed copies of Ptolemy, is questioned on very good authority. In support of this assertion we need only refer our readers to the Fourth Book of Cellarius,