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HomePoems > Kubla Khan > Sources > Pausanias                           

 

 

1. Alph, the first of rivers

 

Pausanias

Pausanias was a Greek travel writer in the second century AD, who described natural phenomena, and cities, covering their daily life, ceremonies, beliefs, and artwork in such detail that even today we can recognize what he was talking about.

The anthropologist Sir James Frazer said, "Without him, the ruins of Greece would for the most part be a labyrinth without a clue, a riddle without an answer."

Coleridge's copy of Thomas Taylor's 1794 translation ended up in William Wordsworth's library. Coleridge had probably read the original Greek, as well.

Pausanias, The Description of Greece, translated by Thomas Taylor, 1794

 

Alph, the first of rivers

The story of the river Alpheus descending into the earth, and then rising up in fountains appears in Pausanias, whom Coleridge probably read in the original, as well as in Thomas Taylor's translation.

Coleridge could not get enough of Taylor, according to Lowes. Speaking of this story, Lowes says that Coleridge "Could scarcely have escaped it in Pausanias."

Pausanias does draw an explicit parallel between the Nile and the Alpheus, a connection that Lowes feels lies behind much of the imagery in Kubla Khan.

Like Alph, the sacred river in Kubla Khan, the Alpheus runs far below the earth, emerges in a fountain, and runs toward the sea.

Other sources

William Bartram
William Beckford
F. Bernier
James Bruce
Thomas Burnet
William Collins
Herodotus
Athanasius Kircher
Jerome Lobo
Thomas Maurice
John Milton
Samuel Purchas
Major James Rennell
Seneca
Strabo
Virgil

Mary Wollstonecraft

 

                                                         Text

But the Alpheus appears to possess something different from other rivers; for it often hides itself in the earth, and again rises out of it. Thus it…merges itself in the Tegeatic land. Ascending from hence in Asaea, and mingling itself with the water of Eurotas, it falls a second time into the earth, emerges from hence, in that place which the Arcadians call the fountains, and running through the Pisaean and Olympian plains, pours itself into the sea…Nor can the agitation of the Adriatic sea restrain its course; for running through this mighty and violent sea, it mingles itself with the water of Arethusa in Ortygia…retaining its ancient name Alpheus.

From the water of Alpheus, therefore, mingling itself with that of Arethusa, I am persuaded the fable respecting the love of Alpheus originated. Such indeed of the Greeks or Aegyptians as have traveled to Aethiopia…relate that the Nile entering into a certain marsh, and gliding through this no otherwise than if it was a continent, flows afterward through lower Aethiopia into Egypt, till it arrives at Pharos and the sea which it contains.

--Taylor, Book II, 381-2 (Passage comes from Book VIII, ch. Liv, section 2) and Taylor, Book III, 18 (from Book V, chapter vii, paragraphs 2 and 3)

 
Word Line # Line Sources for word
Alph

3

Where Alpha, the sacred river, ran

 Pausanias
 Seneca 1
 Strabo 1
 Strabo 2
 Virgil

Ancient 10 And here were forests ancient as the hills  Bernier 2
 Bruce 2
 Burnet 1
 
Pausanias
Earth

18

As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing

 Bartram 2
 Bartram 6
 Bartram 8
 Bernier 2
 Bernier 5
 Bruce 1
 Burnet 2
 Kircher 1

 Kircher 3

 Maurice 1

 Milton 2

 Milton 4
 Pausanias
 Seneca 1
 Seneca 2
 Wollstonecraft

Fountain

19

A mighty fountain momently was forced

 Bartram 4
 Bartram 5
 Bartram 6

 Bartram 7

 Bartram 8
 Beckford
 Bernier 2
 Bernier 4
 Bruce 1
 Bruce 2

 Bruce 3

 Burnet 1
 Herodotus
 Maurice 2
 Milton 4
 Pausanias
 Rennell
 Seneca 1
 Virgil
 Wollstonecraft

 

34

From the fountain and the caves

 Bartram 4
 Bartram 5
 Bartram 6

 Bartram 7

 Bartram 8
 Beckford
 Bernier 2
 Bernier 4
 Bruce 1
 Bruce 2

 Bruce 3

 Burnet 1
 Herodotus
 Maurice 2
 Milton 4
 Pausanias
 Rennell
 Seneca 1
 Virgil
 Wollstonecraft

Mighty 19 A mighty fountain momently was forced Bartram 8
Kircher 1
Pausanias
Mingled

33

Where was heard the mingled measure

 Collins
 Pausanias
 Virgil

River

3

Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

 Bartram 3
 Bartram 6
 Beckford
 Bernier 1
 Bernier 2
 Bernier 3
 Bernier 5

 Bruce 2

 Bruce 4
 Bruce 6

 Burnet 1
 Kircher 1
 
Kircher 3
 
Maurice 1
 Milton 4
 Pausanias
 Rennell
 Seneca 1
 Strabo 1
 Strabo 2

 Virgil

 

24

It flung up momently the sacred river

 Bartram 3
 Bartram 6
 Beckford
 Bernier 1
 Bernier 2
 Bernier 3
 Bernier 5

 Bruce 2

 Bruce 4
 Bruce 6

 Burnet 1
 Kircher 1
 Kircher 3
 
Maurice 1
 Milton 4
 Pausanias
 Rennell
 Seneca 1
 Strabo 1
 Strabo 2

 Virgil

 

26

Through wood and dale the sacred river ran

 Bartram 3
 Bartram 6
 Beckford
 Bernier 1
 Bernier 2
 Bernier 3
 Bernier 5

 Bruce 2

 Bruce 4
 Bruce 6
 Burnet 1

 Kircher 1
 Kircher 3
 
Maurice 1
 Milton 4
 Pausanias
 Rennell
 Seneca 1
 Strabo 1
 Strabo 2

 Virgil

Sea

5

Down to a sunless sea

 Burnet 1
 Kircher 1
 Kircher 3

 Milton 2

 Pausanias
 Seneca 1
 Seneca 2
 Strabo 1
 Virgil

 

 

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