Kosmas Indikopleustes

   Author of the Christian Topography, perhaps the most interesting and curious work of the first half of the sixth century. He was called Indikopleustes, meaning "sailor to India," because of his travels along the borders of the Indian Ocean. As travel literature and as a work of geography founded on personal travel, his descriptions of the Red Sea, Nile River, Axum, Nubia, Arabian Gulf, and Ceylon (qq.v.) are important. He was a merchant, probably from Alexandria (q.v.), also a Nestorian (q.v.) who wrote during the Three Chapters (q.v.) controversy. His work describes trade, but he mentions other things as well, including exotic animals (as does Timothy of Gaza [q.v.]). Most curious to the modern reader is his attempt to prove that the accepted cosmology of Ptolemy is erroneous; he argues that the universe is shaped like the tabernacle of Moses (thus, like a rectangular box). He was perhaps the greatest of Byzantine travelers, but certainly no Copernicus.