With regard to the wars of the Byzantines against Philip, the Gauls, and the kings of Bithynia, we should trust none but the ancient writers who lived before the greatness of the Imperial city had excited a spirit of flattery and fiction.] If we survey Byzantium in the extent which it acquired with the august name of Constantinople, the figure of the Imperial city may be represented under that of an unequal triangle.

The obtuse point, which advances towards the east and the shores of Asia, meets and repels the waves of the Thracian Bosphorus.

The northern side of the city is bounded by the harbor; and the southern is washed by the Propontis, or Sea of Marmara.

The basis of the triangle is opposed to the west, and terminates the continent of Europe.

But the admirable form and division of the circumjacent land and water cannot, without a more ample explanation, be clearly or sufficiently understood.