Strabonis rerum Geographicarum Libri XVII

The best edition of Strabo's enormous Geography, his kolossourgia or colossal work as he described it himself. The influential Greek geographer who travelled widely, studied under both Aristotelian and Stoic teachers, and spent some decades in Rome, wrote his work early in the first century. Along with the less-known geographers Aratus and Geminus, Strabo promulgated the idea that the torrid zone of the spherical globe was occupied throughout its length by an ocean which divided his continent from another antipodal one in the southern hemisphere.

This edition is based on the critical edition by the great classical scholar Casaubon, here further edited with the addition of extensive notes from the best commentators, and with the addition of text that had been omitted from the sources available to Casaubon. 'The annotations of preceding learned men are arranged with skill in their respective places, by the care and diligence of [this edition's editor] Almeloveen' (Dibdin).

The "Geographies" of Strabo were 'by far the most important source for ancient geography, a priceless document of the Augustan age, and a compendium of important material derived from lost authors' (OCD). The work represents the classical world's most significant contribution to the science of geography. The first surviving attempt to collect all geographical knowledge that existed and to compose a general treatise on the subject, it was mainly based on ancient Greek sources. It survived in various manuscripts into the age of printing; however earlier printed editions of the text, including the Aldine edition of 1516, were based on corrupt manuscripts and it was not until 1587 that Casaubon improved the text for this edition, revising it again in 1620. Casaubon's edition of Strabo remained the basis of all subsequent editions until the nineteenth century.

For a very full modern analysis of the work see Daniela Dueck, Hugh Lindsay and Sarah Pothecary, Strabo's cultural geography: the making of a kolossourgia (Cambridge, 2005).