(Cæsar, Strabo); Araris, (Dio Cassius); Sauconia, (Amianus): A river of Celtic Gaul, now the Saone; which rises out of Mount Vogesus on the confines of Lorrain, runs through the Franche Comté and Burgundy, and below Lyons falls into the Rhone. It is so incredibly slow, that the eye cannot distinguish which way it moves, (Cæsar); and therefore Pliny calls it the Sluggish river. Its course is from north to south. It is famous for a bridge of Cæsar, which was built by the soldiers in one day. It is navigable equally with the Rhone.

the name of the mountain on which Noah's ark rested, after the abatement of the waters of the universal deluge. Concerning this mountain there are various conjectures; though it is almost universally allowed to be in Armenia Major. Some are of opinion that it is one of the mountains which divide Armenia on the south from Mesopotamia and that part of Assyria inhabited by the Cardus; from whom these mountains took the name of Cardu or Cardu, by the Greeks turned into Gordyæi, &c. Others, that it lies towards the middle of Armenia, near the river Araxes, above 280 miles distant from the above mentioned mountains, making it belong to Mount Taurus; but the Armenians are positive that Noah's Ararat is no other than a mountain to which they now give the name of Masis, which lies about 12 leagues to the east of Eriwan, and four leagues from the Aras. It is encompassed by several petty hills: on the tops of them are found many ruins, thought to have been the buildings of the first men, who were, for some time, afraid to descend into the plains. It stands by itself, in form of a sugar-loaf, in the midst of a very large plain, detached, as it were, from the other mountains of Armenia, which make a long chain. It consists, properly speaking, of two hills; the lesser of which is the more sharp and pointed: the higher, on which it is said the ark rested, lies to the north-west of it, and rises far above the neighbouring mountains. It seems so high and big, that, when the air is clear, it may be seen four or five days journey off; yet travellers think the height is not extraordinary. Chardin is of opinion that he passed a part of Mount Caucasus which is higher; and Pouillet thinks the height of Mount Masis, or Ararat, not above twice as great as that of Mount Valerian near Paris. They therefore think that its being visible at such a great distance is owing to its lonely situation in a vast plain, and upon the most elevated part of the country, without any mountains before it to obstruct the view. Nor is the snow with which it is always covered from the middle upwards any argument of its height; for in this country, ice hath often been observed in the mornings of the middle of July. (See Armenia). Certain it is, however, that this mountain hath never yet been ascended; which the Armenians pretend was owing to the interposition of angels, in order to disappoint the curiosity of those who wanted to advance to such a sacred place as that whereon the ark rested: but the excess of cold may very reasonably be supposed able to frustrate all such attempts, without any supernatural interposition. The most distinct account we have of this mountain is that given by M. Tournefort: which, however, being much swelled with immaterial circumstances, it is needless to trouble our readers with at length. He tells us, that this mountain is one of the most disagreeable sights upon earth, without either houses, convents, trees, or shrubs; and seems as if continually wasting and mouldering away. He divides it into three regions: The lowermost, he says, is the only one which contains any human creatures, and is occupied by a few miserable shepherds that tend scab by flocks; and here are also found some partridges: the second is inhabited by crows and tigers; and all... the rest is covered with snow, which half the year is involved in thick clouds. On the side of the mountain that looks towards Erivan is a prodigious precipice, from whence rocks of an immense size are continually tumbling down with a hideous noise. This precipice seems quite perpendicular; and the extremities are rough and blackish, as if smutted with smoke. The soil of the mountain is loose, and on the sandy parts it is impossible to take a firm step; so that our traveller encountered great difficulties in his ascent and descent of this mountain; being often obliged, in order to avoid the sand, to betake himself to places where great rocks were heaped on one another, under which he passed as through caverns, or to places full of stones, where he was forced to leap from one stone to another. If we may believe Struys, a Dutch writer, however, all these difficulties may be surmounted. He assures us, he went five days journey up Mount Ararat, to see a Romish hermit: that he passed through three regions of clouds; the first dark and thick, the next cold and full of snow, and the third colder still; that he advanced five miles every day; and when he came to the place where the hermit had his cell, he breathed a very serene and temperate air; that the hermit told him, that he perceived neither wind nor rain all the 25 years he had dwelt there; and that on the top of the mountain there reigned a still greater tranquillity, whereby the ark was preserved uncorrupted. He farther pretends, that the hermit gave him a cross made out of the wood of the ark, together with a certificate; a formal copy of which the author has given in his sham relation.