Pytheas

• Pytheas of Massilia was a Greek Explorer who travelled around Britannia sometime between 330-300 BCE.
• He wrote a description of the seas of northern Europe called ‘On the Ocean’, now a Lost Work.

Works

• ‘On the Ocean’ (now Lost)
  • In this Work he wrote about Thule, along with the midnight sun, ice on the sea, the Tides being caused by the Moon and he described the Germanic Tribes.
  • He also described Amber, a passage which was quoted by Pliny the Elder in his Natural History. He claimed that the Gutones found Amber on the beaches of the Isle of Abalus, in the Mentonomon Sea (Baltic) which they collected and then sold to the Teutones.