Pytheas of Massalia: explorer, geographer, adventurer

e know almost no hard facts about Pytheas (c350–c285 BC). He is believed to have been born in the early to mid-fourth century BC in , which at the time was a Greek colony. The Greek historian Strabo, writing some three centuries later, described Pytheas as a poor man, though that might simply mean that he was not an aristocrat. In any case, must have been impressive. How else could he have survived a journey such as he is reported to have made around Britain, and recorded it, obviously in great detail, in later writings? We must imagine a man , coming as he did from a colony with seafaring in its blood.