previous next   Eth. HELVE´TII (Eth.Ἑλουήττιοι, Eth. Ἑλβήττιοι),
a Celtic people who in Caesar's time occupied the country
between the Jura on the west, the Rhone and Leman lake on the
south, and the Rhine on the east and north. Caesar (Caes. Gal.
1.2) gives the dimensions of their country, as they were
reported to him, and probably the dimensions are not far wrong
if we take the measurements in the right directions. [GALLIA, p.
951.] Cluverius and others would correct these numbers, which
shows a want of judgment. Caesar says nothing, for he knew
nothing, of the southern limit of the Helvetii east of the Leman
lake. There is no evidence in his work that the Helvetii in his
time occupied any of the mountainous part of Switzerland. They
seem to have occupied hilly tracts and plains, but not mountains
or high mountain valleys. Strabo (p. 292) makes the Rhaeti
border on a small part of the lake of Constanz, and the Helvetii
and the Vindelici on the larger part of it. The words are
ambiguous, and may apply both t