The anthropo-geographical evolution which has passed from small to large states and from small to large seas as fields of maritime activity has been attended by a continuous change in the value of coasts, according as these were located on enclosed basins like the Mediterranean, Red, and Baltic; on marginal ones like the China and North seas; or on the open ocean.  In the earlier periods of the world’s history, a location on a relatively small enclosed sea gave a maritime horizon wide enough to lure, but not so wide as to intimidate; and by its seclusion led to a concentration and intensification of historical development, which in many of its phases left models for subsequent ages to wonder at and imitate.  This formative period and formative environment outgrown, historical development was transferred to locations on the open oceans, according to the law of human advance from small to large areas.  The historical importance of the Mediterranean and the Baltic shores was transitory, a prelude to the larger importance of the Atlantic littoral of Europe, just as this in turn was to attain its full significance only when the circumnavigation of Africa and South America linked the Atlantic to the World Ocean.  Thus that gradual expansion of the geographic horizon which has accompanied the progress of history has seen a slow evolution in the value of seaboard locations, the transfer of maritime leadership from small to large basins, from thalassic to oceanic ports, from Lubeck to Hamburg, from Venice to Genoa, as earlier from the Piraeus to Ostia, and later from England’s little Cinque Ports to Liverpool and the Clyde.

[Sidenote:  Geographic location of coasts.]

Though the articulations of a coast determine the ease with which maritime influences are communicated to the land, nevertheless history shows repeated instances where an exceptional location, combined with restricted area, has raised a poorly indented seaboard to maritime and cultural preeminence.  Phoenicia’s brilliant history rose superior to the limitation of indifferent harbors, owing to a position on the Arabian isthmus between the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean at the meeting place of Europe, Asia, and Africa.  Moreover, the advantages of this particular location have in various times and in various degrees brought into prominence all parts of the Syrian and Egyptian coasts from Antioch to Alexandria.  So the whole stretch of coast around the head of the Adriatic, marking the conjunction of a busy sea-route with various land-routes over the encircling mountains from Central Europe, has seen during the ages a long succession of thriving maritime cities, in spite of fast-silting harbors and impeded connection with the hinterland.  Here in turn have ruled with maritime sway Spina, Ravenna, Aquileia,[522] Venice, and Trieste.  On the other side of the Italian peninsula, the location on the northernmost inlet of the western Mediterranean and at the seaward base of the Ligurian Apennines, just