What causes dangerously high waves when there is no wind? Demons in the deeps? Local gods angered by intrusive ships? Or, as Pytheas suggests:
"'...these enormous Atlantic tides, thrusting through a strait cluttered with isles and reefs.'" (p. 25)?
Hanno remarks that Pytheas is still a philosopher. Philosophy and science had not yet been differentiated.
Despite his age and experience, Hanno, in an unprecedented situation, gives advice that costs lives which could have included his own. In tumultuous waves and blinding fog, he suggests that rowing boats might warn of rocks and even pull a ship free. Instead, the single boat launched is dashed against the ship. The steersman who said:
"'You'll not send men down to the demon-beasts.'" (p. 23)
- spoke not superstition but common sense.
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