(urth) The Apu-Punchau Eclipse

[thalassocrat at nym.hush.com]

On Thu, 12 Jun 2008 10:05:12 +1000 "Roy C. Lackey" 
<rclackey at stic.net> wrote:
>
>"Rising over the topmost sail as the New Sun of Urth
>might someday rise above the Wall of Nessus (yet far, far
>larger and more beautiful than even the New Sun can ever
>be, just as that smallest and uppermost sail was an entire
>continent of silver, compared to which the mighty Wall of
>Nessus, a few leagues in height and a few thousand long,
>might have been the tumbledown fence of a sheepfold),[...]
>(XIV, 103)

So the wall of Nessus is more than 4,000 miles long (if "a few" = 
"three or more" & we're talking about Roman-style leagues).

Not really related to the eclipse issue, but how seriously are we 
supposed to take Sev and other characters' sizing estimates?

The Great Wall of China is about 4,000 miles long, but that's not a 
city wall.

If a 4,000 mile wall enclosed a circle, the diameter would be about 
1,300 miles and the enclosed area roughly the size of India.

More likely, I suppose, it encloses an area along the length of 
Gyoll? Say a rough rectangle about 2,000 miles long and 100 miles 
wide.  That gives an area about the size of Spain.

Nessus is a big place!