The City of the Sun

Grandmaster: I pray you, now, tell me what happened to you during that voyage?

Captain: I have already told you how I wandered over the whole earth. In the course of my journeying I came to Taprobane Historically identified as the island of Sri Lanka, and was compelled to go ashore at a place, where through fear of the inhabitants I remained in a wood. When I stepped out of this I found myself on a large plain immediately under the equator The imaginary line dividing the northern and southern hemispheres; the author places his utopia in a tropical, balanced climate.

Grandmaster: And what befell you here?

Captain: I came upon a large crowd of men and armed women, many of whom did not understand our language, and they conducted me forthwith to the City of the Sun The name of the ideal commonwealth described in this work.

Grandmaster: Tell me after what plan this city is built and how it is governed.

Captain: The greater part of the city is built upon a high hill, which rises from an extensive plain,