A classical dictionary / containing a copious account of all the proper names mentioned in ancient authors with tables of coins, weights, and measures used among the Greeks and Romans and a chronological table

by John Lemprière

P

Pacatianus Titus Julius, a general of the Roman armies, who proclaimed himself emperor in Gaul, about the latter part of Philip’s reign. He was soon after defeated, A.D. 249, and put to death, &c.

Paccius, an insignificant poet in the age of Domitian. Juvenal, satire 7, li. 12.

Paches, an Athenian, who took Mitylene, &c. Aristotle, Politics, bk. 4.

Păchīnus, or Pachynus, now Passaro, a promontory of Sicily, projecting about two miles into the sea, in the form of a peninsula, at the south-east corner of the island, with a small harbour of the same name. Strabo, bk. 6.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 699.—Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 25.

Marcus Paconius, a Roman put to death by Tiberius, &c. Suetonius, Tiberias, ch. 61.——A stoic philosopher, son of the preceding. He was banished from Italy by Nero, and he retired from Rome with the greatest composure and indifference. Arrian, bk. 1, ch. 1.

Pacŏrus, the eldest of the 30 sons of Orodes king of Parthia, sent against Crassus, whose army he defeated, and whom he took prisoner. He took Syria from the Romans and supported the republican party of Pompey, and of the murderers of Julius Cæsar. He was killed in a battle by Ventidius Bassus, B.C. 39, on the same day (9th of June) that Crassus had been defeated. Florus, bk. 4, ch. 9.—Horace, bk. 3, ode 6, li. 9.——A king of Parthia, who made a treaty of alliance with the Romans, &c.——Another, intimate with king Decebalus.

Pactōlus, a celebrated river of Lydia, rising in mount Tmolus, and falling into the Hermus after it has watered the city of Sardes. It was in this river that Midas washed himself when he turned into gold whatever he touched, and from that circumstance it ever after rolled golden sands, and received the name of Chrysorrhoas. It is called Tmolus by Pliny. Strabo observes that it had no golden sands in his age. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 10, li. 142.—Strabo, bk. 18.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 11, li. 86.—Herodotus, bk. 5, ch. 110.—Pliny, bk. 33, ch. 8.

Pactyas, a Lydian entrusted with the care of the treasures of Crœsus at Sardes. The immense riches which he could command, corrupted him, and, to make himself independent, he gathered a large army. He laid siege to the citadel of Sardes, but the arrival of one of the Persian generals soon put him to flight. He retired to Cumæ and afterwards to Lesbos, where he was delivered into the hands of Cyrus. Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 154, &c.—Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 35.

Pactye, a town of the Thracian Chersonesus.

Pactyes, a mountain of Ionia, near Ephesus. Strabo, bk. 14.

Pācŭvius Marcus, a native of Brundusium, son of the sister of the poet Ennius, who distinguished himself by his skill in painting, and by his poetical talents. He wrote satires and tragedies which were represented at Rome, and of some of which the names are preserved, as Peribœa, Hermione, Atalanta, Ilione, Teucer, Antiope, &c. Orestes was considered as the best finished performance; the style, however, though rough and without either purity or elegance, deserved the commendation of Cicero and Quintilian, who perceived strong rays of genius and perfection frequently beaming through the clouds of the barbarity and ignorance of the times. The poet in his old age retired to Tarentum, where he died in his 90th year, about 131 years before Christ. Of all his compositions about 437 scattered lines are preserved in the collections of Latin poets. Cicero, On Oratory, bk. 2; Rhetorica ad Herennium, bk. 2, ch. 27.—Horace, bk. 2, ltr. 1, li. 56.—Quintilian, bk. 10, ch. 10.

Padæi, an Indian nation, who devoured their sick before they died. Herodotus, bk. 3, ch. 99.

Padinum, now Bondeno, a town on the Po, where it begins to branch into different channels. Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 15.

Pădua, a town called also Patavium, in the country of the Venetians, founded by Antenor immediately after the Trojan war. It was the native place of the historian Livy. The inhabitants were once so powerful, that they could levy an army of 20,000 men. Strabo, bk. 5.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 4.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1, li. 251.

Padus (now called the Po), a river in Italy, known also by the name of Eridanus, which forms the northern boundary of the territories of Italy. It rises in mount Vesulus, one of the highest mountains of the Alps, and after it has collected in its course the waters of above 30 rivers, discharges itself in an eastern direction into the Adriatic sea by seven mouths, two of which only, the Plana or Volano, and the Padusa, were formed by nature. It was formerly said that it rolled gold dust in its sand, which was carefully searched by the inhabitants. The consuls Caius Flaminius Nepos and Publius Furius Philus were the first Roman generals who crossed it. The Po is famous for the death of Phaeton, who, as the poets mention, was thrown down there by the thunderbolts of Jupiter. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 2, li. 258, &c.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 4.—Lucan, bk. 2, &c.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 9, li. 680.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Pliny, bk. 37, ch. 2.

Padūsa, the most southern mouth of the Po, considered by some writers as the Po itself. See: [Padus]. It was said to abound in swans, and from it there was a cut to the town of Ravenna. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 11, li. 455.

Pæan, a surname of Apollo, derived from the word pæan, a hymn which was sung in his honour, because he had killed the serpent Python, which had given cause to the people to exclaim Io Pæan! The exclamation of Io Pæan! was made use of in speaking to the other gods, as it often was a demonstration of joy. Juvenal, satire 6, li. 171.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 358; bk. 14, li. 720.—Lucan, bk. 1, &c.—Strabo, bk. 18.

Pædaretus, a Spartan who, on not being elected in the number of the 300 sent on an expedition, &c., declared that, instead of being mortified, he rejoiced that 300 men better than himself could be found in Sparta. Plutarch, Lycurgus.

Pædius, a lieutenant of Julius Cæsar in Spain, who proposed a law to punish with death all such as were concerned in the murder of his patron, &c.

Pæmāni, a people of Belgic Gaul, supposed to have dwelt in the country at the west of Luxemburg. Cæsar, Gallic War, bk. 2, ch. 4.

Pæon, a Greek historian. Plutarch, Theseus.——A celebrated physician who cured the wounds which the gods received during the Trojan war. From him, physicians are sometimes called Pæonii, and herbs serviceable in medicinal processes, Pæoniæ herbæ. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 7, li. 769.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 15, li. 535.

Pæŏnes, a people of Macedonia, who inhabited a small part of the country called Pæonia. Some believe that they were descended from a Trojan colony. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 1.—Herodotus, bk. 5, ch. 13, &c.

[♦]Pæŏnia, a country of Macedonia at the west of the Strymon. It received its name from Pæon, a son of Endymion, who settled there. Livy, bk. 42, ch. 51; bk. 45, ch. 29.——A small town of Attica.

[♦] ‘Peŏnia’ replaced with ‘Pæŏnia’

Pæŏnĭdes, a name given to the daughters of Pierus, who were defeated by the Muses, because their mother was a native of Pæonia. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, last fable.

Pæos, a small town of Arcadia.

Pæsos, a town of the Hellespont, called also Apæsos, situated at the north of Lampsacus. When it was destroyed, the inhabitants migrated to Lampsacus, where they settled. They were of Milesian origin. Strabo, bk. 13.—Homer Iliad, bk. 2.

Pæstum, a town of Lucania, called also Neptunia and Posidonia by the Greeks, where the soil produced roses which blossomed twice a year. The ancient walls of the town, about three miles in extent, are still standing, and likewise venerable remains of temples and porticoes. The Sinus Pæstanus on which it stood is now called the gulf of Salerno. Virgil, Georgics, bk. 4, li. 119.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 15, li. 708; ex Ponto, bk. 2, poem 4, li. 28.

Pætovium, a town of Pannonia.

Pætus Cæcinna, the husband of Arria. See: [Arria].——A governor of Armenia, under Nero.——A Roman who conspired with Catiline against his country.——A man drowned as he was going to Egypt to collect money. Propertius, bk. 3, poem 7, li. 5.

Pagæ, a town of Megaris,——of Locris. Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 3.

Păgăsæ, or Păgăsa, a town of Magnesia, in Macedonia, with a harbour and a promontory of the same name. The ship Argo was built there, as some suppose, and, according to Propertius, the Argonauts set sail from that harbour. From that circumstance not only the ship Argo, but also the Argonauts themselves, were ever after distinguished by the epithet of Pagasæus. Pliny confounds Pagasæ with Demetrias, but they are different, and the latter was peopled by the inhabitants of the former, who preferred the situation of Demetrias for its conveniences. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 7, li. 1; bk. 8, li. 349.—Lucan, bk. 2, li. 715; bk. 6, li. 400.—Mela, bk. 2, chs. 3 & 7.—Strabo, bk. 9.—Propertius, bk. 1, poem 20, li. 17.—Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 8.—Apollodorus Rhodius, bk. 1, li. 238, &c.

Păgăsus, a Trojan killed by Camilla. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 11, li. 670.

Pagræ, a town of Syria, on the borders of Cilicia. Strabo, bk. 16.

Pagus, a mountain of Æolia. Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 5.

Palācium, or Palātium, a town of the Thracian Chersonesus.——A small village on the Palatine hill, where Rome was afterwards built.

Palæ, a town at the south of Corsica, now St. Bonifacio.

Palæa, a town of Cyprus,——of Cephallenia.

Palæapŏlis, a small island on the coast of Spain. Strabo.

Palæmon, or Palemon, a sea deity, son of Athamas and Ino. His original name was Melicerta, and he assumed that of Palæmon, after he had been changed into a sea deity by Neptune. See: [Melicerta].——A noted grammarian at Rome in the age of Tiberius, who made himself ridiculous by his arrogance and luxury. Juvenal, satire 6, li. 451.—Martial, bk. 2, ltr. 86.——A son of Neptune, who was amongst the Argonauts. Apollodorus.

Palæpăphos, the ancient town of Paphos in Cyprus, adjoining to the new. Strabo, bk. 14.

Palæpharsālus, the ancient town of Pharsalus in Thessaly. Cæsar, Alexandrine War, ch. 48.

Palæphătus, an ancient Greek philosopher, whose age is unknown, though it can be ascertained that he flourished between the times of Aristotle and Augustus. He wrote five books de incredibilibus, of which only the first remains, and in it he endeavours to explain fabulous and mythological traditions by historical facts. The best edition of Palæphatus is that of Johann Friedrich Fischer, in 8vo, Lipscomb, 1773.——An heroic poet of Athens, who wrote a poem on the creation of the world.——A disciple of Aristotle, born at Abydos.——An historian of Egypt.

Palepŏlis, a town of Campania, built by a Greek colony, where Naples afterwards was erected. Livy, bk. 8, ch. 22.

Palæste, a village of Epirus near Oricus, where Cæsar first landed with his fleet. Lucan, bk. 5, li. 460.

Palæstīna, a province of Syria, &c. Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 105.—Silius Italicus, bk. 3, li. 606.—Strabo, bk. 16.

Palæstīnus, an ancient name of the river Strymon.

Palætyrus, the ancient town of Tyre on the continent. Strabo, bk. 16.

Pălămēdes, a Grecian chief, son of Nauplius king of Eubœa by Clymene. He was sent by the Greek princes, who were going to the Trojan war, to bring Ulysses to the camp, who, to withdraw himself from the expedition, pretended insanity, and, the better to impose upon his friends, used to harness different animals to a plough, and to sow salt instead of barley into the furrows. The deceit was soon perceived by Palamedes; he knew that the regret to part from his wife Penelope, whom he had lately married, was the only reason of the pretended insanity of Ulysses; and to demonstrate this, Palamedes took Telemachus, whom Penelope had lately brought into the world, and put him before the plough of his father. Ulysses showed that he was not insane, by turning the plough a different way not to hurt his child. This having been discovered, Ulysses was obliged to attend the Greek princes to the war, but an immortal enmity arose between Ulysses and Palamedes. The king of Ithaca resolved to take every opportunity to distress him: and when all his expectations were frustrated, he had the meanness to bribe one of his servants, and to make him dig a hole in his master’s tent, and there conceal a large sum of money. After this Ulysses forged a letter in Phrygian characters, which king Priam was supposed to have sent to Palamedes. In the letter the Trojan king seemed to entreat Palamedes to deliver into his hands the Grecian army, according to the conditions which had been previously agreed upon, when he received the money. This forged letter was carried, by means of Ulysses, before the princes of the Grecian army. Palamedes was summoned, and he made the most solemn protestations of innocence. But all was in vain; the money that was discovered in his tent served only to corroborate the accusation, and he was found guilty by all the army, and stoned to death. Homer is silent about the miserable fate of Palamedes, and Pausanias mentions that it had been reported by some, that Ulysses and Diomedes had drowned him in the sea as he was fishing on the coast. Philostratus, who mentions the tragical story above related, adds that Achilles and Ajax buried his body with great pomp on the sea-shore, and that they raised upon it a small chapel, where sacrifices were regularly offered by the inhabitants of Troas. Palamedes was a learned man as well as a soldier, and, according to some, he completed the alphabet of Cadmus by the addition of the four letters θ, ξ, χ, φ, during the Trojan war. To him, also, is attributed the invention of dice and backgammon; and it is said he was the first who regularly ranged an army in a line of battle, and who placed sentinels round a camp, and excited their vigilance and attention by giving them a watchword. Hyginus, fables 95, 105, &c.—Apollodorus, bk. 2, &c.—Dictys Cretensis, bk. 2, ch. 15.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 13, lis. 56 & 308.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 31.—Marcus Manilius, bk. 4, li. 205.—Philostratus, bk. 10, ch. 6.—Euripides, Phœnician Women.—Martial, bk. 13, ltr. 75.—Pliny, bk. 7, ch. 56.

Palantia, a town of Spain. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 6.

Pălātīnus mons, a celebrated hill, the largest of the seven hills on which Rome was built. It was upon it that Romulus laid the first foundation of the capital of Italy, in a quadrangular form, and there also he kept his court, as well as Tullus Hostilius and Augustus, and all the succeeding emperors, from which circumstance the word Palatium has ever since been applied to the residence of a monarch or prince. The Palatine hill received its name from the goddess Pales, or from the Palatini, who originally inhabited the place, or from balare or palare, the bleatings of sheep, which were frequent there, or perhaps from the word palantes, wandering, because Evander, when he came to settle in Italy, gathered all the inhabitants, and made them all one society. There were some games celebrated in honour of Augustus, and called Palatine, because kept on the hill. Dio Cassius, bk. 53.—Silius Italicus, bk. 12, li. 709.—Livy, bk. 1, chs. 7 & 33.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 14, li. 822.—Juvenal, satire 9, li. 23.—Martial, bk. 1, ltr. 71.—Varro, de Lingua Latina, bk. 4, ch. 3.—Cicero, Against Catiline, bk. 1.——Apollo, who was worshipped on the Palatine hill, was also called Palatinus. His temple there had been built, or rather repaired, by Augustus, who had enriched it with a library, valuable for the various collections of Greek and Latin manuscripts which it contained, as also for the Sibylline books deposited there. Horace, bk. 1, ltr. 3, li. 17.

Palantium, a town of Arcadia.

Palēis, or Palæ, a town in the island of Cephallenia. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 15.

Pales, the goddess of sheepfolds and of pastures among the Romans. She was worshipped with great solemnity at Rome, and her festivals, called Palilia, were celebrated the very day that Romulus began to lay the foundation of the city of Rome. Virgil, Georgics, bk. 3, lis. 1 & 294.—Ovid, Fasti, bk. 4, li. 722, &c.—Paterculus, bk. 1, ch. 8.

Palfurius Sura, a writer, removed from the senate by Domitian, who suspected him of attachment to Vitellius, &c. Juvenal, satire 4, li. 53.

Palibothra, a city of India, supposed now to be Patna, or, according to others, Allahabad. Strabo, bk. 15.

Palīci, or Palisci, two deities, sons of Jupiter by Thalia, whom Æschylus calls Ætna, in a tragedy which is now lost, according to the words of Macrobius. The nymph Ætna, when pregnant, entreated her lover to remove her from the pursuit of Juno. The god concealed her in the bowels of the earth, and when the time of her delivery was come, the earth opened, and brought into the world two children, who received the name of Palici, ἀπο του παλιν ἰκεσθαι, because they came again into the world from the bowels of the earth. These deities were worshipped with great ceremonies by the Sicilians, and near their temple were two small lakes of sulphureous water, which were supposed to have sprung out of the earth at the same time that they were born. Near these pools it was usual to take the most solemn oaths, by those who wished to decide controversies and quarrels. If any of the persons who took the oaths perjured themselves, they were immediately punished in a supernatural manner; and those whose oath, by the deities of the place, was sincere, departed unhurt. The Palici had also an oracle, which was consulted upon great emergencies, and which rendered the truest and most unequivocal answers. In a superstitious age, the altars of the Palici were stained with the blood of human sacrifices, but this barbarous custom was soon abolished, and the deities were satisfied with their usual offerings. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 9, li. 585.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, li. 506.—Diodorus, bk. 2.—Macrobius, Saturnalia, bk. 5, ch. 10.—Silius Italicus, bk. 14, li. 219.

Palīlia, a festival celebrated by the Romans, in honour of the goddess Pales. The ceremony consisted in burning heaps of straw, and leaping over them. No sacrifices were offered, but the purifications were made with the smoke of horses’ blood, and with the ashes of a calf that had been taken from the belly of his mother, after it had been sacrificed, and with the ashes of beans. The purification of the flocks was also made with the smoke of sulphur, of the olive, the pine, the laurel, and the rosemary. Offerings of mild cheese, boiled wine, and cakes of millet, were afterwards made to the goddess. This festival was observed on the 21st of April, and it was during the celebration that Romulus first began to build his city. Some call this festival Parilia quasi a pariendo, because the sacrifices were offered to the divinity for the fecundity of the flocks. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 14, li. 774; Fasti, bk. 4, li. 721, &c.; bk. 6, li. 257.—Propertius, bk. 4, poem 1, li. 19.—Tibullus, bk. 2, poem 5, li. 87.

Pălĭnūrus, a skilful pilot of the ship of Æneas. He fell into the sea in his sleep, and was three days exposed to the tempests and the waves of the sea, and at last came safe to the sea-shore near Velia, where the cruel inhabitants of the place murdered him to obtain his clothes. His body was left unburied on the sea-shore, and as, according to the religion of the ancient Romans, no person was suffered to cross the Stygian lake before 100 years were elapsed, if his remains had not been decently buried, we find Æneas, when he visited the infernal regions, speaking to Palinurus, and assuring him, that though his bones were deprived of a funeral, yet the place were his body was exposed should soon be adorned with a monument and bear his name, and accordingly a promontory was called Palinurus, now Palinuro. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 513; bk. 5, li. 840, &c.; bk. 6, li. 341.—Ovid, de Remedia Amoris, li. 577.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 4.—Strabo.—Horace, bk. 3, ode 4, li. 28.

Paliscōrum, or Palīcōrum stagnum, a sulphureous pool in Sicily. See: [Palici].

Paliurus, now Nahil, a river of Africa, with a town of the same name at its mouth, at the west of Egypt, on the Mediterranean. Strabo, bk. 17.

Pallădes, certain virgins of illustrious parents, who were consecrated to Jupiter by the Thebans of Egypt. It was required that they should prostitute themselves, an infamous custom which was considered as a purification, during which they were publicly mourned, and afterwards they were permitted to marry. Strabo, bk. 17.

Pallădium, a celebrated statue of Pallas. It was about three cubits high, and represented the goddess as sitting and holding a pike in her right hand, and in her left a distaff and a spindle. It fell down from heaven near the tent of Ilus, as that prince was building the citadel of Ilium. Some, nevertheless, suppose that it fell at Pessinus in Phrygia, or, according to others, Dardanus received it as a present from his mother Electra. There are some authors who maintain that the Palladium was made with the bones of Pelops by Abaris; but Apollodorus seems to say that it was no more than a piece of clock-work, which moved of itself. However discordant the opinions of ancient authors be about this famous statue, it is universally agreed that on its preservation depended the safety of Troy. This fatality was well known to the Greeks during the Trojan war, and therefore Ulysses and Diomedes were commissioned to steal it away. They effected their purpose; and if we rely upon the authority of some authors, they were directed how to carry it away by Helenus the son of Priam, who proved in this unfaithful to his country, because his brother Deiphobus, at the death of Paris, had married Helen, of whom he was enamoured. Minerva was displeased with the violence which was offered to her statue, and, according to Virgil, the Palladium itself appeared to have received life and motion, and by the flashes which started from its eyes, and its sudden springs from the earth, it seemed to show the resentment of the goddess. The true Palladium, as some authors observe, was not carried away from Troy by the Greeks, but only one of the statues of similar size and shape, which were placed near it, to deceive whatever sacrilegious persons attempted to steal it. The Palladium, therefore, as they say, was conveyed safe from Troy to Italy by Æneas, and it was afterwards preserved by the Romans with the greatest secrecy and veneration, in the temple of Vesta, a circumstance which none but the vestal virgins knew. Herodian, bk. 1, ch. 14, &c.—Ovid, Fasti, bk. 6, li. 442, &c.; Metamorphoses, bk. 13, li. 336.—Dictys Cretensis, bk. 1, ch. 5.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 12.—Dionysius of Halicarnassus, bk. 1, &c.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 10.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 166; bk. 9, li. 151.—Plutarch, Parallela minora.—Lucan, bk. 9.—Dares Phrygius.—Juvenal, satire 3, li. 139.

Palladius, a Greek physician, whose treatise on fevers was edited 8vo, Leiden, 1745.——A learned Roman under Adrian, &c.

Pallantēum, a town of Italy, or perhaps more properly a citadel built by Evander, on mount Palatine, from whence its name originates. Virgil says it was called after Pallas the grandfather of Evander; but Dionysius derives its name from Palantium, a town of Arcadia. Dionysius of Halicarnassus, bk. 1, ch. 31.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 8, lis. 54 & 341.

Pallantia, a town of Spain, now Palencia, on the river Cea. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 6.

Pallantias, a patronymic of Aurora, as being related to the giant Pallas. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 9, fable 12.

Pallantides, the 50 sons of Pallas the son of Pandion and the brother of Ægeus. They were all killed by Theseus the son of Ægeus, whom they opposed when he came to take possession of his father’s kingdom. This opposition they showed in hopes of succeeding to the throne, as Ægeus left no children except Theseus, whose legitimacy was even disputed, as he was born at Trœzene. Plutarch, Theseus.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 22.

Pallas (ădis), a daughter of Jupiter, the same as Minerva. The goddess received this name either because she killed the giant Pallas, or perhaps from the spear which she seems to brandish in her hands (παλλειν). For the functions, power, and character of the goddess, See: [Minerva].

Pallas (antis), a son of king Evander, sent with some troops to assist Æneas. He was killed by Turnus the king of the Rutuli, after he had made a great slaughter of the enemy. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 8, li. 104, &c.——One of the giants, son of Tartarus and Terra. He was killed by Minerva, who covered herself with his skin, whence, as some suppose, she is called Pallas. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 12.——A son of Crius and Eurybia, who married the nymph Styx, by whom he had Victory, Valour, &c. Hesiod, Theogony.——A son of Lycaon.——A son of Pandion, father of Clytus and Butes. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 7, fable 17.—Apollodorus.——A freedman of Claudius, famous for the power and the riches he obtained. He advised the emperor, his master, to marry Agrippina, and to adopt her son Nero for his successor. It was by his means, and those of Agrippina, that the death of Claudius was hastened, and that Nero was raised to the throne. Nero forgot to whom he was indebted for the crown. He discarded Pallas, and some time after caused him to be put to death, that he might make himself master of his great riches, A.D. 61. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 12, ch. 53.

Pallēne, a small peninsula of Macedonia, formerly called Phlegra, situate above the bay of Thermæ on the Ægean sea, and containing five cities, the principal of which is called Pallene. It was in this place, according to some of the ancients, that an engagement happened between the gods and the giants. Livy, bk. 31, ch. 45; bk. 45, ch. 30.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 4, li. 391.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 15, li. 357.——A village of Attica, where Minerva had a temple, and where the Pallantides chiefly resided. Herodotus, bk. 1, chs. 1, 161.—Plutarch, Theseus.

Pallenses, a people of Cephallenia, whose chief town was called Pala or Palæa. Livy, bk. 38, ch. 18.—Polybius, bk. 3, ch. 3.

Palma, a governor of Syria.

Palmaria, a small island opposite Tarracina in Latium. Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 6.

Palmȳra, the capital of Palmyrene, a country on the eastern boundaries of Syria, now called Theudemor, or Tadmor. It is famous for being the seat of the celebrated Zenobia and Odenatus, in the reign of the emperor Aurelian. It is now in ruins, and the splendour and magnificence of its porticoes, temples, and palaces, are now frequently examined by the curious and the learned. Pliny, bk. 6, chs. 26 & 30.

Palphurius, one of the flatterers of Domitian. Juvenal, satire 4, li. 53.

Palumbinum, a town of Samnium. Livy, bk. 10, ch. 45.

Pamīsos, a river of Thessaly, falling into the Peneus. Herodotus, bk. 7, ch. 129.—Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 8.——Another of Messenia in Peloponnesus.

Pammēnes, an Athenian general, sent to assist Megalopolis against the Mantineans, &c.——An astrologer.——A learned Grecian, who was preceptor to Brutus. Cicero, Brutus, ch. 97, Orator, ch. 9.

Pammon, a son of Priam and Hecuba. Apollodorus.

Pampa, a village near Tentyra in Thrace. Juvenal, satire 15, li. 76.

Pamphĭlus, a celebrated painter of Macedonia in the age of Philip, distinguished above his rivals by a superior knowledge of literature, and the cultivation of those studies which taught him to infuse more successfully grace and dignity into his pieces. He was founder of the school for painting at Sicyon, and he made a law which was observed not only in Sicyon, but all over Greece, that none but the children of noble and dignified persons should be permitted to learn painting. Apelles was one of his pupils. Diogenes Laërtius.——A son of Neoclides, among the pupils of Plato. Diogenes Laërtius.

Pamphos, a Greek poet, supposed to have lived before Hesiod’s age.

Pamphy̆la, a Greek woman who wrote a general history in 33 books, in Nero’s reign. This history, so much commended by the ancients, is lost.

Pamphy̆lia, a province of Asia Minor, anciently called Mopsopia, and bounded on the south by a part of the Mediterranean, called the Pamphylian sea, west by Lycia, north by Pisidia, and east by Cilicia. It abounded with pastures, vines, and olives, and was peopled by a Grecian colony. Strabo, bk. 14.—Mela, bk. 1.—Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 3.—Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 26.—Livy, bk. 37, chs. 23 & 40.

Pan was the god of shepherds, of huntsmen, and of all the inhabitants of the country. He was the son of Mercury by Dryope, according to Homer. Some give him Jupiter and Callisto for parents, others Jupiter and Ybis or Oneis. Lucian, Hyginus, &c., support that he was the son of Mercury and Penelope the daughter of Icarius, and that the god gained the affections of the princess under the form of a goat, as she tended her father’s flocks on mount Taygetus, before her marriage with the king of Ithaca. Some authors maintain that Penelope became mother of Pan during the absence of Ulysses in the Trojan war, and that he was the offspring of all the suitors that frequented the palace of Penelope, whence he received the name of Pan, which signifies all or everything. Pan was a monster in appearance; he had two small horns on his head, his complexion was ruddy, his nose flat, and his legs, thighs, tail, and feet were those of a goat. The education of Pan was entrusted to a nymph of Arcadia, called Sinoe, but the nurse, according to Homer, terrified at the sight of such a monster, fled away and left him. He was wrapped up in the skin of beasts by his father, and carried to heaven, where Jupiter and the gods long entertained themselves with the oddity of his appearance. Bacchus was greatly pleased with him, and gave him the name of Pan. The god of shepherds chiefly resided in Arcadia, where the woods and the most rugged mountains were his habitation. He invented the flute with seven reeds, which he called Syrinx, in honour of a beautiful nymph of the same name, to whom he attempted to offer violence, and who was changed into a reed. He was continually employed in deceiving the neighbouring nymphs, and often with success. Though deformed in his shape and features, yet he had the good fortune to captivate Diana, and of gaining her favour, by transforming himself into a beautiful white goat. He was also enamoured of a nymph of the mountains called Echo, by whom he had a son called Lynx. He also paid his addresses to Omphale queen of Lydia, and it is well known in what manner he was received. See: [Omphale]. The worship of Pan was well established, particularly in Arcadia, where he gave oracles on mount Lycæus. His festivals, called by the Greeks Lycæa, were brought to Italy by Evander, and they were well known at Rome by the name of the Lupercalia. See: [Lupercalia]. The worship, and the different functions of Pan, are derived from the mythology of the ancient Egyptians. This god was one of the eight great gods of the Egyptians, who ranked before the other 12 gods, whom the Romans called Consentes. He was worshipped with the greatest solemnity over all Egypt. His statues represented him as a goat, not because he was really such, but this was done for mysterious reasons. He was the emblem of fecundity, and they looked upon him as the principle of all things. His horns, as some observe, represented the rays of the sun, and the brightness of the heavens was expressed by the vivacity and the ruddiness of his complexion. The star which he wore on his breast was the symbol of the firmament, and his hairy legs and feet denoted the inferior parts of the earth, such as the woods and plants. Some suppose that he appeared as a goat because, when the gods fled into Egypt, in their war against the giants, Pan transformed himself into a goat, an example which was immediately followed by all the deities. Pan, according to some, is the same as Faunus, and he is the chief of all the Satyrs. Plutarch mentions that, in the reign of Tiberius, an extraordinary voice was heard near the Echinades, in the Ionian sea, which exclaimed that the great Pan was dead. This was readily believed by the emperor, and the astrologers were consulted; but they were unable to explain the meaning of so supernatural a voice, which probably proceeded from the imposition of one of the courtiers who attempted to terrify Tiberius. In Egypt, in the town of Mendes, which word also signifies a goat, there was a sacred goat kept with the most ceremonious sanctity. The death of this animal was always attended with the greatest solemnities, and, like that of another Apis, became the cause of a universal mourning. As Pan usually terrified the inhabitants of the neighbouring country, that kind of fear which often seizes men, and which is only ideal and imaginary, has received from him the name of panic fear. This kind of terror has been exemplified not only in individuals, but in numerous armies, such as that of Brennus, which was thrown into the greatest consternation at Rome, without any cause or plausible reason. Ovid, Fasti, bk. 1, li. 396; bk. 2, li. 277; Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 689.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 1, li. 17; Æneid, bk. 8, li. 343; Georgics, ch. 3, li. 392.—Juvenal, satire 2, li. 142.—Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 30.—Silius Italicus, bk. 13, li. 327.—Varro, de Lingua Latina, bk. 5, ch. 3.—Livy, bk. 1, ch. 5.—Dionysius of Halicarnassus, bk. 1.—Herodotus, bk. 2, chs. 46 & 145, &c.—Diodorus, bk. 1.—Orpheus, Hymns, poem 10.—Homer, Hymn to Pan.—Lucian, Dialogi Deorum, Dialogue of Pan and Hermes (Mercury).—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 4.

Pănăcēa, a goddess, daughter of Æsculapius, who presided over health. Lucan, bk. 9, li. 918.—Pliny, bk. 35, ch. 11, &c.

Panætius, a stoic philosopher of Rhodes, 138 B.C. He studied at Athens for some time, of which he refused to become a citizen, observing, that a good and modest man ought to be satisfied with one country. He came to Rome, where he reckoned among his pupils Lælius and Scipio the second Africanus. To the latter he was attached by the closest ties of friendship and partiality; he attended him in his expeditions, and partook of all his pleasures and amusements. To the interest of their countryman at Rome, the Rhodians were greatly indebted for their prosperity and the immunities which they for some time enjoyed. Panætius wrote a treatise on the duties of man, whose merit can be ascertained from the encomiums which Cicero bestows upon it. Cicero, de Officiis; de Divinatione, bk. 1; Academica, bk. 2, ch. 2; De Natura Deorum, bk. 2, ch. 46.——A tyrant of Leontini in Sicily, B.C. 613. Polyænus, bk. 5.

Panætolium, a general assembly of the Ætolians. Livy, bk. 31, ch. 29; bk. 35, ch. 32.

Panares, a general of Crete, defeated by Metellus, &c.

Panariste, one of the waiting-women of Berenice the wife of king Antiochus. Polyænus, bk. 8.

Panathenæa, festivals in honour of Minerva the patroness of Athens. They were first instituted by Erechtheus or Orpheus, and called Athenæa, but Theseus afterwards renewed them, and caused them to be celebrated and observed by all the tribes of Athens, which he had united into one, and from this reason the festivals received their name. Some suppose that they are the same as the Roman Quinquatria, as they are often called by that name among the Latins. In the first years of the institution, they were observed only during one day, but afterwards the time was prolonged, and the celebration was attended with greater pomp and solemnity. The festivals were two; the great Panathenæa (μεγαλα), which were observed every fifth year, beginning on the 22nd of the month called Hecatombæon, or the 7th of July; and the lesser Panathenæa (μικρα), which were kept every third year, or rather annually, beginning on the 20th or 21st of the month called Thargelion, corresponding to the 5th or 6th day of the month of May. In the lesser festivals there were three games conducted by 10 presidents chosen from the 10 tribes of Athens, who continued four years in office. On the evening of the first day there was a race with torches, in which men on foot, and afterwards on horseback, contended. The same was also exhibited in the greater festivals. The second combat was gymnical, and exhibited a trial of strength and bodily dexterity. The last was a musical contention, first instituted by Pericles. In the songs they celebrated the generous undertaking of Harmodius and Aristogiton, who opposed the Pisistratidæ, and of Thrasybulus, who delivered Athens from its 30 tyrants. Phrynis of Mitylene was the first who obtained the victory by playing upon the harp. There were, besides, other musical instruments, on which they played in concert, such as flutes, &c. The poets contended in four plays, called from their number τετραλογια. The last of these was a satire. There was also at Sunium an imitation of a naval fight. Whoever obtained the victory in any of these games was rewarded with a vessel of oil, which he was permitted to dispose of in whatever manner he pleased, and it was unlawful for any other person to transport that commodity. The conqueror also received a crown of the olives which grew in the groves of Academus, and were sacred to Minerva, and called μορειαι, from μορος, death, in remembrance of the tragical end of Hallirhotius the son of Neptune, who cut his own legs when he attempted to cut down the olive which had given the victory to Minerva in preference to his father, when these two deities contended about giving a name to Athens. Some suppose that the word is derived from μερος, a part, because these olives were given by contribution by all such as attended at the festivals. There was also a dance called Pyrrhichia, performed by young boys in armour, in imitation of Minerva, who thus expressed her triumph over the vanquished Titans. Gladiators were also introduced when Athens became tributary to the Romans. During the celebration no person was permitted to appear in dyed garments, and if any one transgressed he was punished according to the discretion of the president of the games. After these things, a sumptuous sacrifice was offered, in which every one of the Athenian boroughs contributed an ox, and the whole was concluded by an entertainment for all the company with the flesh that remained from the sacrifice. In the greater festivals, the same rites and ceremonies were usually observed, but with more solemnity and magnificence. Others were also added, particularly the procession, in which Minerva’s sacred πεπλος, or garment, was carried. This garment was woven by a select number of virgins, called ἐργαστικαι, from ἐργον, work. They were superintended by two of the ἀρρηφοροι, or young virgins, not above 17 years of age nor under 11, whose garments were white and set off with ornaments of gold. Minerva’s peplus was of a white colour, without sleeves, and embroidered with gold. Upon it were described the achievements of the goddess, particularly her victories over the giants. The exploits of Jupiter and the other gods were also represented there, and from that circumstance men of courage and bravery are said to be ἀξιοι πεπλου, worthy to be portrayed on Minerva’s sacred garment. In the procession of the peplus, the following ceremonies were observed. In the ceramicus, without the city, there was an engine built in the form of a ship, upon which Minerva’s garment was hung as a sail, and the whole was conducted, not by beasts, as some have supposed, but by subterraneous machines, to the temple of Ceres Eleusinia, and from thence to the citadel, where the peplus was placed upon Minerva’s statue, which was laid upon a bed woven or strewed with flowers, which was called πλακις. Persons of all ages, of every sex and quality, attended the procession, which was led by old men and women carrying olive branches in their hands, from which reason they were called θαλλοφοροι, bearers of green boughs. Next followed men of full age with shields and spears. They were attended by the μετοικοι, or foreigners, who carried small boats as a token of their foreign origin, and from that account they were called σκαφηφοροι, boat-bearers. After them came the women, attended by the wives of the foreigners, called ὑδριαφοροι, because they carried water-pots. Next to these came young men crowned with millet and singing hymns to the goddess, and after them followed select virgins of the noblest families, called κανηφοροι, basket-bearers, because they carried baskets, in which were certain things necessary for the celebration, with whatever utensils were also requisite. These several necessaries were generally in the possession of the chief manager of the festival called ἀρχιθεωρος, who distributed them when occasion offered. The virgins were attended by the daughters of the foreigners, who carried umbrellas and little seats, from which they were named διφρηφοροι, seat-carriers. The boys, called παιδαμικοι, as it may be supposed, led the rear, clothed in coats generally worn at processions. The necessaries for this and every other festival were prepared in a public hall erected for that purpose, between the Piræan gate and the temple of Ceres. The management and the care of the whole was entrusted to the ὑομοφυλακες, or people employed in seeing the rites and ceremonies properly observed. It was also usual to set all prisoners at liberty, and to present golden crowns to such as had deserved well of their country. Some persons were also chosen to sing some of Homer’s poems, a custom which was first introduced by Hipparchus the son of Pisistratus. It was also customary in this festival, and every other quinquennial festival, to pray for the prosperity of the Platæans, whose services had been so conspicuous at the battle of Marathon. Plutarch, Theseus.—Pausanias, Arcadia, ch. 2.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 8, ch. 2.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 14.

Panchæa, Panchēa, or Panchaia, an island of Arabia Felix, where Jupiter Triphylius had a magnificent temple.——A part of Arabia Felix, celebrated for the myrrh, frankincense, and perfumes which it produced. Virgil, Georgics, bk. 2, li. 139; bk. 4, li. 379; The Gnat, li. 87.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 309, &c.—Diodorus, bk. 5.—Lucretius, bk. 2, li. 417.

Panda, two deities at Rome, who presided, one over the openings of roads, and the other over the openings of towns. Varro, de Re Rustica, bk. 1.—Aulus Gellius, bk. 13, ch. 22.

Pandama, a girl of India favoured by Hercules, &c. Polyænus, bk. 1.

Pandaria, or Pandataria, a small island of the Tyrrhene sea.

Pandărus, a son of Lycaon, who assisted the Trojans in their war against the Greeks. He went to the war without a chariot, and therefore he generally fought on foot. He broke the truce which had been agreed upon between the Greeks and Trojans, and wounded Menelaus and Diomedes, and showed himself brave and unusually courageous. He was at last killed by Diomedes; and Æneas, who then carried him in his chariot, by attempting to revenge his death, nearly perished by the hands of the furious enemy. Dictys Cretensis, bk. 2, ch. 35.—Homer, Iliad, bks. 2 & 5.—Hyginus, fable 112.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 495.—Strabo, bk. 14.—Servius, Aeneid, bk. 5, li. 495 ff.——A son of Alcanor, killed with his brother Bitias by Turnus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 9, li. 735.——A native of Crete, punished with death for being accessary to the theft of Tantalus. What this theft was is unknown. Some, however, suppose that Tantalus stole the ambrosia and the nectar from the tables of the gods to which he had been admitted, or that he carried away a dog which watched Jupiter’s temple in Crete, in which crime Pandarus was concerned, and for which he suffered. Pandarus had two daughters, Camiro and Clytia, who were also deprived of their mother by a sudden death, and left without friends or protectors. Venus had compassion upon them, and she fed them with milk, honey, and wine. The goddesses were all equally interested in their welfare. Juno gave them wisdom and beauty, Diana a handsome figure and regular features, and Minerva instructed them in whatever domestic accomplishment can recommend a wife. Venus wished to make their happiness still more complete; and when they were come to nubile years, the goddess prayed Jupiter to grant them kind and tender husbands. But in her absence the Harpies carried away the virgins and delivered them to the Eumenides, to share the punishment which their father suffered. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 30.—Pindar.

Pandărus, or Pandareus, a man who had a daughter called Philomela. She was changed into a nightingale, after she had killed, by mistake, her son Itylus, whose death she mourned in the greatest melancholy. Some suppose him to be the same as Pandion king of Athens.

Pandataria, an island on the coast of Lucania, now called Santa Maria.

Pandates, a friend of Datames at the court of Artaxerxes. Cornelius Nepos, Datames.

Pandemia, a surname of Venus, expressive of her great power over the affections of mankind.

Pandēmus, one of the surnames of the god of love among the Egyptians and the Greeks, who distinguished two Cupids, one of whom was the vulgar, called Pandemus, and another of a purer and more celestial origin. Plutarch, Amatorius.

Pandia, a festival at Athens established by Pandion, from whom it received its name, or because it was observed in honour of Jupiter, who can τα παντα διγευειν, move and turn all things as he pleases. Some suppose that it concerned the moon, because it does παντοτε ἰεναι, moves incessantly, by showing itself day and night, rather than the sun, which never appears but in the day-time. It was celebrated after the Dionysia, because Bacchus is sometimes taken for the Sun or Apollo, and therefore the brother, or, as some will have it, the son, of the moon.

Pandīon, a king of Athens, son of Erichthon and Pasithea, who succeeded his father, B.C. 1437. He became father of Procne and Philomela, Erechtheus and Butes. During his reign, there was such an abundance of corn, wine, and oil, that it was publicly reported that Bacchus and Minerva had personally visited Attica. He waged a successful war against Labdacus king of Bœotia, and gave his daughter Procne in marriage to Tereus king of Thrace, who had assisted him. The treatment which Philomela received from her brother-in-law Tereus [See: [Philomela]] was the source of infinite grief to Pandion, and he died through excess of sorrow, after a reign of 40 years.——There was also another Pandion, son of Cecrops II. by Metiaduca, who succeeded to his father, B.C. 1307. He was driven from his paternal dominions, and fled to Pylas king of Megara, who gave him his daughter Pelia in marriage, and resigned his crown to him. Pandion became father of four children, called from him Pandionidæ, Ægeus, Pallas, Nisus, and Lycus. The eldest of these children recovered his father’s kingdom. Some authors have confounded the two Pandions together in such an indiscriminate manner, that they seem to have been only one and the same person. Many believe that Philomela and Procne were the daughters, not of Pandion I., but of Pandion II. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 6, li. 676.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 15.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 5.—Hyginus, fable 48.——A son of Phineus and Cleopatra, deprived of his eyesight by his father. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 15.——A son of Ægyptus and Hephæstina.——A king of the Indies in the age of Augustus.

Pandōra, a celebrated woman, the first mortal female that ever lived, according to the opinion of the poet Hesiod. She was made with clay by Vulcan at the request of Jupiter, who wished to punish the impiety and artifice of Prometheus, by giving him a wife. When this woman of clay had been made by the artist, and received life, all the gods vied in making her presents. Venus gave her beauty and the art of pleasing, the Graces gave her the power of captivating, Apollo taught her how to sing, Mercury instructed her in eloquence, and Minerva gave her the most rich and splendid ornaments. From all these valuable presents, which she had received from the gods, the woman was called Pandora, which intimates that she had received every necessary gift, παν δωρον. Jupiter after this gave her a beautiful box, which she was ordered to present to the man who married her; and by the commission of the god, Mercury conducted her to Prometheus. The artful mortal was sensible of the deceit, and as he had always distrusted Jupiter, as well as the rest of the gods, since he had stolen fire away from the sun to animate his man of clay, he sent away Pandora without suffering himself to be captivated by her charms. His brother Epimetheus was not possessed of the same prudence and sagacity. He married Pandora, and when he opened the box which she presented to him, there issued from it a multitude of evils and distempers, which dispersed themselves all over the world, and which, from that fatal moment, have never ceased to afflict the human race. Hope was the only one who remained at the bottom of the box, and it is she alone who has the wonderful power of easing the labours of man, and of rendering his troubles and his sorrows less painful in life. Hesiod, Theogony & Works and Days.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 7.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 24.—Hyginus, fable 14.——A daughter of Erechtheus king of Athens. She was sister to Protogenia, who sacrificed herself for her country at the beginning of the Bœotian war.

Pandōrus, a son of Erechtheus king of Athens.

Pandosia, a town in the country of the Brutii, situate on a mountain. Alexander king of the Molossi died there. Strabo, bk. 6.——A town of Epirus. Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 1.

Pandrŏsos, a daughter of Cecrops king of Athens, sister to Aglauros and Herse. She was the only one of the sisters who had not the fatal curiosity to open a basket which Minerva had entrusted to their care [See: [Erichthonius]], for which sincerity a temple was raised to her near that of Minerva, and a festival instituted in her honour, called Pandrosia. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 2, li. 738.—Apollodorus, bk. 3.—Pausanias, bk. 1, &c.

Panenus, or Panæus, a celebrated painter who was for some time engaged in painting the battle of Marathon. Pliny, bk. 35.

Pangæus, a mountain of Thrace, anciently called Mons Caraminus, and joined to mount Rhodope near the sources of the river Nestus. It was inhabited by four different nations. It was on this mountain that Lycurgus the Thracian king was torn to pieces, and that Orpheus called the attention of the wild beasts, and of the mountains and woods, to listen to his song. It abounded in gold and silver mines. Herodotus, bk. 5, ch. 16, &c.; bk. 7, ch. 113.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 4, li. 462.—Ovid, Fasti, bk. 3, li. 739.—Thucydides, bk. 2.—Lucan, bk. 1, li. 679; bk. 7, li. 482.

Paniasis, a man who wrote a poem upon Hercules, &c. See: [Panyasis].

Panionium, a place at the foot of mount Mycale, near the town of Ephesus in Asia Minor, sacred to Neptune of Helice. It was in this place that all the states of Ionia assembled, either to consult for their own safety and prosperity, or to celebrate festivals, or to offer a sacrifice for the good of all the nation, whence the name πανιωγιον, all Ionia. The deputies of the 12 Ionian cities which assembled there were those of Miletus, Myus, Priene, Ephesus, Lebedos, Colophon, Clazomenæ, Phocæa, Teos, Chios, Samos, and Erythræ. If the bull offered in sacrifice bellowed, it was accounted an omen of the highest favour, as the sound was particularly acceptable to the god of the sea, as in some manner it resembled the roaring of the waves of the ocean. Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 148, &c.—Strabo, bk. 14.—Mela, bk. 1, ch. 17.

Panius, a place at Cœlo-Syria, where Antiochus defeated Scopas, B.C. 198.

Pannŏnia, a large country of Europe, bounded on the east by Upper Mœsia, south by Dalmatia, west by Noricum, and north by the Danube. It was divided by the ancients into Lower and Upper Pannonia. The inhabitants were of Celtic origin, and were first invaded by Julius Cæsar, and conquered in the reign of Tiberius. Philip and his son Alexander some ages before had successively conquered it. Sirmium was the ancient capital of all Pannonia, which contains the modern provinces of Croatia, Carniola, Sclavonia, Bosnia, Windisch, March, with part of Servia, and of the kingdoms of Hungary and Austria. Lucan, bk. 3, li. 95; bk. 6, li. 220.—Tibullus, bk. 4, poem 1, li. 109.—Pliny, bk. 3.—Dio Cassius, bk. 49.—Strabo, bks. 4 & 7.—Jornandes.—Paterculus, bk. 2, ch. 9.—Suetonius, Augustus, ch. 20.

Panolbius, a Greek poet, mentioned by Suidas.

Panomphæus, a surname of Jupiter, either because he was worshipped by every nation on earth, or because he heard the prayers and the supplications which were addressed to him, or because the rest of the gods derived from him their knowledge of futurity (πας omnis, ὀμφη vox). Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 11, li. 198.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 8.

Panŏpe, or Panŏpēa, one of the Nereides, whom sailors generally invoked in storms. Her name signifies, giving every assistance, or seeing everything. Hesiod, Theogony, li. 251.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 825.——One of the daughters of Thespius. Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 7.——A town of Phocis, called also Panopeus. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 3, li. 19.—Livy, bk. 32, ch. 18.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 4.—Statius, Thebaid, bk. 7, li. 344.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 2, li. 27; Odyssey, bk. 11, li. 580.

Panŏpes, a famous huntsman among the attendants of Acestes king of Sicily, who was one of those that engaged in the games exhibited by Æneas. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 300.

Panŏpeus, a son of Phocus and Asterodia, who accompanied Amphitryon when he made war against the Teleboans. He was father to Epeus, who made the celebrated wooden horse at the siege of Troy. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 29.—Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 4.——A town of Phocis, between Orchomenos and the Cephisus. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 4.—Strabo, bk. 9.

Panopion, a Roman saved from death by the uncommon fidelity of his servant. When the assassins came to murder him as being proscribed, the servant exchanged clothes with his master, and let him escape by a back door. He afterwards went into his master’s bed, and suffered himself to be killed, as if Panopion himself. Valerius Maximus.

Panopŏlis, the city of Pan, a town of Egypt, called also Chemmis. Pan had there a temple, where he was worshipped with great solemnity, and represented in a statue fascino longissimo et erecto. Diodorus, bk. 5.—Strabo, bk. 17.

Panoptes, a name of Argus, from the power of his eyes. Apollodorus, bk. 2.

Panormus, now called Palermo, a town of Sicily, built by the Phœnicians, on the north-west part of the island, with a good and capacious harbour. It was the strongest hold of the Carthaginians in Sicily, and it was at last taken with difficulty by the Romans. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.—Silius Italicus, bk. 14, li. 262.——A town of the Thracian Chersonesus.——A town of Ionia, near Ephesus,——Another in Crete,——in Macedonia,——Achaia,——Samos.——A Messenian who insulted the religion of the Lacedæmonians. See: [Gonippus].

Panotii, a people of Scythia, said to have very large ears. Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 13.

Pansa Cætronianus Vibius, a Roman consul who, with Aulus Hirtius, pursued the murderers of Julius Cæsar, and was killed in a battle near Mutina. On his death-bed he advised young Octavius to unite his interest with that of Antony, if he wished to revenge the death of Julius Cæsar, and from his friendly advice soon after rose the celebrated second triumvirate. Some suppose that Pansa was put to death by Octavius himself, or, through him, by the physician Glicon, who poured poison into the wounds of his patient. Pansa and Hirtius were the two last consuls who enjoyed the dignity of chief magistrates of Rome with full power. The authority of the consuls afterwards dwindled into a shadow. Paterculus, bk. 2, ch. 6.—Dio Cassius, bk. 46.—Ovid, Tristia bk. 3, poem 5.—Plutarch & Appian.

Pantagnostus, a brother of Polycrates tyrant of Samos. Polyænus, bk. 1.

Pantagyas, a small river on the eastern coast of Sicily, which falls into the sea, after running a short space in rough cascades over rugged stones and precipices. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 689.—Silius Italicus, bk. 14, li. 232.—Ovid, Fasti, bk. 4, li. 471.

Pantaleon, a king of Pisa, who presided at the Olympic games, B.C. 664, after excluding the Eleans, who on that account expunged the Olympiad from the Fasti, and called it the second Anolympiad. They had called for the same reason the eighth the first Anolympiad, because the Pisæans presided.——An Ætolian chief. Livy, bk. 42, ch. 15.

Pantanus lacus, the lake of Lesina, is situate in Apulia at the mouth of the Freuto. Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 12.

Pantauchus, a man appointed over Ætolia by Demetrius, &c. Plutarch.

Panteus, a friend of Cleomenes king of Sparta, &c. Plutarch.

Panthides, a man who married Italia the daughter of Themistocles.

Panthea, the wife of Abradates, celebrated for her beauty and conjugal affection. She was taken prisoner by Cyrus, who refused to visit her, not to be ensnared by the power of her personal charms. She killed herself on the body of her husband, who had been slain in a battle, &c. See: [Abradates]. Xenophon, Cyropædia.—Suidas.——The mother of Eumæus the faithful servant of Ulysses.

Pantheon, a celebrated temple at Rome, built by Agrippa, in the reign of Augustus, and dedicated to all the gods, whence the name πας θεος. It was struck with lightning some time after, and partly destroyed. [♦]Adrian repaired it, and it still remains at Rome, converted into a christian temple, the admiration of the curious. Pliny, bk. 36, ch. 15.—Marcellinus, bk. 16, ch. 10.

[♦] ‘Adarin’ replaced with ‘Adrian’

Pantheus, or Panthus, a Trojan, son of Othryas the priest of Apollo. When his country was burnt by the Greeks, he followed the fortune of Æneas, and was killed. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 429.

Panthoĭdes, a patronymic of Euphorbus the son of Panthous. Pythagoras is sometimes called by that name, as he asserted that he was Euphorbus during the Trojan war. Horace, bk. 1, ode 28, li. 10.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 15, li. 161.——A Spartan general killed by Pericles at the battle of Tanagra.

Panticăpæum, now Kerche, a town of Taurica Chersonesus, built by the Milesians, and governed some time by its own laws, and afterwards subdued by the kings of Bosphorus. It was, according to Strabo, the capital of the European Bosphorus. Mithridates the Great died there. Pliny.—Strabo.

Panticăpes, a river of European Scythia, which falls into the Borysthenes, supposed to be the Samara of the moderns. Herodotus, bk. 4, ch. 54.

Pantilius, a buffoon, ridiculed by Horace, bk. 1, satire 10, li. 78.

Panyăsis, an ancient Greek, uncle to the historian Herodotus. He celebrated Hercules in one of his poems, and the Ionians in another, and was universally esteemed. Athenæus, bk. 2.

Panyăsus, a river of Illyricum, falling into the Adriatic, near Dyrrhachium. Ptolemy.

Papæus, a name of Jupiter among the Scythians. Herodotus, bk. 4.

Păphāges, a king of Ambracia, killed by a lioness deprived of her whelps. Ovid, Ibis, li. 502.

Paphia, a surname of Venus, because the goddess was worshipped at Paphos.——An ancient name of the island of Cyprus.

Paphlăgŏnia, now Penderachia, a country of Asia Minor, situate at the west of the river Halys, by which it was separated from Cappadocia. It was divided on the west from the Bithynians, by the river Parthenius. Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 72.—Strabo, bk. 4.—Mela.—Pliny.—Curtius, bk. 6, ch. 11.—Cicero, De Lege Agraria contra Rullum, bk. 2, chs. 2 & 9.

Paphos, now Bafo, a famous city of the island of Cyprus, founded, as some suppose, about 1184 years before Christ, by Agapenor, at the head of a colony from Arcadia. The goddess of beauty was particularly worshipped there, and all male animals were offered on her altars, which, though 100 in number, daily smoked with the profusion of Arabian frankincense. The inhabitants were very effeminate and lascivious, and the young virgins were permitted by the laws of the place to get a dowry by prostitution. Strabo, bk. 8, &c.—Pliny, bk. 2, ch. 96.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.—Homer, Odyssey, bk. 8.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1, li. 419, &c.; bk. 10, li. 51, &c.—Horace, bk. 1, ode 30, li. 1.—Tacitus, Annals, bk. 3, ch. 62; Histories, bk. 2, ch. 2.

Paphus, a son of Pygmalion, by a statue which had been changed into a woman by Venus. See: [Pygmalion]. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 10, li. 297.

Papia lex, de peregrinis, by Papius the tribune, A.U.C. 688, which required that all strangers should be driven away from Rome. It was afterwards confirmed and extended by the Junian law.——Another, called Papia Poppæa, because it was enacted by the tribunes Marcus Papius Mutilus and Quintus Poppæus Secundus, who had received consular power from the consuls for six months. It was called the Julian law, after it had been published by order of Augustus, who himself was of the Julian family. See: [Julia lex], de Maritandis ordinibus.——Another, to empower the high priest to choose 20 virgins for the service of the goddess Vesta.——Another, in the age of Augustus. It gave the patron a certain right to the property of his client, if he had left a specified sum of money, or if he had not three children.

Papiānus, a man who proclaimed himself emperor some time after the Gordians. He was put to death.

Papias, an early christian writer, who first propagated the doctrine of the Millennium. There are remaining some historical fragments of his.

Papinianus, a writer, A.D. 212. See: [Æmylius Papinianus].

Papinius, a tribune who conspired against Caligula.——A man who destroyed himself, &c. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 6, ch. 49.

Pāpĭria, the wife of Paulus Æmylius. She was divorced. Plutarch.

Papiria lex, by Papirius Carbo, A.U.C. 621. It required that, in passing or rejecting laws in the comitia, the votes should be given on tablets.——Another, by the tribune Papirius, which enacted that no person should consecrate any edifice, place, or thing, without the consent and permission of the people. Cicero, On his House, ch. 50.——Another, A.U.C. 563, to diminish the weight, and increase the value of the Roman as.——Another, A.U.C. 421, to give the freedom of the city to the citizens of Acerræ.——Another, A.U.C. 623. It was proposed, but not passed. It recommended the right of choosing a man tribune of the people as often as he wished.

Pāpĭrius, a centurion engaged to murder Piso the proconsul of Africa. Tacitus, Histories, bk. 4, ch. 49.——A patrician, chosen rex sacrorum, after the expulsion of the Tarquins from Rome.——A Roman who wished to gratify his unnatural desires upon the body of one of his slaves called Publilius. The slave refused, and was inhumanly treated. This called for the interference of justice, and a decree was made which forbade any person to be detained in fetters, but only for a crime that deserved such a treatment, and only till the criminal had suffered the punishment which the laws directed. Creditors also had a right to arrest the goods, and not the person, of their debtors. Livy, bk. 8, ch. 28.——Carbo, a Roman consul who undertook the defence of Opimius, who was accused of condemning and putting to death a number of citizens on mount Aventinus, without the formalities of a trial. His client was acquitted.——Cursor, a man who first erected a sun-dial in the temple of Quirinus at Rome, B.C. 293; from which time the days began to be divided into hours.——A dictator who ordered his master of horse to be put to death, because he had fought and conquered the enemies of the republic without his consent. The people interfered, and the dictator pardoned him. Cursor made war against the Sabines and conquered them, and also triumphed over the Samnites. His great severity displeased the people. He flourished about 320 years before the christian era. Livy, bk. 9, ch. 14.——One of his family surnamed Prætextatus, from an action of his whilst he wore the prætexta, a certain gown for young men. His father, of the same name, carried him to the senate-house, where affairs of the greatest importance were then in debate before the senators. The mother of young Papirius wished to know what had passed in the senate; but Papirius, unwilling to betray the secrets of that august assembly, amused his mother by telling her that it had been considered whether it would be more advantageous to the republic to give two wives to one husband, than two husbands to one wife. The mother of Papirius was alarmed, and she communicated the secret to the other Roman matrons, and, on the morrow, they assembled in the senate, petitioning that one woman might have two husbands, rather than one husband two wives. The senators were astonished at this petition, but young Papirius unravelled the whole mystery, and from that time it was made a law among the senators, that no young man should for the future be introduced into the senate-house, except Papirius. This law was carefully observed till the age of Augustus, who permitted children of all ages to hear the debates of the senators. Macrobius, Saturnalia, bk. 1, ch. 6.——Carbo, a friend of Cinna and Marius. He raised cabals against Sylla and Pompey, and was at last put to death by order of Pompey, after he had rendered himself odious by a tyrannical consulship, and after he had been proscribed by Sylla.——A consul defeated by the armies of the Cimbri.——Crassus, a dictator who triumphed over the Samnites.——A consul murdered by the Gauls, &c.——A son of Papirius Cursor, who defeated the Samnites, and dedicated a temple to Romulus Quirinus.——Maso, a consul who conquered Sardinia and Corsica, and reduced them into the form of a province. At his return to Rome, he was refused a triumph, upon which he introduced a triumphal procession, and walked with his victorious army to the capitol, wearing a crown of myrtle upon his head. His example was afterwards followed by such generals as were refused a triumph by the Roman senate. Valerius Maximus, bk. 3, ch. 6.——The family of the Papirii was patrician, and long distinguished for its services to the state. It bore the different surnames of Crassus, Cursor, Mugillanus, Maso, Prætextatus, and Pætus, of which the three first branches became the most illustrious.

Pappia lex, was enacted to settle the rights of husbands and wives, if they had no children.——Another, by which a person less than 50 years old could not marry another of 60.

Pappus, a philosopher and mathematician of Alexandria, in the reign of Theodosius the Great.

Papyrius. See: [Papirius].

Parabyston, a tribunal of Athens, where causes of inferior consequences were tried by 11 judges. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 40.

Paradīsus, a town of Syria or Phœnicia. Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 23.—Strabo, bk. 16.——In the plains of Jericho there was a large palace, with a garden beautifully planted with trees, and called Balsami Paradisus.

Parætacæ, or Taceni, a people between Media and Persia, where Antigonus was defeated by Eumenes. Cornelius Nepos, Eumenes, ch. 8.—Strabo, bks. 11 & 16.—Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 26.

Parætonium, a town of Egypt at the west of Alexandria, where Isis was worshipped. The word Parætonius is used to signify Egyptian, and is sometimes applied to Alexandria, which was situate in the neighbourhood. Strabo, bk. 17.—Florus, bk. 4, ch. 11.—Lucan, bk. 3, li. 295; bk. 10, li. 9.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 9, li. 712; Amores, bk. 2, poem 13, li. 7.

Parăli, a division of the inhabitants of Attica. They received this name from their being near the sea coast, παρα and ἁλς.

Parălus, a friend of Dion, by whose assistance he expelled Dionysius.——A son of Pericles. His premature death was greatly lamented by his father. Plutarch.

Parasia, a country at the east of Media.

Parasius, a son of Philonomia by a shepherd. He was exposed on Erymanthus by his mother, with his twin brother Lycastus. Their lives were preserved.

Parcæ, powerful goddesses, who presided over the birth and the life of mankind. They were three in number, Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos, daughters of Nox and Erebus, according to Hesiod, or of Jupiter and Themis, according to the same poet in another poem. Some make them daughters of the sea. Clotho, the youngest of the sisters, presided over the moment in which we are born, and held a distaff in her hand; Lachesis spun out all the events and actions of our life; and Atropos, the eldest of the three, cut the thread of human life with a pair of scissors. Their different functions are well expressed in this ancient verse:

Clotho colum retinet, Lachesis net, et Atropos occat.

The name of the Parcæ, according to Varro, is derived a partu or parturiendo, because they presided over the birth of men; and by corruption the word parca is formed from parta or partus: but, according to Servius, they are called so by antiphrasis, quod nemini parcant. The power of the Parcæ was great and extensive. Some suppose that they were subjected to none of the gods but Jupiter, while others support that even Jupiter himself was obedient to their commands; and, indeed, we see the father of the gods, in Homer’s Iliad, unwilling to see Patroclus perish, yet obliged, by the superior power of the Fates, to abandon him to his destiny. According to the more received opinion, they were the arbiters of the life and death of mankind, and whatever good or evil befalls us in the world, immediately proceeds from the Fates or Parcæ. Some make them ministers of the king of hell, and represent them as sitting at the foot of his throne; others represent them as placed on radiant thrones, amidst the celestial spheres, clothed in robes spangled with stars, and wearing crowns on their heads. According to Pausanias, the names of the Parcæ were different from those already mentioned. The most ancient of all, as the geographer observes, was Venus Urania, who presided over the birth of men; the second was Fortune; Ilythia was the third. To these some add a fourth, Proserpina, who often disputes with Atropos the right of cutting the thread of human life. The worship of the Parcæ was well established in some cities of Greece, and though mankind were well convinced that they were inexorable, and that it was impossible to mitigate them, yet they were eager to show a proper respect to their divinity, by raising them temples and statues. They received the same worship as the Furies, and their votaries yearly sacrificed to them black sheep, during which solemnity the priests were obliged to wear garlands of flowers. The Parcæ were generally represented as three old women with chaplets made with wool, and interwoven with the flowers of the narcissus. They were covered with a white robe, and fillet of the same colour, bound with chaplets. One of them held a distaff, another the spindle, and the third was armed with scissors, with which she cut the thread which her sisters had spun. Their dress is differently represented by some authors. Clotho appears in a variegated robe, and on her head is a crown of seven stars. She holds a distaff in her hand, reaching from heaven to earth. The robe which Lachesis wore was variegated with a great number of stars, and near her were placed a variety of spindles. Atropos was clothed in black; she held scissors in her hand, with clues of thread of different sizes, according to the length and shortness of the lives, whose destinies they seemed to contain. Hyginus attributes to them the invention of these Greek letters, α, β, η, τ, υ, and others call them the secretaries of heaven, and the keepers of the archives of eternity. The Greeks call the Parcæ by the different names of μοιρα, αἰσα, κηρ, εἰμαρμενη, which are expressive of their power and of their inexorable decrees. Hesiod, Theogony & Shield of Heracles.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 40; bk. 3, ch. 11; bk. 5, ch. 15.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 20; Odyssey, bk. 7.—Theocritus.—Callimachus, Hymn to Artemis.—Ælian, De Natura Animalium, bk. 10.—Pindar, Olympian, poem 10; Nemean, poem 7.—Euripides, Iphigeneia.—Plutarch, de Faciæ Quæ in Orbe Lunæ Apparet.—Hyginus, in preface to fables & fable 277.—Varro.—Orpheus, hymn 58.—Apollonius, bk. 1, &c.—Claudian, de Raptu Proserpinæ.—Lycophron & Tzetzes, &c.—Horace, bk. 2, ode 6, &c.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, li. 533.—Lucan, bk. 3.—Virgil, Eclogues, poem 4; Æneid, bk. 3, &c.—Seneca, Hercules Furens.—Statius, Thebaid, bk. 6.

Parentalia, a festival annually observed at Rome in honour of the dead. The friends and relations of the deceased assembled on the occasion, when sacrifices were offered, and banquets provided. Æneas first established it. Ovid, Fasti, bk. 2, li. 544.

Parentium, a port and town of Istria. Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 19.

Păris, the son of Priam king of Troy by Hecuba, also called Alexander. He was destined, even before his birth, to become the ruin of his country; and when his mother, in the first month of her pregnancy, had dreamed that she should bring forth a torch which should set fire to her palace, the soothsayers foretold the calamities which might be expected from the imprudence of her future son, and which would end in the destruction of Troy. Priam, to prevent so great and so alarming an evil, ordered his slave Archelaus to destroy the child as soon as born. The slave, either touched with humanity, or influenced by Hecuba, did not destroy him, but was satisfied to expose him on mount Ida, where the shepherds of the place found him, and educated him as their own son. Some attribute the preservation of his life, before he was found by the shepherds, to the motherly tenderness of a she-bear which suckled him. Young Paris, though educated among shepherds and peasants, gave early proofs of courage and intrepidity, and from his care in protecting the flocks of mount Ida against the rapacity of the wild beasts, he obtained the name of Alexander (helper or defender). He gained the esteem of all the shepherds, and his graceful countenance and manly deportment recommended him to the favour of Œnone, a nymph of Ida, whom he married, and with whom he lived with the most perfect tenderness. Their conjugal peace was soon disturbed. At the marriage of Peleus and Thetis, the goddess of discord, who had not been invited to partake of the entertainment, showed her displeasure by throwing into the assembly of the gods who were at the celebration of the nuptials, a golden apple on which were written the words Detur pulchriori. All the goddesses claimed it as their own: the contention at first became general, but at last only three, Juno, Venus, and Minerva, wished to dispute their respective right to beauty. The gods, unwilling to become arbiters in an affair of so tender and so delicate a nature, appointed Paris to adjudge the prize of beauty to the fairest of the goddesses, and indeed the shepherd seemed properly qualified to decide so great a contest, as his wisdom was so well established, and his prudence and sagacity so well known. The goddesses appeared before their judge without any covering or ornament, and each tried by promises and entreaties to gain the attention of Paris, and to influence his judgment. Juno promised him a kingdom; Minerva, military glory; and Venus, the fairest woman in the world for his wife, as Ovid expresses it, Heroides, poem 17, li. 118,

Udaque cum regnum; belli daret altera laudem;

Tyndaridis conjux, tertia dixit, eris.

After he had heard their several claims and promises, Paris adjudged the prize to Venus, and gave her the golden apple, to which, perhaps, she seemed entitled as the goddess of beauty. This decision of Paris in favour of Venus drew upon the judge and his family the resentment of the two other goddesses. Soon after Priam proposed a contest among his sons and other princes, and promised to reward the conqueror with one of the finest bulls of mount Ida. His emissaries were sent to procure the animal, and it was found in the possession of Paris, who reluctantly yielded it up. The shepherd was desirous of obtaining again this favourite animal, and he went to Troy and entered the list of the combatants. He was received with the greatest applause, and obtained the victory over his rivals, Nestor the son of Neleus; Cycnus son of Neptune; Polites, Helenus, and Deiphobus sons of Priam. He also obtained a superiority over Hector himself, and the prince, enraged to see himself conquered by an unknown stranger, pursued him closely, and Paris must have fallen a victim to his brother’s resentment, had he not fled to the altar of Jupiter. This sacred retreat preserved his life, and Cassandra the daughter of Priam, struck with the similarity of the features of Paris with those of her brothers, inquired his birth and his age. From these circumstances she soon discovered that he was her brother, and as such she introduced him to her father and to his children. Priam acknowledged Paris as his son, forgetful of the alarming dream which had influenced him to meditate his death, and all jealousy ceased among the brothers. Paris did not long suffer himself to remain inactive; he equipped a fleet, as if willing to redeem Hesione, his father’s sister, whom Hercules had carried away and obliged to marry Telamon the son of Æacus. This was the pretended motive of his voyage, but the causes were far different. Paris recollected that he was to be the husband of the fairest of women; and if he had been led to form those expectations while he was an obscure shepherd of Ida, he had now every plausible reason to see them realized, since he was acknowledged son of the king of Troy. Helen was the fairest woman of the age, and Venus had promised her to him. On these grounds, therefore, he visited Sparta, the residence of Helen, who had married Menelaus. He was received with every mark of respect, but he abused the hospitality of Menelaus, and while the husband was absent in Crete, Paris persuaded Helen to elope with him and fly to Asia. Helen consented, and Priam received her into his palace without difficulty, as his sister was then detained in a foreign country, and as he wished to show himself as hostile as possible to the Greeks. This affair was soon productive of serious consequences. When Menelaus had married Helen, all her suitors had bound themselves by a solemn oath to protect her person, and to defend her from every violence [See: [Helena]], and therefore the injured husband reminded them of their engagements, and called upon them to recover Helen. Upon this all Greece took up arms in the cause of Menelaus; Agamemnon was chosen general of all the combined forces, and a regular war was begun. See: [Troja]. Paris, meanwhile, who had refused Helen to the petitions and embassies of the Greeks, armed himself with his brothers and subjects to oppose the enemy; but the success of the war was neither hindered nor accelerated by his means. He fought with little courage, and at the very sight of Menelaus, whom he had so recently injured, all his resolution vanished, and he retired from the front of the army, where he walked before like a conqueror. In a combat with Menelaus, which he undertook at the persuasion of his brother Hector, Paris must have perished, had not Venus interfered, and stolen him from the resentment of his adversary. He nevertheless wounded, in another battle, Machaon, Euryphilus, and Diomedes, and, according to some opinions, he killed with one of his arrows the great Achilles. See: [Achilles]. The death of Paris is differently related; some suppose that he was mortally wounded by one of the arrows of Philoctetes, which had been once in the possession of Hercules, and that when he found himself languid on account of his wounds, he ordered himself to be carried to the feet of Œnone, whom he had basely abandoned, and who, in the years of his obscurity, had foretold him that he would solicit her assistance in his dying moments. He expired before he came into the presence of Œnone, and the nymph, still mindful of their former loves, threw herself upon his body, and stabbed herself to the heart, after she had plentifully bathed it with her tears. According to some authors, Paris did not immediately go to Troy when he left the Peloponnesus, but he was driven on the coast of Egypt, where Proteus, who was king of the country, detained him, and when he heard of the violence which had been offered to the king of Sparta, he kept Helen at his court, and permitted Paris to retire. See: [Helena]. Dictys Cretensis, bks. 1, 3, & 4.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 12.—Homer, Iliad.—Ovid, Heroides, poems 5, 16, & 17.—Quintus Calabrus [Smyrnæus], bk. 10, li. 290.—Horace, ode 3.—Euripides, Iphigeneia.—Hyginus, fables 92 & 273.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1, &c.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 12, ch. 42.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 27.—Cicero, de Divinatione.—Lycophron. & Tzetzes on Lycophron.——A celebrated player at Rome, in the good graces of the emperor Nero, &c. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 13, ch. 19, &c.

Parisădes, a king of Pontus in the age of Alexander the Great.——Another, king of Bosphorus.

Parīsii, a people and a city of Celtic Gaul, now called Paris, the capital of the kingdom of France. Cæsar, Gallic War, bk. 6, ch. 3.

Parisus, a river of Pannonia, falling into the Danube. Strabo.

Parium, now Camanar, a town of Asia Minor, on the Propontis, where Archilochus was born, as some say. Strabo, bk. 10.—Pliny, bk. 7, ch. 2; bk. 36, ch. 5.

Parma, a town of Italy, near Cremona, celebrated for its wool, and now for its cheese. The poet Cassius and the critic Macrobius were born there. It was made a Roman colony, A.U.C. 569. The inhabitants are called Parmenenses and Parmani. Livy, bk. 39, ch. 55.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Horace, bk. 1, ltr. 4, li. 3.—Cicero, Philippics, bk. 14, li. 3.—Varro, de Lingua Latina, bk. 7, ch. 31.—Martial, bk. 2, ltr. 43, li. 4; bk. 3, ltr. 13, li. 8 & ltr. 14, li. 155.

Parmenĭdes, a Greek philosopher of Elis, who flourished about 505 years before Christ. He was son of Pyres of Elis, and the pupil of Xenophanes, or of Anaximander, according to some. He maintained that there were only two elements, fire and the earth; and he taught that the first generation of men was produced from the sun. He first discovered that the earth was round, and habitable only in the two temperate zones, and that it was suspended in the centre of the universe, in a fluid lighter than air, so that all bodies left to themselves fell on its surface. There were, as he supposed, only two sorts of philosophy,—one founded on reason, and the other on opinion. He digested this unpopular system in verses, of which a few fragments remain. Diogenes Laërtius.

Parmenio, a celebrated general in the armies of Alexander, who enjoyed the king’s confidence, and was more attached to his person as a man than as a monarch. When Darius king of Persia offered Alexander all the country which lies at the west of the Euphrates, with his daughter Statira in marriage, and 10,000 talents of gold, Parmenio took occasion to observe that he would, without hesitation, accept of these conditions, if he were Alexander. “So would I, were I Parmenio,” replied the conqueror. This friendship, so true and inviolable, was sacrificed to a moment of resentment and suspicion; and Alexander, who had too eagerly listened to a light and perhaps a false accusation, ordered Parmenio and his son to be put to death, as if guilty of treason against his person. Parmenio was in the 70th year of his age, B.C. 330. He died in the greatest popularity, and it has been judiciously observed, that Parmenio obtained many victories without Alexander, but Alexander not one without Parmenio. Curtius, bk. 7, &c.—Plutarch, Alexander.

Parnassus, a mountain of Phocis, anciently called Larnassos, from the boat of Deucalion (λαρναξ), which was carried there in the universal deluge. It received the name of Parnassus from Parnassus the son of Neptune by Cleobula, and was sacred to the Muses, and to Apollo and Bacchus. The soil was barren, but the valleys and the green woods that covered its sides, rendered it agreeable, and fit for solitude and meditation. Parnassus is one of the highest mountains of Europe, and it is easily seen from the citadel of Corinth, though at the distance of about 80 miles. According to the computation of the ancients, it is one day’s journey round. At the north of Parnassus, there is a large plain, about eight miles in circumference. The mountain, according to the poets, had only two tops, called Hyampea and Tithorea, on one of which the city of Delphi was situated, and thence it was called Biceps. Strabo, bks. 8, 9.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 317; bk. 2, li. 221; bk. 5, li. 278.—Lucan, bk. 5, li. 71; bk. 3, li. 173.—Livy, bk. 42, ch. 16.—Silius Italicus, bk. 15, li. 311.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 3.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 6.—Propertius, bk. 2, poem 23, li. 13; bk. 3, poem 11, li. 54.——A son of Neptune, who gave his name to a mountain of Phocis.

Parnes (etis), a mountain of Africa, abounding in vines. Statius, bk. 12, Thebaid, li. 620.

Parnessus, a mountain of Asia near Bactriana. Dionysius Periegeta, li. 737.

Parni, a tribe of the Scythians, who invaded Parthia. Strabo, bk. 11.

Paron and Heraclides, two youths who killed a man who had insulted their father. Plutarch, Apophthegmata Laconica.

Paropamisus, a ridge of mountains at the north of India, called the Stony Girdle, or Indian Caucasus. Strabo, bk. 15.

Paropus, now Colisano, a town at the north of Sicily, on the shores of the Tyrrhene sea. Polybius, bk. 1, ch. 24.

Paroreia, a town of Thrace, near mount Hæmus. Livy, bk. 39, ch. 27.——A town of Peloponnesus.——A district of Phrygia Magna. Strabo, bk. 12.

Paros, a celebrated island among the Cyclades, about 7½ miles distant from Naxos, and 28 from Delos. According to Pliny, it is half as large as Naxos, that is, about 36 or 37 miles in circumference, a measure which some of the moderns have extended to 50 and even 80 miles. It has borne the different names of Pactia, Minoa, Hiria, Demetrias, Zacynthus, Cabarnis, and Hyleassa. It received the name of Paros, which it still bears, from Paros, a son of Jason, or, as some maintain, of Parrhasius. The island of Paros was rich and powerful, and well known for its famous marble, which was always used by the best statuaries. The best quarries were those of Marpesus, a mountain where still caverns of the most extraordinary depth are seen by modern travellers, and admired as the sources from whence the [♦]labyrinth of Egypt and the porticoes of Greece received their splendour. According to Pliny, the quarries were so uncommonly deep, that, in the clearest weather, the workmen were obliged to use lamps, from which circumstance the Greeks have called the marble Lychnites, worked by the light of lamps. Paros is also famous for the fine cattle which it produces, and for its partridges, and wild pigeons. The capital city was called Paros. It was first peopled by the Phœnicians, and afterwards a colony of Cretans settled in it. The Athenians made war against it, because it had assisted the Persians in the invasion of Greece, and took it, and it became a Roman province in the age of Pompey. Archilochus was born there. The Parian marbles, perhaps better known by the appellation of Arundelian, were engraved in this island in capital letters, B.C. 264, and, as a valuable chronicle, preserved the most celebrated epochas of Greece, from the year 1582 B.C. These valuable pieces of antiquity were procured originally by M. de Peirisc, a Frenchman, and afterwards purchased by the earl of Arundel, by whom they were given to the university of Oxford, where they are still to be seen. Prideaux published an account of all the inscriptions in 1676. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Cornelius Nepos, Miltiades & Alcibiades.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1, li. 593; Georgics, bk. 3, li. 34.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 3, li. 419; bk. 7, li. 466.—Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 14; bk. 36, ch. 17.—Diodorus, bk. 5, & Thucydides, bk. 1.—Herodotus, bk. 5, &c.—Horace, bk. 1, ode 19, li. 6.

[♦] ‘labryrinth’ replaced with ‘labyrinth’

Parphŏrus, a native of Colophon, who, at the head of a colony, built a town at the foot of Ida, which was abandoned for a situation nearer his native city. Strabo, bk. 14.—Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 3.

Parrhăsia, a town of Arcadia, founded by Parrhasius the son of Jupiter. The Arcadians are sometimes called Parrhasians, and Arcas Parrhasis, and Carmenta, Evander’s mother, Parrhasiadea. Lucan, bk. 2, li. 237.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 8, li. 333.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 8, li. 315; Fasti, bk. 1, li. 618; Tristia, bk. 1, li. 190.—Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 27.

Parrhăsius, a famous painter, son of Evenor of Ephesus, in the age of Zeuxis, about 415 years before Christ. He was a great master of his profession, and particularly excelled in strongly expressing the violent passions. He was blessed with a great genius, and much invention, and he was particularly happy in his designs. He acquired himself great reputation by his pieces, but by none more than that in which he allegorically represented the people of Athens with all the injustice, the clemency, the fickleness, timidity, the arrogance and inconsistency, which so eminently characterized that celebrated nation. He once entered the lists against Zeuxis, and when they had produced their respective pieces, the birds came to pick with the greatest avidity the grapes which [♦]Zeuxis had painted. Immediately Parrhasius exhibited his piece, and Zeuxis said, “Remove your curtain, that we may see the painting.” The curtain was the painting, and Zeuxis acknowledged himself conquered, by exclaiming, “Zeuxis has deceived birds, but Parrhasius has deceived Zeuxis himself”. Parrhasius grew so vain of his art, that he clothed himself in purple, and wore a crown of gold, calling himself the king of painters. He was lavish in his own praises, and by his vanity too often exposed himself to the ridicule of his enemies. Plutarch, Theseus; Quomodo Adolescens Poetas Audire Debeat.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 28.—Pliny, bk. 35, ch. 10.—Horace, bk. 4, ode 8.——A son of Jupiter, or, according to some, of Mars, by a nymph called Philonomia.

[♦] ‘Xeuxis’ replaced with ‘Zeuxis’

Parthamisiris, a king of Armenia, in the reign of Trajan.

Parthāon, a son of Agenor and Epicaste, who married Euryte daughter of Hippodamus, by whom he had many children, among whom were Œneus and Sterope. Parthaon was brother to Demonice, the mother of Evenus by Mars, and also to Molus, Pylus, and Thestius. He is called Portheus by Homer, Iliad, bk. 14.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 7.—Hyginus, fables 129 & 239.——A son of Peripetus and father of Aristas. Pausanias, bk. 8.

Parthĕniæ and Parthĕnii, a certain number of desperate citizens of Sparta. During the Messenian war, the Spartans were absent from their city for the space of 10 years, and it was unlawful for them to return, as they had bound themselves by a solemn oath not to revisit Sparta before they had totally subdued Messenia. This long absence alarmed the Lacedæmonian women, as well as the magistrates. The Spartans were reminded by their wives, that if they continued in their resolution, the state must at last decay for want of citizens, and when they had duly considered this embassy, they empowered all the young men in the army, who had come to the war while yet under age, and who therefore were not bound by the oath, to return to Sparta, and, by a familiar and promiscuous intercourse with all the unmarried women of the state, to raise a future generation. It was carried into execution, and the children that sprang from this union were called Partheniæ, or sons of virgins (παρθενος). The war with Messenia was some time after ended, and the Spartans returned victorious; but the cold indifference with which they looked upon the Partheniæ was attended with serious consequences. The Partheniæ knew they had no legitimate fathers, and no inheritance, and that therefore their life depended upon their own exertions. This drove them almost to despair. They joined with the Helots, whose maintenance was as precarious as their own, and it was mutually agreed to murder all the citizens of Sparta, and to seize their possessions. This massacre was to be done at a general assembly, and the signal was the throwing of a cap in the air. The whole, however, was discovered through the diffidence and apprehensions of the Helots; and when the people had assembled, the Partheniæ discovered that all was known, by the voice of a crier, who proclaimed that no man should throw up his cap. The Partheniæ, though apprehensive of punishment, were not visibly treated with greater severity; their calamitous condition was attentively examined, and the Spartans, afraid of another conspiracy, and awed by their numbers, permitted them to sail for Italy, with Phalantus their ringleader at their head. They settled in Magna Græcia, and built Tarentum, about 707 years before Christ. Justin, bk. 3, ch. 5.—Strabo, bk. 6.—Pausanias, on Laconia, &c.—Plutarch, Apophthegmata Laconica.

Parthĕnias, a river of Peloponnesus, flowing by Elis. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 21.——The ancient name of Samos. Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 31.

Parthĕnion, a mountain of Peloponnesus at the north of Tegea. Pausanias.

Parthĕnius, a river of Paphlagonia, which, after separating Bithynia, falls into the Euxine sea, near Sesamum. It received its name either because the virgin Diana (παρθενος) bathed herself there, or perhaps it received it from the purity and mildness of its waters. Herodotus, bk. 2, ch. 104.—Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 2.——A mountain of Arcadia, which was said to abound in tortoises. Here Telephus had a temple. Atalanta was exposed on its top and brought up there. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 54.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 13.—Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 7.——A favourite of the emperor Domitian. He conspired against his imperial master, and assisted to murder him.——A river of European Sarmatia. Ovid, ex Ponto, bk. 4, poem 10, li. 49.——A friend of Æneas killed in Italy. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 10, li. 748.——A Greek writer, whose romance, de Amatoriis Affectionibus has been edited in 12mo, Basil, 1531.

Parthĕnon, a temple of Athens, sacred to Minerva. It was destroyed by the Persians, and afterwards rebuilt by Pericles in a more magnificent manner, and still exists. All the circumstances which related to the birth of Minerva were beautifully and minutely represented in bas-relief, on the front of the entrance. The statue of the goddess, 26 cubits high, and made of gold and ivory, passed for one of the masterpieces of Phidias. Pliny, bk. 34.

Parthĕnŏpæus, a son of Meleager and Atalanta, or, according to some, of Milanion and another Atalanta. He was one of the seven chiefs who accompanied Adrastus the king of Argos in his expedition against Thebes. He was killed by Amphidicus. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 9.—Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 12; bk. 9, ch. 19.——A son of Talaus.

Parthĕnŏpe, one of the Sirens.——A daughter of Stymphalus. Apollodorus.——A city of Campania, afterwards called Neapolis, or the new city, when it had been beautified and enlarged by a colony from Eubœa. It is now called Naples. It received the name of Parthenope from one of the Sirens, whose body was found on the sea-shore there. Virgil, Georgics, bk. 4, li. 564.—Strabo, bks. 1 & 5.—Paterculus, bk. 1, ch. 4.—Homer, Odyssey, bk. 12, li. 167.—Silius Italicus, bk. 12, li. 33.

Parthia, a celebrated country of Asia, bounded on the west by Media, south by Carmania, north by Hyrcania, and east by Aria, &c., containing, according to Ptolemy, 25 large cities, the most capital of which was called Hecatompylos, from its hundred gates. Some suppose that the present capital of the country is built on the ruins of Hecatompylos. According to some authors, the Parthians were Scythians by origin, who made an invasion on the more southern provinces of Asia, and at last fixed their residence near Hyrcania. They long remained unknown and unnoticed, and became successively tributary to the empire of the Assyrians, Medes, and Persians. When Alexander invaded Asia, the Parthians submitted, like the other dependent provinces of Persia, and they were for some time under the power of Eumenes, Antigonus, Seleucus, Nicanor, and Antiochus, till the rapacity and oppression of Agathocles, a lieutenant of the latter, roused their spirit, and fomented rebellion. Arsaces, a man of obscure origin, but blessed with great military powers, placed himself at the head of his countrymen, and laid the foundation of the Parthian empire, about 250 years before the christian era. The Macedonians attempted in vain to recover it; a race of active and vigilant princes, who assumed the surname of Arsacides, from the founder of their kingdom, increased its power, and rendered it so formidable, that, while it possessed 18 kingdoms between the Caspian and Arabian seas, it even disputed the empire of the world with the Romans, and could never be subdued by that nation, which had seen no people on earth unconquered by their arms. It remained a kingdom till the reign of Artabanus, who was killed about the year 229 of the christian era, and from that time it became a province of the newly re-established kingdom of Persia, under Artaxerxes. The Parthians were naturally strong and warlike, and were esteemed the most expert horsemen and archers in the world. The peculiar custom of discharging their arrows while they were retiring full speed, has been greatly celebrated by the ancients, particularly by the poets, who all observe that their flight was more formidable than their attacks. This manner of fighting, and the wonderful address and dexterity with which it was performed, gained them many victories. They were addicted much to drinking, and to every manner of lewdness, and their laws permitted them to raise children even by their mothers and sisters. Strabo, bks. 2, 6, &c.—Curtius, bk. 6, ch. 11.—Florus, bk. 3, ch. 5.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 3, li. 31, &c.; Æneid bk. 7, li. 606.—Ovid, Ars Amatoria, bk. 1, &c., Fasti, bk. 5, li. 580.—Dio Cassius, bk. 40.—Ptolemy, bk. 6, ch. 5.—Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 25.—Polybius, bk. 5, &c.—Marcellinus.—Herodian, bk. 3, &c.—Lucan, bk. 1, li. 230; bk. 6, li. 50; bk. 10, li. 53.—Justin, bk. 41, ch. 1.—Horace, bk. 1, ode 19, li. 11; bk. 2, ode 13, li. 17.

Parthini, a people of Illyricum. Livy, bk. 29, ltr. 12; bk. 33, ch. 34; bk. 44, ch. 30.—Suetonius, Augustus, ch. 19.—Cicero, Against Piso, ch. 40.

Parthytēne, a province of Parthia, according to Ptolemy, though some authors support that it is the name of Parthia itself.

Parysădes, a king of Pontus, B.C. 310. Diodorus.——A king of the Cimmerian Bosphorus, who flourished 284 B.C.

Parysătis, a Persian princess, wife of Darius Ochus, by whom she had Artaxerxes, Memnon, and Cyrus the younger. She was so extremely partial to her younger son, that she committed the greatest cruelties to encourage his ambition, and she supported him with all her interest in his rebellion against his brother Memnon. The death of Cyrus at the battle of Cunaxa, was revenged with the grossest barbarity, and Parysatis sacrificed to her resentment all such as she found concerned in his fall. She also poisoned Statira the wife of her son Artaxerxes, and ordered one of the eunuchs of the court to be flayed alive, and his skin to be stretched on two poles before her eyes, because he had, by order of the king, cut off the hand and the head of Cyrus. These cruelties offended Artaxerxes, and he ordered his mother to be confined in Babylon; but they were soon after reconciled, and Parysatis regained all her power and influence till the time of her death. Plutarch, Artaxerxes.—Ctesiphon.

Pasargada, a town of Persia, near Carmania, founded by Cyrus on the very spot where he had conquered Astyages. The kings of Persia were always crowned there, and the Pasargadæ were the noblest families of Persia, in the number of which were the Achæmenides. Strabo, bk. 15.—Pliny, bk. 8, ch. 26.—Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 125.—Mela, bk. 3, ch. 8.

Paseas, a tyrant in Sicyon in Peloponnesus, father to Abantidas, &c. Plutarch, Aratus.

Pasicles, a grammarian, &c.

Pasicrătes, a king of part of the island of Cyprus. Plutarch.

Pasiphae, a daughter of the Sun and of Perseis, who married Minos king of Crete. She disgraced herself by her unnatural passion for a bull, which, according to some authors, she was enabled to gratify by means of the artist Dædalus. This celebrated bull had been given to Minos by Neptune, to be offered on his altars, but as the monarch refused to sacrifice the animal on account of his beauty, the god revenged his disobedience by inspiring Pasiphæ with an unnatural love for it. This fabulous tradition, which is universally believed by the poets, who observe that the Minotaur was the fruit of this infamous commerce, is refuted by some writers, who suppose that the infidelity of Pasiphæ to her husband was betrayed in her affection for an officer called Taurus; and that Dædalus, by permitting his house to be the asylum of the two lovers, was looked upon as accessary to the gratification of Pasiphæ’s lust. From this amour with Taurus, as it is further remarked, the queen became mother of twins, and the name of Minotaurus arises from the resemblance of the children to the husband and the lover of Pasiphæ. Minos had four sons by Pasiphæ, Castreus, Deucalion, Glaucus, and Androgeus, and three daughters, Hecate, Ariadne, and Phædra. See: [Minotaurus]. Plato, Minos.—Plutarch, Theseus.—Apollonius, bk. 2, ch. 1.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 6, li. 24.—Hyginus, fable 40.—Diodorus, bk. 4.—Ovid, Heroides, poem 4, lis. 57 & 165.

Pasithea, one of the Graces, also called Aglaia. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 35.——One of the Nereides. Hesiod.——A daughter of Atlas.

Pasitĭgris, a name given to the river Tigris. Strabo, bk. 15.—Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 20.

Passaron, a town of Epirus, where, after sacrificing to Jupiter, the kings swore to govern according to law, and the people to obey and to defend the country. Plutarch, Pyrrhus.—Livy, bk. 45, chs. 26 & 33.

Passiēnus, a Roman who reduced Numidia, &c. Tacitus, Annals.——Paulus, a Roman knight, nephew to the poet Propertius, whose elegiac compositions he imitated. He likewise attempted lyric poetry, and with success, and chose for his model the writings of Horace. Pliny, ltrs. 6 & 9.——Crispus, a man distinguished as an orator, but more as the husband of Domitia, and afterwards of Agrippina, Nero’s mother, &c. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 6, ch. 20.

Pasus, a Thessalian in Alexander’s army, &c.

Patala, a harbour at the mouth of the Indus, in an island called Patale. The river here begins to form a Delta like the Nile. Pliny places this island within the torrid zone. Pliny, bk. 2, ch. 73.—Curtius, bk. 9, ch. 7.—Strabo, bk. 15.—Arrian, bk. 6, ch. 17.

Pătăra (orum), now Patera, a town of Lycia, situate on the eastern side of the mouth of the river Xanthus, with a capacious harbour, a temple, and an oracle of Apollo, surnamed Patareus, where was preserved and shown, in the age of Pausanias, a brazen cap, which had been made by the hands of Vulcan, and presented by the god to Telephus. The god was supposed by some to reside for the six winter months at Patara, and the rest of the year at Delphi. The city was greatly embellished by Ptolemy Philadelphus, who attempted in vain to change its original name into that of his wife Arsinoe. Livy, bk. 37, ch. 15.—Strabo, bk. 14.—Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 41.—Horace, bk. 3, ode 14, li. 64.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 516.—Mela, bk. 1, ch. 15.

Pătăvium, a city of Italy, at the north of the Po, on the shores of the Adriatic, now called Padua, and once said to be capable of sending 20,000 men into the field. See: [Padua]. It is the birthplace of Livy, from which reason some writers have denominated Patavinity those peculiar expressions and provincial dialect, which they seem to discover in the historian’s style, not strictly agreeable to the purity and refined language of the Roman authors who flourished in or near the Augustan age. Martial, bk. 11, ltr. 17, li. 8.—Quintilian, bk. 1, chs. 5, 56; bk. 8, ch. 13.—Livy, bk. 10, ch. 2; bk. 41, ch. 27.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 4.

Patercŭlus, a Roman, whose daughter Sulpicia was pronounced the chastest matron at Rome. Pliny, bk. 7, ch. 35.——Velleius, an historian. See: [Velleius].

Patizithes, one of the Persian Magi, who raised his brother to the throne because he resembled Smerdis the brother of Cambyses, &c. Herodotus, bk. 3, ch. 61.

Patmos, one of the Cyclades, with a small town of the same name, situate at the south of Icaria, and measuring 30 miles in circumference, according to Pliny, or only 18, according to modern travellers. It has a large harbour, near which are some broken columns, the most ancient in that part of Greece. The Romans generally banished their culprits there. It is now called Palmosa. Strabo.—Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 12.

Patræ, an ancient town at the north-west of Peloponnesus, anciently called Aroe. Diana had there a temple, and a famous statue of gold and ivory. Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 6.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 6, li. 417.—Livy, bk. 27, ch. 29.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 3.

Patro, a daughter of Thestius. Apollodorus.——An epicurean philosopher intimate with Cicero. Cicero, Letters to his Friends, bk. 13, ch. 1.

Pātrōcles, an officer of the fleet of Seleucus and Antiochus. He discovered several countries, and it is said that he wrote a history of the world. Strabo.—Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 17.

Patrocli, a small island on the coast of Attica. Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 5.

Pātrōclus, one of the Grecian chiefs during the Trojan war, son of Menœtius by Sthenele, whom some call Philomela, or Polymela. The accidental murder of Clysonymus the son of Amphidamus, in the time of his youth, obliged him to fly from Opus, where his father reigned. He retired to the court of Peleus king of Phthia, where he was kindly received, and where he contracted the most intimate friendship with Achilles the monarch’s son. When the Greeks went to the Trojan war, Patroclus also accompanied them at the express command of his father, who had visited the court of Peleus, and he embarked with 10 ships from Phthia. He was the constant companion of Achilles, and he lodged in the same tent; and when his friend refused to appear in the field of battle, because he had been offended by Agamemnon, Patroclus imitated his example, and by his absence was the cause of the overthrow of the Greeks. But at last Nestor prevailed upon him to return to the war, and Achilles permitted him to appear in his armour. The valour of Patroclus, together with the terror which the sight of the arms of Achilles inspired, soon routed the victorious armies of the Trojans, and obliged them to fly within their walls for safety. He would have broken down the walls of the city; but Apollo, who interested himself for the Trojans, placed himself to oppose him, and Hector, at the instigation of the god, dismounted from his chariot to attack him, as he attempted to strip one of the Trojans whom he had slain. The engagement was obstinate, but at last Patroclus was overpowered by the valour of Hector, and the interposition of Apollo. His arms became the property of the conqueror, and Hector would have severed his head from his body had not Ajax and Menelaus intervened. His body was at last recovered and carried to the Grecian camp, where Achilles received it with the bitterest lamentations. His funeral was observed with the greatest solemnity. Achilles sacrificed near the burning pile 12 young Trojans, besides four of his horses, and two of his dogs, and the whole was concluded by the exhibition of funeral games, in which the conquerors were liberally rewarded by Achilles. The death of Patroclus, as it is described by Homer, gave rise to new events; Achilles forgot his resentment against Agamemnon, and entered the field to avenge the fall of his friend, and his anger was gratified only by the slaughter of Hector, who had more powerfully kindled his wrath by appearing at the head of the Trojan armies in the armour which had been taken from the body of Patroclus. The patronymic of Actorides is often applied to Patroclus, because Actor was father to Menœtius. Dictys Cretensis, bk. 1, &c.—Homer, bk. 9, Iliad, &c.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 13.—Hyginus, fables 97 & 275.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 13, li. 273.——A son of Hercules. Apollodorus.——An officer of Ptolemy Philadelphus.

Patron, an Arcadian at the games exhibited by Æneas in Sicily. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 298.

Patrous, a surname of Jupiter among the Greeks, represented by his statues as having three eyes, which some suppose to signify that he reigned in three different places, in heaven, on earth, and in hell. Pausanias, bk. 2.

Patulcius, a surname of Janus, which he received a pateo, because the doors of his temple were always open in the time of war. Some suppose that he received it because he presided over gates, or because the year began by the celebration of his festivals. Ovid, Fasti, bk. 1, li. 129.

Paventia, a goddess who presided over terror at Rome, and who was invoked to protect her votaries from its effects. Augustine, City of God, bk. 4, ch. 11.

Paula, the first wife of the emperor Heliogabalus. She was daughter of the prefect of the pretorian guards. The emperor divorced her, and Paula retired to solitude and obscurity with composure.

Paulīna, a Roman lady who married Saturninus, a governor of Syria, in the reign of the emperor Tiberius. Her conjugal peace was disturbed, and violence was offered to her virtue by a young man called Mundus, who was enamoured of her, and who had caused her to come to the temple of Isis by means of the priests of the goddess, who declared that Anubis wished to communicate to her something of moment. Saturninus complained to the emperor of the violence which had been offered to his wife, and the temple of Isis was overturned and Mundus banished, &c. Josephus, Antiquities, bk. 18, ch. 4.——The wife of the philosopher Seneca, who attempted to kill herself when Nero had ordered her husband to die. The emperor, however, prevented her, and she lived some few years after in the greatest melancholy. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 15, ch. 63, &c.——A sister of the emperor Adrian.——The wife of the emperor Maximinus.

Paulīnus Pompeius, an officer in Nero’s reign, who had the command of the German armies, and finished the works on the banks of the Rhine, which Drusus had begun 63 years before. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 13, ch. 53.—Suetonius.——A Roman general, the first who crossed mount Atlas with an army. He wrote a history of this expedition in Africa, which is lost. Paulinus also distinguished himself in Britain, &c. He followed the arms of Otho against Vitellius. Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 1.——Valerius, a friend of Vespasian.——Julius, a Batavian nobleman, put to death by Fonteius Capito, on pretence of rebellion. Tacitus, Histories, bk. 4, ch. 13.

Paulus Æmylius, a Roman, son of the Æmylius who fell at Cannæ, was celebrated for his victories, and received the surname of Macedonicus from his conquest of Macedonia. In the early part of life he distinguished himself by his uncommon application, and by his fondness for military discipline. His first appearance in the field was attended with great success, and the barbarians that had revolted in Spain were reduced with the greatest facility under the power of the Romans. In his first consulship his arms were directed against the Ligurians, whom he totally subjected. His applications for a second consulship proved abortive; but when Perseus the king of Macedonia had declared war against Rome, the abilities of Paulus were remembered, and he was honoured with the consulship about the 60th year of his age. After this appointment he behaved with uncommon vigour, and soon a general engagement was fought near Pydna. The Romans obtained the victory, and Perseus saw himself deserted by all his subjects. In two days the conqueror made himself master of all Macedonia, and soon after the fugitive monarch was brought into his presence. Paulus did not exult over his fallen enemy; but when he had gently rebuked him for his temerity in attacking the Romans, he addressed himself in a pathetic speech to the officers of his army who surrounded him, and feelingly enlarged on the instability of fortune, and the vicissitude of all human affairs. When he had finally settled the government of Macedonia with 10 commissioners from Rome, and after he had sacked 70 cities of Epirus, and divided the booty amongst his soldiers, Paulus returned to Italy. He was received with the usual acclamations, and though some of the seditious soldiers attempted to prevent his triumphal entry into the capital, yet three days were appointed to exhibit the fruits of his victories. Perseus, with his wretched family, adorned the triumph of the conqueror, and as they were dragged through the streets before the chariot of Paulus, they drew tears of compassion from the people. The riches which the Romans derived from this conquest were immense, and the people were freed from all taxes till the consulship of Hirtius and Pansa; but while every one of the citizens received some benefit from the victories of Paulus, the conqueror himself was poor, and appropriated for his own use nothing of the Macedonian treasures except the library of Perseus. In the office of censor, to which he was afterwards elected, Paulus behaved with the greatest moderation, and at his death, which happened about 168 years before the christian era, not only the Romans, but their very enemies, confessed, by their lamentations, the loss which they had sustained. He had married Papiria, by whom he had two sons, one of whom was adopted by the family of Maximus, and the other by that of Scipio Africanus. He had also two daughters, one of whom married a son of Cato, and the other Ælius Tubero. He afterwards divorced Papiria; and when his friends wished to reprobate his conduct in doing so, by observing that she was young and handsome, and that she had made him father of a fine family, Paulus replied, that the shoe which he then wore was new and well made, but that he was obliged to leave it off, though no one but himself, as he said, knew where it pinched him. He married a second wife, by whom he had two sons, whose sudden death exhibited to the Romans, in the most engaging view, their father’s philosophy and stoicism. The elder of these sons died five days before Paulus triumphed over Perseus, and the other three days after the public [♦]procession. This domestic calamity did not shake the firmness of the conqueror; yet before he retired to a private station, he harangued the people, and in mentioning the severity of fortune upon his family, he expressed his wish that every evil might be averted from the republic by the sacrifice of the domestic prosperity of an individual. Plutarch, Lives.—Livy, bks. 43, 44, &c. Justin, bk. 33, ch. 1, &c.——Samosatenus, an author in the reign of Gallienus.——Maximus. See: [Maximus Fabius].——Ægineta, a Greek physician whose work was edited apud, Aldus Manutius, Venice, folio, 1528.——Lucius Æmylius, a consul, who, when opposed to Annibal in Italy, checked the rashness of his colleague Varro, and recommended an imitation of the conduct of the great Fabius, by harassing and not facing the enemy in the field. His advice was rejected, and the battle of Cannæ, so glorious to Annibal, and so fatal to Rome, soon followed. Paulus was wounded, but when he might have escaped from the slaughter, by accepting a horse generously offered by one of his officers, he disdained to fly, and perished by the darts of the enemy. Horace, ode 12, li. 38.—Livy, bk. 22, ch. 39.——Julius, a Latin poet in the age of Adrian and Antoninus. He wrote some poetical pieces, recommended by Aulus Gellius.

[♦] ‘processsion’ replaced with ‘procession’

Pāulus. See: [Æmylius].

Pavor, an emotion of the mind which received divine honours among the Romans, and was considered of a most tremendous power, as the ancients swore by her name in the most solemn manner. Tullus Hostilius, the third king of Rome, was the first who built her temples, and raised altars to her honour, as also to Pallor the goddess of paleness. Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 3, ch. 17.

Pausanias, a Spartan general, who greatly signalized himself at the battle of Platæa, against the Persians. The Greeks were very sensible of his services, and they rewarded his merit with the tenth of the spoils taken from the Persians. He was afterwards set at the head of the Spartan armies, and extended his conquests in Asia; but the haughtiness of his behaviour created him many enemies, and the Athenians soon obtained a superiority in the affairs of Greece. Pausanias was dissatisfied with his countrymen, and he offered to betray Greece to the Persians, if he received in marriage, as the reward of his perfidy, the daughter of their monarch. His intrigues were discovered by means of a youth, who was entrusted with his letters to Persia, and who refused to go, on the recollection that such as had been employed in that office before had never returned. The letters were given to the Ephori of Sparta, and the perfidy of Pausanias laid open. He fled for safety to a temple of Minerva, and as the sanctity of the place screened him from the violence of his pursuers, the sacred building was surrounded with heaps of stones, the first of which was carried there by the indignant mother of the unhappy man. He was starved to death in the temple, and died about 471 years before the christian era. There was a festival, and solemn games instituted in his honour, in which only free-born Spartans contended. There was also an oration spoken in his praise, in which his actions were celebrated, particularly the battle of Platæa, and the defeat of Mardonius. Cornelius Nepos, Lives.—Plutarch, Aristeides & Themistocles.—Herodotus, bk. 9.——A favourite of Philip king of Macedonia. He accompanied the prince in an expedition against the Illyrians, in which he was killed.——Another, at the court of king Philip, very intimate with the preceding. He was grossly and unnaturally abused by Attalus, one of the friends of Philip, and when he complained of the injuries he had received, the king in some measure disregarded his remonstrances, and wished them to be forgotten. This incensed Pausanias; he resolved to revenge himself, and when he had heard from his master Hermocrates the sophist that the most effectual way to render himself illustrious was to murder a person who had signalized himself by uncommon actions, he stabbed Philip as he entered a public theatre. After this bloody action he attempted to make his escape to his chariot, which waited for him at the gate of the city, but he was stopped accidentally by the twig of a vine, and fell down. Attalus, Perdiccas, and other friends of Philip, who pursued him, immediately fell upon him and despatched him. Some support that Pausanias committed this murder at the instigation of Olympias the wife of Philip, and of her son Alexander. Diodorus, bk. 16.—Justin, bk. 9.—Plutarch, Apophthegmata Laconica.——A king of Macedonia, deposed by Amyntas, after a year’s reign. Diodorus.——Another, who attempted to seize upon the kingdom of [♦]Macedonia, from which he was prevented by Iphicrates the Athenian.——A friend of Alexander the Great, made governor of Sardis.——A physician in the age of Alexander. Plutarch.——A celebrated orator and historian, who settled at Rome, A.D. 170, where he died in a very advanced age. He wrote a history of Greece, in 10 books, in the Ionic dialect, in which he gives, with great precision and geographical knowledge, an account of the situation of its different cities, their antiquities, and the several curiosities which they contained. He has also interwoven mythology in his historical account, and introduced many fabulous traditions and superstitious stories. In each book the author treats of a separate country, such as Attica, Arcadia, Messenia, Elis, &c. Some suppose that he gave a similar description of Phœnicia and Syria. There was another Pausanias, a native of Cæsarea in Cappadocia, who wrote some declamations, and who is often confounded with the historian of that name.——The best edition of Pausanias is that of Khunius, folio, Lipscomb, 1696.——A Lacedæmonian, who wrote a partial account of his country.——A statuary of Apollonia, whose abilities were displayed in adorning Apollo’s temple at Delphi. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 9.——A king of Sparta, of the family of the Eurysthenidæ, who died 397 B.C., after a reign of 14 years.

[♦] ‘Macedona’ replaced with ‘Macedonia’

Pausias, a painter of Sicyon, the first who understood how to apply colours to wood or ivory by means of fire. He made a beautiful painting of his mistress Glycere, whom he represented as sitting on the ground, and making garlands with flowers, and from this circumstance the picture, which was bought afterwards by Lucullus for two talents, received the name of Stephanoplocon. Some time after the death of Pausias, the Sicyonians were obliged to part with the pictures which they possessed to deliver themselves from an enormous debt, and Marcus Scaurus the Roman bought them all, in which were those of Pausias, to adorn the theatre, which had been built during his edileship. Pausias lived about 350 years before Christ. Pliny, bk. 35, ch. 11.

Pausily̆pus, a mountain near Naples, which receives its name from the beauty of its situation, (παυω λυπη, cessare facio dolor). The natives show there the tomb of Virgil, and regard it with the highest veneration. There were near some fish-ponds belonging to the emperor. The mountain is now famous for a subterraneous passage near half a mile in length, and 22 feet in breadth, which affords a safe and convenient passage to travellers. Statius, bk. 4, Sylvæ, poem 4, li. 52.—Pliny, bk. 9, ch. 53.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Seneca, ltrs. 5 & 57.

Pax, an allegorical divinity among the ancients. The Athenians raised her a statue, which represented her as holding Plutus the god of wealth in her lap, to intimate that peace gives rise to prosperity and to opulence; and they were the first who erected an altar to her honour after the victories obtained by Timotheus over the Lacedæmonian power, though Plutarch asserts it had been done after the conquests of Cimon over the Persians. She was represented among the Romans with the horn of plenty, and also carrying an olive branch in her hand. The emperor Vespasian built her a celebrated temple at Rome, which was consumed by fire in the reign of Commodus. It was customary for men of learning to assemble in that temple, and even to deposit their writings there, as in a place of the greatest security. Therefore when it was burnt, not only books, but also many valuable things, jewels, and immense treasures, were lost in the general conflagration. Cornelius Nepos, Timotheus, bk. 2.—Plutarch, Cimon.—Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 16.

Paxos, a small island between Ithaca and the Echinades in the Ionian sea.

Peas, a shepherd, who, according to some, set on fire the pile on which Hercules was burnt. The hero gave him his bow and arrows. Apollodorus, bk. 2.

Pedæus, an illegitimate son of Antenor. Homer, Iliad, bk. 7.

Pedācia, a woman of whom Horace, bk. 1, satire 8, li. 39, speaks of as a contemptible character.

Pedāni. See: [Pedum].

Pedānius, a prefect of Rome, killed by one of his slaves for having denied him his liberty, &c. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 14, ch. 42.

Pedasa (orum), a town of Caria, near Halicarnassus. Livy, bk. 33, ch. 30.

Pedăsus, a son of Bucolion the son of Laomedon. His mother was one of the Naiades. He was killed in the Trojan war by Euryalus. Homer, Iliad, bk. 6, li. 21.——One of the four horses of Achilles. As he was not immortal like the other three, he was killed by Sarpedon. Homer, Iliad, bk. 16.——A town near Pylos in the Peloponnesus.

Pediadis, a part of Bactriana, through which the Oxus flows. Polybius.

Pedias, the wife of Cranaus.

Pedius Blæsus, a Roman, accused by the people of Cyrene of plundering the temple of Æsculapius. He was condemned under Nero, &c. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 14, ch. 18.——A nephew of Julius Cæsar, who commanded one of his legions in Gaul, &c.——Poplicola, a lawyer in the age of Horace. His father was one of Julius Cæsar’s heirs, and became consul with Augustus after Pansa’s death.

Pedo, a lawyer, patronized by Domitian. Juvenal, satire 7, li. 129.——Albinovanus. See: [Albinovanus].

Pedianus Asconius, flourished A.D. 76.

Pedum, a town of Latium, about 10 miles from Rome, conquered by Camillus. The inhabitants were called Pedani. Livy, bk. 2, ch. 39; bk. 8, chs. 13 & 14.—Horace, bk. 1, ltr. 4, li. 2.

Pegæ, a fountain at the foot of mount Arganthus in Bithynia, into which Hylas fell. Propertius, bk. 1, poem 20, li. 33.

Pegăsĭdes, a name given to the Muses from the horse Pegasus, or from the fountain which Pegasus had raised from the ground, by striking it with his foot. Ovid, Heroides, poem 15, li. 27.

Pēgăsis, a name given to Œnone by Ovid, Heroides, poem 5, because she was daughter of the river (πηγη) Cebrenus.

Pegăsium stagnum, a lake near Ephesus, which arose from the earth when Pegasus struck it with his foot.

Pegăsus, a winged horse sprung from the blood of Medusa, when Perseus had cut off her head. He received his name from his being born, according to Hesiod, near the sources (πηγη) of the ocean. As soon as born he left the earth, and flew up into heaven, or rather, according to Ovid, he fixed his residence on mount Helicon, where, by striking the earth with his foot, he instantly raised a fountain, which has been called Hippocrene. He became the favourite of the Muses; and being afterwards tamed by Neptune or Minerva, he was given to Bellerophon to conquer the Chimæra. No sooner was this fiery monster destroyed, than Pegasus threw down his rider, because he was a mortal, or rather, according to the more received opinion, because he attempted to fly to heaven. This act of temerity in Bellerophon was punished by Jupiter, who sent an insect to torment Pegasus, which occasioned the melancholy fall of his rider. Pegasus continued his flight up to heaven, and was placed among the constellations by Jupiter. Perseus, according to Ovid, was mounted on the horse Pegasus, when he destroyed the sea monster which was going to devour Andromeda. Hesiod, Theogony, li. 282.—Horace, bk. 4, ode 11, li. 20.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 6, li. 179.—Apollodorus, bk. 2, chs. 3 & 4.—Lycophron, li. 17.—Pausanias, bk. 12, chs. 3 & 4.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 4, li. 785.—Hyginus, fable 57.

Pelăgo, a eunuch, one of Nero’s favourites, &c. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 14, ch. 59.

Pelăgon, a man killed by a wild boar. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 8, li. 360.——A son of Asopus and Metope.——A Phocian, one of whose men conducted Cadmus, and showed him where, according to the oracle, he was to build a city.

Pelagonia, one of the divisions of Macedonia at the north. Livy, bk. 26, ch. 25; bk. 31, ch. 28.

Pelarge, a daughter of Potneus, who re-established the worship of Ceres in Bœotia. She received divine honours after death. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 25.

Pelasgi, a people of Greece, supposed to be one of the most ancient in the world. They first inhabited Argolis in Peloponnesus, which from them received the name of Pelasgia, and about 1883 years before the christian era they passed into Æmonia, and were afterwards dispersed in several parts of Greece. Some of them fixed their habitation in Epirus, others in Crete, others in Italy, and others in Lesbos. From these different changes of situation in the Pelasgians, all the Greeks are indiscriminately called Pelasgians, and their country Pelasgia, though, more properly speaking, it should be confined to Thessaly, Epirus, and Peloponnesus, in Greece. Some of the Pelasgians, that had been driven from Attica, settled at Lemnos, where some time after they carried some Athenian women, whom they had seized in an expedition on the coast of Attica. They raised some children by these captive females, but they afterwards destroyed them with their mothers, through jealousy, because they differed in manners as well as language from them. This horrid murder was attended by a dreadful pestilence, and they were ordered, to expiate their crime, to do whatever the Athenians commanded them. This was to deliver their possessions into their hands. The Pelasgians seem to have received their name from Pelasgus, the first king and founder of their nation. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 1.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Herodotus, bk. 1.—Plutarch, Romulus.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1.—Ovid, Metamorphoses.—Flaccus.—Seneca, Medea & Agamemnon.

Pelasgia, or Pelasgiotis, a country of Greece, whose inhabitants are called Pelasgi or Pelasgiotæ. Every country of Greece, and all Greece in general, is indiscriminately called Pelasgia, though the name should be more particularly confined to a part of Thessaly, situate between the Peneus, the Aliacmon, and the Sperchius. The maritime borders of this part of Thessaly were afterwards called Magnesia, though the sea or its shore still retained the name of Pelasgicus Sinus, now the gulf of Volo. Pelasgia is also one of the ancient names of Epirus, as also of Peloponnesus. See: [Pelasgi].

Pelasgus, a son of Terra, or, according to others, of Jupiter and Niobe, who reigned in Sicyon, and gave his name to the ancient inhabitants of Peloponnesus.

Pĕlēthrŏnii, an epithet given to the Lapithæ, because they inhabited the town of Pelethronium, at the foot of mount Pelion in Thessaly; or because one of their number bore the name of Pelethronius. It is to them that mankind is indebted for the invention of the bit with which they tamed their horses with so much dexterity. Virgil, Georgics, bk. 3, li. 115.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 12, li. 452.—Lucan, bk. 6, li. 387.

Peleus, a king of Thessaly, son of Æacus and Endeis the daughter of Chiron. He married Thetis, one of the Nereides, and was the only one among mortals who married an immortal. He was accessary to the death of his brother Phocus, and on that account he was obliged to leave his father’s dominions. He retired to the court of Eurytus the son of Actor, who reigned at Phthia, or according to the less received opinion of Ovid, he fled to Ceyx king of Trachinia. He was purified of his murder by Eurytus, with the usual ceremonies, and the monarch gave him his daughter Antigone in marriage. Some time after this Peleus and Eurytus went to the chase of the Calydonian boar, where the father-in-law was accidentally killed by an arrow which his son-in-law had aimed at the beast. This unfortunate event obliged him to banish himself from the court of Phthia, and he retired to Iolchos, where he was purified of the murder of Eurytus, by Acastus the king of the country. His residence at Iolchos was short; Astydamia the wife of Acastus became enamoured of him, and when she found him insensible to her passionate declaration, she accused him of attempts upon her virtue. The monarch partially believed the accusations of his wife, but not to violate the laws of hospitality, by putting him instantly to death, he ordered his officers to conduct him to mount Pelion, on pretence of hunting, and there to tie him to a tree, that he might become the prey of the wild beasts of the place. The orders of Acastus were faithfully obeyed; but Jupiter, who knew the innocence of his grandson Peleus, ordered Vulcan to set him at liberty. As soon as he had been delivered from danger, Peleus assembled his friends to punish the ill-treatment which he had received from Acastus. He forcibly took Iolchos, drove the king from his possessions, and put to death the wicked Astydamia. After the death of Antigone, Peleus courted Thetis, of whose superior charms Jupiter himself had been enamoured. His pretensions however, were rejected, and, as he was a mortal, the goddess fled from him with the greatest abhorrence; and the more effectually to evade his inquiries, she generally assumed the shape of a bird, or of a tree, or of a tigress. Peleus became more animated from her refusal; he offered a sacrifice to the gods, and Proteus informed him that to obtain Thetis he must surprise her while she was asleep in her grotto, near the shores of Thessaly. This advice was immediately followed, and Thetis, unable to escape from the grasp of Peleus, at last consented to marry him. Their nuptials were celebrated with the greatest solemnity, and all the gods attended, and made them each the most valuable presents. The goddess of discord was the only one of the deities who was not present, and she punished this seeming neglect by throwing an apple into the midst of the assembly of the gods, with the inscription of Detur pulchriori. See: [Discordia]. From the marriage of Peleus and Thetis was born Achilles, whose education was early entrusted to the Centaur Chiron, and afterwards to Phœnix the son of Amyntor. Achilles went to the Trojan war, at the head of his father’s troops, and Peleus gloried in having a son who was superior to all the Greeks in valour and intrepidity. The death of Achilles was the source of grief to Peleus; and Thetis, to comfort her husband, promised him immortality, and ordered him to retire into the grottos of the island of Leuce, where he would see and converse with the manes of his son. Peleus had a daughter called Polydora, by Antigone. Homer, Iliad, bk. 9, li. 482.—Euripides, Andromache.—Catullus, Marriage of Peleus and Thetis [poem 64].—Ovid, Heroides, poem 5; Fasti, bk. 2; Metamorphoses, bk. 11, fables 7 & 8.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 12.—Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 29.—Diodorus, bk. 4.—Hyginus, fable 54.

Peliădes, the daughters of Pelias. See: [Pelias].

Pelias, the twin brother of Neleus, was son of Neptune, by Tyro the daughter of Salmoneus. His birth was concealed from the world by his mother, who wished her father to be ignorant of her incontinence. He was exposed in the woods, but his life was preserved by shepherds, and he received the name of Pelias, from a spot of the colour of lead in his face. Some time after this adventure, Tyro married Cretheus, son of Æolus king of Iolchos, and became mother of three children, of whom Æson was the eldest. Meantime Pelias visited his mother, and was received in her family; and, after the death of Cretheus, he unjustly seized the kingdom, which belonged to the children of Tyro, by the deceased monarch. To strengthen himself in his usurpation, Pelias consulted the oracle, and when he was told to beware of one of the descendants of Æolus, who should come to his court with one foot shod, and the other bare, he privately removed the son of Æson, after he had publicly declared that he was dead. These precautions proved abortive. Jason the son of Æson, who had been educated by Chiron, returned to Iolchos, when arrived to years of maturity; and as he had lost one of his shoes in crossing the river Anaurus, or the Evenus, Pelias immediately perceived that this was the person whom he was advised so much to dread. His unpopularity prevented him from acting with violence against a stranger, whose uncommon dress and commanding aspect had raised admiration in his subjects. But his astonishment was excited when he saw Jason arrive at his palace, with his friends and his relations, and boldly demand the kingdom which he usurped. Pelias was conscious that his complaints were well founded, and therefore, to divert his attention, he told him that he would voluntarily resign the crown to him if he went to Colchis to avenge the death of Phryxus the son of Athamas, whom Æetes had cruelly murdered. He further observed that the expedition would be attended with the greatest glory, and that nothing but the infirmities of old age had prevented him himself from vindicating the honour of his country, and the injuries of his family by punishing the assassin. This, so warmly recommended, was as warmly accepted by the young hero, and his intended expedition was made known all over Greece. See: [Jason]. During the absence of Jason, in the Argonautic expedition, Pelias murdered Æson and all his family; but, according to the more received opinion of Ovid, Æson was still living when the Argonauts returned, and he was restored to the vigour of youth by the magic of Medea. This sudden change in the vigour and the constitution of Æson astonished all the inhabitants of Iolchos, and the daughters of Pelias, who had received the patronymic of Peliades, expressed their desire to see their father’s infirmities vanish by the same powerful arts. Medea, who wished to avenge the injuries which her husband Jason had received from Pelias, raised the desires of the Peliades, by cutting an old ram to pieces, and boiling the flesh in a cauldron, and afterwards turning it into a fine young lamb. After they had seen this successful experiment, the Peliades cut their father’s body to pieces, after they had drawn all the blood from his veins, on the assurance that Medea would replenish them by her incantations. The limbs were immediately put into a cauldron of boiling water, but Medea suffered the flesh to be totally consumed, and refused to give the Peliades the promised assistance, and the bones of Pelias did not even receive a burial. The Peliades were four in number, Alceste, Pisidice, Pelopea, and Hippothoe, to whom Hyginus adds Medusa. Their mother’s name was Anaxibia, the daughter of Bias, or Philomache, the daughter of Amphion. After this parricide, the Peliades fled to the court of Admetus, where Acastus the son-in-law of Pelias pursued them, and took their protector prisoner. The Peliades died, and were buried in Arcadia. Hyginus, fables 12, 13, & 14.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 7, fables 3 & 4; Heroides, poem 12, li. 129.—Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 11.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 9.—Seneca, Medea.—Apollonius, Argonautica, bk. 1.—Pindar, Pythian, poem 4.—Diodorus, bk. 4.——A Trojan chief wounded by Ulysses during the Trojan war. He survived the ruin of his country, and followed the fortune of Æneas. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 431.——The ship Argo is called Pelias arbor, built of the trees of mount Pelion.——The spear of Achilles. See: [Pelion].

Pelīdes, a patronymic of Achilles, and of Pyrrhus, as being descended from Peleus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 264.

Pēligni, a people of Italy, who dwelt near the Sabines and Marsi, and had Corfinium and Sulmo for their chief towns. The most expert magicians were among the Peligni, according to Horace. Livy, bk. 8, chs. 6 & 29; bk. 9, ch. 41.—Ovid, ex Ponto, bk. 1, poem 8, li. 42.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Horace, bk. 3, ode 19, li. 8.

Pelignus, a friend of the emperor Claudius, made governor of Cappadocia. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 12, ch. 49.

Pelinæus, a mountain of Chios.

Pelinnæum, or Pelinna, a town of Macedonia. Strabo, bk. 14.—Livy, bk. 36, chs. 10 & 14.

Pelion and Pelios, a celebrated mountain of Thessaly, whose top is covered with pine trees. In their wars against the gods, the giants, as the poets mention, placed mount Ossa upon Pelion, to scale the heavens with more facility. The celebrated spear of Achilles, which none but the hero could wield, had been cut down on this mountain, and was thence called Pelias. It was a present from his preceptor Chiron, who, like the other Centaurs, had fixed his residence here. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 155; bk. 13, li. 199.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 3.—Strabo, bk. 9.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 1, li. 281; bk. 3, li. 94.—Seneca, Hercules & Medea.

Pelium, a town of Macedonia. Livy, bk. 31, ch. 40.

Pella, a celebrated town of Macedonia, on the Ludias, not far from the Sinus Thermaicus, which became the capital of the country after the ruin of Edessa. Philip king of Macedonia was educated there, and Alexander the Great was born there, whence he is often called Pellæus juvenis. The tomb of the poet Euripides was in the neighbourhood. The epithet Pellæus is often applied to Egypt or Alexandria, because the Ptolemies, kings of the country, were of Macedonian origin. Martial, bk. 13, ltr. 85.—Lucan, bk. 5, li. 60; bk. 8, lis. 475 & 607; bk. 9, lis. 1016 & 1073; bk. 10, li. 55.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 3.—Strabo, bk. 7.—Livy, bk. 42, ch. 41.

Pellāne, a town of Laconia, with a fountain whose waters have a subterraneous communication with the waters of another fountain. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 21.—Strabo, bk. 8.

Pellēne, a town of Achaia, in the Peloponnesus, at the west of Sicyon, famous for its wool. It was built by the giant Pallas, or, according to others, by Pellen of Argos, son of Phorbas, and was the country of Proteus the sea-god. Strabo, bk. 8.—Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 26.—Livy, bk. 33, ch. 14.

Pĕlŏpēa, or Pĕlŏpīa, a daughter of Thyestes the brother of Atreus. She had a son by her father, who had offered her violence in a wood, without knowing that she was his own daughter. Some suppose that Thyestes purposely committed the incest, as the oracle had informed him that his wrongs should be avenged, and his brother destroyed, by a son who should be born from him and his daughter. This proved too true. Pelopea afterwards married her uncle Atreus, who kindly received in his house his wife’s illegitimate child, called Ægysthus, because preserved by goats (αἰγες) when exposed in the mountains. Ægysthus became his uncle’s murderer. See: [Ægysthus]. Hyginus, fable 87, &c.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 12.—Ovid, Ibis, li. 359.—Seneca, Agamemnon.

Pelŏpēia, a festival observed by the people of Elis in honour of Pelops. It was kept in imitation of Hercules, who sacrificed to Pelops in a trench, as it was usual, when the manes and the infernal gods were the objects of worship.

Pelŏpīa, a daughter of Niobe.——A daughter of Pelias.——The mother of Cycnus.

Pelopĭdas, a celebrated general of Thebes, son of Hippoclus. He was descended of an illustrious family, and was remarkable for his immense possessions, which he bestowed with great liberality to the poor and necessitous. Many were the objects of his generosity; but when Epaminondas had refused to accept his presents, Pelopidas disregarded all his wealth, and preferred before it the enjoyment of his friend’s conversation and of his poverty. From their friendship and intercourse the Thebans derived the most considerable advantages. No sooner had the interest of Sparta prevailed at Thebes, and the friends of liberty and national independence been banished from the city, than Pelopidas, who was in the number of the exiles, resolved to free his country from foreign slavery. His plan was bold and animated, and his deliberations were slow. Meanwhile Epaminondas, who had been left by the tyrants at Thebes, as being in appearance a worthless and insignificant philosopher, animated the youths of the city, and at last Pelopidas, with 11 of his associates, entered Thebes, and easily massacred the friends of the tyranny, and freed the country from foreign masters. After this successful enterprise, Pelopidas was unanimously placed at the head of the government; and so confident were the Thebans of his abilities as a general and a magistrate, that they successively re-elected him 13 times to fill the honourable office of governor of Bœotia. Epaminondas shared with him the sovereign power, and it was to their valour and prudence that the Thebans were indebted for a celebrated victory at the battle of Leuctra. In a war which Thebes carried on against Alexander tyrant of Pheræ, Pelopidas was appointed commander; but his imprudence, in trusting himself unarmed into the enemy’s camp, nearly proved fatal to him. He was taken prisoner, but Epaminondas restored him to liberty. The perfidy of Alexander irritated him, and he was killed bravely fighting in a celebrated battle in which his troops obtained the victory, B.C. 364 years. He received an honourable burial. The Thebans showed their sense for his merit by their lamentations; they sent a powerful army to revenge his death on the destruction of the tyrant of Pheræ; and his relations and his children were presented with immense donations by the cities of Thessaly. Pelopidas is admired for his valour, as he never engaged an enemy without obtaining the advantage. The impoverished state of Thebes before his birth, and after his fall, plainly demonstrates the superiority of his genius and of his abilities; and it has been justly observed, that with Pelopidas and Epaminondas the glory and the independence of the Thebans rose and set. Plutarch & Cornelius Nepos, Lives.—Xenophon, Hellenica.—Diodorus, bk. 15.—Polybius.

Peloponnesiăcum bellum, a celebrated war which continued for 27 years between the Athenians and the inhabitants of Peloponnesus with their respective allies. It is the most famous and the most interesting of all the wars which have happened between the inhabitants of Greece; and for the minute and circumstantial description which we have of the events and revolutions which mutual animosity produced, we are indebted more particularly to the correct and authentic writings of Thucydides and of Xenophon. The circumstances which gave birth to this memorable war are these. The power of Athens, under the prudent and vigorous administration of Pericles, was already extended over Greece, and it had procured itself many admirers and more enemies, when the Corcyreans, who had been planted by a Corinthian colony, refused to pay their founders those marks of respect and reverence which among the Greeks every colony was obliged to pay to its mother country. The Corinthians wished to punish that infidelity; and when the people of Epidamnus, a considerable town on the Adriatic, had been invaded by some of the barbarians of Illyricum, the people of Corinth gladly granted to the Epidamnians that assistance which had in vain been solicited from the Corcyreans, their founders and their patrons. The Corcyreans were offended at the interference of Corinth in the affairs of their colony; they manned a fleet, and obtained a victory over the Corinthian vessels which had assisted the Epidamnians. The subsequent conduct of the Corcyreans, and their insolence to some of the Elians, who had furnished a few ships to the Corinthians, provoked the Peloponnesians, and the discontent became general. Ambassadors were sent by both parties to Athens to claim its protection, and to justify these violent proceedings. The greatest part of the Athenians heard their various reasonings with moderation and with compassion; but the enterprising ambition of Pericles prevailed, and when the Corcyreans had reminded the people of Athens, that in all the states of Peloponnesus they had to dread the most malevolent enemies, and the most insidious of rivals, they were listened to with attention, and were promised support. This step was no sooner taken, than the Corinthians appealed to the other Grecian states, and particularly to the Lacedæmonians. Their complaints were accompanied by those of the people of Megara and of Ægina, who bitterly inveighed against the cruelty, injustice, and insolence of the Athenians. This had due weight with the Lacedæmonians, who had long beheld with concern and with jealousy the ambitious power of the Athenians, and they determined to support the cause of the Corinthians. However, before they proceeded to hostilities, an embassy was sent to Athens, to represent the danger of entering into a war with the most powerful and flourishing of all the Grecian states. This alarmed the Athenians, but when Pericles had eloquently spoken of the resources and the actual strength of the republic, and of the weakness of the allies, the clamours of his enemies were silenced, and the answer which was returned to the Spartans was taken as a declaration of war. The Spartans were supported by all the republics of the Peloponnesus, except Argos and part of Achaia, besides the people of Megara, Bœotia, Phocis, Locris, Leucas, Ambracia, and Anactorium. The Platæans, the Lesbians, Carians, Chians, Messenians, Acarnanians, Zacynthians, Corcyreans, Dorians, and Thracians, were the friends of the Athenians, with all the Cyclades, except Eubœa, Samos, Melos, and Thera. The first blow had already been struck, May 7, B.C. 431, by an attempt of the Bœotians to [♦]surprise Platæa; and therefore Archidamus king of Sparta, who had in vain recommended moderation to the allies, entered Attica at the head of an army of 60,000 men, and laid waste the country by fire and sword. Pericles, who was at the head of the government, did not attempt to oppose them in the field; but a fleet of 150 ships set sail, without delay, to ravage the coasts of the Peloponnesus. Megara was also depopulated by an army of 20,000 men, and the campaign of the first year of the war was concluded in celebrating, with the most solemn pomp, the funerals of such as had nobly fallen in battle. The following year was remarkable for a pestilence which raged in Athens, and which destroyed the greatest part of the inhabitants. The public calamity was still heightened by the approach of the Peloponnesian army on the borders of Attica, and by the [♠]unsuccessful expedition of the Athenians against Epidaurus and in Thrace. The pestilence which had carried away so many of the Athenians proved also fatal to Pericles, and he died about two years and six months after the commencement of the Peloponnesian war. The following years did not give rise to decisive events; but the revolt of Lesbos from the alliance of the Athenians was productive of fresh troubles. Mitylene the capital of the island was recovered, and the inhabitants treated with the greatest cruelty. The island of Corcyra became also the seat of new seditions, and those citizens who had been carried away prisoners by the Corinthians, and for political reasons treated with lenity, and taught to despise the alliance of Athens, were no sooner returned home, than they raised commotions and endeavoured to persuade their countrymen to join the Peloponnesian confederates. This was strongly opposed; but both parties obtained by turns the superiority, and massacred, with the greatest barbarity, all those who obstructed their views. Some time after Demosthenes the Athenian general invaded Ætolia, where his arms were attended with the greatest success. He also fortified Pylos in the Peloponnesus, and gained so many advantages over the confederates, that they sued for peace, which the insolence of Athens refused. The fortune of the war soon after changed, and the Lacedæmonians, under the prudent conduct of Brasidas, made themselves masters of many valuable places in Thrace. But this victorious progress was soon stopped by the death of their general, and that of Cleon the Athenian commander; and the pacific disposition of Nicias, who was now at the head of Athens, made overtures of peace and universal tranquillity. Plistoanax the king of the Spartans wished them to be accepted; but the intrigues of the Corinthians prevented the discontinuation of the war, and therefore hostilities began anew. But while war was carried on with various success in different parts of Greece, the Athenians engaged in a new expedition; they yielded to the persuasive eloquence of Gorgias of Leontium, and the ambitious views of Alcibiades, and sent a fleet of 20 ships to assist the Sicilian states against the tyrannical power of Syracuse, B.C. 416. This was warmly opposed by Nicias; but the eloquence of Alcibiades prevailed, and a powerful fleet was sent against the capital of Sicily. These vigorous though impolitic measures of the Athenians were not viewed with indifference by the confederates. Syracuse, in her distress, implored the assistance of Corinth, and Gylippus was sent to direct her operations, and to defend her against the power of her enemies. The events of battles were dubious, and though the Athenian army was animated by the prudence and intrepidity of Nicias, and the more hasty courage of Demosthenes, yet the good fortune of Syracuse prevailed; and after a campaign of two years of bloodshed, the fleets of Athens were totally ruined, and the few soldiers that survived the destructive siege, made prisoners of war. So fatal a blow threw the people of Attica into consternation and despair, and while they sought for resources at home, they severely felt themselves deprived of support abroad, their allies were alienated by the intrigues of the enemy, and rebellion was fomented in their dependent states and colonies on the Asiatic coast. The threatened ruin, however, was timely averted, and Alcibiades, who had been treated with cruelty by his countrymen, and who had for some time resided in Sparta, and directed her military operations, now exerted himself to defeat the designs of the confederates, by inducing the Persians to espouse the cause of his country. But in a short time after, the internal tranquillity of Athens was disturbed, and Alcibiades, by wishing to abolish the democracy, called away the attention of his fellow-citizens from the prosecution of a war which had already cost them so much blood. This, however, was but momentary; the Athenians soon after obtained a naval victory, and the Peloponnesian fleet was defeated by Alcibiades. The Athenians beheld with rapture the success of their arms; but when their fleet, in the absence of Alcibiades, had been defeated and destroyed near Andros by Lysander the Lacedæmonian admiral, they showed their discontent and mortification by eagerly listening to the accusations which were brought against their naval leader, to whom they gratefully had acknowledged themselves indebted for their former victories. Alcibiades was disgraced in the public assembly, and 10 commanders were appointed to succeed him in the management of the republic. This change of admirals, and the appointment of Callicratidas to succeed Lysander, whose office had expired with the revolving year, produced new operations. The Athenians fitted out a fleet, and the two nations decided their superiority near Arginusæ, in a naval battle. Callicratidas was killed, and the Lacedæmonians conquered, but the rejoicings which the intelligence of this victory occasioned were soon stopped, when it was known that the wrecks of some of the disabled ships of the Athenians, and the bodies of the slain, had not been saved from the sea. The admirals were accused in the tumultuous assembly, and immediately condemned. Their successors in office were not so prudent, but they were more unfortunate in their operations. Lysander was again placed at the head of the Peloponnesian forces, instead of Eteonicus, who had succeeded to the command at the death of Callicratidas. The age and the experience of this general seemed to promise something decisive, and indeed an opportunity was not long wanting for the display of his military character. The superiority of the Athenians over that of the Peloponnesians, rendered the former insolent, proud, and negligent, and when they had imprudently forsaken their ships to indulge their indolence, or pursue their amusements on the sea-shore at Ægospotamus, Lysander attacked their fleet, and his victory was complete. Of 180 sail, only nine escaped, eight of which fled, under the command of Conon, to the island of Cyprus, and the other carried to Athens the melancholy news of the defeat. The Athenian prisoners were all massacred; and when the Peloponnesian conquerors had extended their dominion over the states and communities of Europe and Asia, which formerly acknowledged the power of Athens, they returned home to finish the war by the reduction of the capital of Attica. The siege was carried on with vigour, and supported with firmness, and the first Athenian who mentioned capitulation to his countrymen, was instantly sacrificed to the fury and the indignation of the populace, and all the citizens unanimously declared, that the same moment would terminate their independence and their lives. This animated language, however, was not long continued; the spirit of faction was not yet extinguished at Athens; and it proved, perhaps, more destructive to the public liberty, than the operations and assaults of the Peloponnesian besiegers. During four months, negotiations were carried on with the Spartans by the aristocratical part of the Athenians, and at last it was agreed that to establish the peace, the fortifications of the Athenian harbours must be demolished, together with the long walls which joined them to the city; all their ships, except 12, were to be surrendered to the enemy; they were to resign every pretension to their ancient dominions abroad; to recall from banishment all the members of the late aristocracy; to follow the Spartans in war, and, in the time of peace, to frame their constitution according to the will and the prescriptions of their Peloponnesian conquerors. The terms were accepted, and the enemy entered the harbour, and took possession of the city, that very day on which the Athenians had been accustomed to celebrate the anniversary of the immortal victory which their ancestors had obtained over the Persians about 76 years before, near the island of Salamis. The walls and fortifications were instantly levelled with the ground, and the conquerors observed, that in the demolition of Athens, succeeding ages would fix the era of Grecian freedom. The day was concluded with a festival, and the recitation of one of the tragedies of Euripides, in which the misfortunes of the daughter of Agamemnon, who was reduced to misery, and banished from her father’s kingdom, excited a kindred sympathy in the bosom of the audience, who melted into tears at the recollection that one moment had likewise reduced to misery and servitude the capital of Attica, which was once called the common patroness of Greece, and the scourge of Persia. This memorable event happened about 404 years before the christian era, and 30 tyrants were appointed by Lysander over the government of the city. Xenophon, Hellenica.—Plutarch, Lysander, Pericles, Alcibiades, Nicias, & Agesilaus.—Diodorus, bk. 11, &c.—Aristophanes.—Thucydides.—Plato.—Aristotle.—Lycias.—Isocrates.—Cornelius Nepos, Lysander, Alcibiades, &c.—Cicero, De Officiis, bk. 1, ch. 24.

[♦] ‘supprise’ replaced with ‘surprise’

[♠] ‘unsuccesful’ replaced with ‘unsuccessful’

Peloponnēsus, a celebrated peninsula which comprehends the most southern parts of Greece. It received its name from Pelops, who settled there, as the name indicates (πηλοπος νησος, the island of Pelops). It had been called before Argia, Pelasgia, and Argolis, and in its form, it has been observed by the moderns, highly to resemble the leaf of the plane tree. Its present name is Morea, which seems to be derived either from the Greek word μορεα, or the Latin morus, which signifies a mulberry tree, which is found there in great abundance. The ancient Peloponnesus was divided into six different provinces, Messenia, Laconia, Elis, Arcadia, Achaia propria, and Argolis, to which some add Sicyon. These provinces all bordered on the sea-shore, except Arcadia. The Peloponnesus was conquered, some time after the Trojan war, by the Heraclidæ or descendants of Hercules, who had been forcibly expelled from it. The inhabitants of this peninsula rendered themselves illustrious, like the rest of the Greeks, by their genius, their fondness for the fine arts, the cultivation of learning, and the profession of arms, but in nothing more than by a celebrated war, which they carried on against Athens and her allies for 27 years, and which from them received the name of the Peloponnesian war. See: [Peloponnesiacum bellum]. The Peloponnesus scarce extended 200 miles in length, and 140 in breadth, and about 563 miles in circumference. It was separated from Greece by the narrow isthmus of Corinth, which, as being only five miles broad, Demetrius, Cæsar, Nero, and some others, attempted in vain to cut, to make a communication between the bay of Corinth, and the Saronicus sinus. Strabo, bk. 8.—Thucydides.—Diodorus, bk. 12, &c.—Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 21; bk. 8, ch. 1.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 3.—Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 6.—Herodotus, bk. 8, ch. 40.

Pelopēa mœnia, is applied to the cities of Greece, but more particularly to Mycenæ and Argos, where the descendants of Pelops reigned. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 193.

Pelops, a celebrated prince, son of Tantalus king of Phrygia. His mother’s name was Euryanassa, or, according to others, Euprytone, or Eurystemista, or Dione. He was murdered by his father, who wished to try the divinity of the gods who had visited Phrygia, by placing on their table the limbs of his son. The gods perceived his perfidious cruelty, and they refused to touch the meat, except Ceres, whom the recent loss of her daughter had rendered melancholy and inattentive. She ate one of the shoulders of Pelops, and therefore, when Jupiter had compassion on his fate, and restored him to life, he placed a shoulder of ivory instead of that which Ceres had devoured. This shoulder had an uncommon power, and it could heal by its very touch every complaint, and remove every disorder. Some time after, the kingdom of Tantalus was invaded by Tros king of Troy, on pretence that he had carried away his son Ganymedes. This rape had been committed by Jupiter himself; the war, nevertheless, was carried on, and Tantalus, defeated and ruined, was obliged to fly with his son Pelops, and to seek a shelter in Greece. This tradition is confuted by some, who support that Tantalus did not fly into Greece, as he had been some time before confined by Jupiter in the infernal regions for his impiety, and therefore Pelops was the only one whom the enmity of Tros persecuted. Pelops came to Pisa, where he became one of the suitors of Hippodamia the daughter of king Œnomaus, and he entered the lists against the father, who promised his daughter only to him who could outrun him in a chariot race. Pelops was not terrified at the fate of the 13 lovers, who before him had entered the course against Œnomaus, and had, according to the conditions proposed, been put to death when conquered. He previously bribed Myrtilus the charioteer of Œnomaus, and therefore he easily obtained the victory. See: [Œnomaus]. He married Hippodamia, and threw headlong into the sea Myrtilus, when he claimed the reward of his perfidy. According to some authors, Pelops had received some winged horses from Neptune, with which he was enabled to outrun Œnomaus. When he had established himself on the throne of Pisa, Hippodamia’s possession, he extended his conquests over the neighbouring countries, and from him the peninsula, of which he was one of the monarchs, received the name of Peloponnesus. Pelops, after death, received divine honours, and he was as much revered above all the other heroes of Greece, as Jupiter was above the rest of the gods. He had a temple at Olympia, near that of Jupiter, where Hercules consecrated to him a small portion of land, and offered to him a sacrifice. The place where this sacrifice had been offered was religiously observed, and the magistrates of the country yearly, on coming upon office, made there an offering of a black ram. During the sacrifice, the soothsayer was not allowed, as at other times, to have a share of the victim, but he alone who furnished the wood was permitted to take the neck. The wood for sacrifices, as may be observed, was always furnished by some of the priests to all such as offered victims, and they received a price equivalent to what they gave. The white poplar was generally used in the sacrifices made to Jupiter and to Pelops. The children of Pelops by Hippodamia were Pitheus, Trœzen, Atreus, Thyestes, &c., besides some by concubines. The time of his death is unknown, though it is universally agreed that he survived for some time Hippodamia. Some suppose that the Palladium of the Trojans was made with the bones of Pelops. His descendants were called Pelopidæ. Pindar, who, in his first Olympic, speaks of Pelops, confutes the traditions of his ivory shoulder, and says that Neptune took him up to heaven to become the cup-bearer to the gods, from which he was expelled, when the impiety of Tantalus wished to make mankind partake of the nectar and the entertainments of the gods. Some suppose that Pelops first instituted the Olympic games in honour of Jupiter, and to commemorate the victory which he had obtained over Œnomaus. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 1, &c.—Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 5.—Euripides, Iphigeneia.—Diodorus, bk. 3.—Strabo, bk. 8.—Mela, bk. 1, ch. 18.—Pindar, Olympian, bk. 1.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 3, li. 7.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 6, li. 404, &c.—Hyginus, fables 9, 82, & 83.

Pelor, one of the men who sprang from the teeth of the dragon killed by Cadmus. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 5.

Peloria, a festival observed by the Thessalians, in commemoration of the news which they received by one Pelorious, that the mountains of Tempe had been separated by an earthquake, and that the waters of the lake which lay there stagnated, had found a passage into the Alpheus, and left behind a vast, pleasant, and most delightful plain, &c. Athenæus, bk. 3.

Pelōrus (v. is-dis, v. ias-iados), now Cape Faro, one of the three great promontories of Sicily, on whose top is erected a tower to direct the sailor on his voyage. It lies near the coast of Italy, and received its name from Pelorus, the pilot of the ship which carried away Annibal from Italy. This celebrated general, as it is reported, was carried by the tides into the straits of Charybdis, and as he was ignorant of the coast, he asked the pilot of his ship the name of the promontory, which appeared at a distance. The pilot told him it was one of the capes of Sicily, but Annibal gave no credit to his information, and murdered him on the spot, on the apprehension that he would betray him into the hands of the Romans. He was, however, soon convinced of his error, and found that the pilot had spoken with great fidelity; and therefore, to pay honour to his memory, and to atone for his cruelty, he gave him a magnificent funeral, and ordered that the promontory should bear his name, and from that time it was called Pelorus. Some suppose that this account is false, and they observe that it bore that name before the age of Annibal. Valerius Maximus, bk. 9, ch. 8.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, lis. 411 & 687.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, li. 350; bk. 13, li. 727; bk. 15, li. 706.

Peltæ, a town of Phrygia.

Pelūsium, now Tineh, a town of Egypt, situate at the entrance of one of the mouths of the Nile, called from it Pelusian. It is about 20 stadia from the sea, and it has received the name of Pelusium from the lakes and marshes ([♦]πυλος) which are in its neighbourhood. It was the key of Egypt on the side of Phœnicia, as it was impossible to enter the Egyptian territories without passing by Pelusium, and therefore on that account it was always well fortified and garrisoned, as it was of such importance for the security of the country. It produced lentils, and was celebrated for the linen stuffs made there. It is now in ruins. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 9.—Columella, bk. 5, ch. 10.—Silius Italicus, bk. 3, li. 25.—Lucan, bk. 8, li. 466; bk. 9, li. 83; bk. 10, li. 53.—Livy, bk. 44, ch. 19; bk. 45, ch. 11.—Strabo, bk. 17.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 1, li. 228.

[♦] ‘πμλος’ replaced with ‘πυλος’

Pĕnātes, certain inferior deities among the Romans, who presided over houses and the domestic affairs of families. They were called Penates, because they were generally placed in the innermost and most secret parts of the house, in Penitissimâ ædium parte, quod, as Cicero says, penitus insident. The place [♦]where they stood was afterwards called penetralia, and they themselves received the name of Penetrales. It was in the option of every master of a family to choose his Penates, and therefore Jupiter, and some of the superior gods, are often invoked as patrons of domestic affairs. According to some, the gods Penates were divided into four classes; the first comprehended all the celestial, the second the sea-gods, the third the gods of hell, and the last all such heroes as had received divine honours after death. The Penates were originally the manes of the dead, but when superstition had taught mankind to pay uncommon reverence to the statues and images of their deceased friends, their attention was soon exchanged for regular worship, and they were admitted by their votaries to share immortality and power over the world, with a Jupiter or a Minerva. The statues of the Penates were generally made with wax, ivory, silver, or earth, according to the affluence of the worshipper, and the only offerings they received were wine, incense, fruits, and sometimes the sacrifice of lambs, sheep, goats, &c. In the early ages of Rome, human sacrifices were offered to them; but Brutus, who expelled the Tarquins, abolished this unnatural custom. When offerings were made to them, their statues were crowned with garlands, poppies, or garlic, and besides the monthly day that was set apart for their worship, their festivals were celebrated during the Saturnalia. Some have confounded the Lares and the Penates, but they were different. Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 2, ch. 27; Against Verres, bk. 2.—Dionysius of Halicarnassus, bk. 1.

[♦] ‘were’ replaced with ‘where’

Pendalium, a promontory of Cyprus.

Pēneia, or Penēis, an epithet applied to Daphne, as daughter of Peneus. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 452.

Penelius, one of the Greeks killed in the Trojan war. Homer, Iliad, bk. 2, li. 494.——A son of Hippalmus among the Argonauts.

Pēnĕlŏpe, a celebrated princess of Greece, daughter of Icarius, and wife of Ulysses king of Ithaca. Her marriage with Ulysses was celebrated about the same time that Menelaus married Helen, and she retired with her husband to Ithaca, against the inclination of her father, who wished to detain her at Sparta, her native country. She soon after became mother of Telemachus, and was obliged to part with great reluctance from her husband, whom the Greeks obliged to go to the Trojan war. See: [Palamedes]. The continuation of hostilities for 10 years made her sad and melancholy; but when Ulysses did not return like the other princes of Greece at the conclusion of the war, her fears and her anxieties were increased. As she received no intelligence of his situation, she was soon beset by a number of importuning suitors, who wished her to believe that her husband was shipwrecked, and that therefore, she ought no longer to expect his return, but forget his loss, and fix her choice and affections on one of her numerous admirers. She received their addresses with coldness and disdain; but as she was destitute of power, and a prisoner, as it were, in their hands, she yet flattered them with hopes and promises, and declared that she would make choice of one of them, as soon as she had finished a piece of tapestry, on which she was employed. The work was done in a dilatory manner, and she baffled their eager expectations, by undoing in the night what she had done in the daytime. This artifice of Penelope has given rise to the proverb of Penelope’s web, which is applied to whatever labour can never be ended. The return of Ulysses, after an absence of 20 years, however, delivered her from her fears and from her dangerous suitors. Penelope is described by Homer as a model of female virtue and chastity, but some more modern writers dispute her claims to modesty and continence, and they represent her as the most debauched and voluptuous of her sex. According to their opinions, therefore, she liberally gratified the desires of her suitors, in the absence of her husband, and had a son whom she called Pan, as if to show that he was the offspring of all her admirers. Some, however, suppose that Pan was son of Penelope by Mercury, and that he was born before his mother’s marriage with Ulysses. The god, as it is said, deceived Penelope, under the form of a beautiful goat, as she was tending her father’s flocks on one of the mountains of Arcadia. After the return of Ulysses, Penelope had a daughter, who was called Ptoliporthe; but if we believe the traditions that were long preserved at Mantinea, Ulysses repudiated his wife for her incontinence during his absence, and Penelope fled to Sparta, and afterwards to Mantinea, where she died and was buried. After the death of Ulysses, according to Hyginus, she married Telegonus, her husband’s son by Circe, by order of the goddess Minerva. Some say that her original name was Arnea, or Amirace, and that she was called Penelope, when some river birds called Penelopes had saved her from the waves of the sea, when her father had exposed her. Icarius had attempted to destroy her, because the oracles had told him that his daughter by Peribœa would be the most dissolute of her sex, and a disgrace to his family. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 10.—Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 12.—Homer, Iliad & Odyssey.—Ovid, Heroides, poem 1; Metamorphoses.—Aristotle, History of Animals, bk. 8.—Hyginus, fable 127.—Aristophanes, The Birds.—Pliny, bk. 37.

Pēneus, a river of Thessaly, rising on mount Pindus, and falling into the Thermean gulf, after a wandering course between mount Ossa and Olympus, through the plains of Tempe. It received its name from Peneus, a son of Oceanus and Tethys. The Peneus anciently inundated the plains of Thessaly, till an earthquake separated the mountains Ossa and Olympus, and formed the beautiful vale of Tempe, where the waters formerly stagnated. From this circumstance, therefore, it obtained the name of Arexes, ab ἀρασσω, scindo. Daphne the daughter of the Peneus, according to the fables of the mythologists, was changed into a laurel on the banks of this river. This tradition arises from the quantity of laurels which grow near the Peneus. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 452, &c.—Strabo, bk. 9.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 3.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 4, li. 317.—Diodorus, bk. 4.——Also a small river of Elis in Peloponnesus, better known under the name of Araxes. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 24.—Strabo, bks. 8 & 11.

Penidas, one of Alexander’s friends, who went to examine Scythia under pretence of an embassy. Curtius, bk. 6, ch. 6.

Penīnæ alpes, a certain part of the Alps. Livy, bk. 21, ch. 38.

Pentapŏlis, a town of India.——A part of Africa near Cyrene. It received this name on account of the five cities which it contained, Cyrene, Arsinoe, Berenice, Ptolemais, or Barce, and Apollonia. Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 5.——Also part of Palestine, containing the five cities of Gaza, Gath, Ascalon, Azotus, and Ekron.

Pentelĭcus, a mountain of Attica, where were found quarries of beautiful marble. Strabo, bk. 9.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 32.

Penthesĭlēa, a queen of the Amazons, daughter of Mars by Otrera, or Orithya. She came to assist Priam in the last years of the Trojan war, and fought against Achilles, by whom she was slain. The hero was so struck with the beauty of Penthesilea, when he stripped her of her arms, that he even shed tears for having too violently sacrificed her to his fury. Thersites laughed at the partiality of the hero, for which ridicule he was instantly killed. Lycophron says that Achilles slew Thersites because he had put out the eyes of Penthesilea when she was yet alive. The scholiast of Lycophron differs from that opinion, and declares, that it was commonly believed that Achilles offered violence to the body of Penthesilea when she was dead, and that Thersites was killed because he had reproached the hero for this infamous action, in the presence of all the Greeks. The death of Thersites so offended Diomedes that he dragged the body of Penthesilea out of the camp, and threw it into the Scamander. It is generally supposed that Achilles was enamoured of the Amazon before he fought with her, and that she had by him a son called Cayster. Dictys Cretensis, bks. 3 & 4.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 31.—Quintus Calaber [Smyrnæus], bk. 1.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1, li. 495; bk. 11, li. 662.—Dares Phrygius.—Lycophron, Cassandra, li. 995, &c.—Hyginus, fable 112.

Pentheus, son of Echion and Agave, was king of Thebes in Bœotia. His refusal to acknowledge the divinity of Bacchus was attended with the most fatal consequences. He forbade his subjects to pay adoration to this new god; and when the Theban women had gone out of the city to celebrate the orgies of Bacchus, Pentheus, apprised of the debauchery which attended the solemnity, ordered the god himself, who conducted the religious multitude, to be seized. His orders were obeyed with reluctance, but when the doors of the prison in which Bacchus had been confined opened of their own accord, Pentheus became more irritated, and commanded his soldiers to destroy the whole band of the bacchanals. This, however, was not executed, for Bacchus inspired the monarch with the ardent desire of seeing the celebration of the orgies. Accordingly, he hid himself in a wood on mount Cithæron, from whence he could see all the ceremonies unperceived. But here his curiosity soon proved fatal; he was descried by the bacchanals, and they all rushed upon him. His mother was the first who attacked him, and her example was instantly followed by her two sisters, Ino and Autonoe, and his body was torn to pieces. Euripides introduces Bacchus among his priestesses, when Pentheus was put to death; but Ovid, who relates the whole in the same manner, differs from the Greek poet only in saying, that not Bacchus himself, but one of his priests, was present. The tree on which the bacchanals found Pentheus, was cut down by the Corinthians, by order of the oracle, and with it two statues of the god of wine were made, and placed in their forum. Hyginus, fable 184.—Theocritus, poem 26.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 3, fables 7, 8, & 9.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 4, li. 469.—Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 5.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 5.—Euripides, Bacchæ.—Seneca, Phœnissæ & Hippolytus.

Penthĭlus, a son of Orestes by Erigone the daughter of Ægysthus, who reigned conjointly with his brother Tisamenus at Argos. He was driven some time after from his throne by the Heraclidæ, and he retired to Achaia, and thence to Lesbos, where he planted a colony. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 4.—Strabo, bk. 13.—Paterculus bk. 1, ch. 1.

Penthylus, a prince of Paphos, who assisted Xerxes with 12 ships. He was seized by the Greeks, to whom he communicated many important things concerning the situation of the Persians, &c. Herodotus, bk. 7, ch. 195.

Pepărēthos, a small island of the Ægean sea, on the coast of Macedonia, about 20 miles in circumference. It abounded in olives, and its wines have always been reckoned excellent. They were not, however, palatable before they were seven years old. Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 12.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 7, li. 470.—Livy, bk. 28, ch. 5; bk. 31, ch. 58.

Pephnos, a town of Laconia. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 26.

Pephrēdo, a sea nymph, daughter of Phorcys and Ceto. She was born with white hair, and thence surnamed Graia. She had a sister called Enyo. Hesiod, Theogony, li. 270.—Apollodorus.

Peræa, or Beræa, a country of Judæa, near Egypt. Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 14.——A part of Caria, opposite to Rhodes. Livy, bk. 32, ch. 33.——A colony of the Mityleneans in Æolia. Livy, bk. 37, ch. 21.

Perasippus, an ambassador sent to Darius by the Lacedæmonians, &c. Curtius, bk. 3, ch. 13.

Percōpe, or Percote, a city which assisted Priam during the Trojan war. See: [Percote].

Percosius, a man acquainted with futurity. He attempted in vain to dissuade his two sons from going to the Trojan war by telling them that they should perish there.

Percōte, a town on the Hellespont, between Abydos and Lampsacus, near the sea-shore. Artaxerxes gave it to Themistocles, to maintain his wardrobe. It is sometimes called Percope. Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 117.—Homer.

Perdiccas, the fourth king of Macedonia, B.C. 729, was descended from Temenus. He increased his dominions by conquest, and in the latter part of his life, he showed his son Argeus where he wished to be buried, and told him, that as long as the bones of his descendants and successors on the throne of Macedonia were laid in the same grave, so long would the crown remain in their family. These injunctions were observed till the time of Alexander, who was buried out of Macedonia. Herodotus, bks. 7 & 8.—Justin, bk. 7, ch. 2.——Another, king of Macedonia, son of Alexander. He reigned during the Peloponnesian war, and assisted the Lacedæmonians against Athens. He behaved with great courage on the throne, and died B.C. 413, after a long reign of glory and independence, during which he had subdued some of his barbarian neighbours.——Another, king of Macedonia, who was supported on his throne by Iphicrates the Athenian against the intrusions of Pausanias. He was killed in a war against the Illyrians, B.C. 360. Justin, bk. 7, &c.——One of the friends and favourites of Alexander the Great. At the king’s death he wished to make himself absolute; and the ring which he had received from the hand of the dying Alexander, seemed in some measure to favour his pretensions. The better to support his claims to the throne, he married Cleopatra the sister of Alexander, and strengthened himself by making a league with Eumenes. His ambitious views were easily discovered by Antigonus, and the rest of the generals of Alexander, who all wished, like Perdiccas, to succeed to the kingdom and honours of the deceased monarch. Antipater, Craterus, and Ptolemy, leagued with Antigonus against him, and after much bloodshed on both sides, Perdiccas was totally ruined, and at last assassinated in his tent in Egypt, by his own officers, about 321 years before the christian era. Perdiccas had not the prudence and the address which were necessary to conciliate the esteem and gain the attachment of his fellow-soldiers, and this impropriety of his conduct alienated the heart of his friends, and at last proved his destruction. Plutarch, Alexander.—Diodorus, bks. 17 & 18.—Curtius, bk. 10.—Cornelius Nepos, Eumenes.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 12.

Perdix, a young Athenian, son of the sister of Dædalus. He invented the saw, and seemed to promise to become a greater artist than had ever been known. His uncle was jealous of his rising fame, and he threw him down from the top of a tower and put him to death. Perdix was changed into a bird which bears his name. Hyginus, fables 39 & 274.—Apollodorus, bk. 4, ch. 15.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 8, li. 220, &c.

Perenna. See: [Anna].

Perennis, a favourite of the emperor Commodus. He is described by some as a virtuous and impartial magistrate, while others paint him as a cruel, violent, and oppressive tyrant, who committed the greatest barbarities to enrich himself. He was put to death for aspiring to the empire. Herodian.

Pereus, a son of Elatus and Laodice, grandson of Arcas. He left only one daughter, called Neæra, who was mother of Auge, and of Cepheus and Lycurgus. Apollodorus, bk. 3.—Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 4.

Perga, a town of Pamphylia. See: [Perge], Livy, bk. 38, ch. 57.

Pergămus (Pergama plural), the citadel of the city of Troy. The word is often used for Troy. It was situated in the most elevated part of the town, on the shores of the river Scamander. Xerxes mounted to the top of this citadel when he reviewed his troops as he marched to invade Greece. Herodotus, bk. 7, ch. 43.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1, li. 466, &c.

Pergamus, now Pergamo, a town of Mysia, on the banks of the Caycus. It was the capital of a celebrated empire called the kingdom of Pergamus, which was founded by Philæterus, a eunuch, whom Lysimachus, after the battle of Ipsus, had entrusted with the treasures which he had obtained in the war. Philæterus made himself master of the treasures and of Pergamus, in which they were deposited, B.C. 283, and laid the foundation of an empire, over which he himself presided for 20 years. His successors began to reign in the following order: His nephew Eumenes ascended the throne 263 B.C.; Attalus, 241; [♦]Eumenes II., 197; Attalus Philadelphus, 159; Attalus Philomator, 138, who, B.C. 133, left the Roman people heirs to his kingdom, as he had no children. The right of the Romans, however, was disputed by a usurper, who claimed the empire as his own, and Aquilius the Roman general was obliged to conquer the different cities one by one, and to gain their submission by poisoning the waters which were conveyed to their houses till the whole was reduced into the form of a dependent province. The capital of the kingdom of Pergamus was famous for a library of 200,000 volumes, which had been collected by the different monarchs who had reigned there. This noble collection was afterwards transported to Egypt by Cleopatra, with the permission of Antony, and it adorned and enriched the Alexandrian library, till it was most fatally destroyed by the Saracens, A.D. 642. Parchment was first invented and made use of at Pergamus, to transcribe books, as Ptolemy king of Egypt had forbidden the exportation of papyrus from his kingdom, in order to prevent Eumenes from making a library as valuable and as choice as that of Alexandria. From this circumstance parchment has been called charta pergamena. Galenus the physician and Apollodorus the mythologist were born there. Æsculapius was the chief deity of the country. Pliny, bks. 5 & 15.—Isidorus, bk. 6, ch. 11.—Strabo, bk. 13.—Livy, bk. 29, ch. 11; bk. 31, ch. 46.—Pliny, bk. 10, ch. 21; bk. 13, ch. 11.——A son of Neoptolemus and Andromache, who, as some suppose, founded Pergamus in Asia. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 11.

[♦] ‘Enmenes’ replaced with ‘Eumenes’

Perge, a town of Pamphylia, where Diana had a magnificent temple, whence her surname of Pergæa. Apollonius the geometrician was born there. Mela, bk. 1, ch. 14.—Strabo, bk. 14.

Pergus, a lake of Sicily near Enna, where Proserpine was carried away by Pluto. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, li. 386.

Perĭander, a tyrant of Corinth, son of Cypselus. The first years of his government were mild and popular, but he soon learnt to become oppressive, when he had consulted the tyrant of Sicily, about the surest way of reigning. He received no other answer but whatever explanation he wished to place on the Sicilian tyrant’s having, in the presence of his messenger, plucked, in a field, all the ears of corn which seemed to tower above the rest. Periander understood the meaning of this answer. He immediately surrounded himself with a numerous guard, and put to death the richest and most powerful citizens of Corinth. He was not only cruel to his subjects, but his family also were objects of his vengeance. He committed incest with his mother, and put to death his wife Melissa, upon false accusation. He also banished his son Lycophron to the island of Corcyra, because the youth pitied and wept at the miserable end of his mother, and detested the barbarities of his father. Periander died about 585 years before the christian era, in his 80th year, and by the meanness of his flatterers, he was reckoned one of the seven wise men of Greece. Though he was tyrannical, yet he patronized the fine arts; he was fond of peace, and he showed himself the friend and the protector of genius and of learning. He used to say that a man ought solemnly to keep his word, but not to hesitate to break it if ever it clashed with his interest. He said also, that not only crimes ought to be punished, but also every wicked and corrupt thought. Diogenes Laërtius in Lives.—Aristotle, bk. 5, Politics.—Pausanias, bk. 2.——A tyrant of Ambracia, whom some rank with the seven wise men of Greece, and not the tyrant of Corinth.——A man distinguished as a physician, but contemptible as a poet. Plutarch.—Lucan.

Periarchus, a naval commander of Sparta, conquered by Conon. Diodorus.

Peribœa, the second wife of Œneus king of Calydon, was daughter of Hipponous. She became mother of Tydeus. Some suppose that Œneus debauched her, and afterwards married her. Hyginus, fable 69.——A daughter of Alcathous, sold by her father on suspicion that she was courted by Telamon, son of Æacus king of Ægina. She was carried to Cyprus, where Telamon the founder of Salamis married her, and she became mother of Ajax. She also married Theseus, according to some. She is also called Eribœa. Pausanias, bk. 1, chs. 17 & 42.—Hyginus, fable 97.——The wife of Polybus king of Corinth, who educated Œdipus as her own child.——A daughter of Eurymedon, who became mother of Nausithous by Neptune.——The mother of Penelope, according to some authors.

Peribomius, a noted debauchee, &c. Juvenal, satire 2, li. 16.

Perĭcles, an Athenian of a noble family, son of Xanthippus and Agariste. He was naturally endowed with great powers, which he improved by attending the lectures of Damon, of Zeno, and of Anaxagoras. Under these celebrated masters, he became a commander, a statesman, and an orator, and gained the affections of the people by his uncommon address and well-directed liberality. When he took a share in the administration of public affairs, he rendered himself popular by opposing Cimon, who was the favourite of the nobility; and to remove every obstacle which stood in the way of his ambition, he lessened the dignity and the power of the court of the Areopagus, which the people had been taught for ages to respect and to venerate. He also attacked Cimon, and caused him to be banished by the ostracism. Thucydides also, who had succeeded Cimon on his banishment, shared the same fate, and Pericles remained for 15 years the sole minister, and, as it may be said, the absolute sovereign of a republic which always showed itself so jealous of her liberties, and which distrusted so much the honesty of her magistrates. In his ministerial capacity Pericles did not enrich himself, but the prosperity of Athens was the object of his administration. He made war against the Lacedæmonians, and restored the temple of Delphi to the care of the Phocians, who had been illegally deprived of that honourable trust. He obtained a victory over the Sicyonians near Nemæa, and waged a successful war against the inhabitants of Samos, at the request of his favourite mistress, Aspasia. The Peloponnesian war was fomented by his ambitious views [See: [Peloponnesiacum bellum]], and when he had warmly represented the flourishing state, the opulence, and actual power of his country, the Athenians did not hesitate a moment to undertake a war against the most powerful republics of Greece, a war which continued for 27 years, and which was concluded by the destruction of their empire, and the demolition of their walls. The arms of the Athenians were for some time crowned with success; but an unfortunate expedition raised clamours against Pericles, and the enraged populace attributed all their losses to him, and to make atonement for their ill success, they condemned him to pay 50 talents. This loss of popular favour by republican caprice, did not so much affect Pericles as the recent death of all his children; and when the tide of unpopularity was passed by, he condescended to come into the public assembly, and to view with secret pride the contrition of his fellow-citizens, who universally begged his forgiveness for the violence which they had offered to his ministerial character. He was again restored to all his honours, and if possible invested with more power and more authority than before; but the dreadful pestilence which had diminished the number of his family proved fatal to him, and about 429 years before Christ in his 70th year, he fell a sacrifice to that terrible malady which robbed Athens of so many of her citizens. Pericles was for 40 years at the head of the administration, 25 with others, and 15 alone; and the flourishing state of the empire during his government gave occasion to the Athenians publicly to lament his loss, and venerate his memory. As he was expiring, and seemingly senseless, his friends that stood around his bed expatiated with warmth on the most glorious actions of his life, and the victories which he had won, when he suddenly interrupted their tears and conversation, by saying that, in mentioning the exploits that he had achieved, and which were common to him with all generals, they had forgotten to mention a circumstance which reflected far greater glory upon him as a minister, a general, and above all, as a man. “It is,” says he, “that not a citizen in Athens has been obliged to put on mourning on my account.” The Athenians were so pleased with his eloquence that they compared it to thunder and lightning, and, as to another father of the gods, they gave him the surname of Olympian. The poets, his flatterers, said that the goddess of persuasion, with all her charms and attractions, dwelt upon his tongue. When he marched at the head of the Athenian armies, Pericles observed that he had the command of a free nation that were Greeks, and citizens of Athens. He also declared, that not only the hand of a magistrate, but also his eyes and his tongue, should be pure and undefiled. Yet great and venerable as his character may appear, we must not forget the follies of Pericles. His vicious partiality for the celebrated courtesan Aspasia subjected him to the ridicule and the censure of his fellow-citizens; but if he triumphed over satire and malevolent remarks, the Athenians had occasion to execrate the memory of a man who by his example corrupted the purity and innocence of their morals, and who made licentiousness respectable, and the indulgence of every impure desire the qualification of the soldier as well as of the senator. Pericles lost all his legitimate children by the pestilence, and to call a natural son by his own name he was obliged to repeal a law which he had made against spurious children, and which he had enforced with great severity. This son, called Pericles, became one [♦]of the 10 generals who succeeded Alcibiades in the administration of affairs, and, like his colleagues, he was condemned to death by the Athenians, after the unfortunate battle of Arginusæ. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 25.—Plutarch, Lives.—Quintilian, bk. 12, ch. 9.—Cicero, On Oratory, bk. 3.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 4, ch. 10.—Xenophon, Hellenica.—Thucydides.

[♦] duplicate ‘of’ removed

Periclymĕnus, one of the 12 sons of Neleus, brother to Nestor, killed by Hercules. He was one of the Argonauts, and had received from Neptune his grandfather the power of changing himself into whatever shape he pleased. Apollodorus.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 12, li. 556.

Peridia, a Theban woman, whose son was killed by Turnus in the Rutulian war. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 12, li. 515.

Periegētes Dionysius, a poet. See: [Dionysius].

Periēres, a son of Æolus, or, according to others, of Cynortas. Apollodorus.——The charioteer of Menœceus. Apollodorus.

Perigĕnes, an officer of Ptolemy, &c.

Perigŏne, a woman who had a son called Melanippus by Theseus. She was daughter of Synnis the famous robber, whom Theseus killed. She married Deioneus the son of Eurytus, by consent of Theseus. Plutarch, Theseus.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 25.

Perilāus, an officer in the army of Alexander the Great. Curtius, bk. 10.——A tyrant of Argos.

Perilēus, a son of Icarius and Peribœa.

Perilla, a daughter of Ovid the poet. She was extremely fond of poetry and literature. Ovid, Fasti, bk. 3, poem 7, li. 1.

Perillus, an ingenious artist at Athens, who made a brazen bull for Phalaris tyrant of Agrigentum. This machine was fabricated to put criminals to death by burning them alive, and it was such that their cries were like the roaring of a bull. When Perillus gave it to Phalaris, the tyrant made the first experiment upon the donor, and cruelly put him to death by lighting a slow fire under the belly of the bull. Pliny, bk. 34, ch. 8.—Ovid, Ars Amatoria, bk. 1, li. 653; Ibis, li. 439.——A lawyer and usurer in the age of Horace. Horace, bk. 2, satire 3, li. 75.

Perimēde, a daughter of Æolus, who married Achelous.——The wife of Licymnius.——A woman skilled in the knowledge of herbs and of enchantments. Theocritus, poem 2.

Perimēla, a daughter of Hippodamus, thrown into the sea for receiving the addresses of the Achelous. She was changed into an island in the Ionian sea, and became one of the Echinades. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 8, li. 690.

Perinthia, a play of Menander’s. Terence, Andria, prologue, li. 9.

Pĕrinthus, a town of Thrace, on the Propontis, anciently surnamed Mygdonica. It was afterwards called Heraclea, in honour of Hercules, and now Erekli. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 2.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 29.—Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 11.—Livy, bk. 33, ch. 30.

Peripatetĭci, a sect of philosophers at Athens, disciples to Aristotle. They derived this name from the place where they were taught, called Peripaton, in the Lyceum, or because they received the philosopher’s lectures as they walked (περιπατουντες). The Peripatetics acknowledged the dignity of human nature, and placed their summum bonum, not in the pleasures of passive sensation, but in the due exercise of the moral and intellectual faculties. The habit of this exercise, when guided by reason, constituted the highest excellence of man. The philosopher contended that our own happiness chiefly depends upon ourselves, and though he did not require in his followers that self-command to which others pretended, yet he allowed a moderate degree of perturbation, as becoming human nature, and he considered a certain sensibility of passion totally necessary, as by resentment we are enabled to repel injuries, and the smart which past calamities have inflicted renders us careful to avoid the repetition. Cicero, Academica, bk. 2, &c.

Perĭphas, a man who attempted, with Pyrrhus, Priam’s palace, &c. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 476.——A son of Ægyptus, who married Actæa. Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 1.——One of the Lapithæ. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 12, li. 449.——One of the first kings of Attica, before the age of Cecrops, according to some authors.

Periphēmus, an ancient hero of Greece, to whom Solon sacrificed at Salamis, by order of the oracle.

[♦]Periphētes, a robber of Attica, son of Vulcan, destroyed by Theseus. He is also called Corynetes. Hyginus, fable 38.—Diodorus, bk. 5.

[♦] ‘Periphātes’ replaced with ‘Periphētes’
Resorted in alphebetical order.

Perisades, a people of Illyricum.

Peristhĕnes, a son of Ægyptus, who married Electra. Apollodorus.

Peritanus, an Arcadian who enjoyed the company of Helen after her elopement with Paris. The offended lover punished the crime by mutilation, whence mutilated persons were called Peritani in Arcadia. Ptolemy Hephæstion, bk. 1, near the beginning.

Peritas, a favourite dog of Alexander the Great, in whose honour the monarch built a city.

Peritonium, a town of Egypt, on the western side of the Nile, esteemed of great importance, as being one of the keys of the country. Antony was defeated there by Caius Gallus the lieutenant of Augustus.

Permessus, a river of Bœotia, rising in mount Helicon, and flowing all round it. It received its name from Permessus, the father of a nymph called Aganippe, who also gave her name to one of the fountains of Helicon. The river Permessus, as well as the fountain Aganippe, were sacred to the Muses. Strabo, bk. 8.—Propertius, bk. 2, poem 8.

Pero, or Perone, a daughter of Neleus king of Pylos by Chloris. Her beauty drew many admirers, but she married Bias son of Amythaon, because he had by the assistance of his brother Melampus [See: [Melampus]], and according to her father’s desire, recovered some oxen which Hercules had stolen away; and she became mother of Talaus. Homer, Odyssey, bk. 11, li. 284.—Propertius, bk. 2, poem 2, li. 17.—Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 36.——A daughter of Cimon, remarkable for her filial affection. When her father had been sent to prison, where his judges had condemned him to starve, she supported his life by giving him the milk of her breasts, as to her own child. Valerius Maximus, bk. 5, ch. 4.

Peroe, a fountain of Bœotia, called after Peroe, a daughter of the Asopus. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 4.

Perola, a Roman who meditated the death of Hannibal in Italy. His father Pacuvius dissuaded him from assassinating the Carthaginian general.

Perpenna Marcus, a Roman who conquered Aristonicus in Asia, and took him prisoner. He died B.C. 130.——Another, who joined the rebellion of Sertorius, and opposed Pompey. He was defeated by Metellus, and some time after he had the meanness to assassinate Sertorius, whom he had invited to his house. He fell into the hands of Pompey, who ordered him to be put to death. Plutarch, Sertorius.—Paterculus, bk. 2, ch. 30.——A Greek who obtained the consulship at Rome. Valerius Maximus, bk. 3, ch. 4.

Perperēne, a place of Phrygia, where, as some suppose, Paris adjudged the prize of beauty to Venus. Strabo, bk. 5.

Perranthes, a hill of Epirus, near Ambracia. Livy, bk. 38, ch. 4.

Perrhæbia, a part of Thessaly situate on the borders of the Peneus, extending between the town of Atrax and the vale of Tempe. The inhabitants were driven from their possessions by the Lapithæ, and retired into Ætolia, where part of the country received the name of Perrhæbia. Propertius, bk. 2, poem 5, li. 33—Strabo, bk. 9.—Livy, bk. 33, ch. 34; bk. 39, ch. 34.

Persa, or Perseis, one of the Oceanides, mother of Æetes, Circe, and Pasiphae by Apollo. Hesiod, Theogony.—Apollodorus, bk. 3.

Persæ, the inhabitants of Persia. See: [Persia].

Persæus, a philosopher intimate with Antigonus, by whom he was appointed over the Acrocorinth. He flourished B.C. 274. Diogenes Laërtius, Zeno of Citium.

Persēe, a fountain near Mycenæ, in Peloponnesus. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 16.

Persēis, one of the Oceanides.——A patronymic of Hecate, as daughter of Perses. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 7, li. 69.

Persĕphŏne, a daughter of Jupiter and Ceres, called also Proserpine. See: [Proserpina].——The mother of Amphion by Jasus.

Persĕpŏlis, a celebrated city, the capital of the Persian empire. It was laid in ruins by Alexander after the conquest of Darius. The reason of this is unknown. Diodorus says that the sight of about 800 Greeks, whom the Persians had shamefully mutilated, so irritated Alexander, that he resolved to punish the barbarity of the inhabitants of Persepolis, and of the neighbouring country, by permitting his soldiers to plunder their capital. Others suppose that Alexander set it on fire at the instigation of Thias, one of his courtesans, when he had passed the day in drinking and in riot and debauchery. The ruins of Persepolis, now Estakar, or Tehel-Minar, still astonish the modern traveller by their grandeur and magnificence. Curtius, bk. 5, ch. 7.—Diodorus, bk. 17, &c.—Arrian.—Plutarch, Alexander.—Justin, bk. 11, ch. 14.

Perses, a son of Perseus and Andromeda. From him the Persians, who were originally called Cephenes, received their name. Herodotus, bk. 7, ch. 61.——A king of Macedonia. See: [Perseus].

Perseus, a son of Jupiter and Danae, the daughter of Acrisius. As Acrisius had confined his daughter in a brazen tower to prevent her becoming a mother, because he was to perish, according to the words of an oracle, by the hands of his daughter’s son, Perseus was no sooner born [See: [Danae]] than he was thrown into the sea with his mother Danae. The hopes of Acrisius were frustrated; the slender boat which carried Danae and her son was driven by the winds on the coasts of the island of Seriphos, one of the Cyclades, where they were found by a fisherman called Dictys, and carried to Polydectes the king of the place. They were treated with great humanity, and Perseus was entrusted to the care of the priests of Minerva’s temple. His rising genius and manly courage, however, soon displeased Polydectes, and the monarch, who wished to offer violence to Danae, feared the resentment of her son. Yet Polydectes resolved to remove every obstacle. He invited all his friends to a sumptuous entertainment, and it was requisite that all such as came should present the monarch with a beautiful horse. Perseus was in the number of the invited, and the more particularly so, as Polydectes knew that he could not receive from him the present which he expected from all the rest. Nevertheless, Perseus, who wished not to appear inferior to the others in magnificence, told the king that as he could not give him a horse, he would bring him the head of Medusa, the only one of the Gorgons who was subject to mortality. The offer was doubly agreeable to Polydectes, as it would remove Perseus from Seriphos, and on account of its seeming impossibility, the attempt might perhaps end in his ruin. But the innocence of Perseus was patronized by the gods. Pluto lent him his helmet, which had the wonderful power of making its bearer invisible; Minerva gave him her buckler, which was as resplendent as glass; and he received from Mercury wings and the talaria, with a short dagger, made of diamonds, and called herpe. According to some it was from Vulcan, and not from Mercury, that he received the herpe, which was in form like a scythe. With these arms Perseus began his expedition, and traversed the air, conducted by the goddess Minerva. He went to the Graiæ, the sisters of the Gorgons, who, according to the poets, had wings like the Gorgons, but only one eye and one tooth between them all, of which they made use, each in her turn. They were three in number, according to Æschylus and Apollodorus; or only two, according to Ovid and Hesiod. With Pluto’s helmet, which rendered him invisible, Perseus was enabled to steal their eye and their tooth while they were asleep, and he returned them only when they had informed him where their sisters the Gorgons resided. When he had received every necessary information, Perseus flew to the habitation of the Gorgons, which was situate beyond the western ocean, according to Hesiod and Apollodorus; or in Libya, according to Ovid and Lucan; or in the deserts of Asiatic Scythia, according to Æschylus. He found these monsters asleep; and as he knew that if he fixed his eyes upon them, he should be instantly changed into a stone, he continually looked on his shield, which reflected all the objects as clearly as the best of glasses. He approached them, and with a courage which the goddess Minerva supported, he cut off Medusa’s head with one blow. The noise awoke the two immortal sisters, but Pluto’s helmet rendered Perseus invisible, and the attempts of the Gorgons to revenge Medusa’s death proved fruitless; the conqueror made his way through the air, and from the blood which dropped from Medusa’s head sprang all those innumerable serpents which have ever since infested the sandy deserts of Libya. Chrysaor also, with the golden sword, sprung from these drops of blood, as well as the horse Pegasus, which immediately flew through the air, and stopped on mount Helicon, where he became the favourite of the Muses. Meantime Perseus had continued his journey across the deserts of Libya; but the approach of night obliged him to alight in the territories of Atlas king of Mauritania. He went to the monarch’s palace, where he hoped to find a kind reception by announcing himself as the son of Jupiter, but in this he was disappointed. Atlas recollected that, according to an ancient oracle, his gardens were to be robbed of their fruit by one of the sons of Jupiter, and therefore he not only refused Perseus the hospitality which he demanded, but he even offered violence to his person. Perseus, finding himself inferior to his powerful enemy, showed him Medusa’s head, and instantly Atlas was changed into a large mountain which bore the same name in the deserts of Africa. On the morrow Perseus continued his flight, and as he passed across the territories of Libya, he discovered, on the coasts of Æthiopia, the naked Andromeda, exposed to a sea monster. He was struck at the sight, and offered her father Cepheus to deliver her from instant death, if he obtained her in marriage as a reward of his labours. Cepheus consented, and immediately Perseus raised himself in the air, flew towards the monster, which was advancing to devour Andromeda, and he plunged his dagger in [♦]its right shoulder, and destroyed it. This happy event was attended with the greatest rejoicings. Perseus raised three altars to Mercury, Jupiter, and Pallas, and after he had offered the sacrifice of a calf, a bullock, and a heifer, the nuptials were celebrated with the greatest festivity. The universal joy, however, was soon disturbed. Phineus, Andromeda’s uncle, entered the palace with a number of armed men, and attempted to carry away the bride, whom he had courted and admired long before the arrival of Perseus. The father and mother of Andromeda interfered, but in vain; a bloody battle ensued, and Perseus must have fallen a victim to the rage of Phineus, had not he defended himself at last with the same arms which proved fatal to Atlas. He showed the Gorgon’s head to his adversaries, and they were instantly turned to stone, each in the posture and attitude in which he then stood. The friends of Cepheus, and such as supported Perseus, shared not the fate of Phineus, as the hero had previously warned them of the power of Medusa’s head, and of the services which he received from it. Soon after this memorable adventure Perseus retired to Seriphos, at the very moment that his mother Danae fled to the altar of Minerva, to avoid the pursuit of Polydectes, who attempted to offer her violence. Dictys, who had saved her from the sea, and who, as some say, was the brother of Polydectes, defended her against the attempts of her enemies, and therefore Perseus, sensible of his merit, and of his humanity, placed him on the throne of Seriphos, after he had with Medusa’s head turned into stones the wicked Polydectes, and the officers who were the associates of his guilt. He afterwards restored to Mercury his talaria and his wings, to Pluto his helmet, to Vulcan his sword, and to Minerva her shield; but as he was more particularly indebted to the goddess of wisdom for her assistance and protection, he placed the Gorgon’s head on her shield, or rather, according to the more received opinion, on her ægis. After he had finished these celebrated exploits, Perseus expressed a wish to return to his native country; and accordingly he embarked for the Peloponnesus, with his mother and Andromeda. When he reached the Peloponnesian coasts he was informed that Teutamias king of Larissa was then celebrating funeral games in honour of his father. This intelligence drew him to Larissa to signalize himself in throwing the quoit, of which, according to some, he was the inventor. But here he was attended by an evil fate, and had the misfortune to kill a man with a quoit which he had thrown in the air. This was no other than his grandfather Acrisius, who, on the first intelligence that his grandson had reached the Peloponnesus, fled from his kingdom of Argos to the court of his friend and ally Teutamias, to prevent the fulfilling of the oracle which had obliged him to treat his daughter with so much barbarity. Some suppose, with Pausanias, that Acrisius had gone to Larissa to be reconciled to his grandson, whose fame had been spread in every city of Greece; and Ovid maintains that the grandfather was under the strongest obligations to his son-in-law, as through him he had received his kingdom, from which he had been forcibly driven by the sons of his brother Prœtus. This unfortunate murder greatly depressed the spirits of Perseus: by the death of Acrisius he was entitled to the throne of Argos, but he refused to reign there; and to remove himself from a place which reminded him of the parricide which he had unfortunately committed, he exchanged his kingdom for that of Tirynthus, and the maritime coast of Argolis, where Megapenthes the son of Prœtus then reigned. When he had finally settled in this part of the Peloponnesus, he determined to lay the foundations of a new city, which he made the capital of his dominions, and which he called Mycenæ, because the pommel of his sword, called by the Greeks myces, had fallen there. The time of his death is unknown, yet it is universally agreed that he received divine honours like the rest of the ancient heroes. He had statues at Mycenæ, and in the island of Seriphos, and the Athenians raised him a temple, in which they consecrated an altar in honour of Dictys, who had treated Danae and her infant son with so much paternal tenderness. The Egyptians also paid particular honour to his memory, and asserted that he often appeared among them wearing shoes two cubits long, which was always interpreted as a sign of fertility. Perseus had by Andromeda, Alceus, Sthenelus, Nestor, Electryon, and Gorgophone, and after death, according to some mythologists, he became a constellation in the heavens. Herodotus, bk. 2, ch. 91.—Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 4, &c.—Pausanias, bk. 2, chs. 16 & 18; bk. 3, ch. 17, &c.—Apollonius, Argonautica, bk. 4, li. 1509.—Silius Italicus, bk. 9, li. 442.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 4, fable 16; bk. 5, fable 1, &c.—Lucan, bk. 9, li. 668.—Hyginus, fable 64.—Hesiod, Theogony, li. 270, & Shield of Heracles.—Pindar, Pythian, li. 7, & Olympian, bk. 3.—Silius Italicus, bk. 9.—Propertius, bk. 2.—Athenæus, bk. 13.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 14.—Tzetzes, on Lycophron, ch. 17.——A son of Nestor and Anaxibia. Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 9.——A writer who published a treatise on the republic of Sparta.——A philosopher, disciple to Zeno. See: [Persæus].

[♦] ‘his’ replaced with ‘its’

Perseus, or Perses, a son of Philip king of Macedonia. He distinguished himself, like his father, by his enmity to the Romans, and when he had made sufficient preparations, he declared war against them. His operations, however, were slow and injudicious; he wanted courage and resolution, and though he at first obtained some advantage over the Roman armies, yet his avarice and his timidity proved destructive to his cause. When Paulus was appointed to the command of the Roman armies in Macedonia, Perseus showed his inferiority by his imprudent encampments, and when he had at last yielded to the advice of his officers, who recommended a general engagement, and drawn up his forces near the walls of Pydna, B.C. 168, he was the first who ruined his own cause, and, by flying as soon as the battle was begun, he left the enemy masters of the field. From [♦]Pydna, Perseus fled to Samothrace, but he was soon discovered in his obscure retreat, and brought into the presence of the Roman conqueror, where the meanness of his behaviour exposed him to ridicule, and not to mercy. He was carried to Rome, and dragged along the streets of the city to adorn the triumph of the conqueror. His family was also exposed to the sight of the Roman populace, who shed tears on viewing in their streets, dragged like a slave, a monarch who had once defeated their armies, and spread alarm all over Italy, by the greatness of his military preparations, and by his bold undertakings. Perseus died in prison, or, according to some, he was put to a shameful death the first year of his captivity. He had two sons, Philip and Alexander, and one daughter, whose name is not known. Alexander, the younger of these, was hired to a Roman carpenter, and led the greatest part of his life in obscurity, till his ingenuity raised him to notice. He was afterwards made secretary to the senate. Livy, bk. 40, &c.—Justin, bk. 33, ch. 1, &c.—Plutarch, Æmilius Paulus.—Florus, bk. 2, ch. 12.—Propertius, bk. 4, poem 12, li. 39.

[♦] ‘Pydua’ replaced with ‘Pydna’

Persia, a celebrated kingdom of Asia, which, in its ancient state, extended from the Hellespont to the Indus, above 2800 miles, and from Pontus to the shores of Arabia, above 2000 miles. As a province, Persia was but small, and according to the description of Ptolemy, it was bounded on the north by Media, west by Susiana, south by the Persian gulf, and east by Carmania. The empire of Persia, or the Persian monarchy, was first founded by Cyrus the Great, about 559 years before the christian era, and under the succeeding monarchs it became one of the most considerable and powerful kingdoms of the earth. The kings of Persia began to reign in the following order: Cyrus, B.C. 559; Cambyses 529; and, after the usurpation of Smerdis for seven months, Darius, 521; Xerxes the Great, 485; Artabanus seven months, and Artaxerxes Longimanus, 464; Xerxes II., 425; Sogdianus seven months, 424; Darius II., or Nothus, 423; Artaxerxes II., or Memnon, 404; Artaxerxes III., or Ochus, 358; Arses, or Arogus, 337; and Darius III., or Codomanus, 335, who was conquered by Alexander the Great, 331. The destruction of the Persian monarchy by the Macedonians was easily effected, and from that time Persia became tributary to the Greeks. After the death of Alexander, when the Macedonian empire was divided among the officers of the deceased conqueror, Seleucus Nicanor made himself master of the Persian provinces, till the revolt of the Parthians introduced new revolutions in the east. Persia was partly reconquered from the Greeks, and remained tributary to the Parthians for near 500 years. After this the sovereignty was again placed into the hands of the Persians, by the revolt of Artaxerxes, a common soldier, A.D. 229, who became the founder of the second Persian monarchy, which proved so inimical to the power of the Roman emperors. In their national character, the Persians were warlike, they were early taught to ride, and to handle the bow, and by the manly exercises of hunting, they were inured to bear the toils and fatigues of a military life. Their national valour, however, soon degenerated, and their want of employment at home soon rendered them unfit for war. In the reign of Xerxes, when the empire of Persia was in its most flourishing state, a small number of Greeks were enabled repeatedly to repel for three successive days an almost innumerable army. This celebrated action, which happened at Thermopylæ, shows in a strong light the superiority of the Grecian soldiers over the Persians, and the battles that before, and a short time after, were fought between the two nations at Marathon, Salamis, Platæa, and Mycale, are again an incontestible proof that these Asiatics had more reliance upon their numbers and upon the splendour and richness of their arms, than upon the valour and the discipline of their troops. Their custom, too prevalent among the eastern nations, of introducing luxury into the camp, proved also in some measure destructive to their military reputation, and the view which the ancients give us of the army of Xerxes, of his cooks, stage-dancers, concubines, musicians, and perfumers, is no very favourable sign of the sagacity of a monarch, who, by his nod, could command millions of men to flock to his standard. In their religion the Persians were very superstitious; they paid the greatest veneration to the sun, the moon, and the stars, and they offered sacrifices to fire, but the supreme Deity was never represented by statues among them. They permitted polygamy, and it was no incest among them to marry a sister or a mother. In their punishments they were extremely severe, even to barbarity. The monarch always appeared with the greatest pomp and dignity; his person was attended by a guard of 15,000 men, and he had besides a body of 10,000 chosen horsemen, called immortal. He styled himself, like the rest of the eastern monarchs, the king of kings, as expressive of his greatness and his power. The Persians were formerly called Cephenes, Achæmenians, and Artæi, and they are often confounded with the Parthians by the ancient poets. They received the name of Persians from Perses the son of Perseus and Andromeda, who is supposed to have settled among them. Persepolis was the capital of the country. Curtius, bk. 4, ch. 14; bk. 5, ch. 3.—Plutarch, Artaxerxes, Alexander, &c.—Mela, bk. 1, &c.—Strabo, bk. 2, ch. 15.—Xenophon, Cyropædia.—Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 125, &c.—Apollodorus, bk. 2.—Marcellinus, ch. 23.

Persĭcum mare, or Persicus sinus, a part of the Indian ocean on the coast of Persia and Arabia, now called the gulf of Balgora.

Persis, a province of Persia, bounded by Media, Carmania, Susiana, and the Persian gulf. It is often taken for Persia itself.

Aulus Persius Flaccus, a Latin poet of Volaterræ. He was of an equestrian family, and he made himself known by his intimacy with the most illustrious Romans of the age. The early part of his life was spent in his native town, and at the age of 16 he was removed to Rome, where he studied philosophy under Cornutus the celebrated stoic. He also received the instructions of Palemon the grammarian, and Virginius the rhetorician. Naturally of a mild disposition, his character was unimpeached, his modesty remarkable, and his benevolence universally admired. He distinguished himself by his satirical humour, and made the faults of the orators and poets of his age, the subject of his poems. He did not even spare Nero, and the more effectually to expose the emperor to ridicule, he introduced into his satires some of his verses. The torva mimalloneis implerunt cornua bombis, with the three following verses, are Nero’s, according to some. But though he was so severe upon the vicious and ignorant, he did not forget his friendship for Cornutus, and he showed his regard for his character and abilities by making mention of his name with great propriety in his satires. It was by the advice of his learned preceptor that he corrected one of his poems in which he had compared Nero to Midas, and at his representation he altered the words Auriculas asini Mida rex habet, into Auriculas asini quis non habet? Persius died in the 30th year of his age, A.D. 62, and left all his books, which consisted of 700 volumes, and a large sum of money, to his preceptor; but Cornutus only accepted the books, and returned the money to the sisters and friends of the deceased. The satires of Persius are six in number, blamed by some for obscurity of style and of language. But though they may appear almost unintelligible to some, it ought to be remembered that they were read with pleasure and with avidity by his contemporaries, and that the only difficulties which now appear to the moderns, arise from their not knowing the various characters which they described, the vices which they lashed, and the errors which they censured. The satires of Persius are generally printed with those of Juvenal, the best editions of which will be found to be by Hennin, 4to, Leiden, 1695, and by Hawkey, 12mo, Dublin, 1746. The best edition of Persius, separate, is that of Meric Casaubon, 12mo, London, 1647. Martial.—Quintilian, bk. 10, ch. 1.—Augustine, de Magistro, ch. 9.—Lactantius.——A man whose quarrel with Rupilius is mentioned in a ridiculous manner by Horace, satire 7. He is called Hybrida, as being son of a Greek by a Roman woman.

Pertĭnax Publius Helvius, a Roman emperor after the death of Commodus. He was descended from an obscure family, and, like his father, who was either a slave or the son of a manumitted slave, he for some time followed the mean employment of drying wood and making charcoal. His indigence, however, did not prevent him from receiving a liberal education, and indeed he was for some time employed in teaching a number of pupils the Greek and the Roman languages in Etruria. He left this laborious profession for a military life, and by his valour and intrepidity, he gradually rose to offices of the highest trust in the army, and was made consul by Marcus Aurelius for his eminent services. He was afterwards entrusted with the government of Mœsia, and at last he presided over the city of Rome as governor. When Commodus was murdered, Pertinax was universally selected to succeed to the imperial throne, and his refusal, and the plea of old age and increasing infirmities, did not prevent his being saluted emperor and Augustus. He acquiesced with reluctance, but his mildness, his economy, and the popularity of his administration, convinced the senate and the people of the prudence and the justice of their choice. He forbade his name to be inscribed on such places or estates as were part of the imperial domain, and exclaimed that they belonged not to him, but to the public. He melted all the silver statues which had been raised to his vicious predecessor, and he exposed to public sale all his concubines, his horses, his arms, and all the instruments of his pleasure and extravagance. With the money raised from these he enriched the empire, and was enabled to abolish all the taxes which Commodus had laid on the rivers, ports, and highways through the empire. This patriotic administration gained him the affection of the worthiest and most discerning of his subjects, but the extravagant and luxurious raised their clamours against him, and when Pertinax attempted to introduce among the pretorian guards that discipline which was so necessary to preserve the peace and tranquillity of Rome, the flames of rebellion were kindled, and the minds of the soldiers totally alienated. Pertinax was apprised of this mutiny, but he refused to fly at the hour of danger. He scorned the advice of his friends who wished him to withdraw from the impending storm, and he unexpectedly appeared before the seditious pretorians, and without fear or concern, boldly asked them whether they, who were bound to defend the person of their prince and emperor, were come to betray him and to shed his blood. His undaunted assurance and his intrepidity would have had the desired effect, and the soldiers had already begun to retire, when one of the most seditious advanced and darted his javelin at the emperor’s breast, exclaiming, “The soldiers send you this.” The rest immediately followed the example, and Pertinax, muffling up his head, and calling upon Jupiter to avenge his death, remained unmoved, and was instantly dispatched. His head was cut off, and carried upon the point of a spear as in triumph to the camp. This happened on the 28th of March, A.D. 193. Pertinax reigned only 87 days, and his death was the more universally lamented, as it proceeded from a seditious tumult, and robbed the Roman empire of a wise, virtuous, and benevolent emperor. Dio Cassius.—Herodian.—Capitol.

Pertunda, a goddess at Rome, who presided over the consummation of marriage. Her statue was generally placed in the bridal chamber. Varro, in Augustine, City of God, bk. 6, ch. 9.

Perŭsia, now Perugia, an ancient town of Etruria on the Tiber, built by Ocnus. Lucius Antonius was besieged there by Augustus, and obliged to surrender. Strabo, bk. 5.—Lucan, bk. 1, li. 41.—Paterculus, bk. 2, ch. 74.—Livy, bk. 9, ch. 37; bk. 10, chs. 30 & 37.

Pescennius. See: [Niger].——A man intimate with Cicero.

Pessīnus (untis), a town of Phrygia, where Atys, as some suppose, was buried. It is particularly famous for a temple and a statue of the goddess Cybele, who was from thence called Pessinuntia. Strabo, bk. 12.—Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 17.—Livy, bk. 29, chs. 10 & 11.

Petălia, a town of Eubœa.

Petălus, a man killed by Perseus at the court of Cepheus. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, li. 115.

Petelia, or Petellia, a town. See: [Petilia].

Petelīnus lacus, a lake near one of the gates of Rome. Livy, bk. 6, ch. 20.

Peteon, a town of Bœotia. Statius, Thebaid, bk. 7, li. 333.—Strabo, bk. 9.

Peteus, a son of Orneus, and grandson of Erechtheus. He reigned in Attica, and became father of Menestheus, who went with the Greeks to the Trojan war. He is represented by some of the ancients as a monster, half a man and half a beast. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 10.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 35.

Petilia, now Strongoli, a town of Magna Græcia, the capital of Lucania, built or perhaps only repaired by Philoctetes, who, after his return from the Trojan war, left his country Melibœa, because his subjects had revolted. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 4.—Livy, bk. 23, ch. 20.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 402.—Strabo, bk. 6.

Petilia lex, was enacted by Petilius the tribune to make an inquiry and know how much money had been obtained from the conquests over king Antiochus.

Petilii, two tribunes who accused Scipio Africanus of extortion. He was acquitted.

Petīlius, a pretor who persuaded the people of Rome to burn the books which had been found in Numa’s tomb, about 400 years after his death. His advice was followed. Plutarch, Numa.——A plebeian decemvir, &c.——A governor of the capitol, who stole away the treasures entrusted to his care. He was accused, but, though guilty, he was acquitted, as being the friend of Augustus. Horace, bk. 1, satire 4, li. 94.

Petosīrīs, a celebrated mathematician of Egypt. Juvenal, satire 6, li. 580.

Petra, the capital town of Arabia Petræa. Strabo, bk. 16.——A town of Sicily, near Hybla, whose inhabitants are called Petrini and Petrenses.——A town of Thrace. Livy, bk. 40, ch. 22.——Another of Pieria in Macedonia. Livy, bk. 39, ch. 26.—Cicero, Against Verres, bk. 1, ch. 39.——An elevated place near Dyrrachium, Lucan, bk. 6, lis. 16 & 70.—Cæsar, Civil War, bk. 3, ch. 40.——Another in Elis.——Another near Corinth.

Petræa, one of the Oceanides. Hesiod, Theogony.——A part of Arabia, which has Syria at the east, Egypt on the west, Palestine on the north, and Arabia Felix at the south. This part of Arabia was rocky, whence it has received its name. It was for the most part also covered with barren sands, and was interspersed with some fruitful spots. Its capital was called Petra.

Petreius, a Roman soldier who killed his tribune during the Cimbrian wars, because he hesitated to attack the enemy. He was rewarded for his valour with a crown of grass. Pliny, bk. 22, ch. 6.——A lieutenant of Caius Antonius, who defeated the troops of Catiline. He took the part of Pompey against Julius Cæsar. When Cæsar had been victorious in every part of the world, Petreius, who had retired into Africa, attempted to destroy himself by fighting with his friend king Juba in single combat. Juba was killed first, and Petreius obliged one of his slaves to run him through. Sallust, Catilinæ Coniuratio.—Appian.—Cæsar, bk. 1, Civil War.——A centurion in Cæsar’s army in Gaul, &c. Some read Petronius.

Petrĭnum, a town of Campania. Horace, bk. 1, ltr. 5, li. 5.

Petrocorii, the inhabitants of the modern town of Perigord in France. Cæsar, bk. 7, Gallic War, ch. 75.

Petronia, the wife of Vitellius. Tacitus, Histories, bk. 2, ch. 64.

Petrōnius, a governor of Egypt, appointed to succeed Gallus. He behaved with great humanity to the Jews, and made war against Candace queen of Æthiopia. Strabo, bk. 17.——A favourite of Nero, put to death by Galba.——A governor of Britain.——A tribune killed in Parthia with Crassus.——A man banished by Nero to the Cyclades, when Piso’s conspiracy was discovered. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 15.——A governor of Britain in Nero’s reign. He was put to death by Galba’s orders.——Maximus, a Roman emperor. See: [Maximus].——Arbiter, a favourite of the emperor Nero, and one of the ministers and associates of all his pleasures and his debauchery. He was naturally fond of pleasure and effeminate, and he passed his whole nights in revels and the days in sleep. He indulged himself in all the delights and gaieties of life; but though he was the most voluptuous of the age, yet he moderated his pleasures, and wished to appear curious and refined in luxury and extravagance. Whatever he did seemed to be performed with an air of unconcern and negligence; he was affable in his behaviour, and his witticisms and satirical remarks appeared artless and natural. He was appointed proconsul of Bithynia, and afterwards he was rewarded with the consulship; in both of which honourable employments he behaved with all the dignity which became one of the successors of a Brutus or a Scipio. With his office he laid down his artificial gravity, and gave himself up to the pursuit of pleasure; the emperor became more attached to him, and seemed fonder of his company; but he did not long enjoy the imperial favours. Tigellinus, likewise one of Nero’s favourites, jealous of his fame, accused him of conspiring against the emperor’s life. The accusation was credited, and Petronius immediately resolved to withdraw himself from Nero’s punishment by a voluntary death. This was performed in a manner altogether unprecedented, A.D. 66. Petronius ordered his veins to be opened; but without the eagerness of terminating his agonies, he had them closed at intervals. Some time after they were opened, and as if he wished to die in the same careless and unconcerned manner as he had lived, he passed his time in discoursing with his friends upon trifles, and listened with the greatest avidity to love verses, amusing stories, or laughable epigrams. Sometimes he manumitted his slaves or punished them with stripes. In this ludicrous manner he spent his last moments, till nature was exhausted; and before he expired he wrote an epistle to the emperor, in which he had described with a masterly hand his nocturnal extravagances, and the daily impurities of his actions. This letter was carefully sealed, and after he had conveyed it privately to the emperor, Petronius broke his signet, that it might not after his death become a snare to the innocent. Petronius distinguished himself by his writings, as well as by his luxury and voluptuousness. He is the author of many elegant but obscene compositions still extant, among which is a poem on the civil wars of Pompey and Cæsar, superior in some respects to the Pharsalia of Lucan. There is also the feast of Trimalcion, in which he paints with too much licentiousness the pleasures and the debaucheries of a corrupted court and of an extravagant monarch; reflections on the instability of human life; a poem on the vanity of dreams; another on the education of the Roman youth; two treatises, &c. The best editions of Petronius are those of Burman, 4to, Utrecht, 1709, and Reinesius, 8vo, 1731.

Pettius, a friend of Horace, to whom the poet addressed his eleventh epode.

Petus, an architect. See: [Satyrus].

Peuce, a small island at the mouth of the Danube. The inhabitants are called Peucæ and Peucini. Strabo, bk. 7.—Lucan, bk. 3, li. 202.—Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 12.

Peucestes, a Macedonian set over Egypt by Alexander. He received Persia at the general division of the Macedonian empire at the king’s death. He behaved with great cowardice after he had joined himself to Eumenes. Cornelius Nepos, Eumenes.—Plutarch.—Curtius, bk. 4, ch. 8.——An island which was visited by the Argonauts at their return from the conquest of the golden fleece.

Peucĕtia, a part of Magna Græcia in Italy, at the north of the bay of Tarentum, between the Apennines and Lucania, called also Mesapia and Calabria. It received its name from Peucetus the son of Lycaon, of Arcadia. Strabo, bk. 6.—Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 11.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 14, li. 513.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 13.

Peucīni, a nation of Germany, called also Basternæ. Tacitus, Germania, ch. 46.

Peucolāus, an officer who conspired with Dymnus against Alexander’s life. Curtius, bk. 6.——Another, set over Sogdiana. Curtius, bk. 7.

Pexodōrus, a governor of Caria, who offered to give his daughter in marriage to Aridæus the illegitimate son of Philip. Plutarch.

Phacium, a town of Thessaly. Livy, bk. 32, ch. 13; bk. 36, ch. 13.

Phacūsa, a town of Egypt on the eastern mouth of the Nile.

Phæa, a celebrated sow which infested the neighbourhood of Cromyon. It was destroyed by Theseus as he was travelling from Trœzene to Athens to make himself known to his father. Some suppose that the boar of Calydon sprung from this sow. Phæa, according to some authors, was no other than a woman who prostituted herself to strangers, whom she murdered and afterwards plundered. Plutarch, Theseus.—Strabo, bk. 8.

Phæācia, an island of the Ionian sea, near the coast of Epirus, anciently called Scheria, and afterwards Corcyra. The inhabitants, called Phæaces, were a luxurious and dissolute people, from which reason a glutton was generally stigmatized by the epithet of Phæax. When Ulysses was shipwrecked on the coast of Phæacia, Alcinous was then king of the island, whose gardens have been greatly celebrated. Horace, bk. 1, ltr. 15, li. 24.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 13, li. 719.—Strabo, bks. 6 & 7.—Propertius, bk. 3, poem 2, li. 13.

Phæax, an inhabitant of the island of Phæacia. See: [Phæacia].——A man who sailed with Theseus to Crete.——An Athenian who opposed Alcibiades in his administration.

Phæcasia, one of the Sporades in the Ægean. Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 12.

Phædĭmus, one of Niobe’s children. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 5.——A Macedonian general who betrayed Eumenes to Antigonus.——A celebrated courier of Greece. Statius, bk. 6.

Phædon, an Athenian put to death by the 30 tyrants. His daughters, to escape the oppressors and preserve their chastity, threw themselves together into a well.——A disciple of Socrates. He had been seized by pirates in his younger days, and the philosopher, who seemed to discover something uncommon and promising in his countenance, bought his liberty for a sum of money, and ever after esteemed him. Phædon, after the death of Socrates, returned to Elis his native country, where he founded a sect of philosophers called Elean. The name of Phædon is affixed to one of the dialogues of Plato. Macrobius, Saturnalia, bk. 1, ch. 11.—Diogenes Laërtius.——An archon at Athens, when the Athenians were directed by the oracle to remove the bones of Theseus to Attica. Plutarch, Theseus.

Phædra, a daughter of Minos and Pasiphae, who married Theseus, by whom she became mother of Acamas and Demophoon. They had already lived for some time in conjugal felicity, when Venus, who hated all the descendants of Apollo, because that god had discovered her amours with Mars, inspired Phædra with an unconquerable passion for Hippolytus the son of Theseus, by the Amazon Hippolyte. This shameful passion Phædra long attempted to stifle, but in vain; and therefore, in the absence of Theseus, she addressed Hippolytus with all the impatience of a desponding lover. Hippolytus rejected her with horror and disdain; but Phædra, incensed on account of the reception she had met, resolved to punish his coldness and refusal. At the return of Theseus she accused Hippolytus of attempts upon her virtue. The credulous father listened to the accusation, and without hearing the defence of Hippolytus, he banished him from his kingdom, and implored Neptune, who had promised to grant three of his requests, to punish him in some exemplary manner. As Hippolytus fled from Athens, his horses were suddenly terrified by a huge sea-monster, which Neptune had sent on the shore. He was dragged through precipices and over rocks, and he was trampled under the feet of his horses, and crushed under the wheels of his chariot. When the tragical end of Hippolytus was known at Athens, Phædra confessed her crime, and hung herself in despair, unable to survive one whose death her wickedness and guilt had occasioned. The death of Hippolytus, and the infamous passion of Phædra, are the subject of one of the tragedies of Euripides, and of Seneca. Phædra was buried at Trœzene, where her tomb was still seen in the age of the geographer Pausanias, near the temple of Venus, which she had built to render the goddess favourable to her incestuous passion. There was near her tomb a myrtle, whose leaves were all full of small holes, and it was reported that Phædra had done this with a hair-pin, when the vehemence of her passion had rendered her melancholy and almost desperate. She was represented in a painting in Apollo’s temple at Delphi, as suspended by a cord, and balancing herself in the air, while her sister Ariadne stood near to her, and fixed her eyes upon her; a delicate idea, by which the genius of the artist intimated her melancholy end. Plutarch, Theseus.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 22; bk. 2, ch. 32.—Diodorus, bk. 4.—Hyginus, fables 47 & 243.—Euripides, Hippolytus & Seneca, Phædra.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 6, li. 445.—Ovid, Heroides, poem 4.

Phædria, a village of Arcadia. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 35.

Phædrus, one of the disciples of Socrates. Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 1.——An Epicurean philosopher.——A Thracian who became one of the freedmen of the emperor Augustus. He translated into iambic verses the fables of Æsop, in the reign of the emperor Tiberius. They are divided into five books, valuable for their precision, purity, elegance, and simplicity. They remained long buried in oblivion, till they were discovered in the library of St. Remi, at Rheims, and published by Peter Pithou, a Frenchman, at the end of the 16th century. Phædrus was for some time persecuted by Sejanus, because this corrupt minister believed that he was satirized and abused in the encomiums which the poet everywhere pays to virtue. The best editions of Phædrus are those of Burman, 4to, Leyden, 1727; Hoogstraten, 4to, Amsterdam, 1701; and Barbou, 12mo, Paris, 1754.

Phædy̆ma, a daughter of Otanes, who first discovered that Smerdis, who had ascended the throne of Persia at the death of Cambyses, was an impostor. Herodotus, bk. 3, ch. 69.

Phæmonōe, a priestess of Apollo.

Phænarēte, the mother of the philosopher Socrates. She was a midwife by profession.

Phænias, a peripatetic philosopher, disciple of Aristotle. He wrote a history of tyrants. Diogenes Laërtius.

Phænna, one of the two Graces, worshipped at Sparta, together with her sister Clita. Lacedæmon first paid them particular honour. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 35.

Phænnis, a famous prophetess in the age of Antiochus. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 15.

Phæsana, a town of Arcadia.

Phæstum, a town of Crete. Homer, Odyssey, bk. 3, li. 296.——Another of Macedonia. Livy, bk. 56, ch. 13.

Phaĕton, a son of the sun, or Phœbus and Clymene, one of the Oceanides. He was son of Cephalus and Aurora, according to Hesiod and Pausanias, or of Tithonus and Aurora, according to Apollodorus. He is, however, more generally acknowledged to be the son of Phœbus and Clymene. Phaeton was naturally of a lively disposition, and a handsome figure. Venus became enamoured of him, and entrusted him with the care of one of her temples. This distinguishing favour of the goddess rendered him vain and aspiring; and when Epaphus the son of Io had told him to check his pride, that he was not the son of Phœbus, Phaeton resolved to know his true origin, and at the instigation of his mother, he visited the palace of the sun. He begged Phœbus, that if he really were his father, he would give him incontestible proofs of his paternal tenderness, and convince the world of his legitimacy. Phœbus swore by the Styx that he would grant him whatever he required, and no sooner was the oath uttered, than Phaeton demanded of him to drive his chariot for one day. Phœbus represented the impropriety of such a request, and the dangers to which it would expose him; but in vain; and, as the oath was inviolable, and Phaeton unmoved, the father instructed his son how he was to proceed in his way through the regions of the air. His explicit directions were forgotten, or little attended to; and no sooner had Phaeton received the reins from his father, than he betrayed his ignorance and incapacity to guide the chariot. The flying horses became sensible of the confusion of their driver, and immediately departed from the usual track. Phaeton repented too late of his rashness, and already heaven and earth were threatened with a universal conflagration, when Jupiter, who had perceived the disorder of the horses of the sun, struck the rider with one of his thunderbolts, and hurled him headlong from heaven into the river Po. His body, consumed with fire, was found by the nymphs of the place, and honoured with a decent burial. His sisters mourned his unhappy end, and were changed into poplars by Jupiter. See: [Phaetontiades]. According to the poets, while Phaeton was unskilfully driving the chariot of his father, the blood of the Æthiopians was dried up, and their skin became black, a colour which is still preserved among the greatest part of the inhabitants of the torrid zone. The territories of Libya were also parched up, according to the same tradition, on account of their too great vicinity to the sun; and ever since, Africa, unable to recover her original verdure and fruitfulness, has exhibited a sandy country, and uncultivated waste. According to those who explain this poetical fable, Phaeton was a Ligurian prince, who studied astronomy, and in whose age the neighbourhood of the Po was visited with uncommon heats. The horses of the sun are called Phaetontis equi, either because they were guided by Phaeton, or from the Greek word (φαεθων), which expresses the splendour and lustre of that luminary. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 105.—Hesiod, Theogony, li. 985.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, fable 17; bk. 2, fable 1, &c.—Apollonius, bk. 4, Argonautica.—Horace, bk. 1, ode 11.—Seneca, Medea.—Apollodorus.—Hyginus, fable 156.

Phaĕtontiădes, or Phaetontides, the sisters of Phaeton, who were changed into poplars by Jupiter. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 2, li. 346. See: [Heliades].

Phaetūsa, one of the Heliades changed into poplars, after the death of their brother Phaeton. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 2, li. 346.

Phæus, a town of Peloponnesus.

Phagesia, a festival among the Greeks, observed during the celebration of the Dionysia. It received its name from the good eating and living that then universally prevailed, φαγειν.

Phalacrine, a village of the Sabines, where Vespasian was born. Suetonius, Vespasian, ch. 2.

Phalæ, wooden towers at Rome, erected in the circus. Juvenal, satire 6, li. 589.

Phalæcus, a general of Phocis against the Bœotians, killed at the battle of Cheronæa. Diodorus, bk. 16.

Phalæsia, a town of Arcadia. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 35.

Phalanna, a town of Perrhæbia. Livy, bk. 42, ch. 54.

Phalanthus, a Lacedæmonian, who founded Tarentum in Italy, at the head of the Partheniæ. His father’s name was Aracus. As he went to Italy he was shipwrecked on the coast, and carried to shore by a dolphin, and from that reason there was a dolphin placed near his statute in the temple of Apollo at Delphi. See: [Partheniæ]. He received divine honours after death. Justin, bk. 3, ch. 4.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 10.—Horace, bk. 2, ode 6, li. 11.—Silius Italicus, bk. 11, li. 16.——A town and mountain of the same name in Arcadia. Persius, bk. 8, ch. 35.

Phălăris, a tyrant of Agrigentum, who made use of the most excruciating torments to punish his subjects on the smallest suspicion. Perillus made him a brazen bull, and when he had presented it to Phalaris, the tyrant ordered the inventor to be seized, and the first experiment to be made on his body. These cruelties did not long remain unrevenged; the people of Agrigentum revolted in the tenth year of his reign, and put him to death in the same manner as he had tortured Perillus and many of his subjects after him, B.C. 552. The brazen bull of Phalaris was carried by Amilcar to Carthage; but when that city was taken by Scipio, it was delivered again to the inhabitants of Agrigentum by the Romans. There are now some letters extant written by a certain Abaris to Phalaris, with their respective answers, but they are supposed by some to be spurious. The best edition is that of the learned Boyle, Oxford, 1718. Cicero, Against Verres, bk. 4; Letters to Atticus, bk. 7, ltr. 12; De Officiis, bk. 2.—Ovid, de Ars Amatoria, bk. 1, li. 663.—Juvenal, satire 8, li. 81.—Pliny, bk. 34, ch. 8.—Diodorus.——A Trojan killed by Turnus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 9, li. 762.

Phalarium, a citadel of Syracuse, where Phalaris’s bull was placed.

Phalărus, a river of Bœotia, falling into the Cephisus. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 34.

Phalcidon, a town of Thessaly. Polyænus, bk. 4.

Phaleas, a philosopher and legislator, &c. Aristotle.

Phalēreus Demetrius. See: [Demetrius].

Phaleria, a town of Thessaly. Livy, bk. 32, ch. 15.

Phalēris, a Corinthian who led a colony to Epidamnus from Corcyra.

Phalēron, or Phalerum, or Phalera (orum), or Phalerus portus, an ancient harbour of Athens, about 25 stadia from the city, which, for its situation and smallness, was not very fit for the reception of many ships.——A place of Thessaly.

Phalērus, a son of Alcon, one of the Argonauts. Orpheus.

Phalias, a son of Hercules and Heliconis daughter of Thestius. Apollodorus.

Phallĭca, festivals observed by the Egyptians in honour of Osiris. They receive their name from φαλλος simulachrum ligneum membri virilis. The institution originated in this: After the murder of Osiris, Isis was unable to recover among the other limbs the privities of her husband; and therefore, as she paid particular honour to every part of his body, she distinguished that which was lost with more honour, and paid it more attention. Its representation, called phallus, was made with wood, and carried during the sacred festivals which were instituted in honour of Osiris. The people held it in the greatest veneration; it was looked upon as an emblem of fecundity, and the mention of it among the ancients never conveyed any impure thought or lascivious reflection. The festivals of the phallus were imitated by the Greeks, and introduced into Europe by the Athenians, who made the procession of the phallus part of the celebration of the Dionysia of the god of wine. Those that carried the phallus, at the end of a long pole, were called phallophori. They generally appeared among the Greeks, besmeared with the dregs of wine, covered with skins of lambs, and wearing on their heads a crown of ivy. Lucian, de Syria Dea.—Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 2.

Phalysius, a citizen of Naupactum, who recovered his sight by reading a letter sent him by Æsculapius. Pausanias, bk. 10, final chapter.

Phanæus, a promontory of the island of Chios, famous for its wines. It was called after a king of the same name, who reigned there. Livy, bk. 36, ch. 43.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 2, li. 98.

Phanaræa, a town of Cappadocia. Strabo.

Phanas, a famous Messenian, &c., who died B.C. 682.

Phanes, a man of Halicarnassus, who fled from Amasis king of Egypt, to the court of Cambyses king of Persia, whom he advised, when he invaded Egypt, to pass through Arabia. Herodotus, bk. 3, ch. 4.

Phaneta, a town of Epirus. Livy, bk. 32, ch. 28.

Phanŏcles, an elegiac poet of Greece, who wrote a poem on that unnatural sin of which Socrates is accused by some. He supported that Orpheus had been the first who disgraced himself by that filthy indulgence. Some of his fragments are remaining. Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis, bk. 6.

Phanodēmus, an historian who wrote on the antiquities of Attica.

Phantasia, a daughter of Nicarchus of Memphis, in Egypt. Some have supposed that she wrote a poem on the Trojan war, and another on the return of Ulysses to Ithaca, from which compositions Homer copied the greatest part of his Iliad and Odyssey, when he visited Memphis, where they were deposited.

Phanus, a son of Bacchus, who was among the Argonauts. Apollodorus.

Phaon, a boatman of Mitylene in Lesbos. He received a small box of ointment from Venus, who had presented herself to him in the form of an old woman, to be carried over into Asia, and as soon as he had rubbed himself with what the box contained, he became one of the most beautiful men of his age. Many were captivated with the charms of Phaon, and, among others, Sappho the celebrated poetess. Phaon gave himself up to the pleasures of Sappho’s company; but, however, he soon conceived a disdain for her, and Sappho, mortified at his coldness, threw herself into the sea. Some say that Phaon was beloved by the goddess of beauty, who concealed him for some time among lettuces. Ælian says that Phaon was killed by a man whose bed he was defiling. Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 12.—Ovid, Heroides, poem 21.—Palæphatus, de Incredibilia, ch. 49.—Athenæus.—Lucian, Dialogi Mortuorum, bk. 9.

Phara, a town of Africa, burnt by Scipio’s soldiers.

Pharacĭdes, a general of the Lacedæmonian fleet, who assisted Dionysius the tyrant of Sicily against the Carthaginians. Polyænus, bk. 2.

Pharæ, or Pheræ, a town of Crete.——Another in Messenia. Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 30. See: [Pheræ].

Pharasmănes, a king of Iberia, in the reign of Antoninus, &c. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 6, ch. 33.

Pharax, a Lacedæmonian officer, who attempted to make himself absolute in Sicily.——A Thessalian, whose son, called Cyanippus, married a beautiful woman, called Leuconoe, who was torn to pieces by his dogs. Parthenius.

Pharis, a town of Laconia, whose inhabitants are called Pharitæ. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 30.——A son of Mercury and Philodamea, who built Pharæ in Messenia. Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 30.

Pharmecūsa, an island of the Ægean sea, where Julius Cæsar was seized by some pirates. Suetonius, Cæsar, ch. 4.——Another, where was shown Circe’s tomb. Strabo.

Pharnabāzus, a satrap of Persia, son of a person of the same name, B.C. 409. He assisted the Lacedæmonians against the Athenians, and gained their esteem by his friendly behaviour and support. His conduct, however, towards Alcibiades, was of the most perfidious nature, and he did not scruple to betray to his mortal enemies the man whom he had long honoured with his friendship. Cornelius Nepos, Alcibiades.—Plutarch.——An officer under Eumenes.——A king of Iberia.

Pharnăce, a town of Pontus. Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 4.——The mother of Cinyras king of Pontus. Suidas.

Pharnăces, a son of Mithridates king of Pontus, who favoured the Romans against his father. He revolted against Mithridates, and even caused him to be put to death, according to some accounts. In the civil wars of Julius Cæsar and Pompey, he interested himself for neither of the contending parties; upon which Cæsar turned his army against him, and conquered him. It was to express the celerity of his operations in conquering Pharnaces, that the victorious Roman made use of these words, Veni, vidi, vici. Florus, bk. 3.—Suetonius, Cæsar, ch. 37.—Paterculus, bk. 2, ch. 55.——A king of Pontus, who made war with Eumenes, B.C. 181.——A king of Cappadocia.——A librarian of Atticus. Cicero, Letters to Atticus.

Pharnapātes, a general of Orodes king of Parthia, killed in a battle by the Romans.

Pharnaspes, the father of Cassandra the mother of Cambyses.

Pharnus, a king of Media, conquered by Ninus king of Assyria.

Pharos, a small island in the bay of Alexandria, about seven furlongs distant from the continent. It was joined to the Egyptian shore with a causeway by Dexiphanes, B.C. 284, and upon it was built a celebrated tower, in the reign of Ptolemy Soter and Philadelphus, by Sostratus the son of Dexiphanes. This tower, which was called the tower of Pharos, and which passed for one of the seven wonders of the world, was built with white marble, and could be seen at the distance of 100 miles. On the top, fires were constantly kept to direct sailors in the bay, which was dangerous and difficult of access. The building of this tower cost the Egyptian monarch 800 talents, which were equivalent to above 165,000l. English, if Attic, or if Alexandrian, double that sum. There was this inscription upon it, King Ptolemy to the Gods the saviours, for the benefit of sailors; but Sostratus the architect, wishing to claim all the glory, engraved his own name upon the stones, and afterwards filled the hollow with mortar, and wrote the above-mentioned inscription. When the mortar had decayed by time, Ptolemy’s name disappeared, and the following inscription then became visible: Sostratus the Cnidian, son of Dexiphanes, to the Gods the saviours, for the benefit of sailors. The word Pharius is often used as Egyptian. Lucan, bk. 2, li. 636; bk. 3, li. 260; bk. 6, li. 308; bk. 9, li. 1005, &c.—Ovid, Ars Amatoria, bk. 3, li. 635.—Pliny, bk. 4, chs. 31 & 85; bk. 36, ch. 13.—Strabo, bk. 17.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.—Pliny, bk. 13, ch. 11.—Homer, Odyssey, bk. 4.—Flaccus, bk. 2.—Statius, bk. 3, Sylvæ, poem 2, li. 102.——A watch-tower near Capreæ.——An island on the coast of Illyricum, now called Lesina. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.——The emperor Claudius ordered a tower to be built at the entrance of the port of Ostia, for the benefit of sailors, and it likewise bore the name of Pharos, an appellation afterwards given to every other edifice which was raised to direct the course of sailors, either with lights, or by signals. Juvenal, satire 11, li. 76.—Suetonius.

Pharsălus, now Farsa, a town of Thessaly, in whose neighbourhood is a large plain called Pharsalia, famous for a battle which was fought there between Julius Cæsar and Pompey, in which the former obtained the victory. In that battle, which was fought on the 12th of May, B.C. 48, Cæsar lost about 200 men, or, according to others, 1200. Pompey’s loss was 15,000, or 25,000 according to others, and 24,000 of his army were made prisoners of war by the conqueror. Lucan, bk. 1, &c.—Plutarch, Pompey & Cæsar.—Appian, Civil Wars.—Cæsar, Civil War.—Suetonius, Cæsar.—Dio Cassius.——That poem of Lucan, in which he gives an account of the civil wars of Cæsar and Pompey, bears the name of Pharsalia. See: [Lucanus].

Pharte, a daughter of Danaus. Apollodorus.

Pharus, a Rutulian killed by Æneas. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 10, li. 322.

Pharusii, or Phaurusii, a people of Africa, beyond Mauritania. Mela, bk. 1, ch. 4.

Pharybus, a river of Macedonia, falling into the Ægean sea. It is called by some Baphyrus.

Pharycadon, a town of Macedonia, on the Peneus. Strabo, bk. 9.

Pharyge, a town of Locris.

Phasēlis, a town of Pamphylia, at the foot of mount Taurus, which was long the residence of pirates. Strabo, bk. 14.—Lucan, bk. 8, ch. 251.—Cicero, On the Agrarian Law, bk. 2, ch. 19.

Phasiana, a country of Asia, near the river Phasis. The inhabitants called Phasiani, are of Egyptian origin.

Phasias, a patronymic given to Medea, as being born near the Phasis. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 7.

Phasis, a son of Phœbus and Ocyroe.——A river of Colchis, rising in the mountains of Armenia, now called Faoz, and falling into the east of the Euxine. It is famous for the expedition of the Argonauts, who entered it after a long and perilous voyage, from which reason all dangerous voyages have been proverbially intimated by the words of sailing to the Phasis. There were on the banks of the Phasis a great number of large birds, of which, according to some of the ancients, the Argonauts brought some to Greece, and which were called on that account pheasants. The Phasis was reckoned by the ancients one of the largest rivers of Asia. Pliny, bk. 10, ch. 48.—Martial, bk. 13, ltr. 62.—Strabo, bk. 11.—Mela, bk. 1, ch. 19.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, &c.—Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 44.—Orpheus.

Phassus, a son of Lycaon. Apollodorus.

Phauda, a town of Pontus.

Phavorīnus, a writer, the best edition of whose Greek Lexicon is that in folio, Venice, 1712.

Phayllus, a tyrant of Ambracia.——The brother of Onomarchus of Phocis, &c. See: [Phocis]. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 2.

Phea, or Pheia, a town of Elis. Homer, Iliad, bk. 7.

Phecadum, an inland town of Macedonia. Livy, bk. 31, ch. 41.

Phegeus, or Phlegeus, a companion of Æneas, killed by Turnus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 9, li. 765.——Another, likewise killed by Turnus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 12, li. 371, &c.——A priest of Bacchus, the father of Alphesibœa, who purified Alcmæon of his mother’s murder, and gave him his daughter in marriage. He was afterwards put to death by the children of Alcmæon by Callirhoe, because he had ordered Alcmæon to be killed when he had attempted to recover a collar which he had given to his daughter. See: [Alcmæon]. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 9, li. 412.

Phellia, a river of Laconia. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 20.

Phelloe, a town of Achaia near Ægira, where Bacchus and Diana each had a temple. Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 26.

Phellus, a place of Attica.——A town of Elis, near Olympia. Strabo.

Phemius, a man introduced by Homer as a musician among Penelope’s suitors. Some say that he taught Homer, for which the grateful poet immortalized his name. Homer, Odyssey.——A man who, according to some, wrote an account of the return of the Greeks from the Trojan war. The word is applied by Ovid, Amores, bk. 3, li. 7, indiscriminately to any person who excels in music.

Phemonoe, a priestess of Apollo, who is supposed to have invented heroic verses. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 6.

Phenēum, a town of Arcadia, whose inhabitants, called Pheneatæ, worshipped Mercury. Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 3.

Pheneus, a town with a lake of the same name in Arcadia, whose waters were unwholesome in the night and wholesome in the daytime. Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 3, ch. 22.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 8, li. 165.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 15, li. 332.——A son of Melas, killed by Tydeus. Apollodorus.

Pheræ, a town of Thessaly, where the tyrant Alexander reigned, whence he was called Pheræus. Strabo, bk. 8.—Cicero, bk. 2, de Officis.—Ovid, Ibis, li. 321.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 9, ch. 13.——A town of Attica.——Another in Laconia in Peloponnesus. Livy, bk. 35, ch. 30.

Pheræus, a surname of Jason, as being a native of Pheræ.

Pheraules, a Persian whom Cyrus raised from poverty to affluence. He afterwards gave up all his possessions to enjoy tranquillity in retirement. Xenophon, Cyropaedia.

Pherĕclus, one of the Greeks during the Trojan war. Ovid, Heroides, poem 15.——A pilot of the ship of Theseus, when he went to Crete. Plutarch, Theseus.

Pherēcrătes, a comic poet of Athens, in the age of Plato and Aristophanes. He is supposed to have written 21 comedies, of which only a few verses remain. He introduced living characters on the stage, but never abused the liberty which he had taken, either by satire or defamation. He invented a sort of verse, which from him has been called Pherecratian. It consisted of the three last feet of an hexameter verse, of which the first was always a spondee, as for instance, the third verse of Horace’s bk. 1, ode 5, Grato Pyrrha sub antro.——Another, descended from Deucalion. Cicero, Tusculanæ Disputationes.

Pherecȳdes, a philosopher of Scyros, disciple of Pittacus, one of the first who delivered his thoughts in prose. He was acquainted with the periods of the moon, and foretold eclipses with the greatest accuracy. The doctrine of the immortality of the soul was first supported by him, as also that of the metempsychosis. Pythagoras was one of his disciples, remarkable for his esteem and his attachment to his learned master. When Pherecydes lay dangerously ill in the island of Delos, Pythagoras hastened to give him every assistance in his power, and when all his efforts had proved ineffectual, he buried him, and after he had paid him the last offices, he retired to Italy. Some, however, suppose, that Pherecydes threw himself down from a precipice as he was going to Delphi, or, according to others, he fell a sacrifice to the lousy disease, B.C. 515, in the 85th year of his age. Diogenes Laërtius.—Lactantius [Placidus].——An historian of Leros, surnamed the Athenian. He wrote a history of Attica, now lost, in the age of Darius Hystaspes.——A tragic poet.

Pherendates, a Persian set over Egypt by Artaxerxes.

Pherephate, a surname of Proserpine, from the production of corn.

Pheres, a son of Cretheus and Tyro, who built Pheræ in Thessaly, where he reigned. He married Clymene, by whom he had Admetus and Lycurgus. Apollodorus.——A son of Medea, stoned to death by the Corinthians, on account of the poisonous clothes which he had given to Glauce, Creon’s daughter. See: [Medea]. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 3.——A friend of Æneas, killed by Halesus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 10, li. 413.

Pheretias, a patronymic of Admetus son of Pheres. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 291.

Pheretīma, the wife of Battus king of Cyrene, and mother of Arcesilaus. After her son’s death, she recovered the kingdom by means of Amasis king of Egypt, and to avenge the murder of Arcesilaus, she caused all his assassins to be crucified round the walls of Cyrene, and she cut off the breasts of their wives, and hung them up near the bodies of their husbands. It is said that she was devoured alive by worms, a punishment which, according to some of the ancients, was inflicted by Providence for her unparalleled cruelties. Polyænus, bk. 8.—Herodotus, bk. 4, ch. 204, &c.

Pherinum, a town of Thessaly.

Pheron, a king of Egypt, who succeeded Sesostris. He was blind, and he recovered his sight by washing his eyes, according to the directions of the oracle, in the urine of a woman who had never had any unlawful connexions. He tried his wife first, but she appeared to have been faithless to his bed, and she was burnt with all those whose urine could not restore sight to the king. He married the woman whose urine proved beneficial. Herodotus, bk. 2, ch. 111.

Pherūsa, one of the Nereides. Apollodorus, bk. 1.

Phiăle, one of Diana’s nymphs. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 3.——A celebrated courtesan. Juvenal, satire 10, li. 238.

Phialia, or Phigalia, a town of Arcadia. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 3.

Phiălus, a king of Arcadia. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 3.

Phicores, a people near the Palus Mæotis. Mela, bk. 1, ch. 19.

Phidias, a celebrated statuary of Athens, who died B.C. 432. He made a statue of Minerva, at the request of Pericles, which was placed in the Pantheon. It was made with ivory and gold, and measured 39 feet in height. His presumption raised him many enemies, and he was accused of having carved his own image and that of Pericles on the shield of the statue of the goddess, for which he was banished from Athens by the clamorous populace. He retired to Elis, where he determined to revenge the ill-treatment he had received from his countrymen, by making a statue which should eclipse the fame of that of Minerva. He was successful in the attempt; and the statue he made of Jupiter Olympius was always reckoned the best of all his pieces, and has passed for one of the wonders of the world. The people of Elis were so sensible of his merit, and of the honour he had done to their city, that they appointed his descendants to the honourable office of keeping clean that magnificent statue, and of preserving it from injury. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 4.—Cicero, On Oratory.—Strabo, bk. 8.—Quintilian, bk. 12, ch. 10.—Plutarch, Pericles.

Phidilē, a woman. See: [♦]Phidyle.

[♦] ‘Phidyle’ not referenced in the text.

Phidippĭdes a celebrated courier, who ran from Athens to Lacedæmon, about 152 English miles, in two days, to ask of the Lacedæmonians assistance against the Persians. The Athenians raised a temple to his memory. Herodotus, bk. 6, ch. 105.—Cornelius Nepos, Miltiades.

Phiditia, a public entertainment at Sparta, where much frugality was observed, as the word (φειδιτια, from φειδομαι, parco) denotes. Persons of all ages were admitted; the younger frequented it as a school of temperance and sobriety, where they were trained to good manners and useful knowledge, by the example and discourse of their elders. Cicero, Tusculanæ Disputationes, bk. 5, ch. 34.—Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 10.

Phidon, a man who enjoyed the sovereign power at Argos, and is supposed to have invented scales and measures, and coined silver at Ægina. He died B.C. 854. Aristotle.—Herodotus, bk. 6, ch. 127.——An ancient legislator at Corinth.

Phidy̆re, a female servant of Horace, to whom he addressed bk. 3, ode 23.

Phigalei, a people of Peloponnesus, near Messenia. They were naturally fond of drinking, and negligent of domestic affairs. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 39.

Phila, the eldest daughter of Antipater, who married Craterus. She afterwards married Demetrius, and when her husband had lost the kingdom of Macedonia, she poisoned herself. Plutarch.——A town of Macedonia. Livy, bk. 42, ch. 67; bk. 44, chs. 2 & 34.——An island called also [♦]Phila.

[♦] ‘Phla’ replaced with ‘Phila’

Philadelphia, now Alahasher, a town of Lydia. Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 29.——Another, in Cilicia,——Arabia,——-Syria.

Philadelphus, a king of Paphlagonia, who followed the interest of Marcus Antony.——The surname of one of the Ptolemies, king of Egypt, by antiphrasis, because he destroyed all his brothers. See: [Ptolemæus II.]

[♦]Philæ, a town and island of Egypt, above the smaller cataract, but placed opposite Syene by Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 9. Isis was worshipped there. Lucan, bk. 10, li. 313.—Seneca, Quæstiones Naturales, bk. 4, ch. 2.——One of the Sporades. Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 12.

[♦] ‘Phile’ replaced with ‘Philæ’

Philæni, two brothers of Carthage. When a contest arose between the Cyreneans and Carthaginians, about the extent of their territories, it was mutually agreed that, at a stated hour, two men should depart from each city, and that, wherever they met, there they should fix the boundaries of their country. The Philæni accordingly departed from Carthage, and met the Cyreneans, when they had advanced far into their territories. This produced a quarrel, and the Cyreneans supported that the Philæni had left Carthage before the appointment, and that therefore they must retire or be buried in the sand. The Philæni refused, upon which they were overpowered by the Cyreneans, and accordingly buried in the sand. The Carthaginians, to commemorate the patriotic deeds of the Philæni, who had sacrificed their lives that the extent of their country might not be diminished, raised two altars on the place where their bodies had been buried, which they called Philænorum aræ. These altars were the boundaries of the Carthaginian dominions, which on the other side extended as far as the columns of Hercules, which is about 2000 miles, or, according to the accurate observations of the moderns, only 1420 geographical miles. Sallust, Jugurthine War, chs. 19 & 79.—Silius Italicus, bk. 15, li. 704.

Philænis, or Phileris, a courtesan. See: [Phileris].

Philæus, a son of Ajax, by Lyside the daughter of Coronus, one of the Lapithæ. Miltiades, as some suppose, was descended from him.——A son of Augeas, who upbraided his father for not granting what Hercules justly claimed for cleaning his stables. See: [Augeas]. He was placed upon his father’s throne by Hercules. Apollodorus, bk. 2.

Philammon, a celebrated musician, son of Apollo and Chione.——A man who murdered Arsinoe, and who was slain by her female attendants.

Philanthus, a son of Prolaus of Elis, killed at the Olympic games. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 3.

Philarchus, a hero who gave assistance to the Phocians when the Persians invaded Greece.

Philēmon, a Greek comic poet, contemporary with Menander. He obtained some poetical prizes over Menander, not so much by the merit of his composition, as by the intrigues of his friends. Plautus imitated some of his comedies. He lived to his 97th year, and died, as it is reported, of laughing, on seeing an ass eat figs, B.C. 274.——His son, who bore the same name, wrote 54 comedies, of which some few fragments remain, which do not seem to entitle him to great rank among the Greek comic writers. Valerius Maximus, bk. 9, ch. 12—Quintilian, bk. 10.—Plutarch, de Cohibenda Ira.—Strabo, bk. 14.——A poor man of Phrygia. See: [Baucis].——An illegitimate son of Priam.

Philēne, a town of Attica between Athens and Tanagra. Statius, Thebaid, bk. 4, li. 102.

Philēris, an immodest woman, whom Philocrates the poet lampooned. Martial, bk. 7.

Philĕros, a town of Macedonia. Pliny.

Philesius, a leader of the 10,000 Greeks after the battle of Cunaxa.

Philetærus, a eunuch made governor of Pergamus by Lysimachus. He quarrelled with Lysimachus, and made himself master of Pergamus, where he laid the foundations of a kingdom called the kingdom of Pergamus, B.C. 283. He reigned there for 20 years, and at his death he appointed his nephew Eumenes as his successor. Strabo, bk. 13.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 8.——A Cretan general who revolted from Seleucus, and was conquered, &c. Polyænus, bk. 4.

Philētas, a grammarian and poet of Cos, in the reign of king Philip, and of his son Alexander the Great. He was made preceptor to Ptolemy Philadelphus. The elegies and epigrams which he wrote have been greatly commended by the ancients, and some fragments of them are still preserved in Athenæus. He was so small and slender, according to the improbable accounts of Ælian, that he always carried pieces of lead in his pockets, to prevent being blown away by the wind. Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 9, ch. 14.—Ovid, Fasti, bk. 1, poem 5.—Propertius, bk. 3, poem 1.——An historian.

Philetius, a faithful steward of Ulysses, who, with Eumeus, assisted him in destroying the suitors, who had not only insulted the queen, but wasted the property of the absent monarch. Homer, Odyssey, bk. 20, &c.

Philĭdas, a friend of Pelopidas, who favoured the conspiracy formed to expel the Spartans from Thebes. He received the conspirators in his own house.

Philides, a dealer in horses in the age of Themistocles. Plutarch, Themistocles.

Philinna, a courtesan, mother of Aridæus, by Philip the father of Alexander.

Philīnus, a native of Agrigentum, who fought with Annibal against the Romans. He wrote a partial history of the Punic wars. Cornelius Nepos, Hannibal.—Polybius.

Philippei, or Phillippi, certain pieces of money coined in the reign of Philip of Macedonia, and with his image. Horace, bk. 2, ltr. 1, li. 284.—Livy, bk. 34, ch. 52; bk. 37, ch. 59; bk. 39, chs. 5 & 7.

Philippi, a town of Macedonia, anciently called Datos, and situate at the east of the Strymon on a rising ground, which abounds with springs and water. It was called Philippi after Philip king of Macedonia, who fortified it against the incursions of the barbarians of Thrace, and became celebrated for two battles which were fought there in October, B.C. 42, at the interval of about 20 days, between Augustus and Antony, and the republican forces of Brutus and Cassius, in which the former obtained the victory. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 15, li. 284.—Pliny, bk. 7, ch. 45.—Florus, bk. 4, ch. 7.—Paterculus, bk. 2, ch. 7, &c.—Appian, bk. 2, Civil Wars.—Plutarch, Antonius.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 1, li. 490.—Suetonius, Augustus, ch. 2.

Philippĭdes, a comic poet in Alexander’s age.——A courier, called also Phidippides.

Philippŏpŏlis, a town of Thrace, near the Hebrus, built by Philip the father of Alexander. Livy, bk. 39, ch. 53.——Of Thessaly, called Philippi.

Philippus I., son of Argæus, succeeded his father on the throne of Macedonia, and reigned 38 years, B.C. 640.——The second of that name was the fourth son of Amyntas king of Macedonia. He was sent to Thebes as a hostage by his father, where he learnt the art of war under Epaminondas, and studied with the greatest care the manners and the pursuits of the Greeks. He was recalled to Macedonia, and at the death of his brother Perdiccas, he ascended the throne as guardian and protector of the youthful years of his nephew. His ambition, however, soon discovered itself, and he made himself independent. The valour of a prudent general, and the policy of an experienced statesman, seemed requisite to ensure his power. The neighbouring nations, ridiculing the youth and inexperience of the new king of Macedonia, appeared in arms, but Philip soon convinced them of their error. Unable to meet them as yet in the field of battle, he suspended their fury by presents, and soon turned his arms against Amphipolis, a colony tributary to the Athenians. Amphipolis was conquered, and added to the kingdom of Macedonia, and Philip meditated no less than the destruction of a republic which had rendered itself so formidable to the rest of Greece, and had even claimed submission from the princes of Macedonia. His designs, however, were as yet immature, and before he could make Athens an object of conquest, the Thracians and the Illyrians demanded his attention. He made himself master of a Thracian colony, to which he gave the name of Philippi, and from which he received the greatest advantages on account of the golden mines in the neighbourhood. In the midst of his political prosperity, Philip did not neglect the honour of his family. He married Olympias, the daughter of Neoptolemus king of the Molossi; and when, some time after he became father of Alexander, the monarch, conscious of the inestimable advantages which arise from the lessons, the example, and the conversation of a learned and virtuous preceptor, wrote a letter with his own hand to the philosopher Aristotle, and begged him to retire from his usual pursuits, and to dedicate his whole time to the instruction of the young prince. Everything seemed now to conspire to his aggrandizement, and historians have observed, that Philip received in one day the intelligence of three things which could gratify the most unbounded ambition, and flatter the hopes of the most aspiring monarch: the birth of a son, an honourable crown at the Olympic games, and a victory over the barbarians of Illyricum. But all these increased rather than satiated his ambition; he declared his inimical sentiments against the power of Athens, and the independence of all Greece, by laying siege to Olynthus, a place which, on account of its situation and consequence, would prove most injurious to the interests of the Athenians, and most advantageous to the intrigues and military operations of every Macedonian prince. The Athenians, roused by the eloquence of Demosthenes, sent 17 vessels and 2000 men to the assistance of Olynthus, but the money of Philip prevailed over all their efforts. The greatest part of the citizens suffered themselves to be bribed by the Macedonian gold, and Olynthus surrendered to the enemy, and was instantly reduced to ruins. His successes were as great in every part of Greece; he was declared head of the Amphictyonic council, and was entrusted with the care of the sacred temple of Apollo at Delphi. If he was recalled to Macedonia, it was only to add fresh laurels to his crown, by victories over his enemies in Illyricum and Thessaly. By assuming the mask of a moderator and peacemaker he gained confidence, and in attempting to protect the Peloponnesians against the encroaching power of Sparta, he rendered his cause popular, and by ridiculing the insults that were offered to his person as he passed through Corinth, he displayed to the world his moderation and philosophic virtues. In his attempts to make himself master of Eubœa, Philip was unsuccessful; and Phocion, who despised his gold as well as his meanness, obliged him to evacuate an island whose inhabitants were as insensible to the charms of money, as they were unmoved at the horrors of war, and the bold efforts of a vigilant enemy. From Eubœa he turned his arms against the Scythians, but the advantages which he obtained over this indigent nation were inconsiderable, and he again made Greece an object of plunder and rapine. He advanced far into Bœotia, and a general engagement was fought at Chæronea. The fight was long and bloody, but Philip obtained the victory. His behaviour after the battle reflects great disgrace upon him as a man, and as a monarch. In the hour of festivity, and during the entertainment which he had given to celebrate the trophies he had won, Philip sallied from his camp, and with the inhumanity of a brute he insulted the bodies of the slain, and exulted over the calamities of the prisoners of war. His insolence, however, was checked when Demades, one of the Athenian captives, reminded him of his meanness, by exclaiming, “Why do you, O king, act the part of a Thersites, when you can represent with so much dignity the elevated character of an Agamemnon?” The reproof was felt; Demades received his liberty, and Philip learned how to gain popularity even among his fallen enemies, by relieving their wants and easing their distresses. At the battle of Chæronea the independence of Greece was extinguished; and Philip, unable to find new enemies in Europe, formed new enterprises, and meditated new conquests. He was nominated general of the Greeks against the Persians, and was called upon as well from inclination as duty to revenge those injuries which Greece had suffered from the invasions of Darius and of Xerxes. But he was stopped in the midst of his warlike preparations; he was stabbed by Pausanius as he entered the theatre, at the celebration of the nuptials of his daughter Cleopatra. This murder has given rise to many reflections upon the causes which produced it; and many who consider the recent repudiation of Olympias, and the resentment of Alexander, are apt to investigate the causes of his death in the bosom of his family. The ridiculous honours which Olympias paid to her husband’s murderer strengthened the suspicion, yet Alexander declared that he invaded the kingdom of Persia to revenge his father’s death upon the Persian satraps and princes, by whose immediate intrigues the assassination had been committed. The character of Philip is that of a sagacious, artful, prudent, and intriguing monarch: he was brave in the field of battle, eloquent and dissimulating at home; and he possessed the wonderful art of changing his conduct according to the disposition and caprice of mankind, without ever altering his purpose, or losing sight of his ambitious aims. He possessed much perseverance, and in the execution of his plans he was always vigorous. The hand of an assassin prevented him from achieving the boldest and the most extensive of his undertakings; and he might have acquired as many laurels, and conquered as many nations, as his son Alexander did in the succeeding reign, and the kingdom of Persia might have been added to the Macedonian empire, perhaps with greater moderation, with more glory, and with more lasting advantages. The private character of Philip lies open to censure, and raises indignation. The admirer of his virtues is disgusted to find him amongst the most abandoned prostitutes, and disgracing himself by the most unnatural crimes and lascivious indulgencies, which can make even the most debauched and the most profligate to blush. He was murdered in the 47th year of his age, and the 24th of his reign, about 336 years before the christian era. His reign is become uncommonly interesting, and his administration a matter of instruction. He is the first monarch whose life and actions are described with peculiar accuracy and historical faithfulness. Philip was the father of Alexander the Great and of Cleopatra by Olympias; he had also by Audaca, an Illyrian, Cyna, who married Amyntas the son of Perdiccas, Philip’s elder brother; by Nicasipolis, a Thessalian, Nicæa, who married Cassander; by Philinna, a Larissæan dancer, Aridæus, who reigned some time after Alexander’s death; by Cleopatra the niece of Attalus, Caranus and Europa, who were both murdered by Olympias; and Ptolemy the first king of Egypt by Arsinoe, who in the first month of her pregnancy was married to Lagus. Demosthenes, Philippics & Olynthiacs.—Justin 7, &c.—Diodorus, bk. 16.—Plutarch, Alexander, Demosthenes, & Apophthegmata Laconica.—Isocrates, ad Philippum.—Curtius, bk. 1, &c.—Æschines.—Pausanias, Bœotia, &c.——The last king of Macedonia, of that name, was son of Demetrius. His infancy, at the death of his father, was protected by Antigonus, one of his friends, who ascended the throne, and reigned for 12 years, with the title of independent monarch. When Antigonus died, Philip recovered his father’s throne, though only 15 years of age, and he early distinguished himself by his boldness and his ambitious views. His cruelty, however, to Aratus, soon displayed his character in its true light; and to the gratification of every vice, and every extravagant propensity, he had the meanness to sacrifice this faithful and virtuous Athenian. Not satisfied with the kingdom of Macedonia, Philip aspired to become the friend of Annibal, and wished to share with him the spoils which the distresses and continual loss of the Romans seemed soon to promise. But his expectations were frustrated; the Romans discovered his intrigues, and though weakened by the valour and artifice of the Carthaginian, yet they were soon enabled to meet him in the field of battle. The consul Lævinus entered without delay his territories of Macedonia, and after he had obtained a victory over him near Apollonia, and reduced his fleet to ashes, he compelled him to sue for peace. This peaceful disposition was not permanent, and when the Romans discovered that he had assisted their immortal enemy Annibal with men and money they appointed Titus Quinctius Flaminius to punish his perfidy, and the violation of the treaty. The Roman consul, with his usual expedition, invaded Macedonia; and in a general engagement which was fought near Cynocephale, the hostile army was totally defeated, and the monarch saved his life with difficulty by flying from the field of battle. Destitute of resources, without friends either at home or abroad, Philip was obliged to submit to the mercy of the conqueror, and to demand peace by his ambassadors. It was granted with difficulty. The terms were humiliating; but the poverty of Philip obliged him to accept the conditions, however disadvantageous and degrading to his dignity. In the midst of these public calamities the peace of his family was disturbed; and Perses, the eldest of his sons by a concubine, raised seditions against his brother Demetrius, whose condescension and humanity had gained popularity among the Macedonians, and who, from his residence at Rome as a hostage, had gained the good graces of the senate, and by the modesty and innocence of his manners, had obtained forgiveness from that venerable body for the hostilities of his father. Philip listened with too much avidity to the false accusation of Perses; and when he heard it asserted that Demetrius wished to rob him of his crown, he no longer hesitated to punish with death so unworthy and so ungrateful a son. No sooner was Demetrius sacrificed to credulity, than Philip became convinced of his cruelty and rashness, and, to punish the perfidy of Perses, he attempted to make Antigonus, another son, his successor on the Macedonian throne. But he was prevented from executing his purpose by death, in the 42nd year of his reign, 179 years before the christian era. The assassin of Demetrius succeeded his father; and with the same ambition, with the same rashness and oppression, renewed the war against the Romans till his empire was destroyed and Macedonia became a Roman province. Philip has been compared with his great ancestor of the same name; but though they possessed the same virtues, the same ambition, and were tainted with the same vices, yet the father of Alexander was more sagacious and more intriguing, and the son of Demetrius was more suspicious, more cruel, and more implacable; and according to the pretended prophecy of one of the Sibyls, Macedonia was indebted to one Philip for her rise and consequence among nations, and under another Philip she lamented the loss of her power, her empire, and her dignity. Polybius, bk. 16, &c.—Justin, bk. 29, &c.—Plutarch, Titus Flamininus.—Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 8.—Livy, bk. 31, &c.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 4, ch. 8.—Orosius, bk. 4, ch. 20.——Marcus Julius, a Roman emperor, of an obscure family in Arabia, from which he was surnamed Arabian. From the lowest rank in the army he gradually rose to the highest offices, and when he was made general of the pretorian guards he assassinated Gordian to make himself emperor. To establish himself with more certainty on the imperial throne, he left Mesopotamia a prey to the continual invasions of the Persians, and hurried to Rome, where his election was universally approved by the senate and the Roman people. Philip rendered his cause popular by his liberality and profusion; and it added much to his splendour and dignity that the Romans during his reign commemorated the foundation of their city, a solemnity which was observed but once every 100 years, and which was celebrated with more pomp and more magnificence than under the preceding reigns. The people were entertained with games and spectacles, the theatre of Pompey was successively crowded during three days and three nights, and 2000 gladiators bled in the circus at once, for the amusement and pleasure of a gazing populace. His usurpation, however, was short; Philip was defeated by Decius, who had proclaimed himself emperor in Pannonia, and he was assassinated by his own soldiers near Verona, in the 45th year of his age, and the 5th of his reign, A.D. 249. His son, who bore the same name, and who had shared with him the imperial dignity, was also massacred in the arms of his mother. Young Philip was then in the 12th year of his age, and the Romans lamented in him the loss of rising talents, of natural humanity, and endearing virtues. Aurelius Victor.—Zosimus.——A native of Acarnania, physician to Alexander the Great. When the monarch had been suddenly taken ill, after bathing in the Cydnus, Philip undertook to remove the complaint when the rest of the physicians believed that all medical assistance would be ineffectual. But as he was preparing his medicine, Alexander received a letter from Parmenio, in which he was advised to beware of his physician Philip, as he had conspired against his life. The monarch was alarmed; and when Philip presented him the medicine, he gave him Parmenio’s letter to peruse, and began to drink the potion. The serenity and composure of Philip’s countenance, as he read the letter, removed every suspicion from Alexander’s breast, and he pursued the directions of his physician, and in a few days recovered. Plutarch, Alexander.—Curtius, bk. 3.—Arrian, bk. 2.——A son of Alexander the Great, murdered by order of Olympias.——A governor of Sparta.——A son of Cassander.——A man who pretended to be the son of Perses, that he might lay claim to the kingdom of Macedonia. He was called Pseudophilippus.——A general of Cassander, in Ætolia.——A Phrygian, made governor of Jerusalem by Antiochus, &c.——A son of Herod the Great, in the reign of Augustus.——A brother of Alexander the Great, called also Aridæus. See: [Aridæus].——A freedman of Pompey the Great. He found his master’s body deserted on the sea-shore, in Egypt, and he gave it a decent burial, with the assistance of an old Roman soldier, who had fought under Pompey.——The father-in-law of the emperor Augustus.——A Lacedæmonian who wished to make himself absolute in Thebes.——An officer made master of Parthia, after the death of Alexander the Great.——A king of part of Syria, son of Antiochus Gryphus.——A son of Antipater in the army of Alexander.——A brother of Lysimachus, who died suddenly after hard walking and labour.——An historian of Amphipolis.——A Carthaginian, &c.——A man who wrote a history of Caria.——A native of Megara, &c.——A native of Pamphylia, who wrote a diffuse history from the creation down to his own time. It was not much valued. He lived in the age of Theodosius II.

Philiscus, a famous sculptor, whose statues of Latona, Venus, Diana, the Muses, and a naked Apollo, were preserved in the portico belonging to Octavia.——A Greek comic poet. Pliny, bk. 11, ch. 9.——An Athenian who received Cicero when he fled to Macedonia.——An officer of Artaxerxes, appointed to make peace with the Greeks.

Philistion, a comic poet of Nicæa in the age of Socrates. Martial, bk. 2, ltr. 41.——A physician of Locris. Aulus Gellius, bk. 7, ch. 12.

Philistus, a musician of Miletus.——A Syracusan, who, during his banishment from his native country, wrote a history of Sicily, in 12 books, which was commended by some, though condemned for inaccuracy by Pausanias. He was afterwards sent against the Syracusans by Dionysius the younger, and he killed himself when overcome by the enemy, 356 B.C. Plutarch, Dion.—Diodorus, bk. 13.

Phillo, an Arcadian maid, by whom Hercules had a son. The father, named Alcimedon, exposed his daughter, but she was saved by means of her lover, who was directed to the place where she was doomed to perish, by the chirping of a magpie, which imitated the plaintive cries of a child. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 12.

Philo, a Jewish writer of Alexandria, A.D. 40, sent as ambassador from his nation to Caligula. He was unsuccessful in his embassy, of which he wrote an entertaining account; and the emperor, who wished to be worshipped as a god, expressed his dissatisfaction with the Jews, because they refused to place his statues in their temples. He was so happy in his expressions, and elegant in his variety, that he has been called the Jewish Plato, and the book which he wrote on the sufferings of the Jews in the reign of Caius, met with such unbounded applause in the Roman senate, where he read it publicly, that he was permitted to consecrate it in the public libraries. His works were divided into three parts, of which the first related to the creation of the world, the second spoke of sacred history, and in the third the author made mention of the laws and customs of the Jewish nation. The best edition of Philo is that of Mangey, 2 vols., folio, London, 1742.——A man who fell in love with his daughter, called Proserpine, as she was bathing. He had by her a son, Mercurius Trismegistus.——A man who wrote an account of a journey to Arabia.——A philosopher who followed the doctrines of Carneades, B.C. 100.——Another philosopher of Athens, tutor to Cicero.——A grammarian in the first century.——An architect of Byzantium, who flourished about three centuries before the christian era. He built a dock at Athens, where ships were drawn in safety, and protected from storms. Cicero, On Oratory, bk. 1, ch. 14.——A Greek christian writer, whose work was edited at Rome, 4to, 1772.——A dialectic philosopher, 260 B.C.

Philobœotus, a mountain of Bœotia. Plutarch.

Philochorus, a man who wrote a history of Athens in 17 books, a catalogue of the archons, two books of olympiads, &c. He died B.C. 222.

Philŏcles, one of the admirals of the Athenian fleet, during the Peloponnesian war. He recommended to his countrymen to cut off the right hand of such of the enemies as were taken, that they might be rendered unfit for service. His plan was adopted by all the 10 admirals except one; but their expectations were frustrated, and instead of being conquerors, they were totally defeated at Ægospotamos by Lysander, and Philocles, with 3000 of his countrymen, was put to death, and denied the honours of a burial. Plutarch, Lysander.——A general of Ptolemy king of Egypt.——A comic poet.——Another, who wrote tragedies at Athens.

Philocrātes, an Athenian, famous for his treachery, &c.——A writer who published a history of Thessaly.——A servant of Caius Gracchus.——A Greek orator.

Philoctētes, son of Pœan and Demonassa, was one of the Argonauts, according to Flaccus and Hyginus, and the arm-bearer and particular friend of Hercules. He was present at the death of Hercules, and because he had erected the burning pile on which the hero was consumed, he received from him the arrows which had been dipped in the gall of the hydra, after he had bound himself by a solemn oath not to betray the place where his ashes were deposited. He had no sooner paid the last office to Hercules, than he returned to Melibœa, where his father reigned. From thence he visited Sparta, where he became one of the numerous suitors of Helen, and soon after, like the rest of those princes who had courted the daughter of Tyndarus, and who had bound themselves to protect her from injury, he was called upon by Menelaus to accompany the Greeks to the Trojan war, and he immediately set sail from Melibœa with seven ships, and repaired to Aulis, the general rendezvous of the combined fleet. He was here prevented from joining his countrymen, and the offensive smell which arose from a wound in his foot, obliged the Greeks, at the instigation of Ulysses, to remove him from the camp, and he was accordingly carried to the island of Lemnos, or, as others say, to Chryse, where Phimachus the son of Dolophion was ordered to wait upon him. In this solitary retreat he was suffered to remain for some time, till the Greeks, on the tenth year of the Trojan war, were informed by the oracle that Troy could not be taken without the arrows of Hercules, which were then in the possession of Philoctetes. Upon this Ulysses, accompanied by Diomedes, or, according to others, by Pyrrhus, was commissioned by the rest of the Grecian army to go to Lemnos, and to prevail upon Philoctetes to come and finish the tedious siege. Philoctetes recollected the ill-treatment which he had received from the Greeks, and particularly from Ulysses, and therefore he not only refused to go to Troy, but he even persuaded Pyrrhus to conduct him to Melibœa. As he embarked, the manes of Hercules forbade him to proceed, but immediately to repair to the Grecian camp, where he should be cured of his wounds, and put an end to the war. Philoctetes obeyed, and after he had been restored to his former health by Æsculapius, or, according to some, by Machaon, or Podalirus, he destroyed an immense number of the Trojan enemy, among whom was Paris the son of Priam, with the arrows of Hercules. When by his valour Troy had been ruined, he set sail from Asia, but as he was unwilling to visit his native country, he came to Italy, where, by the assistance of his Thessalian followers, he was enabled to build a town in Calabria, which he called Petilia. Authors disagree about the causes of the wound which Philoctetes received on the foot. The most ancient mythologists support that it was the bite of the serpent which Juno had sent to torment him, because he had attended Hercules in his last moments, and had buried his ashes. According to another opinion, the princes of the Grecian army obliged him to discover where the ashes of Hercules were deposited, and as he had made an oath not to mention the place, he only with his foot struck the ground where they lay, and by this means concluded he had not violated his solemn engagement. For this, however, he was soon after punished, and the fall of one of the poisoned arrows from his quiver upon the foot which had struck the ground, occasioned so offensive a wound, that the Greeks were obliged to remove him from their camp. The sufferings and adventures of Philoctetes are the subject of one of the best tragedies of Sophocles, Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 46.—Pindar, Pythian, poem 1.—Dictys Cretensis, bk. 1, ch. 14.—Seneca, Hercules.—Sophocles, Philoctetes.—Quintus Calaber [Smyrnæus], bks. 9 & 10.—Hyginus, fables 26, 97, & 102.—Diodorus, bks. 2 & 4.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 13, li. 329; bk. 9, li. 234; Tristia, bk. 5, poem 2.—Cicero, Tusculanæ Disputationes, ch. 2.—Ptolemy, Hephæstion, ch. 6.

Philocyprus, a prince of Cyprus in the age of Solon, by whose advice he changed the situation of a city, which in gratitude he called Soli. Plutarch, Solon.

Philodamēa, one of the Danaides, mother of Phares by Mercury. Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 22.

Philodēmus, a poet in the age of Cicero, who rendered himself known by his lascivious and indelicate verses. Cicero, de Finibus Bonorum et Malorum, bk. 2.—Horace, bk. 1, satire 2, li. 121.——A comic poet, ridiculed by Aristophanes.

Philodĭce, a daughter of Inachus, who married Leucippus.

Philolāus, a son of Minos by the nymph Paria, from whom the island of Paros received its name. Hercules put him to death, because he had killed two of his companions. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 1.——A Pythagorean philosopher of Crotona, B.C. 374, who first supported the diurnal motion of the earth round its axis, and its annual motion round the sun. Cicero, Academica, bk. 4, ch. 39, has ascribed this opinion to the Syracusan philosopher Nicetas, and likewise to Plato; and from this passage some supposed that Copernicus started the idea of the system which he afterwards established. Diogenes Laërtius.—Cicero, On Oratory, bk. 3.—Plutarch.——A lawgiver of Thebes. He was a native of Corinth, and of the family of the Bacchiades, &c. Aristotle, bk. 2, Politics, final chapter.——A mechanic of Tarentum.——A surname of Æsculapius, who had a temple in Laconia, near the Asopus.

Philolŏgus, a freedman of Cicero. He betrayed his master to Antony, for which he was tortured by Pomponia the wife of Cicero’s brother, and obliged to cut off his own flesh by piece-meal, and to boil and eat it up. Plutarch, Cicero, &c.

Philomăche, the wife of Pelias king of Iolchos. According to some writers, she was daughter to Amphion king of Thebes, though she is more generally called Anaxibia daughter of Bias. Apollodorus, bk. 1.

Philombrŏtus, an archon at Athens, in whose age the state was entrusted to Solon, when torn by factions. Plutarch, Solon.

Philomēdus, a man who made himself absolute in Phocæa, by promising to assist the inhabitants. Polyænus.

Phĭlŏmēla, a daughter of Pandion king of Athens, and sister to Procne, who had married Tereus king of Thrace. Procne separated from Philomela, to whom she was particularly attached, spent her time in great melancholy till she prevailed upon her husband to go to Athens, and bring his sister to Thrace. Tereus obeyed his wife’s injunctions, but he had no sooner obtained Pandion’s permission to conduct Philomela to Thrace, than he became enamoured of her, and resolved to gratify his passion. He dismissed the guards, whom the suspicions of Pandion had appointed to watch his conduct, and he offered violence to Philomela, and afterwards cut off her tongue, that she might not be able to discover his barbarity, and the indignities which she had suffered. He confined her also in a lonely castle, and after he had taken every precaution to prevent a discovery, he returned to Thrace, and he told Procne that Philomela had died by the way, and that he had paid the last offices to her remains. Procne, at this sad intelligence, put on mourning for the loss of Philomela; but a year had scarcely elapsed before she was secretly informed that her sister was not dead. Philomela, during her captivity, described on a piece of tapestry her misfortunes and the brutality of Tereus, and privately conveyed it to Procne. She was then going to celebrate the orgies of Bacchus when she received it; she disguised her resentment, and as, during the festivals of the god of wine, she was permitted to rove about the country, she hastened to deliver her sister Philomela from her confinement, and she concerted with her on the best measures of punishing the cruelty of Tereus. She murdered her son Itylus, who was in the sixth year of his age, and served him up as food before her husband during the festival. Tereus, in the midst of his repast, called for Itylus, but Procne immediately informed him that he was then feasting on his flesh, and that instant Philomela, by throwing on the table the head of Itylus, convinced the monarch of the cruelty of the scene. He drew his sword to punish Procne and Philomela, but as he was going to stab them to the heart, he was changed into a hoopoe, Philomela into a nightingale, Procne into a swallow, and Itylus into a pheasant. This tragical scene happened at Daulis in Phocis; but Pausanias and Strabo, who mention the whole of the story, are silent about the transformation; and the former observes that Tereus, after this bloody repast, fled to Megara, where he destroyed himself. The inhabitants of the place raised a monument to his memory, where they offered yearly sacrifices, and placed small pebbles instead of barley. It was on this monument that the birds called hoopoes were first seen; hence the fable of his metamorphosis. Procne and Philomela died through excess of grief and melancholy, and as the nightingale’s and swallow’s voice is peculiarly plaintive and mournful, the poets have embellished the fable by supposing that the two unfortunate sisters were changed into birds. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 14.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 42; bk. 10, ch. 4.—Hyginus, fable 45.—[♦]Strabo, bk. 9.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 6, fables 9 & 10.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 4, lis. 15 & 511.——A daughter of Actor king of the Myrmidons.

[♦] ‘Stabo’ replaced with ‘Strabo’

Philomēlum, a town of Phrygia. Cicero, Letters to Atticus, bk. 5, ltr. 20; Against Verres, bk. 3, ch. 83.

Philomēlus, a general of Phocis, who plundered the temple of Delphi, and died B.C. 354. See: [Phocis].——A rich musician. Martial, bk. 4, ltr. 5.

Philon, a general of some Greeks, who settled in Asia. Diodorus, bk. 18.

Philonides, a courier of Alexander, who ran from Sicyon to Elis, 160 miles, in nine hours, and returned the same journey in 15 hours. Pliny, bk. 2, ch. 71.

Philonis, a name of Chione daughter of Dædalion, made immortal by Diana.

Philonoe, a daughter of Tyndarus king of Sparta by Leda daughter of Thestius. Apollodorus.——A daughter of Iobates king of Lycia, who married Bellerophon. Pliny, bk. 2.

Philonŏme, a daughter of Nyctimus king of Arcadia, who threw into the Erymanthus two children whom she had by Mars. The children were preserved, and afterwards ascended their grandfather’s throne. Plutarch, Pericles.——The second wife of Cycnus the son of Neptune. She became enamoured of Tennes, her husband’s son by his first wife Proclea the daughter of Clytius, and when he refused to gratify her passion, she accused him of attempts upon her virtue. Cycnus believed the accusation, and ordered Tennes to be thrown into the sea, &c. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 14.

Philonŏmus, a son of Electryon king of Mycenæ by Anaxo. Apollodorus, bk. 2.

Philonus, a village of Egypt. Strabo.

Philopător, a surname of one of the Ptolemies, king of Egypt. See: [Ptolemæus].

Philophron, a general who, with 5000 soldiers, defended Pelusium against the Greeks who invaded Egypt. Diodorus, bk. 16.

Philopœmen, a celebrated general of the Achæan league, born at Megalopolis. His father’s name was Grangis. His education was begun and finished under Cassander, Ecdemus, and Demophanes, and he early distinguished himself in the field of battle, and appeared fond of agriculture and a country life. He proposed himself Epaminondas for a model, and he was not unsuccessful in imitating the prudence and the simplicity, the disinterestedness and activity, of this famous Theban. When Megalopolis was attacked by the Spartans, Philopœmen, then in the 30th year of his age, gave the most decisive proofs of his valour and intrepidity. He afterwards assisted Antigonus, and was present in the famous battle in which the Ætolians were defeated. Raised to the rank of chief commander, he showed his ability to discharge that important trust, by killing with his own hand Mechanidas the [♦]tyrant of Sparta; and if he was defeated in a naval battle by Nabis, he soon after repaired his losses by taking the capital of Laconia, B.C. 188, and by abolishing the laws of [♠]Lycurgus, which had flourished there for such a length of time. Sparta, after its conquest, became tributary to the Achæans, and Philopœmen enjoyed the triumph of having reduced to ruins one of the greatest and the most powerful of the cities of Greece. Some time after the Messenians revolted from the Achæan league, and Philopœmen, who headed the Achæans, unfortunately fell from his horse, and was dragged to the enemy’s camp. [♣]Dinocrates the general of the Messenians treated him with great severity; he was thrown into a dungeon, and obliged to drink a dose of poison. When he received the cup from the hand of the executioner, Philopœmen asked him how his countrymen had behaved in the field of battle; and when he heard that they had obtained the victory, he drank the whole with pleasure, exclaiming that this was comfortable news. The death of Philopœmen, which happened about 183 years before the christian era, in his 70th year, was universally lamented, and the Achæans, to revenge his fate, immediately marched to Messenia, where Dinocrates, to avoid their resentment, killed himself. The rest of his murderers were dragged to his tomb, where they were sacrificed; and the people of Megalopolis, to show further their great sense of his merit, ordered a bull to be yearly offered on his tomb, and hymns to be sung in his praise, and his actions to be celebrated in a panegyrical oration. He had also statues raised to his memory, which some of the Romans attempted to violate, and to destroy, to no purpose, when Mummius took Corinth. Philopœmen has been justly called by his countrymen the last of the Greeks. Plutarch, Lives.—Justin, bk. 32, ch. 4.—Polybius.——A native of Pergamus, who died B.C. 138.

[♦] ‘tyant’ replaced with ‘tyrant’

[♠] ‘Lyturgus’ replaced with ‘Lycurgus’

[♣] ‘Dioncrates’ replaced with ‘Dinocrates’

Phĭlostrătus, a famous sophist born at Lemnos, or, according to some, at Athens. He came to Rome, where he lived under the patronage of Julia the wife of the emperor Severus, and he was entrusted by the empress with all the papers which contained some account or anecdotes of Apollonius Thyanæus, and he was ordered to review them, and with them to compile a history. The life of Apollonius is written with elegance, but the improbable accounts, the fabulous stories, and the exaggerated details which it gives, render it disgusting. There is, besides, another treatise remaining of his writings, &c. He died A.D. 244. The best edition of his writings is that of Olearius, folio, Lipscomb, 1709.——His nephew, who lived in the reign of Heliogabalus, wrote an account of sophists.——A philosopher in the reign of Nero.——Another in the age of Augustus.

Philōtas, a son of Parmenio, distinguished in the battles of Alexander, and at last accused of conspiring against his life. He was tortured and stoned to death, or, according to some, struck through with darts by the soldiers, B.C. 330. Curtius, bk. 6, ch. 11.—Plutarch.—Arrian.——An officer in the army of Alexander.——Another, who was made master of Cilicia, after Alexander’s death.——A physician in the age of Antony. He ridiculed the expenses and the extravagance of this celebrated Roman. Plutarch.

Philotĕra, the mother of Mylo, &c. Polyænus, bk. 8.

Philotĭmus, a freedman of Cicero. Cicero, De Divinatione, bk. 3, ch. 9.

Philōtis, a servant-maid at Rome, who saved her countrymen from destruction. After the siege of Rome by the Gauls, the Fidenates assembled an army, under the command of Lucius Posthumius, and marched against the capital, demanding all the wives and daughters in the city, as the conditions of peace. This extraordinary demand astonished the senators, and when they refused to comply, Philotis advised them to send all their female slaves disguised in matron’s clothes, and she offered to march herself at the head. Her advice was followed, and when the Fidenates had feasted late in the evening, and were quite intoxicated, and fallen asleep, Philotis lighted a torch as a signal for her countrymen to attack the enemy. The whole was successful, the Fidenates were conquered, and the senate, to reward the fidelity of the female slaves, permitted them to appear in the dress of the Roman matrons. Plutarch, Romulus.—Varro, de Lingua Latina, bk. 5.—Ovid, de Ars Amatoria, bk. 2.

Philoxĕnus, an officer of Alexander, who received Cilicia, at the general division of the provinces.——A son of Ptolemy, who was given to Pelopidas as a hostage.——A dithyrambic poet of Cythera, who enjoyed the favour of Dionysius tyrant of Sicily for some time, till he offended him by seducing one of his female singers. During his confinement, Philoxenus composed an allegorical poem, called Cyclops, in which he had delineated the character of the tyrant under the name of Polyphemus, and represented his mistress under the name of Galatæa, and himself under that of Ulysses. The tyrant, who was fond of writing poetry, and of being applauded, removed Philoxenus from his dungeon, but the poet refused to purchase his liberty, by saying things unworthy of himself, and applauding the wretched verses of Dionysius, and therefore he was sent to the quarries. When he was asked his opinion at a feast about some verses which Dionysius had just repeated, and which the courtiers had received with the greatest applause, Philoxenus gave no answer, but he ordered the guards that surrounded the tyrant’s table to take him back to the quarries. Dionysius was pleased with his pleasantry and with his firmness, and immediately forgave him. Philoxenus died at Ephesus, about 380 years before Christ. Plutarch.——A celebrated musician of Ionia.——A painter of Eretria, who made for Cassander an excellent representation of the battle of Alexander with Darius. He was pupil to Nicomachus. Pliny, bk. 31, ch. 10.——A philosopher, who wished to have the neck of a crane, that he might enjoy the taste of his aliments longer, and with more pleasure. Aristotle, Eudemian Ethics, bk. 3.

Philyllius, a comic poet. Athenæus.

Phily̆ra, one of the Oceanides, who was met by Saturn in Thrace. The god, to escape from the vigilance of Rhea, changed himself into a horse, to enjoy the company of Philyra by whom he had a son, half a man and half a horse, called Chiron. Philyra was so ashamed of giving birth to such a monster, that she entreated the gods to change her nature. She was metamorphosed into the linden tree, called by her name among the Greeks. Hyginus, fable 138.——The wife of Nauplius.

Philyres, a people near Pontus.

Phily̆rĭdes, a patronymic of Chiron the son of Philyra. Ovid, Ars Amatoria.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 3, li. 550.

Phineus, a son of Agenor king of Phœnicia, or, according to some, of Neptune, who became king of Thrace, or, as the greater part of the mythologists support, of Bithynia. He married Cleopatra the daughter of Boreas, whom some call Cleobula, by whom he had Plexippus and Pandion. After the death of Cleopatra, he married Idæa the daughter of Dardanus. Idæa, jealous of Cleopatra’s children, accused them of attempts upon their father’s life and crown, or, according to some, of attempts upon her virtue, and they were immediately condemned by Phineus to be deprived of their eyes. This cruelty was soon after punished by the gods. Phineus suddenly became blind, and the Harpies were sent by Jupiter to keep him under continual alarm, and to spoil the meats which were placed on his table. He was some time after delivered from these dangerous monsters by his brothers-in-law Zetes and Calais, who pursued them as far as the Strophades. He also recovered his sight by means of the Argonauts, whom he had received with great hospitality, and instructed in the easiest and speediest way by which they could arrive in Colchis. The causes of the blindness of Phineus are a matter of dispute among the ancients, some supposing that this was inflicted by Boreas, for his cruelty to his grandson, whilst others attribute it to the anger of Neptune, because he had directed the sons of Phryxus how to escape from Colchis to Greece. Many, however, think that it proceeded from his having rashly attempted to develop futurity, while others assert that Zetes and Calais put out his eyes on account of his cruelty to their nephews. The second wife of Phineus is called by some Dia, Eurytia, Danae, and Idothea. Phineus was killed by Hercules. Argonautica, bk. 2.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 9; bk. 3, ch. 15.—Diodorus, bk. 4.—Hyginus, fable 19.—Orpheus.—Flaccus.——The brother of Cepheus king of Æthiopia. He was going to marry his niece Andromeda, when her father Cepheus was obliged to give her up to be devoured by a sea monster, to appease the resentment of Neptune. She was, however, delivered by Perseus, who married her by the consent of her parents, for having destroyed the sea monster. This marriage displeased Phineus; he interrupted the ceremony, and, with a number of attendants, attacked Perseus and his friends. Perseus defended himself, and turned into stone Phineus and his companions, by showing them the Gorgon’s head. Apollodorus, bk. 2, chs. 1 & 4.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, fables 1 & 2.—Hyginus, fable 64.——A son of Melas.——A son of Lycaon king of Arcadia.——A son of Belus and Anchinoe.

Phinta, a king of Messenia, &c. Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 4.

Phinthias, a fountain where it is said nothing could sink. Pliny, bk. 31, ch. 2.

Phintia, a town of Sicily, at the mouth of the Himera. Cicero, Against Verres, bk. 3, ch. 83.

Phintias, called also Pithias, Pinthias, and Phytias, a man famous for his unparalleled friendship for Damon. See: [Damon]. Cicero, de Officiis, bk. 3, bk. 10; Tusculanæ Disputationes, bk. 5, ch. 22.—Diodorus, bk. 6.——A tyrant of Agrigentum, B.C. 282.

Phinto, a small island between Sardinia and Corsica, now Figo.

Phla, a small island in the lake Tritonis. Herodotus, bk. 4, ch. 178.

Phlegelas, an Indian king beyond the Hydaspes, who surrendered to Alexander. Curtius, bk. 9, ch. 1.

Phlegĕthon, a river of hell, whose waters were burning, as the word φλεγεθω, from which the name is derived, seems to indicate. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 6, li. 550.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 15, li. 532.—Seneca, Thyestes Hippolytus.—Silius Italicus, bk. 13, li. 564.

Phlegias, a man of Cyzicus when the Argonauts visited it, &c. Flaccus.

Phlegon, a native of Tralles in Lydia, one of the emperor Adrian’s freedmen. He wrote different treatises on the long-lived, on wonderful things, besides an historical account of Sicily, 16 books on the olympiads, an account of the principal places in Rome, three books of fasti, &c. Of these some fragments remain. His style was not elegant, and he wrote without judgment or precision. His works have been edited by Meursius, 4to, Leiden, 1620.——One of the horses of the sun. The word signifies burning. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 2.

Phlegra, or Phlegræus Campus, a place of Macedonia, afterwards called Pallene, where the giants attacked the gods and were defeated by Hercules. The combat was afterwards renewed in Italy, in a place of the same name near Cumæ. Silius Italicus, bk. 8, li. 538; bk. 9, li. 305.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Diodorus, bks. 4 & 5.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 10, li. 151; bk. 12, li. 378; bk. 15, li. 532.—Statius, bk. 5, Sylvæ, poem 3, li. 196.

Phlegyæ, a people of Thessaly. Some authors place them in Bœotia. They received their name from Phlegyas the son of Mars, with whom they plundered and burned the temple of Apollo at Delphi. Few of them escaped to Phocis, where they settled. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 36.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 13, li. 301.—Strabo, bk. 9.

Phlegyas, a son of Mars by Chryse daughter of Halmus, was king of the Lapithæ in Thessaly. He was father of Ixion and Coronis, to whom Apollo offered violence. When the father heard that his daughter had been so wantonly abused, he marched an army against Delphi, and reduced the temple of the god to ashes. This was highly resented. Apollo killed Phlegyas and placed him in hell, where a huge stone hangs over his head, and keeps him in continual alarms, by its appearance of falling every moment. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 36.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 5.—Pindar, Pythian, bk. 3.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, li. 87.—Servius, Commentary on the Aeneid of Vergil, bk. 6, li. 618.

Phlias, one of the Argonauts, son of Bacchus and Ariadne. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 12.

Phliasia, a country of Peloponnesus, near Sicyon, of which Phlius was the capital.

Phlius, (genitive, untis), a town in Peloponnesus, now Staphlica, in the territory of Sicyon.——Another, in Elis.——Another, in Argolis, now Drepano.

Phlœus, a surname of Bacchus, expressive of his youth and vigour. Plutarch, Quæstiones Convivales, bk. 5, qu. 8.

Phobētor, one of the sons of Somnus, and his principal minister. His office was to assume the shape of serpents and wild beasts, to inspire terror into the minds of men, as his name intimates (φοβεω). The other two ministers of Somnus were Phantasia and Morpheus. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 11, li. 640.

Phobos, son of Mars, and god of terror among the ancients, was represented with a lion’s head, and sacrifices were offered to him to deprecate his appearance in armies. Plutarch, Amatorius.

Phocæa, now Fochia, a maritime town of Ionia, in Asia Minor, with two harbours, between Cumæ and Smyrna, founded by an Athenian colony. It received its name from Phocus the leader of the colony, or from phocæ, sea calves, which are found in great abundance in the neighbourhood. The inhabitants, called Phocæi and Phocæenses, were expert mariners, and founded many cities in different parts of Europe. They left Ionia, when Cyrus attempted to reduce them under his power, and they came after many adventures into Gaul, where they founded Massilia, now Marseilles. The town of Marseilles is often distinguished by the epithet of Phocaica, and its inhabitants called Phocæenses. Phocæa was declared independent by Pompey, and under the first emperors of Rome it became one of the most flourishing cities of Asia Minor. Livy, bk. 5, ch. 34; bk. 37, ch. 31; bk. 38, ch. 39.—Mela, bk. 1, ch. 17.—Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 3.—Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 165.—Strabo, bk. 14.—Horace, epode 16.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 6, li. 9.—Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 4.

Phocenses and Phocĭci, the inhabitants of Phocis in Greece.

Phocilides, a Greek poet and philosopher of Miletus, about 540 years before the christian era. The poetical piece now extant called νουθετικον, and attributed to him, is not of his composition, but of another poet who lived in the reign of Adrian.

Phocion, an Athenian, celebrated for his virtues, private as well as public. He was educated in the school of Plato and Xenocrates, and as soon as he appeared among the statesmen of Athens, he distinguished himself by his prudence and moderation, his zeal for the public good, and his military abilities. He often checked the violent and inconsiderate measures of Demosthenes, and when the Athenians seemed eager to make war against Philip king of Macedonia, Phocion observed that war should never be undertaken without the strongest and most certain expectations of success and victory. When Philip endeavoured to make himself master of Eubœa, Phocion stopped his progress, and soon obliged him to relinquish his enterprise. During the time of his administration he was always inclined to peace, though he never suffered his countrymen to become indolent, and to forget the jealousy and rivalship of their neighbours. He was 45 times appointed governor of Athens, and no greater encomium can be passed upon his talents as a minister and statesman, than that he never solicited that high, though dangerous, office. In his rural retreat, or at the head of the Athenian armies, he always appeared barefooted, and without a cloak, whence one of his soldiers had occasion to observe, when he saw him dressed more warmly than usual during a severe winter, that since Phocion wore his cloak it was a sign of the most inclement weather. If he was the friend of temperance and discipline, he was not a less brilliant example of true heroism. Philip, as well as his son Alexander, attempted to bribe him, but to no purpose; and Phocion boasted in being one of the poorest of the Athenians, and in deserving the appellation of the Good. It was through him that Greece was saved from an impending war, and he advised Alexander rather to turn his arms against Persia, than to shed the blood of the Greeks, who were either his allies or his subjects. Alexander was so sensible of his merit and of his integrity, that he sent him 100 talents from the spoils which he had obtained from the Persians, but Phocion was too great to suffer himself to be bribed; and when the conqueror had attempted a second time to oblige him, and to conciliate his favour, by offering him the government and possession of five cities, the Athenian rejected the presents with the same indifference, and with the same independent mind. But not totally to despise the favours of the monarch, he begged Alexander to restore to their liberty four slaves that were confined in the citadel of Sardis. Antipater, who succeeded in the government of Macedonia after the death of Alexander, also attempted to corrupt the virtuous Athenian, but with the same success as his royal predecessor; and when a friend had observed to Phocion, that if he could so refuse the generous offers of his patrons, yet he should consider the good of his children, and accept them for their sake, Phocion calmly replied, that if his children were like him they could maintain themselves as well as their father had done, but if they behaved otherwise he declared that he was unwilling to leave them anything which might either supply their extravagancies, or encourage their debaucheries. But virtues like these could not long stand against the insolence and fickleness of an Athenian assembly. When the Piræus was taken, Phocion was accused of treason, and therefore, to avoid the public indignation, he fled for safety to Polyperchon. Polyperchon sent him back to Athens, where he was immediately condemned to drink the fatal poison. He received the indignities of the people with uncommon composure; and when one of his friends lamented his fate, Phocion exclaimed, “This is no more than what I expected; this treatment the most illustrious citizens of Athens have received before me.” He took the cup with the greatest serenity of mind, and as he drank the fatal draught, he prayed for the prosperity of Athens, and bade his friends to tell his son Phocus not to remember the indignities which his father had received from the Athenians. He died about 318 years before the christian era. His body was deprived of a funeral by order of the ungrateful Athenians, and if it was at last interred, it was by stealth, under a hearth, by the hand of a woman who placed this inscription over his bones: Keep inviolate, O sacred hearth, the precious remains of a good man, till a better day restores them to the monument of their forefathers, when Athens shall be delivered of her frenzy, and shall be more wise. It has been observed of Phocion, that he never appeared elated in prosperity, or dejected in adversity, he never betrayed pusillanimity by a tear, nor joy by a smile. His countenance was stern and unpleasant, but he never behaved with severity; his expressions were mild, and his rebukes gentle. At the age of 80 he appeared at the head of the Athenian armies like the most active officer, and to his prudence and cool valour in every period of life his citizens acknowledged themselves much indebted. His merits were not buried in oblivion; the Athenians repented of their ingratitude, and honoured his memory by raising him statues, and putting to a cruel death his guilty accusers. Plutarch & Cornelius Nepos, Lives.—Diodorus, bk. 16.

Phocis, a country of Greece, bounded on the east by Bœotia, and by Locris on the west. It originally extended from the bay of Corinth to the sea of Eubœa, and reached on the north as far as Thermopylæ, but its boundaries were afterwards more contracted. Phocis received its name from Phocus, a son of Ornytion, who settled there. The inhabitants were called Phocenses, and from thence the epithet of Phocicus was formed. Parnassus was the most celebrated of the mountains of Phocis, and Delphi was the greatest of its towns. Phocis is rendered famous for a war which it maintained against some of the Grecian republics, and which has received the name of the Phocian war. This celebrated war originated in the following circumstances:—When Philip king of Macedonia had, by his intrigues and well-concerted policy, fomented divisions in Greece, and disturbed the peace of every republic, the Greeks universally became discontented in their situation, fickle in their resolutions, and jealous of the prosperity of the neighbouring states. The Amphictyons, who were the supreme rulers of Greece, and who at that time were subservient to the views of the Thebans, the inveterate enemies of the Phocians, showed the same spirit of fickleness, and, like the rest of their countrymen, were actuated by the same fears, the same jealousy and ambition. As the supporters of religion, they accused the Phocians of impiety for ploughing a small portion of land which belonged to the god of Delphi. They immediately commanded that the sacred field should be laid waste, and that the Phocians, to expiate their crime, should pay a heavy fine to the community. The inability of the Phocians to pay the fine, and that of the Amphictyons to enforce their commands by violence, gave rise to new events. The people of Phocis were roused by the eloquence and the popularity of Philomelus, one of their countrymen, and when this ambitious ringleader had liberally contributed the great riches he possessed for the good of his countrymen, they resolved to oppose the Amphictyonic council by force of arms. He seized the rich temple of Delphi, and employed the treasures which it contained to raise a mercenary army. During two years hostilities were carried on between the Phocians and their enemies, the Thebans and the people of Locris, but no decisive battles were fought; and it can only be observed, that the Phocian prisoners were always put to an ignominious death, as guilty of the most abominable sacrilege and impiety, a treatment which was liberally retaliated on such of the army of the Amphictyons as became the captives of the enemy. The defeat, however, and death of Philomelus for a while checked their successes; but the deceased general was soon succeeded in the command by his brother, called Onomarchus, his equal in boldness and ambition, and his superior in activity and enterprise. Onomarchus rendered his cause popular, the Thessalians joined his army, and the neighbouring states observed at least a strict neutrality, if they neither opposed nor favoured his arms. Philip of Macedonia, who had assisted the Thebans, was obliged to retire from the field with dishonour, but a more successful battle was fought near Magnesia, and the monarch, by crowning the head of his soldiers with laurel, and telling them that they fought in the cause of Delphi and heaven, obtained a complete victory. Onomarchus was slain, and his body exposed on a gibbet; 6000 shared his fate, and their bodies were thrown into the sea, as unworthy of funeral honours, and 3000 were taken alive. This fatal defeat, however, did not ruin the Phocians; Phayllus, the only surviving brother of Philomelus, took the command of their armies, and doubling the pay of his soldiers, he increased his forces by the addition of 9000 men from Athens, Lacedæmon, and Achaia. But all this numerous force at last proved ineffectual; the treasures of the temple of Delphi, which had long defrayed the expenses of the war, began to fail; dissensions arose among the ringleaders of Phocis; and when Philip had crossed the straits of Thermopylæ, the Phocians, relying on his generosity, claimed his protection, and implored him to plead their cause before the Amphictyonic council. His feeble intercession was not attended with success, and the Thebans, the Locrians, and the Thessalians, who then composed the Amphictyonic council, unanimously decreed that the Phocians should be deprived of the privilege of sending members among the Amphictyons. Their arms and their horses were to be sold, for the benefit of Apollo; they were to pay the annual sum of 60,000 talents till the temple of Delphi had been restored to its ancient splendour and opulence; their cities were to be dismantled, and reduced to distinct villages, which were to contain no more than 60 houses each, at the distance of a furlong from one another, and all the privileges and the immunities of which they were stripped, were to be conferred on Philip king of Macedonia, for his eminent services in the [♦]prosecution of the Phocian war. The Macedonians were ordered to put these cruel commands into execution. The Phocians were unable to make resistance, and 10 years after they had undertaken the sacred war, they saw their country laid desolate, their walls demolished, and their cities in ruins, by the wanton jealousy of their enemies, and the inflexible cruelty of the Macedonian soldiers, B.C. 348. They were not, however, long under this disgraceful sentence; their well-known valour and courage recommended them to favour, and they gradually regained their influence and consequence by the protection of the Athenians, and the favours of Philip. Livy, bk. 32, ch. 18.—Ovid, bk. 2, Amores, poem 6, li. 15; Metamorphoses, bk. 5, li. 276.—Demosthenes.—Justin, bk. 8, &c.—Diodorus, bk. 16, &c.—Plutarch, Demosthenes, Lysander, Pericles, &c.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 5.

[♦] ‘prosetion’ replaced with ‘prosecution’

Phocus, son of Phocion, was dissolute in his manners and unworthy of the virtues of his great father. He was sent to Lacedæmon to imbibe there the principles of sobriety, of temperance, and frugality. He cruelly revenged the death of his father, whom the Athenians had put to death. Plutarch, Phocion & Apophthegmata Laconica.——A son of Æacus by Psamathe, killed by Telamon. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 12.——A son of Ornytion, who led a colony of Corinthians into Phocis. He cured Antiope, a daughter of Nycteus, of insanity, and married her, and by her became father of Panopeus and Crisus. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 4.

Phocylides, an ancient poet. See: [Phocilides].

Phœbas, a name applied to the priestess of Apollo’s temple at Delphi. Lucan, bk. 5, li. 128, &c.

Phœbe, a name given to Diana, or the moon, on account of the brightness of that luminary. She became, according to Apollodorus, mother of Asteria and Latona. See: [Diana].——A daughter of Leucippus and Philodice, carried away, with her sister Hilaira, by Castor and Pollux, as she was going to marry one of the sons of Aphareus. See: [Leucippides]. Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 10.—Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 22.

Phœbeum, a place near Sparta.

Phœbĭdas, a Lacedæmonian general sent by the Ephori to the assistance of the Macedonians against the Thracians. He seized the citadel of Thebes; but though he was disgraced and banished from the Lacedæmonian army for this perfidious measure, yet his countrymen kept possession of the town. He died B.C. 377. Cornelius Nepos, Pelopidas.—Diodorus, bk. 14, &c.

Phœbigĕna, a surname of Æsculapius, &c., as being descended from Phœbus. Virgil, Æneid, [♦]bk. 7, li. 773.

[♦] book reference omitted in text

Phœbus, a name given to Apollo, or the sun. This word expresses the brightness and splendour of that luminary (φοιβος). See: [Apollo].

Phœmos, a lake of Arcadia.

Phœnīce, or Phœnīcia, a country of Asia, at the east of the Mediterranean, whose boundaries have been different in different ages. Some suppose that the names of Phœnicia, Syria, and Palestine are indiscriminately used for one and the same country. Phœnicia, according to Ptolemy, extended on the north as far as the Eleutherus, a small river which falls into the Mediterranean sea, a little below the island of Aradus, and it had Pelusium or the territories of Egypt as its more southern boundary, and Syria on the east. Sidon and Tyre were the most capital towns of the country. The inhabitants were naturally industrious; the invention of letters is attributed to them, and commerce and navigation were among them in the most flourishing state. They planted colonies on the shores of the Mediterranean, particularly Carthage, Hippo, Marseilles, and Utica; and their manufactures acquired such a superiority over those of other nations, that among the ancients, whatever was elegant, great, or pleasing, either in apparel, or domestic utensils, received the epithet of Sidonian. The Phœnicians were originally governed by kings. They were subdued by the Persians, and afterwards by Alexander, and remained tributary to his successors and to the Romans. They were called Phœnicians, from Phœnix son of Agenor, who was one of their kings, or, according to others, from the great number of palm trees (θοινικες) which grow in the neighbourhood. Herodotus, bk. 4, ch. 42; bk. 5, ch. 58.—Homer, Odyssey, bk. 15.—Mela, bk. 1, ch. 11; bk. 2, ch. 7.—Strabo, bk. 16.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 1.—Lucretius, bk. 2, li. 829.—Pliny, bk. 2, ch. 47; bk. 5, ch. 12.—Curtius, bk. 4, ch. 2.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1, &c.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 12, li. 104; bk. 14, li. 345; bk. 15, li. 288.

Phœnīce, a town of Epirus. Livy, bk. 22, ch. 12.

Phœnīcia. See:, [Phœnice].

Phœnīcus, a mountain of Bœotia.——Another in Lycia, called also Olympus, with a town of the same name.——A port of Erythræ. Livy, bk. 56, ch. 45.

Phœnicŭsa, now Felicudi, one of the Æolian islands.

Phœnissa, a patronymic given to Dido, as a native of Phœnicia. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 4, li. 529.

Phœnix, son of Amyntor king of Argos by Cleobule, or Hippodamia, was preceptor to young Achilles. When his father proved faithless to his wife, on account of his fondness for a concubine called Clytia, Cleobule, jealous of her husband, persuaded her son Phœnix to ingratiate himself into the favours of his father’s mistress. Phœnix easily succeeded, but when Amyntor discovered his intrigues, he drew a curse upon him, and the son was soon after deprived of his sight by divine vengeance. According to some, Amyntor himself put out the eyes of his son, which so cruelly provoked him, that he meditated the death of his father. Reason and piety, however, prevailed over passion, and Phœnix, not to become a parricide, fled from Argos to the court of Peleus king of Phthia. Here he was treated with tenderness. Peleus carried him to Chiron, who restored to him his eyesight, and soon after he was made preceptor to Achilles, his benefactor’s son. He was also presented with the government of many cities, and made king of the Dolopes. He accompanied his pupil to the Trojan war, and Achilles was ever grateful for the instructions and precepts which he had received from Phœnix. After the death of Achilles, Phœnix, with others, was commissioned by the Greeks to return to Greece, to bring to the war young Pyrrhus. This commission he performed with success, and after the fall of Troy, he returned with Pyrrhus, and died in Thrace. He was buried at Æon, or, according to Strabo, near Trachinia, where a small river in the neighbourhood received the name of Phœnix. Strabo, bk. 9.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 9, &c.—Ovid, Ibis, li. 259.—Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 7.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 762.——A son of Agenor, by a nymph who was called Telephassa, according to Apollodorus and Moschus, or, according to others, Epimedusa, Perimeda, or Agriope. He was, like his brothers Cadmus and Cilix, sent by his father in pursuit of his sister Europa, whom Jupiter had carried away under the form of a bull, and when his inquiries proved unsuccessful, he settled in a country which, according to some, was from him called Phœnicia. From him, as some suppose, the Carthaginians were called Pœni. Apollodorus, bk. 3.—Hyginus, fable 178.——The father of Adonis, according to Hesiod.——A Theban, delivered to Alexander, &c.——A native of Tenedos, who was an officer in the service of Eumenes.

Pholoe, one of the horses of Admetus.——A mountain of Arcadia, near Pisa. It received its name from Pholus the friend of Hercules, who was buried there. It is often confounded with another of the same name in Thessaly, near mount Othrys. Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 6.—Lucan, bk. 3, li. 198; bk. 6, li. 388; bk. 7, li. 449.—Ovid, bk. 2, Fasti, li. 273.——A female servant, of Cretan origin, given with her two sons to Sergestus by Æneas. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 285.——A courtesan in the age of Horace. Horace, bk. 1, ode 33, li. 7.

Pholus, one of the Centaurs, son of Silenus and Melia, or, according to others, of Ixion and the cloud. He kindly entertained Hercules when he was going against the boar of Erymanthus, but he refused to give him wine, as that which he had belonged to the rest of the Centaurs. Hercules, upon this, without ceremony, broke the cask and drank the wine. The smell of the liquor drew the Centaurs from the neighbourhood to the house of Pholus, but Hercules stopped them when they forcibly entered the habitation of his friend, and killed the greatest part of them. Pholus gave the dead a decent funeral, but he mortally wounded himself with one of the arrows which were poisoned with the venom of the hydra, and which he attempted to extract from the body of one of the Centaurs. Hercules, unable to cure him, buried him when dead, and called the mountain where his remains were deposited by the name of Pholoe. Apollodorus, bk. 1.—Pausanias, bk. 3.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 2, li. 456; Æneid, bk. 8, li. 294.—Diodorus, bk. 4.—Silius Italicus, bk. 1.—Lucan, bks. 3, 6 & 7.—Statius Thebaid, bk. 2.——One of the friends of Æneas, killed by Turnus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 12, li. 341.

Phorbas, a son of Priam and Epithesia, killed during the Trojan war by Menelaus. The god Somnus borrowed his features when he deceived Palinurus, and threw him into the sea near the coast of Italy. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 842.——A son of Lapithus, who married Hyrmine the daughter of Epeus, by whom he had Actor. Pelops, according to Diodorus, shared his kingdom with Phorbas, who also, says the same historian, established himself at Rhodes, at the head of a colony from Elis and Thessaly, by order of the oracle, which promised, by his means only, deliverance from the numerous serpents which infested the island. Diodorus, bk. 2.—Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 1.——A shepherd of Polybus king of Corinth.——A man who profaned Apollo’s temple, &c. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 11, li. 414.——A king of Argos.——A native of Cyrene, son of Methion, killed by Perseus. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, fable 3.

Phorcus, or Phorcys, a sea deity, son of Pontus and Terra, who married his sister Ceto, by whom he had the Gorgons, the dragon that kept the apples of the Hesperides, and other monsters. Hesiod, Theogony.—Apollodorus.——One of the auxiliaries of Priam, killed by Ajax during the Trojan war. Homer, Iliad, bk. 17.——A man whose seven sons assisted Turnus against Æneas. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 10, li. 328.

Phormio, an Athenian general, whose father’s name was Asopicus. He impoverished himself to maintain and support the dignity of his army. His debts were some time after paid by the Athenians, who wished to make him their general, an office which he refused, while he had so many debts, observing that it was unbecoming an officer to be at the head of an army, when he knew that he was poorer than the meanest of his soldiers.——A general of Crotona.——A peripatetic philosopher of Ephesus, who once gave a lecture upon the duties of an officer, and a military profession. The philosopher was himself ignorant of the subject which he treated, upon which Hannibal the Great, who was one of his auditors, exclaimed that he had seen many doting old men, but never one worse than Phormio. Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 2.——An Athenian archon.——A disciple of Plato, chosen by the people of Elis to make a reformation in their government and their jurisprudence.

Phormis, an Arcadian who acquired great riches at the court of Gelon and Hiero in Sicily. He dedicated the brazen statue of a mare to Jupiter Olympius in Peloponnesus, which so much resembled nature, that horses came near it, as if it had been alive. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 27.

Phŏrōneus, the god of a river of Peloponnesus of the same name. He was son of the river Inachus by Melissa, and he was the second king of Argos. He married a nymph called Cerdo, or Laodice, by whom he had Apis, from whom Argolis was called Apia, and Niobe, the first woman of whom Jupiter became enamoured. Phoroneus taught his subjects the utility of laws, and the advantages of a social life and of friendly intercourse, whence the inhabitants of Argolis are often called Phoronæi. Pausanias relates that Phoroneus, with the Cephisus, Asterion, and Inachus, were appointed as umpires in a quarrel between Neptune and Juno, concerning their right of patronizing Argolis. Juno gained the preference, upon which Neptune, in a fit of resentment, dried up all the four rivers, whose decision he deemed partial. He afterwards restored them to their dignity and consequence. Phoroneus was the first who raised a temple to Juno. He received divine honours after death. His temple still existed at Argos, under Antoninus the Roman emperor. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 15, &c.—Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 1.—Hyginus, fable 143.

Phorōnis, a patronymic of Io the sister of Phoroneus. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 625.

Phorōnium, a town of Argolis, built by Phoroneus.

Photīnus, a eunuch who was prime minister to Ptolemy king of Egypt. When Pompey fled to the court of Ptolemy, after the battle of Pharsalia, Photinus advised his master not to receive him, but to put him to death. His advice was strictly followed. Julius Cæsar some time after visited Egypt, and Photinus raised seditions against him, for which he was put to death. When Cæsar triumphed over Egypt and Alexandria, the pictures of Photinus, and of some of the Egyptians, were carried in the procession at Rome. Plutarch.

Photius, a son of Antonina, who betrayed to Belisarius his wife’s debaucheries.——A patrician in Justinian’s reign.

Phoxus, a general of the Phocæans, who burnt Lampsacus, &c. Polyænus, bk. 8.——A tyrant of Chalcis, banished by his subjects, &c. Aristotle, Politics, bk. 5, ch. 4.

Phraates I., a king of Parthia, who succeeded Arsaces III., called also Phriapatius. He made war against Antiochus king of Syria, and was defeated in three successive battles. He left many children behind him, but as they were all too young, and unable to succeed to the throne, he appointed his brother Mithridates king, of whose abilities and military prudence he had often been a spectator. Justin, bk. 41, ch. 5.

Phraates II., succeeded his father Mithridates as king of Parthia; and made war against the Scythians, whom he called to his assistance against Antiochus king of Syria, and whom he refused to pay, on the pretence that they came too late. He was murdered by some Greek mercenaries, who had been once his captives, and who had enlisted in his army, B.C. 129. Justin, bk. 42, ch. 1.—Plutarch, Pompey.

Phraates III., succeeded his father Pacorus on the throne of Parthia, and gave one of his daughters in marriage to Tigranes the son of Tigranes king of Armenia. Soon after he invaded the kingdom of Armenia, to make his son-in-law sit on the throne of his father. His expedition was attended with ill success. He renewed a treaty of alliance which his father had made with the Romans. At his return in Parthia, he was assassinated by his sons Orodes and Mithridates. Justin.

Phraates IV., was nominated king of Parthia by his father Orodes, whom he soon after murdered, as also his own brothers. He made war against Marcus Antony with great success, and obliged him to retire with much loss. Some time after he was dethroned by the Parthian nobility, but he soon regained his power, and drove away the usurper, called Tiridates. The usurper claimed the protection of Augustus the Roman emperor, and Phraates sent ambassadors to Rome to plead his cause, and gain the favour of his powerful judge. He was successful in his embassy: he made a treaty of peace and alliance with the Roman emperor, restored the ensigns and standards which the Parthians had taken from Crassus and Antony, and gave up his four sons with their wives as hostages, till his engagements were performed. Some suppose that Phraates delivered his children into the hands of Augustus to be confined at Rome, that he might reign with greater security, as he knew his subjects would revolt as soon as they found any one of his family inclined to countenance their rebellion, though at the same time they scorned to support the interest of any usurper who was not of the royal house of the Arsacidæ. He was, however, at last murdered by one of his concubines, who placed her son called Phraatices on the throne. Valerius Maximus, bk. 7, ch. 6.—Justin, bk. 42, ch. 5.—Dio Cassius, bk. 51, &c.—Plutarch, Antonius, &c.—Tacitus, Annals, bk. 6, ch. 32.

Phraates, a prince of Parthia in the reign of Tiberius.——A satrap of Parthia. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 6, ch. 42.

Phraatices, a son of Phraates IV. He, with his mother, murdered his father, and took possession of the vacant throne. His reign was short; he was deposed by his subjects, whom he had offended by cruelty, avarice, and oppression.

Phradates, an officer in the army of Darius at the battle of Arbela.

Phragrandæ, a people of Thrace. Livy, bk. 26, ch. 25.

Phrahates, the same as Phraates. See: [Phraates].

Phranicates, a general of the Parthian armies, &c. Strabo, bk. 16.

Phraortes, succeeded his father Deioces on the throne of Media. He made war against the neighbouring nations, and conquered the greatest part of Asia. He was defeated and killed in a battle by the Assyrians, after a reign of 22 years, B.C. 625. His son Cyaxares succeeded him. It is supposed that the Arphaxad mentioned in Judith is Phraortes. Pausanias.—Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 102.——A king of India, remarkable for his frugality. Philostratus.

Phrasĭcles, a nephew of Themistocles, whose daughter Nicomacha he married. Plutarch, Themistocles.

Phrasimus, the father of Praxithea. Apollodorus.

Phrasius, a Cyprian soothsayer, sacrificed on an altar by Busiris king of Egypt.

Phrataphernes, a general of the Massagetæ, who surrendered to Alexander. Curtius, bk. 8.——A satrap who, after the death of Darius, fled to Hyrcania, &c. Curtius.

Phriapatius, a king of Parthia, who flourished B.C. 195.

Phricium, a town near Thermopylæ. Livy, bk. 36, ch. 13.

Phrixus, a river of Argolis. There is also a small town of that name in Elis, built by the Minyæ. Herodotus, bk. 4, ch. 148.

Phronĭma, a daughter of Etearchus king of Crete. She was delivered to a servant to be thrown into the sea, by order of her father, at the instigation of his second wife. The servant was unwilling to murder the child, but as he was bound by an oath to throw her into the sea, he accordingly let her down into the water by a rope, and took her out again unhurt. Phronima was afterwards in the number of the concubines of Polymnestus, by whom she became mother of Battus the founder of Cyrene. Herodotus, bk. 4, ch. 154.

Phrontis, son of Onetor, pilot of the ship of Menelaus, after the Trojan war, was killed by Apollo just as the ship reached Sunium. Homer, Odyssey, bk. 3, li. 282.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 25.——One of the Argonauts. Apollodorus, bk. 1.

Phruri, a Scythian nation.

Phryges, a river of Asia Minor, dividing Phrygia from Caria, and falling into the Hermus. Pausanias.

Phrygia, a country of Asia Minor, generally divided into Phrygia Major and Minor. Its boundaries are not properly or accurately defined by ancient authors, though it appears that it was situate between Bithynia, Lydia, Cappadocia and Caria. It received its name from the Bryges, a nation of Thrace, or Macedonia, who came to settle there, and from their name, by corruption, arose the word Phrygia. Cybele was the chief deity of the country, and her festivals were observed with the greatest solemnity. The most remarkable towns, besides Troy, were Laodice, Hierapolis, and Synnada. The invention of the pipe of reeds, and of all sorts of needlework, is attributed to the inhabitants, who are represented by some authors as stubborn, but yielding to correction (hence Phryx verberatus melior), as imprudent, effeminate, servile, and voluptuous; and to this Virgil seems to allude. Æneid, bk. 9, li. 617. The Phrygians, like all other nations, were called barbarians by the Greeks; their music (Phrygii cantus) was of a grave and solemn nature, when opposed to the brisker and more cheerful Lydian airs. Mela, bk. 1, ch. 19.—Strabo, bk. 2, &c.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 13, li. 429, &c.—Cicero, bk. 7, Letters to his Friends, ltr. 18.—Flaccus, bk. 27.—Dio Cassius, bk. 1, ch. 50.—Pliny, bk. 1, ch. 4.—Horace, bk. 2, ode 9, li. 16.—Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 25.—Herodotus, bk. 7, ch. 73.——A city of Thrace.

Phryne, a celebrated prostitute who flourished at Athens about 328 years before the christian era. She was mistress to Praxiteles, who drew her picture. See: [Praxiteles]. This was one of his best pieces, and it was placed in the temple of Apollo at Delphi. It is said that Apelles painted his Venus Anadyomene after he had seen Phryne on the sea-shore naked, and with dishevelled hair. Phryne became so rich by the liberality of her lovers, that she offered to rebuild, at her own expense, Thebes, which Alexander had destroyed, provided this inscription was placed on the walls: Alexander diruit, sed meretrix Phryne refecit. This was refused. Pliny, bk. 34, ch. 8.——There was also another of the same name who was accused of impiety. When she saw that she was going to be condemned, she unveiled her bosom, which so influenced her judges, that she was immediately acquitted. Quintilian, bk. 2, ch. 15.

Phrynĭcus, a general of Samos, who endeavoured to betray his country to the Athenians, &c.——A flatterer at Athens.——A tragic poet of Athens, disciple to Thespis. He was the first who introduced a female character on the stage. Strabo, bk. 14.——A comic poet.

Phrynis, a musician of Mitylene, the first who obtained a musical prize at the Panathenæa at Athens. He added two strings to the lyre, which had always been used with seven by all his predecessors, B.C. 438. It is said that he was originally a cook at the house of Hiero king of Sicily.——A writer in the reign of Commodus, who made a collection, in 36 books, of phrases and sentences from the best Greek authors, &c.

Phryno, a celebrated general of Athens, who died B.C. 590.

Phryxus, a son of [♦]Athamas king of Thebes by Nephele. After the repudiation of his mother, he was persecuted with the most inveterate fury by his stepmother Ino, because he was to sit on the throne of Athamas, in preference to the children of a second wife. He was apprised of Ino’s intentions upon his life by his mother Nephele, or, according to others, by his preceptor; and the better to make his escape, he secured part of his father’s treasures, and privately left Bœotia, with his sister Helle, to go to their friend and relation Æetes king of Colchis. They embarked on board a ship, or, according to the fabulous account of the poets and mythologists, they mounted on the back of a ram whose fleece was of gold, and proceeded on their journey through the air. The height to which they were carried made Helle giddy, and she fell into the sea. Phryxus gave her a decent burial on the sea-shore, and after he had called the place Hellespont from her name, he continued his flight, and arrived safe in the kingdom of Æetes, where he offered the ram on the altars of Mars. The king received him with great tenderness, and gave him his daughter Chalciope in marriage. She had by him Phrontis, Melias, Argos, Cylindrus, whom some call Cytorus, Catis, Lorus, and Hellen. Some time after he was murdered by his father-in-law, who envied him the possession of the golden fleece; and Chalciope, to prevent her children from sharing their father’s fate, sent them privately from Colchis to Bœotia, as nothing was to be dreaded there from the jealousy or resentment of Ino, who was then dead. The fable of the flight of Phryxus to Colchis on a ram has been explained by some, who observe that the ship on which he embarked was either called by that name, or carried on her prow the figure of that animal. The fleece of gold is explained by recollecting that Phryxus carried away immense treasures from Thebes. Phryxus was placed among the constellations of heaven after death. The ram which carried him to Asia is said to have been the fruit of Neptune’s amour with Theophane the daughter of Altis. This ram had been given to Athamas by the gods, to reward his piety and religious life, and Nephele procured it for her children, just as they were going to be sacrificed to the jealousy of Ino. The murder of Phryxus was some time after amply revenged by the Greeks. It gave rise to a celebrated expedition which was achieved under Jason and many of the princes of Greece, and which had for its object the recovery of the golden fleece, and the punishment of the king of Colchis for his cruelty to the son of Athamas. Diodorus, bk. 4.—Herodotus, bk. 7, ch. 197.—Apollodorus, Argonautica.—Orpheus.—Flaccus.—Strabo.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 9.—Pindar, Pythian, poem 4.—Hyginus, fables 14, 188, &c.—Ovid, Heroides, poem 18; Metamorphoses, bk. 4.——A small river of Argolis.

[♦] ‘Athmas’ replaced with ‘Athamas’

Phthia, a town of Phthiotis, at the east of mount Othrys in Thessaly, where Achilles was born, and from which he is often called Phthius heros. Horace, bk. 4, ode 6, li. 4.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 13, li. 156.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 3.—Propertius, bk. 2, poem 14, li. 38.—Cicero, Tusculanæ Disputationes, bk. 1, ch. 10.——A nymph of Achaia, beloved by Jupiter, who, to seduce her, disguised himself under the shape of a pigeon. Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 1, ch. 15.——A daughter of Amphion and Niobe, killed by Diana. Apollodorus.

Phthiōtis, a small province of Thessaly, between the Pelasgicus sinus, and the Maliacus sinus, Magnesia, and mount Œta. It was also called Achaia. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 8.

Phya, a tall and beautiful woman of Attica, whom Pisistratus, when he wished to re-establish himself a third time in his tyranny, dressed like the goddess Minerva, and led to the city on a chariot, making the populace believe that the goddess herself came to restore him to power. The artifice succeeded. Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 59.—Polyænus, bk. 1, ch. 40.

Phycus (untis), a promontory near Cyrene, now called Ras-al-sem. Lucan, bk. 9.

Phylăce, a town of Thessaly, built by Phylacus. Protesilaus reigned there, from whence he is often called Phylacides. Lucan, bk. 6, li. 252.——A town of Arcadia. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 34.——A town of Epirus. Livy, bk. 45, ch. 26.

Phylăcus, a son of Deion king of Phocis. He married Clymene the daughter of Mynias, and founded Phylace. Apollodorus.

Phylarchus, a Greek biographer, who flourished B.C. 221. He was accused of partiality by Plutarch, Aratus.

Phylas, a king of Ephyre, son of Antiochus and grandson of Hercules.

Phyle, a well-fortified village of Attica, at a little distance from Athens. Cornelius Nepos, Thrasybulus.

Phyleis, a daughter of Thespius. Apollodorus.

Phylēus, one of the Greek captains during the Trojan war.——A son of Augeas. He blamed his father for refusing to pay Hercules what he had promised him for cleaning his stables. He was placed on his father’s throne by Hercules.

Phylĭra. See: [Philyra].

Phylla, the wife of Demetrius Poliorcetes, and mother of Stratonice the wife of Seleucus.

Phyllalia, a part of Arcadia.——A place in Thessaly.

Phylleius, a mountain, country, and town of Macedonia. Apollonius, Argonautica, bk. 1.

Phyllis, a daughter of Sithon, or, according to others, of Lycurgus king of Thrace, who hospitably received Demophoon the son of Theseus, who, at his return from the Trojan war, had stopped on her coasts. She became enamoured of him, and did not find him insensible to her passion. After some months of mutual tenderness and affection, Demophoon set sail for Athens, where his domestic affairs recalled him. He promised faithfully to return as soon as a month was expired; but either his dislike for Phyllis, or the irreparable situation of his affairs, obliged him to violate his engagement, and the queen, grown desperate on account of his absence, hanged herself, or, according to others, threw herself down a precipice into the sea, and perished. Her friends raised a tomb over her body, where there grew up certain trees, whose leaves at a particular season of the year, suddenly became wet, as if shedding tears for the death of Phyllis. According to an old tradition mentioned by Servius, Virgil’s commentator, Phyllis was changed by the gods into an almond tree, which is called Phylla by the Greeks. Some days after this metamorphosis, Demophoon revisited Thrace, and when he heard of the fate of Phyllis, he ran and clasped the tree, which, though at that time stripped of its leaves, suddenly shot forth and blossomed, as if still sensible of tenderness and love. The absence of Demophoon from the house of Phyllis has given rise to a beautiful epistle of Ovid, supposed to have been written by the Thracian queen, about the fourth month after her lover’s departure. Ovid, Heroides, poem 2; De Ars Amatoria, bk. 2, li. 353; Tristia, bk. 2, li. 437.—Hyginus, fable 59.——A country woman introduced in Virgil’s eclogues.——The nurse of the emperor Domitian. Suetonius, Domitian, ch. 17.——A country of Thrace, near mount Pangæus. Herodotus, bk. 7, ch. 13.

Phyllius, a young Bœotian, uncommonly fond of Cygnus the son of Hyria, a woman of Bœotia. Cygnus slighted his passion, and told him that, to obtain a return of affection, he must previously destroy an enormous lion, take alive two large vultures, and sacrifice on Jupiter’s altars a wild bull that infested the country. This he easily effected by means of artifice, and by the advice of Hercules he forgot his partiality for the son of Hyria. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 7, li. 372.—Nicander, Heteroeumena, bk. 3.——A Spartan remarkable for the courage with which he fought against Pyrrhus king of Epirus.

Phyllŏdŏce, one of Cyrene’s attendant nymphs. Virgil, Georgics, bk. 4, li. 336.

Phyllos, a country of Arcadia.——A town of Thessaly near Larissa, where Apollo had a temple.

Phyllus, a general of Phocis during the Phocian or sacred war against the Thebans. He had assumed the command after the death of his brothers Philomelus and Onomarchus. He is called by some Phayllus. See: [Phocis].

Physcella, a town of Macedonia. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 3.

Physcion, a famous rock of Bœotia, which was the residence of the Sphinx, and against which the monster destroyed himself, when his enigmas were explained by Œdipus. Plutarch.

Physcoa, a woman of Elis, mother of Narcæus by Bacchus. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 16.

Physcon, a surname of one of the Ptolemies, king of Egypt, from the great prominency of his belly (φνοκη, venter). Athenæus, bk. 2, ch. 23.

Physcos, a town of Caria, opposite Rhodes. Strabo, bk. 14.

Physcus, a river of Asia falling into the Tigris. The 10,000 Greeks crossed it on their return from Cunaxa.

Phytălĭdes, the descendants of Phytalus, a man who hospitably received and entertained Ceres, when she visited Attica. Plutarch, Theseus.

Phyton, a general of the people of Rhegium, against Dionysius the tyrant of Sicily. He was taken by the enemy and tortured, B.C. 387, and his son was thrown into the sea. Diodorus, bk. 14.

Phyxium, a town of Elis.

Pia, or Pialia, festivals instituted in honour of Adrian, by the Emperor Antoninus. They were celebrated at Puteoli, on the second year of the Olympiads.

Piăsus, a general of the Pelasgi. Strabo, bk. 13.

Picēni, the inhabitants of Picenum, called also Picentes. They received their name from picus, a bird by whose auspices they had settled in that part of Italy. Silius Italicus, bk. 8, li. 425.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 4.

Picentia, the capital of the Picentini.

Picentīni, a people of Italy between Lucania and Campania on the Tuscan sea. They are different from the Piceni or Picentes, who inhabited Picenum. Silius Italicus, bk. 8, li. 450.—Tacitus, Histories, bk. 4, ch. 62.

Picēnum, or Picēnus ager, a country of Italy near the Umbrians and Sabines, on the borders of the Adriatic. Livy, bk. 21, ch. 6; bk. 22, ch. 9; bk. 27, ch. 43.—Silius Italicus, bk. 10, li. 313.—Horace, bk. 2, satire 3, li. 272.—Martial, bk. 1, ltr. 44.

Picra, a lake of Africa, which Alexander crossed when he went to consult the oracle of Ammon. Diodorus.

Pictæ, or Picti, a people of Scythia, called also Agathyrsæ. They received this name from their painting their bodies with different colours, to appear more terrible in the eyes of their enemies. A colony of these, according to Servius, Virgil’s commentator, emigrated to the northern parts of Britain, where they still preserved their name and their savage manners, but they are mentioned only by later writers. Marcellinus, bk. 27, ch. 18.—Claudian, de Consulatu Honorii, li. 54.—Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 12.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 1.

Pictāvi, or Pictŏnes, a people of Gaul in the modern country of Poictou. Cæsar, bk. 7, Gallic War, ch. 4.

Pictăvium, a town of Gaul.

Fabius Pictor, a consul under whom silver was first coined at Rome, A.U.C. 485.

Picumnus and Pilumnus, two deities at Rome, who presided over the auspices that were required before the celebration of nuptials. Pilumnus was supposed to patronize children, as his name seems, in some manner, to indicate, quod pellat mala infantiæ. The manuring of lands was first invented by Picumnus, from which reason he is called Sterquilinius. Pilumnus is also invoked as the god of bakers and millers, as he is said to have first invented how to grind corn. Turnus boasted of being one of his lineal descendants. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 9, li. 4.—Varro.

Picus, a king of Latium, son of Saturn, who married Venilia, who is also called Canens, by whom he had Faunus. He was tenderly loved by the goddess Pomona, and he returned a mutual affection. As he was one day hunting in the woods, he was met by Circe, who became deeply enamoured of him, and who changed him into a woodpecker, called by the name of picus among the Latins. His wife Venilia was so disconsolate when she was informed of his death, that she pined away. Some suppose that Picus was the son of Pilumnus, and that he gave out prophecies to his subjects, by means of a favourite woodpecker, from which circumstance originated the fable of his being metamorphosed into a bird. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 7, lis. 48, 171, &c.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 14, li. 320, &c.

Pidorus, a town near mount Athos. Herodotus, bk. 7, ch. 122.

Pidytes, a man killed by Ulysses during the Trojan war.

Piĕlus, a son of Neoptolemus king of Epirus, after his father. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 11.

Pĭĕra, a fountain of Peloponnesus, between Elis and Olympia. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 16.

Piĕria, a small tract of country in Thessaly or Macedonia, from which the epithet of Pierian was applied to the Muses, and to poetical compositions. Martial, bk. 9, ltr. 88, li. 3.—Horace, bk. 4, ode 8, li. 20.——A place between Cilicia and Syria.——One of the wives of Danaus, mother of six daughters, called Actea, Podarce, Dioxippe, Adyte, Ocypete, and Pilarge. Apollodorus, bk. 2.——The wife of Oxylus the son of Hæmon, and mother of Ætolus and Laias. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 3.——The daughter of Pythas, a Milesian, &c.

Piĕrĭdes, a name given to the Muses, either because they were born in Pieria, in Thessaly, or because they were supposed by some to be the daughters of Pierus, a king of Macedonia, who settled in Bœotia.——Also the daughters of Pierus, who challenged the Muses to a trial in music, in which they were conquered, and changed into magpies. It may perhaps be supposed that the victorious Muses assumed the name of the conquered daughters of Pierus, and ordered themselves to be called Pierides, in the same manner as Minerva was called Pallas because she had killed the giant Pallas. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, li. 300.

Piĕris, a mountain of Macedonia. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 29.

Piĕrus, a mountain of Thessaly, sacred to the Muses, who were from thence, as some imagine, called Pierides.——A rich man of Thessaly, whose nine daughters, called Pierides, challenged the Muses, and were changed into magpies when conquered. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 29.——A river of Achaia, in Peloponnesus.——A town of Thessaly. Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 21.——A mountain with a lake of the same name in Macedonia.

Piĕtas, a virtue which denotes veneration for the deity, and love and tenderness to our friends. It received divine honours among the Romans, and was made one of their gods. Acilius Glabrio first erected a temple to this new divinity, on the spot where a woman had fed with her own milk her aged father, who had been imprisoned by the order of the senate, and deprived of all aliments. Cicero, De Divinatione, bk. 1.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 5, ch. 4.—Pliny, bk. 7, ch. 36.

Pigres and Mattyas, two brothers, &c. Herodotus.——The name of three rivers.

Pigrum mare, a name applied to the Northern sea, from its being frozen. The word Pigra is applied to the Palus Mœotis. Ovid, bk. 4, ex Ponto, ltr. 10, li. 61.—Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 13.—Tacitus, Germania, ch. 45.

Pilumnus, the god of bakers at Rome. See: [Picumnus].

Pimpla, a mountain of Macedonia, with a fountain of the same name, on the confines of Thessaly, near Olympus, sacred to the Muses, who on that account are often called Pimpleæ and Pimpleades. Horace, bk. 1, ode 26, li. 9.—Strabo, bk. 10.—Martial, bk. 12, ltr. 11, li. 3.—Statius, bk. 1, Sylvæ, poem 4, li. 26; Sylvæ, poem 2, li. 36.

Pimprana, a town on the Indus. Arrian.

Pinăre, an island of the Ægean sea.——A town of Syria, at the south of mount Amanus. Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 25.——Of Lycia. Strabo, bk. 14.

Pinārius and Potitius, two old men of Arcadia, who came with Evander to Italy. They were instructed by Hercules, who visited the court of Evander, how they were to offer sacrifices to his divinity, in the morning, and in the evening, immediately at sunset. The morning sacrifice they punctually performed, but on the evening Potitius was obliged to offer the sacrifice alone, as Pinarius neglected to come till after the appointed time. This negligence offended Hercules, and he ordered that for the future Pinarius and his descendants should preside over the sacrifices, but that Potitius, with his posterity, should wait upon the priests as servants, when the sacrifices were annually offered to him on mount Aventine. This was religiously observed till the age of Appius Claudius, who persuaded the Potitii, by a large bribe, to discontinue their sacred office, and to have the ceremony performed by slaves. For this negligence, as the Latin authors observe, the Potitii were deprived of sight, and the family became a little time after totally extinct. Livy, bk. 1, ch. 7.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 8, li. 269, &c.—Victor, de Origo Gentis Romanæ, ch. 8.

Marcus Pinārius Rusca, a pretor, who conquered Sardinia, and defeated the Corsicans. Cicero, On Oratory, bk. 2.

Pinarus, or Pindus, now Delifou, a river falling into the sea near Issus, after flowing between Cilicia and Syria. Dionysius Periegeta.

Pincum, a town of Mœsia Superior, now Gradisca.

Pindărus, a celebrated lyric poet of Thebes. He was carefully trained from his earliest years to the study of music and poetry, and he was taught how to compose verses with elegance and simplicity, by Myrtis and Corinna. When he was young, it is said that a swarm of bees settled on his lips, and there left some honeycombs as he reposed on the grass. This was universally explained as a prognostic of his future greatness and celebrity, and indeed he seemed entitled to notice when he had conquered Myrtis in a musical conquest. He was not, however, so successful against Corinna, who obtained five times, while he was competitor, a poetical prize, which, according to some, was adjudged rather to the charms of her person, than to the brilliancy of her genius, or the superiority of her composition. In the public assemblies of Greece, where females were not permitted to contend, Pindar was rewarded with the prize, in preference to every other competitor; and as the conquerors at Olympia were the subject of his compositions, the poet was courted by statesmen and princes. His hymns and pæans were repeated before the most crowded assemblies in the temples of Greece; and the priestess of Delphi declared that it was the will of Apollo that Pindar should receive the half of all the first fruit offerings that were annually heaped on his altars. This was not the only public honour which he received; after his death, he was honoured with every mark of respect, even to adoration. His statue was erected at Thebes in the public place where the games were exhibited, and six centuries after it was viewed with pleasure and admiration by the geographer Pausanias. The honours which had been paid to him while alive, were also shared by his posterity; and at the celebration of one of the festivals of the Greeks, a portion of the victim which had been offered in sacrifice, was reserved for the descendants of the poet. Even the most inveterate enemies of the Thebans showed regard for his memory, and the Spartans spared the house which the prince of Lyrics had inhabited, when they destroyed the houses and the walls of Thebes. The same respect was also paid him by Alexander the Great when Thebes was reduced to ashes. It is said that Pindar died at the advanced age of 86, B.C. 435. The greatest part of his works have perished. He had written some hymns to the gods, poems in honour of Apollo, dithyrambics to Bacchus, and odes on several victories obtained at the four greatest festivals of the Greeks, the Olympic, Isthmian, Pythian, and Nemean games. Of all these, the odes are the only compositions extant, admired for sublimity of sentiments, grandeur of expression, energy and magnificence of style, boldness of metaphors, harmony of numbers, and elegance of diction. In these odes, which were repeated with the aid of musical instruments, and accompanied by the various inflections of the voice, with suitable attitudes and proper motions of the body, the poet has not merely celebrated the place where the victory was won, but has introduced beautiful episodes, and by unfolding the greatness of his heroes, the dignity of their characters, and the glory of the several republics where they flourished, he has rendered the whole truly beautiful and in the highest degree interesting. Horace has not hesitated to call Pindar inimitable, and this panegyric will not perhaps appear too offensive when we recollect that succeeding critics have agreed in extolling his beauties, his excellence, the fire, animation, and enthusiasm of his genius. He has been censured for his affectation in composing an ode from which the letter S was excluded. The best editions of Pindar are those of Heyne, 4to, Gottingen, 1773; of Glasgow, 12mo, 1774; and of Schmidius, 4to, Witteberg, 1616. Athenæus.—Quintilian, bk. 10, ch. 1.—Horace, bk. 4, ode 2.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 3.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 8; bk. 9, ch. 23.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 9, ch. 12.—Plutarch, Alexander.—Curtius, bk. 1, ch. 13.——A tyrant of Ephesus, who killed his master at his own request, after the battle of Philippi. Plutarch.——A Theban, who wrote a Latin poem on the Trojan war.

Pindăsus, a mountain of Troas.

Pindenissus, a town of Cilicia, on the borders of Syria. Cicero, when proconsul in Asia, besieged it for 25 days and took it. Cicero, For Marcus Cælius; Letters to his Friends, bk. 2, ltr. 10.

Pindus, a mountain, or rather a chain of mountains, between Thessaly, Macedonia, and Epirus. It was greatly celebrated as being sacred to the Muses and to Apollo. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 570.—Strabo, bk. 18.—Virgil, Eclogues, poem 10.—Lucan, bk. 1, li. 674; bk. 6, li. 339.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 3.——A town of Doris in Greece, called also Cyphas. It was watered by a small river of the same name which falls into the Cephisus, near Lilæa. Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 56.

Pingus, a river of Mœsia, falling into the Danube. Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 26.

Pinna, a town of Italy at the mouth of the Matrinus, south of Picenum. Silius Italicus, bk. 8, li. 518.

Pinthias. See: [Phinthias].

Pintia, a town of Spain, now supposed to be Valladolid.

Pion, one of the descendants of Hercules, who built Pionia, near the Caycus in Mysia. It is said that smoke issued from his tomb as often as sacrifices were offered to him. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 18.

Pione, one of the Nereides. Apollodorus.

Piŏnia, a town of Mysia, near the Caycus.

Piræus, or Pyræeus, a celebrated harbour at Athens, at the mouth of the Cephisus, about three miles distant from the city. It was joined to the town by two walls, in circumference seven miles and a half, and 60 feet high, which Themistocles wished to raise in a double proportion. One of these was built by Pericles, and the other by Themistocles. The towers which were raised on the walls to serve as a defence, were turned into dwelling-houses, as the population of Athens gradually increased. It was the most capacious of all the harbours of the Athenians, and was naturally divided into three large basins called Cantharos, Aphrodisium, and Zea, improved by the labours of Themistocles, and made sufficiently commodious for the reception of a fleet of 400 ships, in the greatest security. The walls which joined it to Athens, with all the fortifications, were totally demolished when Lysander put an end to the Peloponnesian war by the reduction of Attica. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 1.—Strabo, bk. 9.—Cornelius Nepos, Themistocles.—Florus, bk. 3, ch. 5.—Justin, bk. 5, ch. 8.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 6, li. 446.

Piranthus, a son of Argus and Evadne, brother to Jasus, Epidaurus, and Perasus. Pausanias, bk. 2, chs. 16 & 17.—Apollodorus, bk. 2.

Pirēne, a daughter of Danaus.——A daughter of Œbalus, or, according to others, of the Achelous. She had by Neptune two sons, called Leches and Cenchrius, who gave their names to two of the harbours of Corinth. Pirene was so disconsolate at the death of her son Cenchrius, who had been killed by Diana, that she pined away, and was dissolved, by her continual weeping, into a fountain of the same name, which was still seen at Corinth in the age of Pausanias. The fountain Pirene was sacred to the Muses, and, according to some, the horse Pegasus was then drinking some of its waters, when Bellerophon took it to go and conquer the Chimæra. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 3.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 2, li. 240.

Pirĭthous, a son of Ixion and the cloud, or, according to others, of Dia the daughter of Deioneus. Some make him son of Dia by Jupiter, who assumed the shape of a horse whenever he paid his addresses to his mistress. He was king of the Lapithæ, and, as an ambitious prince, he wished to become acquainted with Theseus, king of Athens, of whose fame and exploits he had heard so many reports. To see him, and at the same time to be a witness of his valour, he resolved to invade his territories with an army. Theseus immediately met him on the borders of Attica, but at the sight of one another the two enemies did not begin the engagement, but, struck with the appearance of each other, they stepped between the hostile armies. Their meeting was like that of the most cordial friends, and Pirithous, by giving Theseus his hand as a pledge of his sincerity, promised to repair all the damages which his hostilities in Attica might have occasioned. From that time, therefore, the two monarchs became the most intimate and the most attached of friends, so much, that their friendship, like that of Orestes and Pylades, is become proverbial. Pirithous some time after married Hippodamia, and invited not only the heroes of his age, but also the gods themselves, and his neighbours the Centaurs, to celebrate his nuptials. Mars was the only one of the gods who was not invited, and to punish this neglect, the god of war was determined to raise a quarrel among the guests, and to disturb the festivity of the entertainment. Eurythion, captivated with the beauty of Hippodamia, and intoxicated with wine, attempted to offer violence to the bride, but he was prevented by Theseus, and immediately killed. This irritated the rest of the Centaurs; the contest became general, but the valour of Theseus, Pirithous, Hercules, and the rest of the Lapithæ, triumphed over their enemies. Many of the Centaurs were slain, and the rest saved their lives by flight. See: [Lapithus]. The death of Hippodamia left Pirithous very disconsolate, and he resolved with his friend Theseus, who had likewise lost his wife, never to marry again, except to a goddess, or one of the daughters of the gods. This determination occasioned the rape of Helen by the two friends; the lot was drawn, and it fell to the share of Theseus to have the beautiful prize. Pirithous upon this undertook with his friend to carry away Proserpine and to marry her. They descended into the infernal regions, but Pluto, who was apprised of their machinations to disturb his conjugal peace, stopped the two friends and confined them there. Pirithous was tied to his father’s wheel, or, according to Hyginus, he was delivered to the furies to be continually tormented. His punishment, however, was short, and when Hercules visited the kingdom of Pluto, he obtained from Proserpine the pardon of Pirithous, and brought him back to his kingdom safe and unhurt. Some suppose that he was torn to pieces by the dog Cerberus. See: [Theseus]. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 12, fable 4 & 5.—Hesiod, Shield of Heracles.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 2.—Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 10.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 8; bk. 2, ch. 5.—Hyginus, fables 14, 79, 155.—Diodorus, bk. 4.—Plutarch, Theseus.—Horace, bk. 4, ode 7.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 7, li. 304.—Martial, bk. 7, ltr. 23.

Pirus, a captain of the Thracians during the Trojan war, killed by Thoas king of Ætolia. Homer, Iliad, bk. 4.

Pirustæ, a people of Illyricum. Livy, bk. 45, ch. 26.

Pisa, a town of Elis, on the Alpheus at the west of the Peloponnesus, founded by Pisus the son of Perieres, and grandson of Æolus. Its inhabitants accompanied Nestor to the Trojan war, and they enjoyed long the privilege of presiding at the Olympic games, which were celebrated near their city. This honourable appointment was envied by the people of Elis, who made war against the Piseans, and after many bloody battles took their city and totally demolished it. It was at Pisa that Œnomaus murdered the suitors of his daughter, and that he himself was conquered by Pelops. The inhabitants were called Pisæi. Some have doubted the existence of such a place as Pisa; but this doubt originates from Pisa’s having been destroyed in so remote an age. The horses of Pisa were famous. The year on which the Olympic games were celebrated, was often called Pisæus annus, and the victory which was obtained there was called Pisææ ramus olivæ. See: [Olympia]. Strabo, bk. 8.—Ovid, Tristia, bk. 2, li. 386; bk. 4, poem 10, li. 95.—Mela, bk. 2.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 3, li. 180.—Statius, Thebaid, bk. 7, li. 417.—Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 22.

Pisæ, a town of Etruria, built by a colony from Pisa in the Peloponnesus. The inhabitants were called Pisani. Dionysius of Halicarnassus affirms that it existed before the Trojan war, but others support that it was built by a colony of Pisæans, who were shipwrecked on the coast of Etruria at their return from the Trojan war. Pisæ was once a very powerful and flourishing city, which conquered the Baleares, together with Sardinia and Corsica. The sea on the neighbouring coast was called the bay of Pisæ. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 10, li. 179.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Lucan, bk. 2, li. 401.—Livy, bk. 39, ch. 2; bk. 45, ch. 13.—Pliny, bk. 2, ch. 103.

Pisæus, a surname of Jupiter at Pisa.

Pisander, a son of Bellerophon, killed by the Solymi.——A Trojan chief, killed by Menelaus. Homer, Iliad, bk. 13, li. 601.——One of Penelope’s suitors, son of Polyctor. Ovid, Heroides, poem 1.——A son of Antimachus, killed by Agamemnon during the Trojan war. He had had recourse to entreaties and promises, but in vain, as the Grecian wished to resent the advice of Antimachus, who opposed the restoration of Helen. Homer, Iliad, bk. 11, li. 123.——An admiral of the Spartan fleet during the Peloponnesian war. He abolished the democracy at Athens, and established the aristocratical government of the 400 tyrants. He was killed in a naval battle by Conon the Athenian general near Cnidus, in which the Spartans lost 50 galleys, B.C. 394. Diodorus.——A poet of Rhodes, who composed a poem called Heraclea, in which he gave an account of all the labours and all the exploits of Hercules. He was the first who ever represented his hero armed with a club. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 22.

Pisātes, or Pisæi, the inhabitants of Pisa in the Peloponnesus.

Pisaurus, now Poglia, a river of Picenum, with a town called Pisaurum, now Pesaro, which became a Roman colony in the consulship of Claudius Pulcher. The town was destroyed by an earthquake in the beginning of the reign of Augustus. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 4.—Catullus, poem 82.—Pliny, bk. 3.—Livy, bk. 39, ch. 44; bk. 41, ch. 27.

Pisēnor, a son of Ixion and the cloud.——One of the [♦]ancestors of the nurse of Ulysses. Homer, Odyssey, bk. 1.

[♦] ‘ancestor’ replaced with ‘ancestors’

Piseus, a king of [♦]Etruria, about 260 years before the foundation of Rome. Pliny, bk. 7, ch. 26.

[♦] ‘Etrura’ replaced with ‘Etruria’

Pisias, a general of the Argives in the age of Epaminondas.——A statuary at Athens, celebrated for his pieces. Pausanias.

Pĭsĭdia, an inland country of Asia Minor, between Phrygia, Pamphylia, Galatia, and Isauria. It was rich and fertile. The inhabitants were called Pisidæ. Cicero, de Divinatione, bk. 1, ch. 1.—Mela, bk. 1, ch. 2.—Strabo, bk. 12.—Livy, bk. 37, chs. 54 & 56.

Pisidĭce, a daughter of Æolus, who married Myrmidon.——A daughter of Nestor.——A daughter of Pelias.——The daughter of a king of Methymna in Lesbos. She became enamoured of Achilles when he invaded her father’s kingdom, and she promised to deliver the city into his hands if he would marry her. Achilles agreed to the proposal, but when he became master of Methymna, he ordered Pisidice to be stoned to death for her perfidy. Parthenius, Narrationes Amatoriæ, ch. 21.

Pisis, a native of Thespia, who gained uncommon influence among the Thebans, and behaved with great courage in the defence of their liberties. He was taken prisoner by Demetrius, who made him governor of Thespia.

Pisistrătĭdæ, the descendants of Pisistratus tyrant of Athens. See: [Pisistratus].

Pisistrătĭdes, a man sent as ambassador to the satraps of the king of Persia, by the Spartans.

Pisistrătus, an Athenian, son of Hippocrates, who early distinguished himself by his valour in the field, and by his address and eloquence at home. After he had rendered himself the favourite of the populace by his liberality, and by the intrepidity with which he had fought their battles, particularly near Salamis, he resolved to make himself master of his country. Everything seemed favourable to his views; but Solon alone, who was then at the head of affairs, and who had lately instituted his celebrated laws, opposed him, and discovered his duplicity and artful behaviour before the public assembly. Pisistratus was not disheartened by the measures of his relation Solon, but he had recourse to artifice. In returning from his country house, he cut himself in various places, and after he had exposed his mangled body to the eyes of the populace, deplored his misfortunes, and accused his enemies of attempts upon his life, because he was the friend of the people, the guardian of the poor, and the reliever of the oppressed; he claimed a chosen body of 50 men from the populace to defend his person in future from the malevolence and the cruelty of his enemies. The unsuspecting people unanimously granted his request, though Solon opposed it with all his influence; and Pisistratus had no sooner received an armed band, on whose fidelity and attachment he could rely, than he seized the citadel of Athens, and made himself absolute. The people too late perceived their credulity; yet, though the tyrant was popular, two of the citizens, Megacles and Lycurgus, conspired together against him, and by their means he was forcibly ejected from the city. His house and all his effects were exposed to sale, but there was found in Athens only one man who would buy them. The private dissensions of the friends of liberty proved favourable to the expelled tyrant, and Megacles, who was jealous of Lycurgus, secretly promised to restore Pisistratus to all his rights and privileges in Athens, if he would marry his daughter. Pisistratus consented, and, by the assistance of his father-in-law, he was soon enabled to expel Lycurgus, and to re-establish himself. By means of a woman called Phya, whose shape was tall, and whose features were noble and commanding, he imposed upon the people, and created himself adherents even among his enemies. Phya was conducted through the streets of the city, and, showing herself subservient to the artifice of Pisistratus, she was announced as Minerva, the goddess of wisdom and the patroness of Athens, who was come down from heaven to re-establish her favourite Pisistratus, in a power which was sanctioned by the will of the gods, and favoured by the affection of the people. In the midst of his triumph, however, Pisistratus felt himself unsupported, and some time after, when he repudiated the daughter of Megacles, he found that not only the citizens, but even his very troops, were alienated from him by the influence, the intrigues, and the bribery of his father-in-law. He fled from Athens, where he could no longer maintain his power, and retired to Eubœa. Eleven years after, he was drawn from his obscure retreat, by means of his son Hippias, and he was a third time received by the people of Athens as their master and sovereign. Upon this he sacrificed to his resentment the friends of Megacles, but he did not lose sight of the public good; and while he sought the aggrandizement of his family, he did not neglect the dignity and the honour of the Athenian name. He died about 527 years before the christian era, after he had enjoyed the sovereign power at Athens for 33 years, including the years of his banishment, and he was succeeded by his son Hipparchus. Pisistratus claims our admiration for his justice, his liberality, and his moderation. If he was dreaded and detested as a tyrant, the Athenians loved and respected his private virtues and his patriotism as a fellow-citizen; and the opprobrium which generally falls on his head may be attributed not to the severity of his administration, but to the republican principles of the Athenians, who hated and exclaimed against the moderation and equity of the mildest sovereign, while they flattered the pride and gratified the guilty desires of the most tyrannical of their fellow-subjects. Pisistratus often refused to punish the insolence of his enemies; and when he had one day been violently accused of murder, rather than inflict immediate punishment upon the man who had criminated him, he went to the Areopagus, and there convinced the Athenians that the accusations of his enemies were groundless, and that his life was irreproachable. It is to his labours that we are indebted for the preservation of the poems of Homer, and he was the first, according to Cicero, who introduced them at Athens, in the order in which they now stand. He also established a public library at Athens; and the valuable books which he had diligently collected, were carried into Persia when Xerxes made himself master of the capital of Attica. Hipparchus and Hippias, the sons of Pisistratus, who have received the name of Pisistratidæ, rendered themselves as illustrious as their father; but the flames of liberty were too powerful to be extinguished. The Pisistratidæ governed with great moderation, yet the name of tyrant or sovereign was insupportable to the Athenians. Two of the most respectable of the citizens, called Harmodius and Aristogiton, conspired against them, and Hipparchus was dispatched in a public assembly. This murder was not, however, attended with any advantage, and though the two leaders of the conspiracy, who have been celebrated through every age for their patriotism, were supported by the people, yet Hippias quelled the tumult by his uncommon firmness and prudence, and for a while preserved that peace in Athens which his father had often been unable to command. This was not long to continue, Hippias was at last expelled by the united efforts of the Athenians and of their allies of Peloponnesus; and he left Attica, when he found himself unable to maintain his power and independence. The rest of the family of Pisistratus followed him in his banishment, and after they had refused to accept the liberal offers of the princes of Thessaly, and the king of Macedonia, who wished them to settle in their respective territories, the Pisistratidæ retired to Sigæum, which their father had, in the summit of his power, conquered and bequeathed to his posterity. After the banishment of the Pisistratidæ, the Athenians became more than commonly jealous of their liberty, and often sacrificed the most powerful of their citizens, apprehensive of the influence which popularity and a well-directed liberality might gain among the fickle and unsettled populace. The Pisistratidæ were banished from Athens about 18 years after the death of Pisistratus, B.C. 510. Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 13, ch. 14.—Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 26.—Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 59; bk. 6, ch. 103.—Cicero, On Oratory, bk. 3.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 1, ch. 2.——A son of Nestor. Apollodorus.——A king of Orchomenos, who rendered himself odious by his cruelty towards his nobles. He was put to death by them; and they carried away his body from the public assembly, by hiding each a piece of his flesh under their garments, to prevent a discovery from the people, of whom he was a great favourite. Plutarch, Parallela minora.——A Theban attached to the Roman interest while the consul Flaminius was in Greece. He assassinated the pretor of Bœotia, for which he was put to death, &c.

Piso, a celebrated family at Rome, which was a branch of the Calpurnians, descended from Calpus the son of Numa. Before the death of Augustus, 11 of this family had obtained the consulship, and many had been honoured with triumphs, on account of their victories in the different provinces of the Roman empire. Of this family the most famous were——Lucius Calpurnius, who was tribune of the people about 149 years before Christ, and afterwards consul. His frugality procured him the surname of Frugi, and he gained the greatest honours as an orator, a lawyer, a statesman, and an historian. He made a successful campaign in Sicily, and rewarded his son, who had behaved with great valour during the war, with a crown of gold, which weighed 20 pounds. He composed some annals and harangues, which were lost in the age of Cicero. His style was obscure and inelegant.——Caius, a Roman consul, A.U.C. 687 who supported the consular dignity against the tumults of the tribunes, and the clamours of the people. He made a law to restrain the cabals which generally prevailed at the election of the chief magistrates.——Cneus, another consul under Augustus. He was one of the favourites of Tiberius, by whom he was appointed governor of Syria, where he rendered himself odious by his cruelty. He was accused of having poisoned Germanicus; and when he saw that he was shunned and despised by his friends, he destroyed himself, A.D. 20.——Lucius, a governor of Spain, who was assassinated by a peasant, as he was travelling through the country; the murderer was seized and tortured, but he refused to confess the causes of the murder.——Lucius, a private man accused of having uttered seditious words against the emperor Tiberius. He was condemned, but a natural death saved him from the hands of the executioner.——Lucius, a governor of Rome for 20 years, an office which he discharged with the greatest justice and credit. He was greatly honoured by the friendship of Augustus, as well as of his successor, a distinction he deserved, both as a faithful citizen and a man of learning. Some, however, say that Tiberius made him governor of Rome, because he had continued drinking with him a night and two days, or two days and two nights, according to Pliny. Horace dedicated his poem, De Arte Poeticâ, to his two sons, whose partiality for literature had distinguished them among the rest of the Romans, and who were fond of cultivating [♦]poetry in their leisure hours. Plutarch, Cæsar.—Pliny, bk. 18, ch. 3.——Cneus, a factious and turbulent youth, who conspired against his country with Catiline. He was among the friends of Julius Cæsar.——Caius, a Roman who was at the head of a celebrated conspiracy against the emperor Nero. He had rendered himself a favourite of the people by his private as well as public virtues, by the generosity of his behaviour, his fondness of pleasure with the voluptuous, and his austerity with the grave and the reserved. He had been marked by some as a proper person to succeed the emperor; but the discovery of the plot by a freed man who was among the conspirators, soon cut him off, with all his partisans. He refused to court the affections of the people and of the army, when the whole had been made public; and instead of taking proper measures for his preservation, either by proclaiming himself emperor, as his friends advised, or by seeking a retreat in the distant provinces of the empire, he retired to his own house, where he opened the veins of both his arms, and bled to death.——Lucius, a senator who followed the emperor Valerian into Persia. He proclaimed himself emperor after the death of Valerian, but he was defeated and put to death a few weeks after, A.D. 261, by Valens, &c.——Licimanus, a senator adopted by the emperor Galba. He was put to death by Otho’s orders.——A son-in-law of Cicero.——A patrician, whose daughter married Julius Cæsar. Horace.—Tacitus, Annals & Histories.—Valerius Maximus.—Livy.—Suetonius.—Cicero, de Officiis, &c.—Plutarch, Cæsar, &c.——One of the 30 tyrants appointed over Athens by Lysander.

[♦] ‘poety’ replaced with ‘poetry’

Pĭsōnis villa, a place near Baiæ in Campania, which the emperor Nero often frequented. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 1.

Pissirus, a town of Thrace, near the river Nestus. Herodius, bk. 7, ch. 109.

Pistor, a surname given to Jupiter by the Romans, signifying baker, because when their city was taken by the Gauls, the god persuaded them to throw down loaves from the Tarpeian hill where they were besieged, that the enemy might from thence suppose that they were not in want of provisions, though in reality they were near surrendering through famine. This deceived the Gauls, and they soon after raised the siege. Ovid, Fasti, bk. 6, lis. 350, 394, &c.

Pistoria, now Pistoja, a town of Etruria, at the foot of the Apennines, near Florence, where [♦]Catiline was defeated. Sallust, Catilinæ Coniuratio, ch. 47.—Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 4.

[♦] ‘Cataline’ replaced with ‘Catiline’

Pisus, a son of Aphareus, or, according to others, of Perieres. Apollodorus, bk. 3.—Pausanias, bk. 5.

Pisuthnes, a Persian satrap of Lydia, who revolted from Darius Nothus. His father’s name was Hystaspes. Plutarch, Artaxerxes.

Pităne, a town of Æolia in Asia Minor. The inhabitants made bricks which swam on the surface of the water. Lucan, bk. 3, li. 305.—Strabo, bk. 13.—Vitruvius, bk. 2, ch. 3.—Mela, bk. 1, ch. 18.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 7, li. 357.——A town of Laconia. Pindar, ode 6, li. 46.

Pitarātus, an Athenian archon, during whose magistracy Epicurus died. Cicero, De Fato, ch. 9.

Pithecūsa, a small island on the coast of Etruria, anciently called Ænaria and Enarina, with a town of the same name, on the top of a mountain. The frequent earthquakes to which it was subject obliged the inhabitants to leave it. There was a volcano in the middle of the island, which has given occasion to the ancients to say that the giant Typhon was buried there. Some suppose that it received its name from πιθηκοι, monkeys, into which the inhabitants were changed by Jupiter. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 14, li. 90.—Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 6.—Pindar, Pythian, poem 1.—Strabo, bk. 1.

Pitheus. See: [Pittheus].

Pitho, called also Suada, the goddess of persuasion among the Greeks and Romans supposed to be the daughter of Mercury and Venus. She was represented with a diadem on her head, to intimate her influence over the hearts of men. One of her arms appears raised, as in the attitude of an orator haranguing in a public assembly, and with the other she holds a thunderbolt, and fetters made with flowers, to signify the powers of reasoning and the attractions of eloquence. A caduceus, as a symbol of persuasion, appears at her feet, with the writings of Demosthenes and Cicero, the two most celebrated among the ancients, who understood how to command the attention of their audience, and to rouse and animate their various passions.——A Roman courtesan. She received this name on account of the allurements which her charms possessed, and of her winning expressions.

Pitholāus and Lycophron, seized upon the sovereign power of Pheræ, by killing Alexander. They were ejected by Philip of Macedonia. Diodorus, bk. 16.

Pīthŏleon, an insignificant poet of Rhodes, who mingled Greek and Latin in his compositions. He wrote some epigrams against Julius Cæsar, and drew upon himself the ridicule of Horace, on account of the inelegance of his style. Suetonius, Lives of the Rhetoricians.—Horace, bk. 1, satire 10, li. 21.—Macrobius, bk. 2, Saturnalia, ch. 2.

Pithon, one of the body-guards of Alexander, put to death by Antiochus.

Pithys, a nymph beloved by Pan. Boreas was also fond of her, but she slighted his addresses, upon which he dashed her against a rock, and she was changed into a pine tree.

Pittăcus, a native of Mitylene in Lesbos, was one of the seven wise men of Greece. His father’s name was Cyrrhadius. With the assistance of the sons of Alcæus, he delivered his country from the oppression of the tyrant Melanchrus, and in the war which the Athenians waged against Lesbos he appeared at the head of his countrymen, and challenged to single combat Phrynon, the enemy’s general. As the event of the war seemed to depend upon this combat, Pittacus had recourse to artifice, and when he engaged, he entangled his adversary in a net, which he had concealed under his shield, and easily despatched him. He was amply rewarded for his victory, and his countrymen, sensible of his merit, unanimously appointed him governor of their city with unlimited authority. In this capacity Pittacus behaved with great moderation and prudence, and after he had governed his fellow-citizens with the strictest justice, and after he had established and enforced the most salutary laws, he voluntarily resigned the sovereign power after he had enjoyed it for 10 years, observing that the virtues and innocence of private life were incompatible with the power and influence of a sovereign. His disinterestedness gained him many admirers, and when the Mityleneans wished to reward his public services by presenting him with an immense tract of territory, he refused to accept more land than what should be contained within the distance to which he could throw a javelin. He died in the 82nd year of his age, about 570 years before Christ, after he had spent the last 10 years of his life in literary ease, and peaceful retirement. One of his favourite maxims was, that man ought to provide against misfortunes to avoid them; but that if they ever happened he ought to support them with patience and resignation. In prosperity friends were to be acquired, and in the hour of adversity their faithfulness was to be tried. He also observed, that in our actions it was imprudent to make others acquainted with our designs, for if we failed we had exposed ourselves to censure and to ridicule. Many of his maxims were inscribed on the walls of Apollo’s temple at Delphi, to show the world how great an opinion the Mityleneans entertained of his abilities as a philosopher, a moralist, and a man. By one of his laws, every fault committed by a man when intoxicated, deserved double punishment. The titles of some of his writings are preserved by Laërtius, among which are mentioned elegiac verses, some laws in prose, addressed to his countrymen, epistles, and moral precepts called adomena. Diogenes Laërtius.—Aristotle, Politics.—Plutarch, Convivium Septem Sapientium.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 24.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 2, &c.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 6, ch. 2, sect. 5.——A grandson of Porus king of India.

Pitthea, a town near Trœzene. Hence the epithet of Pittheus in Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 15, li. 296.

Pitthēus, a king of Trœzene in Argolis, son of Pelops and Hippodamia. He was universally admired for his learning, wisdom, and application; he publicly taught in a school at Trœzene, and even composed a book, which was seen by Pausanias the geographer. He gave his daughter Æthra in marriage to Ægeus king of Athens, and he himself took particular care of the youth and education of his grandson Theseus. He was buried at Trœzene, which he had founded, and on his tomb were seen, for many ages, three seats of white marble, on which he sat, with two other judges, whenever he gave laws to his subjects or settled their disputes. Pausanias, bks. 1 & 2.—Plutarch, Theseus.—Strabo, bk. 8.

Pituanius, a mathematician in the age of Tiberius, thrown down from the Tarpeian rock, &c. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 2.

Pitulāni, a people of Umbria. Their chief town was called Pitulum.

Pityæa, a town of Asia Minor. Apollonius.

Pityassus, a town of Pisidia. Strabo.

Pityonēsus, a small island on the coast of Peloponnesus, near Epidaurus. Pliny.

Pityus (untis), now Pitchinda, a town of Colchis. Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 5.

Pityūsa, a small island on the coast of Argolis. Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 12.——A name of Chios.——Two small islands in the Mediterranean, near the coast of Spain, of which the larger was called Ebusus, and the smaller Ophiusa. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.—Strabo.—Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 5.

Pius, a surname given to the emperor Antoninus, on account of his piety and virtue.——A surname given to a son of Metellus, because he interested himself so warmly to have his father recalled from banishment.

Placentia, now called Placenza, an ancient town and colony of Italy, at the confluence of the Trebia and Po. Livy, bk. 21, chs. 25 & 56; bk. 37, ch. 10.——Another, near Lusitania, in Spain.

Placideianus, a gladiator in Horace’s age, bk. 2, satire 7.

Placidia, a daughter of Theodosius the Great, sister to Honorius and Arcadius. She married Adolphus king of the Goths, and afterwards Constantine, by whom she had Valentinian III. She died A.D. 449.

Placidius Julius, a tribune of a cohort, who imprisoned the emperor Vitellius, &c. Tacitus, Histories, bk. 3, ch. 85.

Planasia, a small island of the [♦]Tyrrhene sea.——Another, on the coast of Gaul, where Tiberius ordered Agrippa the grandson of Augustus to be put to death. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 1, ch. 3.——A town on the Rhone.

[♦] ‘Tyrhene’ replaced with ‘Tyrrhene’

Plancīna, a woman celebrated for her intrigues and her crimes, who married Piso, and was accused with him of having murdered Germanicus, in the reign of Tiberius. She was acquitted either by means of the empress Livia, or on account of the partiality of the emperor for her person. She had long supported the spirits of her husband, during his confinement, but when she saw herself freed from the accusation, she totally abandoned him to his fate. Subservient in everything to the will of Livia, she, at her instigation, became guilty of the greatest crimes, to injure the character of Agrippina. After the death of Agrippina, Plancina was accused of the most atrocious villanies, and, as she knew she could not elude justice, she put herself to death, A.D. 33. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 6, ch. 26, &c.

Lucius Plancus Munatius, a Roman, who rendered himself ridiculous by his follies and his extravagance. He had been consul, and had presided over a province in the capacity of governor; but he forgot all his dignity, and became one of the most servile flatterers of Cleopatra and Antony. At the court of the Egyptian queen in Alexandria, he appeared in the character of the meanest stage dancer, and in a comedy he personated Glaucus, and painted his body of a green colour, dancing on a public stage quite naked, only with a crown of green reeds on his head, while he had tied behind his back the tail of a large sea fish. This exposed him to the public derision, and when Antony had joined the rest of his friends in censuring him for his unbecoming behaviour, he deserted to Octavius, who received him with great marks of friendship and attention. It was he who proposed, in the Roman senate, that the title of Augustus should be conferred on his friend Octavius, as expressive of the dignity and the reverence which the greatness of his exploits seemed to claim. Horace has dedicated bk. 1, ode 7, to him; and he certainly deserved the honour, from the elegance of his letters, which are still extant, written to Cicero. He founded a town in Gaul, which he called Lugdunum. Plutarch, Antonius.——A patrician, proscribed by the second triumvirate. His servants wished to save him from death, but he refused it, rather than to expose their persons to danger.

Phangon, a courtesan of Miletus, in Ionia.

Platæa, a daughter of Asopus king of Bœotia. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 1, &c.——An island on the coast of Africa in the Mediterranean. It belonged to the Cyreneans. Herodotus, bk. 4, ch. 157.

Platæa, and æ (arum), a town of Bœotia, near mount Cithæron, on the confines of Megaris and Attica, celebrated for a battle fought there between Mardonius the commander of Xerxes king of Persia, and Pausanias the Lacedæmonian, and the Athenians. The Persian army consisted of 300,000 men, 3000 of which scarce escaped with their lives by flight. The Grecian army, which was greatly inferior, lost but few men, and among these 91 Spartans, 52 Athenians, and 16 Tegeans, were the only soldiers found in the number of the slain. The plunder which the Greeks obtained in the Persian camp was immense. Pausanias received the tenth of all the spoils, on account of his uncommon valour during the engagement, and the rest were rewarded each according to their respective merit. This battle was fought on the 22nd September, the same day as the battle of Mycale, 479 B.C., and by it Greece was totally delivered for ever from the continual alarms to which she was exposed on account of the Persian invasions, and from that time none of the princes of Persia dared to appear with a hostile force beyond the Hellespont. The Platæans were naturally attached to the interest of the Athenians, and they furnished them with 1000 soldiers when Greece was attacked by Datis the general of Darius. Platæa was taken by the Thebans, after a famous siege, in the beginning of the Peloponnesian war, and destroyed by the Spartans, B.C. 427. Alexander rebuilt it, and paid great encomiums to the inhabitants, on account of their ancestors, who had so bravely fought against the Persians at the battle of Marathon, and under Pausanias. Herodotus, bk. 8, ch. 50.—Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 1.—Plutarch, Alexander, &c.—Cornelius Nepos, &c.—Cicero, de Officiis, bk. 1, ch. 18.—Strabo.—Justin.

Platanius, a river of Bœotia. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 24.

Plato, a celebrated philosopher at Athens, son of Ariston and Parectonia. His original name was Aristocles, and he received that of Plato from the largeness of his shoulders. As one of the descendants of Codrus, and as the offspring of a noble, illustrious, and opulent family, Plato was educated with care, his body was formed and invigorated with gymnastic exercises, and his mind was cultivated and enlightened by the study of poetry and of geometry, from which he derived that acuteness of judgment and warmth of imagination which have stamped his character as the most subtle and flowery writer of antiquity. He first began his literary career by writing poems and tragedies; but he was soon disgusted with his own productions, when, at the age of 20, he was introduced into the presence of Socrates, and when he was enabled to compare and examine, with critical accuracy, the merit of his compositions with those of his poetical predecessors. He therefore committed to the flames these productions of his early years, which could not command the attention or gain the applause of a maturer age. During eight years he continued to be one of the pupils of Socrates; and if he was prevented by a momentary indisposition from attending the philosopher’s last moments, yet he collected from the conversation of those that were present, and from his own accurate observations, the minutest and most circumstantial accounts, which can exhibit, in its truest colours, the concern and sensibility of the pupil, and the firmness, virtues, and moral sentiments of the dying philosopher. After the death of Socrates, Plato retired from Athens, and to acquire that information which the accurate observer can derive in foreign countries, he began to travel over Greece. He visited Megara, Thebes, and Elis, where he met with the kindest reception from his fellow-disciples, whom the violent death of their master had likewise removed from Attica. He afterwards visited Magna Græcia, attracted by the fame of the Pythagorean philosophy, and by the learning, abilities, and reputation of its professors, Philolaus, Archytas, and Eurytus. He afterwards passed into Sicily, and examined the eruptions and fires of the volcano of that island. He also visited Egypt, where then the mathematician Theodorus flourished, and where he knew that the tenets of the Pythagorean philosophy and metempsychosis had been fostered and cherished. When he had finished his travels, Plato retired to the groves of Academus, in the neighbourhood of Athens, where his lectures were soon attended by a crowd of learned, noble, and illustrious pupils; and the philosopher, by refusing to have a share in the administration of affairs, rendered his name more famous, and his school more frequented. During forty years he presided at the head of the academy, and there he devoted his time to the instruction of his pupils, and composed those dialogues which have been the admiration of every age and country. His studies, however, were interrupted for a while, whilst he obeyed the pressing calls and invitations of Dionysius, and whilst he persuaded the tyrant to become a man, the father of his people, and the friend of liberty. See: [Dionysius II.] In his dress the philosopher was not ostentatious; his manners were elegant but modest, simple without affectation; and the great honours which his learning deserved were not paid to his appearance. When he came to the Olympian games, Plato resided, during the celebration, in a family who were totally strangers to him. He ate and drank with them, he partook of their innocent pleasures and amusements; but though he told them his name was Plato, yet he never spoke of the employment which he pursued at Athens, and never introduced the name of that philosopher whose doctrines he followed, and whose death and virtues were favourite topics of conversation in every part of Greece. When he returned home, he was attended by the family which had so kindly entertained him; and, as being a native of Athens, he was desired to show them the great philosopher whose name he bore: their surprise was great when he told them that he himself was the Plato whom they wished to behold. In his diet he was moderate, and, indeed, to sobriety and temperance in the use of food, and to the want of those pleasures which enfeeble the body and enervate the mind, some have attributed his preservation during the tremendous pestilence which raged at Athens with so much fury at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war. Plato was never subject to any long or lingering indisposition, and though change of climate had enfeebled a constitution naturally strong and healthy, the philosopher lived to an advanced age, and was often heard to say, when his physicians advised him to leave his residence at Athens, where the air was impregnated by the pestilence, that he would not advance one single step to gain the top of mount Athos, were he assured to attain the great longevity which the inhabitants of that mountain were said to enjoy above the rest of mankind. Plato died on his birthday, in the 81st year of his age, about 348 years before the christian era. His last moments were easy and without pain, and, according to some, he expired in the midst of an entertainment, or, according to Cicero, as he was writing. The works of Plato are numerous; they are all written in the form of a dialogue, except 12 letters. He speaks always by the mouth of others, and the philosopher has nowhere made mention of himself except once in his dialogue intituled Phædon, and another time in his apology for Socrates. His writings were so celebrated, and, his opinion so respected, that he was called divine; and for the elegance, melody, and sweetness of his expressions, he was distinguished by the appellation of the Athenian bee. Cicero had such an esteem for him, that in the warmth of panegyric, he exclaimed, Errare meherculè malo cum Platone quàm cum istis vera sentire; and Quintilian said that, when he read Plato, he seemed to hear not a man, but a divinity speaking. His style, however, though admired and commended by the best and most refined of critics among the ancients, has not escaped the censure of some of the moderns; and the philosopher has been blamed, who supports that fire is a pyramid tied to the earth by numbers, that the world is a figure consisting of 12 pentagons, and who, to prove the metempsychosis and the immortality of the soul, asserts that the dead are born from the living, and the living from the dead. The speculative mind of Plato was employed in examining things divine and human, and he attempted to fix and ascertain, not only the practical doctrine of morals and politics, but the more subtle and abstruse theory of mystical theogony. His philosophy was universally received and adopted, and it has not only governed the opinions of the speculative part of mankind, but it continues still to influence the reasoning, and to divide the sentiments, of the moderns. In his system of philosophy he followed the physics of Heraclitus, the metaphysical opinions of Pythagoras, and the morals of Socrates. He maintained the existence of two beings, one self-existent, and the other formed by the hand of a pre-existent creature, god and man. The world was created by that self-existent cause, from the rude undigested mass of matter which had existed from all eternity, and which had even been animated by an irregular principle of motion. The origin of evil could not be traced under the government of a deity, without admitting a stubborn intractability and wildness congenial to matter, and from these, consequently, could be demonstrated the deviations from the laws of nature, and from thence the extravagant passions and appetites of men. From materials like these were formed the four elements, and the beautiful structure of the heavens and the earth; and into the active but irrational principle of matter, the divinity infused a rational soul. The souls of men were formed from the remainder of the rational soul of the world, which had previously given existence to the invisible gods and demons. The philosopher, therefore, supported the doctrine of ideal forms, and the pre-existence of the human mind, which he considered as emanations of the Deity, which can never remain satisfied with objects or things unworthy of their divine original. Men could perceive, with their corporeal senses, the types of immutable things and the fluctuating objects of the material world; but the sudden changes to which these are continually obnoxious, create innumerable disorders, and hence arise deception, and, in short, all the errors and miseries of human life. Yet, in whatever situation man may be, he is still an object of divine concern; and, to recommend himself to the favour of the pre-existent cause, he must comply with the purposes of his creation, and, by proper care and diligence, he can recover those immaculate powers with which he was naturally endowed. All science the philosopher made to consist in reminiscence, and in recalling the nature, forms, and proportions of those perfect and immutable essences with which the human mind had been conversant. From observations like these, the summit of felicity might be attained by removing from the material, and approaching nearer to the intellectual world, by curbing and governing the passions which were ever agitated and inflamed by real and imaginary objects. The passions were divided into two classes: the first consisted of the irascible passions, which originated in pride or resentment, and were seated in the breast; the other, founded on the love of pleasure, was the concupiscible part of the soul seated in the belly, and inferior parts of the body. These different orders induced the philosopher to compare the soul to a small republic, of which the reasoning and judging powers were stationed in the head, as in a firm citadel, and of which the senses were its guards and servants. By the irascible part of the soul men asserted their dignity, repelled injuries, and scorned danger; and the concupiscible part provided for the support and the necessities of the body, and when governed with propriety, it gave rise to temperance. Justice was produced by the regular dominion of reason, and by the submission of the passions; and prudence arose from the strength, acuteness, and perfection of the soul, without which all other virtues could not exist. But, amidst all this, wisdom was not easily attained; at their creation all minds were not endowed with the same excellence, the bodies which they animated on earth were not always in harmony with the divine emanation; some might be too weak, others too strong, and on the first years of a man’s life depended his future consequence; as an effeminate and licentious education seemed calculated to destroy the purposes of the divinity, while the contrary produced different effects, and tended to cultivate and improve the reasoning and judging faculty, and to produce wisdom and virtue. Plato was the first who supported the immortality of the soul upon arguments solid and permanent, deduced from truth and experience. He did not imagine that the diseases, and the death of the body, could injure the principle of life and destroy the soul, which, of itself, was of divine origin, and of an uncorrupted and immutable essence, which, though inherent for a while in matter, could not lose that power which was the emanation of God. From doctrines like these, the great founder of Platonism concluded that there might exist in the world a community of men, whose passions could be governed with moderation, and who, from knowing the evils and miseries which arise from ill conduct, might aspire to excellence, and attain that perfection which can be derived from the proper exercise of the rational and moral powers. To illustrate this more fully, the philosopher wrote a book, well known by the name of the republic of Plato, in which he explains with acuteness, judgment, and elegance the rise and revolution of civil society; and so respected was his opinion as a legislator, that his scholars were employed in regulating the republics of Arcadia, Elis, and Cnidus, at the desire of those states, and Xenocrates gave political rules for good and impartial government to the conqueror of the east. The best editions of Plato are those of Frankfurt, folio, 1602; and Bipontium, 12 vols. 8vo, 1718. Plato, Dialogues, &c.—Cicero, de Officiis, bk. 1; de Divinatione, bk. 1, ch. 36; de Natura Deorum, bk. 2, ch. 12; Tusculanæ Disputationes, bk. 1, ch. 17.—Plutarch, Solon, &c.—Seneca, Epistulæ.—Quintilian, bk. 10, ch. 1, &c.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bks. 2 & 4.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 30.—Diogenes Laërtius.——A son of Lycaon king of Arcadia.——A Greek poet, called the prince of the middle comedy, who flourished B.C. 445. Some fragments remain of his pieces.

Plator, a man of Dyrrhachium, put to death by Piso. Cicero, Against Piso, ch. 34.

Plavis, a river of Venetia, in Italy.

Plautia lex, was enacted by Marcus Plautius the tribune, A.U.C. 664. It required every tribe annually to choose 15 persons of their body, to serve as judges, making the honour common to all the three orders, according to the majority of votes in every tribe.——Another, called also Plotia, A.U.C. 675. It punished with the interdictio ignis & aquæ, all persons who were found guilty of attempts upon the state, or the senators or magistrates, or such as appeared in public, armed with an evil design, or such as forcibly expelled any person from his legal [♦]possessions.

[♦] ‘possesions’ replaced with ‘possessions’

Plautiānus Fulvius, an African of mean birth, who was banished for his seditious behaviour in the years of his obscurity. In his banishment, Plautianus formed an acquaintance with Severus, who, some years after, ascended the imperial throne. This was the beginning of his prosperity; Severus paid the greatest attention to him, and, if we believe some authors, their familiarity and intercourse were carried beyond the bounds of modesty and propriety. Plautianus shared the favours of Severus on the throne as well as in obscurity. He was invested with as much power as his patron at Rome, and in the provinces; and, indeed, he wanted but the name of emperor to be his equal. His table was served with more delicate meats than that of the emperor; when he walked in the public streets he received the most distinguishing honours, and a number of criers ordered the most noble citizens, as well as the meanest beggars, to make way for the favourite of the emperor, and not to fix their eyes upon him. He was concerned in all the rapine and destruction which were committed through the empire, and he enriched himself with the possessions of those who had been sacrificed to the emperor’s cruelty or avarice. To complete his triumph, and to make himself still greater, Plautianus married his favourite daughter Plautilla to Caracalla the son of the emperor, and so eager was the emperor to indulge his inclinations in this and in every other respect, that he declared he loved Plautianus so much that he would even wish to die before him. The marriage of Caracalla with Plautilla was attended with serious consequences. The son of Severus had complied with great reluctance, and, though Plautilla was amiable in her manners, commanding in aspect, and of a beautiful countenance, yet the young prince often threatened to punish her haughty and imperious behaviour as soon as he succeeded to the throne. Plautilla reported the whole to her father, and to save his daughter from the vengeance of Caracalla, Plautianus conspired against the emperor and his son. The conspiracy was discovered, and Severus forgot his attachment to Plautianus, and the favours he had heaped upon him, when he heard of his perfidy. The wicked minister was immediately put to death, and Plautilla banished to the island of Lipari, with her brother Plautius, where, seven years after, she was put to death by order of Caracalla, A.D. 211. Plautilla had two children, a son who died in his childhood, and a daughter, whom Caracalla murdered in the arms of her mother. Dio Cassius.

Plautilla, a daughter of Plautianus the favourite minister of Severus. See: [Plautianus].——The mother of the emperor Nerva, descended of a noble family.

Plautius, a Roman, who became so disconsolate at the death of his wife, that he threw himself upon her burning pile. Valerius Maximus, bk. 4, ch. 6.——Caius, a consul sent against the Privernates, &c.——Aulus, a governor of Britain who obtained an ovation for the conquests he had gained there over the barbarians.——One of Otho’s friends. He dissuaded him from killing himself.——Lateranus, an adulterer of Messalina, who conspired against Nero, and was capitally condemned.——Aulus, a general who defeated the Umbrians and the Etrurians.——Caius, another general, defeated in Lusitania.——A man put to death by order of Caracalla.——Marcus Sylvanus, a tribune, who made a law to prevent seditions in the public assemblies.——Rubellius, a man accused before Nero, and sent to Asia, where he was assassinated.

Marcus Accius Plautus, a comic poet, born at Sarsina, in Umbria. Fortune proved unkind to him, and, from competence, he was reduced to the meanest poverty, by engaging in a commercial line. To maintain himself, he entered into the family of a baker as a common servant, and while he was employed in grinding corn, he sometimes dedicated a few moments to the comic muse. Some, however, confute this account as false, and support that Plautus was never obliged to the laborious employments of a bakehouse for his maintenance. He wrote 25 comedies, of which only 20 are extant. He died about 184 years before the christian era; and Varro, his learned countryman, wrote this stanza, which deserved to be engraved on his tomb:

Postquam morte captus est Plautus,

Comœdia luget, scena est deserta;

Deinde risus, ludus, jocusque, & numeri

Innumeri simul omnes collacrymârunt.

The plays of Plautus were [♦]universally esteemed at Rome, and the purity, the energy, and the elegance of his language were, by other writers, considered as objects of imitation; and Varro, whose judgment is great, and generally decisive, declares, that if the Muses were willing to speak Latin, they would speak in the language of Plautus. In the Augustan age, however, when the Roman language became more pure and refined, the comedies of Plautus did not appear free from inaccuracy. The poet, when compared to the more elegant expressions of a Terence, was censured for his negligence in versification, his low wit, execrable puns, and disgusting obscenities. Yet, however censured as to language or sentiments, Plautus continued to be a favourite on the stage. If his expressions were not choice or delicate, it was [♦]universally admitted that he was more happy than other comic writers in his pictures; the incidents of his plays were more varied, the acts more interesting, the characters more truly displayed, and the catastrophe more natural. In the reign of the emperor Diocletian, his comedies were still acted on the public theatres; and no greater compliment can be paid to his abilities as a comic writer, and no greater censure can be passed upon his successors in dramatic composition, than to observe, that for 500 years, with all the disadvantages of obsolete language and diction, in spite of the change of manners, and the revolutions of government, he commanded and received that applause which no other writer dared to dispute with him. The best editions of Plautus are that of Gronovius, 8vo, Leiden, 1664; that of Barbou, 12mo, in 3 vols., Paris, 1759; that of Ernesti, 2 vols., 8vo, Lipscomb, 1760; and that of Glasgow, 3 vols., 12mo, 1763. Varro on Quintilian, bk. 10, ch. 1.—Cicero, de Officiis, bk. 1, &c.; On Oratory, bk. 3, &c.—Horace, bk. 2, ltr. 1, lis. 58, 170; Art of Poetry, lis. 54 & 270.——Ælianus, a high priest, who consecrated the capitol in the reign of Vespasian. Tacitus, Histories, bk. 4, ch. 53.

[♦] ‘univerally’ replaced with ‘universally’

Plēiădes, or Vergĭliæ, a name given to seven of the daughters of Atlas by Pleione or Æthra, one of the Oceanides. They were placed in the heavens after death, where they formed a constellation called Pleiades, near the back of the bull in the Zodiac. Their names were Alcyone, Merope, Maia, Electra, Taygeta, Sterope, and Celeno. They all, except Merope, who married Sisyphus king of Corinth, had some of the immortal gods for their suitors. On that account, therefore, Merope’s star is dim and obscure among the rest of her sisters, because she married a mortal. The name of the Pleiades is derived from the Greek word πλεειν, to sail, because that constellation shows the time most favourable to navigators, which is in the spring. The name of Vergiliæ they derive from ver, the spring. They are sometimes called Atlantides, from their father, or Hesperides, from the gardens of that name, which belonged to Atlas. Hyginus, fable 192; Poetica Astronomica, bk. 2, ch. 21.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 13, li. 293; Fasti, bk. 5, lis. 106 & 170; Hesiod, Works and Days.—Homer, Odyssey, bk. 5.—Horace, bk. 4, ode 14.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 1, li. 138; bk. 4, li. 233.——Seven poets, who, from their number, have received the name of Pleiades, near the age of Philadelphus Ptolemy king of Egypt. Their names were Lycophron, Theocritus, Aratus, Nicander, Apollonius, Philicus, and Homerus the younger.

Pleiōne, one of the Oceanides, who married Atlas king of Mauritania, by whom she had 12 daughters, and a son called Hyas. Seven of the daughters were changed into a constellation called Pleiades, and the rest into another called Hyades. Ovid, Fasti, bk. 5, li. 84.

Plemmy̆rium, now Massa Oliveri, a promontory with a small castle of that name, in the bay of Syracuse. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 693.

Plemneus, a king of Sicyon, son of Peratus. His children always died as soon as born, till Ceres, pitying his misfortune, offered herself as a nurse to his wife as she was going to be brought to bed. The child lived by the care and protection of the goddess, and Plemneus was no sooner acquainted with the dignity of his nurse, than he raised her a temple. Pausanias, bk. 2, chs. 5 & 11.

Pleumosii, a people of Belgium, the inhabitants of modern Tournay. Cæsar, Gallic War, bk. 5, ch. 38.

Pleurātus, a king of Illyricum. Livy, bk. 26, ch. 24.

Pleuron, a son of Ætolus, who married Xantippe the daughter of Dorus, by whom he had Agenor. He founded a city in Ætolia on the Evenus, which bore his name. Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 7.—Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 2.—Silius Italicus, bk. 15, li. 310.—Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 13.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 7, li. 382.

Plexaure, one of the Oceanides. Hesiod.

Plexippus, a son of Thestius, brother to Althæa the wife of Œneus. He was killed by his nephew Meleager, in hunting the Calydonian boar. His brother Toxeus shared his fate. See: [Althæa] and Meleager.——A son of Phineus and Cleopatra, brother to Pandion king of Athens. Apollodorus.

Caius Plinius Secundus, surnamed the Elder, was born at Verona, of a noble family. He distinguished himself in the field, and, after he had been made one of the augurs at Rome, he was appointed governor of Spain. In his public character he did not neglect the pleasures of literature; the day was employed in the administration of the affairs of his province, and the night was dedicated to study. Every moment of time was precious to him; at his meals one of his servants read to him books valuable for their information, and from them he immediately made copious extracts, in a memorandum book. Even while he dressed himself after bathing, his attention was called away from surrounding objects, and he was either employed in listening to another, or in dictating himself. To a mind so earnestly dedicated to learning, nothing appeared too laborious, no undertaking too troublesome. He deemed every moment lost which was not devoted to study, and from these reasons he never appeared at Rome but in a chariot, and wherever he went, he was always accompanied by his amanuensis. He even censured his nephew, Pliny the younger, because he had indulged himself with a walk, and sternly observed, that he might have employed those moments to better advantage. But if his literary pursuits made him forget the public affairs, his prudence, his abilities, and the purity and innocence of his character, made him known and respected. He was courted and admired by the emperors Titus and Vespasian, and he received from them all the favours which a virtuous prince could offer, and an honest subject receive. As he was at Misenum, where he commanded the fleet, which was then stationed there, Pliny was surprised at the sudden appearance of a cloud of dust and ashes. He was then ignorant of the cause which produced it, and he immediately set sail in a small vessel for mount Vesuvius, which he at last discovered to have made a dreadful eruption. The sight of a number of boats that fled from the coast to avoid the danger, might have deterred another, but the curiosity of Pliny excited him to advance with more boldness, and though his vessel was often covered with stones and ashes, that were continually thrown up by the mountain, yet he landed on the coast. The place was deserted by the inhabitants, but Pliny remained there during the night, the better to observe the mountain, which, during the obscurity, appeared to be one continual blaze. He was soon disturbed by a dreadful earthquake, and the contrary wind on the morrow prevented him from returning to Misenum. The eruption of the volcano increased, and at last the fire approached the place where the philosopher made his observations. Pliny endeavoured to fly before it, but though he was supported by two of his servants, he was unable to escape. He soon fell down, suffocated by the thick vapours that surrounded him, and the insupportable stench of sulphureous matter. His body was found three days after, and decently buried by his nephew, who was then at Misenum with the fleet. This memorable event happened in the 79th year of the christian era, and the philosopher who perished by the eruptions of the volcano, has been called by some the martyr of nature. He was then in the 56th year of his age. Of the works which he composed, none are extant but his natural history in 37 books. It is a work, as Pliny the younger says, full of erudition, and as varied as nature itself. It treats of the stars, the heavens, wind, rain, hail, minerals, trees, flowers, and plants, besides an account of all living animals, birds, fishes, and beasts; a geographical description of every place on the globe, and a history of every art and science, of commerce and navigation, with their rise, progress, and several improvements. He is happy in his descriptions as a naturalist; he writes with force and energy, and though many of his ideas and conjectures are sometimes ill-founded, yet he possesses that fecundity of imagination, and vivacity of expression, which are requisite to treat a subject with propriety, and to render a history of nature pleasing, interesting, and, above all, instructive. His style possesses not the graces of the Augustan age; he has neither its purity and elegance, nor its simplicity, but it is rather cramped, obscure, and sometimes unintelligible. Yet for all this it has ever been admired and esteemed, and it may be called a compilation of everything which had been written before his age on the various subjects which he treats, and a judicious collection from the most excellent treatises which had been composed on the various productions of nature. Pliny was not ashamed to mention the authors which he quoted; he speaks of them with admiration, and while he pays the greatest compliment to their abilities, his encomiums show, in the strongest light, the goodness, the sensibility, and the ingenuousness of his own mind. He had written 160 volumes of remarks and annotations on the various authors which he had read, and so great was the opinion in his contemporaries of his erudition and abilities, that a man called Lartius Lutinius offered to buy his notes and observations for the enormous sum of about 3242l. English money. The philosopher, who was himself rich and independent, rejected the offer, and his compilations, after his death, came into the hands of his nephew Pliny. The best editions of Pliny are that of Harduin, 3 vols., folio, Paris, 1723; that of Frantzius, 10 vols., 8vo, Lipscomb, 1728; that of Brotier, 6 vols., 12mo, Paris, 1779; and the Variorum 8vo, in 8 vols., Lipscomb, 1778 to 1789. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 1, ch. 69; bk. 13, ch. 20; bk. 15, ch. 53.—Pliny, Epistulæ, &c.——Caius Cæcilius Secundus, surnamed the Younger, was son of Lucius Cæcilius by the sister of Pliny the elder. He was adopted by his uncle, whose name he assumed, and whose estates and effects he inherited. He received the greatest part of his education under Quintilian, and at the age of 19 he appeared at the bar, where he distinguished himself so much by his eloquence, that he and Tacitus were reckoned the two greatest orators of their age. He did not make his profession an object of gain like the rest of the Roman orators, but he refused fees from the rich as well as from the poorest of his clients, and declared that he cheerfully employed himself for the protection of innocence, the relief of the indigent, and the detection of vice. He published many of his harangues and orations, which have been lost. When Trajan was invested with the imperial purple, Pliny was created consul by the emperor. This honour the consul acknowledged in a celebrated panegyric, which, at the request of the Roman senate, and in the name of the whole empire, he pronounced on Trajan. Some time after he presided over Pontus and Bithynia, in the office and with the power of proconsul, and by his humanity and philanthropy the subject was freed from the burden of partial taxes, and the persecution which had been begun against the christians of his province was stopped, when Pliny solemnly declared to the emperor that the followers of Christ were a meek and inoffensive sect of men, that their morals were pure and innocent, that they were free from all crimes, and that they voluntarily bound themselves by the most solemn oaths to abstain from vice, and to relinquish every sinful pursuit. If he rendered himself popular in his province, he was not less respected at Rome. He was there the friend of the poor, the patron of learning, great without arrogance, affable in his behaviour, and an example of good breeding, sobriety, temperance, and modesty. As a father and a husband his character was amiable; as a subject he was faithful to his prince; and as a magistrate he was candid, open, and compassionate. His native country shared, among the rest, his unbounded benevolence; and Comum, a small town of Insubria, which gave him birth, boasted of his liberality in the valuable and choice library of books which he collected there. He also contributed towards the expenses which attended the education of his countrymen, and liberally spent part of his estate for the advancement of literature, and for the instruction of those whom poverty otherwise deprived of the advantages of a public education. He made his preceptor Quintilian and the poet Martial objects of his benevolence, and when the daughter of the former was married, Pliny wrote to the father with the greatest civility; and while he observed that he was rich in the possession of learning, though poor in the goods of fortune, he begged of him to accept, as a dowry for his beloved daughter, 50,000 sesterces, about 300l. “I would not,” continued he, “be so moderate, were I not assured, from your modesty and disinterestedness, that the smallness of the present will render it acceptable.” He died in the 52nd year of his age, A.D. 113. He had written a history of his own times, which is lost. It is said that Tacitus did not begin his history till he had found it impossible to persuade Pliny to undertake that laborious task; and, indeed, what could not have been expected from the panegyrist of Trajan, if Tacitus acknowledged himself inferior to him in delineating the character of the times? Some suppose, but falsely, that Pliny wrote the lives of illustrious men, universally ascribed to Cornelius Nepos. He also wrote poetry, but his verses have all perished, and nothing of his learned work remains, but his panegyric on the emperor Trajan, and 10 books of letters, which he himself collected and prepared for the public, from a numerous and respectable correspondence. These letters contain many curious and interesting facts; they abound with many anecdotes of the generosity and the humane sentiments of the writer. They are written with elegance and great purity, and the reader everywhere discovers that affability, that condescension and philanthropy, which so egregiously marked the advocate of the christians. These letters are esteemed by some equal to the voluminous epistles of Cicero. In his panegyric, Pliny’s style is florid and brilliant; he has used, to the greatest advantage, the liberties of the panegyrist, and the eloquence of the courtier. His ideas are new and refined, but his diction is distinguished by that affectation and pomposity which marked the reign of Trajan. The best editions of Pliny are those of Gesner, 8vo, Lipscomb, 1770, and of Lallemand, 12mo, Paris apud Barbou; and of the panegyric separate, that of Schwartz, 4to, 1746, and of the epistles, the Variorum, Leiden, 1669, 8vo. Pliny, Epistulæ.—Vossius.—Sidonius.

Plinthīne, a town of Egypt on the Mediterranean.

Plistarchus, son of Leonidas, of the family of the Eurysthenidæ, succeeded on the Spartan throne at the death of Cleombrotus. Herodotus, bk. 9, ch. 10.——A brother of Cassander.

Plisthanus, a philosopher of Elis, who succeeded in the school of Phædon. Diogenes Laërtius.

Plisthĕnes, a son of Atreus king of Argos, father of Menelaus and Agamemnon, according to Hesiod and others. Homer, however, calls Menelaus and Agamemnon sons of Atreus, though they were in reality the children of Plisthenes. The father died very young, and the two children were left in the house of their grandfather, who took care of them and instructed them. From his attention to them, therefore, it seems probable that Atreus was universally acknowledged their protector and father, and thence their surname of Atridæ. Ovid, Remedia Amoris, li. 778.—Dictys Cretensis, bk. 1.—Homer, Iliad.

Plistīnus, a brother of Faustulus the shepherd, who saved the life of Romulus and Remus. He was killed in a scuffle which happened between the two brothers.

Plistoănax and Plistōnax, son of Pausanias, was general of the Lacedæmonian armies in the Peloponnesian war. He was banished from his kingdom of Sparta for 19 years, and was afterwards recalled by order of the oracle of Delphi. He reigned 58 years. He had succeeded Plistarchus. Thucydides.

Plistus, a river of Phocis falling into the bay of Corinth. Strabo, bk. 9.

Plotæ, small islands on the coast of Ætolia, called also Strophades.

Plotīna Pompeia, a Roman lady who married Trajan while he was yet a private man. She entered Rome in the procession with her husband when he was saluted emperor, and distinguished herself by the affability of her behaviour, her humanity, and liberal offices to the poor and friendless. She accompanied Trajan in the east, and at his death she brought back his ashes to Rome, and still enjoyed all the honours and titles of a Roman empress under Adrian, who by her means had succeeded to the vacant throne. At her death, A.D. 122, she was ranked among the gods, and received divine honours, which, according to the superstition of the times, she seemed to deserve, from her regard for the good and prosperity of the Roman empire, and for her private virtues. Dionysius of Halicarnassus.

Plotinopŏlis, a town of Thrace, built by the emperor Trajan, and called after Plotina, the founder’s wife.——Another in Dacia.

Plotīnus, a Platonic philosopher of Lycopolis in Egypt. He was for eleven years a pupil of Ammonius the philosopher, and after he had profited by all the instructions of his learned preceptor, he determined to improve his knowledge, and to visit the territories of India and Persia to receive information. He accompanied Gordian in his expedition into the east, but the day which proved fatal to the emperor, nearly terminated the life of the philosopher. He saved himself by flight, and the following year he retired to Rome, where he publicly taught philosophy. His school was frequented by people of every sex, age, and quality; by senators as well as plebeians, and so great was the opinion of the public of his honesty and candour, that many, on their death-bed, left all their possessions to his care, and entrusted their children to him, as a superior being. He was the favourite of all the Romans; and while he charmed the populace by the force of his eloquence, and the senate by his doctrines, the emperor Gallienus courted him, and admired the extent of his learning. It is even said that the emperor and the empress Salonina intended to rebuild a decayed city of Campania, and to appoint the philosopher over it, that there he might experimentally know, while he presided over a colony of philosophers, the validity and the use of the ideal laws of the republic of Plato. This plan was not executed, through the envy and malice of the enemies of Plotinus. The philosopher, at last become helpless and infirm, returned to Campania, where the liberality of his friends for a while maintained him. He died A.D. 270, in the 66th year of his age, and as he expired, he declared that he made his last and most violent efforts to give up what there was most divine in him and in the rest of the universe. Amidst the great qualities of the philosopher, we discover some ridiculous singularities. Plotinus never permitted his picture to be taken, and he observed, that to see a painting of himself in the following age, was beneath the notice of an enlightened mind. These reasons also induced him to conceal the day, the hour, and the place of his birth. He never made use of medicines, and though his body was often debilitated by abstinence or too much study, he despised to have recourse to a physician, and thought that it would degrade the gravity of a philosopher. His writings have been collected by his pupil Porphyry. They consist of 54 different treatises divided into six equal parts, written with great spirit and vivacity; but the reasonings are abstruse, and the subjects metaphysical. The best edition is that of Picinus, folio, Basil, 1580.

Plotius Crispīnus, a stoic philosopher and poet, whose verses were very inelegant, and whose disposition was morose, for which he has been ridiculed by Horace, and called Aretalogus. Horace, bk. 1, satire 1, li. 4.——Gallus, a native of Lugdunum, who taught grammar at Rome, and had Cicero among his pupils. Cicero, On Oratory.——Griphus, a man made senator by Vespasian. Tacitus, Histories, bk. 3.——A centurion in Cæsar’s army. Cæsar, Gallic War, bk. 3, ch. 19.——Tucca, a friend of Horace and of Virgil, who made him his heir. He was selected by Augustus, with Varius, to review the Æneid of Virgil. Horace, bk. 1, satire 5, li. 40.——Lucius, a poet in the age of the great Marius, whose exploits he celebrated in his verses.

Plusios, a surname of Jupiter at Sparta, expressive of his power to grant riches. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 19.

Plutarchus, a native of Chæronea, descended of a respectable family. His father, whose name is unknown, was distinguished for his learning and virtue, and his grandfather, called Lamprias, was also as conspicuous for his eloquence and the fecundity of his genius. Under Ammonius, a reputable teacher at Delphi, Plutarch was made acquainted with philosophy and mathematics, and so well established was his character, that he was appointed by his countrymen, while yet very young, to go to the Roman proconsul, in their name, upon an affair of the most important nature. This commission he executed with honour to himself, and with success for his country. He afterwards travelled in quest of knowledge, and after he had visited, like a philosopher and an historian, the territories of Egypt and Greece, he retired to Rome, where he opened a school. His reputation made his school frequented. The emperor Trajan admired his abilities, and honoured him with the office of consul, and appointed him governor of Illyricum. After the death of his imperial benefactor, Plutarch removed from Rome to Chæronea, where he lived in the greatest tranquillity, respected by his fellow-citizens, and raised to all the honours which his native town could bestow. In this peaceful and solitary retreat, Plutarch closely applied himself to study, and wrote the greatest part of his works, and particularly his Lives. He died in an advanced age at Chæronea, about the 140th year of the christian era. Plutarch had five children by his wife, called Timoxena, four sons and one daughter. Two of the sons and the daughter died when young, and those that survived were called Plutarch and Lamprias, and the latter did honour to his father’s memory, by giving to the world an [♦]accurate catalogue of his writings. In his private and public character, the historian of Chæronea was the friend of discipline. He boldly asserted the natural right of mankind, liberty; but he recommended obedience and submissive deference to magistrates, as necessary to preserve the peace of society. He supported that the most violent and dangerous public factions arose too often from private disputes and from misunderstanding. To render himself more intelligent, he always carried a commonplace book with him, and he preserved with the greatest care whatever judicious observations fell in the course of conversation. The most esteemed of his works are his lives of illustrious men, of whom he examines and delineates the different characters with wonderful skill and impartiality. He neither misrepresents the virtues, nor hides the foibles of his heroes. He writes with precision and with fidelity, and though his diction is neither pure nor elegant, yet there is energy and animation, and in many descriptions he is inferior to no historian. In some of his narrations, however, he is often too circumstantial, his remarks are often injudicious; and when he compares the heroes of Greece with those of Rome, the candid reader can easily remember which side of the Adriatic gave the historian birth. Some have accused him of not knowing the genealogy of his heroes, and have censured him for his superstition; yet for all this, he is the most entertaining, the most instructive, and interesting of all the writers of ancient history; and were a man of true taste and judgment asked what book he wished to save from destruction, of all the profane compositions of antiquity, he would perhaps without hesitation reply, the Lives of Plutarch. In his moral treatises, Plutarch appears in a different character, and his misguided philosophy and erroneous doctrines render some of these inferior compositions puerile and disgusting. They, however, contain many useful lessons and curious facts, and though they are composed without connection, compiled without judgment, and often abound with improbable stories and false reasonings, yet they contain much information and many useful reflections. The best editions of Plutarch are that of Francfort, 2 vols., folio, 1599; that of Stephens, 6 vols., 8vo, 1572; the Lives by Reiske, 12 vols., 8vo, Lipscomb. 1775; and the Moralia, &c., by Wyttenbach. Plutarch.——A native of Eretria, during the Peloponnesian war. He was defeated by the Macedonians. Plutarch, Phocion.

[♦] ‘acurate’ replaced with ‘accurate’

Plutia, a town of Sicily. Cicero, Against Verres.

Pluto, a son of Saturn and Ops, inherited his father’s kingdom with his brothers Jupiter and Neptune. He received as his lot the kingdom of hell, and whatever lies under the earth, and as such he became the god of the infernal regions, of death and funerals. From his functions, and the place he inhabited, he received different names. He was called Dis, Hades, or Ades, Clytopolon, Agelastus, Orcus, &c. As the place of his residence was obscure and gloomy, all the goddesses refused to marry him; but he determined to obtain by force what was denied to his solicitations. As he once visited the island of Sicily, after a violent earthquake, he saw Proserpine the daughter of Ceres gathering flowers in the plains of Enna, with a crowd of female attendants. He became enamoured of her, and immediately carried her away upon his chariot drawn by four horses. To make his retreat more unknown, he opened himself a passage through the earth, by striking it with his trident in the lake of Cyane in Sicily, or, according, to others, on the borders of the Cephisus in Attica. Proserpine called upon her attendants for help, but in vain, and she became the wife of her ravisher, and the queen of hell. Pluto is generally represented as holding a sceptre with two teeth; he has also keys in his hand, to intimate that whoever enters his kingdom can never return. He is looked upon as a hard-hearted and inexorable god, with a grim and dismal countenance, and for that reason no temples were raised to his honour, as to the rest of the superior gods. Black victims, and particularly a bull, were the only sacrifices which were offered to him, and their blood was not sprinkled on the altars, or received in vessels, as at other sacrifices, but it was permitted to run down into the earth, as if it were to penetrate as far as the realms of the god. The Syracusans yearly sacrificed to him black bulls, near the fountain of Cyane, where, according to the received traditions, he had disappeared with Proserpine. Among plants, the cypress, the narcissus, and the maiden-hair were sacred to him, as also everything which was deemed inauspicious, particularly the number two. According to some of the ancients, Pluto sat on a throne of sulphur, from which issued the rivers Lethe, Cocytus, Phlegethon, and Acheron. The dog Cerberus watched at his feet, the Harpies hovered round him, Proserpine sat on his left hand, and near to the goddess stood the Eumenides, with their heads covered with snakes. The Parcæ occupied the right, and they each held in their hands the symbols of their office, the distaff, the spindle, and the scissors. Pluto is called by some the father of the Eumenides. During the war of the gods and the Titans, the Cyclops made a helmet which rendered the bearer invisible, and gave it to Pluto. Perseus was armed with it when he conquered the Gorgons. Hesiod, Theogony.—Homer, Iliad.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, &c.—Hyginus, fable 155; Poetica Astronomica, bk. 2.—Statius, Thebaid, bk. 8.—Diodorus, bk. 5.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, fable 6.—Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 36.—Orpheus, hymn 17, &c.—Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 2, ch. 26.—Plato, The Republic.—Euripides, Medea; Hippolytus.—Aeschylus, Persians; Prometheus Bound.—Varro, de Lingua Latina, bk. 4.—Catullus, poem 3.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 4, li. 502; Æneid, bk. 6, li. 273; bk. 8, li. 296.—Lucan, bk. 6, li. 715.—Horace, bk. 2, odes 3 & 18.—Seneca, Hercules Furens.

Plutonium, a temple of Pluto in Lydia. Cicero, De Divinatione, bk. 1, ch. 36.

Plutus, a son of Jasion, or Jasius, by Ceres the goddess of corn, has been confounded by many of the mythologists with Pluto, though plainly distinguished from him as being the god of riches. He was brought up by the goddess of peace, and on that account, Pax was represented at Athens as holding the god of wealth in her lap. The Greeks spoke of him as of a fickle divinity. They represented him as blind, because he distributed riches indiscriminately; he was lame, because he came slow and gradually; but had wings, to intimate that he flew away with more velocity than he approached mankind. Lucian, Timon.—Pausanias, bk. 9, chs. 16 & 26.—Hyginus, Poetica Astronomica.—Aristophanes, Plutus.—Diodorus, bk. 5.—Hesoid, Theogony, li. 970.—Dionysius of Halicarnassus, bk. 1, ch. 53.

Pluvius, a surname of Jupiter as god of rain. He was invoked by that name among the Romans, whenever the earth was parched up with continual heat, and was in want of refreshing showers. He had an altar in the temple on the capitol. Tibullus, bk. 1, poem 7, li. 26.

Plynteria, a festival among the Greeks, in honour of Aglauros, or rather of Minerva, who received from the daughter Cecrops the name of Aglauros. The word seems to be derived from πλυνειν, lavare, because, during the solemnity, they undressed the statue of the goddess and washed it. The day on which it was observed was universally looked upon as unfortunate and inauspicious, and on that account no person was permitted to appear in the temples, as they were purposely surrounded with ropes. The arrival of Alcibiades in Athens that day, was deemed very unfortunate; but, however, the success that ever after attended him, proved it to be otherwise. It was customary at this festival to bear in procession a cluster of figs, which intimated the progress of civilization among the first inhabitants of the earth, as figs served them for food after they had found a dislike for acorns. Pollux.

Pnigeus, a village of Egypt, near Phœnicia. Strabo, bk. 16.

Pnyx, a place of Athens, set apart by Solon for holding assemblies. Cornelius Nepos, Atticus, ch. 3.—Plutarch, Theseus & Themistocles.

Poblicius, a lieutenant of Pompey in Spain.

Podalirius, a son of Æsculapius and Epione. He was one of the pupils of the Centaur Chiron, and he made himself under him such a master of medicine, that, during the Trojan war, the Greeks invited him to their camp, to stop a pestilence which had baffled the skill of all their physicians. Some, however, suppose that he went to the Trojan war not in the capacity of a physician in the Grecian army, but as a warrior, attended by his brother Machaon, in 30 ships, with soldiers from Œchalia, Ithome, and Trica. At his return from the Trojan war, Podalirius was shipwrecked on the coast of Caria, where he [♦]was cured of the falling sickness and married a daughter of Damœtas the king of the place. He fixed his habitation there, and built two towns, one of which he called Syrna, by the name of his wife. The Carians, after his death, built him a temple, and paid him divine honours. Dictys Cretensis.—Quintus Smyrnæus, bks. 6 & 9.—Ovid de Ars Amatoria, bk. 2; Tristia, poem 6.—Pausanias, bk. 3.——A Rutulian engaged in the wars of Æneas and Turnus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 12, li. 304.

[♦] omitted word ‘was’ inserted

Podarce, a daughter of Danaus. Apollodorus.

Podarces, a son of Iphiclus of Thessaly, who went to the Trojan war.——The first name of Priam. When Troy was taken by Hercules, he was redeemed from slavery by his sister Hesione, and from thence received the name of Priam. See: [Priamus].

Podares, a general of Mantinea, in the age of Epaminondas. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 9.

Podarge, one of the Harpies, mother of two of the horses of Achilles by the Zephyrs. The word intimates the swiftness of her feet.

Podargus, a charioteer of Hector. Homer.

Pœas, son of Thaumacus, was among the Argonauts.——The father of Philoctetes. The son is often called Pœantia proles, on account of his father. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 13, li. 45.

Pœcĭle, a celebrated portico at Athens, which received its name from the variety (ποικιλος) of paintings which it contained. It was there that Zeno kept his school, and the stoics also received their lessons there, whence their name (à στοα, a porch). The Pœcile was adorned with pictures of gods and benefactors, and among many others were those of the siege and sacking of Troy, the battle of Theseus against the Amazons, the fight between the Lacedæmonians and Athenians at Œnoe in Argolis, and of Atticus the great friend of Athens. The only reward which Miltiades obtained after the battle of Marathon, was to have his picture drawn more conspicuous than that of the rest of the officers that fought with him, in the representation which was made of the engagement, which was hung up in the Pœcile, in commemoration of that celebrated victory. Cornelius Nepos, Miltiades & Atticus, ch. 3.—Pausanias, bk. 1.—Pliny, bk. 35.

Pœni, a name given to the Carthaginians. It seems to be a corruption of the word Phœni or Phœnices, as the Carthaginians were of Phœnician origin. Servius, on Virgil, bk. 1, li. 302.

Pœon. See: [Pæon].

Pœonia, a part of Macedonia. See: [Pæonia].

Pœus, a part of mount Pindus.

Pogon, a harbour of the Trœzenians on the coast of the Peloponnesus. It received this name on account of its appearing to come forward before the town of Trœzene, as the beard (πωγων) does from the chin. Strabo, bk. 1.—Mela, bk. 2.

Pola, a city of Istria, founded by the Colchians, and afterwards made a Roman colony, and called Pietas Julia. Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 9.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 3.—Strabo, bks. 1 & 5.

Polemarchus. See: [Archon].——The assassin of Polydorus king of Sparta. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 3.

Polemocratia, a queen of Thrace, who fled to Brutus after the murder of Cæsar. She retired from her kingdom because her subjects had lately murdered her husband.

Pŏlĕmon, a youth of Athens, son of Philostratus. He was much given to debauchery and extravagance, and spent the greatest part of his life in riot and drunkenness. He once, when intoxicated, entered the school of Xenocrates, while the philosopher was giving his pupils a lecture upon the effects of intemperance, and he was so struck with the eloquence of the academician, and the force of his arguments, that from that moment he renounced the dissipated life he had led, and applied himself totally to the study of philosophy. He was then in the 30th year of his age, and from that time he never drank any other liquor but water; and after the death of Xenocrates he succeeded in the school where his reformation had been affected. He died about 270 years before Christ, in an extreme old age. Diogenes Laërtius, Lives.—Horace, bk. 2, satire 3, li. 254.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 6, ch. 9.——A son of Zeno the rhetorician, made king of Pontus by Antony. He attended his patron in his expedition against Parthia. After the battle of Actium, he was received into favour by Augustus, though he had fought in the cause of Antony. He was killed some time after by the barbarians near the Palus Mæotis, against whom he had made war. Strabo.—Dionysius of Halicarnassus.——His son, of the same name, was confirmed on his father’s throne by Roman emperors, and the province of Cilicia was also added to his kingdom by Claudius.——An officer in the army of Alexander, intimate with Philotas, &c. Curtius, bk. 7, ch. 1, &c.——A rhetorician at Rome, who wrote a poem on weights and measures still extant. He was master to Perseus the celebrated satirist, and died in the age of Nero.——A sophist of Laodice in Asia Minor, in the reign of Adrian. He was often sent to the emperor with an embassy by his countrymen, which he executed with great success. He was greatly favoured by Adrian, from whom he extracted much money. In the 56th year of his age he buried himself alive, as he laboured with the gout. He wrote declamations in Greek.

Polemonium, now Vatija, a town of Pontus, at the east of the mouth of the [♦]Thermodon.

[♦] ‘Theomodon’ replaced with ‘Thermodon’

Polias, a surname of Minerva, as protectress of cities.

Polichna, a town of Troas on Ida. Herodotus, bk. 6, ch. 28.——Another of Crete. Thucydides, bk. 2, ch. 85.

Polieia, a festival at Thebes in honour of Apollo, who was represented there with grey hair (πολιος), contrary to the practice of all other places. The victim was a bull, but when it happened once that no bull could be found, an ox was taken from the cart and sacrificed. From that time the sacrifice of labouring oxen was deemed lawful, though before it was looked upon as a capital crime.

Poliorcētes (destroyer of cities), a surname given to Demetrius son of Antigonus. Plutarch, Demetrius.

Polisma, a town of Troas, on the Simois. Strabo, bk. 13.

Polistrătus, an Epicurean philosopher born the same day as Hippoclides, with whom he always lived in the greatest intimacy. They both died at the same hour. Diogenes Laërtius.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 1.

Polītes, a son of Priam and Hecuba, killed by Pyrrhus in his father’s presence. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 526, &c. His son, who bore the same name, followed Æneas into Italy, and was one of the friends of young Ascanius. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 564.

Politorium, a city of the Latins destroyed by the Romans, before Christ 639. Livy, bk. 1, ch. 33.

Pollinea, a prostitute, &c. Juvenal, satire 2, li. 68.

Polla Argentaria, the wife of the poet Lucan. She assisted her husband in correcting the three first books of his Pharsalia. Statius, Sylvæ, bks. 1 & 2.

Pollentia, now Polenza, a town of Liguria in Italy, famous for wool. There was a celebrated battle fought there between the Romans and Alaric king of the Huns, about the 403rd year of the christian era, in which the former, according to some, obtained the victory. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.—Pliny, bk. 8, ch. 48.—Suetonius, Tiberius, ch. 37.—Silius Italicus, bk. 8, li. 598.—Cicero, bk. 11, Letters to his Friends, ltr. 13.——A town of Majorca. Pliny & Mela.——Of Picenum. Livy, bk. 39, ch. 44; bk. 41, ch. 27.

Polles, a Greek poet whose writings were so obscure and unintelligible that his name became proverbial. Suidas.

Pollio Caius Asinius, a Roman consul under the reign of Augustus, who distinguished himself as much by his eloquence and writings as by his exploits in the field. He defeated the Dalmatians, and favoured the cause of Antony against Augustus. He patronized, with great liberality, the poets Virgil and Horace, who have immortalized him in their writings. He was the first who raised a public library at Rome, and indeed his example was afterwards followed by many of the emperors. In his library were placed the statues of all the learned men of every age, and Varro was the only person who was honoured there during his lifetime. He was with Julius Cæsar when he crossed the Rubicon. He was greatly esteemed by Augustus, when he had become one of his adherents, after the ruin of Antony. Pollio wrote some tragedies, orations, and a history, which was divided into 17 books. All those compositions are lost, and nothing remains of his writings except a few letters to Cicero. He died in the 80th year of his age, A.D. 4. He is the person in whose honour Virgil has inscribed his fourth eclogue, Pollio, as a reconciliation was effected between Augustus and Antony during his consulship. The poet, it is supposed by some, makes mention of a son of the consul born about this time, and is lavish in his excursions into futurity, and his predictions of approaching prosperity. Paterculus, bk. 2, ch. 86.—Horace, bk. 2, ode 1; satire 10, bk. 1.—Virgil, Eclogues, poems 3 & 4.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 8, ch. 13.—Quintilian, bk. 10.——Annius, a man accused of sedition before Tiberius, and acquitted. He afterwards conspired against Nero, &c. Tacitus, [♦]Annals, bk. 6, ch. 9; bk. 15, ch. 56.——Vedius, one of the friends of Augustus, who used to feed his fishes with human flesh. This cruelty was discovered when one of his servants broke a glass in the presence of Augustus, who had been invited to a feast. The master ordered the servant to be seized; but he threw himself at the feet of the emperor, and begged him to interfere, and not to suffer him to be devoured by fishes. Upon this the causes of his apprehension were examined, and Augustus, astonished at the barbarity of his favourite, caused his servant to be dismissed, all the fish-ponds to be filled up, and the crystal glasses of Pollio to be broken to pieces.——A man who poisoned Britannicus, at the instigation of Nero.——An historian in the age of Constantine the Great.——A sophist in the age of Pompey the Great.——A friend of the emperor Vespasian.

[♦] Book title omitted in text

Pollis, a commander of the Lacedæmonian fleet defeated at Naxos, B.C. 377. Diodorus.

Pollius Felix, a friend of the poet Statius, to whom he dedicated his second Sylva.

Pollupex, now Final, a town of Genoa.

Pollutia, a daughter of Lucius Vetus, put to death after her husband Rubellius Plautus, by order of Nero, &c. Tacitus, bk. 16, Annals, chs. 10 & 11.

Pollux, a son of Jupiter by Leda the wife of Tyndarus. He was brother to Castor. See: [Castor].——A Greek writer, who flourished A.D. 186, in the reign of Commodus, and died in the 58th year of his age. He was born at Naucratis, and taught rhetoric at Athens, and wrote a useful work called Onomasticon, of which the best edition is that of Hemsterhusius, 2 vols., folio, Amsterdam, 1706.

Poltis, a king of Thrace, in the time of the Trojan war.

Polus, a celebrated Grecian actor.——A sophist of Agrigentum.

Polusca, a town of Latium, formerly the capital of the Volsci. The inhabitants were called Pollustini. Livy, bk. 2, ch. 39.

Polyænus, a native of Macedonia, who wrote eight books in Greek of stratagems, which he dedicated to the emperors Antoninus and Verus, while they were making war against the Parthians. He wrote also other books which have been lost, among which was a history, with a description of the city of Thebes. The best editions of his stratagems are those of Masvicius, 8vo, Leiden, 1690, and of Mursinna, 12mo, Berlin, 1756.——A friend of Philopœmen.——An orator in the age of Julius Cæsar. He wrote in three books an account of Antony’s expedition in Parthia, and likewise published orations.——A mathematician, who afterwards followed the tenets of Epicurus, and disregarded geometry as a false and useless study. Cicero, Academicæ Quæstiones, bk. 4.

Polyānus, a mountain of Macedonia, near Pindus. Strabo.

Polyarchus, the brother of a queen of Cyrene, &c. Polyænus, bk. 8.

Polybidas, a general after the death of Agesipolis the Lacedæmonian. He reduced Olynthus.

Polybius, or Poly̆bus, a king of Corinth, who married Peribœa, whom some have called Merope. He was son of Mercury by Chthonophyle, the daughter of Sicyon king of Sicyon. He permitted his wife, who had no children, to adopt and educate as her own son, Œdipus, who had been found by his shepherds exposed in the woods. He had a daughter called Lysianassa, whom he gave in marriage to Talaus son of Bias king of Argos. As he had no male child, he left his kingdom to Adrastus, who had been banished from his throne, and who had fled to Corinth for protection. Hyginus, fable 66.—Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 6.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 5.—Seneca, Œdipus, li. 812.

Polybius, a native of Megalopolis in Peloponnesus, son of Lycortas. He was early initiated in the duties, and made acquainted with the qualifications, of a statesman, by his father, who was a strong supporter of the Achæan league, and under him Philopœmen was taught the art of war. In Macedonia he distinguished himself by his valour against the Romans, and when Perseus had been conquered, he was carried to the capital of Italy as a prisoner of war. But he was not long buried in the obscurity of a dungeon. Scipio and Fabius were acquainted with his uncommon abilities as a warrior and as a man of learning, and they made him their friend by kindness and attention. Polybius was not insensible to their merit; he accompanied Scipio in his expeditions, and was present at the taking of Carthage and Numantia. In the midst of his prosperity, however, he felt the distresses of his country, which had been reduced into a Roman province, and, like a true patriot, he relieved its wants, and eased its servitude by making use of the influence which he had acquired by his acquaintance with the most powerful Romans. After the death of his friend and benefactor Scipio, he retired from Rome, and passed the rest of his days at Megalopolis, where he enjoyed the comforts and honours which every good man can receive from the gratitude of his citizens, and from the self-satisfaction which attends a humane and benevolent heart. He died in the 82nd year of his age, about 124 years before Christ, of a wound which he had received by a fall from his horse. He wrote a universal history in Greek, divided into 40 books, which began with the wars of Rome with the Carthaginians, and finished with the conquest of Macedonia by Paulus. The greatest part of this valuable history is lost; the five first books are extant, and of the 12 following the fragments are numerous. The history of Polybius is admired for its authenticity, and he is, perhaps, the only historian among the Greeks who was experimentally and professedly acquainted with the military operations and the political measures of which he makes mention. He has been recommended in every age and country as the best master in the art of war, and nothing can more effectually prove the esteem in which he was held among the Romans, than to mention that Brutus the murderer of Cæsar perused his history with the greatest attention, epitomized it, and often retired from the field where he had drawn his sword against Octavius and Antony, to read the instructive pages which describe the great actions of his ancestors. Polybius, however great and entertaining, is sometimes censured for his unnecessary digressions, for his uncouth and ill-digested narrations, for his negligence, and the inaccurate arrangement of his words. But everywhere there is instruction to be found, information to be collected, and curious facts to be obtained, and it reflects not much honour upon Livy for calling the historian, from whom he has copied whole books almost word for word, without gratitude or acknowledgment, haudquaquam spernendus auctor. Dionysius also, of Halicarnassus, is one of his most violent accusers; but the historian has rather exposed his ignorance of true criticism, than discovered inaccuracy or inelegance. The best editions of Polybius are those of Gronovius, 3 vols., 8vo, Amsterdam, 1670; of Ernesti, 3 vols., 8vo, 1764; and of Schweighæuser, 7 vols., 8vo, Lipscomb, 1785. Plutarch, Philopœmen, preface.—Livy, bk. 30, ch. 45.—Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 30.——A freedman of Augustus. Suetonius.——A physician, disciple, and successor of Hippocrates.——A soothsayer of Corinth, who foretold to his sons the fate that attended them in the Trojan war.

Polybœa, a daughter of Amyclas and Diomede, sister to Hyacinthus. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 19.

Polybœtes. See: [Polypœtes].

Polybōtes, one of the giants who made war against Jupiter. He was killed by Neptune, who crushed him under a part of the island of Cos, as he was walking across the Ægean. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 2.—Hyginus, preface to fables.

Polybus, a king of Thebes in Egypt in the time of the Trojan war. Homer, Odyssey, bk. 22, li. 284.——One of Penelope’s suitors. Ovid, Heroides, poem 1.——A king of Sicyon.——A king of Corinth. See: [Polybius].

Polycāon, a son of Lelex, who succeeded his brother Myles. He received divine honours after death, with his wife Messene, at Lacedæmon, where he had reigned. Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 1, &c.——A son of Butes, who married a daughter of Hyllus.

Polycarpus, a famous Greek writer, born at Smyrna, and educated at the expense of a rich but pious lady. Some suppose that he was St. John’s disciple. He became bishop of Smyrna, and went to Rome to settle the festival of Easter, but to no purpose. He was condemned to be burnt at Smyrna, A.D. 167. His epistle to the Philippians is simple and modest, yet replete with useful precepts and rules for the conduct of life. The best edition of Polycarp’s epistle is that of Oxford, 8vo, 1708, being annexed to the works of Ignatius.

Polycaste, the youngest of the daughters of Nestor. According to some authors she married Telemachus, when he visited her father’s court in quest of Ulysses.

Polychăres, a rich Messenian, said to have been the cause of the war which was kindled between the Spartans and his countrymen, which was called the first Messenian war.

Polyclēa, the mother of Thessalus, &c.

Poly̆cles, an Athenian in the time of Demetrius, &c. Polyænus, bk. 5.——A famous athlete, often crowned at the four solemn games of the Greeks. He had a statue in Jupiter’s grove at Olympia. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 1.

Polyclētus, a celebrated statuary of Sicyon, about 232 years before Christ. He was universally reckoned the most skilful artist of his profession among the ancients, and the second rank was given to Phidias. One of his pieces, in which he had represented a body-guard of the king of Persia, was so happily executed, and so nice and exact in all its proportions, that it was looked upon as a most perfect model, and accordingly called the Rule. He was acquainted with architecture. Pausanias, bks. 2 & 6.—Quintilian, bk. 12, ch. 10.——Another, who lived about 30 years after.——A favourite of the emperor Nero, put to death by Galba.

Polyclītus, an historian of Larissa. Athenæus, bk. 12.—Ælian, bk. 16, ch. 41.

Polycrătes, a tyrant of Samos, well known for the continual flow of good fortune which attended him. He became very powerful, and made himself master, not only of the neighbouring islands, but also of some cities on the coast of Asia. He had a fleet of 100 ships of war, and was so universally respected, that Amasis the king of Egypt made a treaty of alliance with him. The Egyptian monarch, however, terrified by his continued prosperity, advised him to chequer his enjoyments, by relinquishing some of his most favourite objects. Polycrates complied, and threw into the sea a beautiful seal, the most valuable of his jewels. The voluntary loss of so precious a seal afflicted him for some time, but in a few days after, he received as a present a large fish, in whose belly the jewel was found. Amasis no sooner heard this, than he rejected all alliance with the tyrant of Samos, and observed, that sooner or later his good fortune would vanish. Some time after Polycrates visited Magnesia on the Mæander, where he had been invited by Orœtes the governor. He was shamefully put to death, 522 years before Christ, merely because the governor wished to terminate the prosperity of Polycrates. The daughter of Polycrates had dissuaded her father from going to the house of Orœtes, on account of the bad dreams which she had had, but her advice was disregarded. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 14.—Strabo, bk. 14.—Herodotus, bk. 3, ch. 22, &c.——A sophist of Athens, who, to engage the public attention, wrote a panegyric on Busiris and Clytemnestra. Quintilian, bk. 2, ch. 17.——An ancient statuary.

Polycrēta, or Polycrīta, a young woman of Naxos, who became the wife of Diognetus the general of the Erythreans, &c. Polyænus, bk. 8.——Another woman of Naxos, who died through the excess of joy. Plutarch, de Mulierum virtutes.

Polycrĭtus, a man who wrote the life of Dionysius the tyrant of Sicily.—Diogenes Laërtius.

Polyctor, the husband of Stygna, one of the Danaides. Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 1.——The father of Pisander, one of Penelope’s suitors.——An athlete of Elis. It is said that he obtained a victory at Olympia by bribing his adversary Sosander, who was superior to him in strength and courage. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 21.

Polydæmon, an Assyrian prince killed by Perseus. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, fable 3.

Polydămas, a Trojan, son of Antenor by Theano the sister of Hecuba. He married Lycaste, a natural daughter of Priam. He is accused by some of having betrayed his country to the Greeks. Dares Phrygius.——A son of Panthous, born the same night as Hector. He was inferior in valour to none of the Trojans, except Hector, and his prudence, the wisdom of his counsels, and the firmness of his mind, claimed equal admiration, and proved most salutary to his unfortunate and misguided countrymen. He was at last killed by Ajax, after he had slaughtered a great number of the enemy. Dictys Cretensis, bk. 1, &c.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 12, &c.——A celebrated athlete, son of Nicias, who imitated Hercules in whatever he did. He killed a lion with his fist, and it is said that he could stop with his hand a chariot in its most rapid course. He was one day with some of his friends in a cave, when on a sudden a large piece of rock came tumbling down; and while all fled away, he attempted to receive the fallen fragment in his arms. His prodigious strength, however, was insufficient, and he was instantly crushed to pieces under the rock. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 5.——One of Alexander’s officers, intimate with Parmenio. Curtius, bk. 4, ch. 15.

Polydamna, a wife of Thonis king of Egypt. It is said that she gave Helen a certain powder, which had the wonderful power of driving away care and melancholy. Homer, Odyssey, bk. 4, li. 228.

Polydectes, a king of Sparta, of the family of the Proclidæ. He was son of Eunomus. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 7.——A son of Magnes, king of the island of Seriphos. He received with great kindness Danae and her son Perseus, who had been exposed on the sea by Acrisius. See: [Perseus]. He took particular care of the education of Perseus; but when he became enamoured of Danae, he removed him from his kingdom, apprehensive of his resentment. Some time after he paid his addresses to Danae, and when she rejected him, he prepared to offer her violence. Danae fled to the altar of Minerva for protection, and Dictys the brother of Polydectes, who had himself saved her from the sea-waters, opposed her ravisher and armed himself in her defence. At this critical moment, Perseus arrived, and with Medusa’s head he turned into stones Polydectes, with the associates of his guilt. The crown of Seriphos was given to Dictys, who had shown himself so active in the cause of innocence. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, li. 242.—Hyginus, fable 63, &c.——A sculptor of Greece. Pliny.

Polydeucēa, a fountain of Laconia, near Therapne. Strabo, bk. 9.

Polydōra, a daughter of Peleus king of Thessaly, by Antigone the daughter of Eurytion. She married the river Sperchius, by whom she had Mnestheus. Apollodorus.——One of the Oceanides. Hesiod.——A daughter of Meleager king of Calydon, who married Protesilaus. She killed herself when she heard that her husband was dead. The wife of Protesilaus is more commonly called Laodamia. See: [Protesilaus]. Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 2.——A daughter of Perieres.——An island of the Propontis near Cyzicus.

Polydōrus, a son of Alcamenes king of Sparta. He put an end to the war which had been carried on during 20 years, between Messenia and his subjects; and during his reign, the Lacedæmonians planted two colonies, one at Crotona, and the other at Locri. He was universally respected. He was assassinated by a nobleman, called Polemarchus. His son Eurycrates succeeded him 724 years before Christ. Pausanias, bk. 3.—Herodotus, bk. 7, ch. 204.——A celebrated carver of Rhodes, who with one stone made the famous statue of Laocoon and his children. Pliny, bk. 34, ch. 8.——A son of Hippomedon, who went with the Epigoni to the second Theban war. Pausanias, bk. 2.——A son of Cadmus and Hermione, who married Nycteis, by whom he had Labdacus the father of Laius. He had succeeded to the throne of Thebes, when his father had gone to Illyricum. Apollodorus, bk. 3.——A brother of Jason of Pheræ, who killed his brother and seized upon his possessions. Diodorus, bk. 15.——A son of Priam killed by Achilles.——Another son of Priam by Hecuba, or, according to others, by Laothoe the daughter of Altes king of Pedasus. As he was young and inexperienced when Troy was besieged by the Greeks, his father removed him to the court of Polymnestor king of Thrace, and also entrusted to the care of the monarch a large sum of money, and the greatest part of his treasures, till his country was freed from foreign invasion. No sooner was the death of Priam known in Thrace, than Polymnestor made himself master of the riches which were in his possession; and to ensure them the better, he assassinated young Polydorus, and threw his body into the sea, where it was found by Hecuba. See: [Hecuba]. According to Virgil, the body of Polydorus was buried near the shore by his assassin, and there grew on his grave a myrtle, whose boughs dropped blood, when Æneas, going to Italy, attempted to tear them from the tree. See: [Polymnestor]. Virgil, Æneid, bks. 3, 21, &c.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 12.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 3, li. 432.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 20.—Dictys Cretensis, bk. 2, ch. 18.

Polygius, a surname of Mercury. Pausanias.

Polygnōtus, a celebrated painter of Thasos, about 422 years before the christian era. His father’s name was Aglaophon. He adorned one of the public porticoes of Athens with his paintings, in which he had represented the most striking events of the Trojan war. He particularly excelled in giving grace, liveliness, and expression to his pieces. The Athenians were so pleased with him, that they offered to reward his labours with whatever he pleased to accept. He declined this generous offer, and the Amphictyonic council, which was composed of the representatives of the principal cities of Greece, ordered that Polygnotus should be maintained at the public expense [♦]wherever he went.—Quintilian, bk. 12, ch. 10.—Pliny, bks. 33 & 34.—Plutarch, Cimon.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 25, &c.——A statuary. Pliny, bk. 34.

[♦] ‘whereever’ replaced with ‘wherever’

Polygŏnus and Telegonus, sons of Proteus and Coronis, were killed by Hercules. Apollodorus.

Polyhymnia and Polymnia, one of the Muses, daughter of Jupiter and Mnemosyne. She presided over singing and rhetoric, and was deemed the inventress of harmony. She was represented veiled in white, holding a sceptre in her left hand, and with her right raised up, as if ready to harangue. She had a crown of jewels on her head. Hesiod, Theogony, lis. 75 & 915.—Plutarch, Convivium Septem Sapientium.—Horace, bk. 1, ode 1.—Ovid Fasti, bk. 5, lis. 9 & 53.

Polyidus, a physician who brought back to life Glaucus the son of Minos, by applying to his body a certain herb, with which he had seen a serpent restore life to another which was dead. See: [Glaucus]. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 3.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 43.——A son of Hercules by one of the daughters of Thestius. Apollodorus.——A Corinthian soothsayer, called also Polybius.——A dithyrambic poet, painter, and musician.

Polylāus, a son of Hercules and Crathe, daughter of Thespius.

Polymĕnes, an officer appointed to take care of Egypt after it had been conquered by Alexander. Curtius, bk. 4, ch. 8.

Polymēde, a daughter of Autolycus, who married Æson, by whom she had Jason. She survived her husband only a few days. Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 13.

Polymedon, one of Priam’s illegitimate children.

Polymēla, one of Diana’s companions. She was daughter of Phylas, and had a son by Mercury. Homer, Iliad, bk. 16.——A daughter of Æolus, seduced by Ulysses.——A daughter of Actor. She was the first wife of Peleus the father of Achilles.

Polymnestes, a Greek poet of Colophon. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 14.——A native of Thera, father of Battus, or Aristotle, by Phronima the daughter of Etearchus king of Oaxus. Herodotus, bk. 4, ch. 150.

Polymnestor, a king of the Thracian Chersonesus, who married Ilione, the eldest of Priam’s daughters. When the Greeks besieged Troy, Priam sent the greatest part of his treasures, together with Polydorus, the youngest of his sons, to Thrace, where they were entrusted to the care of Polymnestor. The Thracian monarch paid every attention to his brother-in-law; but when he was informed that Priam was dead, he murdered him to become master of the riches which were in his possession. At that time, the Greeks were returning victorious from Troy, followed by all the captives, among whom was Hecuba the mother of Polydorus. The fleet stopped on the coast of Thrace, where one of the female captives discovered on the shore the body of Polydorus, whom Polymnestor had thrown into the sea. The dreadful intelligence was immediately communicated to the mother, and Hecuba, who recollected the frightful dreams which she had had on the preceding night, did not doubt but Polymnestor was the cruel assassin. She resolved to revenge her son’s death, and immediately she called out Polymnestor, as if wishing to impart to him a matter of the most important nature. The tyrant was drawn into the snare, and was no sooner introduced into the apartments of the Trojan princess, than the female captives rushed upon him and put out his eyes with their pins, while Hecuba murdered his two children who had accompanied him. According to Euripides, the Greeks condemned Polymnestor to be banished into a distant island for his perfidy. Hyginus, however, relates the whole differently, and observes, that when Polydorus was sent to Thrace, Ilione his sister took him instead of her son Deiphilus, who was of the same age, apprehensive of her husband’s cruelty. The monarch was unacquainted with the imposition; he looked upon Polydorus as his own son, and treated Deiphilus as the brother of Ilione. After the destruction of Troy, the conquerors, who wished the house and family of Priam to be totally extirpated, offered Electra the daughter of Agamemnon to Polymnestor, if he would destroy Ilione and Polydorus. The monarch accepted the offer, and immediately despatched his own son Deiphilus, whom he had been taught to regard as Polydorus. Polydorus, who passed as the son of Polymnestor, consulted the oracle after the murder of Deiphilus, and when he was informed that his father was dead, his mother a captive in the hands of the Greeks, and his country in ruins, he communicated the answer of the god to Ilione, whom he had always regarded as his mother. Ilione told him the measures she had pursued to save his life, and upon this he avenged the perfidy of Polymnestor by putting out his eyes. Euripides, Hecuba.—Hyginus, fable 102.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 45, &c.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 13, li. 430, &c.——A king of Arcadia, succeeded on the throne by Ecmis. Pausanias, bk. 8.——A young Milesian who took a hare in running, and afterwards obtained a prize at the Olympic games.

Poly̆nīces, a son of Œdipus king of Thebes by Jocasta. He inherited his father’s throne with his brother Eteocles, and it was mutually agreed between the two brothers, that they should reign each a year alternately. Eteocles first ascended the throne by right of seniority; but when the year was expired, he refused to resign the crown to his brother. Polynices, upon this, fled to Argos, where he married Argia, the daughter of Adrastus the king of the country, and levied a large army, at the head of which he marched to Thebes. The command of this army was divided among seven celebrated chiefs, who were to attack the seven gates of the city of Thebes. The battle was decided by a single combat between the two brothers, who both killed one another. See: [Eteocles]. Aeschylus, Seven Against Thebes.—Euripides, Phoenician Women.—Seneca, Œdipus.—Diodorus, bk. 4.—Hyginus, fable 68, &c.—Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 20; bk. 9, ch. 5.—Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 5.

Polynoe, one of the Nereides. Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 2.

Polypēmon, a famous thief, called also Procrustes, who plundered all the travellers about the Cephisus, and near Eleusis in Attica. He was killed by Theseus. Ovid calls him father of Procrustes, and Apollodorus of Sinus. See: [Procrustes]. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 38.—Ovid, Ibis, li. 409.—Diodorus, bk. 4.—Plutarch, Theseus.

Polyperchon, or Polysperchon, one of the officers of Alexander. Antipater, at his death, appointed him governor of the kingdom of Macedonia, in preference to his own son Cassander. Polyperchon, though old, and a man of experience, showed great ignorance in the administration of the government. He became cruel, not only to the Greeks, or such as opposed his ambitious views, but even to the helpless and innocent children and friends of Alexander, to whom he was indebted for his rise and military reputation. He was killed in a battle 309 B.C. Curtius.—Diodorus, bk. 17, &c.—Justin, bk. 13.

Polyphēmus, a celebrated Cyclops, king of all the Cyclops in Sicily, and son of Neptune and Thoosa the daughter of Phorcys. He is represented as a monster of strength, of tall stature, and one eye in the middle of the forehead. He fed upon human flesh, and kept his flocks on the coasts of Sicily, when Ulysses, at his return from the Trojan war, was driven there. The Grecian prince, with 12 of his companions, visited the coast, and were seized by the Cyclops, who confined them in his cave, and daily devoured two of them. Ulysses would have shared the fate of his companions, had he not intoxicated the Cyclops, and put out his eye with a firebrand while he was asleep. Polyphemus was awaked by the sudden pain; he stopped the entrance of his cave, but Ulysses made his escape by creeping between the legs of the rams of the Cyclops, as they were led out to feed on the mountains. Polyphemus became enamoured of Galatæa, but his addresses were disregarded, and the nymph shunned his presence. The Cyclops was more earnest, and when he saw Galatæa surrender herself to the pleasures of Acis, he crushed his rival with a piece of a broken rock. Theocritus, poem 1.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 13, li. 772.—Homer, Odyssey, bk. 19.—Euripides, Cyclops.—Hyginus, fable 125.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 619, &c.——One of the Argonauts, son of Elatus and Hippea. Hyginus, fable 14.

Polyphonta, one of Diana’s nymphs, daughter of Hipponus and Thraosa.

Polyphontes, one of the Heraclidæ, who killed Cresphontes king of Messenia, and usurped his crown. Hyginus, fable 137.——One of the Theban generals, under Eteocles. Aeschylus, Seven Against Thebes.

Polypœtes, a son of Pirithous and Hippodamia, at the Trojan war. Homer, Iliad, bk. 2.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 26.——A son of Apollo by Pythia.——One of the Trojans whom Æneas saw when he visited the infernal regions. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 6, li. 484.

Polysperchon. See: [Polyperchon].

Polystrātus, a Macedonian soldier, who found Darius after he had been stabbed by Bessus, and gave him water to drink, and carried the last injunctions of the dying monarch to Alexander. Curtius, bk. 5, ch. 13.——An epicurean philosopher who flourished B.C. 238.

Polytecnus, an artist of Colophon, who married Ædon the daughter of Pandarus.

Polytion, a friend of Alcibiades, with whom he profaned the mysteries of Ceres. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 2.

Polytimētus, a river of Sogdiana. Curtius, bk. 6, ch. 4.

Polyphron, a prince killed by his nephew Alexander the tyrant of Pheræ.

Polytrŏpus, a man sent by the Lacedæmonians with an army against the Arcadians. He was killed at Orchomenus. Diodorus, bk. 15.

Polyxĕna, a daughter of Priam and Hecuba, celebrated for her beauty and accomplishments. Achilles became enamoured of her, and solicited her hand, and their marriage would have been consummated, had not Hector her brother opposed it. Polyxena, according to some authors, accompanied her father when he went to the tent of Achilles to redeem the body of his son Hector. Some time after, the Grecian hero came into the temple of Apollo to obtain a sight of the Trojan princess, but he was murdered there by Paris; and Polyxena, who had returned his affection, was so afflicted at his death, that she went and sacrificed herself on his tomb. Some, however, suppose that that sacrifice was not voluntary, but that the manes of Achilles appeared to the Greeks as they were going to embark, and demanded of them the sacrifice of Polyxena. The princess, who was in the number of the captives, was upon this dragged to her lover’s tomb, and there immolated by Neoptolemus the son of Achilles. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 13, fable 5, &c.—Dictys Cretensis, bks. 3 & 5.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 321.—Catullus, poem 65.—Hyginus, fable 90.

Polyxenĭdas, a Syrian general, who flourished B.C. 192.

Polyxĕnus, one of the Greek princes during the Trojan war. His father’s name was Agasthenes. Homer, Iliad, bk. 2.—Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 3.——A son of Medea by Jason.——A young Athenian who became blind, &c. Plutarch, Parallela minora.——A general of Dionysius, from whom he revolted.

Polyxo, a priestess of Apollo’s temple in Lemnos. She was also nurse to queen Hypsipyle. It was by her advice that the Lemnian women murdered all their husbands. Apollonius, bk. 1.—Flaccus, bk. 2.—Hyginus, fable 15.——One of the Atlantides.——A native of Argos, who married Tlepolemus son of Hercules. She followed him to Rhodes, after the murder of his uncle Licymnius, and when he departed for the Trojan war with the rest of the Greek princes, she became the sole mistress of the kingdom. After the Trojan war, Helen fled from Peloponnesus to Rhodes, where Polyxo reigned. Polyxo detained her, and to punish her as being the cause of a war, in which Tlepolemus had perished, she ordered her to be hanged on a tree by her female servants, disguised in the habit of Furies. See: [Helena]. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 19.——The wife of Nycteus.——One of the wives of Danaus.

Polyzēlus, a Greek poet of Rhodes. He had written a poem on the origin and birth of Bacchus, Venus, the Muses, &c. Some of his verses are quoted by Athenæus. Hyginus, Poetica Astronomica, bk. 2, ch. 14.——An Athenian archon.

Pomaxæthres, a Parthian soldier, who killed Crassus, according to some. Plutarch.

Pometia, Pometii, Pometia Suessa, a town of the Volsci in Latium, totally destroyed by the Romans, because it had revolted. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 6, li. 775.—Livy, bk. 2, ch. 17.

Pometīna, one of the tribes of the people at Rome.

Pomōna, a nymph at Rome, who was supposed to preside over gardens and to be the goddess of all sorts of fruit trees. She had a temple at Rome, and a regular priest called Flamen Pomonalis, who offered sacrifices to her divinity, for the preservation of fruit. She was generally represented as sitting on a basket full of flowers and fruit, and holding a bough in one hand and apples in the other. Pomona was particularly delighted with the cultivation of the earth; she disdained the toils of the field, and the fatigues of hunting. Many of the gods of the country endeavoured to gain her affection, but she received their addresses with coldness. Vertumnus was the only one who, by assuming different shapes, and introducing himself into her company, under the form of an old woman, prevailed upon her to break her vow of celibacy and to marry him. This deity was unknown among the Greeks. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 14, li. 628, &c.—Festus, Lexicon of Festus.

Pompeia, a daughter of Sextus Pompey by Scribonia. She was promised to Marcellus, as a means of procuring a reconciliation between her father and the triumvirs, but she married Scribonius Libo.——A daughter of Pompey the Great, Julius Cæsar’s third wife. She was accused of incontinence, because Clodius had introduced himself in women’s clothes into the room where she was celebrating the mysteries of Cybele. Cæsar repudiated her upon this accusation. Plutarch.——The wife of Annæus Seneca, was the daughter of Pompeius Paulinus.——There was a portico at Rome, called Pompeia, much frequented by all orders of people. Ovid, Ars Amatoria, li. 67.—Martial, bk. 11, ltr. 48.

Pompeia lex, by Pompey the Great, de ambitu, A.U.C. 701. It ordained that whatever person had been convicted of the crime of ambitus, should be pardoned, provided he could impeach two others of the same crime, and occasion the condemnation of one of them.——Another by the same, A.U.C. 701, which forbade the use of laudatores in trials, or persons who gave a good character of the prisoner then impeached.——Another by the same, A.U.C. 683. It restored to the tribunes their original power and authority, of which they had been deprived by the Cornelian law.——Another by the same, A.U.C. 701. It shortened the forms of trials, and enacted that the three first days of a trial should be employed in examining witnesses, and it allowed only one day to the parties to make their accusation and defence. The plaintiff was confined to two hours, and the defendant to three. This law had for its object the riots, which happened from the quarrels of Clodius and Milo.——Another by the same, A.U.C. 698. It required that the judges should be the richest of every century, contrary to the usual form. It was, however, requisite that they should be such as the Aurelian law prescribed.——Another of the same, A.U.C. 701. Pompey was by this empowered to continue in the government of Spain five years longer.

Pompeiānus Jupiter, a large statue of Jupiter, near Pompey’s theatre, whence it received its name. Pliny, bk. 34, ch. 7.

Pompeiānus, a Roman knight of Antioch, raised to offices of the greatest trust, under the emperor Aurelius, whose daughter Lucilla he married. He lived in great popularity at Rome, and retired from the court when Commodus succeeded to the imperial crown. He ought, according to Julian’s opinion, to have been chosen and adopted as successor by Marcus Aurelius.——A general of Maxentius, killed by Constantine.——A Roman put to death by Caracalla.

Pompeii, or Pompeium, a town of Campania, built, as some suppose, by Hercules, and so called because the hero there exhibited the long procession (pompa) of the herds of Geryon, which he had obtained by conquest. It was partly demolished by an earthquake, A.D. 63, and afterwards rebuilt. Sixteen years after it was swallowed up by another earthquake, which accompanied one of the eruptions of mount Vesuvius. Herculaneum, in its neighbourhood, shared the same fate. The people of the town were then assembled in a theatre, where public spectacles were exhibited. See: [Herculaneum]. Livy, bk. 9, ch. 38.—Strabo, bk. 6.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 4.—Dionysius of Halicarnassus, bk. 1.—Seneca, Quæstiones Naturales, bk. 4.—Solinus, bk. 8.

Pompeiopŏlis, a town of Cilicia, formerly called Soli. Mela, bk. 1, ch. 13.——Another in Paphlagonia, originally called Eupatoria, which name was exchanged when Pompey conquered Mithridates.

Quintus Pompeius, a consul who carried on war against the Numantines, and made a shameful treaty. He is the first of that noble family, of whom mention is made. Florus, bk. 2, ch. 18.——Cneus, a Roman general, who made war against the Marsi, and triumphed over the Piceni. He declared himself against Cinna and Marius, and supported the interest of the republic. He was surnamed Strabo, because he squinted. While he was marching against Marius, a plague broke out in his army, and raged with such violence, that it carried away 11,000 men in a few days. He was killed by a flash of lightning, and as he had behaved with cruelty while in power, the people dragged his body through the streets of Rome with an iron hook, and threw it into the Tiber. Paterculus, bk. 2.—Plutarch, Pompey.—— Rufus, a Roman consul with Sylla. He was sent to finish the Marsian war, but the army mutinied at the instigation of Pompeius Strabo, whom he was to succeed in command, and he was assassinated by some of the soldiers. Appian, Civil Wars, bk. 1.——A general who succeeded Metellus in Spain, and was the occasion of a war with Numantia.——Another general, taken prisoner by Mithridates.——Sextus, a governor of Spain, who cured himself of the gout by placing himself in corn above the knee. Pliny, bk. 22, ch. 25.——Rufus, a grandson of Sylla.——A tribune of the soldiers in Nero’s reign, deprived of his office when Piso’s conspiracy was discovered. Tacitus.——A consul praised for his learning and abilities. Ovid, ex Ponto, bk. 4, poem 1.——A son of Theophanes of Mitylene, famous for his intimacy with Pompey the Great, and for his writings. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 6.——A tribune of a pretorian cohort under Galba.——A Roman knight, put to death by the emperor Claudius for his adultery with Messalina. Tacitus, bk. 11, Annals.——Cneus, surnamed Magnus, from the greatness of his exploits, was son of Pompeius Strabo and Lucilia. He early distinguished himself in the field of battle, and fought with success and bravery under his father, whose courage and military prudence he imitated. He began his career with great popularity; the beauty and elegance of his person gained him admirers, and by pleading at the bar he displayed his eloquence, and received the most unbounded applause. In the disturbances which agitated Rome, by the ambition and avarice of Marius and Sylla, Pompey followed the interest of the latter, and by levying three legions for his service he gained his friendship and his protection. In the 26th year of his age, he conquered Sicily, which was in the power of Marius and his adherents, and in 40 days he regained all the territories of Africa, which had forsaken the interest of Sylla. This rapid success astonished the Romans, and Sylla, who admired and dreaded the rising power of Pompey, recalled him to Rome. Pompey immediately obeyed, and the dictator, by saluting him with the appellation of the Great, showed to the world what expectations he formed from the maturer age of his victorious lieutenant. This sounding title was not sufficient to gratify the ambition of Pompey; he demanded a triumph, and when Sylla refused to grant it, he emphatically exclaimed, that the sun shone with more ardour at his rising than at his setting. His assurance gained what petitions and entreaties could not obtain, and he was the first Roman knight who, without an office under the appointment of the senate, marched in triumphal procession through the streets of Rome. He now appeared, not as a [♦]dependent, but as a rival, of the dictator, and his opposition to his measures totally excluded him from his will. After the death of Sylla, Pompey supported himself against the remains of the Marian faction, which was headed by Lepidus. He defeated them, put an end to the war which the revolt of Sertorius in Spain had occasioned, and obtained a second triumph, though still a private citizen, about 73 years before the christian era. He was soon after made consul, and in that office he restored the tribunitial power to its original dignity, and in 40 days removed the pirates from the Mediterranean, where they had reigned for many years, and by their continual plunder and audacity, almost destroyed the whole naval power of Rome. While he prosecuted the piratical war, and extirpated these maritime robbers in their obscure retreat in Cilicia, Pompey was called to greater undertakings, and by the influence of his friends at Rome, and of the tribune Manilius, he was empowered to finish the war against two of the most powerful monarchs of Asia—Mithridates king of Pontus, and Tigranes king of Armenia. In this expedition Pompey showed himself no ways inferior to Lucullus, who was then at the head of the Roman armies, and who resigned with reluctance an office which would have made him the conqueror of Mithridates and the master of all Asia. His operations against the king of Pontus were bold and vigorous, and in a general engagement the Romans so totally defeated the enemy, that the Asiatic monarch escaped with difficulty from the field of battle. See: [Mithridaticum bellum]. Pompey did not lose sight of the advantages which despatch would ensure; he entered Armenia, received the submission of king Tigranes, and after he had conquered the Albanians and Iberians, visited countries which were scarce known to the Romans, and, like a master of the world, disposed of kingdoms and provinces, and received homage from 12 crowned heads at once; he entered Syria, and pushed his conquests as far as the Red sea. Part of Arabia was subdued, Judea became a Roman province, and when he had now nothing to fear from Mithridates, who had voluntarily destroyed himself, Pompey returned to Italy with all the pomp and majesty of an eastern conqueror. The Romans dreaded his approach; they knew his power and his influence among his troops, and they feared the return of another tyrannical Sylla. Pompey, however, banished their fears; he disbanded his army, and the conqueror of Asia entered Rome like a private citizen. This modest and prudent behaviour gained him more friends and adherents than the most unbounded power, aided with profusion and liberality. He was honoured with a triumph, and the Romans, for three successive days, gazed with astonishment on the riches and the spoils which their conquests had acquired in the east, and expressed their raptures at the sight of the different nations, habits, and treasures which preceded the conqueror’s chariot. But it was not this alone which gratified the ambition, and flattered the pride of the Romans; the advantages of their conquests were more lasting than an empty show, and when 20,000 talents were brought into the public treasury, and when the revenues of the republic were raised from 50 to 85 millions of drachmæ, Pompey became more powerful, more flattered, and more envied. To strengthen himself, and to triumph over his enemies, Pompey soon after united his interest with that of Cæsar and Crassus, and formed the first triumvirate, by solemnly swearing that their attachment should be mutual, their cause common, and their union permanent. The agreement was completed by the marriage of Pompey with Julia the daughter of Cæsar, and the provinces of the republic were arbitrarily divided among the triumvirs. Pompey was allotted Africa and the two Spains, while Crassus repaired to Syria, to add Parthia to the empire of Rome, and Cæsar remained satisfied with the rest, and the continuation of his power as governor of Gaul for five additional years. But this powerful confederacy was soon broken; the sudden death of Julia, and the total defeat of Crassus in Syria, shattered the political bands which held the jarring interest of Cæsar and Pompey united. Pompey dreaded his father-in-law, and yet he affected to despise him; and by suffering anarchy to prevail in Rome, he convinced his fellow-citizens of the necessity of investing him with dictatorial power. But while the conqueror of Mithridates was as a sovereign at Rome, the adherents of Cæsar were not silent. They demanded that either the consulship should be given to him, or that he should be continued in the government of Gaul. This just demand would perhaps have been granted, but Cato opposed it, and when Pompey sent for the two legions which he had lent to Cæsar, the breach became more wide, and a civil war inevitable. Cæsar was privately preparing to meet his enemies, while Pompey remained indolent, and gratified his pride in seeing all Italy celebrate his recovery from an indisposition by universal rejoicings. But he was soon roused from his inactivity, and it was now time to find his friends, if anything could be obtained from the caprice and the fickleness of a people which he had once delighted and amused, by the exhibition of games and spectacles in a theatre which could contain 20,000 spectators. Cæsar was now near Rome, he had crossed the Rubicon, which was a declaration of hostilities, and Pompey, who had once boasted that he could raise legions to his assistance by stamping on the ground with his foot, fled from the city with precipitation, and retired to Brundusium with the consuls and part of the senators. His cause, indeed, was popular; he had been invested with discretionary power, the senate had entreated him to protect the republic against the usurpation and tyranny of Cæsar, and Cato, by embracing his cause, and appearing in his camp, seemed to indicate that he was the friend of the republic, and the assertor of Roman liberty and independence. But Cæsar was now master of Rome, and in 60 days all Italy acknowledged his power, and the conqueror hastened to Spain, there to defeat the interest of Pompey, and to alienate the hearts of his soldiers. He was too successful, and when he had gained to his cause the western parts of the Roman empire, Cæsar crossed Italy and arrived in Greece, where Pompey had retired, supported by all the power of the east, the wishes of the republican Romans, and a numerous and well-disciplined army. Though superior in numbers, he refused to give the enemy battle, while Cæsar continually harassed him, and even attacked his camp. Pompey repelled him with great success, and he might have decided the war, if he had continued to pursue the enemy, while their confusion was great, and their escape almost impossible. Want of provisions obliged Cæsar to advance towards Thessaly; Pompey pursued him, and in the plains of Pharsalia the two armies engaged. The whole was conducted against the advice and approbation of Pompey; and by suffering his troops to wait for the approach of the enemy, he deprived his soldiers of that advantage which the army of Cæsar obtained by running to the charge with spirit, vigour, and animation. The cavalry of Pompey soon gave way, and the general retired to his camp, overwhelmed with grief and shame. But here there was no safety; the conqueror pushed on every side, and Pompey disguised himself, and fled to the sea-coast, whence he passed to Egypt, where he hoped to find a safe asylum, till better and more favourable moments returned, in the court of Ptolemy, a prince whom he had once protected and ensured on his throne. When Ptolemy was told that Pompey claimed his protection, he consulted his ministers, and had the baseness to betray and to deceive him. A boat was sent to fetch him on shore, and the Roman general left his galley, after an affectionate and tender parting with his wife Cornelia. The Egyptian sailors sat in sullen silence in the boat, and when Pompey disembarked, Achillas and Septimius assassinated him. His wife, who had followed him with her eyes to the shore, was a spectator of the bloody scene, and she hastened away from the bay of Alexandria, not to share his miserable fate. He died B.C. 48, in the 58th or 59th year of his age, the day after his birthday. His head was cut off and sent to Cæsar, who turned away from it with horror, and shed a flood of tears. The body was left for some time naked on the sea-shore, till the humanity of Philip, one of his freedmen, and an old soldier who had often followed his standard to victory, raised a burning pile, and deposited his ashes under a mound of earth. Cæsar erected a monument on his remains, and the emperor Adrian, two centuries after, when he visited Egypt, ordered it to be repaired at his own expense, and paid particular honour to the memory of a great and good man. The character of Pompey is that of an intriguing and artful general, and the oris probi and animo inverecundo of Sallust, short and laconic as it may appear, is the best and most descriptive picture of his character. He wished it to appear that he obtained all his honours and dignity from merit alone, and as the free and unprejudiced favour of the Romans, while he secretly claimed them by faction and intrigue; and he who wished to appear the patron and an example of true discipline and ancient simplicity, was not ashamed publicly to bribe the populace to gain an election, or support his favourites. Yet amidst all this dissimulation, which was perhaps but congenial with the age, we perceive many other striking features; Pompey was kind and clement to the conquered, and generous to his captives, and he buried at his own expense Mithridates, with all the pomp and solemnity which the greatness of his power and the extent of his dominions seemed to claim. He was an enemy to flattery, and when his character was impeached by the malevolence of party, he condescended, though consul, to appear before the censorial tribunal, and to show that his actions and measures were not subversive of the peace and the independence of the people. In his private character he was as remarkable; he lived with great temperance and moderation, and his house was small, and not ostentatiously furnished. He destroyed with great prudence the papers which were found in the camp of Sertorius, lest mischievous curiosity should find causes to accuse the innocent, and to meditate their destruction. With great disinterestedness he refused the presents which princes and monarchs offered to him, and he ordered them to be added to the public revenue. He might have seen a better fate, and terminated his days with more glory, if he had not acted with such imprudence when the flames of civil war were first kindled; and he reflected with remorse, after the battle of Pharsalia, upon his want of usual sagacity and military prudence, in fighting at such a distance from the sea, and in leaving the fortified places of Dyrrachium, to meet in the open plain an enemy, without provisions, without friends, and without resources. The misfortunes which attended him after the conquest of Mithridates, are attributed by christian writers to his impiety in profaning the temple of the Jews, and in entering with the insolence of a conqueror the Holy of Holies, where even the sacred person of the high priest of the nation was not admitted but upon the most solemn occasions. His duplicity of behaviour in regard to Cicero is deservedly censured, and he should not have violently sacrificed to party and sedition a Roman whom he had ever found his firmest friend and adherent. In his meeting with Lucullus he cannot but be taxed with pride, and he might have paid more deference and more honour to a general who was as able and more entitled than himself to finish the Mithridatic war. Pompey married four different times. His first matrimonial connection was with Antistia the daughter of the pretor Antistius, whom he divorced, with great reluctance, to marry Æmylia the daughter-in-law of Sylla. Æmylia died in child-bed; and Pompey’s marriage with Julia the daughter of Cæsar was a step more of policy than affection. Yet Julia loved Pompey with great tenderness, and her death in child-bed was the signal of war between her husband and her father. He afterwards married Cornelia the daughter of Metellus Scipio, a woman commended for her virtues, beauty, and accomplishments. Plutarch, Lives.—Florus, bk. 4.—Paterculus, bk. 2, ch. 29.—Dio Cassius.—Lucan.—Appian.—Cæsar, Civil War.—Cicero, Orator, ch. 68, Letters to Atticus, bk. 7, ltr. 25; Letters to his Friends, bk. 13, ltr. 19.—Eutropius.——The two sons of Pompey the Great, called Cneus and Sextus, were masters of a powerful army, when the death of their father was known. They prepared to oppose the conqueror, but Cæsar pursued them with his usual vigour and success, and at the battle of Munda they were defeated, and Cneus was left among the slain. Sextus fled to Sicily, where he for some time supported himself; but the murder of Cæsar gave rise to new events, and if Pompey had been as prudent and as sagacious as his father, he might have become, perhaps, as great and as formidable. He treated with the triumvirs as an equal, and when Augustus and Antony had the imprudence to trust themselves without arms and without attendants in his ship, Pompey, by following the advice of his friend Menas, who wished him to cut off the illustrious persons who were masters of the world, and now in his power, might have made himself as absolute as Cæsar; but he refused, and observed it was unbecoming the son of Pompey to act with such duplicity. This friendly meeting of Pompey with two of the triumvirs was not productive of advantages to him; he wished to have no superior, and hostilities began. Pompey was at the head of 350 ships, and appeared so formidable to his enemies, and so confident of success in himself, that he called himself the son of Neptune, and the lord of the sea. He was, however, soon defeated in a naval engagement by Octavius and Lepidus, and of all his numerous fleet, only 17 sail accompanied his flight into Asia. Here for a moment he raised seditions, but Antony ordered him to be seized and put to death about 35 years before the christian era. Plutarch, Antonius, &c.—Paterculus, bk. 2, ch. 55, &c.—Florus, bk. 4, ch. 2, &c.——Trogus. See: [Trogus].——Sextus Festus, a Latin grammarian, of whose treatise de verborum significatione, the best edition is in 4to, Amsterdam, 1699.

[♦] ‘dependant’ replaced with ‘dependent’

Pompelon, a town of Spain, now Pompeluna, the capital of Navarre. Pliny, bk. 1, ch. 3.

Pompĭlius Numa, the second king of Rome. See: [Numa]. The descendants of the monarch were called Pompilius Sanguis, an expression applied by Horace to the Pisos. Art of Poetry, li. 292.——Andronicus, a grammarian of Syria, who opened a school at Rome, and had Cicero and Cæsar among his pupils. Suetonius.

Pompĭlia, a daughter of Numa Pompilius. She married Numa Martius, by whom she had Ancus Martius the fourth king of Rome.

Pompīlus, a fisherman of Ionia. He carried into Miletus Ocyroe the daughter of Chesias, of whom Apollo was enamoured; but before he had reached the shore, the god changed the boat into a rock, Pompilus into a fish of the same name, and carried away Ocyroe. Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 29; bk. 9, ch. 15; bk. 32, ch. 11.

Pompiscus, an Arcadian. Polyænus, bk. 5.

Pompōnia, the wife of Quintus Cicero, sister to Pomponius Atticus. She punished with the greatest cruelty Philologus, the slave who had betrayed her husband to Antony, and she ordered him to cut his flesh by piecemeal, and afterwards to boil it and eat it in her presence.——A daughter of Pomponius Græcinus, in the age of Augustus, &c.——Another matron, banished from Rome by Domitian, and recalled by Nerva.

Pompōnius, the father of Numa, advised his son to accept the regal dignity which the Roman ambassadors offered to him.——A celebrated Roman intimate with Cicero. He was surnamed Atticus from his long residence at Athens. See: [Atticus].——Flaccus, a man appointed governor of Mœsia and Syria by Tiberius, because he had continued drinking and eating with him for two days without intermission. Suetonius, Tiberius, ch. 42.——A tribune of the people in the time of Servilius Ahala the consul.——Labeo, a governor of Mœsia, accused of ill management in his province. He destroyed himself by opening his veins. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 6, li. 29.——Mela, a Spaniard, who wrote a book on geography. See: [Mela].——A proconsul of Africa, accused by the inhabitants of his province, and acquitted, &c.——A Roman who accused Manlius the dictator of cruelty. He triumphed over Sardinia, of which he was made governor. He escaped from Rome, and the tyranny of the triumvirs, by assuming the habit of a pretor, and by travelling with his servants disguised in the dress of lictors with their fasces.——Secundus, an officer in Germany in the age of Nero. He was honoured with a triumph for a victory over the barbarians of Germany. He wrote some poems greatly celebrated by the ancients for their beauty and elegance. They are lost.——A friend of Caius Gracchus. He was killed in attempting to defend him. Plutarch, Tiberius Gracchus.——An officer taken prisoner by Mithridates.——A dissolute youth, &c. Horace, bk. 1, satire 4, li. 52.——Sextus, a lawyer, disciple to Papinian, &c.

Pomposiānus, a Roman put to death by Domitian. He had before been made consul by Vespasian.

Pomptina. See: [Pontina].

Caius Pomptinus, a Roman officer, who conquered the Allobroges after the defeat of Catiline. Cicero bk. 4, Letters to Atticus, ltr. 16; bk. 6, ltr. 3.

Pompus, a king of Arcadia. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 5.

Pons Ælius, was built by the emperor Adrian at Rome. It was the second bridge of Rome in following the current of the Tiber. It is still to be seen, the largest and most beautiful in Rome.——Æmylius, an ancient bridge at Rome, originally called Sublicius, because built with wood (sublicæ). It was raised by Ancus Martius, and dedicated with great pomp and solemnity by the Roman priests. It was rebuilt with stones by Æmylius Lepidus, whose name it assumed. It was much injured by the overflowing of the river, and the emperor Antoninus, who repaired it, made it all with white marble. It was the last of all the bridges of Rome, in following the course of the river, and some vestiges of it may still be seen.——Aniensis was built across the river Anio, about three miles from Rome. It was rebuilt by the eunuch Narses, and called after him when destroyed by the Goths.——Cestus was built in the reign of Tiberius, by a Roman called Cestius Gallus, from whom it received its name, and carried back from an island of the Tiber, to which the Fabricius conducted.——Aurelianus was built with marble by the emperor [♦]Antoninus.——Armoniensis was built by Augustus, to join the Flaminian to the Æmylian road.——Bajanus was built at Baiæ in the sea by Caligula. It was supported by boats, and measured about six miles in length.——Janicularis received its name from its vicinity to mount Janiculum. It is still standing.——Milvius was about one mile from Rome. It was built by the censor Ælius Scaurus. It was near it that Constantine defeated Maxentius.——Fabricius was built by Fabricius, and carried to an island of the Tiber.——Gardius was built by Agrippa.——Palatinus, near mount Palatine, was also called Senatorius, because the senators walked over it in procession when they went to consult the Sibylline books. It was begun by Marcus Fulvius, and finished in the censorship of Lucius Mummius, and some remains of it are still visible.——Trajani was built by Trajan across the Danube, celebrated for its bigness and magnificence. The emperor built it to assist more expeditiously the provinces against the barbarians, but his successor destroyed it, as he supposed that it would be rather an inducement for the barbarians to invade the empire. It was raised on 20 piers of hewn stones, 150 feet from the foundation, 60 feet broad, and 170 feet distant one from the other, extending in length above a mile. Some of the pillars are still standing.——Another was built by Trajan over the Tagus, part of which still remains. Of temporary bridges, that of Cæsar over the Rhine was the most famous.——The largest single-arched bridge known is over the river Elaver in France, called Pons Veteris Brivatis. The pillars stand on two rocks, at the distance of 195 feet. The arch is 84 feet high above the water.——Suffragiorum was built in the Campus Martius, and received its name, because the populace were obliged to pass over it whenever they delivered their suffrages at the elections of magistrates and officers of the state.——Tirensis, a bridge of Latium between Arpinum and Minturnæ.——Triumphalis was on the way to the capitol, and passed over by those who triumphed.——Narniensis joined two mountains near Narnia, built by Augustus, of stupendous height, 60 miles from Rome; one arch of it remains, about 100 feet high.

[♦] ‘Antonnius’ replaced with ‘Antoninus’

Pontia, a Roman matron who committed adultery with Sagitta, &c. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 12.——A mother infamous for her cruelty. Martial, bk. 1, ltr. 34.——A surname of Venus at Hermione. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 34.——A woman condemned by Nero as guilty of a conspiracy. She killed herself by opening her veins. She was daughter of Petronius and wife of Bolanus. Juvenal, satire 6, li. 637.——An island in the Tyrrhene sea, where Pilate, surnamed Pontius, is supposed to have lived. Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 6.—Ptolemy, bk. 3, ch. 1. See: [Œnotrides].

Pontĭcum mare, the sea of Pontus, generally called the Euxine.

Pontīcus, a poet of Rome, contemporary with Propertius, by whom he is compared to Homer. He wrote an account of the Theban war in heroic verse. Propertius, bk. 1, poem 7.——A man in Juvenal’s age, fond of boasting of the antiquity and great actions of his family, yet without possessing himself one single virtue.

Pontīna, or Pomptina lacus, a lake in the country of the Volsci, through which the great Appian road passed. Travellers were sometimes conveyed in a boat, drawn by a mule, in the canal that ran along the road from Forum Appii to Tarracina. This lake is now become so dangerous, from the exhalations of its stagnant water, that travellers avoid passing near it. Horace, bk. 1, satire 5, li. 9.—Lucan, bk. 3, li. 85.

Pontīnus, a friend of Cicero.——A tribune of the people, who refused to rise up when Cæsar passed in triumphal procession. He was one of Cæsar’s murderers, and was killed at the battle of Mutina. Suetonius, Cæsar, ch. 78.—Cicero, bk. 10, Letters to his Friends.——A mountain of Argolis, with a river of the same name. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 73.

Pontius Aufidianus, a Roman citizen, who, upon hearing that violence had been offered to his daughter, punished her and her ravisher with death. Valerius Maximus, bk. 6, ch. 1.——Herennius, a general of the Samnites, who surrounded the Roman army under the consuls Titus Veturius and Publius Posthumius. As there was no possibility of escaping for the Romans, Pontius consulted his father what he could do with an army that were prisoners in his hands. The old man advised him either to let them go untouched, or put them all to the sword. Pontius rejected his father’s advice, and spared the lives of the enemy, after he had obliged them to pass under the yoke with the greatest ignominy. He was afterwards conquered, and obliged, in his turn, to pass under the yoke. Fabius Maximus defeated him, when he appeared again at the head of another army, and he was afterwards shamefully put to death by the Romans, after he had adorned the triumph of the conqueror. Livy, bk. 9, ch. 1, &c.——Cominius, a Roman who gave information to his countrymen who were besieged in the capitol, that Camillus had obtained a victory over the Gauls. Plutarch.——A Roman slave who told Sylla, in a prophetic strain, that he brought him success from Bellona.——One of the favourites of Albucilla. He was degraded from the rank of a senator. Tacitus.——Titus, a Roman centurion, whom Cicero de Senectute mentions as possessed of uncommon strength.

Pontus, a kingdom of Asia Minor, bounded on the east by Colchis, west by the Halys, north by the Euxine sea, and south by part of Armenia. It was divided into three parts, according to Ptolemy; Pontus Galaticus, of which Amasia was the capital, Pontus Polemoniacus, from its chief town Polemonium, and Pontus Cappadocius, of which Trapezus was the capital. It was governed by kings, the first of whom was Artabazes, either one of the seven Persian noblemen who murdered the usurper Smerdis, or one of their descendants. The kingdom of Pontus was in its most flourishing state under Mithridates the Great. When Julius Cæsar had conquered it, it became a Roman province, though it was often governed by monarchs who were tributary to the power of Rome. Under the emperors a regular governor was always appointed over it. Pontus produced castors, whose testicles were highly valued among the ancients for their salutary qualities in medicinal processes. Virgil, Georgics, bk. 1, li. 58.—Mela, bk. 1, chs. 1 & 19.—Strabo, bk. 12.—Cicero, De Legibus.—Manitius.—Appian.—Ptolemy, bk. 5, ch. 6.——A part of Mysia in Europe, on the borders of the Euxine sea, where Ovid was banished, and from whence he wrote his four books of epistles ex Ponto, and his six books de Tristibus. Ovid, ex Ponto.——An ancient deity, father of Phorcys, Thaumas, Nereus, Eurybia, and Ceto by Terra. He is the same as Oceanus. Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 2.

Pontus Euxīnus, a celebrated sea, situate at the west of Colchis between Asia and Europe, at the north of Asia Minor. It is called the Black sea by the moderns. See: [Euxinus].

Marcus Popilius, a consul who was informed, as he was offering a sacrifice, that a sedition was raised in the city against the senate. Upon this he immediately went to the populace in his sacerdotal robes, and quieted the multitude with a speech. He lived about the year of Rome 404. Livy, bk. 9, ch. 21.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 7, ch. 8.——Caius, a consul, who, when besieged by the Gauls, abandoned his baggage to save his army. Cicero, Rhetorica ad Herennium, bk. 1, ch. 15.——Lænas, a Roman ambassador to Antiochus king of Syria. He was commissioned to order the monarch to abstain from hostilities against Ptolemy king of Egypt, who was an ally of Rome. Antiochus wished to evade him by his answers, but Popilius, with a stick which he had in his hand, made a circle round him on the sand, and bade him, in the name of the Roman senate and people, not to go beyond it before he spoke decisively. This boldness intimidated Antiochus; he withdrew his garrisons from Egypt, and no longer meditated a war against Ptolemy. Valerius Maximus, bk. 6, ch. 4.—Livy, bk. 45, ch. 12.—Paterculus, bk. 1, ch. 10.——A tribune of the people who murdered Cicero, to whose eloquence he was indebted for his life when he was accused of parricide. Plutarch.——A pretor who banished the friends of Tiberius Gracchus from Italy.——A Roman consul who made war against the people of Numantia, on pretence that the peace had not been firmly established. He was defeated by them.——A senator who alarmed the conspirators against Cæsar, by telling them that the whole plot was discovered.——A Roman emperor. See: [Nepotianus].

Poplicŏla, one of the first consuls. See: [Publicola].

Poppæa Sabīna, a celebrated Roman matron, daughter of Titus Ollius. She married a Roman knight called Rufus Crispinus, by whom she had a son. Her personal charms, and the elegance of her figure, captivated Otho, who was then one of Nero’s favourites. He carried her away and married her; but Nero, who had seen her, and had often heard her accomplishments extolled, soon deprived him of her company, and sent him out of Italy, on pretence of presiding over one of the Roman provinces. After he had taken this step, Nero repudiated his wife Octavia, on pretence of barrenness, and married Poppæa. The cruelty and avarice of the emperor did not long permit Poppæa to share the imperial dignity, and though she had already made him father of a son, he began to despise her, and even to use her with barbarity. She died of a blow which she received from his foot when many months advanced in her pregnancy, about the 65th year of the christian era. Her funeral was performed with great pomp and solemnity, and statues were raised to her memory. It is said that she was so anxious to preserve her beauty and the elegance of her person, that 500 asses were kept on purpose to afford her milk in which she used daily to bathe. Even in her banishment she was attended by 50 of these animals for the same purpose, and from their milk she invented a kind of ointment or pomatum, to preserve beauty, called poppæanum from her. Pliny, bk. 11, ch. 41.—Dio Cassisus, bk. 65.—Juvenal, satire 6.—Suetonius, Nero & Otho.—Tacitus, [♦]Annals, bks. 13 & 14.——A beautiful woman at the court of Nero. She was mother to the preceding. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 11, ch. 1, &c.

[♦] Book title omitted in text

Poppæus Sabīnus, a Roman of obscure origin, who was made governor of some of the Roman provinces. He destroyed himself, &c. Tacitus, bk. 6, Annals, ch. 39.——Sylvanus, a man of consular dignity, who brought to Vespasian a body of 600 Dalmatians.——A friend of Otho.

Populonia, or Populanium, a town of Etruria, near Pisæ, destroyed in the civil wars of Sylla. Strabo, bk. 5.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 10, li. 172.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 5.—Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 5.

Porata, a river of Dacia, now Pruth, falling into the Danube a little below Axiopoli.

Porcia, a sister of Cato of Utica, greatly commended by Cicero.——A daughter of Cato of Utica, who married Bibulus, and after his death, Brutus. She was remarkable for her prudence, philosophy, courage, and conjugal tenderness. She gave herself a heavy wound in the thigh, to see with what fortitude she could bear pain; and when her husband asked her the reason of it, she said that she wished to try whether she had courage enough to share not only his bed, but to partake of his most hidden secrets. Brutus was astonished at her constancy, and no longer detained from her knowledge the conspiracy which he and many other illustrious Romans had formed against Julius Cæsar. Porcia wished them success, and though she betrayed fear, and fell into a swoon the day that her husband was gone to assassinate the dictator, yet she was faithful to her promise, and dropped nothing which might affect the situation of the conspirators. When Brutus was dead, she refused to survive him, and attempted to end her life as a daughter of Cato. Her friends attempted to terrify her; but when she saw that every weapon was removed from her reach, she swallowed burning coals and died, about 42 years before the christian era. Valerius Maximus says that she was acquainted with her husband’s conspiracy against Cæsar when she gave herself the wound. Valerius Maximus, bk. 3, ch. 2; bk. 4, ch. 6.—Plutarch, Brutus, &c.

Porcia lex, de civitate, by Marcus Porcius the tribune, A.U.C. 453. It ordained that no magistrate should punish with death, or scourge with rods, a Roman citizen when condemned, but only permit him to go into exile. Sallust, Catilinae Coniuratio.—Livy, bk. 10.—Cicero, For Rabirius Postumus.

Porcina, a surname of the orator Marcus Æmilius Lepidus, who lived a little before Cicero’s age, and was distinguished for his abilities. Cicero, Rhetorica ad Herennium, bk. 4, ch. 5.

Marcus Porcius Latro, a celebrated orator who killed himself when labouring under a quartan ague, A.U.C. 750.——Licinius, a Latin poet during the time of the third Punic war, commended for the elegance, the graceful ease, and happy wit of his epigrams.——A Roman senator who joined the conspiracy of Catiline.——A son of Cato of Utica, given much to drinking.

Poredorax, one of the 40 Gauls whom Mithridates ordered to be put to death, and to remain unburied for conspiring against him. His mistress at Pergamus buried him against the orders of the monarch. Plutarch, Mulierum Virtutes.

Porīna, a river of Peloponnesus. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 85.

Poroselēne, an island near Lesbos. Strabo, bk. 13.—Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 31.

Porphyrion, a son of Cœlus and Terra, one of the giants who made war against Jupiter. He was so formidable, that Jupiter, to conquer him, inspired him with love for Juno, and while the giant endeavoured to obtain his wishes, he, with the assistance of Hercules, overpowered him. Horace, bk. 3, ode 4.—Martial, bk. 13, ltr. 78.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 6.

Porphy̆ris, a name of the island Cythera.

Porphyrius, a Platonic philosopher of Tyre. He studied eloquence at Athens under Longinus, and afterwards retired to Rome, where he perfected himself under Plotinus. Porphyry was a man of universal information, and, according to the testimony of the ancients, he excelled his contemporaries in the knowledge of history, mathematics, music, and philosophy. He expressed his sentiments with elegance and with dignity, and while other philosophers studied obscurity in their language, his style was remarkable for its simplicity and grace. He applied himself to the study of magic, which he called a theourgic or divine operation. The books that he wrote were numerous, and some of his smaller treatises are still extant. His most celebrated work, which is now lost, was against the religion of Christ, and in this theological contest he appeared so formidable, that most of the fathers of the church have been employed in confuting his arguments, and developing the falsehood of his assertions. He has been universally called the greatest enemy which the christian religion had, and, indeed, his doctrines were so pernicious, that a copy of his book was publicly burnt by order of Theodosius, A.D. 388. Porphyry resided for some time in Sicily, and died at the advanced age of 71, A.D. 304. The best edition of his life of Pythagoras is that of Kuster, 4to, Amsterdam, 1707, that of his treatise, De Abstinentiâ, is De Rhoer, Utrecht, 8vo, 1767, and that De Antro Nympharum, in 8vo, Utrecht, 1765.——A Latin poet in the reign of Constantine the Great.

Porrima, one of the attendants of Carmente when she came from Arcadia. Ovid, bk. 1, Fasti, li. 633.

Porsenna, or Porsĕna, a king of Etruria, who declared war against the Romans because they refused to restore Tarquin to his throne and to his royal privileges. He was at first successful; the Romans were defeated, and Porsenna would have entered the gates of Rome, had not Cocles stood at the head of a bridge, and supported the fury of the whole Etrurian army, while his companions behind were cutting off the communication with the opposite shore. This act of bravery astonished Porsenna; but when he had seen Mutius Scævola enter his camp with an intention to murder him, and when he had seen him burn his hand without emotion to convince him of his fortitude and intrepidity, he no longer dared to make head against a people so brave and so generous. He made a peace with the Romans, and never after supported the claims of Tarquin. The generosity of Porsenna’s behaviour to the captives was admired by the Romans, and to reward his humanity they raised a brazen statue to his honour. Livy, bk. 2, ch. 9, &c.—Plutarch, Publicola.—Florus, bk. 1, ch. 10.—Horace, epode 16.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 8, li. 646.

Porta Capēna, a gate at Rome, which leads to the Appian road. Ovid, Fasti, bk. 6, li. 192.——Aurelia, a gate at Rome, which received its name from Aurelius, a consul who made a road which led to Pisæ, all along the coast of Etruria.——Asinaria led to mount Cœlius. It received its name from the family of the Asinii.——Carmentalis was at the foot of the capitol, built by Romulus. It was afterwards called Scelerata, because the 300 Fabii marched through when they went to fight an enemy, and were killed near the river Cremera.——Janualis was near the temple of Janus.——Esquilina was also called Metia, Taurica, or Libitinensis, and all criminals who were going to be executed generally passed through, as also dead bodies which were carried to be burnt on mount Esquilinus.——Flaminia, called also Flumentana, was situate between the capitol and mount Quirinalis, and through it the Flaminian road passed.——Fontinalis led to the Campus Martius. It received its name from the great number of fountains that were near it.——Navalis was situate near the place where the ships came from Ostia.——Viminalis was near mount Viminalis.——Trigemina, called also Ostiensis, led to the town of Ostia.——Catularia was near the Carmentalis Porta, at the foot of mount Viminalis.——Collatina received its name from its leading to Collatia.——Collina, called also Quirinalis, Agonensis, and Salaria, was near Quirinalis Mons. Annibal rode up to this gate and threw a spear into the city. It is to be observed, that at the death of Romulus there were only three or four gates at Rome, but the number was increased, and in the time of Pliny there were 37, when the circumference of the walls was 13 miles and 200 paces.

Portia and Portius. See: [Porcia] and [Porcius].

Portmos, a town of Eubœa. Demosthenes.—Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 5.

Portumnalia, festivals of Portumnus at Rome, celebrated on the 17th of August, in a very solemn and lugubrious manner, on the borders of the Tiber. Ovid, Fasti, bk. 6, li. 547.—Varro, de Lingua Latina, bk. 5, ch. 3.

Portumnus, a sea deity. See: [Melicerta].

Porus, the god of plenty at Rome. He was son of Metis or Prudence. Plato.——A king of India, when Alexander invaded Asia. The conqueror of Darius ordered him to come and pay homage to him, as a dependent prince. Porus scorned his commands, and declared he would go and meet him on the frontiers of his kingdom sword in hand, and immediately he marched a large army to the banks of the Hydaspes. The stream of the river was rapid; but Alexander crossed it in the obscurity of the night, and defeated one of the sons of the Indian monarch. Porus himself renewed the battle, but the valour of the Macedonians prevailed, and the Indian prince retired covered with wounds, on the back of one of his elephants. Alexander sent one of the kings of India to demand him to surrender, but Porus killed the messenger, exclaiming, “Is not this the voice of the wretch who has abandoned his country?” and when he at last was prevailed upon to come before the conqueror, he approached him as an equal. Alexander demanded of him how he wished to be treated. “Like a king,” replied the Indian monarch. This magnanimous answer so pleased the Macedonian conqueror, that he not only restored him his dominions, but he increased his kingdom by the conquest of new provinces; and Porus, in acknowledgment of such generosity and benevolence, became one of the most faithful and attached friends of Alexander, and never violated the assurances of peace which he had given him. Porus is represented as a man of uncommon stature, great strength, and proportionable dignity. Plutarch, Alexander.—Philostratus, bk. 2, ch. 10.—Curtius, bk. 8, ch. 8, &c.—Claudianus, De Consulatu Honorii, ch. 4.——Another king of India in the reign of Alexander.——A king of Babylon.

Pŏsīdes, a eunuch and freedman of the emperor Claudius, who rose to honours by the favour of his master. Juvenal, satire 14, li. 94.

Posidēum, a promontory and town of Ionia, where Neptune had a temple. Strabo, bk. 14.——A town of Syria below Libanus. Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 20.——A town near the Strymon, on the borders of Macedonia. Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 10.

Posīdon, the name of Neptune among the Greeks.

Posidonia, a town of Lucania, better known by the name of Pæstum. See: [Pæstum].

Posidonium, a town or temple of Neptune, near Cænis in Italy, where the straits of Sicily are narrowest, and scarce a mile distant from the opposite shore.

Posidonius, a philosopher of Apamea. He lived at Rhodes for some time, and afterwards came to Rome, where, after cultivating the friendship of Pompey and Cicero, he died in his 84th year. He wrote a treatise on the nature of the gods, and also attempted to measure the circumference of the earth; he accounted for the tides from the motion of the moon, and calculated the height of the atmosphere to be 400 stadia, nearly agreeing with the ideas of the moderns. Cicero, Tusculanæ Disputationes, bk. 5, ch. 37.—Strabo, bk. 14.——Another philosopher, born at Alexandria in Egypt.

Posio, a native of Magnesia, who wrote a history of the Amazons.

Posthumia, a vestal virgin, accused of adultery and acquitted.——The wife of Servius Sulpicius. Cicero, Epistles.——A daughter of Sylla.

Posthumius Albīnus, a man who suffered himself to be bribed by Jugurtha, against whom he had been sent with an army.——A writer at Rome whom Cato ridiculed for composing a history in Greek, and afterwards offering apologies for the inaccuracy and inelegance of his expressions.——Tubero, a master of horse to the dictator Æmilius Mamercus. He was himself made dictator in the war which the Romans waged against the Volsci, and he punished his son with death for fighting against his orders, A.U.C. 312. Livy, bk. 4, ch. 23.——Spurius, a consul sent against the Samnites. He was taken in an ambush by Pontius, the enemy’s general, and obliged to pass under the yoke with all his army. He saved his life by a shameful treaty, and when he returned to Rome he persuaded the Romans not to reckon as valid the engagements he had made with the enemy, as it was without their advice. He was given up to the enemy because he could not perform his engagements; but he was released by Pontius for his generous and patriotic behaviour.——Aulus, a dictator who defeated the Latins and the Volsci.——Tubertus, another dictator, who defeated the Æqui and Volsci.——Lucius, a consul sent against the Samnites.——A general who defeated the Sabines, and who was the first who obtained an ovation.——A man poisoned by his wife.——A general who conquered the Æqui, and who was stoned by the army, because he refused to divide the promised spoils. Florus, bk. 22.——Lucius, a Roman consul who was defeated by the Boii. He was left among the slain, and his head was cut off from his body, and carried in triumph by the barbarians into their temples, where they made with the skull a sacred vessel to offer libations to their gods.——Marcus Crassus Latianus, an officer proclaimed emperor in Gaul, A.D. 260. He reigned with great popularity, and gained the affection of his subjects by his humanity and moderation. He took his son of the same name as a colleague on the throne. They were both assassinated by their soldiers, after a reign of six years.——Megilthus, a consul against the Samnites and Tarentines.——Quintus, a man put to death by Antony.——A soothsayer in the age of Sylla.——Spurius, an enemy of Tiberius Gracchus.——Albus, a Roman decemvir, sent to Athens to collect the most salutary laws of Solon, &c. Livy, bk. 3, ch. 31.——Sylvius, a son of Æneas and Sylvia.

Postverta, a goddess at Rome, who presided over the painful travails of women. Ovid, Fasti, bk. 1, li. 633.

Postumia via, a Roman road about the town of Hostilia.

Postumius. See: [Posthumius].

Potamĭdes, nymphs who presided over rivers and fountains, as their name (ποταμος, fluvius) implies.

Potamon, a philosopher of Alexandria, in the age of Augustus. He wrote several treatises, and confined himself to the doctrines of no particular sect of philosophers.

Potamos, a town of Attica, near Sunium. Strabo, bk. 9.

Potentia, a town of Picenum. Livy, bk. 39, ch. 44.

Pothīnus, a eunuch, tutor to Ptolemy king of Egypt. He advised the monarch to murder Pompey, when he claimed his protection after the battle of Pharsalia. He stirred up commotions in Alexandria, when Cæsar came there, upon which the conqueror ordered him to be put to death. Lucan, bk. 8, li. 483; bk. 10, li. 95.

Pothos, one of the deities of the Samothracians. Pliny, bk. 36, ch. 5.

Potidæa, a town of Macedonia, situate in the peninsula of Pallene. It was founded by a Corinthian colony, and became tributary to the Athenians, from whom Philip of Macedonia took it. The conqueror gave it to the Olynthians, to render them more attached to his interest. Cassander repaired and enlarged it, and called it Cassandria, a name which it still preserves, and which has given occasion to Livy to say, that Cassander was the original founder of that city. Livy, bk. 44, ch. 11.—Demosthenes, Olynthiac.—Strabo, bk. 7.—Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 23.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 2.

Potidania, a town of Ætolia. Livy, bk. 28, ch. 8.

Potīna, a goddess at Rome, who presided over children’s potions. Varro.

Potitius. See: [Pinarius].

Potniæ, a town of Bœotia, where Bacchus had a temple. The Potnians, having once murdered the priest of the god, were ordered by the oracle, to appease his resentment, yearly to offer on his altars a young man. This unnatural sacrifice was continued for some years, till Bacchus himself substituted a goat, from which circumstance he received the appellation of Ægobolus and Ægophagus. There was here a fountain whose waters made horses run mad as soon as they were touched. There were also here certain goddesses called Potniades, on whose altars, in a grove sacred to Ceres and Proserpine, victims were sacrificed. It was also usual, at a certain season of the year, to conduct into the grove young pigs, which were found the following year in the groves of Dodona. The mares of Potniæ destroyed their master Glaucus son of Sisyphus. See: [Glaucus]. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 8.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 3, li. 267.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 15, ch. 25.——A town of Magnesia, whose pastures gave madness to asses, according to Pliny.

Practium, a town and a small river of Asia Minor, on the Hellespont.

Præcia, a courtesan at Rome, who influenced Cethegus, and procured Asia as a consular province for Lucullus. Plutarch, Lucullus.

Præneste, a town of Latium, about 21 miles from Rome, built by Telegonus son of Ulysses and Circe, or, according to others, by Cæculus the son of Vulcan. There was a celebrated temple of Fortune there, with two famous images, as also an oracle, which was long in great repute. Cicero, De Divinatione, bk. 2, ch. 41.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 7, li. 680.—Horace, bk. 3, ode 4.—Statius, bk. 1, Sylvæ, poem 3, li. 80.

Præsos, a small town of Crete, destroyed in a civil war by one of the neighbouring cities.

Præsti, a nation of India. Curtius, bk. 9, ch. 8.

Prætōria, a town of Dacia, now Cronstadt.——Another, now Aoust, in Piedmont.

Prætorius, a name ironically applied to As. Sempronius Rufus, because he was disappointed in his solicitations for the pretorship, as being too dissolute and luxurious in his manners. He was the first who had a stork brought to his table. Horace, bk. 2, satire 2, li. 50.

Prætutium, a town of Picenum. Silius Italicus, bk. 15, li. 568.—Livy, bk. 22, ch. 9; bk. 27, ch. 43.

Prasiane, now Verdant, a large island at the mouth of the Indus. Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 20.

Prasias, a lake between Macedonia and Thrace, where were silver mines. Herodotus, bk. 5, ch. 17.

Prasii, a nation of India in Alexander’s age. Curtius, bk. 9, ch. 2.

Pratellia lex, was enacted by Pratellius the tribune, A.U.C. 398, to curb and check the ambitious views of men who were lately advanced in the state. Livy, bk. 7, ch. 15.

Pratinas, a Greek poet of Phlius, contemporary with Æschylus. He was the first among the Greeks who composed satires, which were represented as farces. Of these 32 were acted, as also 18 of his tragedies, one of which only obtained the poetical prize. Some of his verses are extant, quoted by Athenæus. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 13.

Praxagŏras, an Athenian writer, who published a history of the kings of his own country. He was then only 19 years old, and, three years after, he wrote the life of Constantine the Great. He had also written the life of Alexander, all now lost.

Praxias, a celebrated statuary of Athens. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 18.

Praxidămas, a famous athlete of Ægina. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 18.

Praxidĭce, a goddess among the Greeks, who presided over the execution of enterprises, and who punished all evil actions. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 33.

Praxĭla, a lyric poetess of Sicyon, who flourished about 492 years before Christ. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 13.

Praxiphănes, a Rhodian, who wrote a learned commentary on the obscure passages of Sophocles.——An historian. Diogenes Laërtius.

Praxis, a surname of Venus at Megara. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 43.

Praxitĕles, a famous sculptor of Magna Græcia, who flourished about 324 years before the christian era. He chiefly worked on Parian marble, on account of its beautiful whiteness. He carried his art to the greatest perfection, and was so happy in copying nature, that his statues seemed to be animated. The most famous of his pieces was a Cupid which he gave to Phryne. This celebrated courtesan, who wished to have the best of all the statues of Praxiteles, and who could not depend upon her own judgment in the choice, alarmed the sculptor, by telling him his house was on fire. Praxiteles upon this showed his eagerness to save his Cupid from the flames, above all his other pieces; but Phryne restrained his fears, and, by discovering her artifice, obtained the favourite statue. The sculptor employed his chisel in making a statue of this beautiful courtesan, which was dedicated in the temple of Delphi, and placed between the statues of Archidamus king of Sparta, and Philip king of Macedon. He also made a statue of Venus, at the request of the people of Cos, and gave them their choice of the goddess, either naked or veiled. The former was superior to the other in beauty and perfection, but the inhabitants of Cos preferred the latter. The [♦]Cnidians, who did not wish to patronize modesty and decorum with the same eagerness as the people of Cos, bought the naked Venus, and it was so universally esteemed, that Nicomedes king of Bithynia offered the Cnidians to pay an enormous debt under which they laboured, if they would give him their favourite statue. This offer was not accepted. The famous Cupid was bought of the Thespians by Caius Cæsar and carried to Rome, but Claudius restored it to them, and Nero afterwards obtained possession of it. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 40; bk. 8, ch. 9.—Pliny, bk. 7, chs. 34 & 36.

[♦] ‘Cnidans’ replaced with ‘Cnidians’

Praxithea, a daughter of Phrasimus and Diogenea. She married Erechtheus king of Athens, by whom she had Cecrops, Pandarus, and Metion, and four daughters, Procris, Creusa, Chthonia, and Orithyia. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 15.——A daughter of Thestius, mother of some children by Hercules. Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 7.——A daughter of Erechtheus, sacrificed by order of the oracle.

Prelius, a lake of Tuscany, now Castiglione. Cicero, For Milo, ch. 27.—Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 5.

Presbon, a son of Phryxus, father of Clymenus.——A son of Clytodora and Minyas also bore the same name. Pausanias, bk. 9, chs. 34 & 37.

Pretor, one of the chief magistrates at Rome. The office of pretor was first instituted A.U.C. 388, by the senators, who wished by some new honour to compensate for the loss of the consulship, of which the plebeians had claimed a share. The pretor received his name a præeundo. Only one was originally elected, and another A.U.C. 501. One of them was totally employed in administering justice among the citizens, whence he was called pretor urbanus; and the other appointed judges in all causes which related to foreigners. In the year of Rome 520, two more pretors were created to assist the consul in the government of the provinces of Sicily and Sardinia, which had been lately conquered, and two more when Spain was reduced into the form of a Roman province, A.U.C. 521. Sylla the dictator added two more, and Julius Cæsar increased the number to 10, and afterwards to 16, and the second triumvirate to 64. After this their numbers fluctuated, being sometimes 18, 16, or 12, till, in the decline of the empire, their dignity decreased, and their numbers were reduced to three. In his public capacity the pretor administered justice, protected the rights of widows and orphans, presided at the celebration of public festivals, and in the absence of the consul assembled or prorogued the senate as he pleased. He also exhibited shows to the people, and in the festivals of the Bona Dea, where no males were permitted to appear, his wife presided over the rest of the Roman matrons. Feasts were announced and proclaimed by him, and he had the power to make and repeal laws, if it met with the approbation of the senate and people. The questors were subject to him, and in the absence of the consuls, he appeared at the head of the armies, and in the city he kept a register of all the freedmen of Rome, with the reasons for which they had received their freedom. In the provinces the pretors appeared with great pomp; six lictors with the fasces walked before them, and when the empire was increased by conquests, they divided, like the consuls, their government, and provinces were given them by lot. When the year of their pretorship was elapsed, they were called proprætors, if they still continued at the head of their province. At Rome the pretors appeared also with much pomp; two lictors preceded them, they wore the prætexta, or the white robe with purple borders, they sat in curule chairs, and their tribunal was distinguished by a sword and a spear, while they administered justice. The tribunal was called prætorium. When they rode they appeared on white horses at Rome, as a mark of distinction. The pretor who appointed judges to try foreign causes, was called prætor peregrinus. The pretors Cereales, appointed by Julius Cæsar, were employed in providing corn and provision for the city. They were on that account often called frumentarii.

Preugĕnes, a son of Agenor. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 2; bk. 7, chs. 18 & 20.

Prexaspes, a Persian who put Smerdis to death, by order of king Cambyses. Herodotus, bk. 3, ch. 30.

Priamĭdes, a patronymic applied to Paris, as being son of Priam. It is also given to Hector, Deiphobus, and all the other children of the Trojan monarch. Ovid, Heroides.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 235.

Priămus, the last king of Troy, was son of Laomedon by Strymo, called Placia by some. When Hercules took the city of Troy [See: [Laomedon]], Priam was in the number of his prisoners, but his sister Hesione redeemed him from captivity, and he exchanged his original name of Podarces for that of Priam, which signifies bought or ransomed. See: [Podarces]. He was also placed on his father’s throne by Hercules, and he employed himself with well-directed diligence in repairing, fortifying, and embellishing the city of Troy. He had married, by his father’s orders, Arisba, whom now he divorced for Hecuba the daughter of Dimas, or Cisseus, a neighbouring prince. He had by Hecuba 17 children, according to Cicero, or, according to Homer, 19; the most celebrated of whom are Hector, Paris, Deiphobus, Helenus, Pammon, Polites, Antiphus, Hipponous, Troilus, Creusa, Laodice, Polyxena, and Cassandra. Besides these he had many others by concubines. Their names, according to Apollodorus, are Melampus, Gorgythion, Philæmon, Glaucus, Agathon, Evagoras, Hippothous, Chersidamas, Hippodamas, Mestor, Atas, Dorcylus, Dryops, Lycaon, Astygonus, Bias, Evander, Chromius, Telestas, Melius, Cebrion, Laodocus, Idomeneus, Archemachus, Echephron, Hyperion, Ascanius, Arrhetus, Democoon, Dejoptes, Echemon, Clovius, Ægioneus, Hypirychus, Lysithous, Polymedon, Medusa, Lysimache, Medesicaste, and Aristodeme. After he had reigned for some time in the greatest prosperity, Priam expressed a desire to recover his sister Hesione, whom Hercules had carried into Greece, and married to Telamon his friend. To carry this plan into execution, Priam manned a fleet, of which he gave the command to his son Paris, with orders to bring back Hesione. Paris, to whom the goddess of beauty had promised the fairest woman in the world [See: [Paris]], neglected in some measure his father’s injunctions, and as if to make reprisals upon the Greeks, he carried away Helen the wife of Menelaus king of Sparta, during the absence of her husband. Priam beheld this with satisfaction, and he countenanced his son by receiving in his palace the wife of the king of Sparta. This rape kindled the flames of war; all the suitors of Helen, at the request of Menelaus [See: [Menelaus]], assembled to revenge the violence offered to his bed, and a fleet, according to some, of 140 ships under the command of the 69 chiefs that furnished them, set sail for Troy. Priam might have averted the impending blow by the restoration of Helen; but this he refused to do, when the ambassadors of the Greeks came to him, and he immediately raised an army to defend himself. Troy was soon besieged; frequent skirmishes took place, in which the success was various, and the advantages on both sides inconsiderable. The siege was continued for 10 successive years, and Priam had the misfortune to see the greatest part of his children massacred by the enemy. Hector, the eldest of these, was the only one upon whom now the Trojans looked for protection and support; but he soon fell a sacrifice to his own courage, and was killed by Achilles. Priam severely felt his loss, and as he loved him with the greatest tenderness, he wished to ransom his body, which was in the enemy’s camp. The gods, according to Homer, interested themselves in favour of old Priam. Achilles was prevailed upon by his mother, the goddess Thetis, to restore Hector to Priam, and the king of Troy passed through the Grecian camp conducted by Mercury the messenger of the gods, who with his rod had made him invisible. The meeting of Priam and Achilles was solemn and affecting; the conqueror paid to the Trojan monarch that attention and reverence which was due to his dignity, his years, and his misfortunes, and Priam in a suppliant manner addressed the prince whose favours he claimed, and kissed the hands that had robbed him of the greatest and the best of his children. Achilles was moved by his tears and entreaties; he restored Hector, and permitted Priam a truce of 12 days for the funeral of his son. Some time after Troy was betrayed into the hands of the Greeks by Antenor and Æneas, and Priam upon this resolved to die in defence of his country. He put on his armour and advanced to meet the Greeks, but Hecuba by her tears and entreaties detained him near an altar of Jupiter, whither she had fled for protection. While Priam yielded to the prayers of his wife, Polites, one of his sons, fled also to the altar before Neoptolemus, who pursued him with fury. Polites, wounded and overcome, fell dead at the feet of his parents, and the aged father, fired with indignation, ventured the most bitter invectives against the Greek, who paid no regard to the sanctity of altars and temples, and raising his spear darted it upon him. The spear hurled by the feeble hand of Priam touched the buckler of Neoptolemus, and fell to the ground. This irritated the son of Achilles; he seized Priam by his grey hairs, and without compassion or reverence for the sanctity of the place, he plunged his dagger into his breast. His head was cut off, [♦]and the mutilated body was left among the heaps of slain. Dictys Cretensis, bk. 1, &c.—Dares Phrygius.—Herodotus, bk. 2, ch. 120.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 25.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 22, &c.—Euripides, Troades.—Cicero, Tusculanæ Disputationes, bk. 1, ch. 35.—Quintus Smyrnæus, bk. 1.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 507, &c.—Horace, ode 10, li. 14.—Hyginus, fable 110.—Quintus Calaber [Smyrnæus], bk. 15, li. 226.

[♦] ‘und’ replaced with ‘and’

Priāpus, a deity among the ancients, who presided over gardens, and the parts of generation in the sexes. He was son of Venus by Mercury or Adonis, or, according to the more received opinion, by Bacchus. The goddess of beauty, who was enamoured of Bacchus, went to meet him as he returned victorious from his Indian expedition, and by him she had Priapus, who was born at Lampsacus. Priapus was so deformed in all his limbs, particularly the genitals, by means of Juno, who had assisted at the delivery of Venus, that the mother, ashamed to have given birth to such a monster, ordered him to be exposed on the mountains. His life, however, was preserved by the shepherds, and he received the name of Priapus propter deformitatem & membri virilis magnitudinem. He soon became a favourite of the people of Lampsacus, but he was expelled by the inhabitants on account of the freedom which he took with their wives. This violence was punished by the son of Venus, and when the Lampsacenians had been afflicted with a disease in the genitals, Priapus was recalled, and temples erected to his honour. Festivals were also celebrated, and the people, naturally idle and indolent, gave themselves up to every lasciviousness and impurity during the celebration. His worship was also introduced in Rome; but the Romans revered him more as a god of orchards and gardens, than as the patron of licentiousness. A crown painted with different colours was offered to him in the spring, and in the summer a garland of ears of corn. An ass was generally sacrificed to him, because that animal, by its braying, awoke the nymph Lotis, to whom Priapus was going to offer violence. He is generally represented with a human face and the ears of a goat; he holds a stick in his hand, with which he terrifies birds, as also a club to drive away thieves, and a scythe to prune the trees and cut down corn. He was crowned with the leaves of the vine, and sometimes with laurel or rocket. The last of these plants was sacred to him, as it is said to raise the passions and excite love. Priapus is often distinguished by the epithet of phallus, fascinus, Ictyphallus, or ruber, or rubicundus, which are all expressive of his deformity. Catullus, poems 19 & 20.—Columella, bk. 2, de Res Rustica.—Horace, bk. 1, satire 1.—Tibullus, bk. 1, poem 1, li. 18.—Ovid, Fasti, bk. 1, li. 415; bk. 6, li. 319.—Virgil, Eclogues, poem 7, li. 33; Georgics, bk. 4, li. 111.—Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 31.—Hyginus, fable 190.—Diodorus, bk. 1.——A town of Asia Minor near Lampsacus, now Caraboa. Priapus was the chief deity of the place, and from him the town received its name, because he had taken refuge there when banished from Lampsacus. Strabo, bk. 12.—Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 32.—Mela, bk. 1, ch. 19.——An island near Ephesus. Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 31.

Priēne, a maritime town of Asia Minor, at the foot of mount Mycale, one of the 12 independent cities of Ionia. It gave birth to Bias, one of the seven wise men of Greece. It had been built by an Athenian colony. Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 2; bk. 8, ch. 14.—Strabo, bk. 12.

Prima, a daughter of Romulus and Hersilia.

Prion, a place at Carthage.

Prisciānus, a celebrated grammarian at Athens, in the age of the emperor Justinian.

Priscilla, a woman praised for her conjugal affection by Statius, bk. 5, Sylvæ, poem 1.

Priscus Servilius, a dictator at Rome who defeated the Veientes and the Fidenates.——A surname of the elder Tarquin king of Rome. See: [Tarquinius].——A governor of Syria, brother to the emperor Philip. He proclaimed himself emperor in Macedonia when he was informed of his brother’s death, but he was soon after conquered and put to death by Decius, Philip’s murderer.——A friend of the emperor Severus.——A friend of the emperor Julian, almost murdered by the populace.——Helvidius, a questor in Achaia during the reign of Nero, remarkable for his independent spirit. Tacitus, Histories, bk. 4, ch. 6.—Juvenal.——An officer under Vitellius.——One of the emperor Adrian’s friends.——A friend of Domitian.——An orator, whose dissipated and luxurious manners Horace ridicules, bk. 1, satire 7, li. 9.

Pristis, the name of one of the ships that engaged in the naval combat which was exhibited by Æneas at the anniversary of his father’s death. She was commanded by Mnestheus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1, li. 116.

Privernus, a Rutulian killed by Capys in the wars between Æneas and Turnus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 9, li. 576.

Privernum, now Piperno Vecchio, a town of the Volsci in Italy, whose inhabitants were called Privernates. It became a Roman colony. Livy, bk. 8, ch. 10.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 11, li. 540.—Cicero, bk. 1, De Divinatione, ch. 43.

Proba, the wife of the emperor Probus.——A woman who opened the gates of Rome to the Goths.

Probus Marcus Aurelius Severus, a native of Sirmium in Pannonia. His father was originally a gardener, who, by entering the army, rose to the rank of a military tribune. His son obtained the same office in the 22nd year of his age, and he distinguished himself so much by his probity, his valour, his intrepidity, moderation, and clemency, that, at the death of the emperor Tacitus, he was invested with the imperial purple by the voluntary and uninfluenced choice of his soldiers. His election was universally approved by the Roman senate and the people; and Probus, strengthened on his throne by the affection and attachment of his subjects, marched against the enemies of Rome, in Gaul and Germany. Several battles were fought, and after he had left 400,000 barbarians dead in the field, Probus turned his arms against the Sarmatians. The same success attended him, and after he had quelled and terrified to peace the numerous barbarians of the north, he marched through Syria against the Blemmyes in the neighbourhood of Egypt. The Blemmyes were defeated with great slaughter, and the military character of the emperor was so well established, that the king of Persia sued for peace by his ambassadors, and attempted to buy the conqueror’s favour with the most splendid presents. Probus was then feasting upon the most common food when the ambassadors were introduced; but without even casting his eyes upon them, he said, that if their master did not give proper satisfaction to the Romans, he would lay his territories desolate, and as naked as the crown of his head. As he spoke, the emperor took off his cap, and showed the baldness of his head to the ambassadors. The conditions were gladly accepted by the Persian monarch, and Probus retired to Rome to convince his subjects of the greatness of his conquests, and to claim from them the applause which their ancestors had given to the conqueror of Macedonia or the destroyer of Carthage, as he passed along the streets of Rome. His triumph lasted several days, and the Roman populace were long entertained with shows and combats. But the Roman empire, delivered from its foreign enemies, was torn by civil discord; and peace was not re-established till three usurpers had been severally defeated. While his subjects enjoyed tranquillity, Probus encouraged the liberal arts; he permitted the inhabitants of Gaul and Illyricum to plant vines in their territories, and he himself repaired 70 cities in different parts of the empire which had been reduced to ruins. He also attempted to drain the waters which were stagnated in the neighbourhood of Sirmium, by conveying them to the sea by artificial canals. His armies were employed in this laborious undertaking; but as they were unaccustomed to such toils, they soon mutinied, and fell upon the emperor as he was passing into one of the towns of Illyricum. He fled into an iron tower which he himself had built to observe the marshes, but as he was alone, and without arms, he was soon overpowered and murdered, in the 50th year of his age, after a reign of six years and four months, on the second of November, after Christ 282. The news of his death was received with the greatest consternation; not only his friends, but his very enemies, deplored his fate, and even the army, which had been concerned in his fall, erected a monument over his body, and placed upon it this inscription: Hic Probus imperator, verè probus, situs est, victor omnium gentium barbararum, victor etiam tyrannorum. He was then preparing in a few days to march against the Persians that had revolted, and his victories there might have been as great as those he obtained in the two other quarters of the globe. He was succeeded by Carus, and his family, who had shared his greatness, immediately retired from Rome, not to become objects either of private or public malice. Zosimus.—Probus.—Saturninus.——Æmilius, a grammarian in the age of Theodosius. The lives of excellent commanders, written by Cornelius Nepos, have been falsely attributed to him by some authors.——An oppressive prefect of the pretorian guards, in the reign of Valentinian.

Procas, a king of Alba after his father Aventinus. He was father of Amulius and Numitor. Livy, bk. 1, ch. 3.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 14, li. 622.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 6, li. 767.

Prochy̆ta, an island of Campania in the bay of Puteoli, now Procida. It was situated near Inarima, from which it was said that it had been separated by an earthquake. It received its name, according to Dionysius, from the nurse of Æneas. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 715.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.—Dionysius of Halicarnassus, bk. 2.

Procilius, a Latin historian in the age of Pompey the Great. Varro.

Procilla Julia, a woman of uncommon virtue, killed by the soldiers of Otho. Tacitus, Agricola, ch. 4.

Caius Valerius Procillus, a prince of Gaul, intimate with Cæsar.

Proclēa, a daughter of Clitius, who married Cycnus, a son of Neptune. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 14.

Procles, a son of Aristodemus and Argia, born at the same birth as Eurysthenes. There were continual dissensions between the two brothers, who both sat on the Spartan throne, See: [Eurysthenes] and [Lacedæmon].——A native of Andros in the Ægean sea, who was crowned at the Olympic games. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 14.——A man who headed the Ionians when they took Samos. Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 4.——A Carthaginian writer, son of Eucrates. He wrote some historical treatises, of which Pausanias has preserved some fragments. Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 35.——A tyrant of Epidaurus, put to death and thrown into the sea. Plutarch, de Defectu Oraculorum.——A general of the Naxians in Sicily, who betrayed his country to Dionysius the tyrant for a sum of money.

Proclidæ, the descendants of Procles, who sat on the throne of Sparta, together with the Eurysthenidæ. See: [Lacedæmon] and [Eurysthenes].

Procne. See: [Progne].

Proconnēsus, now Marmora, an island of the Propontis, at the north-east of Cyzicus; also called Elaphonnesus and Neuris. It was famous for its fine marble. Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 32.—Strabo, bk. 13.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.

Procopius, a celebrated officer of a noble family in Cilicia, related to the emperor Julian, with whom he lived in great intimacy. He was universally admired for his integrity, but he was not destitute of ambition or pride. After he had signalized himself under Julian and his successor, he retired from the Roman provinces among the barbarians in the Thracian Chersonesus, and some time after he suddenly made his appearance at Constantinople, when the emperor Valens had marched into the east, and he proclaimed himself master of the eastern empire. His usurpation was universally acknowledged, and his victories were so rapid, that Valens would have resigned the imperial purple, had not his friends intervened. But now fortune changed; Procopius was defeated in Phrygia, and abandoned by his army. His head was cut off, and carried to Valentinian in Gaul, A.D. 366. Procopius was slain in the 42nd year of his age, and he had usurped the title of emperor for above eight months. Ammianus Marcellinus, bks. 25 & 26.——A Greek historian of Cæsarea in Palestine, secretary to the celebrated Belisarius, A.D. 534. He wrote the history of the reign of Justinian, and greatly celebrated the hero, whose favours and patronage he enjoyed. This history is divided into eight books, two of which give an account of the Persian war, two of the Vandals, and four of the Goths, to the year 553, which was afterwards continued in five books by Agathias till 559. Of this performance the character is great, though perhaps the historian is often too severe on the emperor. The works of Procopius were edited in 2 vols., folio, Paris, 1662.

Procris, a daughter of Erechtheus king of Athens. She married Cephalus. See: [Cephalus]. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 6, li. 445.——A daughter of Thestius.

Procrustes, a famous robber of Attica, killed by Theseus near the Cephisus. He tied travellers on a bed, and if their length exceeded that of the bed, he used to cut it off, but if they were shorter, he had them stretched to make their length equal to it. He is called by some Damastes and Polypemon. Ovid, Heroides, poem 2, li. 69; Metamorphoses, bk. 9, li. 43.—Plutarch, Theseus.

Procŭla, a prostitute in Juvenal’s age, satire 2, li. 68.

Procūleius, a Roman knight, very intimate with Augustus. He is celebrated for his humanity and paternal kindness to his brothers Muræna and Scipio, with whom he divided his possessions, after they had forfeited their estates, and incurred the displeasure of Augustus for siding with young Pompey. He was sent by Augustus to Cleopatra, to endeavour to bring her alive into his presence, but to no purpose. He destroyed himself when labouring under a heavy disease. Horace, bk. 2, ode 2.—Plutarch, Antonius.—Pliny, bk. 36, ch. 24.——A debauchee in Nero’s reign. Juvenal, satire 1, li. 40.

Procŭlus Julius, a Roman who, after the death of Romulus, declared that he had seen him in his appearance more than human, and that he had ordered him to bid the Romans to offer him sacrifices under the name of Quirinus, and to rest assured that Rome was destined by the gods to become the capital of the world. Plutarch, Romulus.—Livy, bk. 1, ch. 16.——Geganius, a Roman consul.——Placitius, a Roman who conquered the Hernici.——A friend of Vitellius.——A consul under Nerva.——A man accused of extortion.——An African in the age of Aurelius. He published a book entitled de regionibus, or religionibus, on foreign countries, &c.——An officer who proclaimed himself emperor in Gaul, in the reign of Probus. He was soon after defeated, and exposed on a gibbet. He was very debauched and licentious in his manners, and had acquired riches by piratical excursions.

Procyon, a star near Sirius, or the dog-star, before which it generally rises in July. Cicero calls it Anticanis, which is of the same signification (προ κυων). Horace, bk. 3, ode 29.—Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 2, ch. 44.

Prodĭcus, a sophist and rhetorician of Cos, about 396 years before Christ. He was sent as ambassador by his countrymen to Athens, where he publicly taught, and had among his pupils Euripides, Socrates, Theramenes, and Isocrates. He travelled from town to town in Greece, to procure admirers and get money. He made his auditors pay to hear him harangue, which has given occasion to some of the ancients to speak of the orations of Prodicus for 50 drachmas. In his writings, which were numerous, he composed a beautiful episode, in which virtue and pleasure were introduced, as attempting to make Hercules one of their votaries. The hero at last yielded to the charms of virtue and rejected pleasure. This has been imitated by Lucian. Prodicus was at last put to death by the Athenians on pretence that he corrupted the morals of their youth. Xenophon, Memorabilia.

Proerna, a town of Phthiotis. Livy, bk. 63, ch. 14.

Prœrosia, a surname of Ceres. Her festivals, celebrated at Athens and Eleusis before the sowing of corn, bore the same name. Meursius, Eleusinia.

Prœtĭdes, the daughters of Prœtus king of Argolis, were three in number, Lysippe, Iphinoe, and Iphianassa. They became insane for neglecting the worship of Bacchus, or, according to others, for preferring themselves to Juno, and they ran about the fields, believing themselves to be cows, and flying away not to be harnessed to the plough or to the chariot. Prœtus applied to Melampus to cure his daughters of their insanity, but he refused to employ him when he demanded the third part of his kingdom as a reward. This neglect of Prœtus was punished, the insanity became contagious, and the monarch at last promised Melampus two parts of his kingdom and one of his daughters, if he would restore them and the Argian women to their senses. Melampus consented, and after he had wrought the cure, he married the most beautiful of the Prœtides. Some have called them Lysippe, Ipponoe, and Cyrianassa. Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 2.—Virgil, Eclogues, poem 6, li. 48.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 15.—Lactantius [Placidus] on Statius, Thebaid, bks. 1 & 3.

Prœtus, a king of Argos, son of Abas and Ocalea. He was twin brother to Acrisius, with whom he quarrelled even before their birth. This dissension between the two brothers increased with their years. After their father’s death, they both tried to obtain the kingdom of Argos; but the claims of Acrisius prevailed, and Prœtus left Peloponnesus and retired to the court of Jobates king of Lycia, where he married Stenobœa, called by some Antea or Antiope. He afterwards returned to Argolis, and by means of his father-in-law he made himself master of Tirynthus. Stenobœa had accompanied her husband to Greece, and she became by him mother of the Prœtides, and of a son called Megapenthes, who after his father’s death succeeded on the throne of Tirynthus. See: [Stenobœa]. Homer, Iliad, bk. 6, li. 160.—Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 2.

Progne, a daughter of Pandion king of Athens by Zeuxippe. She married Tereus king of Thrace, by whom she had a son called Itylus or Itys. See: [Philomela].

Prolăus, a native of Elis, father to Philanthus and Lampus by Lysippe. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 2.

Promăchus, one of the Epigoni, son of Parthenopæus. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 20.——A son of Psophis daughter of Eryx king of Sicily. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 34.——An athlete of Pallene.——A son of Æson, killed by Pelias. Apollodorus.

Promathĭdas, an historian of Heraclea.

Promathion, a man who wrote a history of Italy. Plutarch, Romulus.

Promĕdon, a native of the island of Naxos, &c.

Promenæa, one of the priestesses of the temple of Dodona. It was from her that Herodotus received the tradition that two doves had flown from Thebes in Egypt, one to Dodona, and the other to the temple of Jupiter Ammon, where they gave oracles.—Herodotus, bk. 2, ch. 55.

Promethei jugum and antrum, a place on the top of mount Caucasus, in Albania.

Promētheus, a son of Iapetus by Clymene, one of the Oceanides. He was brother to Atlas, Menœtius, and Epimetheus, and surpassed all mankind in cunning and fraud. He ridiculed the gods, and deceived Jupiter himself. He sacrificed two bulls, and filled their skins, one with the flesh and the other with the bones, and asked the father of the gods which of the two he preferred as an offering. Jupiter became the dupe of his artifice, and chose the bones, and from that time the priests of the temples were ever after ordered to burn the whole victims on the altars, the flesh and the bones altogether. To punish Prometheus and the rest of mankind, Jupiter took fire away from the earth, but the son of Iapetus outwitted the father of the gods. He climbed the heavens by the assistance of Minerva, and stole fire from the chariot of the sun, which he brought down upon the earth at the end of a ferula. This provoked Jupiter the more; he ordered Vulcan to make a woman of clay, and after he had given her life, he sent her to Prometheus, with a box of the richest and most valuable presents which she had received from the gods. See: [Pandora]. Prometheus, who suspected Jupiter, took no notice of Pandora or her box, but he made his brother Epimetheus marry her, and the god, now more irritated, ordered Mercury, or Vulcan, according to Æschylus, to carry this artful mortal to mount Caucasus, and there tie him to a rock, where for 30,000 years a vulture was to feed upon his liver, which was never diminished, though continually devoured. He was delivered from this painful confinement about 30 years afterwards by Hercules, who killed the bird of prey. The vulture, or, according to others, the eagle which devoured the liver of Prometheus, was born from Typhon and Echidna. According to Apollodorus, Prometheus made the first man and woman that ever were upon the earth with clay, which he animated by means of the fire which he had stolen from heaven. On this account, therefore, the Athenians raised him an altar in the grove of Academus, where they yearly celebrated games to his honour. During these games there was a race, and he who carried a burning torch in his hand without extinguishing it obtained the prize. Prometheus, as it is universally credited, had received the gift of prophecy; and all the gods, and even Jupiter himself, consulted him as a most infallible oracle. To him mankind are indebted for the invention of many of the useful arts; he taught them the use of plants, with their physical power, and from him they received the knowledge of taming horses and different animals, either to cultivate the ground, or for the purposes of luxury. Hesiod, Theogony, lis. 510 & 550.—Apollodorus, bks. 1 & 2.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 30; bk. 5, ch. 11.—Hyginus, fable 144.—Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound.—Virgil, Eclogues, poem 6.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 82.—Horace, bk. 1, ode 3.—Seneca, Medea, li. 823.

Promēthis and Promethīdes, a patronymic applied to the children of Prometheus, as to Deucalion, &c. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 10, li. 390.

Promethus and Damasichthon, two sons of Codrus, who conducted colonies into Asia Minor. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 3.

Promŭlus, a Trojan killed by Turnus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 9, li. 574.

Pronapĭdes, an ancient Greek poet of Athens, who was, according to some, preceptor to Homer. It is said that he first taught the Greeks how to write from the left to the right, contrary to the custom of writing from the right to the left, which is still observed by some of the eastern nations. Diodorus, bk. 3.

Pronax, a brother of Adrastus king of Argos, son of Talaus and Lysimache. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 18.

Pronoe, a daughter of Phorbas, mother of Pleuron and Calydon by Æolus.

Pronŏmus, a Theban who played so skilfully on the lute, that the invention of that musical instrument is attributed to him. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 12.—Athenæus, bk. 14, ch. 7.

Pronous, a son of Phlegeas, killed by the sons of Alcmæon.

Pronŭba, a surname of Juno, because she presided over marriages. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 4, li. 166.

Propertius Sextus Aurelius, a Latin poet born at Mevania, in Umbria. His father was a Roman knight, whom Augustus proscribed, because he had followed the interest of Antony. He came to Rome, where his genius and poetical talents soon recommended him to the notice of the great and powerful. Mecænas, Gallus, and Virgil became his friends, and Augustus his patron. Mecænas wished him to attempt an epic poem, of which he proposed the emperor for hero; but Propertius refused, observing that his abilities were unequal to the task. He died about 19 years before Christ, in the 40th year of his age. His works consist of four books of elegies, which are written with so much spirit, vivacity, and energy, that many authors call him the prince of the elegiac poets among the Latins. His poetry, though elegant, is not free from faults, and the many lascivious expressions which he uses deservedly expose him to censure. Cynthia, who is the heroine of all his elegies, was a Roman lady, whose real name was Hostia, or Hostilia, of whom the poet was deeply enamoured. Though Mevania is more generally supposed to be the place of his birth, yet four other cities of Umbria have disputed the honour of it; Hespillus, Ameria, Perusia, and Assisium. The best edition is that of Santenius, 4to, Utrecht, 1780; and when published together with Catullus and Tibullus, those of Grævius, 8vo, Utrecht, 1680, and of Vulpius, 4 vols., Patavii, 1737, 1749, 1755, and the edition of Barbou, 12mo, Paris, 1754. Ovid, Tristia, bk. 2, li. 465; bk. 4, poem 10, li. 55; De Ars Amatoria, bk. 3, li. 333.—Martial, bk. 8, ltr. 73; bk. 14, ltr. 189.—Quintilian, bk. 10, ch. 1.—Pliny, bk. 6, Letters; bk. 9, ltr. 22.

Propœtĭdes, some women of Cyprus, severely punished by Venus, whose divinity they had despised. They sent their daughters to the sea-shore, where they prostituted themselves to strangers. The poets have feigned that they were changed into stones, on account of their insensibility to every virtuous sentiment. Justin, bk. 18, ch. 5.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 10, li. 238.

Propontis, a sea which has a communication with the Euxine, by the Thracian Bosphorus, and with the Ægean by the Hellespont, now called the sea of Marmora. It is about 175 miles long and 62 broad, and it received its name from its vicinity to Pontus. Mela, bk. 1, ch. 19.—Strabo, bk. 2.—Ovid, bk. 1; Tristia, bk. 9, li. 29.—Propertius, bk. 3, poem 22.

Propylea, a surname of Diana. She had a temple at Eleusis in Attica.

Proselystius, a surname of Neptune among the Greeks. Pausanias, bk. 2.

Proserpĭna, a daughter of Ceres by Jupiter, called by the Greeks Persephone. She was so beautiful, that the father of the gods himself became enamoured of her, and deceived her by changing himself into a serpent, and folding her in his wreaths. Proserpine made Sicily the place of her residence, and delighted herself with the beautiful views, the flowery meadows, and limpid streams, which surrounded the plains of Enna. In this solitary retreat, as she amused herself with her female attendants in gathering flowers, Pluto carried her away into the infernal regions, of which she became the queen. See: [Pluto]. Ceres was so disconsolate at the loss of her daughter, that she travelled all over the world, but her inquiries were in vain, and she never could have discovered whither she had been carried, had not she found the girdle of Proserpine on the surface of the waters of the fountain Cyane, near which the ravisher had opened himself a passage to his kingdom by striking the earth with his trident. Ceres soon learned from the nymph Arethusa that her daughter had been carried away by Pluto, and immediately she repaired to Jupiter, and demanded of him to punish the ravisher. Jupiter in vain attempted to persuade the mother that Pluto was not unworthy of her daughter, and when he saw that she was inflexible for the restitution of Proserpine, he said that she might return on earth, if she had not taken any aliments in the infernal regions. Her return, however, was impossible. Proserpine, as she walked in the Elysian fields, had gathered a pomegranate from a tree and eaten it, and Ascalaphus was the only one who saw it, and for his discovery the goddess instantly turned him into an owl. Jupiter, to appease the resentment of Ceres, and soothe her grief, permitted that Proserpine should remain six months with Pluto in the infernal regions, and that she should spend the rest of the year with her mother on earth. As queen of hell, and wife of Pluto, Proserpine presided over the death of mankind, and, according to the opinion of the ancients, no one could die, if the goddess herself, or Atropos her minister, did not cut off one of the hairs from the head. From this superstitious belief, it was usual to cut off some of the hair of the deceased, and to strew it at the door of the house, as an offering for Proserpine. The Sicilians were very particular in their worship to Proserpine, and as they believed that the fountain Cyane had risen from the earth at the very place where Pluto had opened himself a passage, they annually sacrificed there a bull, of which they suffered the blood to run into the water. Proserpine was universally worshipped by the ancients, and she was known by the different names of Core, Theogamia, Libitina, Hecate, Juno inferna, Anthesphoria, Cotyto, Deois, Libera, &c. Plutarch, Lucullus.—Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 37; bk. 9, ch. 31.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, fable 6; Fasti, bk. 4, li. 417.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 4, li. 698; bk. 6, li. 138.—Strabo, bk. 7.—Diodorus, bk. 5.—Cicero, Against Verres, bk. 4.—Hyginus, fable 146.—Hesiod, Theogony.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 3.—Orpheus, Hymn 28.—Claudian, de Raptu Proserpinæ.

Prosopītis, an island in one of the mouths of the Nile. Herodotus, bk. 2, ch. 4.

Prosper, one of the fathers who died A.D. 466. His works have been edited by Mangeant, folio, Paris, 1711.

Prosymna, a part of Argolis, where Juno was worshipped. It received its name from a nymph of the same name, daughter of Asterion, who nursed Juno. Pausanias, bk. 2.

Protagŏras, a Greek philosopher of Abdera in Thrace, who was originally a porter. He became one of the disciples of Democritus, when that philosopher had seen him carrying faggots on his head, poised in a proper equilibrium. He soon rendered himself ridiculous by his doctrines, and in a book which he published, he denied the existence of a Supreme Being. This doctrine he supported by observing, that his doubts arose from the uncertainty of the existence of a Supreme Power, and from the shortness of human life. This book was publicly burnt at Athens, and the philosopher banished from the city, as a worthless and contemptible being. Protagoras visited from Athens different islands in the Mediterranean, and died in Sicily in a very advanced age, about 400 years before the christian era. He generally reasoned by dilemmas, and always left the mind in suspense about all the questions which he proposed. Some suppose that he was drowned. Diogenes Laërtius, bk. 9.—[♦]Plato, Protagoras.——A king of Cyprus, tributary to the court of Persia.——Another.

[♦] ‘Plutarch’ replaced with ‘Plato’

Protagorĭdes, an historian of Cyzicus, who wrote a treatise on the games of Daphne, celebrated at Antioch.

Protei columnæ, a place in the remotest parts of Egypt. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 11, li. 262.

Protesilai turris, the monument of Protesilaus, on the Hellespont. Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 11.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 2.

Prōtĕsĭlāus, a king of part of Thessaly, son of Iphiclus, originally called Iolaus, grandson of Phylacus, and brother to Alcimede the mother of Jason. He married Laodamia the daughter of Acastus, and some time after he departed with the rest of the Greeks for the Trojan war with 40 sail. He was the first of the Greeks who set foot on the Trojan shore, and as such he was doomed by the oracle to perish, therefore he was killed as soon as he had leaped from his ship, by Æneas or Hector. Homer has not mentioned the person who killed him. His wife Laodamia destroyed herself when she heard of his death. See: [Laodamia]. Protesilaus has received the patronymic of Phylacides either because he was descended from Phylace, or because he was a native of Phylace. He was buried on the Trojan shore, and, according to Pliny, there were near his tomb certain trees which grew to an extraordinary height, which, as soon as they could be discovered and seen from Troy, immediately withered and decayed, and afterwards grew up again to their former height, and suffered the same vicissitude. Homer, Iliad, bk. 2, li. 205.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 12, fable 1; Heroides, poem 13, li. 17.—Propertius, bk. 1, poem 19.—Hyginus, fable 103, &c.

Proteus, a sea deity, son of Oceanus and Tethys, or, according to some, of Neptune and Phœnice. He had received the gift of prophecy from Neptune because he had tended the monsters of the sea, and from his knowledge of futurity mankind received the greatest services. He usually resided in the Carpathian sea, and, like the rest of the gods, he reposed himself on the sea-shore, where such as wished to consult him generally resorted. He was difficult of access, and when consulted he refused to give answers, by immediately assuming different shapes, and if not properly secured in fetters, eluding the grasp in the form of a tiger, or a lion, or disappearing in a flame of fire, a whirlwind, or a rushing stream. Aristæus and Menelaus were in the number of those who consulted him, as also Hercules. Some suppose that he was originally king of Egypt, known among his subjects by the name of Cetes, and they assert that he had two sons, Telegonus and Polygonus, who were both killed by Hercules. He had also some daughters, among whom were Cabira, Eidothea, and Rhetia. Homer, Odyssey, bk. 4, li. 360.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 8, fable 10; Amores, poem 12, li. 36.—Hesiod, Theogony, li. 243.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 4, li. 387.—Hyginus, fable 118.—Herodotus, bk. 2, ch. 112.—Diodorus, bk. 1.

Prothēnor, a Bœotian who went to the Trojan war. Homer, Iliad, bk. 2.

Protheus, a Greek at the Trojan war.——A Spartan who endeavoured to prevent a war with the Thebans.

Prothous, a son of Lycaon of Arcadia. Apollodorus.——A son of Agrius.

Proto, one of the Nereides. Apollodorus.

Protogenēa, a daughter of Calydon, by Æolia the daughter of Amythaon. She had a son called Oxylus by Mars. Apollodorus, bk. 1.

Protogĕnes, a painter of Rhodes, who flourished about 328 years before Christ. He was originally so poor that he painted ships to maintain himself. His countrymen were ignorant of his ingenuity before Apelles came to Rhodes, and offered to buy all his pieces. This opened the eyes of the Rhodians; they became sensible of the merit of their countrymen, and liberally rewarded him. Protogenes was employed for seven years in finishing a picture of Jalysus, a celebrated huntsman, supposed to have been the son of Apollo, and the founder of Rhodes. During all this time the painter lived upon lupines and water, thinking that such aliments would leave him greater flights of fancy; but all this did not seem to make him more successful in the perfection of his picture. He was to represent in the piece a dog panting, and with froth at his mouth, but this he never could do with satisfaction to himself; and when all his labours seemed to be without success, he threw his sponge upon the piece in a fit of anger. Chance alone brought to perfection what the utmost labours of art could not do; the fall of the sponge upon the picture represented the froth of the mouth of the dog in the most perfect and natural manner, and the piece was universally admired. Protogenes was very exact in his representations, and copied nature with the greatest nicety, but this was blamed as a fault by his friend Apelles. When Demetrius besieged Rhodes he refused to set fire to a part of the city which might have made him master of the whole, because he knew that Protogenes was then working in that quarter. When the town was taken, the painter was found closely employed in a garden in finishing a picture; and when the conqueror asked him why he showed not more concern at the general calamity, he replied, that Demetrius made war against the Rhodians, and not against the fine arts. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 3.—Pliny, bk. 35, ch. 10.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 12.—Juvenal, satire 3, li. 120.—Plutarch, Demetrius.——One of Caligula’s favourites, famous for his cruelty and extravagance.

Protogenīa, a daughter of Deucalion and Pyrrha. She was beloved by Jupiter, by whom she had Æthlius the father of Endymion. Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 7.—Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 1.—Hyginus, fable 155.——Another. See: [Protogenea].

Protomedūsa, one of the Nereides, called Protomelia by Hesiod. Theogony, li. 245.

Proxĕnus, a Bœotian of great authority at Thebes, in the age of Xenophon. Polyænus.——A writer who published historical accounts of Sparta. Athenæus.

Prudentius Aurelius Clemens, a Latin poet who flourished A.D. 392, and was successively a soldier, an advocate, and a judge. His poems are numerous, and all theological, devoid of the elegance and purity of the Augustan age, and yet greatly valued. The best editions are the Delphin, 4to, Paris, 1687; that of Cellarius, 12mo, Halæ, 1703; and that of Parma, 2 vols., 4to, 1788.

Prumnides, a king of Corinth.

Prusa, a town of Bithynia, built by king Prusias, from whom it received its name. Strabo, bk. 12.—Pliny, bk. 10, ltr. 16.

Prusæus Dion, flourished A.D. 105.

Prusias, a king of Bithynia, who flourished 221 B.C.——Another, surnamed Venator, who made an alliance with the Romans when they waged war with Antiochus king of Syria. He gave a kind reception to Annibal, and by his advice he made war against Eumenes king of Pergamus, and defeated him. Eumenes, who was an ally of Rome as well as Prusias, complained before the Romans of the hostilities of the king of Bithynia. Quinctius Flaminius was sent from Rome to settle the disputes of the two monarchs, and he was no sooner arrived in Bithynia, than Prusias, to gain his favour, prepared to deliver to him, at his request, the celebrated Carthaginian, to whom he was indebted for all the advantages which he had obtained over Eumenes; but Annibal prevented it by a voluntary death. Prusias was obliged by the Roman ambassador to make a restitution of the provinces he had conquered, and by his meanness he continued to enjoy the favours of the Romans. When some time after he visited the capital of Italy, he appeared in the habit of a manumitted slave, calling himself the freedman of the Romans; and when he was introduced into the senate-house, he saluted the senators by the name of visible deities, of saviours and deliverers. Such abject behaviour rendered him contemptible not only in the eyes of the Romans, but of his subjects, and when he returned home the Bithynians revolted, and placed his son Nicomedes on the throne. The banished monarch fled to Nicomedia, where he was assassinated near the altar of Jupiter, about 149 years before Christ. Some say that his son became his murderer. Prusias, according to Polybius, was the meanest of monarchs, without honesty, without morals, virtue, or principle; he was cruel and cowardly, intemperate and voluptuous, and an enemy to all learning. He was naturally deformed, and he often appeared in public in the habit of a woman, to render his deformities more visible. Polybius.—Livy.—Justin, bk. 31, &c.—Cornelius Nepos, Hannibal.—Plutarch, Titus Flamininus, &c.

Prymno, one of the Oceanides.

Prytănes, certain magistrates at Athens who presided over the senate, and had the privilege of assembling it when they pleased, festivals excepted. They generally met in a large hall, called prytaneum, where they gave audiences, offered sacrifices, and feasted together with all those who had rendered signal service to their country. The Prytanes were elected from the senators which were in number 500, 50 of which were chosen from each tribe. When they were elected, the names of the 10 tribes of Athens were thrown into one vessel, and in another were placed nine black beans and a white one. The tribe whose name was drawn with the white bean, presided the first, and the rest in the order in which they were drawn. They presided each for 35 days, as the year was divided into 10 parts; but it is unknown what tribe presided the rest of those days which were supernumerary. When the number of tribes was increased to 12, each of the Prytanes presided one full month.——Some of the principal magistrates of Corinth were also called Prytanes.

Prytănis, a king of Sparta, of the family of the Proclidæ. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 36.——One of the friends of Æneas killed by Turnus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 9, li. 767.

Psamăthe, one of the Nereides, mother of Phocus by Æacus king of Ægina. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 12.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 11, li. 398.—Flaccus, [♦]bk. 1, li. 364.——A daughter of Crotopus king of Argos. She became mother of Linus by Apollo, and to conceal her shame from her father, she exposed her child, which was found by dogs and torn to pieces. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 43.——A fountain and town of Thebes. Flaccus, bk. 1, li. 364.

[♦] Book reference omitted in text.

Psamathos, a town and port of Laconia. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 25.

Psammenītus, succeeded his father Amasis on the throne of Egypt. Cambyses made war against him, and as he knew that the Egyptians paid the greatest veneration to cats, the Persian monarch placed some of these animals at the head of his army, and the enemy, unable to defend themselves, and unwilling to kill those objects of adoration, were easily conquered. Psammenitus was twice beaten at Pelusium and in Memphis, and became one of the prisoners of Cambyses, who treated him with great humanity. Psammenitus, however, raised seditions against the Persian monarch; and attempted to make the Egyptians rebel, for which he was put to death by drinking bull’s blood. He had reigned about six months. He flourished about 525 years before the christian era. Herodotus, bk. 3, ch. 10, &c.

Psammetĭchus, a king of Egypt. He was one of the 12 princes who shared the kingdom among themselves; but as he was more popular than the rest, he was banished from his dominions, and retired into the marshes near the sea-shore. A descent of some of the Greeks upon Egypt proved favourable to his cause: he joined the enemy, and defeated the 11 princes who had expelled him from the country. He rewarded the Greeks, by whose valour he had recovered Egypt, he allotted them some territory on the sea-coast, patronized the liberal arts, and encouraged commerce among his subjects. He made useless inquiries to find the sources of the Nile, and he stopped, by bribes and money, a large army of Scythians that were marching against him. He died 617 years before the christian era, and was buried in Minerva’s temple at Sais. During his reign there was a contention among some of the neighbouring nations about the antiquity of their language. Psammetichus took a part in the contest. He confined two young children and fed them with milk; the shepherd to whose care they were entrusted was ordered never to speak to them, but to watch diligently their articulations. After some time the shepherd observed, that whenever he entered the place of their confinement they repeatedly exclaimed Beccos, and he gave information of this to the monarch. Psammetichus made inquiries, and found that the word Beccos signified bread in the Phœnician language, and from that circumstance, therefore, it was universally concluded that the language of Phœnicia was of the greatest antiquity. Herodotus, bk. 2, ch. 28, &c.—Polyænus, bk. 8.—Strabo, bk. 16.——A son of Gordius, brother to Periander, who held the tyranny at Corinth for three years, B.C. 584. Aristotle, Politics, bk. 5, ch. 12.

Psammis, or Psammuthis, a king of Egypt, B.C. 376.

Psaphis, a town on the confines of Attica and Bœotia. There was there an oracle of Amphiaraus.

Psapho, a Libyan who taught a number of birds which he kept to say, “Psapho is a god,” and afterwards gave them their liberty. The birds did not forget the words which they had been taught, and the Africans paid divine honours to Psapho. Ælian.

Psecas, one of Diana’s attendant nymphs. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 3.

Psophis, a town of Arcadia near the river Erymanthus, whose name it originally bore, and afterwards that of Phegia. Statius, Thebaid, bk. 4, li. 296.—Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 24.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, li. 607.——A river and town of Elis.——A daughter of Eryx.——A town of Acarnania.——Another of Libya.

Psyche, a nymph whom Cupid married and carried into a place of bliss, where he long enjoyed her company. Venus put her to death because she had robbed the world of her son; but Jupiter, at the request of Cupid, granted immortality to Psyche. The word signifies the soul, and this personification of Psyche first mentioned by Apuleius is posterior to the Augustan age, though still it is connected with ancient mythology. Psyche is generally represented with the wings of a butterfly, to intimate the lightness of the soul, of which the butterfly is the symbol, and on that account, among the ancients, when a man had just expired, a butterfly appeared fluttering above, as if rising from the mouth of the deceased.

Psychrus, a river of Thrace. When sheep drank of its waters they were said always to bring forth black lambs. Aristotle.

Psylli, a people of Libya near the Syrtes, very expert in curing the venomous bite of serpents, which had no fatal effect upon them. Strabo, bk. 17.—Dio Cassius, bk. 51, ch. 14.—Lucan, bk. 9, lis. 894, 937.—Herodotus, bk. 4, ch. 173.—Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 28.

Pteleum, a town of Thessaly on the borders of Bœotia. Lucan, bk. 6, li. 852.—Livy, bk. 35, ch. 43.

Pterelaus, a son of Taphius, presented with immortality from Neptune, provided he kept on his head a yellow lock. His daughter cut it off and he died. He reigned at Taphos in Argos, &c. Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 4.

Pteria, a well-fortified town of Cappadocia. It was in the neighbourhood, according to some, that Crœsus was defeated by Cyrus. Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 76.

Ptolederma, a town of Arcadia. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 27.

Ptolemæum, a certain place at Athens dedicated to exercise and study. Cicero, bk. 5, de Finibus Bonorum et Malorum.

Ptolemæus I., surnamed Lagus, a king of Egypt, son of Arsinoe, who, when pregnant by Philip of Macedonia, married Lagus, a man of mean extraction. See: [Lagus]. Ptolemy was educated in the court of the king of Macedonia; he became one of the friends and associates of Alexander, and when that monarch invaded Asia, the son of Arsinoe attended him as one of his generals. During the expedition, he behaved with uncommon valour; he killed one of the Indian monarchs in single combat, and it was to his prudence and courage that Alexander was indebted for the reduction of the rock Aornus. After the conqueror’s death, in the general division of the Macedonian empire, Ptolemy obtained as his share the government of Egypt, with Libya, and part of the neighbouring territories of Arabia. In this appointment the governor soon gained the esteem of the people by acts of kindness, by benevolence, and clemency; and though he did not assume the title of independent monarch till 19 years after, yet he was so firmly established, that the attempts of Perdiccas to drive him away from his possessions proved abortive; and Ptolemy, after the murder of his rival by Grecian soldiers, might have added the kingdom of Macedonia to his Egyptian territories. He made himself master of Cœlosyria, Phœnicia, and the neighbouring coast of Syria, and when he had reduced Jerusalem, he carried about 100,000 prisoners to Egypt, to people the extensive city of Alexandria, which became the capital of his dominions. After he had rendered these prisoners the most attached and faithful of his subjects by his liberality and the grant of privileges, Ptolemy assumed the title of king of Egypt, and soon after reduced Cyprus under his power. He made war with success against Demetrius and Antigonus, who disputed his right to the provinces of Syria, and from the assistance he gave to the people of Rhodes against their common enemies, he received the name of Soter. While he extended his dominions, Ptolemy was not negligent of the advantages of his people. The bay of Alexandria being dangerous of access, he built a tower to conduct the sailors in the obscurity of the night [See: [Pharos]], and that his subjects might be acquainted with literature, he laid the foundation of a library, which, under the succeeding reigns, became the most celebrated in the world. He also established in the capital of his dominions a society called museum, of which the members, maintained at the public expense, were employed in philosophical researches, and in the advancement of science and the liberal arts. Ptolemy died in the 84th year of his age, after a reign of 39 years, about 284 years before Christ. He was succeeded by his son Ptolemy Philadelphus, who had been his partner on the throne the last 10 years of his reign. Ptolemy Lagus has been commended for his abilities, not only as a sovereign, but as a writer, and among the many valuable compositions which have been lost, we are to lament a history of Alexander the Great, by the king of Egypt, greatly admired and valued for elegance and authenticity. All his successors were called Ptolemies from him. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 7.—Justin, bk. 13, &c.—Polybius, bk. 2.—Arrian.—Curtius.—Plutarch, Alexander.

Ptolemæus II., son of Ptolemy I., succeeded his father on the Egyptian throne, and was called Philadelphus by antiphrasis, because he killed two of his brothers. He showed himself worthy in every respect to succeed his great father, and, conscious of the advantages which arise from an alliance with powerful nations, he sent ambassadors to Italy to solicit the friendship of the Romans, whose name and military reputation had become universally known for the victories which they had just obtained over Pyrrhus and the Tarentines. His ambassadors were received with marks of the greatest attention, and immediately after four Roman senators came to Alexandria, where they gained the admiration of the monarch and of his subjects, and, by refusing the crowns of gold and the rich presents which were offered to them, convinced the world of the virtue and of the disinterestedness of their nation. But while Ptolemy strengthened himself by alliance with foreign powers, the internal peace of his kingdom was disturbed by the revolt of Magas his brother, king of Cyrene. The sedition, however, was stopped, though kindled by Antiochus king of Syria, and the death of the rebellious prince re-established peace for some time in the family of Philadelphus. Antiochus the Syrian king married Berenice the daughter of Ptolemy, and the father, though old and infirm, conducted his daughter to her husband’s kingdom, and assisted at the nuptials. Philadelphus died in the 64th year of his age, 246 years before the christian era. He left two sons and a daughter by Arsinoe the daughter of Lysimachus. He had afterwards married his sister Arsinoe, whom he loved with uncommon tenderness, and to whose memory he began to erect a celebrated monument. See: [Dinocrates]. During the whole of his reign, Philadelphus was employed in exciting industry, and in encouraging the liberal arts and useful knowledge among his subjects. The inhabitants of the adjacent countries were allured by promises and presents to increase the number of the Egyptian subjects, and Ptolemy could boast of reigning over 33,339 well-peopled cities. He gave every possible encouragement to commerce, and by keeping two powerful fleets, one in the Mediterranean, and the other in the Red sea, he made Egypt the mart of the world. His army consisted of 200,000 foot, 40,000 horse, besides 300 elephants and 2000 armed chariots. With justice, therefore, he has been called the richest of all the princes and monarchs of his age, and, indeed, the remark is not false when it is observed, that at his death he left in his treasury 750,000 Egyptian talents, a sum equivalent to two hundred millions sterling. His palace was the asylum of learned men, whom he admired and patronized. He paid particular attention to Euclid, Theocritus, Callimachus, and Lycophron, and by increasing the library which his father had founded, he showed his taste for learning, and his wish to encourage genius. This celebrated library at his death contained 200,000 volumes of the best and choicest books, and it was afterwards increased to 700,000 volumes. Part of it was burnt by the flames of Cæsar’s fleet when he set it on fire to save himself, a circumstance, however, not mentioned by the general, and the whole was again magnificently repaired by Cleopatra, who added to the Egyptian library that of the kings of Pergamus. It is said that the Old Testament was translated into Greek during his reign, a translation which has been called Septuagint, because translated by the labours of 70 different persons. Eutropius.—Justin, bk. 17, ch. 2, &c.—Livy.—Plutarch.—Theocritus.—Athenæus, bk. 12.—Pliny, bk. 13, ch. 12.—Dio Cassius, bk. 42.—Aulus Gellius, bk. 6, ch. 17.

Ptolemæus III., succeeded his father Philadelphus on the Egyptian throne. He early engaged in a war against Antiochus Theus, for his unkindness to Berenice, the Egyptian king’s sister, whom he had married with the consent of Philadelphus. With the most rapid success he conquered Syria and Cilicia, and advanced as far as the Tigris, but a sedition at home stopped his progress, and he returned to Egypt loaded with the spoils of conquered nations. Among the immense riches which he brought, he had above 2500 statues of the Egyptian gods, which Cambyses had carried away into Persia when he conquered Egypt. These were restored to the temples, and the Egyptians called their sovereign Evergetes, in acknowledgment of his attention, beneficence, and religious zeal for the gods of his country. The last years of Ptolemy’s reign were passed in peace, if we except the refusal of the Jews to pay the tribute of 20 silver talents which their ancestors had always paid to the Egyptian monarchs. He also interested himself in the affairs of Greece, and assisted Cleomenes the Spartan king against the leaders of the Achæan league; but he had the mortification to see his ally defeated, and even a fugitive in Egypt. Evergetes died 221 years before Christ, after a reign of 25 years, and, like his two illustrious predecessors, he was the patron of learning, and, indeed, he is the last of the Lagides who gained popularity among his subjects by clemency, moderation and humanity, and who commanded respect even from his enemies, by valour, prudence, and reputation. It is said that he deposited 15 talents in the hands of the Athenians to be permitted to translate the original manuscripts of Æschylus, Euripides, and Sophocles. Plutarch, Cleomenes, &c.—Polybius, bk. 2.—Justin, bk. 29, &c.

Ptolemæus IV., succeeded his father Evergetes on the throne of Egypt, and received the surname of Philopater by antiphrasis, because, according to some historians, he destroyed his father by poison. He began his reign with acts of the greatest cruelty, and he successively sacrificed to his avarice his own mother, his wife, his sister, and his brother. He received the name of Tiphon from his extravagance and debauchery, and that of Gallus, because he appeared in the streets of Alexandria like one of the bacchanals, and with all the gestures of the priests of Cybele. In the midst of his pleasures, Philopater was called to war against Antiochus king of Syria, and at the head of a powerful army he soon invaded his enemies’ territories, and might have added the kingdom of Syria to Egypt, if he had made a prudent use of the victories which attended his arms. In his return he visited Jerusalem, but the Jews prevented him forcibly from entering their temple, for which insolence to his majesty the monarch determined to extirpate the whole nation. He ordered an immense number of Jews to be exposed in a plain, and trodden under the feet of elephants, but, by a supernatural instinct, the generous animals turned their fury not on those that had been devoted to death, but upon the Egyptian spectators. This circumstance terrified Philopater, and he behaved with more than common kindness to a nation which he had so lately devoted to destruction. In the latter part of his reign, the Romans, whom a dangerous war with Carthage had weakened, but at the same time roused to superior activity, renewed, for political reasons, the treaty of alliance which had been made with the Egyptian monarchs. Philopater at last, weakened and enervated by intemperance and continual debauchery, died in the 37th year of his age, after a reign of 17 years, 204 years before the christian era. His death was immediately followed by the murder of the companions of his voluptuousness and extravagance, and their carcases were dragged with the greatest ignominy through the streets of Alexandria. Polybius.—Justin, bk. 30, &c.—Plutarch, Cleomenes.

Ptolemæus V., succeeded his father Philopater as king of Egypt, though only in the fourth year of his age. During the years of his minority he was under the protection of Sosibius and of Aristomenes, by whose prudent administration Antiochus was dispossessed of the provinces of Cœlosyria and Palestine, which he had conquered by war. The Romans also renewed their alliance with him after their victories over Annibal, and the conclusion of the second Punic war. This flattering embassy induced Aristomenes to offer the care of the patronage of the young monarch to the Romans, but the regent was confirmed in his honourable office, and by making a treaty of alliance with the people of Achaia, he convinced the Egyptians that he was qualified to wield the sceptre and to govern the nation. But now that Ptolemy had reached his 14th year, according to the laws and customs of Egypt, the years of his minority had expired. He received the surname of Epiphanes, or Illustrious, and was crowned at Alexandria with the greatest solemnity, and the faithful Aristomenes resigned into his hands an empire which he had governed with honour to himself and with credit to his sovereign. Young Ptolemy was no sooner delivered from the shackles of a superior, than he betrayed the same vices which had characterized his father; the counsels of Aristomenes were despised, and the minister who for 10 years had governed the kingdom with equity and moderation, was sacrificed to the caprice of the sovereign, who abhorred him for the salutary advice which his own vicious inclinations did not permit him to follow. His cruelties raised seditions among his subjects, but these were twice quelled by the prudence and the moderation of one Polycrates, the most faithful of his corrupt ministers. In the midst of his extravagance, Epiphanes did not forget his alliance with the Romans; above all others he showed himself eager to cultivate friendship with a nation from whom he could derive so many advantages, and during their war against Antiochus he offered to assist them with money against a monarch whose daughter Cleopatra he had married, but whom he hated on account of the seditions he raised in the very heart of Egypt. After a reign of 24 years, 180 years before Christ, Ptolemy was poisoned by his ministers, whom he had threatened to rob of their possessions, to carry on a war against Seleucus king of Syria. Livy, bk. 35, ch. 13, &c.—Justin, &c.

Ptolemæus VI., succeeded his father Epiphanes on the Egyptian throne, and received the surname of Philometor, on account of his hatred against his mother Cleopatra. He was in the sixth year of his age when he ascended the throne, and during his minority the kingdom was governed by his mother, and at her death by a eunuch, who was one of his favourites. He made war against Antiochus Epiphanes king of Syria, to recover the provinces of Palestine and Cœlosyria, which were part of the Egyptian dominions, and after several successes he fell into the hands of his enemy, who detained him in confinement. During the captivity of Philometor, the Egyptians raised to the throne his younger brother Ptolemy Evergetes, or Physcon, also son of Epiphanes, but he was no sooner established in his power than Antiochus turned his arms against Egypt, drove the usurper [♦]out, and restored Philometor to all his rights and privileges as king of Egypt. This artful behaviour of Antiochus was soon comprehended by Philometor, and when he saw that Pelusium, the key of Egypt, had remained in the hands of his Syrian ally, he recalled his brother Physcon, and made him partner on the throne, and concerted with him how to repel their common enemy. This union of interest in the two royal brothers incensed Antiochus; he entered Egypt with a large army, but the Romans checked his progress and obliged him to retire. No sooner were they delivered from the impending war, than Philometor and Physcon, whom the fear of danger had united, began with mutual jealousy to oppose each other’s views. Physcon was at last banished by the superior power of his brother, and as he could find no support in Egypt, he immediately repaired to Rome. To excite more effectually the compassion of the Romans, and to gain their assistance, he appeared in the meanest dress, and took his residence in the most obscure corner of the city. He received an audience from the senate, and the Romans settled the dispute between the two royal brothers, by making them independent of one another, and giving the government of Libya and Cyrene to Physcon, and confirming Philometor in the possession of Egypt, and the island of Cyprus. These terms of accommodation were gladly accepted, but Physcon soon claimed the dominion of Cyprus, and in this he was supported by the Romans, who wished to aggrandize themselves by the diminution of the Egyptian power. Philometor refused to deliver up the island of Cyprus, and to call away his brother’s attention, he fomented the seeds of rebellion in Cyrene. But the death of Philometor, 145 years before the christian era, left Physcon master of Egypt and all the dependent provinces. Philometor has been commended by some historians for his clemency and moderation. Diodorus.—Livy.—Polybius.

[♦] omitted word ‘out’ inserted

Ptolemæus VII., surnamed Physcon, on account of the prominence of his belly, ascended the throne of Egypt after the death of his brother Philometer, and as he had reigned for some time conjointly with him [See: [Ptolemæus VI.]], his succession was approved, though the wife and the son of the deceased monarch laid claim to the crown. Cleopatra was supported in her claims by the Jews, and it was at last agreed that Physcon should marry the queen, and that her son should succeed on the throne at his death. The nuptials were accordingly celebrated, but on that very day the tyrant murdered Cleopatra’s son in her arms. He ordered himself to be called Evergetes, but the Alexandrians refused to do it, and stigmatized him with the appellation of Kakergetes, or evil-doer, a surname which he deserved by his tyranny and oppression. A series of barbarity rendered him odious, but as no one attempted to rid Egypt of her tyranny, the Alexandrians abandoned their habitations, and fled from a place which continually streamed with the blood of their massacred fellow-citizens. If their migration proved fatal to the commerce and prosperity of Alexandria, it was of the most essential service to the countries where they retired; and the numbers of Egyptians that sought a safer asylum in Greece and Asia, introduced among the inhabitants of those countries the different professions that were practised with success in the capital of Egypt. Physcon endeavoured to repeople the city which his cruelty had laid desolate; but the fear of sharing the fate of the former inhabitants, prevailed more than the promise of riches, rights, and immunities. The king at last, disgusted with Cleopatra, repudiated her, and married her daughter by Philometor, called also Cleopatra. He still continued to exercise the greatest cruelty upon his subjects, but the prudence and vigilance of his ministers kept the people in tranquillity, till all Egypt revolted when the king had basely murdered all the young men of Alexandria. Without friends or support in Egypt he fled to Cyprus, and Cleopatra the divorced queen ascended the throne. In his banishment Physcon dreaded lest the Alexandrians should also place the crown on the head of his son, by his sister Cleopatra, who was then governor of Cyrene, and under these apprehensions he sent for the young prince, called Memphitis, to Cyprus, and murdered him as soon as he reached the shore. To make the barbarity more complete he sent the limbs of Memphitis to Cleopatra, and they were received as the queen was going to celebrate her birthday. Soon after this he invaded Egypt with an army, and obtained a victory over the forces of Cleopatra, who, being left without friends or assistance, fled to her eldest daughter Cleopatra, who had married Demetrius king of Syria. This decisive blow restored Physcon to his throne, where he continued to reign for some time, hated by his subjects, and feared by his enemies. He died at Alexandria in the 67th year of his age, after a reign of 29 years, about 116 years before Christ. Some authors have extolled Physcon for his fondness for literature; they have observed, that from his extensive knowledge he was called the philologist, and that he wrote a comment upon Homer, besides a history in 24 books, admired for its elegance, and often quoted by succeeding authors whose pen was employed on the same subject. Diodorus.—Justin, bk. 38, &c.—Athenæus, bk. 2.—Porphyry.

Ptolemæus VIII., surnamed Lathyrus, from an excrescence like a pea on the nose, succeeded his father Physcon as king of Egypt. He had no sooner ascended the throne, than his mother Cleopatra, who reigned conjointly with him, expelled him to Cyprus, and placed the crown on the head of his brother Ptolemy Alexander, her favourite son. Lathyrus, banished from Egypt, became king of Cyprus; and soon after he appeared at the head of a large army, to make war against Alexander Jannæus king of Judæa, through whose assistance and intrigue he had been expelled by Cleopatra. The Jewish monarch was conquered, and 50,000 of his men were left on the field of battle. Lathyrus, after he had exercised the greatest cruelty upon the Jews, and made vain attempts to recover the kingdom of Egypt, retired to Cyprus till the death of his brother Alexander restored him to his native dominions. Some of the cities of Egypt refused to acknowledge him as their sovereign; and Thebes, for its obstinacy, was closely besieged for three successive years, and from a powerful and populous city, it was reduced to ruins. In the latter part of his reign Lathyrus was called upon to assist the Romans with a navy for the conquest of Athens; but Lucullus, who had been sent to obtain the wanted supply, though received with kingly honours, was dismissed with evasive and unsatisfactory answers, and the monarch refused to part with troops which he deemed necessary to preserve the peace of his kingdom. Lathyrus died 81 years before the christian era, after a reign of 36 years since the death of his father Physcon, 11 of which he had passed with his mother Cleopatra on the Egyptian throne, 18 in Cyprus, and seven after his mother’s death. He was succeeded by his only daughter Cleopatra, whom Alexander the son of Ptolemy Alexander, by means of the dictator Sylla, soon after married and murdered. Josephus, Jewish Antiquities.—Justin, bk. 39.—Plutarch, Lucullus.—Appian, Mithridatic Wars.

Ptolemæus IX. See: [Alexander Ptolemy I.]

Ptolemæus X. See: [Alexander Ptolemy II.]

Ptolemæus XI. See: [Alexander Ptolemy III.]

Ptolemæus XII., the illegitimate son of Lathyrus, ascended the throne of Egypt at the death of Alexander III. He received the surname of Auletes, because he played skilfully on the flute. His rise showed great marks of prudence and circumspection; and as his predecessor by his will had left the kingdom of Egypt to the Romans, Auletes knew that he could not be firmly established on his throne without the approbation of the Roman senate. He was successful in his applications, and Cæsar, who was then consul, and in want of money, established his succession, and granted him the alliance of the Romans, after he had received the enormous sum of about 1,162,500l. sterling. But these measures rendered him unpopular at home, and when he had suffered the Romans quietly to take possession of Cyprus, the Egyptians revolted, and Auletes was obliged to fly from his kingdom, and seek protection among the most powerful of his allies. His complaints were heard at Rome, at first with indifference, and the murder of 100 noblemen of Alexandria, whom the Egyptians had sent to justify their proceedings before the Roman senate, rendered him unpopular and suspected. Pompey, however, supported his cause, and the senators decreed to re-establish Auletes on his throne; but as they proceeded slowly in the execution of their plans, the monarch retired from Rome to Ephesus, where he lay concealed for some time in the temple of Diana. During his absence from Alexandria, his daughter Berenice had made herself absolute, and established herself on the throne by a marriage with Archelaus, a priest of Bellona’s temple at Comana; but she was soon driven from Egypt, when Gabinius, at the head of a Roman army, approached to replace Auletes on his throne. Auletes was no sooner restored to power, than he [♦]sacrificed to his ambition his daughter Berenice, and behaved with the greatest ingratitude and perfidy to Rabirius, a Roman who had supplied him with money when expelled from his kingdom. Auletes died four years after his restoration, about 51 years before the christian era. He left two sons and two daughters; and by his will ordered the eldest of his sons to marry the eldest of his sisters, and to ascend with her the vacant throne. As these children were young, the dying monarch recommended them to the protection and paternal care of the Romans, and accordingly Pompey the Great was appointed by the senate to be their patron and their guardian. Their reign was as turbulent as that of their predecessors, and it is remarkable for no uncommon events, only we may observe that the young queen was the Cleopatra who soon after became so celebrated as being the mistress of Julius Cæsar, the wife of Marcus Antony, and the last of the Egyptian monarchs of the family of Lagus. Cicero, For Rabirius.—Strabo, bk. 17.—Dio Cassius, bk. 39.—Appian, Civil Wars.

[♦] ‘sacrified’ replaced with ‘sacrificed’

Ptolemæus XIII., surnamed Dionysius or Bacchus, ascended the throne of Egypt conjointly with his sister Cleopatra, whom he had married, according to the directions of his father Auletes. He was under the care and protection of Pompey the Great [See: [Ptolemæus XII.]], but the wickedness and avarice of his ministers soon obliged him to reign independent. He was then in the 13th year of his age, when his guardian, after the fatal battle of Pharsalia, came to the shores of Egypt, and claimed his protection. He refused to grant the required assistance, and by the advice of his ministers he basely murdered Pompey, after he had brought him to shore under the mask of friendship and cordiality. To curry the favour of the conqueror of Pharsalia, Ptolemy cut off the head of Pompey; but Cæsar turned with indignation from such perfidy, and when he arrived at Alexandria, he found the king of Egypt as faithless to his cause as to that of his fallen enemy. Cæsar sat as judge to hear the various claims of the brother and sister to the throne; and to satisfy the people, he ordered the will of Auletes to be read, and confirmed Ptolemy and Cleopatra in the possession of Egypt, and appointed the two younger children masters of the island of Cyprus. This fair and candid decision might have left no room for dissatisfaction, but Ptolemy was governed by cruel and avaricious ministers, and therefore he refused to acknowledge Cæsar as a judge or a mediator. The Roman enforced his authority by arms, and three victories were obtained over the Egyptian forces. Ptolemy, who had been for some time a prisoner in the hands of Cæsar, now headed his armies; but a defeat was fatal, and as he attempted to save his life by flight, he was drowned in the Nile, about 46 years before Christ, and three years and eight months after the death of Auletes. Cleopatra, at the death of her brother, became sole mistress of Egypt; but as the Egyptians were no friends to female government, Cæsar obliged her to marry her younger brother Ptolemy, who was then in the 11th year of his age. Appian, Civil Wars.—Cæsar, Alexandrine War.—Strabo, bk. 17.—Josephus, Antiquities.—Dio Cassius.—Plutarch, Antonius, &c.—Suetonius Cæsar.

Ptolemæus Apion, king of Cyrene, was the illegitimate son of Ptolemy Physcon. After a reign of 20 years he died; and as he had no children, he made the Romans heirs of his dominions. The Romans presented his subjects with their independence. Livy, bk. 70.——Ceraunus, a son of Ptolemy Soter by Eurydice the daughter of Antipater. Unable to succeed to the throne of Egypt, Ceraunus fled to the court of Seleucus, where he was received with friendly marks of attention. Seleucus was then king of Macedonia, an empire which he had lately acquired by the death of Lysimachus in a battle in Phrygia; but his reign was short, and Ceraunus perfidiously murdered him and ascended his throne, 280 B.C. The murderer, however, could not be firmly established in Macedonia, as long as Arsinoe the widow and the children of Lysimachus were alive, and entitled to claim his kingdom as the lawful possession of their father. To remove these obstacles, Ceraunus made offers of marriage to Arsinoe, who was his own sister. The queen at first refused, but the protestations and solemn promises of the usurper at last prevailed upon her to consent. The nuptials, however, were no sooner celebrated, than Ceraunus murdered the two young princes, and confirmed his usurpation by rapine and cruelty. But now three powerful princes claimed the kingdom of Macedonia as their own: Antiochus the son of Seleucus; Antigonus the son of Demetrius; and Pyrrhus the king of Epirus. These enemies, however, were soon removed; Ceraunus conquered Antigonus in the field of battle, and stopped the hostilities of his two other rivals by promises and money. He did not long remain inactive; a barbarian army of Gauls claimed a tribute from him, and the monarch immediately marched to meet them in the field. The battle was long and bloody. The Macedonians might have obtained the victory, if Ceraunus had shown more prudence. He was thrown down from his elephant, and taken prisoner by the enemy, who immediately tore his body to pieces. Ptolemy had been king of Macedonia only 18 months. Justin, bk. 24, &c.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 10.——An illegitimate son of Ptolemy Lathyrus king of Cyprus, of which he was tyrannically dispossessed by the Romans. Cato was at the head of the forces which were sent against Ptolemy by the senate, and the Roman general proposed to the monarch to retire from the throne, and to pass the rest of his days in the obscure office of high priest in the temple of Venus at Paphos. This offer was rejected with the indignation which it merited, and the monarch poisoned himself at the approach of the enemy. The treasures found in the island amounted to the enormous sum of 1,356,250l. sterling, which were carried to Rome by the conquerors. Plutarch, Cato.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 9.—Florus, bk. 3.——A man who attempted to make himself king of Macedonia, in opposition to Perdiccas. He was expelled by Pelopidas.——A son of Pyrrhus king of Epirus, by Antigone the daughter of Berenice. He was left governor of Epirus, when Pyrrhus went to Italy to assist the Tarentines against the Romans, where he presided with great prudence and moderation. He was killed, bravely fighting in the expedition which Pyrrhus undertook against Sparta and Argos.——A eunuch, by whose friendly assistance Mithridates the Great saved his life after a battle with Lucullus.——A king of Epirus, who died very young as he was marching an army against the Ætolians, who had seized part of his dominions. Justin, bk. 28.——A king of Chalcidica in Syria, about 30 years before Christ. He opposed Pompey when he invaded Syria, but he was defeated in the attempt, and the conqueror spared his life only upon receiving 1000 talents. Josephus, Antiquities, bk. 13.——A nephew of Antigonus, who commanded an army in the Peloponnesus. He revolted from his uncle to Cassander, and some time after he attempted to bribe the soldiers of Ptolemy Lagus king of Egypt, who had invited him to his camp. He was seized and imprisoned for his treachery, and the Egyptian monarch at last ordered him to drink hemlock.——A son of Seleucus, killed in the celebrated battle which was fought at Issus, between Darius and Alexander the Great.——A son of Juba, made king of Mauritania. He was son of Cleopatra Selene the daughter of Marcus Antony, and the celebrated Cleopatra. He was put to death by Caius Caligula. Dio Cassius.—Tacitus, Annals, bk. 11.——A friend of Otho.——A favourite of Antiochus king of Syria. He was surnamed Macron.——A Jew, famous for his cruelty and avarice. He was for some time governor of Jericho, about 135 years before Christ.——A powerful Jew during the troubles which disturbed the peace of Judæa, in the reign of Augustus.——A son of Antony by Cleopatra, surnamed Philadelphus by his father, and made master of Phœnicia, Syria, and all the territories of Asia Minor, which were situated between the Ægean and the Euphrates. Plutarch, Antonius.——A general of Herod king of Judæa.——A son of Chrysermus, who visited Cleomenes king of Sparta, when imprisoned in Egypt.——A governor of Alexandria, put to death by Cleomenes.——Claudius, a celebrated geographer and astrologer in the reign of Adrian and Antoninus. He was a native of Alexandria, or, according to others, of Pelusium, and on account of his great learning, he received the name of most wise, and most divine, among the Greeks. In his system of the world, he places the earth in the centre of the universe, a doctrine universally believed and adopted till the 16th century, when it was confuted and rejected by Copernicus. His geography is valued for its learning, and the very useful information which he gives. Besides his system and his geography Ptolemy wrote other books, in one of which he gives an account of the fixed stars, of 1022 of which he mentions the certain and definite longitude and latitude. The best edition of Ptolemy’s geography is that of Bertius, folio, Amsterdam, 1618, and that of his treatise de Judiciis Astrologicis by Camerarii, 4to, 1555; and of the Harmonica, 4to, Wallis, Oxford, 1683.

Ptolemāis, a town of Thebais in Egypt, called after the Ptolemies, who beautified it. There was also another city of the same name in the territories of Cyrene. It was situate on the sea-coast, and, according to some, it was the same as Barce. See: [Barce].——A city of Palestine, called also Acon. Mela, bk. 1, ch. 8; bk. 3, ch. 8.—Pliny, bk. 2, ch. 73.—Strabo, bk. 14, &c.

Ptoly̆cus, a statuary of Corcyra, pupil to Critias the Athenian. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 3.

Ptous, a son of Athamas and Themisto, who gave his name to a mountain of Bœotia, upon which he built a temple to Apollo, surnamed Ptous. The god had also a celebrated oracle on mount Ptous. Plutarch, de Defectu Oraculorum.—Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 23.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 9.

Publicia lex, forbade any person to play with bad or [♦]fraudulent designs.

[♦] ‘fradulent’ replaced with ‘fraudulent’

Publicius, a Roman freedman, so much like Pompey the Great, that they were often confounded together. Valerius Maximus, bk. 9, ch. 14.

Publicŏla, a name given to Publius Valerius, on account of his great popularity. See: [Valerius]. Plutarch, Publicola.—Livy, bk. 2, ch. 8.—Pliny, bk. 30, ch. 15.

Publilia lex, was made by Publilius Philo the dictator, A.U.C. 445. It permitted one of the censors to be elected from the plebeians, since one of the consuls was chosen from that body. Livy, bk. 8, ch. 12.——Another, by which it was ordained, that all laws should be previously approved by the senators, before they were proposed by the people.

Publius Syrus, a Syrian mimic poet, who flourished about 44 years before Christ. He was originally a slave sold to a Roman patrician, called Domitius, who brought him up with great attention, and gave him his freedom when of age. He gained the esteem of the most powerful at Rome, and reckoned Julius Cæsar among his patrons. He soon eclipsed the poet Laberius, whose burlesque compositions were in general esteem. There remains of Publius a collection of moral sentences, written in iambics, and placed in alphabetical order; the newest edition of which is that of Patavium. Josephus Cominus, 1740.

Publius, a prænomen common among the Romans.——Caius, a man who conspired with Brutus against Julius Cæsar.——A pretor who conquered Palæpolis. He was only a plebeian, and though neither consul nor dictator, he obtained a triumph in spite of the opposition of the senators. He was the first who was honoured with a triumph during a pretorship.——A Roman consul who defeated the Latins, and was made dictator.——A Roman flatterer in the court of Tiberius.——A tribune who accused Manlius, &c.

Pudīcĭtia, a goddess who, as her name implies, presided over chastity. She had two temples at Rome. Festus, Lexicon of Festus.—Livy, bk. 10, ch. 7.

Pulchĕria, a daughter of the emperor Theodosius the Great, famous for her piety, moderation, and virtues.——A daughter of Arcadius, who held the government of the Roman empire for many years. She was mother of Valentinian. Her piety, and her private as well as public virtues, have been universally admired. She died A.D. 452, and was interred at Ravenna, where her tomb is still to be seen.——A sister of Theodosius, who reigned absolute for some time in the Roman empire.

Pulchrum, a promontory near Carthage, now Rasafran. Livy, bk. 29, ch. 27.

Pullus, a surname of Numitorius.

Punĭcum bellum. The first Punic war was undertaken by the Romans against Carthage, B.C. 264. The ambition of Rome was the origin of this war. For upwards of 240 years, the two nations had beheld with secret jealousy each other’s power, but they had totally eradicated every cause of contention, by settling, in three different treaties, the boundaries of their respective territories, the number of their allies, and how far one nation might sail in the Mediterranean without giving offence to the other. Sicily, an island of the highest consequence to the Carthaginians as a commercial nation, was the seat of the first dissensions. The Mamertini, a body of Italian mercenaries, were appointed by the king of Syracuse to guard the town of Messana, but this tumultuous tribe, instead of protecting the citizens, basely massacred them, and seized their possessions. This act of cruelty raised the indignation of all the Sicilians, and Hiero king of Syracuse, who had employed them, prepared to punish their perfidy; and the Mamertini, besieged in Messana, and without friends or resources, resolved to throw themselves for protection into the hands of the first power that could relieve them. They were, however, divided in their sentiments, and while some implored the assistance of Carthage, others called upon the Romans for protection. Without hesitation or delay, the Carthaginians entered Messana, and the Romans also hastened to give to the Mamertini that aid which had been claimed from them with as much eagerness as from the Carthaginians. At the approach of the Roman troops, the Mamertini, who had implored their assistance, took up arms, and forced the Carthaginians to evacuate Messana. Fresh forces were poured in on every side, and though Carthage seemed superior in arms and in resources, yet the valour and intrepidity of the Romans daily appeared more formidable, and Hiero, the Syracusan king, who hitherto had embraced the interest of the Carthaginians, became the most faithful ally of the republic. From a private quarrel the war became general. The Romans obtained a victory in Sicily, but as their enemies were masters at sea, the advantages which they gained were small and inconsiderable. To make themselves equal to their adversaries, they aspired to the dominion of the sea, and in 60 days timber was cut down, and a fleet of 120 galleys completely manned and provisioned. The successes they met with at sea were trivial, and little advantages could be gained over an enemy that were sailors by actual practice and long experience. [♦]Duillius at last obtained a victory, and he was the first Roman who ever received a triumph after a naval battle. The losses which they had already sustained induced the Carthaginians to sue for peace, and the Romans, whom an unsuccessful descent upon Africa, under Regulus [See: [Regulus]], had rendered diffident, listened to the proposal, and the first Punic war was concluded B.C. 241, on the following terms:—The Carthaginians pledged themselves to pay to the Romans, within 20 years, the sum of 3000 Euboic talents; they promised to release all the Roman captives without ransom, to evacuate Sicily, and the other islands in the Mediterranean, and not to molest Hiero king of Syracuse, or his allies. After this treaty, the Carthaginians, who had lost the dominion of Sardinia and Sicily, made new conquests in Spain, and soon began to repair their losses by industry and labour. They planted colonies, and secretly prepared to revenge themselves upon their powerful rivals. The Romans were not insensible of their successes in Spain, and to stop their progress towards Italy, they made stipulations with the Carthaginians, by which they were not permitted to cross the Iberus, or to molest the cities of their allies the Saguntines. This was for some time observed, but when Annibal succeeded to the command of the Carthaginian armies in Spain, he spurned the boundaries which the jealousy of Rome had set to his arms, and he immediately formed the siege of Saguntum. The Romans were apprised of the hostilities which had been begun against their allies, but Saguntum was in the hands of the active enemy before they had taken any steps to oppose him. Complaints were carried to Carthage, and war was determined on by the influence of Annibal in the Carthaginian senate. Without delay or diffidence, B.C. 218, Annibal marched a numerous army of 90,000 foot and 12,000 horse towards Italy, resolved to carry on the war to the gates of Rome. He crossed the Rhone, the Alps, and the Apennines, with uncommon celerity, and the Roman consuls who were stationed to stop his progress were severally defeated. The battles of Trebia, of Ticinus, and of the lake of Thrasymenus, threw Rome into the greatest apprehensions, but the prudence and the dilatory measures of the dictator Fabius soon taught them to hope for better times. Yet the conduct of Fabius was universally censured as cowardice, and the two consuls who succeeded him in the command, by pursuing a different plan of operations, soon brought on a decisive action at Cannæ, in which 45,000 Romans were left in the field of battle. This bloody victory caused so much consternation at Rome, that some authors have declared that if Annibal had immediately marched from the plains of Cannæ to the city, he would have met with no resistance, but would have terminated a long and dangerous war with glory to himself, and the most inestimable advantages to his country. This celebrated victory at Cannæ left the conqueror master of two camps, and of an immense booty; and the cities which had hitherto observed a neutrality, no sooner saw the defeat of the Romans, than they eagerly embraced the interest of Carthage. The news of this victory was carried to Carthage by Mago, and the Carthaginians refused to believe it till three bushels of golden rings were spread before them, which had been taken from the Roman knights in the field of battle. After this Annibal called his brother Asdrubal from Spain with a large reinforcement; but the march of Asdrubal was intercepted by the Romans, his army was defeated, and himself slain. Affairs now had taken a different turn, and Marcellus, who had the command of the Roman legions in Italy, soon taught his countrymen that Annibal was not invincible in the field. In different parts of the world the Romans were making very rapid conquests, and if the sudden arrival of a Carthaginian army in Italy at first raised fears and apprehensions, they were soon enabled to dispute with their enemies for the sovereignty of Spain and the dominion of the sea. Annibal no longer appeared formidable in Italy; if he conquered towns in Campania or Magna Græcia, he remained master of them only while his army hovered in the neighbourhood, and if he marched towards Rome the alarm he occasioned was but momentary; the Romans were prepared to oppose him, and his retreat was therefore the more dishonourable. The conquests of young Scipio in Spain had now raised the expectations of the Romans, and he had no sooner returned to Rome than he proposed to remove Annibal from the capital of Italy by carrying the war to the gates of Carthage. This was a bold and hazardous enterprise, but though Fabius opposed it, it was universally approved by the Roman senate, and young Scipio was empowered to sail to Africa. The conquests of the young Roman were as rapid in Africa as in Spain, and the Carthaginians, apprehensive for the fate of their capital, recalled Annibal from Italy, and preferred their safety at home to the maintaining of a long and expensive war in another quarter of the globe. Annibal received their orders with indignation, and with tears in his eyes he left Italy, where for 16 years he had known no superior in the field of battle. At his arrival in Africa, the Carthaginian general soon collected a large army, and met his exulting adversary in the plains of Zama. The battle was long and bloody, and though one nation fought for glory, and the other for the dearer sake of liberty, the Romans obtained the victory, and Annibal, who had sworn eternal enmity to the gods of Rome, fled from Carthage after he had advised his countrymen to accept the terms of the conqueror. This battle of Zama was decisive, the Carthaginians sued for peace, which the haughty conquerors granted with difficulty. The conditions were these: Carthage was permitted to hold all the possessions which she had in Africa before the war, and to be governed by her own laws and institutions. She was ordered to make restitution of all the ships and other effects which had been taken in violation of a truce that had been agreed upon by both nations. She was to surrender the whole of her fleet, except 10 galleys; she was to release and deliver up all the captives, deserters, or fugitives, taken or received during the war; to indemnify Masinissa for all the losses which he had sustained; to deliver up all her elephants, and for the future never more to tame or break any more of these animals. She was not to make war upon any nation whatever without the consent of the Romans, and she was to reimburse the Romans, to pay the sum of 10,000 talents, at the rate of 200 talents a year for 50 years, and she was to give up hostages from the noblest families for the performance of these several articles; and till the ratification of the treaty, to supply the Roman forces with money and provisions. These humiliating conditions were accepted 201 B.C., and immediately 4000 Roman captives were released, 500 galleys were delivered and burnt on the spot, but the immediate exaction of 200 talents was more severely felt, and many of the Carthaginian senators burst into tears. During the 50 years which followed the conclusion of the second Punic war, the Carthaginians were employed in repairing their losses by unwearied application and industry; but they found still in the Romans a jealous rival and a haughty conqueror, and in Masinissa the ally of Rome an intriguing and ambitious monarch. The king of Numidia made himself master of one of their provinces; but as they were unable to make war without the consent of Rome, the Carthaginians sought relief by embassies, and made continual complaints in the Roman senate of the tyranny and oppression of Masinissa. Commissioners were appointed to examine the cause of their complaints; but as Masinissa was the ally of Rome, the interest of the Carthaginians was neglected, and whatever seemed to depress their republic was agreeable to the Romans. Cato, who was in the number of the commissioners, examined the capital of Africa with a jealous eye; he saw it with concern, rising as it were from its ruins; and when he returned to Rome he declared, in full senate, that the peace of Italy would never be established while Carthage was in being. The senators, however, were not guided by his opinion, and the delenda est Carthago of Cato did not prevent the Romans from acting with moderation. But while the senate were debating about the existence of Carthage, and while they considered it as a dependent power, and not as an ally, the wrongs of Africa were without redress, and Masinissa continued his depredations. Upon this the Carthaginians resolved to do their cause that justice which the Romans had denied them; they entered the field against the Numidians, but they were defeated in a bloody battle by Masinissa, who was then 90 years old. In this bold measure they had broken the peace; and as their late defeat had rendered them desperate, they hastened with all possible speed to the capital of Italy to justify their proceedings, and to implore the forgiveness of the Roman senate. The news of Masinissa’s victory had already reached Italy, and immediately some forces were sent to Sicily, and from thence ordered to pass into Africa. The ambassadors of Carthage received evasive and unsatisfactory answers from the senate; and when they saw the Romans landed at Utica, they resolved to purchase peace by the most submissive terms which even the most abject slaves could offer. The Romans acted with the deepest policy; no declaration of war had been made, though hostilities appeared inevitable; and in answer to the submissive offers of Carthage, the consuls replied, that to prevent every cause of quarrel, the Carthaginians must deliver into their hands 300 hostages, all children of senators, and of the most noble and respectable families. The demand was great and alarming, but it was no sooner granted, than the Romans made another demand, and the Carthaginians were told that peace could not continue, if they refused to deliver up all their ships, their arms, engines of war, with all their naval and military stores. The Carthaginians complied, and immediately 40,000 suits of armour, 20,000 large engines of war, with a plentiful store of ammunition and missile weapons, were surrendered. After this duplicity had succeeded, the Romans laid open the final resolutions of the senate, and the Carthaginians were then told that, to avoid hostilities, they must leave their ancient habitations and retire into the inland parts of Africa, and found another city, at the distance of not less than 10 miles from the sea. This was heard with horror and indignation; the Romans were fixed and inexorable, and Carthage was filled with tears and lamentations. But the spirit of liberty and independence was not yet extinguished in the capital of Africa, and the Carthaginians determined to sacrifice their lives for the protection of their gods, the tombs of their forefathers, and the place which had given them birth. Before the Roman army approached the city, preparations to support a siege were made, and the ramparts of Carthage were covered with stones, to compensate for the weapons and instruments of war which they had ignorantly betrayed to the duplicity of their enemies. Asdrubal, whom the despair of his countrymen had banished on account of the unsuccessful expedition against Masinissa, was immediately recalled; and, in the moment of danger, Carthage seemed to have possessed more spirit and more vigour than when Annibal was victorious at the gates of Rome. The town was blocked up by the Romans, and a regular siege begun. Two years were spent in useless operations, and Carthage seemed still able to rise from its ruins, to dispute for the empire of the world; when Scipio, the descendant of the great Scipio, who finished the second Punic war, was sent to conduct the siege. The vigour of his operations soon baffled the efforts and the bold resistance of the besieged; the communications which they had with the land were cut off, and the city, which was 20 miles in circumference, was completely surrounded on all sides by the enemy. Despair and famine now raged in the city, and Scipio gained access to the city walls, where the battlements were low and unguarded. His entrance into the streets was disputed with uncommon fury, the houses as he advanced were set on fire to stop his progress; but when a body of 50,000 persons of either sex had claimed quarter, the rest of the inhabitants were disheartened, and such as disdained to be prisoners of war perished in the flames, which gradually destroyed their habitations, 147 B.C., after a continuation of hostilities for three years. During 17 days Carthage was in flames; and the soldiers were permitted to redeem from the fire whatever possession they could. But while others profited from the destruction of Carthage, the philosophic general, struck by the melancholy aspect of the scene, repeated two lines from Homer, which contained a prophecy concerning the fall of Troy. He was asked by the historian Polybius to what he then applied his prediction. “To my country,” replied Scipio; “for her too I dread the vicissitude of human affairs, and in her turn she may exhibit another flaming Carthage.” This remarkable event happened about the year of Rome 606. The news of this victory caused the greatest rejoicings at Rome; and immediately commissioners were appointed by the Roman senate, not only to raze the walls of Carthage, but even to demolish and burn the very materials with which they were made: and in a few days, that city which had been once the seat of commerce, the model of magnificence, the common store of the wealth of nations, and one of the most powerful states of the world, left behind no traces of its splendour, of its power, or even of its existence. Polybius.—Orosius.—Appian, Punic Wars, &c.—Florus.—Plutarch, Cato, &c.—Strabo.—Livy, Epitaph.—Diodorus.

[♦] ‘Duilius’ replaced with ‘Duillius’

Pupia lex, de senatu, required that the senate should not be assembled from the 18th of the calends of February to the calends of the same month, and that before the embassies were either accepted or rejected, the senate should be held on no account.

Pupiēnus Marcus Claudius Maximus, a man of an obscure family, who raised himself by his merit to the highest offices in the Roman armies, and gradually became a pretor, consul, prefect of Rome, and a governor of the provinces. His father was a blacksmith. After the death of the Gordians, Pupienus was elected with Balbinus to the imperial throne, and to rid the world of the usurpation and tyranny of the Maximini, he immediately marched against these tyrants; but he was soon informed that they had been sacrificed to the fury and resentment of their own soldiers; and therefore he retired to Rome to enjoy the tranquillity which his merit claimed. He soon after prepared to make war against the Persians, who insulted the majesty of Rome, but in this he was prevented, and massacred A.D. 236, by the pretorian guards. Balbinus shared his fate. Pupienus is sometimes called Maximus. In his private character he appeared always grave and serious; he was the constant friend of justice, moderation, and clemency, and no greater encomium can be passed upon his virtues than to say that he was invested with the purple without soliciting for it, and that the Roman senate said that they had selected him from thousands because they knew no person more worthy or better qualified to support the dignity of an emperor.

Pupius, a centurion of Pompey’s army, seized by Cæsar’s soldiers, &c. Cæsar, Gallic War, bk. 1, ch. 13.

Puppius, a tragic poet in the age of Julius Cæsar. His tragedies were so pathetic, that when they were represented on the Roman stage, the audience melted into tears, from which circumstance Horace calls them lacrymosa, bk. 1, ltr. 1, li. 67.

Purpurăriæ, two islands of the Atlantic on the African coast, now Lancarota and Fortaventura. Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 31; bk. 35, ch. 6.

Puteŏli, a maritime town of Campania, between Baiæ and Naples, founded by a colony from Cumæ. It was originally called Dicæarchia, and afterwards Puteoli, from the great number of wells that were in the neighbourhood. It was much frequented by the Romans, on account of its mineral waters and hot baths, and near it Cicero had a villa called Puteolanum. It is now called Puzzoli, and contains, instead of its ancient magnificence, not more than 10,000 inhabitants. Silius Italicus, bk. 13, li. 385.—Strabo, bk. 5.—Varro, de Lingua Latina, bk. 4, ch. 5.—Cicero, Philippics, bk. 8, ch. 3; Letters to his Friends, bk. 15, ltr. 5.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 4.—Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 7.

Puticŭlæ, a place near the Esquiline gate, where the meanest of the Roman populace were buried. Part of it was converted into a garden by Mecænas, who received it as a present from Augustus. Horace, bk. 1, satire 8, li. 8.—Varro, de Lingua Latina, bk. 4, ch. 5.

Pyanepsia, an Athenian festival celebrated in honour of Theseus and his companions; who, after their return from Crete, were entertained with all manner of fruits, and particularly pulse. From this circumstance, the Pyanepsia was ever after commemorated by the boiling of pulse, ἀπο του ἑψειν πυανα. Some, however, suppose that it was observed in commemoration of the Heraclidæ, who were entertained with pulse by the Athenians.

Pydna, a town of Macedonia, originally called Citron, situate between the mouth of the rivers Aliacmon and Lydius. It was in this city that Cassander massacred Olympias the mother of Alexander the Great, his wife Roxane, and his son Alexander. Pydna is famous for a battle which was fought there, on the 22nd of June, B.C. 168, between the Romans under Paulus, and king Perseus, in which the latter was conquered, and Macedonia soon after reduced to the form of a Roman province. Justin, bk. 14, ch. 6.—Florus.—Plutarch, Æmilius Paulus.—Livy, bk. 44, ch. 10.

Pygela, a seaport town of Ionia. Livy, bk. 37, ch. 11.

Pygmæi, a nation of dwarfs, in the extremest parts of India, or, according to others, in Æthiopia. Some authors affirm that they were no more than one foot high, and that they built their houses with egg-shells. Aristotle says that they lived in holes under the earth, and that they came out in the harvest time with hatchets to cut down the corn as if to fell a forest. They went on goats and lambs of proportionable stature to themselves, to make war against certain birds, whom some call cranes, which came there yearly from Scythia to plunder them. They were originally governed by Gerana, a princess who was changed into a crane, for boasting herself fairer than Juno. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 6, li. 90.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 3.—Strabo, bk. 7.—Aristotle, History of Animals, bk. 8, ch. 12.—Juvenal, satire 13, li. 186.—Pliny, bk. 4, &c.—Mela, bk. 3, ch. 8.—Suetonius, Augustus, ch. 83.—Philostratus, Imagines, bk. 2, ch. 22, mentions that Hercules once fell asleep in the deserts of Africa, after he had conquered Antæus, and that he was suddenly awakened by an attack which had been made upon his body by an army of these Liliputians, who discharged their arrows with great fury upon his arms and legs. The hero, pleased with their courage, wrapped the greatest number of them in the skin of the Nemæan lion, and carried them to Eurystheus.

Pygmæon, a surname of Adonis in Cyprus. Hesychius.

Pygmălion, a king of Tyre, son of Belus, and brother to the celebrated Dido, who founded Carthage. At the death of his father, he ascended the vacant throne, and soon became odious by his cruelty and avarice. He sacrificed everything to the gratification of his predominant passions, and he did not even spare the life of Sichæus, Dido’s husband, because he was the most powerful and opulent of all the Phœnicians. This murder he committed in a temple, of which Sichæus was the priest; but instead of obtaining the riches which he desired, Pygmalion was shunned by his subjects, and Dido, to avoid further acts of cruelty, fled away with her husband’s treasures, and a large colony, to the coast of Africa, where she founded a city. Pygmalion died in the 56th year of his age, and in the 47th of his reign. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1, li. 347, &c.—Justin, bk. 18, ch. 5.—Apollodorus, bk. 3.—Silius Italicus, bk. 1.——A celebrated statuary of the island of Cyprus. The debauchery of the females of Amathus, to which he was a witness, created in him such an aversion for the fair sex, that he resolved never to marry. The affection which he had denied to the other sex, he liberally bestowed upon the works of his own hands. He became enamoured of a beautiful statue of marble which he had made, and at his earnest request and prayers, according to the mythologists, the goddess of beauty changed the favourite statue into a woman, whom the artist married, and by whom he had a son called Paphus, who founded the city of that name in Cyprus. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 10, fable 9.

Pylădes, a son of Strophius king of Phocis, by one of the sisters of Agamemnon. He was educated, together with his cousin Orestes, with whom he formed the most inviolable friendship, and whom he assisted to revenge the murder of Agamemnon, by assassinating Clytemnestra and Ægysthus. He also accompanied him to Taurica Chersonesus, and for his services Orestes rewarded him by giving him his sister Electra in marriage. Pylades had by her two sons, Medon and Strophius. The friendship of Orestes and Pylades became proverbial. See: [Orestes]. Euripides, Iphigeneia.—Æschylus, Agamemnon, &c.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 28.——A celebrated Greek musician, in the age of Philopœmen. Plutarch, Philopœmen.——A mimic in the reign of Augustus, banished, and afterwards recalled.

Pylæ, a town of Asia, between Cappadocia and Cilicia. Cicero, bk. 5, Letters to Atticus. The word Pylæ, which signifies gates, was often applied by the Greeks to any straits or passages which opened a communication between one country and another, such as the straits of Thermopylæ, of Persia, Hyrcania, &c.

Pylæmĕnes, a Paphlagonian, son of Melius, who came to the Trojan war, and was killed by Menelaus. His son, called Harpalion, was killed by Meriones. Dictys Cretensis, bk. 2, ch. 34.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 2, li. 358.——A king of Mæonia, who sent his sons, Mestes and Antiphus, to the Trojan war.——Another, son of Nicomedes, banished from Paphlagonia by Mithridates, and restored by Pompey. Eutropius, bks. 5 & 6.

Pylagŏræ, a name given to the Amphictyonic council, because they always assembled at Pylæ, near the temple of Delphi.

Pylāon, a son of Neleus and Chloris, killed by Hercules with his brothers. Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 9.

Pylarge, a daughter of Danaus. Apollodorus.

Pylartes, a Trojan killed by Patroclus. Homer, Iliad, bk. 16, li. 695.

Pylas, a king of Megara. He had the misfortune accidentally to kill his uncle Bias, for which he fled away, leaving his kingdom to Pandion his son-in-law, who had been driven from Athens. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 15.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 39.

Pylēne, a town of Ætolia. Homer, Iliad, bk. 2.

Pyleus, a Trojan chief, killed by Achilles.——A son of Clymenus king of Orchomenos.

Pylleon, a town of Thessaly. Livy, bk. 42, ch. 42.

Pylo, a daughter of Thespius, mother of Hippotas. Apollodorus.

Pylos, now Navarin, a town of Messenia, situate on the western coast of the Peloponnesus, opposite the island Sphacteria in the Ionian sea. It was also called Coryphasion, from the promontory on which it was erected. It was built by Pylus, at the head of a colony from Megara. The founder was dispossessed of it by Neleus, and fled into Elis, where he dwelt in a small town, which he also called Pylos.——A town of Elis, at the mouth of the river Alpheus, between the Peneus and the Selleis.——Another town of Elis, called Triphyliacha, from Triphylia, a province of Elis, where it was situate. These three cities, which bore the name of Pylos, disputed their respective right to the honour of having given birth to the celebrated Nestor son of Neleus. The Pylos which is situated near the Alpheus seems to win the palm, as it had in its neighbourhood a small village called Geranus, and a river called Geron, of which Homer makes mention. Pindar, however, calls Nestor king of Messenia, and therefore gives the preference to the first-mentioned of these three cities. Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 19; bk. 3, ch. 15.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 39.—Strabo, bk. 9.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 2, Odyssey, bk. 3.

Pylus, a town. See: [Pylos].——A son of Mars by Demonice the daughter of Agenor. He was present at the chase of the Calydonian boar. Apollodorus, bk. 1.

Pyra, part of mount Œta, on which the body of Hercules was burnt. Livy, bk. 36, ch. 30.

Pyracmon, one of Vulcan’s workmen in the forges of mount Ætna. The name is derived from two Greek words which signify fire and an anvil. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 8, li. 425.

Pyracmos, a man killed by Cæneus. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 12, li. 460.

Pyræchmes, a king of Eubœa.——A king of Pæonia during the Trojan war.

Pyrămus, a youth of Babylon, who became enamoured of Thisbe, a beautiful virgin who dwelt in the neighbourhood. The flame was mutual, and the two lovers, whom their parents forbade to marry, regularly received each other’s addresses through the chink of a wall, which separated their houses. After the most solemn vows of sincerity they both agreed to elude the vigilance of their friends, and to meet one another at the tomb of Ninus, under a white mulberry tree, without the walls of Babylon. Thisbe came first to the appointed place, but the sudden arrival of a lioness frightened her away; and as she fled into a neighbouring cave she dropped her veil, which the lioness found and besmeared with blood. Pyramus soon arrived; he found Thisbe’s veil all bloody, and concluding that she had been torn to pieces by the wild beasts of the place, he stabbed himself with his sword. Thisbe, when her fears were vanished, returned from the cave, and at the sight of the dying Pyramus, she fell upon the sword which still reeked with his blood. This tragical scene happened under a white mulberry tree, which, as the poets mention, was stained with the blood of the lovers, and ever after bore fruit of the colour of blood. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 4, li. 55, &c.—Hyginus, fable 243.——A river of Cilicia, rising in mount Taurus, and falling into the Pamphylian sea. Cicero, bk. 3, Letters to his Friends, ltr. 11.—Dionysius Periegetes.

Pyrenæa Venus, a town of Gallia [♦]Narbonensis.

[♦] ‘Narbonesis’ replaced with ‘Narbonensis’

Pyrēnæi, a mountain, or a long ridge of high mountains, which separate Gaul from Spain, and extend from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean sea. They receive their name from Pyrene the daughter of Bebrycius [See: [Pyrene]], or from the fire (πυρ) which once raged there for several days. This fire was originally kindled by shepherds, and so intense was the heat which it occasioned, that all the silver mines of the mountains were melted, and ran down in large rivulets. This account is deemed fabulous by Strabo and others. Diodorus, bk. 5.—Strabo, bk. 3.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 6.—Silius Italicus, bk. 3, li. 415.—Livy, bk. 21, ch. 60.—Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 34.

Pyrenæus, a king of Thrace, who, during a shower of rain, gave shelter in his house to the nine muses, and attempted to offer them violence. The goddesses upon this took to their wings and flew away. Pyrenæus, who attempted to follow them, as if he had wings, threw himself down from the top of a tower and was killed. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, li. 274.

Pyrēne, a daughter of Bebrycius king of the southern parts of Spain. Hercules offered violence to her before he went to attack Geryon, and she brought into the world a serpent, which so terrified her, that she fled into the woods, where she was torn to pieces by wild beasts.——A nymph, mother of Cycnus by Mars. Apollodorus.——A fountain near Corinth.——A small village in Celtic Gaul, near which, according to some, the river Ister took its rise.

Pyrgi, an ancient town of Etruria, on the sea coast. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 10, li. 184.—Livy, bk. 36, ch. 3.

Pyrgion, an historian who wrote on the laws of Crete. Athenæus.

Pyrgo, the nurse of Priam’s children, who followed Æneas in his flight from Troy. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 645.

Pyrgotĕles, a celebrated engraver on gems in the age of Alexander the Great. He had the exclusive privilege of engraving the conqueror, as Lysippus was the only sculptor who was permitted to make statues of him. Pliny, bk. 37, ch. 1.

Pyrgrus, a fortified place of Elis in the Peloponnesus.

Pyrippe, a daughter of Thespius.

Pyro, one of the Oceanides. Hesiod.

Pyrodes, a son of Cilix, said to be the first who discovered and applied to human purposes the fire concealed in flints. Pliny, bk. 7, ch. 56.

Pyrois, one of the horses of the sun. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 2, li. 153.

Pyronia, a surname of Diana. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 16.

Pyrrha, a daughter of Epimetheus and Pandora, who married Deucalion the son of Prometheus, who reigned in Thessaly. In her age all mankind were destroyed by a deluge, and she alone, with her husband, escaped from the general destruction, by saving themselves in a boat which Deucalion had made by his father’s advice. When the waters had retired from the surface of the earth, Pyrrha, with her husband, went to the oracle of Themis, where they were directed, to repair the loss of mankind, to throw stones behind their backs. They obeyed, and the stones which Pyrrha threw were changed into women, and those of Deucalion into men. See: [Deucalion]. Pyrrha became mother of Amphictyon, Hellen, and Protogenea by Deucalion. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 350, &c.—Hyginus, fable 153.—Apollonius of Rhodes, bk. 3, li. 1085.——A daughter of Creon king of Thebes. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 10.——The name which Achilles bore when he disguised himself in women’s clothes, at the court of Lycomedes. Hyginus, fable 96.——A town of Eubœa. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 7.——A promontory of Phthiotis, on the bay of Malia.——A town of Lesbos.——A beautiful courtesan at Rome, of whom Horace was long an admirer. Horace, bk. 1, ode 5.

Pyrrheus, a place in the city of Ambracia. Livy, bk. 38, ch. 5.

Pyrrhi castra, a place of Lucania. Livy, bk. 35, ch. 27.

Pyrrhias, a boatman of Ithaca, remarkable for his humanity. He delivered from slavery an old man who had been taken by pirates, and robbed of some pots full of pitch. The old man was so grateful for his kindness, that he gave the pots to his deliverer, after he had told him that they contained gold under the pitch. Pyrrhias, upon this, offered the sacrifice of a bull to the old man, and retained him in his house, with every act of kindness and attention, till the time of his death. Plutarch, Quæstiones Græcæ.——A general of the Ætolians, defeated by Philip, king of Macedonia.

Pyrrhicha, a kind of dance, said to be invented and introduced into Greece by Pyrrhus the son of Achilles. The dancers were generally armed. Pliny, bk. 7, ch. 56.

Pyrrhicus, a free town of Laconia. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 21.—Athenæus, bk. 14.

Pyrrhidæ, a patronymic given to the successors of Neoptolemus in Epirus.

Pyrrho, a philosopher of Elis, disciple to Anaxarchus, and originally a painter. His father’s name was Plistarchus, or Pistocrates. He was in continual suspense of judgment; he doubted of everything, never made any conclusions, and when he had carefully examined a subject, and investigated all its parts, he concluded by still doubting of its evidence. This manner of doubting in the philosopher has been called Pyrrhonism, and his disciples have received the appellation of sceptics, inquisitors, examiners, &c. He pretended to have acquired an uncommon dominion over opinion and passions. The former of these virtues he called ataraxia, and the latter matriopathia, and so far did he carry his want of common feeling and sympathy, that he passed with unconcern near a ditch in which his master Anaxarchus had fallen, and where he nearly perished. He was once in a storm, and when all hopes were vanished, and destruction certain, the philosopher remained unconcerned; and while the rest of the crew were lost in lamentations, he plainly told them to look at a pig which was then feeding himself on board the vessel, exclaiming, “This is a true model for a wise man.” As he showed so much indifference in everything, and declared that life and death were the same thing, some of his disciples asked him why he did not hurry himself out of the world. “Because,” says he, “there is no difference between life and death.” When he walked in the streets he never looked behind, or moved from the road for a chariot, even in its most rapid course; and, indeed, as some authors remark, this indifference for his safety often exposed him to the greatest and most imminent dangers, from which he was saved by the interference of his friends who followed him. He flourished B.C. 304, and died at the advanced age of 90. He left no writings behind him. His countrymen were so partial to him that they raised statues to his memory, and exempted all the philosophers of Elis from taxes. Diogenes Laërtius, bk. 9.—Cicero, On Oratory, bk. 3, ch. 17.—Aulus Gellius, bk. 11, ch. 5.—Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 24.

Pyrrhus, a son of Achilles and Deidamia the daughter of king Lycomedes, who received this name from the yellowness of his hair. He was also called Neoptolemus, or new warrior, because he came to the Trojan war in the last year of the celebrated siege of the capital of Troas. See: [Neoptolemus].——A king of Epirus, descended from Achilles by the side of his mother, and from Hercules by that of his father, and son of Æacides and Phthia. He was saved when an infant, by the fidelity of his servants, from the pursuits of the enemies of his father, who had been banished from his kingdom, and he was carried to the court of Glautias king of Illyricum, who educated him with great tenderness. Cassander king of Macedonia wished to despatch him, as he had so much to dread from him; but Glautias not only refused to deliver him up into the hands of his enemy but he even went with an army and placed him on the throne of Epirus, though only 12 years of age. About five years after, the absence of Pyrrhus, to attend the nuptials of one of the daughters of [♦]Glautias, raised new commotions. The monarch was expelled from his throne by Neoptolemus, who had usurped it after the death of Æacides; and being still without resources, he applied to his brother-in-law Demetrius for assistance. He accompanied Demetrius at the battle of Ipsus, and fought there with all the prudence and intrepidity of an experienced general. He afterwards passed into Egypt, where, by his marriage with Antigone the daughter of Berenice, he soon obtained a sufficient force to attempt the recovery of his throne. He was successful in the undertaking, but to remove all causes of quarrel, he took the usurper to share with him the royalty, and some time after he put him to death under pretence that he had attempted to poison him. In the subsequent years of his reign, Pyrrhus engaged in the quarrels which disturbed the peace of the Macedonian monarchy; he marched against Demetrius, and gave the Macedonian soldiers fresh proofs of his valour and activity. By dissimulation he ingratiated himself in the minds of his enemy’s subjects, and when Demetrius laboured under a momentary illness, Pyrrhus made an attempt upon the crown of Macedonia, which, if not then successful, soon after rendered him master of the kingdom. This he shared with Lysimachus for seven months, till the jealousy of the Macedonians, and the ambition of his colleague, obliged him to retire. Pyrrhus was meditating new conquests, when the Tarentines invited him to Italy to assist them against the encroaching power of Rome. He gladly accepted the invitation, but his passage across the Adriatic proved nearly fatal, and he reached the shores of Italy, after the loss of the greatest part of his troops in a storm. At his entrance into Tarentum, B.C. 280, he began to reform the manners of the inhabitants, and by introducing the strictest discipline among their troops, to accustom them to bear fatigue and to despise dangers. In the first battle which he fought with the Romans, he obtained the victory, but for this he was more particularly indebted to his elephants, whose bulk and uncommon appearance astonished the Romans and terrified their cavalry. The number of the slain was equal on both sides, and the conqueror said that such another victory would totally ruin him. He also sent Cineas, his chief minister, to Rome, and though victorious, he sued for peace. These offers of peace were refused, and when Pyrrhus questioned Cineas about the manners and the character of the Romans, the sagacious minister replied, that their senate was a venerable assembly of kings, and that to fight against them, was to attack another Hydra. A second battle was fought near Asculum, but the slaughter was so great, and the valour so conspicuous on both sides, that the Romans and their enemies reciprocally claimed the victory as their own. Pyrrhus still continued the war in favour of the Tarentines, when he was invited into Sicily by the inhabitants, who laboured under the yoke of Carthage, and the cruelty of their own petty tyrants. His fondness of novelty soon determined him to quit Italy; he left a garrison at Tarentum, and crossed over to Sicily, where he obtained two victories over the Carthaginians, and took many of their towns. He was for a while successful, and formed the project of invading Africa; but soon his popularity vanished, his troops became insolent, and he behaved with haughtiness, and showed himself oppressive, so that his return to Italy was deemed a fortunate event for all Sicily. He had no sooner arrived at Tarentum than he renewed hostilities with the Romans with great acrimony, but when his army of 80,000 men had been defeated by 20,000 of the enemy, under Curius, he left Italy with precipitation, B.C. 274, ashamed of the enterprise, and mortified by the victories which had been obtained over one of the descendants of Achilles. In Epirus he began to repair his military character by attacking Antigonus, who was then on the Macedonian throne. He gained some advantages over his enemy, and was at last restored to the throne of Macedonia. He afterwards marched against Sparta, at the request of Cleonymus, but when all his vigorous operations were insufficient to take the capital of Laconia, he retired to Argos, where the treachery of Aristeus invited him. The Argives desired him to retire, and not to interfere in the affairs of their republic, which were confounded by the ambition of two of their nobles. He complied with their wishes, but in the night he marched his forces into the town, and might have made himself master of the place had he not retarded his progress by entering it with his elephants. The combat that ensued was obstinate and bloody, and the monarch, to fight with more boldness, and to encounter dangers with more facility, exchanged his dress. He was attacked by one of the enemy, but as he was going to run him through in his own defence, the mother of the Argive, who saw her son’s danger from the top of a house, threw down a tile and brought Pyrrhus to the ground. His head was cut off, and carried to Antigonus, who gave his remains a magnificent funeral, and presented his ashes to his son Helenus, 272 years before the christian era. Pyrrhus has been deservedly commended for his talents as a general; and not only his friends, but also his enemies, have been warm in extolling him; and Annibal declared, that for experience and sagacity the king of Epirus was the first of commanders. He had chosen Alexander the Great for a model, and in everything he wished not only to imitate, but to surpass him. In the art of war none were superior to him; he not only made it his study as a general, but even he wrote many books on encampments, and the different ways of training up an army, and whatever he did was by principle and rule. His uncommon understanding and his penetration are also admired; but the general is severely censured, who has no sooner conquered a country, than he looks for other victories, without regarding or securing what he has already obtained, by measures and regulations honourable to himself, and advantageous to his subjects. The Romans passed great encomiums upon him, and Pyrrhus was no less struck with their magnanimity and valour; so much indeed, that he exclaimed that if he had soldiers like the Romans, or if the Romans had him for a general, he would leave no corner of the earth unseen, and no nation unconquered. Pyrrhus married many wives, and all for political reasons; besides Antigone, he had Lanassa the daughter of Agathocles, as also a daughter of Autoleon king of Pæonia. His children, as his biographer observes, derived a warlike spirit from their father, and when he was asked by one to which of them he should leave the kingdom of Epirus, he replied, to him who has the sharpest sword. Ælian, De Natura Animalium, bk. 10.—Plutarch, Lives.—Justin, bk. 17, &c.—Livy, bks. 13 & 14.—Horace, bk. 3, ode 6.——A king of Epirus, son of Ptolemy, murdered by the people of Ambracia. His daughter, called Laudamia, or Deidamia, succeeded him. Pausanias.——A son of Dædalus.

[♦] ‘Glautius’ replaced with ‘Glautias’

Pyste, the wife of Seleucus, taken prisoner by the Gauls, &c. Polyænus, bk. 2.

Pythagŏras, a celebrated philosopher, born at Samos. His father Mnesarchus was a person of distinction, and therefore the son received that education which was most calculated to enlighten his mind and invigorate his body. Like his contemporaries, he was early made acquainted with poetry and music; eloquence and astronomy became his private studies, and in gymnastic exercises he often bore the palm for strength and dexterity. He first made himself known in Greece, at the Olympic games, where he obtained, in the 18th year of his age, the prize for wrestling; and, after he had been admired for the elegance and the dignity of his person, and the brilliancy of his understanding, he retired into the east. In Egypt and Chaldæa he gained the confidence of the priests, and learned from them the artful policy, and the symbolic writings, by which they governed the prince as well as the people, and, after he had spent many years in gathering all the information which could be collected from antique tradition concerning the nature of the gods and the immortality of the soul, Pythagoras revisited his native island. The tyranny of Polycrates at Samos disgusted the philosopher, who was a great advocate for national independence; and though he was the favourite of the tyrant, he retired from the island, and a second time assisted at the Olympic games. His fame was too well known to escape notice; he was saluted in the public assembly by the name of Sophist, or wise man; but he refused the appellation, and was satisfied with that of philosopher, or, the friend of wisdom. “At the Olympic games,” said he, in explanation of this new appellation he wished to assume, “some are attracted with the desire of obtaining crowns and honours, others come to expose their different commodities to sale, while curiosity draws a third class, and the desire of contemplating whatever deserves notice in that celebrated assembly; thus, on the more extensive theatre of the world, while many struggle for the glory of a name, and many pant for the advantages of fortune, a few, and indeed but a few, who are neither desirous of money nor ambitious of fame, are sufficiently gratified to be spectators of the wonder, the hurry, and the magnificence of the scene.” From Olympia, the philosopher visited the republics of Elis and Sparta, and retired to Magna Græcia, where he fixed his habitation in the town of Crotona, about the 40th year of his age. Here he founded a sect which has received the name of the Italian, and he soon saw himself surrounded by a great number of pupils, which the recommendation of his mental as well as his personal accomplishments had procured. His skill in music and medicine, and his knowledge of mathematics and of natural philosophy, gained him friends and admirers, and amidst the voluptuousness that prevailed among the inhabitants of Crotona, the Samian sage found his instructions respected and his approbation courted; the most debauched and effeminate were pleased with the eloquence and the graceful delivery of the philosopher, who boldly upbraided them for their vices, and called them to more virtuous and manly pursuits. These animated harangues were attended with rapid success, and a reformation soon took place in the morals and the life of the people of Crotona. The females were exhorted to become modest, and they left off their gaudy ornaments; the youths were called away from their pursuits of pleasure, and instantly they forgot their intemperance, and paid to their parents that submissive attention and deference which the precepts of Pythagoras required. As to the old, they were directed no longer to spend their time in amassing money, but to improve their understanding, and to seek that peace and those comforts of mind which frugality, benevolence, and philanthropy alone can produce. The sober and religious behaviour of the philosopher strongly recommended the necessity and importance of these precepts. Pythagoras was admired for his venerable aspect; his voice was harmonious, his eloquence persuasive, and the reputation he had acquired by his distant travels, and by being crowned at the Olympic games, was great and important. He regularly frequented the temples of the gods, and paid his devotion to the divinity at an early hour; he lived upon the purest and most innocent food, he clothed himself like the priests of the Egyptian gods, and by his continual purifications and regular offerings, he seemed to be superior to the rest of mankind in sanctity. These artful measures united to render him an object not only of reverence, but of imitation. To set himself at a greater distance from his pupils, a number of years was required to try their various dispositions; the most talkative were not permitted to speak in the presence of their master before they had been his auditors for five years, and those who possessed a natural taciturnity were allowed to speak after a probation of two years. When they were capable of receiving the secret instructions of the philosopher, they were taught the use of cyphers and hieroglyphic writings, and Pythagoras might boast that his pupils could correspond together, though in the most distant regions, in unknown characters; and by the signs and words which they had received, they could discover, though strangers and barbarians, those that had been educated in the Pythagorean school. So great was his authority among his pupils, that to dispute his word was deemed a crime, and the most stubborn were drawn to coincide with the opinions of their opponent, when they helped their arguments by the words of the master said so, an expression which became proverbial in jurare in verba magistri. The great influence which the philosopher possessed in his school was transferred to the world: the pupils divided the applause and the approbation of the people with their venerable master, and in a short time the rulers and the legislators of all the principal towns of Greece, Sicily, and Italy, boasted in being the disciples of Pythagoras. The Samian philosopher was the first who supported the doctrine of metempsychosis, or transmigration of the soul into different bodies, and those notions he seemed to have imbibed among the priests of Egypt, or in the solitary retreats of the Brachmans. More strenuously to support his chimerical system, he declared he recollected the different bodies which his soul had animated before that of the son of Mnesarchus. He remembered to have been Æthalides the son of Mercury, to have assisted the Greeks during the Trojan war in the character of Euphorbus [See: [Euphorbus]], to have been Hermotimus, afterwards a fisherman, and last of all Pythagoras. He forbade his disciples to eat flesh, as also beans, because he supposed them to have been produced from the same putrefied matter from which, at the creation of the world, man was formed. In his theological system Pythagoras supported that the universe was created from a shapeless heap of passive matter by the hands of a powerful being, who himself was the mover and soul of the world, and of whose substance the souls of mankind were a portion. He considered numbers as the principles of everything, and perceived in the universe regularity, correspondence, beauty, proportion, and harmony, as intentionally produced by the Creator. In his doctrines of morality, he perceived in the human mind propensities common to us with the brute creation; but besides these, and the passions of avarice and ambition, he discovered the nobler seeds of virtue, and supported that the most ample and perfect gratification was to be found in the enjoyment of moral and intellectual pleasures. The thoughts of the past he considered as always present to us, and he believed that no enjoyment could be had where the mind was disturbed by consciousness of guilt, or fears about futurity. This opinion induced the philosopher to recommend to his followers a particular mode of education. The tender years of the Pythagoreans were employed in continual labour, in study, in exercise, and repose; and the philosopher maintained his well-known and important maxim, that many things, especially love, are best learnt late. In a more advanced age, the adult was desired to behave with caution, spirit, and patriotism, and to remember that the community and civil society demanded his exertions, and that the good of the public, and not his own private enjoyments, were the ends of his creation. From lessons like these, the Pythagoreans were strictly enjoined to call to mind, and carefully to review, the actions, not only of the present, but of the preceding days. In their acts of devotion, they early repaired to the most solitary places of the mountains, and after they had examined their private and public conduct, and conversed with themselves, they joined in the company of their friends, and early refreshed their body with light and frugal aliments. Their conversation was of the most innocent nature; political or philosophic subjects were discussed with propriety, but without warmth, and after the conduct of the following day was regulated, the evening was spent with the same religious ceremony as the morning, in a strict and partial self-examination. From such regularity nothing but the most salutary consequences could arise, and it will not appear wonderful that the disciples of Pythagoras were so much respected and admired as legislators, and imitated for their constancy, friendship, and humanity. The authors that lived in, and after, the age of Alexander, have rather tarnished than brightened the glory of the founder of the Pythagorean school, and they have obscured his fame by attributing to him actions which were dissonant with his character as a man and a moralist. To give more weight to his exhortations, as some writers mention, Pythagoras retired into a subterraneous cave, where his mother sent him intelligence of everything which happened during his absence. After a certain number of months he again reappeared on the earth, with a grim and ghastly countenance, and declared, in the assembly of the people, that he was returned from hell. From similar exaggerations, it has been asserted that he appeared at the Olympic games with a golden thigh, and that he could write in letters of blood whatever he pleased on a looking-glass, and that, by setting it opposite to the moon, when full, all the characters which were on the glass became legible on the moon’s disc. They also support that, by some magical words, he tamed a bear, stopped the flight of an eagle, and appeared on the same day and at the same instant in the cities of Crotona and Metapontum, &c. The time and the place of the death of this great philosopher are unknown; yet many suppose that he died at Metapontum about 497 years before Christ; and so great was the veneration of the people of Magna Græcia for him, that he received the same honours as were paid to the immortal gods, and his house became a sacred temple. Succeeding ages likewise acknowledged his merits, and when the Romans, A.U.C. 411, were commanded by the oracle of Delphi to erect a statue to the bravest and wisest of the Greeks, the distinguished honour was conferred on Alcibiades and Pythagoras. Pythagoras had a daughter, called Damo. There is now extant a poetical composition ascribed to the philosopher, and called the golden verses of Pythagoras, which contain the greatest part of his doctrines and moral precepts; but many support that it is a supposititious composition, and that the true name of the writer was Lysis. Pythagoras distinguished himself also by his discoveries in geometry, astronomy, and mathematics, and it is to him that the world is indebted for the demonstration of the 47th proposition of the first book of Euclid’s elements, about the square of the hypothenuse. It is said that he was so elated after making the discovery, that he made an offering of a hecatomb to the gods; but the sacrifice was undoubtedly of small oxen, made with wax, as the philosopher was ever an enemy to shedding the blood of all animals. His system of the universe, in which he placed the sun in the centre, and all the planets moving in elliptical orbits round it, was deemed chimerical and improbable, till the deep inquiries and the philosophy of the 16th century proved it, by the most accurate calculations, to be true and incontestable. Diogenes Laërtius, Porphyry, Iamblicus, and others, have written an account of his life, but with more erudition, perhaps, than veracity. Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 1, ch. 5; Tusculanæ Disputationes, bk. 4, ch. 1.—Diogenes Laërtius, bk. 8, &c.—Hyginus, fable 112.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 15, li. 60, &c.—Plato.—Pliny, bk. 34, ch. 6.—Aulus Gellius, bk. 9.—Iamblic.—Porphyry.—Plutarch.——A soothsayer of Babylon, who foretold the death of Alexander and of Hephæstion, by consulting the entrails of victims.——A tyrant of Ephesus.——One of Nero’s wicked favourites.

Pytheas, an archon at Athens.——A native of Massilia, famous for his knowledge of astronomy, mathematics, philosophy, and geography. He also distinguished himself by his travels, and, with a mind that wished to seek information in every corner of the earth, he advanced far into the northern seas, and discovered the island of Thule, and entered that then unknown sea, which is now called the Baltic. His discoveries in astronomy and geography were ingenious, and, indeed, modern navigators have found it expedient to justify and accede to his conclusions. He was the first who established a distinction of climate by the length of days and nights. He wrote different treatises in Greek, which have been lost, though some of them were extant in the beginning of the fifth century. Pytheas lived, according to some, in the age of Aristotle. Strabo, bk. 2, &c.—Pliny, bk. 37.——An Athenian rhetorician, in the age of Demosthenes, who distinguished himself by his intrigues, rapacity, and his opposition to the measures of Demosthenes, of whom he observed that his orations smelt of the lamp. Pytheas joined Antipater after the death of Alexander the Great. His orations were devoid of elegance, harsh, unconnected, and diffuse, and from this circumstance he has not been ranked among the orators of Athens. Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 7, ch. 7.—Plutarch, Demosthenes & Politica Præcepta.

Pythes, a native of Abdera, in Thrace, son of Andromache, who obtained a crown at the Olympian games. Pliny, bk. 34, ch. 7.—Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 14.

Pytheus, a Lydian in the age of Xerxes, famous for his riches. He kindly entertained the monarch and all his army, when he was marching on his expedition against Greece, and offered him to defray the expenses of the whole war. Xerxes thanked him with much gratitude, and promised to give him whatever he should require. Pytheus asked him to dismiss his son from the expedition; upon which the monarch ordered the young man to be cut in two, and one half of the body to be placed on the right hand of the way, and the other on the left, that his army might march between them. Plutarch, de Mulierum Virtutes.—Herodotus.

Pythia, the priestess of Apollo at Delphi. She delivered the answer of the god to such as came to consult the oracle, and was supposed to be suddenly inspired by the sulphureous vapours which issued from the hole of a subterraneous cavity within the temple, over which she sat bare on a three-legged stool, called a tripod. In this stool was a small aperture, through which the vapour was inhaled by the priestess, and, at this divine inspiration, her eyes suddenly sparkled, her hair stood on end, and a shivering ran over all her body. In this convulsive state she spoke the oracles of the god, often with loud howlings and cries, and her articulations were taken down by the priest, and set in order. Sometimes the spirit of inspiration was more gentle, and not always violent; yet Plutarch mentions one of the priestesses who was thrown into such an excessive fury, that not only those that consulted the oracle, but also the priest that conducted her to the sacred tripod, and attended her during the inspiration, were terrified and forsook the temple; and so violent was the fit, that she continued for some days in the most agonizing situation, and at last died. The Pythia, before she placed herself on the tripod, used to wash her whole body, and particularly her hair, in the waters of the fountain Castalis, at the foot of mount Parnassus. She also shook a laurel tree that grew near the place, and sometimes ate the leaves with which she crowned herself. The priestess was originally a virgin, but the institution was changed when Echecrates, a Thessalian, had offered violence to one of them, and none but women who were above the age of 50 were permitted to enter upon that sacred office. They always appeared dressed in the garments of virgins, to intimate their purity and modesty, and they were solemnly bound to observe the strictest laws of temperance and chastity, that neither fantastical dresses nor lascivious behaviour might bring the office, the religion, or the sanctity of the place into contempt. There was originally but one Pythia, besides subordinate priests, and afterwards two were chosen, and sometimes more. The most celebrated of all these is Phemonoe, who is supposed by some to have been the first who gave oracles at Delphi. The oracles were always delivered in hexameter verses, a custom which was some time after discontinued. The Pythia was consulted only one month in the year, about the spring. It was always required that those who consulted the oracle should make large presents to Apollo, and from thence arose the opulence, splendour, and the magnificence of that celebrated temple of Delphi. Sacrifices were also offered to the divinity, and if the omens proved unfavourable, the priestess refused to [♦]give an answer. There were generally five priests who assisted at the offering of the sacrifices, and there was also another who attended the Pythia, and assisted her in receiving the oracle. See: [♠][Delphi], [Oraculum]. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 5.—Diodorus, bk. 16.—Strabo, bks. 6 & 9.—Justin, bk. 24, ch. 5.—Plutarch, De Defectu Oraculorum.—Euripides, Ion.—Dio Chrysostom.——Games celebrated in honour of Apollo, near the temple of Delphi. They were at first instituted, according to the more received opinion, by Apollo himself, in commemoration of the victory which he had obtained over the serpent Python, from which they received their name; though others maintain that they were first established by Agamemnon, or Diomedes, or by Amphictyon, or, lastly, by the council of Amphictyons, B.C. 1263. They were originally celebrated once in nine years, but afterwards every fifth year, or the second year of every olympiad, according to the number of the Parnassian nymphs who congratulated Apollo after his victory. The gods themselves were originally among the combatants, and, according to some authors, the first prize was won by Pollux, in boxing; by Castor, in horse-races; by Hercules, in the pancratium; by Zetes, in fighting with the armour; by Calais, in running; by Telamon, in wrestling; and by Peleus in throwing the quoit. These illustrious conquerors were rewarded by Apollo himself, who was present, with crowns and laurels. Some, however, observe that it was nothing but a musical contention, in which he who sung best the praises of Apollo obtained the prize, which was presents of gold or silver, which were afterwards exchanged for a garland of the palm tree, or of beech leaves. It is said that Hesiod was refused admission to these games because he was not able to play upon the harp, which was required of all such as entered the lists. The songs which were sung were called Πυθικοι νομοι, the Pythian modes, divided into five parts, which contained a representation of the fight and victory of Apollo over Python; ἀνακρουσις, the preparation for the fight; ἐμπειρα, the first attempt; κατακελευσμος, taking breath and collecting courage; ἰαμβοι και δακτυλοι, the insulting sarcasms of the god over his vanquished enemy; συριγγες, an imitation of the hisses of the serpent, just as he expired under the blows of Apollo. A dance was also introduced; and in the 48th Olympiad, the Amphictyons, who presided over the games, increased the number of musical instruments by the addition of a flute; but, as it was more peculiarly used in funeral songs and lamentations, it was soon rejected as unfit for merriment, and the festivals which represented the triumph of Apollo over the conquered serpent. The Romans, according to some, introduced them into their city, and called them Apollinares ludi. Pausanias, bk. 10, chs. 13 & 37.—Strabo, bk. 9.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 447.—Pliny, bk. 7.—Livy, bk. 25.

[♦] ‘gave’ replaced with ‘give’

[♠] ‘Delphia’ replaced with ‘Delphi’

Pythias, a Pythagorean philosopher, intimate with Damon. See: [Phintias].——A road which led from Thessaly to Tempe. Ælian.——A comic character, &c.

Pythion, an Athenian killed, with 420 soldiers, when he attempted to drive the garrison of Demetrius from Athens, &c. Polyænus, bk. 5.

Pythium, a town of Thessaly. Livy, bk. 42, ch. 53; bk. 44, ch. 2.

Pythius, a Syracusan, who defrauded Canius, a Roman knight, to whom he had sold his gardens, &c. Cicero, de Officiis, bk. 3, ch. 14.——A surname of Apollo, which he had received for his having conquered the serpent Python, or because he was worshipped at Delphi; called also Pytho. Macrobius, bk. 1, Saturnalia, ch. 17.—Propertius, bk. 2, poem 33, li. 16.

Pytho, the ancient name of the town of Delphi, which it received ἀπο του πυθεσθαι, because the serpent which Apollo killed, rotted there. It was also called Parnassia Nape. See: [Delphi].

Pythochăris, a musician, who assuaged the fury of some wolves by playing on a musical instrument, &c. Ælian.

Pythŏcles, an Athenian descended from Aratus. It is said, that on his account, and for his instruction, Plutarch wrote the life of Aratus.——A man put to death with Phocion.——A man who wrote on Italy.

Pythodōrus, an Athenian archon in the age of Themistocles.

Pytholāus, the brother of Theba, the wife of Alexander tyrant of Pheræ. He assisted his sister in despatching her husband. Plutarch.

Python, a native of Byzantium, in the age of Philip of Macedonia. He was a great favourite of the monarch who sent him to the Thebes, when that city, at the instigation of Demosthenes, was going to take arms against Philip. Plutarch, Demosthenes.—Diodorus.——One of the friends of Alexander, put to death by Ptolemy Lagus.——A man who killed Cotys king of Thrace at the instigation of the Athenians.——A celebrated serpent sprung from the mud and stagnated waters which remained on the surface of the earth after the deluge of Deucalion. Some, however, suppose that it was produced from the earth by Juno, and sent by the goddess to persecute Latona, who was then pregnant by Jupiter. Latona escaped his fury by means of her lover, who changed her into a quail during the remaining months of her pregnancy, and afterwards restored her to her original shape in the island of Delos, where she gave birth to Apollo and Diana. Apollo, as soon as he was born, attacked the monster and killed him with his arrows, and in commemoration of the victory which he had obtained, he instituted the celebrated Pythian games. Strabo, bk. 8.—Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 7; bk. 10, ch. 6.—Hyginus.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, li. 438, &c.—Lucan, bk. 5, li. 134.

Pythonĭce, an Athenian prostitute greatly honoured by Harpalus, whom Alexander some time before had entrusted with the treasures of Babylon. He married her; and according to some, she died at the very moment that the nuptials were going to be celebrated. He raised her a splendid monument on the road which led from Athens to Eleusis, which cost him 30 talents. Diodorus, bk. 17.—Pausanias, bk. 1.—Athenæus, bk. 13, &c.

Pythonissa, a name given to the priestess of Apollo’s temple at Delphi. She is more generally called Pythia. See: [Pythia]. The word Pythonissa was commonly applied to women who attempted to explain futurity.

Pytna, a part of mount Ida.

Pyttalus, a celebrated athlete, son of Lampis of Elis, who obtained a prize at the Olympic games. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 16.

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