Tyrrhēnum mare, that part of the Mediterranean which lies on the coast of Etruria. It is also called Inferum, as being at the bottom or south of Italy.
Tyrrhēnus, a son of Atys king of Lydia, who came to Italy, where part of the country was called after him. Strabo, bk. 5.—Tacitus, Annals, bk. 4, ch. 55.—Paterculus, bk. 1, ch. 1.——A friend of Æneas. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 11, li. 612.
Tyrrheus, a shepherd of king Latinus, whose stag being killed by the companions of Ascanius, was the first cause of war between Æneas and the inhabitants of Latium. Hence the word Tyrrheides. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 7, li. 485.——An Egyptian general, B.C. 91.
Tyrsis, a place in the Balearides, supposed to be the palace of Saturn.
Tyrtæus, a Greek elegiac poet, born in Attica, son of Archimbrotus. In the second Messenian war, the Lacedæmonians were directed by the oracle to apply to the Athenians for a general, if they wished to finish their expedition with success, and they were contemptuously presented with Tyrtæus. The poet, though ridiculed for his many deformities, and his ignorance of military affairs, animated the Lacedæmonians with martial songs, just as they wished to raise the siege of Ithome, and inspired them with so much courage, that they defeated the Messenians. For his services, he was made a citizen of Lacedæmon, and treated with great attention. Of the compositions of Tyrtæus nothing is extant but the fragments of four or five elegies. He flourished about 684 B.C. Justin, bk. 2, ch. 5.—Strabo, bk. 8.—Aristotle, Politics, bk. 5, ch. 7.—Horace, Art of Poetry, li. 402.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 12, ch. 50.—Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 6, &c.
Tyrus, or Tyros, a very ancient city of Phœnicia, built by the Sidonians, on a small island at the south of Sidon, about 200 stadia from the shore, and now called Sur. There were, properly speaking, two places of that name, the old Tyros, called Palætyros, on the sea-shore, and the other in the island. It was about 19 miles in circumference, including Palætyros, but, without it, about four miles. Tyre was destroyed by the princes of Assyria, and afterwards rebuilt. It maintained its independence till the age of Alexander, who took it with much difficulty, and only after he had joined the island to the continent by a mole, after a siege of seven months, on the 20th of August, B.C. 332. The Tyrians were naturally industrious; their city was the emporium of commerce, and they were deemed the inventors of scarlet and purple colours. They founded many cities in different parts of the world, such as Carthage, Gades, Leptis, Utica, &c., which on that account are often distinguished by the epithet Tyria. The buildings of Tyre were very splendid and magnificent; the walls were 150 feet high, with a proportionate breadth. Hercules was the chief deity of the place. It had two large and capacious harbours, and a powerful fleet, and was built, according to some writers, about 2760 years before the christian era. Strabo, bk. 16.—Herodotus, bk. 2, ch. 44.—Mela, bk. 1, ch. 12.—Curtius, bk. 4, ch. 4.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1, lis. 6, 339, &c.—Ovid, Fasti, bk. 1, &c. Metamorphoses, bks. 5 & 10.—Lucan, bk. 3, &c.——A nymph, mother of Venus, according to some.
Tysias, a man celebrated by Cicero. See: [Tisias].
U & V
Vacatione (lex de), was enacted concerning the exemption from military service, and contained this very remarkable clause, nisi bellum Gallicum exoriatur, in which case the priests themselves were not exempted from service. This can intimate how apprehensive the Romans were of the Gauls, by whom their city had once been taken.