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.