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.