[321] It appears from this that the History of the Marsic war by Lucullus was extant in the time of Plutarch. Cicero (Ad Attic. i. 19) mentions this Greek history of Lucullus.
[322] This Marcus was adopted by M. Terentius Varro, whence after his adoption he was called M. Terentius Varro Lucullus. The curule ædileship of the two brothers belongs to the year B.C. 79, and the event is here placed, after Plutarch's fashion, not in the proper place in his biography, but the story is told incidentally as a characteristic of Lucullus. I have expressed myself ambiguously at the end of this chapter. It should be "that Lucullus in his absence was elected ædile with his brother." (Cicero, Academ. Prior. ii. 1.)
[323] See Life of Sulla, c. 13, &c.
[324] Drumann (Geschichte Roms, Licinii Luculli, p. 121, n. 80) observes that this winter expedition of Lucullus was "not after the capture of Athens, as Plutarch, Lucullus, c. 2," states, and he refers to Appian (Mithridat. c. 33). But Plutarch's account is not what Drumann represents it to be. This expedition was in the winter of B.C. 87 and 86. Ælian (Var. Hist. ii. 42) tells a similar story of Plato and the Arcadians, and Diogenes Lærtius (iii. 17) has a like story about Plato and the Arcadians and Thebans.
[325] This can only be Ptolemæus VIII., sometimes called Soter II. and Lathyrus, who was restored to his kingdom B.C. 89-8. The difficulty that Kaltwasser raises about Lathyrus being in Cyprus at this time is removed by the fact that he had returned from Cyprus. As to Plutarch calling him a "young man," that is a mistake; or Plutarch may have confounded him with his younger brother Alexander.
[326] Plutarch is alluding to the Pyramids, and to the great temples of Memphis.
[327] Pitane was one of the old Greek towns of Æolis, situated on the coast at the mouth of the Evenus, and opposite to the island of Lesbos, now Mytilene.
[328] See Life of Sulla, c. 12.
[329] See Life of Sulla, c. 21.
[330] This was the consul L. Valerius Flaccus. See the Life of Sulla, c. 20.