Lesches: one of the post-Homeric (‘Cyclic’) poets, and writer of the Little Iliad; a native of Lesbos, fl. c. 705 B.C.
Leuctra: Boeotian village; the scene of the great defeat of the Spartans by Epaminondas, 371 B.C.
Livia: Livia Drusilla, 56 B.C.-A.D. 29. Her first husband was Tiberius Claudius Nero, by whom she was the mother of Tiberius, the future emperor. Married to Augustus (then Octavianus) in 38 B.C., and having no children by him, she was anxious to keep the succession in her own family. A woman of strong character, she exerted a tactful control over Augustus and attempted one more imperious over Tiberius, but failed.
Locri: Locri Epizephyrii, an important Greek town of South Italy, about the modern Gerace. Its constitutional code was often regarded as a model.
Locris: a Greek community lying along the north side of the middle of the Corinthian Gulf.
Loxias: Apollo as God of Oracles. The name was commonly interpreted as ‘Riddling’ or ‘Indirect’.
Lucullus: Roman conqueror of Mithridates, succeeded in his command by Pompey, 66 B.C. Famous for his wealth and luxury, and particularly for his lavish feasts. A byword for self-indulgence.
Lycéum: an exercise ground with terraces (‘walks’) and colonnades just outside the wall to the east of Athens. It was here that Aristotle discoursed on the ‘Walk’ (peripatos), whence the name ‘Peripatetic’ became applied to his school.
Lycurgus: (1) the more or less legendary lawgiver and constitution-maker of Sparta. His date and personality are quite uncertain, and he is not improbably as mythical as Heracles.
(2) son of Dryas, a legendary Thracian king who resisted the worship of Dionysius and hacked down his sacred plant, the vine. Dionysius punished him with madness, during which he killed his own son, thinking him a vine. The story is much varied in particulars.