Crœ´sus, the fifth and last of the Mermnadæ, who reigned in Lydia, was the son of Alyattes, and was considered the richest man in the world. His court was an asylum for learning, and Æsop, the famous fable writer, with other learned men, lived under his patronage. “As rich as Crœsus,” has become a proverb.
Cupi´do, god of love, son of Jupiter and Venus, is represented as a winged infant, naked, armed with a bow and arrows. On gems and ornaments he is represented generally as amusing himself with some childish diversion. Cupid, like the rest of the gods, assumed different shapes, and we find him in the Æneid putting on, at the request of his mother, the form of Ascanius, and going to Dido’s court, where he inspired the queen with love.
Cur´tius, M. A Roman who devoted himself to the service of his country, about 360 years B.C., by leaping on horseback, and fully armed, into a huge gap in the earth, at the command of the oracle.
Cyb´ele. A goddess, daughter of Cœlus and Terra, and wife of Saturn. She was supposed to be the same as Ceres, Rhea, Ops, Vesta, etc. According to Diodorus, she was the daughter of a Lydian prince. On her birth she was exposed on a mountain, where she was tended and fed by wild beasts, receiving the name of Cybele from the mountain where her life had been preserved.
Cyclo´pes. A race of men of gigantic stature, supposed to be the sons of Cœlus and Terra. They had only one eye, which was in the center of the forehead. According to Hesiod they were three in number, and named Arges, Brontes, and Steropes.
Cy´rus. A king of Persia, son of Cambyses and Mandane, daughter of Astyages, king of Media. Xenophon has written the life of Cyrus; and delineates him as a brave and virtuous prince, and often puts in his mouth many of the sayings of Socrates.
Cy´rus the younger was the son of Darius Nothus, and the brother of Artaxerxes, the latter succeeding to the throne at the death of Nothus. Cyrus was appointed to the command of Lydia and the sea-coasts, where he fomented rebellion and levied troops under various pretenses. At length he took the field with an army of 100,000 Barbarians and 13,000 Greeks under the command of Clearchus. Artaxerxes met him with 900,000 men near Cunaxa. The engagement ended fatally for Cyrus, who was killed 401 years B.C.
Dæd´alus, an Athenian, was the most ingenious artist of his age; he was the inventor of the wedge and many other mechanical instruments. He made a famous labyrinth for Minos, king of Crete, but incurred the displeasure of Minos, who ordered him to be confined in the labyrinth. Here he made himself wings with feathers and wax, and fitted them to his body, adopting the same course with his son Icarus, who was the companion of his confinement. They mounted into the air, but the heat of the sun melted the wax on the wings of Icarus, and he fell into the ocean, which after him has been called the Icarian Sea. The father alighted safely at Cumæ, where he built a temple to Apollo.
Dan´ae, daughter of Acrisius, king of Argos, and Eurydice. Jupiter was enamored with her, and they had a son, with whom Danae was exposed in a boat on the sea by her father. The winds carried them to the island of Seriphus, where she was saved by some fishermen, and carried to Polydectes, king of the place, whose brother, named Dictys, educated the child, who was called Perseus, and kindly treated the mother.
Dana´ides. The fifty daughters of Danaus, king of Argos, who married the fifty sons of their uncle Ægyptus. Danaus had been told by the oracle that he would be killed by a son-in-law, and he made his daughters promise to slay their husbands immediately after marriage. All of them fulfilled their father’s wishes except one, Hypermnestra, who spared her husband Lynceus.