Listed 100 (total found 308) sub titles with search on: Biographies for wider area of: "NORTH AEGEAN Region GREECE" .
MYTILINI (Ancient city) LESVOS
Alcaeus (Alkaios), the son of Miccus, was a native of Mytilene, according to Suidas,
who may, however, have confounded him in this point with the lyric poet. He is
found exhibiting at Athens as a poet of the old comedy, or rather of that mixed
comedy, which formed the transition between the old and the middle. In B. C. 388,
he brought forward a play entitled Pasiphae, in the same contest in which Aristophanes
exhibited his second Plutus, but, if the meaning of Suidas is rightly understood,
he obtained only the fifth place. He left ten plays, of which some fragments remain,
and the following titles are known, Adelphai moicheuomenai, Ganumedes, Endumion,
Hiepos gamos, Kallisto, Komoidotragoidia, Palaistra.
Alcaeus, a tragic poet, mentioned by Fabricius, does not appear to
be a different person from Alcaeus the comedian. The mistake of calling him a
tragic poet arose simply from an erroneous reading of the title of his " Comoedo-tragoedia."
SAMOS (Ancient city) SAMOS
Lynceus (Lunkeus), of Samos, the disciple of Theophrastus, and the brother of the historian Duris, was a contemporary of Menander, and his rival in comic poetry. He survived Menander, upon whom he wrote a book. He seems to have been more distinguished as a grammarian and historian than as a comic poet; for, while only one of his comedies is mentioned (the Kentauros), we have the titles of the following works of his: -- Aiguptiaka, Apomnemoneumata, Apophsegmara, Epistolai deipnetikai, techne opsonetike. (Suid. s. v.; Athen. viii.; Plut. Demetr. 27)
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited Oct 2006 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
SAMOS (Ancient city) SAMOS
320 - 250
Aristarchus of Samos, often referred to as the Copernicus of antiquity, laid the
foundation for much scientific examination of the heavens. According to his contemporary,
Archimedes, Aristarchus was the first to propose not only a heliocentric universe,
but one larger than any of the geocentric universes proposed by his predecessors.
Copernicus himself originally gave credit to Aristarchus in his own
heliocentric treatise, De revolutionibus caelestibus , where he had written,
”Philolaus believed in the mobility of the earth, and some even say that
Aristarchus of Samos was of that opinion.” Interestingly, this passage was
crossed out shortly before publication, maybe because Copernicus decided his treatise
would stand on its own merit.
Plutarch in his De facie in orbe lunae gives reference not
only to Aristarchus's theory, but to the way it was received by contemporaries.
The general opinion of the time appeared to be that of Dercyllides, who “says
that we must suppose the earth, the Hearth of the House of the Gods according
to Plato, to remain fixed, and the planets with the whole embracing heaven to
move, and rejects with abhorrence the view of those who have brought to rest the
things which move and set in motion the things which by their nature and position
are unmoved, such a supposition being contrary to the hypotheses of mathematics.”
As we can imagine, this did not look good for Aristarchus, and was probably one
of the main reasons the heliocentric hypothesis did not re-emerge until the mid
15th century with the Copernican revolution.
Though some of his reasoning was a bit out of place in his time, Aristarchus
nevertheless was able to adapt to the conventions of society and use the methods
of known geometry to explain other phenomena. His treatise On the Sizes and
Distances of the Sun and Moon , written from a geocentric point of view,
was a breakthrough in finding distances to objects in the universe, and his methods
were used by later astronomers and mathematicians through the time of Hipparchus
and Ptolemy.
Aristarchus introduced six hypotheses, from which he determined first
the relative distances of the sun and the moon, then their relative sizes:
1) The moon receives its light from the sun.
2) The earth is positioned as a point in the center of the sphere
in which the moon moves.
3) When the moon appears to us halved, the great circle which divides
the dark and bright portions of the moon is in the direction of our eye.
4) When the moon appears to us halved, its [angular] distance from
the sun is then less than a quadrant by one-thirtieth part of a quadrant. (One
quadrant = 90 degrees, which means its angular distance is less than 90 by 1/30th
of 90, or 3 degrees, and is therefore equal to 87 degrees.) (This assigned value
was based on Aristarchus' observations.)
5) The breadth of the earth's shadow is that of two moons.
6) The moon subtends one fifteenth part of a sign of the Zodiac. (The
360 degrees of the celestial sphere are divided into twelve signs of the Zodiac
each encompassing 30 degrees, so the moon, therefore, has an angular diameter
of 2 degrees.)
Although he proved many propositions (eighteen to be exact), the three
most well-known are the following:
1) The distance of the sun from the earth is greater than eighteen
times, but less than twenty times, the distance of the moon from the earth.
2) The diameter of the sun has the same ratio (greater than eighteen
but less than twenty) to the diameter of the moon.
3) the diameter of the sun has to the diameter of the earth a ratio
greater than 19 to 3, but less than 43 to 6. In his determination of these three
factors, Aristarchus developed the Lunar Dichotomy method and the Eclipse Diagram,
the latter of which became a much-used method of determining celestial distances
up until the seventeenth century.
Method of Lunar Dichotomy
When the moon appears to us in its phase of First Quarter or Last
Quarter, it is “dichotomized”, or half illuminated. At the moment
when the dividing line between light and dark exactly bisects the moon's circle,
the angle from Earth to Moon to Sun is exactly 90 degrees. Aristarchus determined
that at this precise moment the angular separation between the moon and the sun,
that is, the angle from Moon to Earth to Sun, is equal to 87 degrees, as he stated
in his fourth hypothesis. Using these angles, he determined (without using trigonometric
tables or formulae--they weren't invented yet) that the ratio of the distance
ES to EM was greater than 18 to 1, but less than 20 to 1.
In order to determine the actual values for the sizes of the sun and
moon, Aristarchus used two observations: first, that the disk of the moon just
covers the sun during a solar eclipse--although this is not always true, for the
sun appears larger during an annular eclipse.
Second, that during a lunar eclipse the shadow of the earth appears
to be twice as large as the moon at the moon's distance. (See hypothesis 5.) With
this data he constructed the Eclipse Diagram, which he used to show that the earth
is approximately three times larger than the moon, and that the radius of the
sun is more than six times larger than the radius of the earth.
Although his geometry was perfect, Aristarchus' methods of measurement
were extremely inaccurate. His basic value for the angle from Sun to Earth to
Moon was off by a few degrees (the actual value is 89 degrees, 50 minutes), and
the width of the earth's shadow cone at the moon is actually three rather than
two moon diameters. Using improved values, we can show that the sun is about 400
times farther from the earth than the moon, and its diameter is approximately
109 times greater than that of earth.
In terms of heliocentricity or the movement of the earth, the only
person to follow Aristarchus' philosophy was Seleucus, who in 150 BC attributed
the ocean tides to the stirring of air caused by the rotation of the earth and
its interaction with the revolution of the moon. Later, in the first century BC,
Seneca mentioned the possibility of a rotating earth, but did not necessarily
believe that it was possible.
Overall, Aristarchus was a pioneer both in his depiction of the universe
and his geometric approach to the measurement of the heavenly bodies. He contributed
a great deal to both geometry and astronomy, and his methods, as adapted by Hipparchus
and others, were used well into the 17th century.
by Kristen Riley
Aristarchus (Aristarchos), of Samos, one of the earliest astronomers of the Alexandrian
school. We know little of his history, except that he was living between B. C.
280 and 264. The first of these dates is inferred from a passage in the megale
suntaxis of Ptolemy (iii. 2), in which Hipparchus is said to have referred, in
his treatise on the length of the year, to an observation of the summer solstice
made by Aristarchus in the 50th year of the st Calippic period: the second from
the mention of him in Plutarch (de Facie in Orbe Lunae), which makes him contemporary
with Cleanthes the Stoic, the successor of Zeno.
It seems that he employed himself in the determination of some of
the most important elements of astronomy; but none of his works remain, except
a treatise on the magnitudes and distances of the sun and moon (peri megethon
kai apostematon heliou kai selenes). We do not know whether the method employed
in this work was invented by Aristarchus (Suidas, s. v. philosophos, mentions
a treatise on the same subject by a disciple of Plato); it is, however, very ingenious,
and correct in principle. It is founded on the consideration that at the instant
when the enlightened part of the moon is apparently bounded by a straight line,
the plane of the circle which separates the dark and light portions passes through
the eye of the spectator, and is also perpendicular to the line joining the centres
of the sun and moon; so that the distances of the sun and moon from the eye are
at that instant respectively the hypothenuse and side of a right-angled triangle.
The angle at the eye (which is the angular distance between the sun and moon)
can be observed, and then it is an easy problem to find the ratio between the
sides containing it. But this process could not, unless by accident, lead to a
true result; for it would be impossible, even with a telescope, to determine with
much accuracy the instant at which the phaenomenon in question takes place; and
in the time of Aristarchus there were no means of measuring angular distances
with sufficient exactness. In fact, he takes the angle at the eye to be 83 degrees
whereas its real value is less than a right angle by about half a minute only;
and hence he infers that the distance of the sun is between eighteen and twenty
times greater than that of the moon, whereas the true ratio is about twenty times
as great, the distances being to one another nearly as 400 to 1. The ratio of
the true diameters of the sun and moon would follow immediately from that of their
distances, if their apparent (angular) diameters were known. Aristarchus assumes
that their apparent diameters are equal, which is nearly true; but estimates their
common value at two degrees, which is nearly four times too great. The theory
of parallax was as yet unknown, and hence, in order to compare the diameter of
the earth with the magnitudes already mentioned, he compares the diameter of the
moon with that of the earth's shadow in its neighbourhood, and assumes the latter
to be twice as great as the former (Its mean value is about 84?). Of course all
the numerical results deduced from these assumptions are, like the one first mentioned,
very erroneous. The geometrical processes employed shew that nothing like trigonometry
was known. No attempt is made to assign the absolute values of the magnitudes
whose ratios are investigated; in fact, this could not be done without an actual
measurement of the earth--an operation which seems to have been first attempted
on scientific principles in the next generation. Aristarchus does not explain
his method of determining the apparent diameters of the sun and of the earth's
shadow; but the latter must have been deduced from observations of lunar eclipses,
and the former may probably have been observed by means of the skaphium by a method
described by Macrobius (Somn. Scip. i. 20). This instrument is said to have been
invented by Aristarchus (Vitruv. ix. 9): it consisted of an improved gnomon, the
shadow being received not upon a horizontal plane, but upon a concave hemispherical
surface having the extremity of the style at its centre, so that angles might
be measured directly by arcsinstead of by their tangents. The gross error in the
value attributed to the sun's apparent diameter is remarkable; it appears, however,
that Aristarchus must afterwards have adopted a much more correct estimate, since
Archimedes in the Psammites refers to a treatise in which he made it only half
a degree. Pappus, whose commentary on the book peri megethon, &c. is extant, does
not notice this emendation, whence it has been conjectured, that the other works
of Aristarchus did not exist in his time, having perhaps perished with the Alexandrian
library.
It has been the common opinion, at least in modern times, that Aristarchus
agreed with Philolaus and other astronomers of the Pythagorean school in considering
the sun to be fixed, and attributing a motion to the earth. Plutarch (de fac.
in orb. lun.) says, that Cleanthes thought that Aristarthus ought to be accused
of impiety for supposing (hupotithemenos), that the heavens were at rest, and
that the earth moved in an oblique circle, and also about its own axis (the true
reading is evidently Kleanthes oieto dein Aristarchon, k. t. l.); and Diogenes
Laertius, in his list of the works of Cleanthes mentions one pros Aristarchon
(See also Sext. Empir. adv. Math.; Stobaeus, i. 26). Archimedes, in the psammites,
refers to the same theory (hupotithetai gar, k. t. l.). But the treatise peri
megethon contains not a word upon the subject, nor does Ptolemy allude to it when
he maintains the immobility of the earth. It seems therefore probable, that Aristarchus
adopted it rather as a hypothesis for particular purposes than as a statement
of the actual system of the universe. In fact, Plutarch, in another place (Plat.
Quest.) expressly says, that Aristarchus taught it only hypothetically. It appears
from the passage in the psammites alluded to above, that Aristarchus had much
juster views than his predecessors concerning the extent of the universe. He maintained,
namely, that the sphere of the fixed stars was so large, that it bore to the orbit
of the earth the relation of a sphere to its centre. What he meant by the expression,
is not clear : it may be interpreted as an anticipation of modern discoveries,
but in this sense it could express only a conjecture which the observations of
the age were not accurate enough either to confirm or refute -a remark which is
equally applicable to the theory of the earth's motion. Whatever may be the truth
on these points, it is probable that even the opinion, that the sun was nearly
twenty times as distant as the moon, indicates a great step in advance of the
popular doctrines.
Censorinus (de Die Natali, c. 18) attributes to Aristarchus the invention
of the magnus annus of 2484 years.
A Latin translation of the treatise peri megethon was published by
Geor. Valla, Venet. 1498, and another by Commandine, Pisauri, 1572. The Greek
text, with a Latin translation and the commentary of Pappus, was edited by Wallis,
Oxon. 1688, and reprinted in vol. iii. of his works. There is also a French translation,
and an edition of the text, Paris, 1810.
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited Oct 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
He lived in Alexandria at the time of the Kings Ptolemaios, Soter and Philadelphos. Aristyllos and Timocharis were the only astronomers who made astronomical observations before Hipparchos. His observations on the constellation of Capricorn and three stars of the Great Bear are extremely important.
Plutarch mentions him "as a writer of astronomical works".
A moon crater at the NE is called Aristyllos to his honor.
A Samian wrestler who had been born dumb. Seeing some unlawful measures pursued in a contest, which would deprive him of the prize, his indignation gave him on a sudden the powers of utterance, which had hitherto been denied him, and from this time he spoke with ease.
CHIOS (Town) NORTH AEGEAN
1952
Born on the island of Chios in 1952. He studied at the Athens University
School of Philosophy and the Giorgos Theodossiadis Drama School. Apart from his
films Dimos Avdeliodis has also directed for the stage.
This text is cited October 2004 from the Greek Film Center URL below
CHIOS (Ancient city) GREECE
Pharmacist. Mentioned by Theophrastos as "undefeated by poisons as he took 22 doses of hellebore and antidote to them ; nothing happened to him". He also writes "Eudemos is a root breaker and asks his profession with experience and conscientious".
Theophrastos : Histories on plants, IX - 17,3.
MYTILINI (Ancient city) LESVOS
A writer who probably lived in the third century A.D. He was
the author of a Greek pastoral romance, Daphnis and Chloe, in four books. It is
considered the best of all ancient romances which have come down to us, on account
of its deep and natural feeling, its grace of narrative, and the comparative purity
and ease of its language. It has suggested many imitations by Italian, French,
German, and English writers, the more famous being Bernardin de St. Pierre's Paul
et Virginie. The rare translation by John Day of the French version of Amyot was
reprinted in 1890. The Greek text is edited by Hirschig with a Latin version in
the Erotici Scriptores of the Didot collection (Paris, 1856). Translation by Smith
(London, 1855).
This text is from: Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. Cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Longus was the creator of the pastoral romance, and author of Daphnis and Chloe. Nothing is known about him; even his name has been suspected and his floruit is most uncertain. Perhaps he was from Lesbos. His work, a bucolic idyll in prose, narrates how Daphnis and Chloe, two foundlings brought up by shepherds in Lesbos, gradually became enamoured to each other and finally married. What interests the author chiefly is to describe how the passion of love develops in the two protagonists, from the first naive and confused feelings of infancy to full sexual maturity.
The general tone of his romance is dictated by glyketes: this sweet-ening of pastoral life appealed very much to the critics of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, when 'bergeries' were in fashion. In spite of his artificiality in language and style, his ecphrastic descriptions of nature testify to a notable love of nature, which was highly praised by Goethe.
2nd cent. B.C. He worked in Alexandria and wrote about the Argonauts, the city of Troy and the relationship of Dionysus with the Amazons.
Dionysius. Of Mytilene, was surnamed Scytobrachion, and seems to have lived shortly before the time of Cicero, if we may believe the report that he instructed M. Antonius Gnipho at Alexandria (Suet. de Illustr. Gram. 7), for Suetonius expresses a doubt as to its correctness for chronological reasons. Artemon (ap. Athen. xii.) states, that Dionysius Scytobrachion was the author of the historical work which was commonly attributed to the ancient historian Xanthus of Lydia, who lived about B. C. 480. From this it has been inferred, that our Dionysius must have lived at a much earlier time. But if we conceive that Dionysius may have made a revision of the work of Xanthus, it does not follow that he must needs have lived very near the age of Xanthus. Suidas attributes to him a metrical work, the expedition of Dionysus and Athena (he Dionusou kai Hathenas stratia), and a prose work on the Argonauts in six books, addressed to Parmenon. He was probably also the author of the historic Cycle, which Suidas attributes to Dionysius of Miletus. The Argonautica is often referred to by the Scholiast on Apollonius Rhodius, who likewise several times confounds the Mytilenean with the Milesian (i. 1298, ii. 207, 1144, iii. 200, 242, iv. 119, 223, 228, 1153), and this work was also consulted by Diodorus Siculus. (iii. 52, 66.)
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited Oct 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
SAMOS (Ancient city) SAMOS
650 - 560
Aesopus, (Aisopos). A famous writer of fables, the first author
who created an independent class of stories about animals, so that in a few generations
his name and person had become typical of that entire class of literature. In
course of time, thanks to his plain, popular manner, the story of his own life
was enveloped in an almost inextricable tissue of tales and traditions, which
represent him as an ugly hunchback and buffoon. In the Middle Ages these were
woven into a kind of romance. A Phrygian by birth, and living in the time of the
Seven Sages, about B.C. 600, he is said to have been at first a slave to several
masters, till Iadmon of Samos set him free. That he next lived at the court of
Croesus, and being sent by him on an embassy to Delphi, was murdered by the priests
there, is pure fiction. Under his name were propagated in all parts of Greece,
at first only by tradition in the mouth of the people, a multitude of prose tales
teaching the lessons of life under the guise of fables about animals. We know
how Socrates, during his last days in prison, was engaged in turning the fables
of Aesop into verse. The first written collection appears to have been made by
Demetrius of Phalerum, B.C. 300. The collections of Aesop's Fables that have come
down to us are, in part, late prose renderings of the version in choliambics by
Babrius, which still retain here and there a scrap of verse; partly products of
the rhetorical schools, and therefore of very different periods and degrees of
merit.
This text is from: Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. Cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Babrius (Babrios) or Babrias (Babrias). The compiler of a comprehensive collection of Aesop's fables in choliambic metre. The book is probably to be assigned to the beginning of the first century B.C. Until 1842 nothing was known of Babrius but fragments and paraphrases, bearing the name of Aesopus. But in that year a Greek, Minoides Minas, discovered 123 of the original fables in the monastery on Mt. Athos. In 1857, he brought out 95 more, the genuineness of which was disputed by Cobet and other scholars...
This extract is from: Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. Cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Aesop (from the Greek Aisopos), famous for his Fables, is supposed
to have lived from about 620 to 560 B.C. The place of his birth is uncertain--Thrace,
Phrygia, Aethiopia,
Samos, Athens and Sardis
all claiming the honour.
We possess little trustworthy information concerning his life, except
that he was the slave of Iadmon of Samos and met with a violent death at the hands
of the inhabitants of Delphi.
Aesop must have received his freedom from Iadmon, or he could not have conducted
the public defence of a certain Samian demagogue. According to the story, he subsequently
lived at the court of Croesus, where he met Solon, and dined in the company of
the Seven Sages of Greece with Periander at Corinth.
During the reign of Peisistratus he is said to have visited Athens,
on which occasion he related the fable of The Frogs asking for a King, to dissuade
the citizens from attempting to exchange Peisistratus for another ruler.
The popular stories current regarding him are derived from a life,
or rather romance, prefixed to a book of fables, purporting to be his, collected
by Maximus Planudes, a monk of the 14th century. In this he is described as a
monster of ugliness and deformity, as he is also represented in a well-known marble
figure in the Villa Albani at Rome.
That this life, however, was in existence a century before Planudes, appears from
a 13th-century manuscript of it found at Florence.
In Plutarch's Symposium of the Seven Sages, at which Aesop is a guest, there are
many jests on his original servile condition, but nothing derogatory is said about
his personal appearance. We are further told that the Athenians erected in his
honour a noble statue by the famous sculptor Lysippus, which furnishes a strong
argument against the fiction of his deformity. Lastly, the obscurity in which
the history of Aesop is involved has induced some scholars to deny his existence
altogether.
It is probable that Aesop did not commit his fables to writing. Demetrius
of Phalerum (345-283 B.C.)
made a collection in ten books, probably in prose for the use of orators, which
has been lost. Next appeared an edition in elegiac verse, often cited by Suidas,
but the author's name is unknown. Babrius, according to Crusius, a Roman and tutor
to the son of Alexander Severus, turned the fables into choliambics in the earlier
part of the 3rd century A.D. The most celebrated of the Latin adapters is Phaedrus,
a freedman of Augustus. Avianus (of uncertain date, perhaps the 4th century) translated
42 of the fables into Latin elegiacs. The collections which we possess under the
name of Aesop's Fables are late renderings of Babrius's Version or Progymnasmata,
rhetorical exercises of varying age and merit. Syntipas translated Babrius into
Syriac, and Andreopulos put the Syriac back again into Greek. Ignatius Diaconus,
in the 9th century, made a version of 55 fables in choliambic tetrameters. Stories
from Oriental sources were added, and from these collections Maximus Planudes
made and edited the collection which has come down to us under the name of Aesop,
and from which the popular fables of modern Europe have been derived.
This extract is cited June 2003 from the Malspina Great Books URL below, which contains image.
Aesop's anecdote defending demagogue: Aesop, when defending at Samos a demagogue who was being tried for his life, related the following anecdote. "A fox, while crossing a river, was driven into a ravine. Being unable to get out, she was for a long time in sore distress, and a number of dog-fleas clung to her skin. A hedgehog, wandering about, saw her and, moved with compassion, asked her if he should remove the fleas. The fox refused and when the hedgehog asked the reason, she answered: They are already full of me and draw little blood; but if you take them away, others will come that are hungry and will drain what remains to me.’ You in like manner, O Samians, will suffer no more harm from this man, for he is wealthy; but if you put him to death".
Editor’s Information
The e-texts of the works by Aesopus are found in Greece (ancient country) under the category Ancient Greek Writings.
CHIOS (Town) NORTH AEGEAN
The name of an ancient and noble family of the Republic of Genoa,
distinguished alike in the Island of Chios, one of its dependencies, where it
possessed many beautiful and valuable estates. Besides giving to the Church one
pope, Urban VII, it adorned the Dominican Order with several eminent theologians
and distinguished religious.
LEONARDO MARINI, archbishop, born 1509 on the island of Chios,
in the Aegean Sea; died 11
June 1573, at Rome. He entered
the order in his native place, and, after his religious profession, made his studies
in the Convent of Genoa with
great distinction, obtaining finally the degree of Master of Sacred Theology.
He was a man of deep spirituality, and was esteemed the most eloquent
of contemporary orators and preachers. On 5 March 1550, Julius III created him
titular Bishop of Laodicea
and administrator of the Diocese of Mantua.
On 26 Feb., 1562, Pius IV elevated him to the metropolitan See of Lanciano, and
the same year appointed him papal legate to the Council of Trent, in all the deliberations
of which he took a prominent part. Marini now resigned his diocesan duties and
retired to the castle of his brother to combat by pen and prayer the errors of
the reformers. Pius V, however, not slow in recognizing his brilliant talents,
appointed him to the See of Alba and made him Apostolic Visitor of twenty-five
dioceses. In 1572 he was sent by Gregory XIII on a mission to Philip II of Spain
and Sebastian of Portugal
to secure from these monarchs a renewal of their alliance against the Turks. His
mission was successful.
He returned to Rome
to be elevated to the cardinalate, but died two days after his return.
Joseph Schroeder, ed.
Transcribed by: Douglas J. Potter
This extract is cited June 2003 from The Catholic Encyclopedia, New Advent online edition URL below.
PSARA (Island) NORTH AEGEAN
1790 - 1877
1795 - 1879
1790 - 1855
1770 - 1827
MYTILINI (Ancient city) LESVOS
Coes (Koes), of Mytilene, attended Dareius Hystaspis in his Scythian expedition as commander of the Mytilenaeans, and dissuaded the king from breaking up his bridge of boats over the Danube, and so cutting off his own retreat. For this good counsel he was rewarded by Dareius on his return with the tyranny of Mytilene. In B. C. 501, when the lonians had been instigated to revolt by Aristagoras, CoΓ«s, with several of the other tyrants, was seized by latragoras at Myus, where the Persian fleet that had been engaged at Naxos was lying. They were delivered up to the people of their several cities, and most of them were allowed to go uninjured into exile; but Coes, on the contrary, was stoned to death by the Mytilenaeans. (Herod. iv. 97, v. 11, 37, 38)
Laomedon of Mytilene, son of Larichus, was one of Alexander's generals, and appears to have enjoyed a high place in his confidence even before the death of Philip, as he was one of those banished by that monarch (together with his brother Erigyius, Ptolemy, Nearchus, and others) for taking part in the intrigues of the young prince. (Arrian. Anab. iii. 6). After the death of Philip, Laomedon, in common with the others who had suffered on this occasion, was held by Alexander in the highest honour: he accompanied him to Asia, where, on account of his acquaintance with the Persian language, he was appointed to the charge of the captives. (Arrian. l. c.) Though his name is not afterwards mentioned during the wars of Alexander, the high consideration he enjoyed is sufficiently attested by his obtaining in the division of the provinces, after the king's death, the important government of Syria. (Diod. xviii. 3; Arrian. ap. Phot. p. 69, a; Dexipp. ap. Phot. p. 64, a; Justin. xiii. 4; Curt. x. 10; Appian. Syr. 52). This he was still allowed to retain on the second partition at Triparadeisus, but it was not long before the provinces of Phoenicia and Coele Syria excited the cupidity of his powerful neighbour Ptolemy. The Egyptian king at first offered Laomedon a large sum of money in exchange for his government; but the latter having rejected his overtures, he sent Nicanor with an army to invade Syria. Laomedon was unable to offer any effectual resistance: he was made prisoner by Nicanor, and sent into Egypt, from whence, however, he managed to effect his escape, and join Alcetas in Pisidia. (Arrian. ap. Phot. p. 71, b; Diod. xviii. 39, 43; Appian, Syr. 52). There can be no doubt that he took part in the subsequent contest of Alcetas, Attalus, and the other surviving partizans of Perdiccas against Antigonus, and shared in the final overthrow of that party (B. C. 320), but his individual fate is not mentioned.
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SAMOS (Ancient city) SAMOS
During Hellenistic hera. He wrote "Circumnavigation of the Black Sea" (Contains valuable information on Geography, flora and fauna of the regions around the Black Sea. He mentions a "wonderful" plant that flourishes at Tanais and another one near the Inachas river. He also describes a mountain close to the city of Trapezous), "Scythian" , "On rivers" .
He wrote: "Indica" He describes his journey which started at the city Limyra of Lycia and ended at the Indian peninsula. He gives valuable geographical information. He mentions the constellations of Taurus and the Pleiades which he observed. Two islands of the Arabian Gulf were named after him (today's name: Perim islands). Some excerpts of his books remain through the writings of other geographers.
CHIOS (Ancient city) GREECE
377 - 323
Theopompus. A Greek historian, born at Chios about B.C. 378. He left home,
probably about 361, with his father, who was banished by the democratic party
on account of his predilection for the Spartans, and, having been trained in oratory
by Isocrates, spoke with great success in all the larger towns of Greece. He distinguished
himself so greatly in the rhetorical contest instituted (351) by Queen Artemisia,
wife of Mausolus, in honour of her deceased husband, that he obtained a brilliant
victory over all competitors. He afterwards travelled, with the object of acquiring
material for his historical works. The favour shown him by Alexander the Great
induced him to return to Chios at the age of forty-five; but on the death of his
patron he found himself again obliged to flee from his opponents, whose hatred
he had incurred by his vehement adoption of the sentiments of the aristocracy.
He took refuge with Ptolemy I., at Alexandria, about 305. Here he did not, however,
meet with a favourable reception, and was compelled to withdraw, as his life was
in danger. Of his subsequent career nothing is known.
Besides numerous orations (principally panegyrics) he composed
two large histories, founded on the most careful and minute research: (a) Hellenica
(Hellenikai Historiai), in twelve books, a continuation of Thucydides, covering
the period from 411- 394; and (b) Philippica (Philippika), in fifty-eight books,
treating of the life and times of Philip of Macedon. Of these works only fragments
remain. The charge of malignity, which was brought against him by the ancients,
seems to have originated in the reckless manner in which, on the testimony of
Dionysius of Halicarnassus (Ep. ad Cn. Pompeium), he exposed the pettiness and
baseness of the politics of those times, especially those of the Macedonian party.
There seems to be better foundation for the charge brought against him of being
too fond of digressions; for when, in later times, the digressions in the Philippica
were omitted, the work was thereby reduced to sixteen books. Theopompus was the
first Greek writer to make any definite mention of Rome, speaking of its capture
by the Gauls.
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Among the writers of history Theopompus of Chios began his history
of Philip at this point (360/359 B.C) and composed fifty-eight books, of which
five are lost.(Diod. 16.3.8)
Commentary: Of this work, the longest history published till then, two
hundred seventeen fragments remain. Theopompus' admiration for Philip is reflected
by Diodorus, who must have relied heavily on his account.
Theopompus of Chios ended with this year (393 B.C.) and the battle
of Cnidus his Hellenic History, which he wrote in twelve books. This historian
began with the battle of Cynossema, with which Thucydides ended his work, and
covered in his account a period of seventeen years (410-394 B.C.). (Diod. 14.84.7)
Theopompus of Chios, the historian, in his History of Philip, included
three books dealing with affairs in Sicily. Beginning with the tyranny of Dionysius
the Elder he covered a period of fifty years, closing with the expulsion of the
younger Dionysius. These three books are 41-43.(Diod. 16.71.3)
MITHYMNA (Ancient city) LESVOS
480 - 400
Hellanicus, (Hellanikos). One of the Greek logographi or chroniclers,
born at Mitylene in Lesbos about B.C. 490. He is said to have lived till the age
of eighty-five, and to have gone on writing until after B.C. 406. In the course
of his long life he composed a series of works on genealogy, chorography, and
chronology, of which the fragments are collected by C. and Th. Muller (Paris,
1841). He was the first writer who attempted to introduce a systematic chronological
arrangement into the traditional periods of Greek, and especially Athenian, history
and mythology. His theories of the ancient Attic chronology were accepted down
to the time of Eratosthenes.
Hellanicus, (Hellanikos). Of Mytilene in the island of Lesbos, the most eminent
among the Greek logographers. He was the son, according to some, of Andromenes
or Aristomenes, and, according to others, of Scamon (Seammon), though this latter
may be merely a mistake of Suidas (s. v. Hellanikos). According to the confused
account of Suidas, Hellanicus and Herodotus lived together at the court of Amyntas
(B. C. 553--504), and Hellanicus was still alive in the reign of Perdiccas, who
succeeded to the throne in B. C. 461. This account, however, is irreconcilable
with the further statement of Suidas, that Hellanicus was a contemporary of Sophocles
and Euripides. Lucian (Macrob. 22) states that Hellanicus died at the age of eighty-five,
and the learned authoress Pamphila (ap. Gellium, xv. 23), who likewise makes him
a contemporary of Herodotus, says that at the beginning of the Peloponnesian war
(B. C. 431), Hellanicus was about sixty-five years old, so that he would have
been born about B. C. 496, and died in B. C. 411. This account, which in itself
is very probable, seems to be contradicted by a statement of a scholiast (ad Aristoph.
Ran. 706), from which it would appear that after the battle of Arginusae, in B.
C. 406, Hellanicus was still engaged in writing; but the vague and indefinite
expression of that scholiast does not warrant such an inference, and it is moreover
clear from Thucydides (i. 97), that in B. C. 404 or 403 Hellanicus was no longer
alive. Another authority, all anonymous biographer of Euripides (p. 134 in Westermann's
Vitarum Scriptores Graeci minores, Brunswick, 1845), states that Hellanicus was
born on the day of the battle of Salamis, that is, on the 20th of Boedromion B.
C. 481, and that he received his name from the victory of Hellas over the barbarians;
but this account is too much like an invention of some grammarian to account for
the name Hellanicus, and deserves no credit; and among the various contradictory
statements we are inclined to adopt that of Pamphila. Respecting the life of Hellanicus
we are altogether in the dark, and we only learn from Suidas that he died at Perperene,
a town on the coast of Asia Minor opposite to Lesbos ; we may, however, presume
that he visited at least some of the countries of whose history he treated.
Hellanicus was a very prolific writer, and if we were to look upon
all the titles that have come down to us as titles of genuine productions and
distinct works, their number would amount to nearly thirty; but the recent investigations
of Preller (De Hellanico Lesbio Historico, Dorpat, 1840, 4to.) have shown that
several works bearing his name are spurious and of later date, and that many others
which are referred to as separate works, are only chapters or sections of other
works. We adopt Preller's arrangement, and first mention those works which were
spurious. 1. Aiguptiaka. The late origin of this production is obvious from the
fragment quoted by Arrian (Dissert. Epictet. ii. 19) and Gellius (i. 2; comp.
Athen. xi., xv.) 2. Eis Ammonos anabasis, which is mentioned by Athenaeus (xiv.),
who, however, doubts its genuineness. 3. Barbarika nomima, which, even according
to the opinions of the ancients, was a compilation made from the works of Herodotus
and Damastes. (Euseb. Praep. Evang. ix.; comp. Suid. s.v. Zamolxis; Etymol. Mag.
p. 407. 48.) 4. Ethnon onomasiai, which seems to have been a similar compilation.
(Athen. xi. ; comp. Herod. iv. 190.) It may have been the same work as the one
which we find referred to under the name of Peri ethnon (Schol. ad Apollon. Rhod,
iv. 322), Ktiseis ethnon kai poleon, or simply ktiseis. (Steph. Byz. s. v. Charimatai;
Athen. x.) Stephanus of Byzantium refers to some other works under the name of
Hellanicus, such as Kupriaka, ta peri Ludian, and Skuthika, of which we cannot
say whether they were parts of another work, perhaps the Persika (of which we
shall speak presently). The Phoinikika mentioned by Cedrenus (Synops.), and the
historiai (Athen. ix., where hiereiais must probably be read for historiais; Theodoret,
de Aff.), probably never existed at all, and are wrong titles. There is one work
referred to by Fulgentius (Myth. i. 2), called Dios polutuchia, the very title
of which is a mystery, and is otherwise unknown.
Setting aside these works, which were spurious, or at least of very
doubtful character, we proceed to enumerate the genuine productions of Hellanicus,
according to the three divisions under which they are arranged by Preller, viz.
genealogical, chorographical, and chronological works.
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I. Genealogical works. It is a very probable opinion of Preller,
that Apollodorus, in writing his Bibliotheca, followed principally the genealogical
works of Hellanicus, and he accordingly arranges the latter in the following order,
agreeing with that in which Apollodorus treats of his subjects. 1. Deukalioneia,
in two books, containing the Thessalian traditions about the origin of man, and
about Deucalion and his descendants down to the time of the Argonauts. (Clem.
Alex. Strom. vi.) The Phettalika referred to by Harpoeration (s. v. tetrarchia)
were either the same work or a portion of it. 2. Phoronis, in two books, contained
the Pelasgian and Argive traditions from the time of Phoroneus and Ogyges down
to Heracles, perhaps even down to the return of the Heracleidae. (Dionys. i. 28.)
The works Peri Arkadias (Schol. ad Apollon. Rhod. i. 162), Argolika (Schol. ad
Hom. Il. iii. 75), and Boiotika (ibid. iii. 494) were either the same work as
the Phoronis or portions of it. 3. Atlantias, in two books, containing the stories
about Atlas and his descendants. (Harpocrat. s. v. Homeridai; Schol. ad Hom. Il.
xviii. 486.) 4. Troika, in two books, beginning with the time of Dardanus. (Harpocrat.
s. v. Krithote; Schol. ad Hom. Il.) The Adopis was only a portion of the Troica.
(Marcellin. Vit. Thue. § 4.)
II. Chorographical works. 1. Atthis, or a history of Attica,
consisting of at least four books. The first contained the history of the mythical
period ; the second was principally occupied with the history and antiquities
of the Attic demi; the contents of the third and fourth are little known, but
we know that Hellanicus treated of the Attic colonies established in Ionia, and
of the subsequent events down to his own time. (Preller; comp. Thuc. i. 97.) 2.
Aiolika, or the history of the Aeolians in Asia Minor and the islands of the Aegean.
The Lesbiaca and Peri Chiou ktiseos seem to have formed sections of the Aeolica.
(Tzetz. ad Lyeoph. 1374; Schol. ad Pind. Nem. xi. 43, ad Hom. Od. viii. 294.)
3. Persika, in two books, contained the history of Persia, Media, and Assyria
from the time of Ninus to that of Hellanicus himself, as we may gather from the
fragments still extant, and as is expressly stated by Cephalion in Syncellus (p.
315, ed. Dindorf).
III. Chronological works. 1. Hiereiai tes Heras in three books,
contained a chronological list of the priestesses of Hera at Argos. There existed
undonbtedly at Argos in the temple of Hera records in the form of annals, which
ascended to the earliest times for which they were made up from oral traditions.
Hellanicus made use of these records, but his work was not a mere meagre list,
but he incorporated in it a variety of traditions and historical events, for which
there was no room in any of his other works, and he thus produced a sort of chronicle.
It was one of the earliest attempts to regulate chronology, and was afterwards
made use of by Thucydides (ii. 2, iv. 1, 33), Timaeus (Polyb. xii. 12), and others.
(Comp. Plut. De Mus.; Preller, l. c.) 2. Karneonikai, or a chronological list
of the victors in the musical and poetical contests at the festival of the Carneia.
This work may be regarded as the first attempt towards a history of literature
in Greece. A part of this work, or perhaps an early edition of it, is said to
have been in verse. (Athen. xiv.) Suidas states that Hellanicus wrote many works
both in prose and in verse; but of the latter kind nothing is known.
All the productions of Hellanicus are lost, with the exception of
a considerable number of fragments. Although he belongs, strictly speaking, to
the logographers (Dionys. Jud. de Thuc. 5; Diod. i. 37), still he holds a much
higher place among the early Greek historians than any of those who are designated
by the name of logographers. He forms the transition from that class of writers
to the real historians; for he not only treated of the mythical ages, but, in
several instances, he carried history down to his own times. But, as far as the
form of history is concerned, he had not emancipated himself from the custom and
practice of other logographers, for, like them, he. treated history from local
points of view, and divided it into such portions as might be related in the form
of genealogies. Hence he wrote local histories and traditions. This circumstance,
and the many differences in his accounts from those of Herodotus, renders it highly
probable that these two writers worked quite independently of each other, and
that the one was unknown to the other. It cannot be matter of surprise that, in
regard to early traditions, he was deficient in historical criticism, and we may
believe Thucydides (i. 97), who says that Hellanicus wrote the history of later
times briefly, and that he was not accurate in his chronology. In his geographical
views, too, he seems to have been greatly dependent upon his predecessors, and
gave, for the most part, what he found in them; whence Agathemerus (i. 1), who
calls him an aner poluistor, remarks that he aplastos paredoke ten historian;
but the censure for falsehood and the like bestowed on him by such writers as
Ctesias (ap. Phot. Bibl. Cod. 72), Theopompus (ap. Strab. i.), Ephorus (up. Joseph.
c. Apion, i. 3; comp. Strab. viii.), and Strabo (x., xi., xiii.), is evidently
one-sided, and should not bias us in forming our judgment of his merits or demerits
as a writer; for there can be no doubt that he was a learned and diligent compiler,
and that so far as his sources went, he was a trustworthy one. His fragments are
collected in Sturz, Hellanici Lesbii Fragmenta, Lips. 1796, 8vo., 2d edition 11826;
in the Museum Criticum,vol.ii., Camb. 1826 ; and in C. and Th. Muller, Fragmenta
Histor. Graec. (Dahlmann, Herodot., Muller, Hist. of Greek Lit., and especially
the work of Preller above referred to.)
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Chorizontes. "Separators." A name given to such of the ancient scholars
and critics as held the belief that the Iliad and Odyssey of Homer were written
by different authors. The names of only two of these critics -Xenon and Hellanicus-
have come down to us.
Of the historians, Hermeias of Methymne brought to a close with this year his narrative of Sicilian affairs, having composed ten books, or, as some divide the work, twelve.
Commentary: One fragment of the Sicilian history of Hermeias remains (Athenaeus 10.438c; also FHG, 2.80.1). The history seems to have dealt mainly with the Elder Dionysius with perhaps a brief introduction on earlier Sicilian affairs.
Hermeias. Of Methymna in Lesbos, the author of a history of Sicily, the third
book of which is quoted by Athenaeus (x. ); but we know from Diodorus Siculus
(xv. 37) that Hermeias related the history of Sicily down to the year B. C. 376,
and that the whole work was divided into ten or twelve books. Stephanus Byzantius
(s. v. Chalkis) speaks of a Periegesis of Hermeias, and Athenaeus (iv.) quotes
the second book of a work Peri tou Gruneion Apollonos, by one Hermeias, but whether
both or either of them is identical with the historian of Sicily is quite uncertain.
A Lesbian historical writer of uncertain date; one of the sources used by Dionysius of Halicarnassus in his account of the Pelasgians (i. 23).
SAMOS (Ancient city) SAMOS
340 - 270
A Samian writer of history who flourished about B.C. 350. He was a descendant of Alcibiades, and at one time was tyrant of Samos. Only fragments now remain of his historical writings
Duris, (Douris), of Samos, a descendant of Alcibiades (Plut. Alcib. 32), and brother
of Lynceus, lived in the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus. The early part of his
life fell in the period when the Athenians sent 2000 cleruchi to Samos, by whom
the inhabitants of the island were expelled, B. C. 352. During the absence from
his native country, Duris, when yet a boy, gained a victory at Olympia in boxing,
for which a statue was erected to him there with an inscription. (Paus. vi. 13.3)
The year of that victory is unknown, but it took place previous to the return
of the Samians to their island, in B. C. 324. He must have been staying for some
time at Athens, as he and his brother Lynceus are mentioned among the pupils of
Theophrastus. (Athen. iv.) After his return to Samos, he obtained the tyranny,
though it is unknown by what means and how long he maintained himself in that
position. He must, however, have survived the year B. C. 281, as in one of his
works (ap. Plin. H. N. viii. 40) he mentioned an occurrence which belongs to that
year.
Duris was the author of a considerable number of works, most of which
were of an historical nature, but none of them has come down to us, and all we
possess of his productions consists of a number of scattered fragments. His principal
work was--1. A history of Greece, he ton Hellenikon historia (Diod. xv. 60), or,
as others simply call it, isturiai. It commenced with the death of the three princes,
Amyntas, the father of Philip of Macedonia, Agesipolis of Sparta, and Jason of
Pherae, that is, with the year B. C. 370, and carried the history down at least
to B. C. 281, so that it embraced a period of at least 89 years. The number of
books of which it consisted is not known, though their number seems to have amounted
to about 28. Some ancient writers speak of a work of Duris entitled Makedonika,
and the question as to whether this was a distinct work, or merely a part of or
identical with the historiai, has been much discussed in modern times. Grauert
(Histor. Analect.) and Clinton maintain, that it was a separate work, whereas
Vossius and Droysen (Gesch. d. Nachfolg. Alex.) have proved by the strongest evidence,
that the Macedonica is the same work as the historiai. 2. Peri Agathoklea historiai
in several books, the fourth of which is quoted by Suidas. 3. Samion oroi, that
is, Annals of the history of Samos, is frequently referred to by the ancients,
and consisted of at least twelve books. 4. Peri Euripidou kai Sophokleous (Athen.
iv.), seems to be the same as peri tragoidiass. (Athen. xiv. p. 636.) 5. peri
no/mwn. (Etym. M.) 6. Peri agonon. (Tzetz. ad Lycoph. 613; Photius, s. v. Selinou
stephanos.) 7. Peri zographias. (Diog. Laert. i. 38, ii. 19.) 8. Peri torentikes
(Plin. Elench. lib. 33, 34), may, however, have been the same as the preceding
work. 9. Aibuka. (Phot. s. v. Damia; Schol. ad Aristoph. Vesp. 1030.) Duris as
an historian does not appear to have enjoyed any very great reputation among the
ancients. Cicero (ad Alt. vi. 1) says of him merely homo in historia satis diligens,
and Dionysius (de Compos. Verb. 4) reckons him among those historians who bestowed
no care upon the form of their compositions. His historical veracity also is questioned
by Plutarch (Pericl. 28; comp. Demosth. 19, Alcib. 32, Eum. 1), but he does not
give any reasons for it, and it may be that Plutarch was merely struck at finding
in Duris things which no other writer had mentioned, and was thus led to doubt
the credibility of his statements. The fragments of Duris have been collected
by J. G. Hulleman, " Duridis Samii quae supersunt," Traject. ad Rhen.
1841, 8vo.
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He wrote history of Persia
Aethlius (Aethlios), the author of a work entitled "Samian Annals" (Horoi Samioi), the fifth book of which is quoted by Athenaeus, although he expresses a doubt about the genuineness of the work. (xiv. p. 650, d. 653, f.) Aethlius is also referred to by Clemens Alexandrinus (Protr. p. 30, a), Eustathius (ad Od. vii. 120, p. 1573), and in the Etymologicum Magnum (s. v. nenotai), where the name is written Athlius.
4th ce. BC, he wrote Samian History
Alexis. A Samian, the author of an historical work called Samioi Horoi or Horoi Samiakoi (Samian Annals), which Athenaeus quotes. (xiii., xii.)
Evanthes. Of Samos, a Greek historian, who is mentioned only by Plutarch. (Sol. 11.) There are several passages in which authors of the name of Evanthes are referred to; but, their native countries not being stated, it is uncertain whether those passages refer to any of the three Evanthes here specified, or to other persons of the same name. Thus Pliny (H. N. viii. 22) quotes one Evanthes whom he calls inter auctores Graeciae son spretus, and from whose work he gives a statement respecting some religious rite observed in Areadia. One might therefore be inclined to think him the same as the Evanthes who is quoted by the Scholiast on Apollonius Rhodius (i. 1063, 1065) as the author of muthika. Athenaeus (vii.) speaks of an epic poet Evanthes, of whose productions he mentions a hymn to Glaucus.
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Eugeon, (or Eugaion), of Samos, one of the earliest Greek historians mentioned by Dionysius of Halicarnassus. (Jud. de Thueyd. 5; comp. Suid. s.v.)
MARATHOKAMBOS (Small town) SAMOS
Marathokampos is the home land of Kapetan Stamatis Georgiadis, Napoleon's great
fighter, member of the Karmanioli movement, and a hero of the Samian renaissance,
whose presence at the Kavo's Fonia battle gave the victory to the Samian Arms
in 1924. His family, his brothers, his sisters, his brothers in law gave everything
to the strangle and died in exile in Evia
when Samos turned to a hegemony. His house can be found in the village of Marathokampos
where many of his personal belongings are saved there.
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MYRINA (Small town) LEMNOS (LIMNOS)
1952
CHIOS (Ancient city) GREECE
Oenopides (Oinopides). An astronomer and mathematician of Chios, who obtained
from the Egyptian priests a knowledge of the obliquity of the ecliptic, of which
he subsequently claimed to be the discoverer. He fixed the length of the solar
year at 365 days, less nine hours. To him are ascribed the demonstrations of the
twelfth and twenty-third propositions in Euclid, and the quadrature of the meniscus.
He flourished in the fifth century B.C.
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Oenopides of Chios, Mathematician, Astronomer
Life Cited by Diodorus Siculus and by Proclus in his "Commentary on Euclid",
Oenopides travelled widely through Egypt and acquired considerable skill in astronomy.
His work focused on studies of the lunar and solar years. The discoveries he made
were engraved on a bronze tablet which he offered to Olympia.
Work His work also included: The first geometric constructions with ruler
and compasses (e.g. "Perpendicular to a line from a point that is not on that
line", "Construction on a given straight line of an angle equal to a given angle).
The discovery of the inclination of the ecliptic. The introduction into Greece
the "Great Year" of 59 years. Oenopides accepted a year of 365 days and a month
of 291/2 days. 59 is the largest whole number of years that contains an exact
number of lunar months (730). Since 730 lunar months correspond to 21,557 days,
each year in the Great Year would have 365.373 days, or a little less than 365
days and 9 hours.
This text is based on the Greek book "Ancient Greek Scientists", Athens, 1995 and is cited August 2004 from The Technology Museum of Thessaloniki URL below.
490 - 420
Hippocrates, born in the island of Chios, in Ionia, started, according to a tradition recorded in Philoponus' Commentary on Aristotle's Physics, as a merchant and came to Athens to prosecute pirates who had robbed him of all his goods. Required to stay there for a while to settle his case, he consorted with philosophers and became interested in mathematics, so that in the end, he stayed in Athens from about 450 to 430 B. C. He was, according to Proclus (Commentary on Euclid, I), the first to write Elements (possibly around 430 B. C.), more than one century before those of Euclid (usually dated from around 300 B. C.), but his works are no longer extant and are known only from references by later commentators. In trying to square the circle, Hippocrates adressed the problem of the surface of lunes, figures included between two intersecting arcs of circles.
This text is cited Dec 2003 from the Plato and his dialogues URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks.
Hippocrates of Chios (fl. in second half of 5th c.) is the first; then Leon,
who also discovered diorismi, put together a more careful collection, the propositions
proved in it being more numerous as well as more serviceable
Commentary: This passage has frequently been taken as crediting Hippocrates
with the discovery of the method of geometrical reduction. As Tannery remarks,
if the particular reduction of the duplication problem to that of the two means
is the first noted in history, it is difficult to suppose that it was really
the first; for Hippocrates must have found instances of it in the Pythagorean
geometry. Bretschneider, I think, comes nearer the truth when he boldly translates:
"This reduction of the aforesaid construction is said to have been first
given by Hippocrates". The words are proton de phasi ton aporoumenon diagrammaton
ten apagogen poiesasthai, which must, literally, be translated as in the text
above; but, when Proclus speaks vaguely of "difficult constructions",
he probably means to say simply that "this first recorded instance of a
reduction of a difficult construction is attributed to Hippocrates".
470 - 410
Mathematician
WORK
"Greek Anthology" ( Ελληνική Ανθολογία )
Contains 46 arithmetic "inscriptions". Some of them are mentioned by Diophantos and Platon. These "inscriptions" help to solve simple equation systems and are very interesting for the history of arithmetic.
SAMOS (Ancient city) SAMOS
Astronomer, historian, geographer. He lived in Miletos and Alexandria.
Aristeides of Samos, a writer mentioned by Varro in his work entitled " Hebdomades," as an authority for the opinion, that the moon completed her circuit in twenty-eight days exactly. (Aul. Gell. N. A. iii. 10.)
Arignote of Samos,a female Pythagorean philosopher, is sometimes described as a daughter, at other times merely as a disciple of Pythagoras and Theano. She wrote epigrams and several works upon the worship and mysteries of Dionysus. (Suidas, s. v. Arignote, Theano, Puthag.; Clem. Alex. Strom. iv.; Harpocrat. s. v. Euoi.)
280 - 220
Conon: A native of Samos, distinguished as an astronomer and
geometrician. None of his works have reached us; he is mentioned, however, by
Archimedes, Vergil, Seneca, and others. Conon lived between about 300 and 260
years before our era. Apollonius, in the fourth book of his Conic Sections, thinks
that many of Conon 's demonstrations might be rendered more concise. He is mentioned
as an astronomer by one of the commentators on Ptolemy, and Seneca informs us
that he had made out a list of the eclipses of the sun that had been visible in
Egypt. He is mentioned also by Vergil, and by Catullus in his translation of the
Greek poem of Callimachus, on the tresses of Berenice.
This text is from: Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. Cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Conon (Konon), of Samos, a mathematician and astronomer, lived in the time of the Ptolemies Philadelphus and Euergetes (B. C. 283-222), and was the friend and probably the teacher of Archimedes, who survived him. None of his works are preserved. His observations are referred to by Ptolemy in his phadeis aplanon, and in the historical notice appended to that work they are said to have been made in Italy (Petav. Uranolog.), in which country he seems to have been celebrated (See Virgil's mention of him, Ecl. iii. 40). According to Seneca (Nat. Quaest. vii. 3), he made a collection of the observations of solar eclipses preserved by the Egyptians. Apollonius Pergaeus (Conic. lib. iv. praef.) mentions his attempt to demonstrate some propositions concerning the number of points in which two conic sections can cut one another. Conon was the inventor of the curve called the spiral of Archimedes; but he seems to have contented himself with proposing the investigation of its properties as a problem to other geometers (Pappus, Math. Coll. iv. Prop. 18). He is said to have given the name (Coma Berenices to the constellation so called, on the authority of an ode of Callimachus translated by Catullus (lxvii. de Coma Berenices); a fragment of the original is preserved by Theon in his Scholia on Aratus (Phaenom. 146; see also Hyginus, Poet. Astron. ii. 24). But it is doubtful whether the constellation was really adopted by the Alexandrian astronomers. The strongest evidence which remains to us of Conon's mathematical genius consists in the admiration with which he is mentioned by Archimedes. See his prefaces to the treatises on the Quadrature of the Parabola and on Spirals.
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited Nov 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Engineer, astronomer. His work: Bridge on the Hellespont (481-480 BC).
This was a floating bridge which consisted of boats connected to each other, between Sestos-Madytos (european coast) and Abydos (asiatic coast). The bridge was constructed and commissioned by the King Xerxes in order to facilitate the passage of the persian army to the european coast.
Herodotos describes the construction: Width of the strait: 5280 feet (1580 m). The first try was made by Phoenician, then by Egyptian engineers, who announced to Xerxes the completion of the work. Winter had already began and strong winds broke the bridge in two. Xerxes was very angry and ordered the decapitation of the engineers, to whip the waters with 300 strokes and throw a pair of chains to the sea in order to captivate the Hellespont. The stress with which the chief engineer Harpalos and his collaborators worked is self-evident. The Greeks constructed two bridges at right angles to the Hellespont. Every bridge consisted of triremes and quinquiremes alternately connected to each other. In order to confront the stream and the wind, the bow was at the Aegean side and the stern was at the Black Sea. The bridge at the Black Sea side consisted of 360 boats, the other one (to the Aegean side) consisted of 314. In both rows openings had been provided in order to enable small commercial ships to pass through. The hanging bridges were connected to the coasts by 6 colossal ropes. The ropes were tied to wooden "onos" ("donkeys", special machines for the rising of heavy bodies). So they succeeded to connect the boats to each other and construct a road up on them. 2 of the ropes on every bridge consisted of canvas and 4 of papyrus. Through this combination the safety factor was increased. Harpalos' report after finishing the construction showed that the Phoenicians had used only canvas and the Egyptians only papyrus. The Greeks put trunks, cut to the same size on the ropes on shore at the anchoring area. On the trunks they placed a second layer of ropes etc. The footings of the bridges were completed with the heap up of earth and wood, probably by compression, in order to receive the reactions at the supports. Finally they constructed on both sides earth dams, probably combined with ramps, so that the passing animals could not see the sea and be alarmed.
Two months after the end of the construction and, probably after some endurance tests, Xerxes arrived at Abydos and the running through started. The army used the bridge to the Black Sea side. For animals and supplies the bridge to the Aegean side was used. According to Herodot's estimation passed safely through both bridges 1.700.000 infantry soldiers, belonging to 46 nations, 80.000 riders with the respective horses and 20.000 camels with the respective camel riders.
Mandrocles was the technical consultant of Dareios 1st, King of the Persians. He followed him in the campaign against the Skyths (513-512 BCE). The bridging of the Bosporos was a great achievement in antiquity, considered the big opening to the sea streams and the depth of the sea. It is the first engineer work of this kind in world history. Herodot mentions it. Mandrocles ordered a painting showing Dareios' Army passing over the bridge and Dareios watching. A description of this work accompanied the paper. He dedicated it to the Heraion of Samos. The bridge was probably constructed at the narrowest point of the Bosporos, 660 m width (today Rumeli Hissar). The depth at this point is 120 m and the anchoring of the ships was very difficult because of the very strong streams.
Work: "Floating bridge", connecting both coasts of the Bosporos northly of Chalkedon, probably at the mouth of the Areta river.
MYTILINI (Ancient city) LESVOS
Erigyius, (Eriguios), a Mytilenaean, son of Larichus, was an officer in Alexander's
army. He had been driven into banishment by Philip because of his faithful attachment
to Alexander, and returned when the latter came to the throne in B. C. 336. At
the battle of Arbela, B. C. 331, he commanded the cavalry of the allies, as he
did also when Alexander set out from Ecbatana in pursuit of Dareius, B. C. 330.
In the same year Erigyius was entrusted with the command of one of the three divisions
with which Alexander invaded Hyrcania, and he was, too, among the generals sent
against Satibarzanes, whom he slew in battle with his own hand. In 329, together
with Craterus and Hephaestion, and by the assistance of Aristander the soothsayer,
he endeavoured to dissuade Alexander from crossing the Jaxartes against the Scythians.
In 328 he fell in battle against the Bactrian fugitives. (Arr. Anab. iii. 6, 11,
20, 23, 28, iv. 4; Diod. xvii. 57; Curt. vi. 4.3, vii. 3.2, 4.32-40, 7.6-29, viii.
2.40.)
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited Oct 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
SAMOS (Ancient city) SAMOS
A Samian, son of Aristagoras, envoy to the Greeks before Mycale
Hegesistratus. A Samian, was among those who were sent from Samos to Leotychides,
the Spartan king, in command of the Greek fleet at Delos, to urge him to him to
come to the aid of the Ionians against the Persians. Leotychides accepted the
name Hegesistratus (conductor of the army) as a good omen, and complied with the
request. The result was the battle of Mycale, B. C. 479. (Herod. ix. 90-92.)
ANTISSA (Ancient city) LESVOS
Aristocleides (Aristokleides), a celebrated player on the cithara, who traced his descent from Terpander, lived in the time of the Persian war. He was the master of Phrynis of Mytilene. (Schol. ad. Aristoph. Nub. 958; Suidas, s. v. Phrunis)
CHIOS (Ancient city) GREECE
Dion. Of Chios, a flute player, who is said to have been the first who played the Bacchic spondee on the flute. (Athen. xiv. p. 638.) It may be that he is the same as Dion, the aulopoios, who is mentioned by Varro. (Fragm., ed. Bipont.)
Archytas. A musician of Mitylene, mentioned by Diogenes Laertius as having written a treatise on agriculture.
Archytas (Archutas), of Mytilene, a musician, who may perhaps have been the author of the work Peri Aulon, which is ascribed to Archytas of Tarentum. (Diog. Laert. viii. 82; Athen. xiii., iv.)
SAMOS (Ancient city) SAMOS
A Samian flute-player, his grave made by Cleopatra.
CHIOS (Ancient city) GREECE
Caucalus (Kaukalos), of Chios, a rhetorician, of whom an culogium on Heracles is mentioned by Athenaeus (x.), who also states that he was a brother of the historian Theopompus. It is very probable, that Suidas and Photius (s. v. Lemnion kakon) refer to our rhetorician, itn which case the name Kaukasos must be changed into Kaukalos.
MYTILINI (Ancient city) LESVOS
Diophanes. Of Mytilene, one of the most distinguished Greek rhetoricians of the
time of the Gracchi. For reasons unknown to us, he was obliged to quit his native
place, and went to Rome, where he instructed Tiberius Gracchus, and became his
intimate friend. After T. Gracchus had fallen a victim to the oligarchical faction,
Diophanes and many other friends of Gracchus were also put to death. (Cic. Brut.
27; Strab. xiii.; Plut. T. Gracch. 8, 20.) Another much later rhetorician of the
same name occurs in Porphyry's life of Plotinus.
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited Oct 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
SAMOS (Ancient city) SAMOS
Agatharchus (Agatharchos), a Athenian artist, said by Vitruvius (Praef. ad lib.
vii.) to have invented scene-painting, and to have painted a scene for a tragedy
which Aeschylus exhibited. As this appears to contradict Aristotle's assertion
(Poet. 4.16), that scene-painting was introduced by Sophocles, some scholars understand
Vitruvius to mean merely, that Agatharchus constructed a stage (Compare Hor. Ep
ad. Pis. 279: et modicis instraxit pulpita tignis). But the context shews clearly
that perspective painting must be meant, for Vitruvius goes on to say, that Democritus
and Anaxagoras, carrying out the principles laid down in the treatise of Agatharchus,
wrote on the same subject, shewing how, in drawing, the lines ought to be made
to correspond, according to a natural proportion, to the figure which would be
traced out on an imaginary intervening plane by a pencil of rays proceeding from
the eye, as a fixed point of sight, to the several points of the object viewed.
There was another Greek painter of the name of Agatharchus, who was a native of
the island of Samos, and the son of Eudemus. lie was a contemporary of Alcibiades
and Zeuxis. We have no definite accounts respecting his performances, but he does
not appear to have been an artist of much merit : he prided himself chiefly on
the ease and rapidity with which he finished his works (Plut. Perid. 13). Plutarch
(Alcib. 16) and Andocides at greater length (in Alcib.) tell an anecdote of Alcibiades
having inveigled Agatharchus to his house and kept him there for more than three
months in striet durance, compelling him to adorn it with his pencil. The speech
of Andocides above referred to seems to have been delivered after the destruction
of Melos (B. C. 416) and before the expedition to Sicily (B. C. 415); so that
from the above data the age of Agatharchus may be accurately fixed. Some scholars
(as Bentley, Bottiger, and Meyer) have supposed him to be the same as the contemporary
of Aeschylus, who, however, must have preceded him by a good half century.
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited July 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
CHIOS (Ancient city) GREECE
Ariston, a (Stoic) philosopher of Chios, a pupil of Zeno, founder of the sceptic philosophy, and contemporary of Ceasar.
Ariston. Of Chios, a Stoic philosopher, and a disciple of Zeno, who flourished about B.C. 260.
Ariston, son of Miltiades, born in the island of Chios, a Stoic and disciple of
Zeno, flourished about B. C. 260, and was therefore contemporary with Epicurus,
Aratus, Antigonus Gonatas, and with the first Punic war. Though he professed himself
a Stoic, yet he differed from Zeno in several points; and indeed Diogenes Laertius
(vii. 160, &c.) tells us, that he quitted the school of Zeno for that of Polemo
the Platonist. He is said to have displeased the former by his loquacity, -a quality
which others prized so highly, that he acquired the surname of Siren, as a master
of persuasive eloquence. He was also called Phalancus, from his baldness. He rejected
all branches of philosophy but ethics, considering physiology as beyond man's
powers, and logic as unsuited to them. Even with regard to ethics, Seneca (Ep.
89) complains, that he deprived them of all their practical side, a subject which
he said belonged to the schoolmaster rather than to the philosopher. The sole
object, therefore, of ethics was to shew wherein the supreme good consists, and
this he made to be adiaphoria, i. e. entire indifference to everything except
virtue and vice (Cic. Acad. ii. 42). All external things therefore were in his
view perfectly indifferent; so that he entirely rejected Zeno's distinction between
the good and the preferable (ta proegmena), i. e. whatever excites desire in the
individual mind of any rational being, without being in itself desirable or good,
and of which the pure Stoical doctrine permitted an account to be taken in the
conduct of human life (Cic. Fin. iv. 25). But this notion of proegmena was so
utterly rejected by Ariston, that he held it to be quite indifferent whether we
are in perfect health, or afflicted by the severest sickness (Cic. Fin. ii. 13);
whereas of virtue he declared his wish that even beasts could understand words
which would excite them to it. It is, however, obvious that those who adopt this
theory of the absolute indifference of everything but virtue and vice, in fact
take away all materials for virtue to act upon, and confine it in a state of mere
abstraction. This part of Ariston's system is purely cynical, and perhaps he wished
to shew his admiration for that philosophy, by opening his school at Athens in
the Cynosarges, where Antisthenes had taught. He also differed with Zeno as to
the plurality of virtues, allowing of one only, which he called the health of
the soul (hugeian onomaze, Plut. Virt. Mor. 2). This appears to follow from the
cynical parts of his system, for by taking away all the objects of virtue, he
of course deprives it of variety; and so he based all morality on a well-ordered
mind. Connected with this is his paradox, Sapiens non opinatur--the philosopher
is free from all opinions (since they would be liable to disturb his unruffled
equanimity); and this doctrine seems to disclose a latent tendency to scepticism,
which Cicero appears to have suspected, by often coupling him. with Pyrrho. In
conformity with this view, he despised Zeno's physical speculations, and doubted
whether God is or is not a living Being (Cic. Nat. Deor. i. 14). But this apparently
atheistic dogma perhaps only referred to the Stoical conception of God, as of
a subtle fire dwelling in the sky and ditlusing itself through the universe. He
may have meant merely to demonstrate his position, that physiology is above the
human intellect, by shewing the impossibility of certainly attributing to this
pantheistic essence, form, senses, or life.
Ariston is the founder of a small school, opposed to that of Herillus,
and of which Diogenes Laertius mentions Diphilus and Miltiades as members. We
learn from Athenaeus (vii.), on the authority of Eratosthenes and Apollophanes,
two of his pupils, that in his old age he abandoned himself to pleasure. He is
said to have died of a coup de soleil. Diogenes gives a list of his works, but
says, that all of them, except the Letters to Cleanthes, were attributed by Panaetius
(B. C. 143) and Sosicrates (B. C. 200-128) to another Ariston, a Peripatetic of
Ceos, with whom he is often confounded. Nevertheless, we find in Stobaeus (Serm.
iv. 110, &c.) fragments of a work of his called homoiomata.
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited Oct 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Metrodorus Chius, a pupil of Democritus and teacher of Anaxarchus and of the fourth Hippocrates (about B. C. 330).
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