A CLASSICAL DICTIONARY, ETC., ETC. (continued 15)

Dēmŏdĭce, the wife of Cretheus king of Iolchos. Some call her Biadice, or Tyro. Hyginus, Poeticon Astronomicon, bk. 2, ch. 20.

Dēmŏdŏchus, a musician at the court of Alcinous, who sang, in the presence of Ulysses, the secret amours of Mars and Venus, &c. Homer, Odyssey, bk. 8, li. 44.—Plutarch, de Musica.――A Trojan chief, who came with Æneas into Italy, where he was killed. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 10, li. 413.――An historian. Plutarch, de Fluviis.

Dēmŏleon, a centaur, killed by Theseus at the ♦nuptials of Pirithous. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 12, li. 356.――A son of Antenor, killed by Achilles. Homer, Iliad, bk. 20, li. 395.

Dēmŏleus, a Greek, killed by Æneas in the Trojan war. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 260.

Dēmon, an Athenian, nephew to Demosthenes. He was at the head of the government during the absence of his uncle, and obtained a decree that Demosthenes should be recalled, and that a ship should be sent to bring him back.

Dēmonassa, a daughter of Amphiaraus, who married Thersander. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 5.

Dēmōnax, a celebrated philosopher of Crete, in the reign of Adrian. He showed no concern about the necessaries of life; but when hungry, he entered the first house he met, and there satisfied his appetite. He died in his 100th year.――A man of Mantinea, sent to settle the government of Cyrene. Herodotus, bk. 4, ch. 161.

Dēmŏnīca, a woman who betrayed Ephesus to Brennus. Plutarch, Parallela minora.

Dēmŏphantus, a general killed by Antigonus, &c. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 49.

Demophĭle, a name given to the sibyl of Cumæ, who, as it is supposed by some, sold the sibylline books to Tarquin. Varro, cited by Lactantius, [Divine Institutes], bk. 1, ch. 6.

Dēmŏphĭlus, an Athenian archon.――An officer of Agathocles. Diodorus, bk. 19.

Dēmŏphon, an Athenian, who assisted the Thebans in recovering Cadmea, &c. Diodorus, bk. 15.

Dēmŏphoon, son of Theseus and Phædra, was king of Athens, B.C. 1182 and reigned 33 years. At his return from the Trojan war, he visited Thrace, where he was tenderly received and treated by Phyllis. He retired to Athens, and forgot the kindness and love of Phyllis, who hanged herself in despair. Ovid, Heroides, poem 2.—Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 55.――A friend of Æneas, killed by Camilla. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 11, li. 675.

Dēmŏpŏlis, a son of Themistocles. Plutarch, Themistocles.

Dēmos, a place of Ithaca.

Dēmosthĕnes, a celebrated Athenian, son of a rich blacksmith, called Demosthenes, and of Cleobule. He was but seven years of age when his father died. His guardians negligently managed his affairs, and embezzled the greatest part of his possessions. His education was totally neglected; and for whatever advances he made in learning, he was indebted to his own industry and application. He became the pupil of Isæus and Plato, and applied himself to study the orations of Isocrates. At the age of 17 he gave an early proof of his eloquence and abilities against his guardians, from whom he obtained the retribution of the greatest part of his estate. His rising talents were, however, impeded by weak lungs, and a difficulty of pronunciation, especially of the letter ρ, but these obstacles were soon conquered by unwearied application. To correct the stammering of his voice, he spoke with pebbles in his mouth; and removed the distortion of his features, which accompanied his utterance, by watching the motions of his countenance in a looking-glass. That his pronunciation might be loud and full of emphasis, he frequently ran up the steepest and most uneven walks, where his voice acquired force and energy; and on the sea-shore, when the waves were violently agitated, he declaimed aloud, to accustom himself to the noise and tumults of a public assembly. He also confined himself in a subterraneous cave, to devote himself more closely to studious pursuits; and to eradicate all curiosity of appearance in public, he shaved one half of his head. In this solitary retirement, by the help of a glimmering lamp, he composed the greatest part of his orations, which have ever been the admiration of every age, though his contemporaries and rivals severely inveighed against them, and observed that they smelt of oil. His abilities as an orator raised him to consequence at Athens, and he was soon placed at the head of the government. In this public capacity he roused his countrymen from their indolence, and animated them against the encroachments of Philip of Macedonia. In the battle of Cheronæa, however, Demosthenes betrayed his pusillanimity, and saved his life by flight. After the death of Philip, he declared himself warmly against his son and successor Alexander, whom he branded with the appellation of boy; and when the Macedonians demanded of the Athenians their orators, Demosthenes reminded his countrymen of the fable of the sheep which delivered their dogs to the wolves. Though he had boasted that all the gold of Macedonia could not tempt him, yet he suffered himself to be bribed by a small golden cup from Harpalus. The tumults which this occasioned forced him to retire from Athens; and in his banishment, which he passed at Trœzene and Ægina, he lived with more effeminacy than true heroism. When Antipater made war against Greece, after the death of Alexander, Demosthenes was publicly recalled from his exile, and a galley was sent to fetch him from Ægina. His return was attended with much splendour, and all the citizens crowded at the Piræus to see him land. His triumph and popularity, however, were short. Antipater and Craterus were near Athens, and demanded all the orators to be delivered up into their hands. Demosthenes, with all his adherents, fled to the temple of Neptune in Calauria, and when he saw that all hopes of safety were banished, he took a dose of poison, which he always carried in a quill, and expired on the day that the Thesmophoria were celebrated, in the 60th year of his age, B.C. 322. The Athenians raised a brazen statue to his honour, with an inscription translated into this distich:

Si tibi par menti robur, Vir magne, fuisset, Græcia non Macedæ succubuisset hero.

Demosthenes has been deservedly called the prince of orators; and Cicero, his successful rival among the Romans, calls him a perfect model, and such as he wished to be. These two great princes of eloquence have often been compared together; but the judgment hesitates to which to give the preference. They both arrived at perfection, but the measures by which they obtained it were diametrically opposite. Demosthenes has been compared, and with propriety, by his rival Æschines, to a Siren, from the melody of his expressions. No orator can be said to have expressed the various passions of hatred, resentment, or indignation, with more energy than he; and as a proof of his uncommon application, it need only be mentioned, that he transcribed eight or even ten times the history of Thucydides, that he might not only imitate, but possess the force and energy of the great historian. The best editions of his works are that of Wolfius, folio, Frankof. 1604; that left unfinished by Taylor, Cambridge, 4to, and that published in 12 vols., 8vo, 1720, &c., Lipscomb, by Reiske and his widow. Many of the orations of Demosthenes have been published separately. Plutarch, Parallel Lives.—Diodorus, bk. 16.—Cicero, Orator, &c.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 8; bk. 2, ch. 33.――An Athenian general, sent to succeed Alcibiades in Sicily. He attacked Syracuse with Nicias, but his efforts were ineffectual. After many calamities he fell into the enemy’s hands, and his army was confined to hard labour. The accounts about the death of Demosthenes are various; some believe that he stabbed himself, while others suppose that he was put to death by the Syracusans, B.C. 413. Plutarch, Nicias.—Thucydides, bk. 4, &c.—Diodorus, bk. 12.――The father of the orator Demosthenes. He was very rich, and employed an immense number of slaves in the business of a sword-cutler. Plutarch, Demosthenes.――A governor of Cæsarea, under the Roman emperors.

Dēmostrătus, an Athenian orator.

Demūchus, a Trojan, son of Philetor, killed by Achilles. Homer, Iliad, bk. 20, li. 457.

Dēmy̆lus, a tyrant who tortured the philosopher Zeno. Plutarch, de Stoicorum Repugnantiis.

Denseletæ, a people of Thrace. Cicero, Against Piso, ch. 34.

Deobriga, a town on the Iberus in Spain, now Miranda de Ebro.

Deodătus, an Athenian who opposed the cruel resolutions of Cleon against the captive prisoners of Mitylene.

Dēōis, a name given to Proserpine from her mother Ceres, who was called Deo. This name Ceres received, because when she sought her daughter all over the world, all wished her success in her pursuits, with the word δηεις, invenies; a δηω, invenio. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 6, li. 114.

Deræ, a place of Messenia.

Derbe, a town of Lycaonia, at the north of mount Taurus in Asia Minor, now Alah-Dag.—Cicero, Letters to his Friends, bk. 13, ltr. 73.

Derbĭces, a people near Caucasus, who killed all those that had reached their 70th year. They buried such as died a natural death. Strabo.

Derce, a fountain in Spain, whose waters were said to be uncommonly cold.

Dercennus, an ancient king in Latium. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 11, li. 850.

Dercĕto and Dercĕtis, a goddess of Syria, called also Atergatis, whom some supposed to be the same as Astarte. She was represented as a beautiful woman above the waist, and the lower part terminated in a fish’s tail. According to Diodorus, Venus, whom she had offended, made her passionately fond of a young priest, remarkable for the beauty of his features. She had a daughter by him, and became so ashamed of her incontinence, that she removed her lover, exposed the fruit of her amour, and threw herself into a lake. Her body was transformed into a fish, and her child was preserved, and called Semiramis. As she was chiefly worshipped in Syria, and represented like a fish, the Syrians anciently abstained from fishes. Lucian, de Deâ Syria.—Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 13.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 4, li. 44.—Diodorus, bk. 2.

Dercyllĭdas, a general of Sparta, celebrated for his military exploits. He took nine different cities in eight days, and freed Chersonesus from the inroads of the Thracians by building a wall across the country. He lived B.C. 399. Diodorus, bk. 14.—Xenophon, Hellenica, bk. 1, &c.

Dercyllus, a man appointed over Attica by Antipater. Cornelius Nepos, Phocion, ch. 2.

Dercy̆nus, a son of Neptune, killed by Hercules. Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 5.

Dersæi, a people of Thrace.

Derthona, now Tortona, a town of Liguria, between Genoa and Placentia, where a Roman colony was settled. Cicero, De Divinatione, bk. 2.

Dertose, now Tortosa, a town of Spain near the Iberus.

Derusiæi, a people of Persia.

Dēsudăba, a town of Media. Livy, bk. 44, ch. 26.

Deva, a town of Britain, now Chester on the Dee.

Deucălion, a son of Prometheus, who married Pyrrha the daughter of Epimetheus. He reigned over part of Thessaly, and in his age the whole earth was overwhelmed with a deluge. The impiety of mankind had irritated Jupiter, who resolved to destroy the world, and immediately the earth exhibited a boundless scene of waters. The highest mountains were climbed up by the frightened inhabitants of the country; but this seeming place of security was soon overtopped by the rising waters, and no hope was left of escaping the universal calamity. Prometheus advised his son to make himself a ship, and by this means he saved himself and his wife Pyrrha. The vessel was tossed about during nine successive days, and at last stopped on the top of mount Parnassus, where Deucalion remained till the waters had subsided. Pindar and Ovid make no mention of a vessel built by the advice of Prometheus; but, according to their relation, Deucalion saved his life by taking refuge on the top of Parnassus, or, according to Hyginus, of Ætna in Sicily. As soon as the waters had retired from the surface of the earth, Deucalion and his wife went to consult the oracle of Themis, and were directed to repair the loss of mankind, by throwing behind them the bones of their grandmother. This was nothing but the stones of the earth; and after some hesitation about the meaning of the oracle, they obeyed. The stones thrown by Deucalion became men, and those of Pyrrha women. According to Justin, Deucalion was not the only one who escaped from the universal calamity. Many saved their lives by ascending the highest mountains, or trusting themselves in small vessels to the mercy of the waters. This deluge, which chiefly happened in Thessaly, according to the relation of some writers, was produced by the inundation of the waters of the river Peneus, whose regular course was stopped by an earthquake near mount Ossa and Olympus. According to Xenophon, there were no less than five deluges. The first happened under Ogyges, and lasted three months. The second, which was in the age of Hercules and Prometheus, continued but one month. During the third, which happened in the reign of another Ogyges, all Attica was laid waste by the waters. Thessaly was totally covered by the waters during the fourth, which happened in the age of Deucalion. The last was before the Trojan war, and its effects were severely felt by the inhabitants of Egypt. There prevailed a report in Attica, that the waters of Deucalion’s deluge had disappeared through a small aperture about a cubit wide, near Jupiter Olympius’s temple; and Pausanias, who saw it, further adds, that a yearly offering of flour and honey was thrown into it with religious ceremony. The deluge of Deucalion, so much celebrated in ancient history, is supposed to have happened 1503 years B.C. Deucalion had two sons by Pyrrha, Hellen, called by some son of Jupiter, and Amphictyon king of Attica, and also a daughter, Protogenia, who became mother of Æthlius by Jupiter. Pindar, poem 9, Olympian.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 1, fable 8; Heroides, ♦poem 15, li. 167.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 7.—Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 10; bk. 5, ch. 8.—Juvenal, satire 1, li. 81.—Hyginus, fable 153.—Justin, bk. 2, ch. 6.—Diodorus, bk. 5.—Lucian, de Deâ Syriâ.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 1, li. 62.――One of the Argonauts.――A son of Minos. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 1.――A son of Abas.

Deucetius, a Sicilian general. Diodorus, bk. 11.

Deudorix, one of the Cherusci, led in triumph by Germanicus.

Dexamĕne, one of the Nereides. Homer, Iliad, bk. 18.

Dexamĕnus, a man delivered by Hercules from the hands of his daughter’s suitors. Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 5.――A king of Olenus in Achaia, whose two daughters married the sons of Actor. Pausanias, bk. 5, ch. 3.

Dexippus, a Spartan who assisted the people of Agrigentum, &c. Diodorus, bk. 13.

Dexithea, the wife of Minos. Apollodorus, bk. 3, ch. 1.

Dexius, a Greek, father of Iphinous, killed by Glaucus in the Trojan war, &c. Homer, Iliad, bk. 7.

Dīa, a daughter of Deion, mother of Pirithous by Ixion.――An island in the Ægean sea, 17 miles from Delos. It is the same as Naxos. See:Naxos. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 8, li. 157.――Another on the coast of Crete, now Standia.――A city of Thrace,――of Eubœa,――Peloponnesus,――Lusitania,――Italy, near the Alps,――Scythia, near the Phasis,――Caria,――Bithynia,――and Thessaly.

Diactorĭdes, one of Agarista’s suitors. Herodotus, bk. 6, ch. 127.――The father of Eurydame the wife of Leutychides. Herodotus, bk. 6, ch. 71.

Diæus, of Megalopolis, a general of the Achæans, who killed himself when his affairs became desperate. Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 16.

Diadumeniānus, a son of Macrinus, who enjoyed the title of Cæsar during his father’s lifetime, &c.

Diăgon and Diăgum, a river of Peloponnesus, flowing into the Alpheus, and separating Pisa from Arcadia. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 21.

Diagondas, a Theban who abolished all nocturnal sacrifices. Cicero, de Legibus, bk. 2, ch. 15.

Diăgŏras, an Athenian philosopher. His father’s name was Teleclytus. From the greatest superstition, he became a most unconquerable atheist, because he saw a man who laid a false claim to one of his poems, and who perjured himself, go unpunished. His great impiety and blasphemies provoked his countrymen, and the Areopagites promised one talent to him who brought his head before their tribunal, and two if he were produced alive. He lived about 416 years before Christ. Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 1, ch. 23; bk. 3, ch. 37, &c.—Valerius Maximus, bk. 1, ch. 1.――An athlete of Rhodes, 460 years before the christian era. Pindar celebrated his merit in a beautiful ode still extant, which was written in golden letters in a temple of Minerva. He saw his three sons crowned the same day at Olympia, and died through excess of joy. Cicero, Tusculanæ Disputationes, bk. 5.—Plutarch, Pelopidas.—Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 7.

Diālis, a priest of Jupiter at Rome, first instituted by Numa. He was never permitted to swear, even upon public trials. Varro, de Lingua Latina, bk. 4, ch. 15.—Dionysius of Halicarnassus, bk. 2.—Livy, bk. 1, ch. 20.

Diallus, an Athenian who wrote a history of all the memorable occurrences of his age.

Diamastigōsis, a festival of Sparta in honour of Diana Orthia, which received that name, ἀπο του μαστιγουν, from whipping, because boys were whipped before the altar of the goddess. These boys, called Bomonicæ, were originally free-born Spartans; but, in the more delicate ages, they were of mean birth, and generally of a slavish origin. This operation was performed by an officer in a severe and unfeeling manner; and that no compassion should be raised, the priest stood near the altar with a small light statue of the goddess, which suddenly became heavy and insupportable if the lash of the whip was more lenient or less rigorous. The parents of the children attended the solemnity, and exhorted them not to commit anything, either by fear or groans, that might be unworthy of Laconian education. These flagellations were so severe, that the blood gushed in profuse torrents, and many expired under the lash of the whip without uttering a groan, or betraying any marks of fear. Such a death was reckoned very honourable, and the corpse was buried with much solemnity, with a garland of flowers on its head. The origin of this festival is unknown. Some suppose that Lycurgus first instituted it to inure the youths of Lacedæmon to bear labour and fatigue, and render them insensible to pain and wounds. Others maintain that it was a mitigation of an oracle, which ordered that human blood should be shed on Diana’s altar; and according to their opinion, Orestes first introduced that barbarous custom, after he had brought the statue of Diana Taurica into Greece. There is another tradition, which mentions that Pausanias, as he was offering prayers and sacrifices to the gods, before he engaged with Mardonius, was suddenly attacked by a number of Lydians who disturbed the sacrifice, and were at last repelled with staves and stones, the only weapons with which the Lacedæmonians were provided at that moment. In commemoration of this, therefore, the whipping of boys was instituted at Sparta, and after that the Lydian procession.

Diāna, was the goddess of hunting. According to Cicero, there were three of this name; a daughter of Jupiter and Proserpine, who became mother of Cupid; a daughter of Jupiter and Latona; and a daughter of Upis and Glauce. The second is the most celebrated, and to her all the ancients allude. She was born at the same birth as Apollo; and the pains which she saw her mother suffer during her labour, gave her such an aversion to marriage, that she obtained from her father the permission to live in perpetual celibacy, and to preside over the travails of women. To shun the society of men, she devoted herself to hunting, and obtained the permission of Jupiter to have for her attendants 60 of the Oceanides, and 20 other nymphs, all of whom, like herself, abjured the use of marriage. She is represented with a bent bow and quiver, and attended with dogs, and sometimes drawn in a chariot by two white stags. Sometimes she appears with wings, holding a lion in one hand and a panther in the other, with a chariot drawn by two heifers, or two horses of different colours. She is represented taller by the head than her attendant nymphs, her face has something manly, her legs are bare, well-shaped, and strong, and her feet are covered with a buskin, worn by huntresses among the ancients. Diana received many surnames, particularly from the places where her worship was established, and from the functions over which she presided. She was called Lucina, Ilythia, or Juno Pronuba, when invoked by women in child-bed, and Trivia when worshipped in the cross-ways, where her statues were generally erected. She was supposed to be the same as the moon, and Proserpine or Hecate, and from that circumstance she was called Triformis; and some of her statues represented her with three heads, that of a horse, a dog, and a boar. Her power and functions under these three characters have been beautifully expressed in these two verses:

Terret, lustrat, agit, Proserpina, Luna, Diana,

Ima, suprema, feras, sceptro, fulgore, sagittâ.

She was also called Agrotera, Orthia, Taurica, Delia, Cynthia, Aricia, &c. She was supposed to be the same as the Isis of the Egyptians, whose worship was introduced into Greece with that of Osiris under the name of Apollo. When Typhon waged war against the gods, Diana is said to have metamorphosed herself into a cat, to avoid his fury. The goddess is generally known in the figures that represent her, by the crescent on her head, by the dogs which attend her, and by her hunting habit. The most famous of her temples was that of Ephesus, which was one of the seven wonders of the world. See: Ephesus. She was there represented with a great number of breasts, and other symbols which signified the earth, or Cybele. Though she was the patroness of chastity, yet she forgot her dignity to enjoy the company of Endymion, and the very familiar favours which, according to mythology, she granted to Pan and Orion are well known. See: Endymion, Pan, Orion. The inhabitants of Taurica were particularly attached to the worship of this goddess, and they cruelly offered on her altar all the strangers that were shipwrecked on their coasts. Her temple in Aricia was served by a priest who had always murdered his predecessor, and the Lacedæmonians yearly offered her human victims till the age of Lycurgus, who changed this barbarous custom for the sacrifice of flagellation. The Athenians generally offered her goats, and others a white kid, and sometimes a boar pig, or an ox. Among plants the poppy and the ditamy were sacred to her. She, as well as her brother Apollo, had some oracles, among which those of Egypt, Cilicia, and Ephesus are the most known. Ovid, Fasti, bk. 2, li. 155; Metamorphoses, bk. 3, li. 156; bk. 7, lis. 94 & 194, &c.—Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 3.—Horace, bk. 3, ode 22.—Virgil, Georgics, bk. 3, li. 302; Æneid, bk. 1, li. 505.—Homer, Odyssey, bk. 5.—Pausanias, bk. 8, chs. 31 & 37.—Catullus.—Statius, bk. 3, Sylvæ, poem 1, li. 57.—Apollodorus bk. 1, ch. 4, &c.; bk. 3, ch. 5, &c.

Dianasa, the mother of Lycurgus. Plutarch, Lycurgus.

Dianium, a town and promontory of Spain, now cape Martin, where Diana was worshipped.

Diasia, festivals in honour of Jupiter at Athens. They received their name ἀπο του διος και της ἁτης, from Jupiter and misfortune, because, by making application to Jupiter, men obtained relief from their misfortunes, and were delivered from dangers. During this festival things of all kinds were exposed for sale.

Dibio, a town of France, now Dijon in Burgundy.

Dicæa and Dicæarchea, a town of Italy. Silius Italicus, bk. 13, li. 385.

Dicæus, an Athenian who was supernaturally apprised of the defeat of the Persians in Greece. Herodotus, bk. 8, ch. 65.

Dice, one of the Horæ, daughters of Jupiter. Apollonius, bk. 1, ch. 3.

Dicearchus, a Messenian famous for his knowledge of philosophy, history, and mathematics. He was one of Aristotle’s disciples. Nothing remains of his numerous compositions. He had composed a history of the Spartan republic, which was publicly read over every year by order of the magistrates, for the improvement and instruction of youth.

Diceneus, an Egyptian philosopher in the age of Augustus, who travelled into Scythia, where he ingratiated himself with the king of the country, and by his instruction softened the wildness and rusticity of his manners. He also gained such an influence over the multitude, that they destroyed all the vines which grew in their country, to prevent the riot and dissipation which the wine occasioned among them. He wrote all his maxims and his laws in a book, that they might not lose the benefit of them after his death.

Dicomas, a king of the Getæ. Plutarch, Antonius.

Dictæ and Dictæus mons, a mountain of Crete. The island is often known by the name of Dictæa arva. Virgil, Eclogues, poem 6; Æneid, bk. 3, li. 171.――Jupiter was called Dictæus, because worshipped there, and the same epithet was applied to Minos. Virgil, Georgics, bk. 2, li. 536.—Ovid. Metamorphoses, bk. 8, li. 43.—Ptolemy, bk. 3, ch. 17.—Strabo, bk. 10.

Dictamnum and Dictynna, a town of Crete, where the herb called dictamnus chiefly grows. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 12, li. 412.—Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 2, ch. 50.

Dictātor, a magistrate at Rome, invested with regal authority. This officer, whose magistracy seems to have been borrowed from the customs of the Albans or Latins, was first chosen during the Roman wars against the Latins. The consuls being unable to raise forces for the defence of the state, because the plebeians refused to enlist, if they were not discharged from all the debts they had contracted with the patricians, the senate found it necessary to elect a new magistrate, with absolute and incontrollable power to take care of the state. The dictator remained in office for six months, after which he was again elected, if the affairs of the state seemed to be desperate; but if tranquillity was re-established, he generally laid down his power before the time was expired. He knew no superior in the republic, and even the laws were subjected to him. He was called dictator, because dictus, named by the consul, or quoniam dictis ejus parebat populus, because the people implicitly obeyed his command. He was named by the consul in the night, vivâ voce, and his election was confirmed by the auguries, though sometimes he was nominated or recommended by the people. As his power was absolute, he could proclaim war, levy forces, conduct them against an enemy, and disband them at pleasure. He punished as he pleased; and from his decision there was no appeal, at least till later times. He was preceded by 24 lictors, with the fasces: during his administration, all other offices, except the tribunes of the people, were suspended, and he was the master of the republic. But amidst all his independence he was not permitted to go beyond the borders of Italy, and he was always obliged to march on foot in his expeditions; and he never could ride in difficult and laborious marches, without previously obtaining a formal leave from the people. He was chosen only when the state was in imminent dangers from foreign enemies or inward seditions. In the time of a pestilence, a dictator was sometimes elected, as also to hold the comitia, or to celebrate the public festivals, to hold trials, to choose senators, or drive a nail in the Capitol, by which superstitious ceremonies the Romans believed that a plague could be averted, or the progress of an enemy stopped. This office, so respectable and illustrious in the first ages of the republic, became odious by the perpetual usurpations of Sylla and Julius Cæsar; and after the death of the latter the Roman senate, on the motion of the consul Antony, passed a decree, which for ever after forbade a dictator to exist in Rome. The dictator, as soon as elected, chose a subordinate officer, called his master of horse, magister equitum. This officer was respectable, but he was totally subservient to the will of the dictator, and could do nothing without his express order, though he enjoyed the privilege of using a horse, and had the same insignia as the pretors. This subordination, however, was some time after removed; and during the second Punic war the master of the horse was invested with a power equal to that of the dictator. A second dictator was also chosen for the election of magistrates at Rome, after the battle of Cannæ. The dictatorship was originally confined to the patricians, but the plebeians were afterwards admitted to share it. Titus Lartius Flavus was the first dictator, A.U.C. 253. Dionysius of Halicarnassus.—Cicero, de Legibus, bk. 3.—Dio Cassius.—Plutarch, Fabius Maximus.—Appian, bk. 3.—Polybius, bk. 3.—Paterculus, bk. 2, ch. 28.—Livy, bk. 1, ch. 23; bk. 2, ch. 18; bk. 4, ch. 57; bk. 9, ch. 38.

Dictidienses, certain inhabitants of mount Athos. Thucydides, bk. 5, ch. 82.

Dictynna, a nymph of Crete, who first invented hunting nets. She was one of Diana’s attendants, and for that reason the goddess is often called Dictynnia. Some have supposed that Minos pursued her, and that, to avoid his importunities, she threw herself into the sea, and was caught in fishermen’s nets, δικτυα, whence her name. There was a festival at Sparta in honour of Diana, called Dictynnia. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 30; bk. 3, ch. 12.――A city of Crete.

Dictys, a Cretan, who went with Idomeneus to the Trojan war. It is supposed that he wrote a history of this celebrated war, and that at his death he ordered it to be laid in his tomb, where it remained till a violent earthquake, in the reign of Nero, opened the monument where he had been buried. This convulsion of the earth threw out his history of the ♦Trojan war, which was found by some shepherds, and afterwards carried to Rome. This mysterious tradition is deservedly deemed fabulous; and the history of the Trojan war, which is now extant as the composition of Dictys of Crete, was composed in the 15th century, or, according to others, in the age of Constantine, and falsely attributed to one of the followers of Idomeneus. The edition of Dictys is by Mascellus Venia, 4to, Milan, 1477.――A king of the island of Seriphus, son of Magnes and Nais. He married the nymph Clymene, and was made king of Seriphus by Perseus, who deposed Polydectes, because he behaved with wantonness to Danae. See: Polydectes. Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 9; bk. 2, ch. 4.――A centaur, killed at the nuptials of Pirithous. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 12, li. 334.

Didas, a Macedonian who was employed by Perseus to render Demetrius suspected to his father Philip. Livy, bk. 40.

Didia lex, de Sumptibus, by Didius, A.U.C. 606, to restrain the expenses that attended public festivals and entertainments, and limit the number of guests which generally attended them, not only at Rome, but in all the provinces of Italy. By it, not only those who received guests in these festive meetings, but the guests themselves, were liable to be fined. It was an extension of the Oppian and Fannian laws.

Didius, a governor of Spain, conquered by Sertorius. Plutarch, Sertorius.――A man who brought Cæsar the head of Pompey’s eldest son. Plutarch.――A governor of Britain under Claudius.――Julianus, a rich Roman, who, after the murder of Pertinax, bought the empire which the pretorians had exposed to sale, A.D. 192. His great luxury and extravagance rendered him odious; and when he refused to pay the money which he had promised for the imperial purple, the soldiers revolted against him, and put him to death, after a short reign. Severus was made emperor after him.

Dīdo, called also Elissa, a daughter of Belus king of Tyre, who married Sichæus, or Sicharbas, her uncle, who was priest of Hercules. Pygmalion, who succeeded to the throne of Tyre after Belus, murdered Sichæus, to get possession of the immense riches which he possessed; and Dido, disconsolate for the loss of a husband whom she tenderly loved, and by whom she was equally esteemed, set sail in quest of a settlement, with a number of Tyrians, to whom the cruelty of the tyrant became odious. According to some accounts, she threw into the sea the riches of her husband, which Pygmalion so greatly desired; and by that artifice compelled the ships to fly with her, that had come by order of the tyrant to obtain the riches of Sichæus. During her voyage, Dido visited the coast of Cyprus, where she carried away 50 women, who prostituted themselves on the sea-shore, and gave them as wives to her Tyrian followers. A storm drove her fleet on the African coast, and she bought of the inhabitants as much land as could be covered by a bull’s hide, cut into thongs. Upon this piece of land she built a citadel, called Byrsa [See: Byrsa], and in the increase of population, and the rising commerce among her subjects, soon obliged her to enlarge her city and the boundaries of her dominions. Her beauty, as well as the fame of her enterprise, gained her many admirers; and her subjects wished to compel her to marry Iarbas king of Mauritania, who threatened them with a dreadful war. Dido begged three months to give her decisive answer; and during that time, she erected a funeral pile, as if wishing, by a solemn sacrifice, to appease the manes of Sichæus, to whom she had promised eternal fidelity. When all was prepared, she stabbed herself on the pile in presence of her people, and by this uncommon action obtained the name of Dido, valiant woman, instead of Elissa. According to Virgil and Ovid, the death of Dido was caused by the sudden departure of Æneas, of whom she was deeply enamoured, and whom she could not obtain as a husband. This poetical fiction represents Æneas as living in the age of Dido, and introduces an anachronism of near 300 years. Dido left Phœnicia, 247 years after the Trojan war, or the age of Æneas; that is, about 953 years B.C. This chronological error proceeds not from the ignorance of the poets, but it is supported by the authority of Horace,

Aut famam sequere, aut sibi convenientia finge.

While Virgil describes, in a beautiful episode, the desperate love of Dido, and the submission of Æneas to the will of the gods, he at the same time gives an explanation of the hatred which existed between the republics of Rome and Carthage, and informs his readers that their mutual enmity originated in their very first foundation, and was apparently kindled by a more remote cause than the jealousy and rivalship of two flourishing empires. Dido, after her death, was honoured as a deity by her subjects. Justin, bk. 18, ch. 4, &c.—Paterculus, bk. 1, ch. 6.—Virgil, Æneid.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 14, fable 2; Heroides, poem 6.—Appian, Punic Wars.—Orosius, bk. 4.—Herodian.—Dionysius of Halicarnassus.

Dĭdy̆ma, a place of Miletus. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 9.――An island in the Sicilian sea. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 11.

Dĭdy̆mæus, a surname of Apollo.

Dĭdy̆māon, an excellent artist, famous for making suits of armour. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 359.

Dĭdy̆me, one of the Cyclades. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 7, li. 469.――A city of Sicily. Ovid, Fasti, bk. 4, li. 476.――One of the Lipari isles, now Saline.――A place near Miletus, where the Branchidæ had their famous oracle.

Dĭdy̆mum, a mountain of Asia Minor.

Dĭdy̆mus, a freedman of Tiberius, &c. Tacitus, Annals, bk. 6, ch. 24.――A scholiast on Homer, surnamed Χαλκεντερος, flourished B.C. 40. He wrote a number of books, which are now lost. The editions of his commentaries are, that in 2 vols., Venice, by Aldus Manutius, 1528, and that of Paris, 8vo, 1530.

Diēnĕces, a Spartan, who, upon hearing, before the battle of Thermopylæ, that the Persians were so numerous that their arrows would darken the light of the sun, observed that it would be a great convenience, for they then should fight in the shade. Herodotus, bk. 7, ch. 226.

Diespĭter, a surname of Jupiter, as being the father of light.

Digentia, a small river which watered Horace’s farm, in the country of the Sabines. Horace, bk. 1, ltr. 18, li. 104.

Digma, a part of the Piræus at Athens.

Dii, the divinities of the ancient inhabitants of the earth, were very numerous. Every object which causes terror, inspires gratitude, or bestows affluence, received the tribute of veneration. Man saw a superior agent in the stars, the elements, or the trees, and supposed that the waters which communicated fertility to his fields and possessions, were under the influence and direction of some invisible power, inclined to favour and to benefit mankind. Thus arose a train of divinities, which imagination arrayed in different forms, and armed with different powers. They were endowed with understanding, and were actuated by the same passions which daily afflict the human race; and those children of superstition were appeased or provoked as the imperfect being which gave them birth. Their wrath was mitigated by sacrifice and incense, and sometimes human victims bled to expiate a crime which superstition alone supposed to exist. The sun, from its powerful influence and animating nature, first attracted the notice, and claimed the adoration, of the uncivilized inhabitants of the earth. The moon also was honoured with sacrifices, and addressed in prayers; and after immortality had been liberally bestowed on all the heavenly bodies, mankind classed among their deities the brute creation, and the cat and the sow shared equally with Jupiter himself, the father of gods and men, the devout veneration of their votaries. This immense number of deities have been divided into classes, according to the will and pleasure of the mythologists. The Romans, generally speaking, reckoned two classes of the gods, the dii majorum gentium, or dii consulentes, and the dii minorum gentium. The former were 12 in number, six males and six females. See: Consentes. In the class of the latter, were ranked all the gods who were worshipped in different parts of the earth. Besides these, there were some called dii selecti, sometimes classed with the 12 greater gods; these were Janus, Saturn, the Genius, the Moon, Pluto, and Bacchus. There were also some called demi-gods, that is, who deserved immortality by the greatness of their exploits, and for their uncommon services to mankind. Among these were Priapus, Vertumnus, Hercules, and those whose parents were some of the immortal gods. Besides these, there were some called topici, whose worship was established at particular places, such as Isis in Egypt, Astarte in Syria, Uranus at Carthage, &c. In process of time also, all the passions and the moral virtues were reckoned as powerful deities, and temples were raised to a goddess of concord, peace, &c. According to the authority of Hesiod, there were no less than 30,000 gods that inhabited the earth, and were guardians of men, all subservient to the power of Jupiter. To these succeeding ages have added an almost equal number; and indeed they were so numerous, and their functions so various, that we find temples erected, and sacrifices offered, to unknown gods. It is observable, that all the gods of the ancients have lived upon earth as mere mortals; and even Jupiter, who was the ruler of heaven, is represented by the mythologists as a helpless child; and we are acquainted with all the particulars that attended the birth and education of Juno. In process of time, not only good and virtuous men who had been the patrons of learning and the supporters of liberty, but also thieves and pirates, were admitted among the gods; and the Roman senate courteously granted immortality to the most cruel and abandoned of their emperors.

Dii, a people of Thrace, on mount Rhodope.

Dimassus, an island near Rhodes. Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 31.

Dinarchus, a Greek orator, son of Sostratus, and disciple to Theophrastus at Athens. He acquired much money by his compositions, and suffered himself to be bribed by the enemies of the Athenians, 307 B.C. Of 64 of his orations, only three remain. Cicero, On Oratory, bk. 2, ch. 53.――A Corinthian ambassador, put to death by Polyperchon. Plutarch, Phocion.――A native of Delos, who collected some fables in Crete, &c. Dionysius of Halicarnassus.

Dindy̆mus (or a, orum), a mountain of Phrygia, near a town of the same name in the neighbourhood of Cyzicus. It was from this place that Cybele was called Dindymene, as her worship was established there by Jason. Strabo, bk. 12.—Statius, bk. 1, Sylvæ, poem 1, li. 9.—Horace, bk. 1, ode 16, li. 5.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 9, li. 617.

Dinia, a town of Phrygia. Livy, bk. 38, ch. 5.――A town of Gaul, now Digne in Provence.

Dinias, a general of Cassander. Diodorus, bk. 19.――A man of Pheræ, who seized the supreme power at Cranon. Polyænus, bk. 2.――A man who wrote a history of Argos. Plutarch, Aratus.

Dinĭche, the wife of Archidamus. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 10.

Dinŏchăres, an architect who finished the temple of Diana at Ephesus, after it had been burnt by Erostratus.

Dinŏcrătes, an architect of Macedonia, who proposed to Alexander to cut mount Athos in the form of a statue, holding a city in one hand, and in the other a basin, into which all the waters of the mountain should empty themselves. This project Alexander rejected as too chimerical, but he employed the talents of the artist in building and beautifying Alexandria. He began to build a temple in honour of Arsinoe, by order of Ptolemy Philadelphus, in which he intended to suspend a statue of the queen, by means of loadstones. His death, and that of his royal patron, prevented the execution of a work which would have been the admiration of future ages. Pliny, bk. 7, ch. 37.—Marcellinus, bk. 22, ch. 40.—Plutarch, Alexander.――A general of Agathocles.――A Messenian, who behaved with great effeminacy and wantonness. He defeated Philopœmen, and put him to death, B.C. 183. Plutarch, Titus Flamininus.

Dinŏdŏchus, a swift runner. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 1.

Dinolŏchus, a Syracusan, who composed 14 comedies. Ælian, de Natura Animalium, bk. 6, ch. 52.

Dinŏmĕnes, a tyrant of Syracuse. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 42.

Dinon, a governor of Damascus, under Ptolemy, &c. Polyænus, bk. 4.――The father of Clitarchus, who wrote a history of Persia in Alexander’s age. He is esteemed a very ♦authentic historian by Cornelius Nepos, Conon.—Plutarch, Alexander.—Diogenes Laërtius.

Dinosthĕnes, a man who made himself a statue of an Olympian victor. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 16.

Dinostrătus, a celebrated geometrician in the age of Plato.

Diŏclea, festivals in the spring at Megara, in honour of Diocles, who died in the defence of a certain youth to whom he was tenderly attached. There was a contention on his tomb, and the youth who gave the sweetest kiss was publicly rewarded with a garland. Theocritus has described them in his Idylls, bk. 12, li. 27.――A town on the coast of Dalmatia. Pliny, bk. 3, ch. 23.

Diocles, a general of Athens, &c. Polyænus, bk. 5.――A comic poet of Athens.――An historian, the first Grecian who ever wrote concerning the origin of the Romans, and the fabulous history of Romulus. Plutarch, Romulus.――One of the four brothers placed over the citadel of Corinth by Archelaus, &c. Polyænus, bk. 6.――A rich man of Messenia. Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 2.――A general of Syracuse. Diodorus, bk. 13.

Diocletianopŏlis, a town of Thessaly, called so in honour of Diocletian.

Diocletiānus Caius Valerius Jovius, a celebrated Roman emperor, born of an obscure family in Dalmatia. He was first a common soldier, and by merit and success he gradually rose to the office of a general, and at the death of Numerian he was invested with the imperial purple. In this high station, he rewarded the virtue and fidelity of Maximian, who had shared with him all the subordinate offices in the army, by making him his colleague on the throne. He created two subordinate emperors, Constantius and Galerius, whom he called Cæsars, whilst he claimed for himself and his colleague the superior title of Augustus. Diocletian has been celebrated for his military virtues; and though he was naturally unpolished by education and study, yet he was the friend and patron of learning and true genius. He was bold and resolute, active and diligent, and well acquainted with the arts which endear a sovereign to his people, and make him respectable even in the eyes of his enemies. His cruelty, however, against the followers of christianity has been deservedly branded with the appellation of unbounded tyranny, and insolent wantonness. After he had reigned 21 years in the greatest prosperity, he publicly abdicated the crown at Nicomedia, on the 1st of May, A.D. 304, and retired to a private station at Salona. Maximian, his colleague, followed his example, but not from voluntary choice; and when he some time after endeavoured to rouse the ambition of Diocletian, and persuade him to reassume the imperial purple, he received for answer, that Diocletian took now more delight in cultivating his little garden, than he formerly enjoyed in a palace, when his power was extended over all the earth. He lived nine years after his abdication in the greatest security and enjoyment at Salona, and died in the 68th year of his age. Diocletian is the first sovereign who voluntarily resigned his power; a philosophical resolution, which, in a later age, was imitated by the emperor Charles V. of Germany.

Diŏdōrus, an historian, surnamed Siculus, because he was born at Argyra in Sicily. He wrote a history of Egypt, Persia, Syria, Media, Greece, Rome, and Carthage, which was divided into 40 books, of which only 15 are extant, with some few fragments. This valuable composition was the work of an accurate inquirer, and it is said that he visited all the places of which he has made mention in his history. It was the labour of 30 years, though the greater part may be considered as nothing more than a judicious compilation from Berosus, Timæus, Theopompus, Callisthenes, and others. The author, however, is too credulous in some of his narrations, and often wanders far from the truth. His style is neither elegant nor too laboured, but it contains great simplicity and unaffected correctness. He often dwells too long upon fabulous reports and trifling incidents, while events of the greatest importance to history are treated with brevity, and sometimes passed over in silence. His manner of reckoning, by the Olympiads and the Roman consuls, will be found very erroneous. The historian flourished about 44 years B.C. He spent much time at Rome to procure information, and authenticate his historical narrations. The best edition of his works is that of Wesseling, 2 vols., folio, Amsterdam, 1746.――A disciple of Euclid, in the age of Plato. Diogenes Laërtius, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers.――A comic poet.――A son of Echeanax, who, with his brothers Codrus and Anaxagoras, murdered Hegesias the tyrant of Ephesus, &c. Polyænus, bk. 6.――An Ephesian, who wrote an account of the life of Anaximander. Diogenes Laërtius.――An orator of Sardis, in the time of the Mithridatic war.――A stoic philosopher, preceptor to Cicero. He lived and died in the house of his pupil, whom he instructed in the various branches of Greek literature. Cicero, Brutus.――A general of Demetrius.――A writer, surnamed Periegetes, who wrote a description of the earth. Plutarch, Themistocles.――An African, &c. Plutarch.

Dioetas, a general of Achaia, &c. Polyænus, bk. 2.

Dīŏgēnes, a celebrated Cynic philosopher of Sinope, banished from his country for coining false money. From Sinope, he retired to Athens, where he became the disciple of Antisthenes, who was at the head of the Cynics. Antisthenes, at first, refused to admit him into his house, and even struck him with a stick. Diogenes calmly bore the rebuke, and said, “Strike me, Antisthenes, but never shall you find a stick sufficiently hard to remove me from your presence, whilst there is anything to be learnt, any information to be gained, from your conversation and acquaintance.” Such firmness recommended him to Antisthenes, and he became his most devoted pupil. He dressed himself in the garment which distinguished the Cynics, and walked about the streets with a tub on his head, which served him as a house and a place of repose. Such singularity, joined to the greatest contempt for riches, soon gained him reputation, and Alexander the Great condescended to visit the philosopher in his tub. He asked Diogenes if there was anything in which he could gratify or oblige him. “Get out of my sunshine,” was the only answer which the philosopher gave. Such an independence of mind so pleased the monarch, that he turned to his courtiers, and said, “Were I not Alexander, I would wish to be Diogenes.” He was once sold as a slave, but his magnanimity so pleased his master, that he made him the preceptor of his children, and the guardian of his estates. After a life spent in the greatest misery and indigence, he died B.C. 324, in the 96th year of his age. He ordered his body to be carelessly thrown into a ditch, and some dust to be sprinkled over it. His orders were, however, disobeyed in this particular, and his friends honoured his remains with a magnificent funeral at Corinth. The inhabitants of Sinope raised statues to his memory; and the marble figure of a dog was placed on a high column erected on his tomb. His biographer has transmitted to posterity a number of his sayings, remarkable for their simplicity and moral tendency. The life of Diogenes, however, shrinks from the eye of a strict examination; he boasted of his poverty, and was so arrogant, that many have observed that the virtues of Diogenes arose from pride and vanity, not from wisdom and sound philosophy. His morals were corrupted, and he gave way to his most vicious indulgencies, and his unbounded wantonness has given occasion to some to observe, that the bottom of his tub would not bear too close an examination. Diogenes Laërtius, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers.—Plutarch, Apophthegmata Laconica.—Cicero, de Natura Deorum, bk. 3, ch. 36, &c.――A stoic of Babylon, disciple of Chrysippus. He went to Athens, and was sent as ambassador to Rome, with Carneades and Critolaus, 155 years before Christ. He died in the 88th year of his age, after a life of the most exemplary virtue. Some suppose that he was strangled by order of Antiochus king of Syria, for speaking disrespectfully of his family in one of his treatises. Quintilian, bk. 1, ch. 1.—Athenæus, bk. 5, ch. 11.—Cicero, de Officiis, bk. 3, ch. 51.――A native of Apollonia, celebrated for his knowledge of philosophy and physic. He was pupil to Anaxagoras. Diogenes Laërtius, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers.――Laërtius, an epicurean philosopher, born in Cilicia. He wrote the lives of the philosophers in 10 books, still extant. This work contains an accurate account of the ancient philosophers, and is replete with all their anecdotes and particular opinions. It is compiled, however, without any plan, method, or precision, though much neatness and conciseness are observable through the whole. In this multifarious biography the author does not seem particularly partial to any sect, except perhaps it be that of Potamon of Alexandria. Diogenes died A.D. 222. The best editions of his works are that of Meibomius, 2 vols., 4to, Amsterdam, 1692, and that of Lipscomb, 8vo, 1759.――A Macedonian, who betrayed Salamis to Aratus. Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 8.――There was a philosopher of that name who attended Alexander in his Asiatic expedition, for the purpose of marking out and delineating his march, &c.

Diogĕnia, a daughter of Celeus. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 38.――A daughter of the Cephisus, who married Erechtheus. Apollodorus.

Diogĕnus, a man who conspired with Dymnus against Alexander. Curtius, bk. 6, ch. 7.

Diognetus, a philosopher who instructed Marcus Aurelius in philosophy, and in writing dialogues.

Diŏmēda, a daughter of Phorbas, whom Achilles brought from Lemnos, to be his mistress after the loss of Briseis. Homer, Iliad, bk. 9, li. 661.――The wife of Deion of Amyclæ.

Diŏmēdes, son of Tydeus and Deiphyle, was king of Ætolia, and one of the bravest of the Grecian chiefs in the Trojan war. He engaged Hector and Æneas, and by repeated acts of valour obtained much military glory. He went with Ulysses to steal the Palladium from the temple of Minerva at Troy; and assisted in murdering Rhesus king of Thrace, and carrying away his horses. At his return from the siege of Troy, he lost his way in the darkness of the night, and landed in Attica, where his companions plundered the country, and lost the Trojan Palladium. During his long absence, his wife Ægiale forgot her marriage vows, and prostituted herself to Cometes, one of her servants. This lasciviousness of the queen was attributed by some to the resentment of Venus, whom Diomedes had severely wounded in the arm in a battle before Troy. The infidelity of Ægiale was highly displeasing to Diomedes. He resolved to abandon his native country, which was the seat of his disgrace, and the attempts of his wife to take away his life, according to some accounts, did not a little contribute to hasten his departure. He came to that part of Italy which has been called Magna Græcia, where he built a city called Argyripa, and married the daughter of Daunus the king of the country. He died there in extreme old age, or, according to a certain tradition, he perished by the hand of his father-in-law. His death was greatly lamented by his companions, who in the excess of their grief were changed into birds resembling swans. These birds took flight into a neighbouring island in the Adriatic, and became remarkable for the tameness with which they approached the Greeks, and for the horror with which they shunned all other nations. They are called the birds of Diomedes. Altars were raised to Diomedes, as to a god, one of which Strabo mentions at Timavus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 1, li. 756; bk. 11, li. 243, &c.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 14, fable 10.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 8; bk. 3, ch. 7.—Hyginus, fables 97, 112, & 113.—Pausanias, bk. 2, ch. 30.――A king of Thrace, son of Mars and Cyrene, who fed his horses with human flesh. It was one of the labours of Hercules to destroy him; and accordingly the hero, attended with some of his friends, attacked the inhuman tyrant, and gave him to be devoured by his own horses, which he had fed so barbarously. Diodorus, bk. 4.—Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 18.—Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 5.――A friend of Alcibiades. Plutarch, Alcibiades.――A grammarian.

Diŏmēdon, an Athenian general, put to death for his negligence at Arginusæ. Thucydides, bk. 8, ch. 19.――A man of Cyzicus, in the interest of Artaxerxes. Cornelius Nepos, Epaminondas.

Dion, a Syracusan, son of Hipparinus, famous for his power and abilities. He was related to Dionysius, and often advised him, together with the philosopher Plato, who at his request had come to reside at the tyrant’s court, to lay aside the supreme power. His great popularity rendered him odious in the eyes of the tyrant, who banished him to Greece. There he collected a numerous force, and encouraged by the influence of his name, and the hatred of his enemy, he resolved to free his country from tyranny. He entered the port of Syracuse only with two ships, and in three days reduced under his power an empire which had already subsisted for 50 years, and which was guarded by 500 ships of war, and 100,000 foot and 10,000 horse. The tyrant fled to Corinth, and Dion kept the power in his own hands, fearful of the aspiring ambition of some of the friends of Dionysius. He was, however, shamefully betrayed and murdered by one of his familiar friends, called Callicrates, or Callipus, 354 years before the christian era, in the 55th year of his age, and four years after his return from Peloponnesus. His death was universally lamented by the Syracusans, and a monument was raised to his memory. Diodorus, bk. 16.—Cornelius Nepos, Life of Dion.――A town of Macedonia. Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 36.――Cassius, a native of Nicæa in Bithynia. His father’s name was Apronianus. He was raised to the greatest offices of state in the Roman empire by Pertinax and his three successors. Naturally fond of study, he improved himself by unwearied application, and was 10 years collecting materials for a history of Rome, which he made public in 80 books, after a laborious employment of 12 years in composing it. This valuable history began with the arrival of Æneas in Italy, and was continued down to the reign of the emperor Alexander Severus. The 34 first books are totally lost, the 20 following are mutilated, and fragments are all that we possess of the last 20. In the compilation of his extensive history, Dion proposed to himself Thucydides for a model; but he is not perfectly happy in his imitation. His style is pure and elegant, and his narrations are judiciously managed, and his reflections learned; but upon the whole he is credulous, and the bigoted slave of partiality, satire, and flattery. He inveighs against the republican principles of Brutus and Cicero, and extols the cause of Cæsar. Seneca also is the object of his satire, and he represents him as debauched and licentious in his morals. Dion flourished about the 230th year of the christian era. The best edition of his works is that of Reimarus, 2 vols., folio, Hamburg, 1750.――A famous christian writer, surnamed Chrysostom, &c.

Diōnæa, a surname of Venus, supposed to be the daughter of Jupiter and Done.

Diōne, a nymph, daughter of Nereus and Doris. She was mother of Venus by Jupiter, according to Homer and others. Hesiod, however, gives Venus a different origin. See: Venus. Venus is herself sometimes called Dione. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 19.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 5, li. 381.—Statius, bk. 1, Sylvæ, poem 1, li. 86.

Dionȳsia, festivals in honour of Bacchus among the Greeks. Their form and solemnity were first introduced into Greece from Egypt by a certain Melampus, and if we admit that Bacchus is the same as Isis, the Dionysia of the Greeks are the same as the festivals celebrated by the Egyptians in honour of Isis. They were observed at Athens with more splendour and ceremonious superstition than in any other part of Greece. The years were numbered by their celebration, the Archon assisted at the solemnity, and the priests that officiated were honoured with the most dignified seats at the public games. At first they were celebrated with great simplicity, and the time was consecrated to mirth. It was then usual to bring a vessel of wine adorned with a vine branch, after which followed a goat, a basket of figs, and the φαλλοι. The worshippers imitated in their dress and actions the poetical fictions concerning Bacchus. They clothed themselves in fawns’ skins, fine linen, and mitres; they carried thyrsi, drums, pipes, and flutes, and crowned themselves with garlands of ivy, vine, fir, &c. Some imitated Silenus, Pan, and the Satyrs by the uncouth manner of their dress, and their fantastical motions. Some rode upon asses, and others drove the goats to slaughter for the sacrifice. In this manner both sexes joined in the solemnity, and ran about the hills and country, nodding their heads, dancing in ridiculous postures, and filling the air with hideous shrieks and shouts, and crying aloud, “Evoe Bacche! Io! Io! Evoe! Iacche! Io Bacche! Evohe!” With such solemnities were the festivals of Bacchus celebrated by the Greeks, particularly the Athenians. In one of these there followed a number of persons carrying sacred vessels, one of which contained water. After these came a select number of noble virgins, carrying little baskets of gold filled with all sorts of fruits. This was the most mysterious part of the solemnity. Serpents were sometimes put in the baskets, and by their wreathing and crawling out they amused and astonished the beholders. After the virgins followed a company of men carrying poles, at the end of which were fastened φαλλοι. The heads of these men, who were called φαλλοφοροι, were crowned with ivy and violets, and their faces covered with other herbs. They marched singing songs upon the occasion of the festivals, called φαλλικα ᾁσματα. Next to the φαλλοφοροι followed the ἰθυφαλλοι in women’s apparel, with white striped garments reaching to the ground; their heads were decked with garlands, and on their hands they wore gloves composed of flowers. Their gestures and actions were like those of a drunken man. Besides these, there were a number of persons called λικνοφοροι, who carried the λικνον or musical van of Bacchus; without their attendance none of the festivals of Bacchus were celebrated with due solemnity, and on that account the god is often called λικνιτης. The festivals of Bacchus were almost innumerable. The name of the most celebrated were the Dionysia ♦ἀρχαιότερα, at Limnæ in Attica. The chief persons that officiated were 14 women called γεραιραι, venerable. They were appointed by one of the archons, and before their appointment they solemnly took an oath before the archon or his wife, that their body was free from all pollution.――The greater Dionysia, sometimes called ἀστικα or τα κατ’ ἀστυ, as being celebrated within the city, were the most famous. They were supposed to be the same as the preceding.――The less Dionysia, sometimes called τα κατ’ ἀργους, because celebrated in the country, or ληναια, from ληνος, a wine-press, were, to all appearance, a preparation for the greater festivals. They were celebrated in autumn.――The Dionysia βραυρωνια, observed at Brauron in Attica, were a scene of lewdness, extravagance, and debauchery.――The Dionysia νυκτηλια were observed by the Athenians in honour of Bacchus Nyctelius. It was unlawful to reveal whatever was seen or done during the celebration.――The Dionysia called ὠμοφαγια, because human victims were offered to the god, or because the priests imitated the eating of raw flesh, were celebrated with much solemnity. The priests put serpents in their hair, and by the wildness of their looks, and the oddity of their actions, they feigned insanity.――The Dionysia ἀρκαδικα were yearly observed in Arcadia, and the children who had been instructed in the music of Philoxenus and Timotheus, were introduced in a theatre, where they celebrated the festivals of Bacchus by entertaining the spectators with songs, dances, and different exhibitions. There were, besides these, others of inferior note. There was also one observed every three years called Dionysia τριετηρικα, and it is said that Bacchus instituted it himself in commemoration of his Indian expedition, in which he spent three years. There is also another, celebrated every fifth year, as mentioned by the scholiast of Aristophanes.――All these festivals, in honour of the god of wine, were celebrated by the Greeks with great licentiousness, and they contributed much to the corruption of morals among all ranks of people. They were also introduced into Tuscany, and from thence to Rome. Among the Romans, both sexes promiscuously joined in the celebration during the darkness of night. The drunkenness, the debauchery, and impure actions and indulgencies which soon prevailed at the solemnity, called aloud for the interference of the senate, and the consuls Spurius Posthumius Albinus and Quintus Martius Philippus made a strict examination concerning the propriety and superstitious forms of the Bacchanalia. The disorder and pollution which was practised with impunity by no less than 7000 votaries of either sex, were beheld with horror and astonishment by the consuls, and the Bacchanalia were for ever banished from Rome by a decree of the senate. They were again reinstituted there in length of time, but not with such licentiousness as before. Euripides, Bacchæ.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 11, li. 737.—Diodorus, bk. 4.—Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 3, li. 533; bk. 4, li. 391; bk. 6, li. 587.

Diŏnȳsiădes, two small islands near Crete.――Festivals in honour of Bacchus. Pausanias, bk. 3, ch. 13.

Diŏnȳsias, a fountain. Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 36.

Diŏnysides, a tragic poet of Tarsus.

Diŏnȳsiodōrus, a famous geometer. Pliny, bk. 7, ch. 109.――A Bœotian historian. Diodorus, bk. 15.――A Tarentine, who obtained a prize at Olympia in the 100th Olympiad.

Dionȳsion, a temple of Bacchus in Attica. Pausanias, bk. 1, ch. 43.

Dionȳsipŏlis, a town of Thrace. Mela, bk. 2, ch. 2.

Dionȳsius I., or the elder, was son of Hermocrates. He signalized himself in the wars which the Syracusans carried on against the Carthaginians, and, taking advantage of the power lodged in his hands, he made himself absolute at Syracuse. To strengthen himself in his usurpation, and acquire popularity, he increased the pay of the soldiers, and recalled those that had been banished. He vowed eternal enmity against Carthage, and experienced various success in his wars against that republic. He was ambitious of being thought a poet, and his brother Theodorus was commissioned to go to Olympia, and repeat there some verses in his name, with other competitors, for the poetical prizes. His expectations were frustrated, and his poetry was received with groans and hisses. He was not, however, so unsuccessful at Athens, where a poetical prize was publicly adjudged to one of his compositions. This victory gave him more pleasure than all the victories he had ever obtained in the field of battle. His tyranny and cruelty at home rendered him odious in the eyes of his subjects, and he became so suspicious that he never admitted his wife or children to his private apartment without a previous examination of their garments. He never trusted his head to a barber, but always burnt his beard. He made a subterraneous cave in a rock, said to be still extant, in the form of a human ear, which measured 80 feet in height and 250 in length. It was called the ear of Dionysius. The sounds of this subterraneous cave were all necessarily directed to one common tympanum, which had a communication with an adjoining room, where Dionysius spent the greatest part of his time to hear whatever was said by those whom his suspicion and cruelty had confined in the apartments above. The artists that had been employed in making this cave were all put to death by order of the tyrant, for fear of their revealing to what purposes a work of such uncommon construction was to be appropriated. His impiety and sacrilege were as conspicuous as his suspicious credulity. He took a golden mantle from the statue of Jupiter, observing that the son of Saturn had a covering too warm for the summer, and too cold for the winter, and he placed one of wool instead. He also robbed Æsculapius of his golden beard, and plundered the temple of Proserpine. He died of an indigestion in the 63rd year of his age, B.C. 368, after a reign of 38 years. Authors, however, are divided about the manner of his death, and some are of opinion that he died a violent death. Some suppose that the tyrant invented the catapulta, an engine which proved of infinite service for the discharging of showers of darts and stones in the time of a siege. Diodorus, bks. 13, 15, &c.—Justin, bk. 20, ch. 1, &c.—Xenophon, Hellenica.—Cornelius Nepos, Timoleon.—Plutarch, Diodorus.――The second of that name, surnamed the younger, was son of Dionysius I. by Doris. He succeeded his father as tyrant of Sicily, and by the advice of Dion his brother-in-law, he invited the philosopher Plato to his court, under whom he studied for a while. The philosopher advised him to lay aside the supreme power, and in his admonitions he was warmly seconded by Dion. Dionysius refused to consent, and soon after Plato was seized and publicly sold as a slave. Dion likewise, on account of his great popularity, was severely abused and insulted in his family, and his wife given in marriage to another. Such a violent behaviour was highly resented; Dion, who was banished, collected some forces in Greece, and in three days rendered himself master of Syracuse, and expelled the tyrant B.C. 357. See: Dion. Dionysius retired to Locri, where he behaved with the greatest oppression, and was ejected by the citizens. He recovered Syracuse 10 years after his expulsion, but his triumph was short, and the Corinthians, under conduct of Timoleon, obliged him to abandon the city. He fled to Corinth, where to support himself he kept a school, as Cicero observes, that he might still continue to be tyrant; and as he could not command over men, that he might still exercise his power over boys. It is said that he died from excess of joy, when he heard that a tragedy of his own composition had been rewarded with a poetical prize. Dionysius was as cruel as his father, but he did not, like him, possess the art of restraining his power. This was seen and remarked by the old man, who, when he saw his son attempting to debauch the wives of some of his old subjects, asked him, with the greatest indignation, whether he had ever heard of his having acted so brutal a part in his younger days? “No,” answered the son, “because you were not the son of a king.” “Well, my son,” replied the old man, “never shalt thou be the father of a king.” Justin, bk. 21, chs. 1, 2, &c.—Diodorus, bk. 15, &c.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 9, ch. 8.—Quintilian, bk. 8, ch. 6.—Cornelius Nepos, Dion.—Cicero, Tusculanæ Disputationes, bk. 5, ch. 2.――An historian of Halicarnassus, who left his country and came to reside at Rome, that he might carefully study all the Greek and Latin writers, whose compositions treated of the Roman history. He formed an acquaintance with all the learned of the age, and derived much information from their company and conversation. After an unremitted application, during 24 years, he gave to the world his Roman antiquities in 20 books, of which only the 11 first are now extant, nearly containing the account of 312 years. His composition has been greatly valued by the ancients as well as the moderns for the easiness of his style, the fidelity of his chronology, and the judiciousness of his remarks and criticism. Like a faithful historian, he never mentioned anything but what was authenticated, and he totally disregarded the fabulous traditions which fill and disgrace the pages of both his predecessors and followers. To the merits of the elegant historian, Dionysius, as may be seen in his treatises, has also added the equally respectable character of the eloquent orator, the critic, and the politician. He lived during the Augustan age, and came to Rome about 80 years before the christian era. The best editions of his works are that of Oxford, 2 vols., folio, 1704, and that of Reiske, 6 vols., 8vo, Lipscomb, 1774.――A tyrant of Heraclea in Pontus, in the age of Alexander the Great. After the death of the conqueror and of Perdiccas, he married Amestris the niece of king Darius, and assumed the title of king. He was of such an uncommon corpulence that he never exposed his person in public, and when he gave audience to foreign ambassadors, he always placed himself in a chair which was conveniently made to hide his face and person from the eyes of the spectators. When he was asleep, it was impossible to awake him without boring his flesh with pins. He died in the 55th year of his age. As his reign was remarkable for mildness and popularity, his death was severely lamented by his subjects. He left two sons and a daughter, and appointed his widow queen-regent.――A surname of Bacchus.――A disciple of Chæremon.――A native of Chalcis, who wrote a book entitled κτισεις, or the origin of cities.――A commander of the Ionian fleet against the Persians, who went to plunder Phœnicia. Herodotus, bk. 6, ch. 17.――A general of Antiochus Hierax.――A philosopher of Heraclea, disciple to Zeno. He starved himself to death, B.C. 279, in the 81st year of his age. Diogenes Laërtius.――An epic poet of Mitylene.――A sophist of Pergamus. Strabo, bk. 13.――A writer in the Augustan age, called Periegetes. He wrote a very valuable geographical treatise in Greek hexameters, still extant. The best edition of his treatise is that of Henry Stephens, 4to, 1577, with the scholia, and that of Hill, 8vo, London, 1688.――A christian writer, A.D. 492, called Areopagita. The best edition of his works is that of Antwerp, 2 vols., folio, 1634.――The music master of Epaminondas. Cornelius Nepos.――A celebrated critic. See: Longinus.――A rhetorician of Magnesia.――A Messenian madman, &c. Plutarch, Alexander.――A native of Thrace, generally called the Rhodian, because he lived there. He wrote some grammatical treatises and commentaries, B.C. 64. Strabo, bk. 14.――A painter of Colophon.

Diŏphănes, a man who joined Peloponnesus to the Achæan league. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 30.――A rhetorician intimate with Tiberias Gracchus. Plutarch, Tiberius Gracchus.

Diŏphantus, an Athenian general of the Greek mercenary troops in the service of Nectanebus king of Egypt. Diodorus, bk. 16.――A Greek orator of Mitylene, preceptor to Tiberius Gracchus. Cicero, Brutus.――A native of Alexandria in the fourth century. He wrote 13 books of arithmetical questions, of which six are still extant, the best edition of which is that in folio, Tolosæ, 1670. He died in his 84th year, but the age in which he lived is uncertain. Some place him in the reign of Augustus, others under Nero and Antonines.

Diopœnus, a noble sculptor of Crete. Pliny, bk. 36, ch. 4.

Diopŏlis, a name given to Cabira, a town of Paphlagonia, by Pompey. Strabo, bk. 12.

Diōres, a friend of Æneas, killed by Turnus. He had engaged in the games exhibited by Æneas on his father’s tomb in Sicily. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 5, li. 297; bk. 12, li. 509.

Dioryctus, a place of Acarnania, where a canal was cut (δια ὀρυσσω), to make Leucadia an island. Pliny, bk. 4, ch. 1.

Dioscorĭdes, a native of Cilicia, who was physician to Antony and Cleopatra, or lived, as some suppose, in the age of Nero. He was originally a soldier, but afterwards he applied himself to study, and wrote a book upon medicinal herbs, of which the best edition is that of Saracenus, folio, Frankfurt. 1598.――A man who wrote an account of the republic of Lacedæmon.――A nephew of Antigonus. Diodorus, bk. 19.――A Cyprian, blind of one eye, in the age of Ptolemy Philadelphus.――A disciple of Isocrates.――An astrologer sent ambassador by Julius Cæsar to Achillas, &c. Cæsar, Civil War, bk. 3, ch. 109.

Dioscorĭdis insula, an island situate at the south of the entrance of the Arabic gulf, and now called Socotra.

Dioscūri, or sons of Jupiter, a name given to Castor and Pollux. There were festivals in their honour, called Dioscuria, celebrated by the people of Corcyra, and chiefly by the Lacedæmonians. They were observed with much jovial festivity. The people made a free use of the gifts of Bacchus, and diverted themselves with sports, of which wrestling matches always made a part.

Dioscurias, a town of Colchis. Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 28.

Diospăge, a town of Mesopotamia. Pliny, bk. 6, ch. 26.

Diospŏlis, or Thebæ, a famous city of Egypt, formerly called Hecatompylos. See: Thebæ.

Diotīme, a woman who gave lectures upon philosophy, which Socrates attended. Plutarch, Convivium Septem Sapientium.

Diotīmus, an Athenian skilled in maritime affairs, &c. Polyænus, bk. 5.――A stoic, who flourished 85 B.C.

Diotrephes, an Athenian officer, &c. Thucydides, bk. 3, ch. 75.

Dioxippe, one of the Danaides. Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 1.

Dioxippus, a soldier of Alexander, who killed one of his fellow-soldiers in a fury, &c. Ælian.――An Athenian boxer, &c. Diodorus, bk. 17.――A Trojan killed by Turnus. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 9, li. 574.

Dipæa, a place of Peloponnesus, where a battle was fought between the Arcadians and Spartans. Herodotus, bk. 9, ch. 35.

Diphĭlas, a man sent to Rhodes by the Spartans, to destroy the Athenian faction there. Diodorus, bk. 14.――A governor of Babylon in the interest of Antigonus. Diodorus, bk. 19.――An historian.

Dīphĭlus, an Athenian general, A.U.C. 311.――An architect so slow in finishing his works, that Diphilo tardior became a proverb. Cicero, Letters to his brother Quintus, bk. 3.――A tragic writer.

Diphorĭdas, one of the Ephori at Sparta. Plutarch, Agesilaus.

Dipœnæ, a town of Arcadia. Pausanias, bk. 8, ch. 31.

Dipŏlis, a name given to Lemnos, as having two cities, Hephæstia and Myrina.

Dipsas (antis), a river of Cilicia, flowing from mount Taurus. Lucan, bk. 8, li. 255.――(adis), a profligate and incontinent woman mentioned by Ovid, Amores, bk. 1, poem 8.――A kind of serpent. Lucan, bk. 9.

Dipylon, one of the gates of Athens.

Diræ, the daughters of Acheron and Nox, who persecuted the souls of the guilty. They are the same as the furies, and some suppose they are called Furies in hell, Harpies on earth, and Diræ in heaven. They were represented as standing near the throne of Jupiter, in an attitude which expressed their eagerness to receive his orders, and the power of tormenting the guilty on earth with the most excruciating punishments. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 4, li. 473; bk. 8, li. 701.

Dirce, a woman whom Lycus king of Thebes married after he had divorced Antiope. When Antiope became pregnant by Jupiter, Dirce suspected her husband of infidelity to her bed, and imprisoned Antiope, whom she tormented with the greatest cruelty. Antiope escaped from her confinement, and brought forth Amphion and Zethus on mount Cithæron. When these children were informed of the cruelties to which their mother had been exposed, they besieged Thebes, put Lycus to death, and tied the cruel Dirce to the tail of a wild bull, which dragged her over rocks and precipices, and exposed her to the most poignant pains, till the gods, pitying her fate, changed her into a fountain, in the neighbourhood of Thebes. According to some accounts, Antiope was mother of Amphion and Zethus before she was confined and exposed to the tyranny of Dirce. See: Amphion, Antiope. Propertius, bk. 3, poem 15, li. 37.—Pausanias, bk. 9, ch. 26.—Ælian, Varia Historia, bk. 12, ch. 57.—Lucan, bk. 3, li. 175; bk. 4, li. 550.

Dircenna, a cold fountain of Spain, near Bilbilis. Martial, bk. 1, ltr. 50, li. 17.

Dirphyia, a surname of Juno, from Dirphya, a mountain of Bœotia, where the goddess had a temple.

Dis, a god of the Gauls, the same as Pluto the god of hell. The inhabitants of Gaul supposed themselves descended from that deity. Cæsar, Gallic War, bk. 6.—Tacitus, Histories, bk. 4, ch. 84.

Discordia, a malevolent deity, daughter of Nox, and sister to Nemesis, the Parcæ, and death. She was driven from heaven by Jupiter, because she sowed dissensions among the gods, and was the cause of continual quarrels. When the nuptials of Peleus and Thetis were celebrated, the goddess of discord was not invited, and this seeming neglect so irritated her, that she threw an apple into the midst of the assembly of the gods, with the inscription of detur pulchriori. This apple was the cause of the ruin of Troy, and of infinite misfortunes to the Greeks. See: Paris. She is represented with a pale, ghastly look, her garment is torn, her eyes sparkle with fire, and she holds a dagger concealed in her bosom. Her head is generally entwined with serpents, and she is attended by Bellona. She is supposed to be the cause of all dissensions, murders, wars, and quarrels which arise upon earth, public as well as private. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 8, li. 702.—Hesiod, Theogony, li. 225.—Petronius.

Dithyrambus, a surname of Bacchus, whence the hymns sung in his honour were called Dithyrambics. Horace, bk. 4, ode 2.

Dittani, a people of Spain.

Divi, a name chiefly appropriated to those who were made gods after death, such as heroes and warriors, or the Lares and Penates, and other domestic gods.

Divitiăcus, one of the Ædui, intimate with Cæsar. Cicero bk. 1, de Divinatione.

Dium, a town of Eubœa, where there were hot baths. Pliny, bk. 31, ch. 2.――A promontory of Crete.――A town of Macedonia. Livy, bk. 44, ch. 7.

Divodurum, a town of Gaul, now Metz in Lorrain.

Divus Fidius, a god of the Sabines, worshipped also at Rome. Dionysius of Halicarnassus.

Diyllus, an Athenian historian. Diodorus, bk. 16.――A statuary. Pausanias, bk. 10, ch. 13.

Doberes, a people of Pæonia. Herodotus, bk. 5, ch. 16.

Docĭlis, a gladiator at Rome, mentioned by Horace, bk. 1, ltr. 18, li. 19.

Docĭmus, a man of Tarentum, deprived of his military dignity by Philip son of Amyntas, for indulging himself with hot baths. Polyænus, bk. 4.――An officer of Antigonus. Diodorus, bk. 19.――An officer of Perdiccas, taken by Antigonus. Diodorus, bk. 18.

Dōdōna, a town of Thesprotia in Epirus, or, according to others, in Thessaly. There was in its neighbourhood, upon a small hill called Tmarus, a celebrated oracle of Jupiter. The town and temple of the god were first built by Deucalion, after the universal deluge. It was supposed to be the most ancient oracle of all Greece, and according to the traditions of the Egyptians mentioned by Herodotus, it was founded by a dove. Two black doves, as he relates, took their flight from the city of Thebes in Egypt, one of which flew to the temple of Jupiter Ammon, and the other to Dodona, where, with a human voice, they acquainted the inhabitants of the country that Jupiter had consecrated the ground, which in future would give oracles. The extensive grove which surrounded Jupiter’s temple was endowed with the gift of prophecy, and oracles were frequently delivered by the sacred oaks, and the doves which inhabited the place. This fabulous tradition of the oracular power of the doves is explained by Herodotus, who observes that some Phœnicians carried away two priestesses from Egypt, one of which went to fix her residence at Dodona, where the oracle was established. It may further be observed, that the fable might have been founded upon the double meaning of the word πελειαι, which signifies doves in most parts of Greece, while in the dialect of the Epirots, it implies old women. In ancient times the oracles were delivered by the murmuring of a neighbouring fountain, but the custom was afterwards changed. Large kettles were suspended in the air near a brazen statue, which held a lash in its hand. When the wind blew strong, the statue was agitated and struck against one of the kettles, which communicated the motion to all the rest, and raised that clattering and discordant din which continued for a while, and from which the artifice of the priests drew their predictions. Some suppose that the noise was occasioned by the shaking of the leaves and boughs of an old oak, which the superstition of the people frequently consulted, and from which they pretended to receive oracles. It may be observed with more probability that the oracles were delivered by the priests, who, by artfully concealing themselves behind the oaks, gave occasion to the superstitious multitude to believe that the trees were endowed with the power of prophecy. As the ship Argo was built with some of the oaks of the forest of Dodona, there were some beams in the vessel which gave oracles to the Argonauts, and warned them against the approach of calamity. Within the forest of Dodona there was a stream with a fountain of cool water, which had the power of lighting a torch as soon as it touched it. This fountain was totally dry at noonday, and was restored to its full course at midnight, from which time till the following noon it began to decrease, and at the usual hour was again deprived of its waters. The oracles of Dodona were originally delivered by men, but afterwards by women. See: Dodonides. Pliny, bk. 2, ch. 103.—Herodotus, bk. 2, ch. 57.—Mela, bk. 2, ch. 3.—Homer, Odyssey, bk. 14; Iliad.—Pausanias, bk. 7, ch. 21.—Strabo, bk. 17.—Plutarch, Pyrrhus.—Apollodorus, bk. 1, ch. 9.—Lucan, bk. 6, li. 427.—Ovid, Tristia, bk. 4, poem 8, li. 23.

Dōdōnæus, a surname of Jupiter from Dodona.

Dōdōne, a daughter of Jupiter and Europa.――A fountain in the forest of Dodona. See: Dodona.

Dōdōnĭdes, the priestesses who gave oracles in the temple of Jupiter in Dodona. According to some traditions the temple was originally inhabited by seven daughters of Atlas, who nursed Bacchus. Their names were Ambrosia, Eudora, Pasithoe, Pytho, Plexaure, Coronis, Tythe or Tyche. In the latter ages the oracles were always delivered by three old women, which custom was first established when Jupiter enjoyed the company of Dione, whom he permitted to receive divine honour in his temple at Dodona. The Bœotians were the only people of Greece who received their oracles at Dodona from men, for reasons which Strabo, bk. 9, fully explains.

Doii, a people of Arabia Felix.

Dolabella Publius Cornelius, a Roman who married the daughter of Cicero. During the civil wars he warmly espoused the interest of Julius Cæsar, whom he accompanied at the famous battles at Pharsalia, Africa, and Munda. He was made consul by his patron, though Marcus Antony his colleague opposed it. After the death of Julius Cæsar, he received the government of Syria as his province. Cassius opposed his views, and Dolabella, for violence, and for the assassination of Trebonius, one of Cæsar’s murderers, was declared an enemy to the republic of Rome. He was besieged by Cassius in Laodicea, and when he saw that all was lost, he killed himself, in the 27th year of his age. He was of small stature, which gave occasion to his father-in-law to ask him once when he entered his house, who had tied him so cleverly to his sword.――A proconsul of Africa.――Another, who conquered the Gauls, Etrurians, and Boii at the lake of Vadimonis, B.C. 283.――The family of the Dolabellæ distinguished themselves at Rome, and one of them, Lucius Cornelius, conquered Lusitania, B.C. 99.

Dolichaon, the father of the Hebrus, &c. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 10, li. 696.

Dolīche, an island in the Ægean sea. Apollodorus, bk. 2, ch. 6.――A town of Syria,――of Macedonia. Livy, bk. 42, ch. 53.

Dolius, a faithful servant of Ulysses. Homer, Odyssey, bk. 4, li. 675.

Dolomēna, a country of Assyria. Strabo, bk. 16.

Dŏlon, a Trojan, son of Eumedes, famous for his swiftness. Being sent by Hector to spy the Grecian camp by night, he was seized by Diomedes and Ulysses, to whom he revealed the situation, schemes, and resolutions of his countrymen, with the hopes of escaping with his life. He was put to death by Diomedes, as a traitor. Homer, Iliad, bk. 10, li. 314.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 12, li. 349, &c.――A poet. See: Susarion.

Dōlonci, a people of Thrace. Herodotus, bk. 6, ch. 34.

Dŏlŏpes, a people of Thessaly, near mount Pindus. Peleus reigned there, and sent them to the Trojan war under Phœnix. They became also masters of Scyros, and like the rest of the ancient Greeks, were fond of migration. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 7.—Flaccus, bk. 2, li. 10.—Livy, bk. 36, ch. 33.—Strabo, bk. 9.—Plutarch, Cimon.

Dŏlŏpia, the country of the Dolopes, near Pindus, through which the Achelous flowed.

Dŏlops, a Trojan, son of Lampus, killed by Menelaus. Homer, Iliad, bk. 15, li. 525.

Domidūcus, a god who presided over marriage. Juno also was called Domiduca, from the power she was supposed to have in marriages.

Domīnĭca, a daughter of Petronius, who married the ♦emperor Valens.

Domitĭa lex, de Religione, was enacted by Domitius Ahenobarbus the tribune, A.U.C. 650. It transferred the right of electing priests from the college to the people.

Domĭtia Longīna, a Roman lady who boasted in her debaucheries. She was the wife of the emperor Domitian.

Domĭtiānus Titus Flavius, son of Vespasian and Flavia Domatilla, made himself emperor of Rome at the death of his brother Titus, whom, according to some accounts, he destroyed by poison. The beginning of his reign promised tranquillity to the people, but their expectations were soon frustrated. Domitian became cruel, and gave way to incestuous and unnatural indulgencies. He commanded himself to be called God and Lord in all the papers which were presented to him. He passed the greatest part of the day in catching flies and killing them with a bodkin, so that it was wittily answered by Vibius to a person who asked him who was with the emperor, “Nobody, not even a fly.” In the latter part of his reign Domitian became suspicious, and his anxieties were increased by the predictions of astrologers, but still more poignantly by the stings of remorse. He was so distrustful even when alone, that round the terrace, where he usually walked, he built a wall with shining stones, that from them he might perceive as in a looking-glass whether anybody followed him. All these precautions were unavailing; he perished by the hand of an assassin the 18th of September, A.D. 96, in the 45th year of his age and the 15th of his reign. He was the last of the 12 Cæsars. He distinguished himself for his love of learning, and in a little treatise which he wrote upon the great care which ought to be taken of the hair to prevent baldness, he displayed much taste and elegance, according to the observations of his biographers. After his death he was publicly deprived by the senate of all the honours which had been profusely heaped upon him, and even his body was left in the open air without the honours of a funeral. This disgrace might proceed from the resentment of the senators, whom he had exposed to terror as well as to ridicule. He once assembled that august body, to know in what vessel a turbot might be most conveniently dressed. At another time they received a formal invitation to a feast, and when they arrived at the palace, they were introduced into a large gloomy hall hung with black, and lighted with a few glimmering tapers. In the middle were placed a number of coffins, on each of which was inscribed the name of some one of the invited senators. On a sudden a number of men burst into the room, clothed in black, with drawn swords and flaming torches, and after they had for some time terrified the guests, they permitted them to retire. Such were the amusements and cruelties of a man who, in the first part of his reign, was looked upon as the father of his people, and the restorer of learning and liberty. Suetonius, The Twelve Caesars.—Eutropius, bk. 7.

Domĭtilla Flavia, a woman who married Vespasian, by whom she had Titus a year after her marriage, and, 11 years after, Domitian.――A niece of the emperor Domitian, by whom she was banished.

Domĭtius Domitiănus, a general of Diocletian in Egypt. He assumed the imperial purple at Alexandria, A.D. 288, and supported the dignity of emperor for about two years. He died a violent death.――Lucius. See: Ænobarbus.――Cnæus Ænobarbus, a Roman consul, who conquered Bituitus the Gaul, and left 20,000 of the enemy on the field of battle, and took 3000 prisoners.――A grammarian in the reign of Adrian. He was remarkable for his virtues, and his melancholy disposition.――A Roman who revolted from Antony to Augustus. He was at the battle of Pharsalia, and forced Pompey to fight by the mere force of his ridicule.――The father of Nero, famous for his cruelties and debaucheries. Suetonius, Nero.――A tribune of the people, who conquered the Allobroges. Plutarch.――A consul during whose consulate peace was concluded with Alexander king of Epirus. Livy, bk. 8, ch. 17.――A consul under Caligula. He wrote some few things now lost.――A Latin poet, called also Marsus, in the age of Horace. He wrote epigrams, remarkable for little besides their indelicacy. Ovid, ex Ponto, bk. 4, poem 16, li. 5.――Afer, an orator, who was preceptor to Quintilian. He disgraced his talents by his adulation, and by practising the arts of an informer under Tiberius and his successors. He was made a consul by Nero, and died A.D. 59.

Ælius Donātus, a grammarian, who flourished A.D. 353.――A bishop of Numidia, a promoter of the Donatists, A.D. 311.――A bishop of Africa, banished from Carthage, A.D. 356.

Donilāus, a prince of Gallogræcia, who assisted Pompey with 300 horsemen against Julius Cæsar.

Donūca, a mountain of Thrace. Livy, bk. 40, ch. 57.

Dŏnȳsa, one of the Cyclades in the Ægean, where green marble is found. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 3, li. 125.

Doracte, an island in the Persian gulf.

Dōres, the inhabitants of Doris. See: Doris.

Dori and Dorica, a part of Achaia near Athens.

Dorĭcus, an epithet applied not only to Doris, but to all the Greeks in general. Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 27.

Dorienses, a people of Crete,――of Cyrene.

Dorieus, a son of Anaxandridas, who went with a colony into Sicily, because he could not bear to be under his brother at home. Herodotus, bk. 5, ch. 42, &c.—Pausanias, bk. 3, chs. 3 & 16, &c.――A son of Diagoras of Rhodes. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 7.

Dorilas, a rich Libyan prince, killed in the court of Cepheus. Ovid, Metamorphoses, bk. 5, fable 4.

Dorilaus, a general of the great Mithridates.

Dorion, a town of Thessaly, where Thamyras the musician challenged the muses to a trial of skill. Statius, Thebiad, bk. 4, li. 182.—Propertius, bk. 2, poem 22, li. 19.—Lucan, bk. 6, li. 352.

Dōris, a country of Greece between Phocis, Thessaly, and Acarnania. It received its name from Dorus the son of Deucalion, who made a settlement there. It was called Tetrapolis, from the four cities of Pindus or Dryopis, Erineum, Cytinium, Borium, which it contained. To these four some add Lilæum and Carphia, and therefore call it Hexapolis. The name of Doris has been common to many parts of Greece. The Dorians, in the age of Deucalion, inhabited Phthiotis, which they exchanged for Histiæotis, in the age of Dorus. From thence they were driven by the Cadmæans, and came to settle near the town of Pindus. From thence they passed into Dryopis, and afterwards into Peloponnesus. Hercules having re-established Ægimius king of Phthiotis or Doris, who had been driven from his country by the Lapithæ, the grateful king appointed Hyllus the son of his patron to be his successor, and the Heraclidæ marched from that part of the country to go to recover Peloponnesus. The Dorians sent many colonies into different places, which bore the same name as their native country. The most famous of these is Doris in Asia Minor, of which Halicarnassus was once the capital. This part of Asia Minor was called Hexapolis, and afterwards Pentapolis, after the exclusion of Halicarnassus. Strabo, bk. 9, &c.—Virgil, Æneid, bk. 2, li. 27.—Pliny, bk. 5, ch. 29.—Apollodorus, bk. 2.—Herodotus, bk. 1, ch. 144; bk. 8, ch. 31.――A goddess of the sea, daughter of Oceanus and Tethys. She married her brother Nereus, by whom she had 50 daughters called Nereides. Her name is often used to express the sea itself. Propertius, bk. 1, poem 17, li. 25.—Virgil, Eclogues, poem 10.—Hesiod, Theogony, li. 240.――A woman of Locri, daughter of Xenetus, whom Dionysius the elder, of Sicily, married the same day with Aristomache. Cicero, Tusculanæ Disputationes, bk. 5.――One of the 50 Nereides. Hesiod, Theogony, li. 250.—Homer, Iliad, bk. 18, li. 45.

Doriscus, a place of Thrace near the sea, where Xerxes numbered his forces. Herodotus, bk. 7, ch. 59.

Dorium, a town of Peloponnesus. Pausanias, bk. 4, ch. 33.――One of the Danaides. Apollodorus.

Dorius, a mountain of Asia Minor. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 3.

Dorsennus, a comic poet of great merit in the Augustan age. Pliny, bk. 14, ch. 13.—Horace, bk. 2, ltr. 10, li. 173.

Dorso Caius Fabius, a Roman who, when Rome was in the possession of the Gauls, issued from the Capitol, which was then besieged, to go and offer a sacrifice, which was to be offered on mount Quirinalis. He dressed himself in sacerdotal robes, and carrying on his shoulders the statues of his country gods, passed through the guards of the enemy, without betraying the least signs of fear. When he had finished his sacrifice, he returned to the Capitol unmolested by the enemy, who were astonished at his boldness, and did not obstruct his passage or molest his sacrifice. Livy, bk. 5, ch. 46.