Prax-
iteles and his son Cephisodorus adorned the shrine;
Scopas contributed a statue of Hecate; Timarete, the
daughter of Micon, the first female artist upon record,
finished a picture of the goddess, the most ancient in
Ephesus; and Parrhasius and Apellcs employed their
jkill to embellish tho walls.
iteles and his son Cephisodorus adorned the shrine;
Scopas contributed a statue of Hecate; Timarete, the
daughter of Micon, the first female artist upon record,
finished a picture of the goddess, the most ancient in
Ephesus; and Parrhasius and Apellcs employed their
jkill to embellish tho walls.
Charles - 1867 - Classical Dictionary
(Cic.
, Brutus, c.
20. ) He was also protected by tho elder Scipio Afri-
canus, whom he is said to have accompanied in most
of hi* campaigns. (C/audian, de Laud. Stilic. lib. 3,
prof) It is not easy, however, to see in what expe-
ditions he could have attended this renowned general.
Scipio'* Spanish and African wars were concluded be-
fore Ennius was brought from Sardinia to Rome; and
the campaign against Antiochus was commenced and
terminated while he was serving under Fulvius Nobilior
in ? tolia. In his old age he obtained the friendship
of Scipio Nasica ; and the degree of intimacy subsist-
ing between them has been characterized by the well-
known anecdote of their successively feigning to be
from home. {Cic. , de Oral. , 2, 68. ) He ia said to
have been intemperate in drinking (Horat. , Epi. it. . 1,
? ? 19, 7), which brought on the disease called Morbus
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? ENNIUS.
tfNNlUS.
J>>. 22. --" L'Aloutttt et tea petits avec It maitrt i'un
champ"). It is certainly much to bo regretted that we
possess such scanty fragments of these productions,
which would have been curious as the first attempts
at a species of composition, which was carried to such
perfection by succeeding Latin poets, and which has
been regarded as almost peculiar to the Romans.
The great work, however, of Ennius, and of which
"a have still considerable remains, was his Annals,
or Metrical Chronicles, devoted to the celebration of
Roman exploits, from the earliest periods to the con-
clusion of the Istrian war. These annals were writ-
ten by our poet in his old age; at least Aulus Gel-
l>ns informs us, on the authority of Varro, that the
twelfth book was finished by him in his sixty-seventh
year (17, 21). The annals of Ennius were partly
founded on those ancient traditions and old heroic bal-
lads, which Cicero, on the authority of Cato's Ori-
sines, mentions as having been sung at feasts by
the guests, many centuries before the age of Cato,
in praise of the heroes of Rome. Niebuhr has at-
tempted to show, that all tho memorable events of
Roman history had been versified in ballads or metri-
cal chronicles, in the Saturnian measure, before the
lime of Ennius; who, according to him, merely ex-
pressed in the Greek hexameter what his predecessors
had delivered in a ruder strain, and then maliciously
depreciated these ancient compositions, in order that
he himself might be considered as the founder of Ro-
man poetry. The chief work, according to Niebuhr,
from which Ennius borrowed, was a romantic epopee,
or chronicle, made up from these heroic ballads, about
the end of the fourth century of Rome, commencing
with the accession of Tarquinius, and ending with the
battle of Regillus. --Ennius begins his Annals with an
invocation of the nine Muses, and the account of a
vision in which Homer had appeared to him, and re-
lated the story of the metamorphosis already mention-
ed. He afterward invokes a great number of tho
gods, and then proceeds to the history of the Al-
ban kings, the dream of the Vestal virgin Ilia, which
announced her pregnancy by Mars and the foundation
of Rome. The reigns of the kings, and the contests
of the republic with the neighbouring states previous
to the Punic war, occupy the metrical annals to the
end of the sixth book. It should be observed, in pass-
ing, that the Annals were not separated by Ennius
himself into books; hut were so divided, long after his
death, by the grammarian Q. Vargunteius. (Suelon. ,
de Illuttr. Gramm. , c. 2. ) Cicero, in his Brutus (c.
19),'says that Ennius did not treat of the first Punic
war, as Nievius had previously written on the same
subject. P. Merula, however, who edited the frag-
ments of Ennius, is of opinion that this passage of Ci-
cero can only mean that he had not entered into much
detail of its events, as he finds several lines in the
seventh book which, he thinks, evidently apply to the
first Carthaginian war, particularly the description of
naval operations, and the building of the first fleet with
which the Carthaginians were attacked by the Ro-
mans. In some of the editions of Ennius, the charac-
ter of the friend and military adviser of Servilius, gen-
erally supposed to be intended as a portrait of the poet
himself, is ranged under the seventh book. The
eighth and ninth books of these Annals, which arc
much mutilated, detail the events of the second Car-
thaginian war in Italy and * fiica. This was by much
? ? the most interesting part of the copious subject which
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? ENNIUS
EPA
t passage jf Apuleius, that the work of Ennius was a
digest of all the previous books on this suh/ect. The
eleven lines which remain, and which have been pre-
served by Apuleius, mention the places where differ-
ent sorts of Hsh are found in greatest perfection and
abundance. Another poem of Ennius, entitled Epi-
ckirmus, was so called because it was translated from
the Greek work of Epicharmus, the Pythagorean, on
the Nature of Things, in the same manner as Plato
? rave the name of Timsmis to the book which he trans-
lated from Tiraasus the Locrian. The fragments of
this work of Ennius are so broken and corrupted, that
it is impossible to follow the plan of his poem, or the
system of philosophy which it inculcated. It appears,
however, to have contained many speculations con-
cerning the elements of which the world was primarily
composed, and which, according to hi. n, were water,
earth, air, and (ire ( Varro, R. R. , 1,4); as also with
regard to the preservative powers of nature. Jupiter
teems merely to have been considered by him as the air,
the clouds, and the storm --Ennius, however, whose
compositions thus appear to have been formed entirely
on Greek originals, has not availed himself so success-
fully of these writings as Virgil has done of the works of
Ennius himself. The prince of Latin poets has often
condescended to imitate long passages, and sometimes
to copy whole lines, from the Father of Roman Song.
This has been shown, in a close comparison, by Ma-
crobius, in his Saturnalia (6, 1, seqq. ). Lucretius
and Ovid have also frequently availed themselves of
the works of Ennius. His description of the cutting
of a forest, in order to fit out a fleet against the Car-
thaginians, in the seventh book, has been imitated by
Statius in the tenth book of the Thebais. The pas-
sage in his sixth Satire, in which he has painted the
happy situation of a parasite, compared with that of
the mister of a feast, is copied in Terence's Phormio
(t, 2)--It appears, then, that Ennius occasionally
produced verses of considerable harmony and beauty,
? cr? that his conceptions were frequently expressed
wiu energy and spirit. It must be recollected, how-
ever, that the lines imitated by Virgil, and the other
passages which are usually selected with reference to
the imitation of the early bard by other poets, are very
favourable specimens of his taste and genius. Many
of his verses are harsh and defective in their mechani-
cal construction; others are frigidly prosaic; and not
a few are deformed with the most absurd conceits, not
wmuch in the idea, as in a jingle of words and ex-
travagant alliteration. --On the whole, the works of
Ennius are rather pleasing and interesting, aa the early
blossoms of that poetry which afterward opened to
such perfection, than estimable from their intrinsic
beauty. But, whatever may have been the merit of
the works of Ennius, of which we are now but incom-
petent judges, they were at least sufficiently various.
Epic, dramatic, satiric, and didactic poetry were all
successively attempted by him; and we also learn that
he nercised himself in the lighter species of verse, as
the epigram and acrostic. (Cte. , de Din. , 2,64. ) For
this novelty and exuberance it is not difficult to ac-
count. The fountains of Greek liternture, as yet un-
taxed in Latium, were open for his imitation. He
stood in very different circumstances from thbse Greek
bards who drew solely from the resources of their
own genius; or from his successors in Latin poetry,
who wrote after the best productions of Greece had
? ? become familiar to the Romans. He was thus placed
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? EFAMIN0XDA9
EPH
remarkaule concurrence of ancient writers. Nepos
observes that, before Epaminondas was born, and after
his death, Thebes was always in subjection to some
other power: on the contrary, while he directed her
councils, she was at the head of Greece. His public
life extends from the restoration of democracy by Pe-
lopidas and the other exiles, B. C. 379, to the battle
of Mantinea, B. C. 362. In the conspiracy by which
that revolution was effected he took no part, refu-
ging to stain his hands with the blood of his country-
men; but thenceforward he became the prime mover
of the Theban state. His policy was first directed to
assert the right, and to secure the power to Thebes
of controlling the other cities of Boeotia, several of
which claimed to be independent. In this cause he
ventured to engage his country, single handed, in war
with the Spartans, who marched into Boeotia, B. C.
371, with a force superior to any which could be
brought against them. The Theban generals were di-
vided in opinion whether a battle should be risked;
for to encounter the Lacedaemonians with inferior
numbers was universally esteemed hopeless. Epami-
nondas prevailed with his colleagues to venture it; and
devised on this occasion a new method of attack. In-
stead of joining battle along the whole line, he concen-
trated an overwhelming force on one point, directing
the weaker part of his line to keep back. The Spartan
right being broken and their king slain, the rest of the
army found it necessary to abandon the field. This
memorable battle was fought at Leuctra. The moral
effect of it was much more important than the mere
loss inflicted upon Sparta, for it overthrew the pre-
scriptive superiority in arms claimed by that siato ever
since its reformation by Lycurgtis. This brilliant suc-
cess led Epaminondas to the second object of his pol-
icy, the overthrow of the supremacy of Sparta, and the
substitution of Thebes as the leader of Greece in the
democratic interest. In this hope a Theban army,
under his command, marched into the Peloponnesus
early in the winter, B. C. 369, and, in conjunction with
the Eleans, Arcadians, and Argives, invaded and laid
waste a large part of Laconia. Numbers of the He-
lots took that opportunity to shake off a most oppress-
ive slavery; and Epaminondas struck a deadly blow
at the power of Sparta, by establishing these descend-
ants of the old Messenians on Mount Ithome ip Mea-
Bcnia, as an independent state, and inviting their coun-
trymen, scattered through Italy and Sicily, to return to
their ancient patrimony. Numbers obeyed the call.
This memorable event is known in history as the re-
turn of the Messenians, and two hundred years had
elapsed since their expulsion. In 368 B C, Epami-
nondas again led an army into the Peloponnesus; but,
not fulfilling the expectations of Uie people, he was
disgraced, and, according to Diodorus (IS, 71), was
ordered to serve in the ranks. In that capacity he is
said to have saved the army in Thessaly, when entan-
gled in dangers which threatened it with destruction;
being required by the general voice to assume the com-
mand He is not again heard of in a public capacity
till B. C. 366, when he was sent to support the demo-
cratic interest in Achaia, and by his moderation and
judgment brought that whole confederation over to the
rhebar. alliance, without bloodshed or banishment. It
soon bctame plain, however, that a mere change of
mastcic Thebes instead of Sparta, would be of no ser-
vice to the Grecian states. Achaia first, then Elis. then
? ? Mantinea and great part of Arcadia, returned to the La-
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? rim&us.
EPHESUS
p rail tall >> - Avnt Prion. (Powon. , /. e. ) It
is TKordsi U, k Fn >u \\d, in foimer times, been call-
ed Lepre Ak\ ^*. >>aoj ami); and a part behind Prion
waj still caTcA lb. ) Back of Lepre when Strabo wrote.
Pliny (5, 29) enumerates other names for the city,
such as Ortygi. i, Smyrna, Trachea, &c. -- Lysima-
c'nus, wishing to protect Ephetus from the inunda-
tions to which it was yearly exposod by the overflow-
? ngs of the Cayster, built a city up on the mountain,
and surrounded it with walls. Tin inhabitants were
unwilling to remove into this, but a heavy rain falling,
and Lvsimachus slopping the drains and flooding their
houses, they were glad to exchange. (Sirabu, 640. )
The port of Ephesus had originally a wide mouth, but
foul with mud lodging in it from the Cayster. Attalus
Philadelphus and his architect were of opinion that,
if the entrance were contracted, it would become deep-
er, and in time be capable of receiving ships cf bur-
den. But the slime, which had before been ir. oved
by the flux and reflux of the tide, snet carried off. be-
ing slopped, the whole basin, quite to the mouth, was
rendered shallow. This port is a mcrrss, which com-
municates with the Cayster, as might be expected, by a
narrow mouth; and at the water's edre, near the ferry,
as well as in other places, may be sew the wall in-
tended lo embank the stream, and give it force by con-
finement. The masonry is of that kind termed xrut-
lum, in which the stones are of various shipes, but
nicely joined. The situation was so advanngecus as
to overbalance the inconveniences attending the port.
The town increased daily, and under the Romans, was
considered the chief emporium of Asia this sideoi'Tvi-
rii In the arrangement of the provinces under tbe
Eastern emperors it became the capital of the province
of Asia, (liierocles, p. 658 ) Towards the end of tbi!
eleventh century, Ephesus experienced ihe same fate as
Smyrna. A Turkish pirate, named Tannri panes, set-
tled here. But the Greek admiral, John Ducas, de-
feated hioi in a bloody battle, and pursued the flying
Turks up the Moeander to Polybotum. In 1306 it was
among the places which suffered from the cxactioni of
the Grand Duke Roger; and, two years after, it surren-
dered to Sultan Saysan, who tn prevent future insur-
rections, removed most of the inhabitants to Tyrieum,
where they were massacred. In the conflicts which
desolated Asia Minor at a subsequent period, Ephesus
was again a sufferer, and the city became at length re-
duced to a heap of ruins. The modern name is Aias-
aiuk. or, more properly, this 13 the appellation of a
small village inhabited by a few Turkish families,
standing chiefly on the south side of the castle hill,
among bushes and ruins. The name is supposed to
he a corruption of Agios Theologot, from the circum-
stance of a famous church of St. John the Divine hav-
ing once stood near the spot. When Smith wrote in
1677, Ephesus was already 'reduced to an inconsid-
erable number of cottages, wholly inhabited by Turks. "
Kyceut confirms this observation. "This place, where
once Christianity ao flourished as to be a mother
church and the see of a metropolitan bishop, cannot
now show o. ie family of Christians: so hath the secret
providence of God disposed affairs, too deep and mys-
terious for us to search into. " From Chishull we
learn that, in 1699, "the miserable remains of the
church of Ephesus resided, not on the spot, hut at a vil-
lage called Kirktngecui. " Tournefjrt, however, says
there were thirty or forty Greek families; but as he
? ? wrote about the same time as Chishull, this is probably
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? EPHESUS
EPHESUS.
B. C. ; and their plan was continued by Demetrius, a
? wicst of Diana; but the whole was completed by
Daphnis of Miletus, and a citizen of Ephesus, the
building having occupied 230 years. It was the first
specimen of the Ionic style, in which the fluted col-
umn and capital with volutes were introduced. The
whole length of the temple was 425 feet, and the
breadth 220; with 127 columns of the Ionic order
and Parian marble, each of a single shaft, and sixty
feet high. These were donations from kings, accord-
ing to Pliny (36, 14), but there is reason to doubt
the correctness of the text where this assertion is
made. Of these columns thirty-six were carved; and
one of them, perhaps as a model, by Scopas. The
temple hud a double row of columns, fifteen on either
side; and Vitruvius has not determined if it had a
roof; probably over the cell only. The folding doors
or gates had been continued four years in glue, and
were made of cypress wood, which had been treasured
up for four generations, highly polished. These were
found by Mulianus as fresh and as beautiful 400 years
after as when new. The ceiling was of cedar; and
the steps for ascending the roof (of the cell? ) of a
single stem of a vine, which attested the durable na-
ture of that wood. The dimensions of this great tem-
ple excite ideas of uncommon grandeur from mere
massiveness; but the notices we collect of its inter-
nal ornament will increase our admiration. It was
the repository in which the great artists of antiquity
dedicated their most perfect works to posterity.
Prax-
iteles and his son Cephisodorus adorned the shrine;
Scopas contributed a statue of Hecate; Timarete, the
daughter of Micon, the first female artist upon record,
finished a picture of the goddess, the most ancient in
Ephesus; and Parrhasius and Apellcs employed their
jkill to embellish tho walls. The excellence of these
performances may be supposed to have been propor-
tionate to their price; and a picture of Alexander
grasping a thunderbolt, by the latter, was added to the
ariperb collection at the expense of twenty talents of
gold. This description, however, applies chiefly to
the temple as it was rebuilt, after the earlier temple
had been partially burned, perhaps the roof of timber
only, by Hcrostratus, who chose that method to ensure
to himself an immortal name, on the very night that
Alexander the Great was born. Twenty years after,
that magnificent prince, during his expedition against
Persia, offered to appropriate his spoils to the restora-
tion of it, if the Ephesians would consent to allow him
the sole honour, and would placo his name on the
temple. They declined the proposal, however, with
the flattering remark, that it was not right for one deity
to erect a temple to another: national vanity was,
however, the real ground of their refusal. The archi-
tect who superintended the erection of the new edi-
fice was Dinocratcs, of whose aid Alexander afterward
availed himself in building Alexandrea. (Fin-tro. , 2,
praf. --Compare Strabo, 640. --Plut. , Vit. Alex. , 72.
--Plin. , 7, 37. --Solin. , 40. ) The extreme sanctity
of the temple inspired universal awe and reverence.
It was for many ages a repository of foreign and do-
mestic treasure. There property, whether public or
private, was secure amid all revolutions. The conduct
of Xerxes was an example to subsequent conquerors,
and the impiety of sacrilege was not extended to the
Ephesian goddess. But Nero deviated from this rule.
He removed many costly offerings and images, and an
? ? immense quantity of silver and gold. It was again
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? EPH
EPH
po-jit a la description de Pline," &c, and he has no
ether mode of accounting for this difference, than by
supposing it might have been rebuilt after the time of
Pliny, perhaps in the reign of Gallicnus, after it had
been pillaged and burned by the Goths. Dallaway
suggest*, that the massive walls of, and adjoining to,
the gymnasium may be those of the temple. The
grandeur of its plan and dimensions, which are still
marked by a long nave, finished by an arch of great ex-1
panse at either termination, seems to favour the pre-
tensions of this edifice above those of the other. In
various points of description they correspond, except-
ing that this was beyond the limits of the city walls;
for the circumstance of having been washed by the sea
applies equally to both ruins. But the Turks, from
whose barbarous corruptions or analogous terms the
real and more ancient name is in some instances to be
collected, call this particular ruin " Kialar Serai," or
the palace of virgins. The same name induced Dr.
Pocockc, when investigating Alexandrea Troas, to de-
cide on a building as another temple of Diana. Per-
haps the most probable solution of the difficulty will
be, that the entire remains of the temple are buried
under the soil. In the valley above Nolium is a fine
Ionic column, evidently in its original situation, but of
which not more than three or four feet are visible ; the
remainder is buried by the rapid accumulation of soil;
and Mr. Cockerell calculates, that of the temple at
Sirdis 25 feet remain still covered with earth : the ac-
cumulation from the Caystcr must be vastly greater
and more rapid. The relative position of the temple
with the SeUnusian laker would be in favour of a con-
jecture that it stood considerably lower down, and more
towards the northeast than the spot usually assigned to
u. This would agree better with the distance from
Ibe city, and its situation without the Magncsian gate,
which can never be imagined to be that, as Chand-
ler supposes, next to Aiasaluc. (ArundeWs Seven
Churches of Asia. p. 38, seqq. --Hirt, Geschichte dcr
liaukunst bei den Allen, vol. 2, p. 60, seqq. )
Ephialtes, a giant, son of Alocus. ( Vid. Aloi'tlns. )
Ernoai (*Ec>opo<), a body of magistrates at Sparta,
who were possessed of great privileges. The institu-
tion of this office is usually ascribed to Thcopompus,
the grandson of Charilaus the Proclid; but it has been
inferred, from the existence of an ephoralty in other
Dorian states before the time of Thcopompus, and
from its being apparently placed among the institu-
tions of Lyeurgus by Herodotus (1, 65) and Xeno-
phon (de Rep. L*e. , 8, 3), that it was an ancient Do-
rian magistracy. Arnold supposes that the ephori,
who were five in number, were coeval wilh the first
settlement of the Dorians in Sparta, and were merely
the municipal magistrates of the five hamlets which
composed the city {Midler, Dorians, vol. 2, p. 550,
JEn/r. transl. ); but that afterward, when the Heracli-
da? began to encroach upon the privileges of the other
Dorians, and, it would seem, in the reign of Thco-
pompus, who endeavoured to diminish the powers of
the general assembly of the Spartan aristocracv, the
Dcrians, in the struggle which ensued, gained for the
ephori an extension of authority, which placed them
virtually at the head of the state, although the nominal
sovereignty was still kept in the hands of the Heraclids.
(Arnold, ad Thucyd. , 1, ST. --Append. , 2, vol. 1, p.
646) Thus the ephori were popular magistrates, as
far as the Dorians themselves were concerned, and
? ? were, in fact, the guardians of their rights from the en-
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? E Pt
? PI
tie wile of Aidoneus, they were both taken prisoners
and detained. (I'ausan. , I, 17. --Compare Apollodo-
rus, 2, 7. --Died. Sic, 4, 36. ) It appears from Stra-
ta (3241 apd other authorities, that this town after-
ward tooK tbe name of Cichyrus, but on what occasion
we are not informed. Mr. Hughes, who has explored
with great attention this part of Epirus, reports, "that
? he rums of Ephyra are to be seen at no great dis-
tance from the Acherusian lake, near a deserted con-
<ent dedicated to St. John. Though the walls lie for
the most part in a confused mass of ruins, they may
be distinctly traced in a circular figure: those parts
which remain perfect exhibiting a specimen of masonry
apparently more rude even than Tiryns itself, though
the blocks used are not of so large dimensions. "
{Travels, vol. 2, p. 812. --Cramer's Ancient Greece,
vol. 1, p. 113, seqq)
Epicharmus, the first Greek comic writer of whom
? ve have any certain account. He was a Syracusan,
? -ither by birth or emigration. (Theocritus, Epig. , 17. )
tome make him a native of Orastus, some of Cos
iSuidas -- Eudocia, p. 100); but all agree that he
;>assed his life at Syracuse. It was about B. C. 600,
Olymp. 70, 1, thirty-five years after Thespis began to
? xhibit, eleven years after the commencement of Phry-
nichus, and just before the appearance of jEschylus as
n tragedian, that Epicharmus produced the first come-
dy properly so called. Before him this department of
the drama was, as we have every reason to believe,
eothing but a series of licentious songs and sarcastic
episodes, without plot, connexion, or consistency. He
gave to each exhibition one single and unbroken fable,
and converted the loose interlocutions into regular dia-
logue. (Arislot. , Poet. , 5, fi. ) The subjects of his
? omedics, as we may infer from the extant titles of
hirty-five of them, were partly parodies of mythologt-
tal subjects, and, as such, not very different from the
lialogue of the aatyric drama, and partly political, and
in this respect may have furnished a model for the
iialogue of the Athenian comedy. Tragedy had, some
fears before the era of Epicharmus, begun to assume
its st. - id and dignified character The woes of heroes
and the majesty of the gods had, under Phrynicus, be-
come its favourite theme. The Sicilian poet seems
to have been struck with the idea of exciting the mirth
of his audience by tbe exhibition of some ludicrous
matter dressed up in all the grave solemnity of the
newly-invented art. Discarding, therefore, the low drol-
leries and scurrilous invectives of the ancient Kuuyiia,
he opened a novel and less invidious source of amuse-
ment, by composing a set of burlesque dramas upon the
usual tragic subjects. (Athenaus, 15, p. 698, id.
Schiectgh. , vol. 5, p. 5fl5. ) They succeeded, and the
turn thus given to comedy long continued; so that
when it once more returned to personality and satire,
as it afterward did, tragedy and tragic poets were the
constant objects of its parody and ridicule. The great
changes thus effected by Epicharmus justly entitled
him to be called the Inventor of Comedy {Theocritus,
Epig. , 17), though it is probable that Phormis or Phor
mus preceded him by a few Olympiads. {Arislot. ,
Poet. , 3, 5. --Athenaus, 14, p. 652 a. ) But his mer-
. ts rest not here: he was distinguished for elegance
of composition as well as originality of conception.
Demetrius Phalereus (compare Vvssius, de Poet. Gr. ,
S, p. 31) says, that Epicharmus excelled in the choice
and collocation of epithets: on which account the
? ? name of 'E-rt^up/uoc was given to his kind of style,
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? EP1
EPICURUS.
mi; until he benevolently adopted a child whom a
friend had been compelled by poverty to expose, and
hired a nupe for its sake. --Epictetus was a teacher of
the Stoic philosophy, and the chief of those who lived
during the period of the Roman empire. Hia lessons
were principally, if not solely, directed to practical
Morality. His favourite maxim, and that into which
be resolved all practical morality, was " bear and/or-
h*r," uvixov icai an-e^ou. He appears to have dif-
fered from the Stoics on the subject of suicide. (Ar-
rian, Epict , 1, 8. ) We are told by Arrian, in his
Preface to the " Discourses," that he was a powerful
and exciting lecturer; and, according to Origen (c.
Cds. , 1, ad intl. ), his style was superior to that of
Plato. It ia a proof of the estimation iu which Epic-
tetus was held, that, on his death, his lamp was pur-
chased by some more eager than wise aspirant after
philosophy for three thousand drachmas, or over five
hundred dollars of our currency. (Lucian, adv. In-
ioct. her. ement , vol. 8. p. 15, erf Bip. ) Though it
is said by Suidas that Epictetus wrote much, there is
good reason to believe that he himself wrote nothing.
His Discourses were taken down by his pupil Arrian,
and published after his* death in six books, of which
four remain. The same Arrian compiled the Enchi-
ridion, and wrote a life of Epictetus, which is lost.
Some fragments have been preserved, however, by
Stobsus. Simplicius has also left a commentary on
his doctrine, in the Eclectic manner. The best edi-
tion of the remains of Epictetus is that of Schwcig-
heeuser, 6 vols. 8vo, L\ps. , 1799. The same editor
has published the Enchiridion, together with the Ta-
blet of Cebes, in a separate volume (Lips. , 1797,
8vo). There is an English version of the Enchiridion
or Manual by Mrs. Carter. {Fabric, Bibl. Grac, ed.
HarUs, vol. 5, p. 64. --Enfield, Hist. I'hilos. , vol. 2,
p 121. --Encycl. Us. Knoicl. , vol. 9, p. 471. )
Epiccrus, a celebrated philosopher, born in the year
Ml B. C. , seven years after the death of Plato. He
was a native of the Island of Samos, whither his father
had gone from Athens, in the year 352 B. C. , among
2000 colonists then sent out by the Athenians. (Stra-
ta 638. ) Yet he was an Athenian by right, belong-
ing to the borough Gargettus, and to the tribe . 'Egeis.
Hj father Neocles is said to have been a schoolmas-
ter, and his mother Chasristrata to have practised arts
of magic, in which iv was afterward made a charge
against Epicurus, that, when he was young, he assist-
ed her. (Diog.
20. ) He was also protected by tho elder Scipio Afri-
canus, whom he is said to have accompanied in most
of hi* campaigns. (C/audian, de Laud. Stilic. lib. 3,
prof) It is not easy, however, to see in what expe-
ditions he could have attended this renowned general.
Scipio'* Spanish and African wars were concluded be-
fore Ennius was brought from Sardinia to Rome; and
the campaign against Antiochus was commenced and
terminated while he was serving under Fulvius Nobilior
in ? tolia. In his old age he obtained the friendship
of Scipio Nasica ; and the degree of intimacy subsist-
ing between them has been characterized by the well-
known anecdote of their successively feigning to be
from home. {Cic. , de Oral. , 2, 68. ) He ia said to
have been intemperate in drinking (Horat. , Epi. it. . 1,
? ? 19, 7), which brought on the disease called Morbus
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? ENNIUS.
tfNNlUS.
J>>. 22. --" L'Aloutttt et tea petits avec It maitrt i'un
champ"). It is certainly much to bo regretted that we
possess such scanty fragments of these productions,
which would have been curious as the first attempts
at a species of composition, which was carried to such
perfection by succeeding Latin poets, and which has
been regarded as almost peculiar to the Romans.
The great work, however, of Ennius, and of which
"a have still considerable remains, was his Annals,
or Metrical Chronicles, devoted to the celebration of
Roman exploits, from the earliest periods to the con-
clusion of the Istrian war. These annals were writ-
ten by our poet in his old age; at least Aulus Gel-
l>ns informs us, on the authority of Varro, that the
twelfth book was finished by him in his sixty-seventh
year (17, 21). The annals of Ennius were partly
founded on those ancient traditions and old heroic bal-
lads, which Cicero, on the authority of Cato's Ori-
sines, mentions as having been sung at feasts by
the guests, many centuries before the age of Cato,
in praise of the heroes of Rome. Niebuhr has at-
tempted to show, that all tho memorable events of
Roman history had been versified in ballads or metri-
cal chronicles, in the Saturnian measure, before the
lime of Ennius; who, according to him, merely ex-
pressed in the Greek hexameter what his predecessors
had delivered in a ruder strain, and then maliciously
depreciated these ancient compositions, in order that
he himself might be considered as the founder of Ro-
man poetry. The chief work, according to Niebuhr,
from which Ennius borrowed, was a romantic epopee,
or chronicle, made up from these heroic ballads, about
the end of the fourth century of Rome, commencing
with the accession of Tarquinius, and ending with the
battle of Regillus. --Ennius begins his Annals with an
invocation of the nine Muses, and the account of a
vision in which Homer had appeared to him, and re-
lated the story of the metamorphosis already mention-
ed. He afterward invokes a great number of tho
gods, and then proceeds to the history of the Al-
ban kings, the dream of the Vestal virgin Ilia, which
announced her pregnancy by Mars and the foundation
of Rome. The reigns of the kings, and the contests
of the republic with the neighbouring states previous
to the Punic war, occupy the metrical annals to the
end of the sixth book. It should be observed, in pass-
ing, that the Annals were not separated by Ennius
himself into books; hut were so divided, long after his
death, by the grammarian Q. Vargunteius. (Suelon. ,
de Illuttr. Gramm. , c. 2. ) Cicero, in his Brutus (c.
19),'says that Ennius did not treat of the first Punic
war, as Nievius had previously written on the same
subject. P. Merula, however, who edited the frag-
ments of Ennius, is of opinion that this passage of Ci-
cero can only mean that he had not entered into much
detail of its events, as he finds several lines in the
seventh book which, he thinks, evidently apply to the
first Carthaginian war, particularly the description of
naval operations, and the building of the first fleet with
which the Carthaginians were attacked by the Ro-
mans. In some of the editions of Ennius, the charac-
ter of the friend and military adviser of Servilius, gen-
erally supposed to be intended as a portrait of the poet
himself, is ranged under the seventh book. The
eighth and ninth books of these Annals, which arc
much mutilated, detail the events of the second Car-
thaginian war in Italy and * fiica. This was by much
? ? the most interesting part of the copious subject which
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? ENNIUS
EPA
t passage jf Apuleius, that the work of Ennius was a
digest of all the previous books on this suh/ect. The
eleven lines which remain, and which have been pre-
served by Apuleius, mention the places where differ-
ent sorts of Hsh are found in greatest perfection and
abundance. Another poem of Ennius, entitled Epi-
ckirmus, was so called because it was translated from
the Greek work of Epicharmus, the Pythagorean, on
the Nature of Things, in the same manner as Plato
? rave the name of Timsmis to the book which he trans-
lated from Tiraasus the Locrian. The fragments of
this work of Ennius are so broken and corrupted, that
it is impossible to follow the plan of his poem, or the
system of philosophy which it inculcated. It appears,
however, to have contained many speculations con-
cerning the elements of which the world was primarily
composed, and which, according to hi. n, were water,
earth, air, and (ire ( Varro, R. R. , 1,4); as also with
regard to the preservative powers of nature. Jupiter
teems merely to have been considered by him as the air,
the clouds, and the storm --Ennius, however, whose
compositions thus appear to have been formed entirely
on Greek originals, has not availed himself so success-
fully of these writings as Virgil has done of the works of
Ennius himself. The prince of Latin poets has often
condescended to imitate long passages, and sometimes
to copy whole lines, from the Father of Roman Song.
This has been shown, in a close comparison, by Ma-
crobius, in his Saturnalia (6, 1, seqq. ). Lucretius
and Ovid have also frequently availed themselves of
the works of Ennius. His description of the cutting
of a forest, in order to fit out a fleet against the Car-
thaginians, in the seventh book, has been imitated by
Statius in the tenth book of the Thebais. The pas-
sage in his sixth Satire, in which he has painted the
happy situation of a parasite, compared with that of
the mister of a feast, is copied in Terence's Phormio
(t, 2)--It appears, then, that Ennius occasionally
produced verses of considerable harmony and beauty,
? cr? that his conceptions were frequently expressed
wiu energy and spirit. It must be recollected, how-
ever, that the lines imitated by Virgil, and the other
passages which are usually selected with reference to
the imitation of the early bard by other poets, are very
favourable specimens of his taste and genius. Many
of his verses are harsh and defective in their mechani-
cal construction; others are frigidly prosaic; and not
a few are deformed with the most absurd conceits, not
wmuch in the idea, as in a jingle of words and ex-
travagant alliteration. --On the whole, the works of
Ennius are rather pleasing and interesting, aa the early
blossoms of that poetry which afterward opened to
such perfection, than estimable from their intrinsic
beauty. But, whatever may have been the merit of
the works of Ennius, of which we are now but incom-
petent judges, they were at least sufficiently various.
Epic, dramatic, satiric, and didactic poetry were all
successively attempted by him; and we also learn that
he nercised himself in the lighter species of verse, as
the epigram and acrostic. (Cte. , de Din. , 2,64. ) For
this novelty and exuberance it is not difficult to ac-
count. The fountains of Greek liternture, as yet un-
taxed in Latium, were open for his imitation. He
stood in very different circumstances from thbse Greek
bards who drew solely from the resources of their
own genius; or from his successors in Latin poetry,
who wrote after the best productions of Greece had
? ? become familiar to the Romans. He was thus placed
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? EFAMIN0XDA9
EPH
remarkaule concurrence of ancient writers. Nepos
observes that, before Epaminondas was born, and after
his death, Thebes was always in subjection to some
other power: on the contrary, while he directed her
councils, she was at the head of Greece. His public
life extends from the restoration of democracy by Pe-
lopidas and the other exiles, B. C. 379, to the battle
of Mantinea, B. C. 362. In the conspiracy by which
that revolution was effected he took no part, refu-
ging to stain his hands with the blood of his country-
men; but thenceforward he became the prime mover
of the Theban state. His policy was first directed to
assert the right, and to secure the power to Thebes
of controlling the other cities of Boeotia, several of
which claimed to be independent. In this cause he
ventured to engage his country, single handed, in war
with the Spartans, who marched into Boeotia, B. C.
371, with a force superior to any which could be
brought against them. The Theban generals were di-
vided in opinion whether a battle should be risked;
for to encounter the Lacedaemonians with inferior
numbers was universally esteemed hopeless. Epami-
nondas prevailed with his colleagues to venture it; and
devised on this occasion a new method of attack. In-
stead of joining battle along the whole line, he concen-
trated an overwhelming force on one point, directing
the weaker part of his line to keep back. The Spartan
right being broken and their king slain, the rest of the
army found it necessary to abandon the field. This
memorable battle was fought at Leuctra. The moral
effect of it was much more important than the mere
loss inflicted upon Sparta, for it overthrew the pre-
scriptive superiority in arms claimed by that siato ever
since its reformation by Lycurgtis. This brilliant suc-
cess led Epaminondas to the second object of his pol-
icy, the overthrow of the supremacy of Sparta, and the
substitution of Thebes as the leader of Greece in the
democratic interest. In this hope a Theban army,
under his command, marched into the Peloponnesus
early in the winter, B. C. 369, and, in conjunction with
the Eleans, Arcadians, and Argives, invaded and laid
waste a large part of Laconia. Numbers of the He-
lots took that opportunity to shake off a most oppress-
ive slavery; and Epaminondas struck a deadly blow
at the power of Sparta, by establishing these descend-
ants of the old Messenians on Mount Ithome ip Mea-
Bcnia, as an independent state, and inviting their coun-
trymen, scattered through Italy and Sicily, to return to
their ancient patrimony. Numbers obeyed the call.
This memorable event is known in history as the re-
turn of the Messenians, and two hundred years had
elapsed since their expulsion. In 368 B C, Epami-
nondas again led an army into the Peloponnesus; but,
not fulfilling the expectations of Uie people, he was
disgraced, and, according to Diodorus (IS, 71), was
ordered to serve in the ranks. In that capacity he is
said to have saved the army in Thessaly, when entan-
gled in dangers which threatened it with destruction;
being required by the general voice to assume the com-
mand He is not again heard of in a public capacity
till B. C. 366, when he was sent to support the demo-
cratic interest in Achaia, and by his moderation and
judgment brought that whole confederation over to the
rhebar. alliance, without bloodshed or banishment. It
soon bctame plain, however, that a mere change of
mastcic Thebes instead of Sparta, would be of no ser-
vice to the Grecian states. Achaia first, then Elis. then
? ? Mantinea and great part of Arcadia, returned to the La-
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? rim&us.
EPHESUS
p rail tall >> - Avnt Prion. (Powon. , /. e. ) It
is TKordsi U, k Fn >u \\d, in foimer times, been call-
ed Lepre Ak\ ^*. >>aoj ami); and a part behind Prion
waj still caTcA lb. ) Back of Lepre when Strabo wrote.
Pliny (5, 29) enumerates other names for the city,
such as Ortygi. i, Smyrna, Trachea, &c. -- Lysima-
c'nus, wishing to protect Ephetus from the inunda-
tions to which it was yearly exposod by the overflow-
? ngs of the Cayster, built a city up on the mountain,
and surrounded it with walls. Tin inhabitants were
unwilling to remove into this, but a heavy rain falling,
and Lvsimachus slopping the drains and flooding their
houses, they were glad to exchange. (Sirabu, 640. )
The port of Ephesus had originally a wide mouth, but
foul with mud lodging in it from the Cayster. Attalus
Philadelphus and his architect were of opinion that,
if the entrance were contracted, it would become deep-
er, and in time be capable of receiving ships cf bur-
den. But the slime, which had before been ir. oved
by the flux and reflux of the tide, snet carried off. be-
ing slopped, the whole basin, quite to the mouth, was
rendered shallow. This port is a mcrrss, which com-
municates with the Cayster, as might be expected, by a
narrow mouth; and at the water's edre, near the ferry,
as well as in other places, may be sew the wall in-
tended lo embank the stream, and give it force by con-
finement. The masonry is of that kind termed xrut-
lum, in which the stones are of various shipes, but
nicely joined. The situation was so advanngecus as
to overbalance the inconveniences attending the port.
The town increased daily, and under the Romans, was
considered the chief emporium of Asia this sideoi'Tvi-
rii In the arrangement of the provinces under tbe
Eastern emperors it became the capital of the province
of Asia, (liierocles, p. 658 ) Towards the end of tbi!
eleventh century, Ephesus experienced ihe same fate as
Smyrna. A Turkish pirate, named Tannri panes, set-
tled here. But the Greek admiral, John Ducas, de-
feated hioi in a bloody battle, and pursued the flying
Turks up the Moeander to Polybotum. In 1306 it was
among the places which suffered from the cxactioni of
the Grand Duke Roger; and, two years after, it surren-
dered to Sultan Saysan, who tn prevent future insur-
rections, removed most of the inhabitants to Tyrieum,
where they were massacred. In the conflicts which
desolated Asia Minor at a subsequent period, Ephesus
was again a sufferer, and the city became at length re-
duced to a heap of ruins. The modern name is Aias-
aiuk. or, more properly, this 13 the appellation of a
small village inhabited by a few Turkish families,
standing chiefly on the south side of the castle hill,
among bushes and ruins. The name is supposed to
he a corruption of Agios Theologot, from the circum-
stance of a famous church of St. John the Divine hav-
ing once stood near the spot. When Smith wrote in
1677, Ephesus was already 'reduced to an inconsid-
erable number of cottages, wholly inhabited by Turks. "
Kyceut confirms this observation. "This place, where
once Christianity ao flourished as to be a mother
church and the see of a metropolitan bishop, cannot
now show o. ie family of Christians: so hath the secret
providence of God disposed affairs, too deep and mys-
terious for us to search into. " From Chishull we
learn that, in 1699, "the miserable remains of the
church of Ephesus resided, not on the spot, hut at a vil-
lage called Kirktngecui. " Tournefjrt, however, says
there were thirty or forty Greek families; but as he
? ? wrote about the same time as Chishull, this is probably
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? EPHESUS
EPHESUS.
B. C. ; and their plan was continued by Demetrius, a
? wicst of Diana; but the whole was completed by
Daphnis of Miletus, and a citizen of Ephesus, the
building having occupied 230 years. It was the first
specimen of the Ionic style, in which the fluted col-
umn and capital with volutes were introduced. The
whole length of the temple was 425 feet, and the
breadth 220; with 127 columns of the Ionic order
and Parian marble, each of a single shaft, and sixty
feet high. These were donations from kings, accord-
ing to Pliny (36, 14), but there is reason to doubt
the correctness of the text where this assertion is
made. Of these columns thirty-six were carved; and
one of them, perhaps as a model, by Scopas. The
temple hud a double row of columns, fifteen on either
side; and Vitruvius has not determined if it had a
roof; probably over the cell only. The folding doors
or gates had been continued four years in glue, and
were made of cypress wood, which had been treasured
up for four generations, highly polished. These were
found by Mulianus as fresh and as beautiful 400 years
after as when new. The ceiling was of cedar; and
the steps for ascending the roof (of the cell? ) of a
single stem of a vine, which attested the durable na-
ture of that wood. The dimensions of this great tem-
ple excite ideas of uncommon grandeur from mere
massiveness; but the notices we collect of its inter-
nal ornament will increase our admiration. It was
the repository in which the great artists of antiquity
dedicated their most perfect works to posterity.
Prax-
iteles and his son Cephisodorus adorned the shrine;
Scopas contributed a statue of Hecate; Timarete, the
daughter of Micon, the first female artist upon record,
finished a picture of the goddess, the most ancient in
Ephesus; and Parrhasius and Apellcs employed their
jkill to embellish tho walls. The excellence of these
performances may be supposed to have been propor-
tionate to their price; and a picture of Alexander
grasping a thunderbolt, by the latter, was added to the
ariperb collection at the expense of twenty talents of
gold. This description, however, applies chiefly to
the temple as it was rebuilt, after the earlier temple
had been partially burned, perhaps the roof of timber
only, by Hcrostratus, who chose that method to ensure
to himself an immortal name, on the very night that
Alexander the Great was born. Twenty years after,
that magnificent prince, during his expedition against
Persia, offered to appropriate his spoils to the restora-
tion of it, if the Ephesians would consent to allow him
the sole honour, and would placo his name on the
temple. They declined the proposal, however, with
the flattering remark, that it was not right for one deity
to erect a temple to another: national vanity was,
however, the real ground of their refusal. The archi-
tect who superintended the erection of the new edi-
fice was Dinocratcs, of whose aid Alexander afterward
availed himself in building Alexandrea. (Fin-tro. , 2,
praf. --Compare Strabo, 640. --Plut. , Vit. Alex. , 72.
--Plin. , 7, 37. --Solin. , 40. ) The extreme sanctity
of the temple inspired universal awe and reverence.
It was for many ages a repository of foreign and do-
mestic treasure. There property, whether public or
private, was secure amid all revolutions. The conduct
of Xerxes was an example to subsequent conquerors,
and the impiety of sacrilege was not extended to the
Ephesian goddess. But Nero deviated from this rule.
He removed many costly offerings and images, and an
? ? immense quantity of silver and gold. It was again
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? EPH
EPH
po-jit a la description de Pline," &c, and he has no
ether mode of accounting for this difference, than by
supposing it might have been rebuilt after the time of
Pliny, perhaps in the reign of Gallicnus, after it had
been pillaged and burned by the Goths. Dallaway
suggest*, that the massive walls of, and adjoining to,
the gymnasium may be those of the temple. The
grandeur of its plan and dimensions, which are still
marked by a long nave, finished by an arch of great ex-1
panse at either termination, seems to favour the pre-
tensions of this edifice above those of the other. In
various points of description they correspond, except-
ing that this was beyond the limits of the city walls;
for the circumstance of having been washed by the sea
applies equally to both ruins. But the Turks, from
whose barbarous corruptions or analogous terms the
real and more ancient name is in some instances to be
collected, call this particular ruin " Kialar Serai," or
the palace of virgins. The same name induced Dr.
Pocockc, when investigating Alexandrea Troas, to de-
cide on a building as another temple of Diana. Per-
haps the most probable solution of the difficulty will
be, that the entire remains of the temple are buried
under the soil. In the valley above Nolium is a fine
Ionic column, evidently in its original situation, but of
which not more than three or four feet are visible ; the
remainder is buried by the rapid accumulation of soil;
and Mr. Cockerell calculates, that of the temple at
Sirdis 25 feet remain still covered with earth : the ac-
cumulation from the Caystcr must be vastly greater
and more rapid. The relative position of the temple
with the SeUnusian laker would be in favour of a con-
jecture that it stood considerably lower down, and more
towards the northeast than the spot usually assigned to
u. This would agree better with the distance from
Ibe city, and its situation without the Magncsian gate,
which can never be imagined to be that, as Chand-
ler supposes, next to Aiasaluc. (ArundeWs Seven
Churches of Asia. p. 38, seqq. --Hirt, Geschichte dcr
liaukunst bei den Allen, vol. 2, p. 60, seqq. )
Ephialtes, a giant, son of Alocus. ( Vid. Aloi'tlns. )
Ernoai (*Ec>opo<), a body of magistrates at Sparta,
who were possessed of great privileges. The institu-
tion of this office is usually ascribed to Thcopompus,
the grandson of Charilaus the Proclid; but it has been
inferred, from the existence of an ephoralty in other
Dorian states before the time of Thcopompus, and
from its being apparently placed among the institu-
tions of Lyeurgus by Herodotus (1, 65) and Xeno-
phon (de Rep. L*e. , 8, 3), that it was an ancient Do-
rian magistracy. Arnold supposes that the ephori,
who were five in number, were coeval wilh the first
settlement of the Dorians in Sparta, and were merely
the municipal magistrates of the five hamlets which
composed the city {Midler, Dorians, vol. 2, p. 550,
JEn/r. transl. ); but that afterward, when the Heracli-
da? began to encroach upon the privileges of the other
Dorians, and, it would seem, in the reign of Thco-
pompus, who endeavoured to diminish the powers of
the general assembly of the Spartan aristocracv, the
Dcrians, in the struggle which ensued, gained for the
ephori an extension of authority, which placed them
virtually at the head of the state, although the nominal
sovereignty was still kept in the hands of the Heraclids.
(Arnold, ad Thucyd. , 1, ST. --Append. , 2, vol. 1, p.
646) Thus the ephori were popular magistrates, as
far as the Dorians themselves were concerned, and
? ? were, in fact, the guardians of their rights from the en-
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? E Pt
? PI
tie wile of Aidoneus, they were both taken prisoners
and detained. (I'ausan. , I, 17. --Compare Apollodo-
rus, 2, 7. --Died. Sic, 4, 36. ) It appears from Stra-
ta (3241 apd other authorities, that this town after-
ward tooK tbe name of Cichyrus, but on what occasion
we are not informed. Mr. Hughes, who has explored
with great attention this part of Epirus, reports, "that
? he rums of Ephyra are to be seen at no great dis-
tance from the Acherusian lake, near a deserted con-
<ent dedicated to St. John. Though the walls lie for
the most part in a confused mass of ruins, they may
be distinctly traced in a circular figure: those parts
which remain perfect exhibiting a specimen of masonry
apparently more rude even than Tiryns itself, though
the blocks used are not of so large dimensions. "
{Travels, vol. 2, p. 812. --Cramer's Ancient Greece,
vol. 1, p. 113, seqq)
Epicharmus, the first Greek comic writer of whom
? ve have any certain account. He was a Syracusan,
? -ither by birth or emigration. (Theocritus, Epig. , 17. )
tome make him a native of Orastus, some of Cos
iSuidas -- Eudocia, p. 100); but all agree that he
;>assed his life at Syracuse. It was about B. C. 600,
Olymp. 70, 1, thirty-five years after Thespis began to
? xhibit, eleven years after the commencement of Phry-
nichus, and just before the appearance of jEschylus as
n tragedian, that Epicharmus produced the first come-
dy properly so called. Before him this department of
the drama was, as we have every reason to believe,
eothing but a series of licentious songs and sarcastic
episodes, without plot, connexion, or consistency. He
gave to each exhibition one single and unbroken fable,
and converted the loose interlocutions into regular dia-
logue. (Arislot. , Poet. , 5, fi. ) The subjects of his
? omedics, as we may infer from the extant titles of
hirty-five of them, were partly parodies of mythologt-
tal subjects, and, as such, not very different from the
lialogue of the aatyric drama, and partly political, and
in this respect may have furnished a model for the
iialogue of the Athenian comedy. Tragedy had, some
fears before the era of Epicharmus, begun to assume
its st. - id and dignified character The woes of heroes
and the majesty of the gods had, under Phrynicus, be-
come its favourite theme. The Sicilian poet seems
to have been struck with the idea of exciting the mirth
of his audience by tbe exhibition of some ludicrous
matter dressed up in all the grave solemnity of the
newly-invented art. Discarding, therefore, the low drol-
leries and scurrilous invectives of the ancient Kuuyiia,
he opened a novel and less invidious source of amuse-
ment, by composing a set of burlesque dramas upon the
usual tragic subjects. (Athenaus, 15, p. 698, id.
Schiectgh. , vol. 5, p. 5fl5. ) They succeeded, and the
turn thus given to comedy long continued; so that
when it once more returned to personality and satire,
as it afterward did, tragedy and tragic poets were the
constant objects of its parody and ridicule. The great
changes thus effected by Epicharmus justly entitled
him to be called the Inventor of Comedy {Theocritus,
Epig. , 17), though it is probable that Phormis or Phor
mus preceded him by a few Olympiads. {Arislot. ,
Poet. , 3, 5. --Athenaus, 14, p. 652 a. ) But his mer-
. ts rest not here: he was distinguished for elegance
of composition as well as originality of conception.
Demetrius Phalereus (compare Vvssius, de Poet. Gr. ,
S, p. 31) says, that Epicharmus excelled in the choice
and collocation of epithets: on which account the
? ? name of 'E-rt^up/uoc was given to his kind of style,
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? EP1
EPICURUS.
mi; until he benevolently adopted a child whom a
friend had been compelled by poverty to expose, and
hired a nupe for its sake. --Epictetus was a teacher of
the Stoic philosophy, and the chief of those who lived
during the period of the Roman empire. Hia lessons
were principally, if not solely, directed to practical
Morality. His favourite maxim, and that into which
be resolved all practical morality, was " bear and/or-
h*r," uvixov icai an-e^ou. He appears to have dif-
fered from the Stoics on the subject of suicide. (Ar-
rian, Epict , 1, 8. ) We are told by Arrian, in his
Preface to the " Discourses," that he was a powerful
and exciting lecturer; and, according to Origen (c.
Cds. , 1, ad intl. ), his style was superior to that of
Plato. It ia a proof of the estimation iu which Epic-
tetus was held, that, on his death, his lamp was pur-
chased by some more eager than wise aspirant after
philosophy for three thousand drachmas, or over five
hundred dollars of our currency. (Lucian, adv. In-
ioct. her. ement , vol. 8. p. 15, erf Bip. ) Though it
is said by Suidas that Epictetus wrote much, there is
good reason to believe that he himself wrote nothing.
His Discourses were taken down by his pupil Arrian,
and published after his* death in six books, of which
four remain. The same Arrian compiled the Enchi-
ridion, and wrote a life of Epictetus, which is lost.
Some fragments have been preserved, however, by
Stobsus. Simplicius has also left a commentary on
his doctrine, in the Eclectic manner. The best edi-
tion of the remains of Epictetus is that of Schwcig-
heeuser, 6 vols. 8vo, L\ps. , 1799. The same editor
has published the Enchiridion, together with the Ta-
blet of Cebes, in a separate volume (Lips. , 1797,
8vo). There is an English version of the Enchiridion
or Manual by Mrs. Carter. {Fabric, Bibl. Grac, ed.
HarUs, vol. 5, p. 64. --Enfield, Hist. I'hilos. , vol. 2,
p 121. --Encycl. Us. Knoicl. , vol. 9, p. 471. )
Epiccrus, a celebrated philosopher, born in the year
Ml B. C. , seven years after the death of Plato. He
was a native of the Island of Samos, whither his father
had gone from Athens, in the year 352 B. C. , among
2000 colonists then sent out by the Athenians. (Stra-
ta 638. ) Yet he was an Athenian by right, belong-
ing to the borough Gargettus, and to the tribe . 'Egeis.
Hj father Neocles is said to have been a schoolmas-
ter, and his mother Chasristrata to have practised arts
of magic, in which iv was afterward made a charge
against Epicurus, that, when he was young, he assist-
ed her. (Diog.
