A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. By various writers. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

ALCIDAMAS.
to- his fortified domain at Bisanthe in the Thracian
Chersonesus. He collected a band of mercenaries,
and made war on the neighbouring Thracian
tribes, by which means he considerably enriched
himself, and afforded protection to the neighbouring Greek cities. Before the fatal battle of AegosPotami(B. c. 405), he gave an ineffectual warning to
the Athenian generals. After the establishment
of the tyranny of the Thirty (B. c. 404), he was
condemned to banishment. Upon this he tookrefuge with Pharnabazus, and was about to proceed to the court of Artaxerxes, when one night
his house was surrounded by a band of armed men,
and set on fire. He rushed out sword in hand,
but fell, pierced with arrows. (B. c. 404.) According to Diodorus and Ephorus (Diod. xiv. 11)
the assassins were emissaries of Pharnabazus, who
had been led to this step either by his own jealousy
of Alcibiades, or by the instigation of the Spartans.
It is more probable that they were either eniployed
by the Spartans, or (according to one account in
Plutarch) by the brothers of a lady whom Alcibiades had seduced. His corpse was taken up
and buried by his mistress Timandra. Athenaeus
(xiii. p. 574) mentions a monument erected to his
memory at Melissa, the place of his death, and a
statue of him erected thereon by the emperor
Hadrian, who also instituted certain yearly sacrifices in his honour. He left a son by his wife
Hipparete, named Alcibiades, who never distinguished himself. It was for him that Isocrates
wrote the speech nIept TOV ZEsyovs. Two of
Lysias's speeches (xiv. and xv.) are directed
against him. The fortune which he left behind
him turned out to be smaller than his patrimony.
(Plut. Alcib. and Nicias; Thucyd. lib. v.-viii.;
Xenophon, HIellen. lib. i. ii.; Andoc. in Alcib. and
de Mkylster.; Isocr. De Bigis; Nepos, Alcib.; Diod.
xii. 78-84, xiii. 2-5, 37-41, 45, 46, 49-51,
64-73; Athen. i. p. 3, iv. p. 184, v. pp. 215, 216,
ix. p. 407, xi. p. 506, xii. pp. 525, 534, 535, xiii.
pp. 574, 575.) [C. P. M.]
ALCIBI'ADES ('AAmctmiasis), a Spartan exile,
was restored to his country about B. c. 184, by the
Achaeans, but was ungrateful enough to go as ambassador from Sparta to Rome, in order to accuse
Philopoemen and the Achaeans. (Polyb. xxiii. 4,
11, 12, xxiv. 4; Liv. xxxix. 35.)
ALCI'DAMAS ('AXiMdaixes), a Greek rhetorician, was a native of Elaea in Aeolis, in Asia
Minor. (Quintil. iii. 1.~ 10, with Spalding's note.)
lie was a pupil of Gorgias, and resided at Athens
between the years B. c. 432 and 411. Here he
gave instructions in eloquence, according to Eudocia (p. 100), as the successor of his master, and
was the last of that sophistical school, with which
the only object of eloquence was to please the
hearers by the pomp and brilliancy of words. That
the works of Alcidamas bore the strongest marks
of this character of his school is stated by Aristotle (Rhet. iii. 3. ~ 8), who censures his pompous
diction and extravagant use of poetical epithets and
phrases, and by Dionysius (De Isaeo, 19), who
calls his style vulgar and inflated. He is said to
have been an opponent of Isocrates (Tzetz. C1hil.
xi. 672), but whether this statement refers to real
personal enmity, or whether it is merely an inference from the fact, that Alcidamas condemned the
practice of writing orations for the purpose of delivering them, is uncertain.
The ancients mention several works of Alcida

ALCIMACHUS. 101
mas, such as an Eulogy on Death, in which ho
enumerated the evils of human life, and of which
Cicero seems to speak with great praise (Tusc. i.
48); a shew-speech, called Aoyos MeaoreoviaKds
(Aristot. Rhet. i. 13. ~ 5); a work on music (Suidas, s. v.'AAF/cisasr); and some scientific works,
viz. one on rhetoric (r6Xme p-ropmciK, Plut. Denmosth.
5), and another called o'yos va-eKo's (Diog. Laert.
viii. 56); but all of them are now lost. Tzetzes
(01il. xi. 752) had still before him several orations
of Alcidamnas, but we now possess only two declamations which go under his name. 1. 'OSwv-0-evs,
S'Card YlAatsu'ovus npooaoiaes, in which Odysseus
is made to accuse Palamedes of treachery to the
cause of the Greeks during the siege of Troy. 2.
ireplt oouruio'P, in which the author sets forth the
advantages of delivering extempore speeches over
those which have previously been written out.
These two orations, the second of which is the better one, both in form and thought, bear scarcely
any traces of the faults which Aristotle and Dionysius censure in the works of Alcidamas; their
fault is rather being frigid and insipid. It has
therefore been maintained by several critics, that
these orations are not the works of Alcidamas;
and with regard to the first of them, the supposition is supported by strong probability; the second may have been written by Alcidamas with a
view to counteract the influence of Isocrates. The
first edition of them is that in the collection of
Greek orators published by Aldus, Venice, 1513,
fol. The best modern editions are those in Reiske's
Oratores Graeci, vol. viii. p. 64, &c.; and in
Bekker's Oratores A tici, vol. vii. (Oxford.) [L. S.]
A'LCIDAS ('AAtcilas), was appointed, B. c.
428, commander of the Peloponnesian fleet, which
was'sent to Lesbos for the relief of Mytilene, then
besieged by the Athenians. But Mytilene surrendered to the Athenians seven days before the
Peloponnesian fleet arrived on the coast of Asia-;
and Alcidas, who, like most of the Spartan commanders, had little enterprise, resolved to return
home, although he was recommended either to attempt the recovery of Mytilene or to make a descent upon the Ionian coast. While sailing along
the coast,he captured many vessels, and put to death
all the Athenian allies whom he took. From Ephesus
he sailed home with the utmost speed, being chased
by the Athenian fleet, under Paches, asfar as Patmos.
(Thuc. iii. 16, 26-33.) After receiving reinforcements, Alcidas sailed to Corcyra, B. c. 427; and
when the Athenians and Corcyraeans sailed out to
meet him, he defeated them and drove them back
to the island. With his habitual caution, however, he would not follow up the advantage he had
gained; and being informed that a large Athenian
fleet was approaching, he sailed back to Peloponnesus. (iii. 69-81.) In B. c. 426, he was one
of the leaders of the colony founded by the Lacedaemonians at Heracleia, near Thermopylae. (iii.
92.)
ALCI'DICE ('AAKtSIKftc), the daughter of Aleus,
and wife of Salmoneus, by whom she had a daughter, Tyro. Alcidice died early, and Salmoneus
afterwards married Sidero. (Diod. iv. 68; Apollod. i. 9. ~ 8.) [L. S.]
ALCI'MACHUS, a painter mentioned by
Pliny. (H. N. xxxv. 11. s. 40.) He is not
spoken of by any other writer, and all that is
known about him is, that he painted a picture of
Dioxippus, a victor in the pancratium at Olympia.