NONNUS.
NONNUS, a Christian Poet, of the City of Panopolis in Aegypt, is reckoned among the Authors of the Fifth Age, though it be not exactly known at what Time he flou∣rish'd * 1.1. * 1.2 All that can be said is, That he lived after S. Gregory Nazianzen, but is more ancient than Justinian, since Agathi••••, who lived in the Time of this Emperor, quotes him in his Fourth Book of the Gothick Wars. His Style and Manners are suitable to the Authors of the Fourth Age. He hath made a Paraphrase upon S. John's Gospel in Verse, in a swelling and lofty Style. Aldur Manutius first published the Greek Text, in the beginning of the former Age, [in 1508. at Rome:] Several Versions have been since made of it, which were printed with the Text, at Lyons in 1590. at Frankfurt 1541, and at Heidelberg in 1596. Heinsius having spent much Pains upon this Work put out a new Edition of it [with his own Exer∣citations upon it] at † 1.3 Amsterdam in 1627. There was also another Edition at Paris by Cramoisy in 1623. 'Tis also in the Bibliotheca Patrum, printed [at Paris] in 1624. [It was also printed at Leyden in 1598. in Octavo, with Nansius's Notes.]
This Author also hath composed another Poem in the same Style, but upon a very different Subject. It is divided into Forty eight Books, called Dionysiacks, containing the fabulous Expeditions of Bacchus [written while he was an Heathen, printed in Greek at Antwerp in 1569. in Quarto, in Greek and Latin at Hanover in 1605. in Octavo, among the Greek Poets at Geneva in 1606. and with Cunaeus and Scaliger's Notes at Hanover in 1610.]