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

AMPHION.
AMPHI'NOME ('Ajwpipto' ), the wife of Aeson
and mother of Jason. When her husband and
her son Promachus had been slain by Pelias, and
she too was on the point of sharing their fate, she
fled to the hearth of Pelias, that his crime might
be aggravated by murdering her on that sacred
spot. She then cursed the murderer of her relatives, and plunged a sword into her own breast.
(Diod. iv. 50; Apollon. Rhod. i. 45.) Two other
mythical personages of this name are mentioned in
Diod. iv. 53, and in the Iliad, xviii. 44. [L. S.]
AMPHI'ON ('AjuPiw,). I. A son of Zeus and
Antiope, the daughter of Nycteus of Thebes, and
twin-brother of Zethus. (Ov. Met. vi. 110, &c.;
Apollod. iii. 5. ~ 5.) When Antiope was with
child by the father of the gods, fear of her own father
induced her to flee to Epopeus at Sicyon, whom
she married. Nycteus killed himself in despair,
but charged his brother Lycus to avenge him on
Epopeus and Antiope. Lycus accordingly marched
againt Sicyon, took the town, slew Epopeus, and
carried Antiope with him to Eleutherae in Boeotia.
During her imprisonment there she gave birth to
two sons, Amphion and Zethus, who were exposed,
but found and brought up by shepherds. (Apollod.
1. c.) According to Hyginus (Fab. 7), Antiope
was the wife of Lycus, and was seduced by Epopeus. Hereupon she was repudiated by her husband, and it was not until after this event that she
was visited by Zeus. Dirce, the second wife of
Lycus, was jealous of Antiope, and had her put in
chains; but Zeus helped her in escaping to mount
Cithaeron, where she gave birth to her two sons.
According to Apollodorus, she remained in captivity for a long time after the birth of her sons,
who grew up among the shepherds, and did not
know their descent. Hermes (according to others,
Apollo, or the Muses) gave Amphion a lyre, who
henceforth practised song and music, while his brother spent his time in hunting and tending the
flocks. (Horat. Epist. i. 18. 41, &c.) The two
brothers, whom Euripides (Phoen. 609) calls "the
Dioscuri with white horses," fortified the town of
Entresis near Thespiae, and settled there. (Steph.
Byz. s. v.) Antiope, who had in the meantime
been very ill-treated by Lycus and Dirce, escaped
from her prison, her chains having miraculously
been loosened; and her sons, on recognising their
mother, went to Thebes, killed Lycus, tied Dirce
to a bull, and had her dragged about till she too
was killed, and then threw her body into a well,
which was from this time called the well of Dirce.
After having taken possession of Thebes, the two
brothers fortified the town by a wall, the reasons
for which are differently stated. It is said, that
when Amphion played his lyre, the stones not only
moved of their own accord to the place where they
were wanted, but fitted themselves together so as to
form the wall. (Apollon. Rhod. i. 740, 755, with
the Schol.; Syncell. p. 125, d.; Horat. ad Pison.
394, &c.) Amphion afterwards married Niobe,
who bore him many sons and daughters, all of
whom were killed by Apollo. (Apollod, iii. 5. ~ 6;
Gellius, xx. 7; Hygin. Fab. 7, 8; Hem. Od. xi.
260, &c.; Paus. ix. 5. ~ 4; comp. NIOBE.) As
regards the death of Amphion, Ovid (Met. vi. 271)
relates, that he killed himself with a sword from
grief at the loss of his children. According to
others, he was killed by Apollo because he made
an assault on the Pythian temple of the god. (Hygin. Fab. 9.) Amphion was buried together with

AMPHIISSUS. 151
his brother at Thebes (or, according to Stephanus
Byzantius, s. v. TtOopaia, at Tithoraea), and the
Tithoraeans believed, that they could make their
own fields more fruitful by taking, at a certain
time of the year, from Amphion's grave a piece of
earth, and putting it on the grave of Antiope. For
this reason the Thebans watched the grave of Amphion at that particular season. (Paus. ix. 17. ~ 3,
&c.) In Hades Amphion was punished for his
conduct towards Leto. (ix. 5. ~ 4.) The following
passages may also be compared: Paus. ii. 6. ~ 2,
vi. 20. ~ 8; Propert. iii. 13. 29. The punishment
inflicted by Amphion and his brother upon Dirce
is represented in one of the finest works of art still
extant-the celebrated Farnesian bull, the work of
Apollonius and Tauriscus, which was discovered in
1546, and placed in the palace Farnese at Rome.
(Pliny, H.N. xxxvi. 4; Heyne, Antiqntar. Aifs:tze,
ii. p. 182, &c.; comp. M'iller, Orchom. p. 227, &c.)
2. A son of Jasus and husband of Persephone,
by whom he became the father of Chloris. (Hom.
Od. xi. 281, &c.) In Homer, this Amphion, king
of Orchomenos, is distinct from Amphion, the husband of Niobe; but in earlier traditions they seem
to have been regarded as the same person. (Eustath. ad Hom. p. 1684; Miller, Orchom. pp. 231,
370.)
There are three other mythical personages of
this name, one a leader of the Epeians against
Troy (Hom. II. xiii. 692), the second one of the
Argonauts (Apollon. Rhod. i. 176; Orph. Arg. 214;
Hygin. Fab. 14), and the third one of the sons of
Niobe. [NIOBE.] [L. S.]
AMPHION ('Apeuiw). 1. A sculptor, son of
ACESTOR, pupil of Ptolichus of Corcyra, and teacher
of Piso of Calaureia, was a native of Cnossus, and
flourished about B. c. 428 or 424. He executed a
group in which Battus, the colonizer of Cyrene,
was represented in a chariot, with Libya crowning
him, and Cyrene as the charioteer. This group
was dedicated at Delphi by the people of Cyrene.
(Paus. vi. 3. ~ 2, x. 15. ~ 4.)
2. A Greek painter, was contemporary with
Apelles (B. c. 332), who yielded to him in
arrangement or grouping (cedebat Amphioni dispositione, Plin. xxv. 36. ~ 10: but the reading Amphioni is doubtful: Melanthio is Brotier's conjecture; MELANTHIUS). [P. S.]
AMPHIS ("AupPis), an Athenian comic poet, of
the middle comedy, contemporary with the philosopher Plato. A reference to Phryne, the Thespian, in one of his plays (Athen. xiii. p. 591, d.),
proves that he was alive in B. c. 332. We have
the titles of twenty-six of his plays, and a few
fragments of them. (Suidas, s. v.; Pollux, i. 233;
Diog. Laert. iii. 27; Athen. xiii. p. 567, f.; Meineke, i. p. 403, iii. p. 301.) [P. S.]
AMPHISSA ("Ateqo-o-a), a daughter of Macareus and grand-daughter of Aeolus, was beloved by
Apollo, and is said to have given the name to the
town of Amphissa in Phocis, where her memory
was perpetuated by a splendid monument. (Paus.
x. 38. ~ 2, &c.) [L. S.]
AMPHISSUS ("Apqcroos), a son of Apollo
and Dryope, is said to have been of extraordinary
strength, and to have built the town of Oeta on
the mountain of the same name. Here he also
founded two temples, one of Apollo and the other
of the Nymphs. At the latter, games were celebrated down to a late period. (Anton. Lib. 32.)
[L. S.]