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

B62 AGATHIAS.

the contemporary of Aeschylus, who, however,
must have preceded him by a good half century.
(Muller, Arch. d. Kunst, p. 88.) [C. P. M.]
AGATHE'MERUS ('AyaO5fLepos), the son of
Orthon, and the author of a small geographical
work in two books, entitled rr-s yewypaplas sirorUvTrdiwrs d EnE7rLTOi (" A Sketch of Geography
in epitome"), addressed to his pupil Philon. His
age cannot be fixed with much certainty, but he
is supposed to have lived about the beginning of
the third century after Christ. He lived after
Ptolemy, whom he often quotes, and before the
foundation of Constantinople on the site of Byzantium in A. D. 328, as he mentions only the old
city Byzantium. (ii. 14.) Wendelin has attempted to shew that he wrote in the beginning of the
third century, from the statement he gives of the
distance of the tropic from the equator; but Dodwell, who thinks he lived nearer the time of
Ptolemy, contends that the calculation cannot be
depended on. From his speaking of Albion v 7'
orparo7rea t'psvraL, it has been thought that he
wrote not very long after the erection of the wall
of Severus. This is probably true, but the language
is scarcely definite enough to establish the point.
His work consists chiefly of extracts from
Ptolemy and other earlier writers. From a comparison with Pliny, it appears that Artemidorus,
of whose work a sort of compendium is contained
in the first book, was one of his main authorities.
He gives a short account of the various forms
assigned to the earth by earlier writers, treats of
the divisions of the earth, seas, and islands, the
winds, and the length and shortness of the days,
and then lays down the most important distances
on the inhabited part of the earth, reckoned in
stadia. The surname Agathemerus frequently
occurs in inscriptions. (Dodwell in Hudson's Geograph. Scriptores Gr. Minores; Ukert, Geogr. der
Griecken: u. Romer, pt. i. div. 1. p. 236.) [C. P. M.]
AGATHE'MERUS, CLAUDIUS (Kaul3tos
"Aya04eupos), an ancient Greek physician, who
lived in the first century after Christ. He was
born at Lacedaemon, and was a pupil of the philosopher Cornutus, in whose house he became acquainted with the poet Persius about A. D. 50.
(Pseudo-Sueton. vita Persii.) In the old editions
of Suetonius he is called Agaternus, a mistake
which was first corrected by Reinesius (Syntagma
Inscript. Antiq. p. 610), from the epitaph upon
him and his wife, Myrtale, which is preserved
in the Marmora Oxoniensia and the Greek Anthology, voL iii. p. 381. ~ 224, ed. Tauchn.
The apparent anomaly of a Roman praenomen
being given to a Greek, may be accounted for
by the fact which we learn from Suetonius
(Tiber. 6), that the Spartans were the hereditary
clients of the Claudia Gens. (C. G. Kiuhn, Additam, ad Elench. MIedic. Vet. a J. A. Fabricio, in
"Bibliolh. Graeca" exhibit.) [W. A. G.]
AGA'THIAS ('Aya0eas), the son of Mamnonius, a rhetorician, was born, as it seems, in 536
or 537 A. D. (Iist. ii. 16, and Vita A,atiiae in ed.
Bonn. p. xiv.), at Myrina, a town at the mouth of
the river Pythicus in Aeolia (Agathiac Prooemiunm,
p. 9, ed. Bonn.; p. 5, Par.; p. 7, Ven.), and received his education in Alexandria, where he
studied literature. In 554 he went to Constantinople (Hist. ii. 16), where his father-then most
probably resided, and studied for several years the
Roman law. (Epigr. 4.) He afterward exercised

AGATHIAS.
with great success the profession of an advocate,
though only for the sake of a livelihood, his favourite occupation being the study of ancient
poetry (Hist. iii. 1); and he paid particular attention to history. His profession of a lawyer was
the cause of his surname SXoAacTrucds (Suidas,s. v.
'AyaOias), which word signified an advocate in the
time of Agathias. Niebuhr (Vita Agath. in ed.
Bonn. p. xv.) believes, that he died during the
reign of Tiberius Thrax, a short time before the
death of this emperor and the accession of Mauritius in 582, at the age of only 44 or 45 years.
Agathias, who was a Christian (Epigr. 3, 5, and
especially 4), enjoyed during his life the esteem of
several great and distinguished men of his time,
such as Theodorus the decurio, Paulus Silentiarius,
Eutychianus the younger, and Macedonius the exconsul. He shewed them his gratitude by dedicating to them several of his literary productions, and
he paid particular homage to Paulus Silentiarius,
the son of Cyrus Florus, who was descended from
an old and illustrious family. (Hist. v. 9.)
Agathias is the author of the following works:
1. Aaumraad, a collection of small love poems,
divided into nine books; the poems are written in
hexametres. Nothing is extant of this collection,
which the author calls a juvenile essay. (Agath.
Prooemnium, p. 6, ed. Bonn.; p. 4, Par.; p. 6, Ven.)
2. KvKicos, an anthology containing poems of
early writers and of several of his contemporaries,
chiefly of such as were his protectors, among whom
were Paulus Silentiarius and Macedonius. This
collection was divided into seven books, but nothing
of it is extant except the introduction, which was
written by Agathias himself. However, 108 epigrams, which were in circulation either before he
collected his KdhcAos, or which he composed at a
later period, have come down to us. The last
seven and several others of these epigrams are generally attributed to other writers, such as Paulus
Silentiarius, &c. The epigrams are contained in
the Anthologia Graeca (iv. p. 3, ed. Jacobs), and
in the editions of the historical work of Agathias.
Joseph Scaliger; Janus Douza, and Bonaventura
Vulcanius, have translated the greater part of
them into Latin. The epigrams were written and
published after the Aaiptamcd.
3. 'AyaOov u 2XOhaO.r-Ko MvpLvaiov 'IoTropiwv E.
" Agathiae Scholastici Myrinensis Historiarum
Libri V." This is his principa, work. It contains the history from 553-558 a,., a short
period, but remarkable for the important events
with which it is filled up. The first book contains
the conquest of Italy by Narses over the Goths,
and the first contests between the Greeks and the
Franks; the second book contains the continuation of these contests, the description of the great
earthquake of 554, and the beginning of the war
between the Greeks and the Persians; the third
and the fourth books contain the continuation of
this war until the first peace in 536; the fifth
book relates the second gieat earthquake of 557,
the rebuilding of St. Sophia by Justinian, the
plague, the exploits of Belisarius over the Huns
and other barbarians in 558, and it finishes
abruptly with the 25th chapter.
Agathias, after having related that he had
abandoned his poetical occupation for more serious
studies (Prooemium, ed. Bonn. pp. 6, 7; Par. p. 4;
Ven. p. 6), tells us that several distinguished men
had suggested to him the idea of writing the history