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

1 004 MEDITRINA. MEDIUS.
~ 23; iHes. Theog. 961; Diod. iv. 45). She was MUller.)' Varro connects the name with the verb
the wife of Jason, and the most famous among the mederi, to heal, and this seems to accord well with
mythical sorcerers. The principal parts of her story the rites observed at the festival of the goddess.
have already been given under ABSYRTUS, ARGO- (Diet. of Ant. s. v. Meditrinalia.) [L. S.]
NAUTAE, and JASON. After her flight from Co- ME'DIUS FI'DIUS. [FIDIUS.]
rinth to Athens, she is said to have married king ME'DIUS (Mtibwos). 1. Dynast of Larissa in
Aegeus (Plut. Thes. 12), or to have been beloved Thessaly, who was engaged in a war with Lyby Sisyphus. (Schol. ad Pind. 01. xiii. 74.) Zeus cophron, tyrant of Pherae, in the year B.C. 395.
himself is said to have sued for her, but in vain, In this he was assisted by the Boeotians, who had
because Medeia dreaded the anger of Hera; and just concluded an alliance with the Argives, Corinththe latter rewarded her by promising immortality ians, and Athenians, against the power of Sparta,
to her children. Her children are, according to and with their assistance he took the city of Pharsome accounts, Mermerus, Pheres, or Thessalus, salus (Diod. xiv. 82). These events are omitted
Alcimenes and Tisander, and, according to others, by Xenophon.
she had seven sons and seven daughters, while 2. Son of Oxythemis, a native of Larissa in
others mention only two children, Medus (some Thessaly, and a friend of Alexander the Great.
call him Polyxemus) and Eriopis, or one son Ar- He is mentioned as commanding a trireme during
gus. (Apollod. i. 9. ~ 28; Died. iv. 54; Ptolem. the descent of the Indus (Arrian, Ind. 18), but
Heph. 2; Schol. ad Eurip. Med. 276.) Respect- with this exception his name does not occur in the
ing her flight from Corinth, there are different tra- military operations of the king. He appears, howditions. Some say, as we remarked above, that ever, to have enjoyed a high place in the personal
she fled to Athens and married Aegeus, but when favour of the monarch, and it was at his house
it was discovered that she had laid snares for The- that Alexander supped just before his last illness.
seus, she escaped and went to Asia, the inhabitants Hence, according to those writers who represented
of which were called after her Medes. (Medi, the king to have been poisoned, it was at this banPaus. ii. 3. ~ 7; Ov. MAet. vii. 391, &c.) Others quet that the fatal draught was administered, and
relate that first she fled from Corinth to Heracles not without the cognizance, as it was said, of Meat Thebes, who had promised her his assistance dius himself. Others more plausibly ascribed the
while yet in Colchis, in case of Jason being un- illness of Alexander to his intemperance upon the
faithful to her. She cured Heracles, who was same occasion (Arrian, Anab. vii. 24, 25; Plut.
seized with madness, and as he could not afford Alex. 75; Died. xvii. 117; Athen. x. p. 434. c.).
her the assistance he had promised, she went to Plutarch speaks in very unfavourable terms of MeAthens. (Diod. iv. 54.) She is said to have given dius, whom he represents as one of the flatterers
birth to her son Medus after her -arrival in Asia, to whose evil counsels the most reprehensible of
where, after her flight from Athens, she had mar- the actions of Alexander were to be ascribed (De
ried a king; whereas others state that her son Adul. et Amic. 24). But no trace of this is to be
Medus accompanied her from Athens to Colchis, found in the better authorities.
where her son slew Perses, and restored her father After the death of Alexander, Medius followed
Aeites to his kingdom. The restoration of Aeites, the fortunes of Antigonus, whose fleet we find him
however, is attributed by some to Jason, who ac- commanding in B.c. 314, when he defeated and
companied Medeia to Colchis. (Diod. iv. 54-56; took thirty-six ships of the Pydnaeans, who. had
Hygin. Fab. 26; Justin, xlii. 2; Tac. Ann. vi. espoused the party of Cassander (Diod. xix. 69).
34.) There is also a tradition that in Thessaly The following year (313) he took Miletus, and
Medeia entered into a contest with Thetis about her afterwards relieved the city of Oreus in Euboea,
beauty, which was decided by Idomeneus in favour which was besieged by Cassander himself (lb. 75).
of Thetis (Ptolem. Heph. 5), and another that Again, in 312, he was despatched by Antigonus
Medeia went to Italy, and there taught the Mar- with a fleet of 150 ships, to make a descent in
rubians the art of fascinating and subduing ser- Greece, and landed a large army in Boeotia under
pents, whence she is said to have been called Ptolemy; after which he returned to Asia to
Anguitia or Angitia. (Serv. ad Aen. vii. 750; co-operate with Antigonus himself, at the Hellescomp. ANGITIA.) At length Medeia is said to pont (Ib. 77). In 306 we find him present in
have become immortal, to have been honoured with the great sea-fight off Salamis in Cyprus, on which
divine worship, and to have married Achilles in occasion he commanded the left wing of the fleet
Elysium. (Scehol. ad Eurip. Med. 10, ad Apollon. of Demetrius' (Id. xx. 50). It appears also that
Rlod. iv. 814; comp. MUller, Orclom. p. 264, he accompanied Antigonus on his unsuccessful ex2d edit.) - [L. S.] pedition against Egypt in the same year (Plut.
MEDEIUS (MrjseLos), another form for Medus, Demetr. 19), but after this we hear no more of him.
the son of Medeiaj from whom the Medes in Asia His authority is cited by Strabo (xi. p. 530) in a
were believed to have derived their name. (Hes. manner that would lead us to conclude he had
Tzseog. 1001; Cic. De O.ff i. 31.) [L. S.] left some historical work, but we find no further
ME'DEON (MiqEc8a5), a son of Pylades and mention of him as a writer. The Medius who is
Electra, from whom the town of Medeon in Phocis quoted by Lucian (Mbacrob. 11) concerning the age
was believed to have received its name. (Steph. of Antigonus Gonatas, must evidently have been a
Byz. s. v.).. [L. S.] different person, and one otherwise unknown. (See
MEDESICASTE (M?71e-1lcdaeT), a daughter Geier, Alexandri M. Histor. Scriptores, p. 344,
of Priam, and the wife of Imbrus, at' Pedaeus. &c.) [E. H. B.]
(Hom. II. xiii. 173; Paus. x. 25, in fin.) [L. S.] ME'DIUS(M8os), a Greek physician who was
MEDITRI'NA, a Roman divinity' of the art of a pupil of Chrysippus of Cnidos (Galen, De Ven.
healing, in whose honour the festival of the Medi- Sect. adv. Erasistr. Roan. Deg. c. 2, De Cur. Rat.
trinalia was celebrated in the month of October. per Ven. Sect. c. 2, vol. xi. pp. 197, 252), and who
(Varro, De L. L. vi. 21; Paul Diac. p. 123, ed, lived therefore probably in the fourth and third