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

104 EURIPIDES. EURIPIDES..
tratus tells'us, of seeking his pupils among youths ascribes also to the same date the composition of
of high rank. (Plat. Apol. p. 19, e.; Stallb., ad the Veiled Hippolytus. The representation of
loo.; Arist. Rhet. iii. 14. ~ 9; Philostr. Vit. Soph. the Peliades, the first play of Euripides which
Prodicus.) It is said that the future distinction was acted, at least in his own name, took place in
of Euripides was predicted by an oracle, promising B. C. 455. This statement rests on. the authority
that he should be crowned with " sacred garlands," of his anonymous life, edited by- Elmsley from a
in consequence of which his father had him trained MS. in the Ambrosian library, and compared with
to gymnastic exercises; and we learn that, while that by Thomas Magister; and it is confirmed by
yet a boy, he won the prize at the Eleusinian and the life in the MSS. of Paris, Vienna, and CopenThesean contests (see Dict. of Ant. pp. 374, 964), hagen. In B. C. 441, Euripides gained for the first
and offered himself, when 17 years old, as a can- time the first prize, and he continued to exhibit
didate at the Olympic. games, but was not admitted plays until B. c. 408, the date of the Orestes.
because of some doubt about his age. (Oenom. ap. (See Clinton, sub annis.) Soon after this he
Euseb. Praep. Evan. v. 33; Gell. xv. 20.) Some left Athens for the court of ARCHELAUS, king of
trace of his early gymnastic pursuits is remarked Macedonia, his reasons for which step can only be
by Mr. Keble (Prael. Acad. xxix. p. 605) in the matter of conjecture. Traditionary scandal has
detailed description of the combat between Eteocles ascribed it to his disgust at the intrigue of his
and Polynices in the Phoenissae. (v. 1392, &c.) wife with Cephisophon, and the ridicule which was
Soon, however, abandoning these, he studied the showered upon him in consequence by the comic
art of painting (Thom. Mag. Fit. Eur.; Suid. s. v.), poets. But the whole story in question has been
not, as we learn, without success; and it has been sufficiently refuted by Hartung (p. 165, &c.),
observed that the veiled figure of Agamemnon in though objections may be taken to one or two of
the Iphigeneia of Timanthes was probably sug- his assumptions and arguments. The anonymous
gested by a line in Euripides' description of the author of the life of Euripides reports that he
same scene. (Iph. in Aul. 1550; Barnes, ad loc.; married Choerilla, daughter of Mnesilochus, and
comp. Ion, 183, &c.). To philosophy and literature that, in consequence of her infidelity, he wrote the
he devoted himself with much interest and energy, Hlippolytus to satirize the sex, and divorced her.
studying physics under Anaxagoras, -and rhetoric, He then married again, and his second wife,
as we have already seen, under Prodicus. (Diod. named Melitto, proved no better than the first.
i. 7, 38; Strab. xiv. p. 645; Heracl. Pont. Alleg. Now the Hippolytus was acted in B. c. 428, the
Homer. ~ 22.) We learn also from Athenaeus Thesmophoriazusae of Aristophanes in 414, and
that he was a great book-collector, and it is re- at the latter period Euripides was still married to
corded of him that he committed to memory certain Choerilla, Mnesilochus being spoken of as his
treatises of Heracleitus, which he found hidden in iKc6leraS with no hint of the connexion having
the temple of Artemis, and which he was the first ceased. (See Thesm. 210, 289.) But what can
to introduce to the notice of Socrates. (Athen. i. be more unlikely than that Euripides should have
p. 3, a.; Tatian, Or. a. Graec. p. 143, b.; Hartung, allowed fourteen years to elapse between his disEur..Rest. p. 131.) His intimacy with the latter covery of his wife's infidelity and his divorce of
is beyond a doubt, though we must reject the her? or that Aristophanes should have made no
statement of Gellius (I. c.), that he received in- mention of so piquant an event in the Thesmostruction from him in moral science, since Socrates phoriazusae? It may be said, however, that the
was not born till B. C. 468, twelve years after the name Choerilla is a mistake of the grammarians
birth of Euripides. Traces of the teaching of for Melitto; that it was the latter whose infidelity
Anaxagoras have been remarked in many passages gave rise to the Hippolytus; and that the inboth of the extant plays and of the fragments, and trigueof the former with Cephisophon, subsequent to
were impressed especially on the lost tragedy of 414, occasioned Euripides to leave Athens. But
AI'felanippa the Wise. (Orest. 545, 971; Pors. this is inconsistent with Choerilla's age, according
ad loc.; Plat. Apol. p. 26, d. e.; Troad. 879, Hel. to Hartung, who argues thus:- Euripides had
1014; Fragm. Melanipp., ed. Wagner, p.255; Cic. three sons by this lady, the youngest of whom
Tusc. Disp. i. 26; Hartung, p. 109; Barnes, ad must have been born not later han 434, for he.Eur. Heracl. 529; Valck. Diatr. c. 4, &c.) The exhibited plays of his father (?) in 404, and must
philosopher is also supposed to be alluded to in the at that time, therefore (?), have been thirty years
Alcestis (v. 925, &c.; comp. Cic. Tusc. Disp. iii. old (comp. Hartung, p. 6); consequently Choerilla
14). "We do not know," says. Muller (Greek must have become the wife of Euripides not later
Literature, p. 358), "what induced a person with than 440. At the time, then, of her alleged adulsuch tendencies to devote himself to tragic poetry." tery she must have been upwards of fifty, and
Ile is referring apparently to the opposition be- must have been married thirty years. But it may
tween the philosophical convictions of Euripides be urged that Choerilla may have died soon after
and the mythical legends which formed the subjects the representation of the Thesmophoriazusae (and
of tragedy; otherwise it does not clearly appear no wonder, says Hartung, if her death was hastwhy poetry should be thought incompatible with ened by so atrocious an attack on her husband and
philosophical pursuits. If, however, we may trust her father!), and Euripides may then have married
the account in Gellius (I. c.), it would seem,-and a young wife, Melitto, who played him false. To
this is not unimportant for our estimation of his this it is answered, that it is clear from the Frops
poetical character,-that the mind of Euripides that his friendship with Cephisophon, the supposed
was led at a very early period to that which gallant, continued unbroken till his death. After
afterwards became the business of his life, since he all, however, the silence of Aristophanes is the best
wrote a tragedy at the age of eighteen. That it refutation of the calumny. [CEPHISOPHON.] With
was, therefore, exhibited, and that it was proba- respect to the real reason for the poet's removal
bly no other than the Rhesus are, points unwar- into Macedonia, it is clear that an invitation from
rantably concluded by. artung (p. 6, &c.), who Archelaiis, at whose court the highest honours