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

348 HARMENOPULUS.: HARMENOPULUS.
Notit. Basil. p. 16, n. (a)), Heimbach (de Basil. Hexabiblus and Epitome of the Canons left rio
Orig. p. 113, 132-7), Zachariae (Hist. Jur. Gr. orations. Nay, in the commencement of his comRom. Delin. ~ 49). On the other hand, Ch.Waecht- mentary on the Digest, he calls himself an ineloler is censured by his editor Trotz (Praef. ad quent man, slow of speech, and states that for this
Waechtleri Opusc. p. 75) for still adhering, like cause he left the defence of clients, and betook
Cave and Bayle, to the ancient belief.. himself to the more umbratile province of legal
The general reception of the more modern meditation and authorship. Besides this comopinion, which places Harmenopulus in the middle mentary on the Digest, Comnenus ascribes to him
of the fourteenth century, has been favoured by a commentaries upon the Code and the Novells, and
circumstantial narrative of his life, resting upon an scholia on the Novells of Leo, and says that he
authority which has deceived many recent writers, was the author of the Tomus contra Gregoriuna
but is now known to be utterly unworthy of credit. Palanmam, which is published by Allatius in Graecia
Nic. Comnenus Papadopoli, in his Praenotiones Orthlodoxa (vol. i. p. 780-5, 4to. Rome, 1652), and
Mystagogicae, published in 1696, gives a biography that he closely followed the jurist Tipucitus, and
of Harmenopulus, the materials of which he pro- was far more learned than Balsamo, &c. For
fesses (p. 143) to have derived from the Paralipo- fuller particulars relating to the works of Harmemena of G. Coressius, and Maximus Planudes upon nopulus, Comnenus refers to his own Graeciae Sethe Nomocanon of Photius. (Fabric. Bibl. Gr. vol. pientis Testimonium, but we cannot find any mention
xi. p. 260.) of this treatise of Comnenus in the catalogues, and
The questionable narrative of Nic. Comnenus, it was never seen by Fabricius.
which is the source of the modem biographies, is to We may here stop to remark, that the greater
the following effect. Harmenopulus was born at part of the above account is probably sheer in-'Constantinople about A. D. 1320, nearly sixty years vention. The title of antecessor is not met with
after Constantinople had been recovered from the in authentic history under the later emperors-the
Latins. His father held the office of Curopalates, story of Simon Attaliata, the descendant of Michael
and his mother, Muzalona, was cousin of the em- Attaliata, is very like a fable-and there is no
peror Joannes Cantacuzenus. He commenced the evidence that the compilations of Justinian were
study of his native language under the monk Phi- known at Constantinople, in their original form, in
lastrius, and when he attained the age of sixteen the age when Harmenopulus is stated to have comyears his father thought that it was time to initiate mented upon them. (Heimbach, Anecdota, vol. i.
him into Latin literature.. Accordingly, the edu- p. 222.) At all events, they were not likely to be
cation of the young Harmenopulus was confided to annotated by a practical jurist.
Aspasius, a Calabrian monk, who was sent for ex- To return to the apocryphal biography. About
pressly from Italy to undertake this charge. While the fortieth year of his age, Harmenopulus, in the
under this master, Harmenopulus attended the lec- midst of the avocations of. office, turned his attentures of Leo, who was afterwards archbishop of tion to the difficulties of the canon law, a species
Mytilene, and whom Nic. Comnenus believes to be of study to which the Greeks of the middle ages
the same with Leo Magentinus, the commentator were more addicted than to the cultivation of eleon Aristotle. At the age of twenty he devoted gant literature. In this pursuit he acquired the
himself entirely to jurisprudence, under the jurist highest reputation, and became no less celebrated
Simon Attaliata, great-grandson of Michael Attali- as a canonist than he had previously been as a
ata, the author of a legal compendium. [ATTALI- civilian. He died at Constantinople in 1380, or,
AT..] Possessed of a keen and active intellect, according to more exact accounts, on the 1st of
he soon mastered the whole extent of the science, March, 1383.
and had scarcely attained the age of twenty-eight, A Greek translation of the Donation of Conwhen he earned and obtained the title of antecessor, stantine the Great to the papal see is attributed
which was usually conferred by the emperors on to Harmenopulus. It is printed in Fabricius
those only who had grown grey in the successful (Bibl. Gr. vol. vi. p. 698). To the catalogues of
study and practice of the law. At the age of Lambecius, Montfaucon, &c., we must refer for
thirty he was appointed judge of the superior an account of the manuscripts of a Greek lexicon,
court (judex Dromi). Soon afterwards he was in- and other minor works of this author,.which have
vited to become a member of the council of the not been printed.
emperor Joannes Cantacuzenus, and, though he The works by which Harmenopulus is known to
was the youngest of the royal councillors, the first the world are the following:place of honour was assigned to him. He discharged 1. IIpo'Xepov NJuwv, seu Promptuarium Juris
the high functions of his office with so much saga- Civilis, seu Alanuale Legum, dictum Hexabibls.,
city and prudence, that, after the dethronement This work (which is cited indifferently by all the
of the emperor Cantacuzenus, in 1355, he expe- above names) is based on the older Prochiron of
rienced no change of fortune from the succeeding Basileius Constantinus, and Leo, of which it was
emperor, Joannes Palaeologus. Upon the death of intended to correct the errors and supply the,
his father, he was appointed Curopalates in his deficiencies. In fact, it incorporates the whole of
place, and received the title of Sebastus. Soon the older work, the portions of which are distinafterwards he was named prefect of Thessalonice, guished, in the best manuscripts, by the mark of
and nomophylax. Loaded with honours and Saturn (h ), while to the additions is prefixed the
wealth (for his wife Briennia was a lady of large sign of the sun (Q). In the printed edition of
fortune), he applied himself to the interpretation of Reiz, the extracts from the old Prochiron are delaw with an extent of skill and learning which are noted by an asterisk (*), and the whole of the
every where conspicuous in his works. Comnenus older original Prochiron has been recently pub(p. 272) professes to refute Maximus Margunius, lished in a distinct and separate form by Zachariae
who is stated to have cited the Orations of Harme- with very valuable Prolegomena (Heidelb. 1837).
nopulus; for, says Comnenus, the author of the Harmenopulus also, in his preface (Protheorc~i