Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 1.djvu/1045

Rh DION. and during the whole period of the command of Al- cibiudes were probably in active service. When after the battle of Notium, b. c. 407, he was dis- graced, they were among the ten generals appointed in his room. Diomedon in tliis command was employed at a disUince from the main fleet ; and when Callicratidas chased Conon into Mytilene, on the infoi-mation, perhaps, of the galley which made its escape to the Hellespont, he sailed for Lesbos, and lost 10 out of 1*2 ships in attempting to join his besieged colleague. In the subsequent glorious victory of Arginusae, he was among the commanders. So was he also among those unhappy six who returned to Athens and fell victims to the mysterious intrigues of the oligarchical party and the wild credulity of the people. It was in his behalf and that of Pericles, that his friend Eurypto- lemus made the attempt, so nearly successful, to put off the trial. According to the account given in his speech, Diomedon, after the engagement, when the commanders met, had given the advice to form in single file and pick up the castaways ; and after Theramenes and Thrasybulus had been prevented by the storm from effecting their com- mission to the same purpose, he with Pericles had dissuaded his colleagues from naming those officers and this commission in their despatch, for fear of their incurring the displeasure which thus in the end fell on the generals themselves. (Xenoph. HeU. I 5. § 16, 6. §§ 22, 29, 7. §§ 1, 16, 17, 29.) Diodorus, who hitherto had not mentioned his name, here relates that Diomedon, a man of great military skill, and distinguished for justice .and other virtues, when sentence had been passed and he and the rest were now to be led to execu- tion, came forward and bade the people be mindful to perform, as he and his colleagues could not, the vows which before the engagement they had made to the gods. (Diod. xiii. 102.) [A. H. C] DIO'MILUS (Ai(5^tos), an Andrian refugee, probably of military reputation, placed by the Sy- racusans at the head of a force of 600 picked men ill the spring of b. c. 414. He fell in the first ex- ercise of his command, when the Athenians made their landing at Epipolae, in endeavouring to dis- lodge them from Euryelus. (Thuc. vi. 9Q.) [A. H. C] Dl'OMUS {Alo/xos), a son of Colyttus, a fa- vourite and attendant of Heracles, from whom the Attic demos of Diomeia was believed to have deriv- ed its name. (Steph. Byz. s. w. Kwoaapycs, AiSfieia.) [L. S.] DrOMUS (Aio/ios), a Sicilian shepherd, who is said to have invented bucolic poetr}', and was mentioned as such in two poems of Epicharmus. (Athen. xiv. p. G19.) [L. S.] DION, a king in Laconia and husband of Iphi- tea, the daughter of Prognaus. Apollo, who had been kindly received by Iphitea, rewarded her by conferring upon her three daughters, Orphe, Lyco, and Carj'a, the gift of prophecy, on condition, how- over, that they should not betray the gods nor search after forbidden things. Afterwards Diony- sus also came to the house of Dion ; he was not only well received, like Apollo, but won the love of Carya, and therefore soon paid Dion a second visit, under the pretext of consecrating a temple, which the king had erected to him. Orphe and Lyco, however, guarded their sister, and when Dionysus had reminded them, in vain, of the com- mand of Apollo, they were seized with raging mad- ness, and having gone to the heights of Taygetus, DION. 1027 they were metamorphosed into rocks. Carj'a, the beloved of Dionysus, was changed into a nut tree, and the Lacedaemonians, on being informed of it by Artemis, dedicated a temple to Artemis Caryatis. (Serv. ad Vira. Ed. viii. 30 ; Caryatis.) [L. S.] DION (AUtfv), a Syracusan, son of Hipparinus. His father had been from the first a constant friend and supporter of the elder Dionysius, who had subsequently married his daughter Aristo- mache. These circumstances naturally brought Dion into friendly relations with Dionysius, and the latter having conceived a high opinion of his character and abilities, treated him with the greatest distinction, and employed him in many services of the utmost trust and confidence. Among others he sent him on an embassy to the Carthagi- nians, by whom he was received with the greatest distinction. ( Plut. Dion^ '6—5 ; Com. Nep. Dion^ 1.) Dion also married, during the lifetime of her father, Arete, the daughter of Dionysius by Aris- tomache. Of this close connexion and favour with the tyrant he seems to have .ivailed himself to amass great wealth, so that on the death of Diony- sius he offered to equip and maintain 50 triremes at his own cost to assist in the war against Car- thage. (Plut. Dion^ 6.) He made no opposition to the succession of the younger Dionysius to all his father's power, but his near relationship to the sons of the latter by his wife Aristomache, as well as his dangerous pre-eminence in wealth and in- fluence, rendered him an object of suspicion and jealousy to the youthful tyrant, to whom he also made himself personally disagreeable by the austerity of his manners. Dion appears to have been naturally a man of a proud and stern charac- ter, and having become an ardent disciple of Plato when that philosopher visited Syracuse in the reign of the elder Dionysius, he carried to excess the austerity of a philosopher, and viewed with undis- guised contempt the debaucheries and dissolute pleasures of his nephew. From these he endea- voured to withdraw him by persuading him to mvite Plato a second time to Syracuse ; but the philosopher, though received at first with the ut- most distinction, failed in obtaining a permanent hold on the mind of Dionysius ; and the intrigues of the opposite party, headed by Philistus, were successful in procuring the banishment of Dion. (Plut. Diem, 7-14 ; Com. Nep. Dion, 3, 4 ; Diod. xvi. 6.) The circumstances attending this are variously reported, but it seems to have been at first merely an honourable txile, and he was allowed to receive the produce of his vast wealth. According to Plutarch, he retired to Athens, where he lived in habitual intercourse with Plato and his disciples, at times also visiting the other cities of Greece, and displaying his magnificence on all public occasions. But Plato having failed in pro- curing his recall (for which purpose he had a third time visited Syracuse), and Dionysius having at length confiscated his property and compelled his wife to marry another person, he finally determined on attempting the expulsion of the tyrant by force. (Plut. Dion, 15—21 ; P8eud.-Plat. Epist. 6 ; but compare Diod. xvi. 6.) His knowledge of the general unpopularity of Dionysius and the disaffection of his subjects encouraged him to undertake this with forces apparently very insufficient Very few of the numerous Syracusan exiles then in Greece could be induced to join him, and he sailed from Zacyn* 3u2