Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 1.djvu/974

Rh 956 DELMATIUS. whom she became the mother of Diomedes. (Apol- lod. i. 8. § 5, 9. § 13.) Servius {ad Aen.. 101) and Hyginus {Fab, Q9) call her Deiphile. [L. S.] DEI'PYLUS (ATjfTTuAos), three mythical beings concerning whom nothing of interest is related. (Horn. II. V. 323; Hygin. Fah. 15, 109.) [L. S.] DE'LIUS and DE'LIA (AtjAios and A7jfa or Ari6.s), surnames of Apollo and Artemis respec- tively, which are derived from the island of Delos, the birthplace of those two divinities. ( Virg. Aen. vi. 12, Eclog. vii. 29 ; Val. Flacc. i. 446 ; Orph. Hymn. 33. 8.) They are likewise applied, espe- cially in the plural, to other divinities that were worshipped in Delos, viz. Demeter, Aphrodite, and the nymphs. ( Aristoph. Thesm. 333 ; CalHra. Hymn, in Dian. 169, Hymn, in Del. 323; Hom. liymn. in Apoll. Dd. 157.) [L. S.] Q. DE'LLIUS, a Roman eques, who seems to have lived as a negotiator in Asia, where in B. c. 44 he joined Dolabella. Afterwards he went over to Cassius and then joined M. Antony, who sent him, in B.'c. 41, to Egypt to summon Cleopatra to appear before him at Tarsus in Cilicia. Cleopatra, trusting to the power of her personal charms, obeyed the command and went to Antony. In B. c. 36, Dellius was engaged on some business in Judaea, and on that occasion he is said to have advised Alexandra, the daughter of Hyrcanus and widow of Alexander, to send the portraits of her beautiful children to Antony in order to win the favour of the triumvir. In the same year he ac- companied Antony on his expedition against the Parthians. In b. c. 34, when Antony marched into Armenia, Delliua was sent before him to Arta- vasdes, to lull him into security by treacherous promises. When the war of Actium broke out, B. c. 31, Dellius and Amyntas were sent by Antony from Galatia to Macedonia to collect auxiliaries ; but before the fatal battle was fought, Dellius deserted to Octavian. This step was nothing ex- traordinary in a man of his kind, who had suc- cessively belonged to all the parties of the time ; but he is said to have been led to this last deser- tion by his fear of Cleopatra, whom he had offended by ridiculing the meanness she displayed at her entertainments. After this we hear no more of him. Dellius appears to have been a man of some talent; he did at least some service to literature by writing a history of the war against the Parthians, in which he himself had fought under Antony. (Strab. xi. p. 523, with Casaubon's correction.) This work is completely lost, and we cannot even say whether it was written in Latin or in Greek ; but we have reason for believing that Plutarch's account of that war {Ani. 37 — 52) was taken from Dellius, so that probably we possess at least an abridgement of the work. (Plut. Ant. 6Q.) In the time of Seneca {Suas. p. 7) there existed some letters of Dellius to Cleopatra of a lascivious nature, which are now likewise lost. Our Q. Dellius is probably the same person as the Dellius to whom Horace addressed the beautiful third od^ of the second book. (Comp. Dion Cass. xlix. 39, 1. 13, 23 ; Veil. Pat. ii. 84 ; Joseph. Ant.Jud. XV. 2. § 6 ; Plut. Ant. 25 ; Zonar. x. 29 ; Senec. de Ckmeni. i. 10.) [L. S.] DELMA'TICUS, a surname of L. Caecilius Metellus, consul in B. c. 119. [Metellus.] DELMA'TIUS or DALMA'TIUS. 1. Son of Constantius Chlorus and his second wife, Flavia Maximiana Theodora. From his half-brother, DELPHUS. Constantine the Great, he received the title of censor, which had lain dormant since the attempt of Decius to revive it in the person of Valerian, and now appears for the last time among the dignities of Rome. Delmatius was entrusted with the task of investigating the charge brought by the Arians against Athanasius of having murdered Arsenius, bishop of Hypselis [Athanasius, p. 394], and appears to have died before the year A. D. 335. (Tillemont, Histolre des Empereurs^ vol. iv. p. 288.) He was the father of 2. Flavius Julius Delmatius, who was edu- cated at Narbonne under the care of the rhetorician Exsuperius ; distinguished himself b}' suppressing the rebellion of Calocerus in Cyprus ; was appoint- ed consul A. D. 333 ; two years afterwards was created Caesar by his uncle, whom he is said to have resembled strongly in disposition ; upon the di^nsion of the empire received Thrace, Macedonia, together with Achaia, as his portion ; and was put to death by the soldiers in a. d. 337, sharing the fate of the brothers, nephews, and chief ministers of Constantine. It must be observed that there is frequently great difficulty in distinguishing Delmatius the father from Delmatius the son. Many historians believe the former to have been the consul of a. d. 333, and the conqueror of Calocerus, the date of whose revolt is very uncertain. A few coins of the younger in gold, silver, and small brass, are to to be found in all large collections, and on these his name is conjoined with the title of Caesar and Princeps Juventutis, the orthography being for the most part UElmatiuSy although Delmatius also occasionally appears. (Au son. Pro/! 17 ; Victor, EpU. 41, de Caes. 41, Excerpt. Vales. § 35 ; Theophan. Chronograph, p. 282 ; Tillemont, His- toire des Empereurs, vol. iv. pp. 251, 259, 261, 313, and his note, p. 664, in which he discusses at length the dates connected with the history of Delmatius and Hannibalianus. [ W. R.] DELPHI'NIA (AeAt^ii/m), a surname of Arte- mis at Athens. (Pollux, x. 119.) The masculine form Delphinius is used as a surname of Apollo, and is derived either from his slaying the dragon Delphine or Delpliyne (usually called Python) who guarded the oracle at Pytho, or from his hav- ing shewn the Cretan colonists the way to Delphi, while riding on a dolphin or metamorphosing him- self into a dolphin. (Tzetz. ad Lycoph. 208.) Under this name Apollo had temples at Athens, Cnossus in Crete, Didyma, and Massilia. (Paus. i. 19. § 1; Plut. Thes. 14; Strab.. iv. p. 179; Mul- eT,Aeginet. p. 154.') [L. S.] DELPHUS (AeA(/)oj). 1. A son of Poseidon and Melantho, a daughter of Deucalion, from whom the town of Delphi was believed to have derived its name. (Tzetz, ad LycopL 208 ; comp. Ov. Met. vi. 120.) 2. A son of Apollo by Celaeno, the daughter of Hyanuis, and, according to others, by Thyia, the daughter of Castalius, or b' Melaena, the daughter of Cephissus. Tradition pointed to him also as