Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 2.djvu/21

Rh ELAGABALUS. ceived information of what had happened, de- spatched Julianus with a body of troops to quell the insurrection. But these, instead of obe3'ing the orders of their general, were prevailed upon to join the mutineers. Whereupon Macrinus ad- vanced in person to meet his rival, was signally- defeated in a battle fought on the borders of Syria and Phoenicia, and having escaped in disguise was soon afterwards discovered, brought back, and put to death. [Macrinus.] Tlie conqueror hastened to Antioch, from whence he forwarded a letter to the senate, in which he at once assumed, without waiting for the form of their consent, all the desig- nations of Caesar, Imperator, son of Antoninus, grandson of Severus, Pius, Felix, Augustus, and Proconsul, together with the tribunitian authority. At the same time he inveighed against the t-ieachery of Macrinus towards his master, his low birth, and his presumption in daring to adopt the title of emperor, concluding with a promise to con- sult the best interests of all classes of the com- munity, and declaring that he intended to set up Augustus, whose age when he first grasped the reins of power he compared with his own, as a model for imitation. No resistance to these claims was testified on the part of the senate or people, for we find from a curious inscription, discovered some years ago at Rome, that the Fratres Arvales assembled in the Capitol on the 1 4th of July, that is scarcely more than five weeks after the decisive victory over Macrinus, in order to oflfer up their annual vows for the health and safety of their young prince, who is distinguished by all the appellations enumerated above. Elagabalus entered upon his second consulship in A. D. 219, at Nicomedeia, and from thence pro- ceeded to Rome, where he celebrated his accession by magnificent games, by prodigal largesses, and by laying the foundation of a sumptuous shrine for his tutelary deity. Two years afterwards, when he had rendered himself alike odious and con- temptible by all manner of follies and abominations, he was persuaded by the politic Maesa to adopt his first cousin, Alexander Severus, to proclaim him Caesar, and nominate him consul-elect. Soon after, having repented of these steps, he endeavoured to procure the death of his kinsman, but was frus- trated, partly by the watchfulness of his grand- mother and partly by the zeal of the soldiers, with whom Alexander was a great favourite. A repeti- tion of a similar attempt the year following (a. d. 222) proved his own destruction ; for a mutiny having arisen among the praetorians in consequence, he was slain along with Soemias in the camp while endeavouring to appease their fury. The two bodies were dragged through the streets and cast into the Tiber, and hence the epithet or nickname of Tiberifius, one of the many applied in scorn to the tyrant after his death. The reign of this prince, who perished at the age of eighteen, after having occupied the throne for three years, nine months, and four days, dating from the battle of Antioch, was characterised throughout by an accumulation of the most fantastic folly, and the most frantic superstition, together with impurity so bestial that the particulars almost transcend the limits of credibility. Had he con- fined himself to the absurd practical jokes of which so many have been recorded ; had he been satisfied with supping on the tongues of peacocks and nightmjfales, with feeding lions on pheasants and FLATUS. 7 parrots, with assembling comptmies of guests who were all fat, or all lean, or all tall, or all short, oi all bald, or all gouty, and regaling them with mock repasts ; had he been content to occupy his leisure hours in solemnizing the nuptials of his favourite deity with the Trojan Pallas or the African Urania, and in making matches between the gods and god- desses all over Italy, men might have laughed goodiiaturedly, anticipating an increase of wisdom with increasing years. But unhappily even these trivial amusements were not unfrequently accom- panied with cruelty and bloodshed. His earnest devotion to that god whose minister he had been, and to whose favour he probably ascribed his eleva- tion, might have been regarded as excusable or even justifiable had it not been attended with persecution and tyranny. The 'Roman populace would with easy toleration have admitted and wor- shipped a new divinity, but they beheld with dis- gust their emperor appearing in public, arrayed in the attire of a Syrian priest, dancing wild measures and chanting barbaric hymns ; they listened with horror to the tales of magic rites, and of human victims secretly slaughtered ; they could scarcely submit without indignation to the ordinance that an outlandish idol should take precedence of their fathers' gods and of Jupiter himself, and still less could they consent to obey the decree subsequently promulgated, that it should not be lawful to offer homage at Rome to any other celestial power. But by far the blackest of his offences were his sins against the decencies of both public and private life, the details of which are too horrible and too disgusting to admit of description. (Dion Cass. Ixxvii. 30 — 4], Ixxix. ; Herodian, v. 4 — 23; Lamprid. Elagab. ; Capitolin. Macrm. ; Eutrop. viii. 13; Aurel. Vict, de Cues, xxiii., Epit. xxiii.) A coin of Elagabalus is given under Paula, the wife of Elagabalus. [W. R.J E'LAPHUS ("EAat/jos), the fifteenth in descent from Aesculapius, the son of Chrysus and the father of Hippolochus II., who lived probably in the island of Cos in the sixth and fifth centuries B. c. (Suid. s. V. 'iTTTTOicpaTris ; Thessali Oratio^ ap. Hippocr. Opera, vol. iii. p. 840.) [W. A. G.] E'LARA ('EAapa), a daughter of Orchomenus or Minyas, who became by Zeus the mother of the giant Tityus ; and Zeus, from fear of Hera, con- cealed her under the earth. (ApoUod. i. 4. § 1 ; Apollon. Rhod. i. 7t!2 ; Eustath. ad Horn. p. 1583; MuUer, Orchom. p. 185, 2d. edit.) [L. S.] E'LASUS ("EAao-os). There are two Trojans of this name, one of whom was slain by Patroclus and the other by Neoptolemus. (Ilom. 11. xvi. 696; Paus. x. 26. § 1.) [L. S.] F/LATUS ("EAoTos). 1. A son of Areas by Leaneira, Metaneira, or by the nymph Chrysope- leia. He was a brother of Azan and Apheidas, and king of Arcadia. By his wife Laodice he had four sons, Stymphalus, Aepytus, Cyllen, and Pe- reus. (ApoUod. iii. 9. § 1, 10. § 3; Paus. viii. 4. § 2.) He is also called the father of Ischys (Pind. Pyih. iii. 31) and of Dotis. (Steph. Byz. s.v. AoJ- Tiov.) He is said to have resided on mount Cyl- lene, and to have gone from thence to Phocis, where he protected the Phocians and the Delphic sanctuary against the Phlegyans, and founded the town of Elateia. (Paus. /. c, x. 34. § 3.) A sta- tue of his stood in the market-place of Elateia, and another at Tegea. (Paus. x. 34. § 3, viii. 48. § 6.) 2. A prince of the Lapitliae at Larissa in Tbes-