Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/1123

Rh THUCLES. Suid. s. V. Qpar.) He seems to have been par- ticularly fond of making his syllables fall into vaeons (Quintil. ix. 4. § 87). Suidas, who very stupidly makes him a disciple of Plato and Isocrates, mentions as his works — 1. Orations (av/Li§ovfv- riKol). 2. Texvr] priTopiKij. 3. Halyvia. 4. Acpop/jLol ^rjTopiKai. Athenaeus (x. p. 416) quotes from one of his introductions. The following epitaph was placed upon his monument at Chalcedon : ov, oav. Uarpls XahKTjdcav 7] Se rix^fl co(pir]. (A then. 3f. p. 454.) [C. P. M.] THRASYME'DES (Qpaa-ufx-fiSris), a son of the Pyliiin Nestor and Anaxibia, accompanied his father on the expedition against Troy, and returned with him to Pylos. (liom. //. ix. 81, xiv. 10, xvi. 321, xvii. 378, 705, Od. iii. 39, 414, 442, &c.) According to Philostratus {Her. iii. 2), he did not go to Troy. He was the father of Sillus, and his tomb was shown at Pylos in Messenia. (Pans. ii. 18. § 7, iv. 36. § 2.) [L.S.] THRASYME'DES (QpaavfjL-ndvi), the son of Arignotus of Paros, was the maker of the chrys- elephantine statue of Asclepius, in his temple at Epidaurus. Pausanias (ii. 27. § 2) describes the statue as being about half the size of that of the Olympian Zeus at Athens. The god was seated on a throne, holding a staff in one hand, and with the other hand held over the dragon's head, and with a dog lying by his side. The throne itself was adorned with sculptures, representing the Ar- give heroes, Bellerophon slaying the Chimaera, and Perseus holding the severed head of Medusa. From the reference in this passage to the chrys- elephantine statue of Zeus Oiympius at Athens, which was made at the expense of Hadrian (Paus. i. 18. § 6), it has been conjectured that the Epi- daurians were indebted for the statue of their pa- tron deity to the munificence of the same emperor, or of Antoninus Pius, who expended large sums on the decoration of that city (Paus. ii. 27. § 7) ; but it seems improbable that, if this were the case, Pausanias should not have stated the fact in so many words. (Siebelis, ad loc. and Hirt, Gescli. d. bild. Kiinste bei den J /ten, p. 190.) [P. S.] THRIAE (&,Jiai), the name of three prophetic nymphs on Mount Parnassus, by whom Apollo was reared, and who were believed to have invented the art of prophecy by means of little stones (i^ptai), which were thrown into an urn. (Hom. Hymn, in Merc. 552 ; Schol. ad Callim. Hymn, in ApolL 45 ; comp. Lobeck, Aqlanph. p. 814.) [L.S.] THU'CLES or THE'OCLES (©ou/cA^s, 0eo- kA-^s), a citizen apparently of Chalcis in Euboea, who, having been cast by storms on the coast of Sicily, took notice of the fertility of the soil, and of the probable ease with which it might be won from the Sicel inhabitants. On his return home he made a report of tliese things, and was commis- sioned by the Chalcidian state to lead forth a body of colonists, Chalcidian and Naxian. With these he proceeded to Sicily, where he occupied as a strong-hold the hill Taurus, overlooking the sea on the eastern coast — a place remarkable as the spot where Grecian conquest in tlie island first began, and as the site of the later city of Tauromenium, — and from this eminence, having now obtained pos- session of the land, he founded in the immediate noighboiuhood the town of Naxos, about B.C. 736. THUCYDIDES. nil (Thuc. vi. 3 ; Ephor. ap. Strab. vi. p. 267 ; Hella- nic. ap. Sieph. Byz. s. v. XuKkIs ; comp. Grote'a Greece, vol. iii. pp. 477, 478.) [E. E.J THUCY'DIDES i&ovKvdiSrjs), historical. 1. An Athenian, of the demos Alopece, son of Melesias, and related to Cimon, to whom he is said to have been inferior in military talent, though he possessed more skill as a political tactician. After the death of Cimon, in b. c. 449, Thucydides became the leader of the aristocratic party, which he concen- trated and more thoroughly organized in opposition to Pericles. With all his ability, however, and all his family influence, he was no match for his great adversary either in eloquence or address ; and this he is said to have acknowledged himself, when king Archidamus II. of Sparta asked him whether he or Pericles was the better wrestler. " When I throw Pericles," was the answer, *' he always contrives to make the spectators believe that he has had no fall." The line of attack also, which Plu- tarch represents Thucydides as adopting, does not appear to have been the most judicious, for he inveighed against the profuse expenditure of Pericles in public works, by no means the least popular feature in the great statesman's administra- tion, and not long after this the struggle came to an end by the ostracism of Thucydides in b. c. 444. (Plut. Per. 6, 8, 11, 14, 16.) From an allusion in Aristophanes ( Vesp. 947) we learn that, when he was in danger of this banishment, and rose to make his defence, he utterly broke down and was unable to open his mouth. According to the scholia on the same passage of Aristophanes, the historian Philochorus assigned as the cause of his exile some alleged misconduct during a command which he held in Thrace ; while Idomeneus related that he was not ostracised merely, but sentenced to per- petual banishment with confiscation of his property, and that he fled to Artaxerxes, king of Persia. Here, however, the scholiast appears to have con- founded Thucydides with Themistocles. [Idome- neus.] (Comp. Arist.ylc/i. 668, 673.) That he retired to Sparta is in itself probable enough, and is in some measure confirmed by the anecdote, above related, of his conversation with Archidamus. But the usual term of ostracism, viz. ten years, seems to have been abridged in his case, since we hear of him in B. c. 440 (at least there is good reason to suppose it the same person) as united with Hagnon and Phormion in the command of forty ships, which were sent to reinforce Pericles, then engaged in the siege of Samos. The arrival of these vessels, together with other reinforcements, compelled the Samians to capitulate (Thuc. i. 117; comp. ThirlwalPs Greece, vol. iii. p. 53, note 1). Aristotle, according to Plutarch {Nic. 2) classed Thucydides with Nicias and Theramenes as an excellent citizen and distinguished by an hereditary feeling of good will towards the people. He left two sons, Melesias and Stephanus ; and a son of the former of these, named Thucydides after his grand- father, was a pupil of Socrates. (Plat. Men. p. 94, T/ieaff. p. 130, Loch. p. 179 ; Athen. vi. p. 234, e.) 2. A Pharsalian, was a proxenus of the Athenians and happened to be at Athens in b. c. 411, during the usurpation of the Four Hundred. When the tumult against the government broke out in the Peiraeeus, and Theramenes had gone thither with the promise of quelling it, Thucydides with some difficulty restrained the adherents of the oligarcha 4b 4