Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/1231

Rh VALGIUS. His joke against the emperor is recorded by Capi- tolinus {M. Ant. Phil. 6). He may have been a descendant of the Titius Homullus, whom the younger Pliny speaks of as one of the orators of his time {Ep. iv. 9, v. 20, vi. 19). VALE'RIUS, JU'LIUS. Angelo Mai printed in the seventh volume of his " Classici Auctores e Vaticanis codicibus editi " (8vo. Rom. 1835) from one Ambrosian and two Vatican MSS. an historical tract inscribed Julii Valerii viri clarissimi Res Gestae Alexandri Macedonis translatae ex Aesopo Graeco., and in his " Spicilegium Romanum " (8vo. Rom. 1842) he added some new matter obtained from a Turin MS. The work, as the title im- ports, is taken from the Greek of Aesopus, and the original must have been composed before the middle of the fourth century, and probably before the di- vision of the empire, since the temple of Serapis which was destroyed in a. d. 389 by an edict of Theodosius, and the tomb of Alexander which had been removed in the age of Chrysostom, are both spoken of as if standing in their original state (i. 30, iii. 57), while in describing the dimen- sions of the most famous cities (i. 20) no notice is taken of Constantinople. We cannot determine with the same certainty a limit for the period when the translation was executed, but judging from the general tone of the Latinity it could not have been later than the beginning of the fifth century. This piece, although published for the first time by Mai, was known to Vincent of Beauvais, to Sau- maise, to Chifflet, and to many other critics. It is by no means undeserving of attention ; the style is lively and attractive, and, although many of the statements are evidently fabulous, much curious in- formation may be gleaned from it with regard to the affairs of Egypt and especially of Alexandria. The author was probably a native of that city (i. 27) ; and it has been conjectured, from some peculiarities in the language, that Valerius was an African. (See the prefatory remarks of Mai in his " Classici Auctores.") [W. R.] VALE'RIUS LARGUS. [Largus.] VALE'RIUS LICINIA'NUS. [Licinia- NUS.] VALE'RIUS LIGUR, praefectus of the prae- torian cohorts under Augustus. (Dion Cass. Ix. 23.) VALE'RIUS MARCELLI'NUS, a Roman historian, who wrote the lives of some of the em- perors. (Capitol. Maxim, et Balbin. 4.) VALE'RIUS MARFNUS, had been named one of the consuls by Galba for the year QQ A. d., but was deprived of the intended honour by Vi- tellius. (Tac. Hist. ii. 71.) VALE'RIUS MARTIA'LIS. [Martialis.] VALE'RIUS MAXIMIA'NUS. [Maximi- ANUS,] VALE'RIUS MAXIMI'NUS. [Maximinus.] VALE'RIUS MA'XIMUS. [Maximus.] VALE'RIUS NASO. [Naso.] VALE'RIUS NEPOS. [Nepos.] VALE'RIUS PAULPNUS. [Paulinus.] VALE'RIUS PO'LLIO. [Pollio.] VALE'RIUS PO'NTICUS, banished in Nero's rei.jn, A. D. 61. (Tac. Ann. xiv. 41.) VALE'RIUS PRAECONI'NUS. [Prae- CONINUS.J VALE'RIUS PRISCUS. [PrisJcus.] VALE'RIUS PROBUS. [Probus.] VALE'RIUS PROCILLUS. [Procillus.] VALE'RIUS SORA'NUS. [Soranus.] VALGIUS. 1219 VALE'RIUS THEON. [Theon, No. 6.] VALE'RIUS VALENTI'NUS. [Valen- tin us.] VA'LGIUS. 1. The father-in-law of RuUus, who proposed the agrarian law in the consulship of Cicero, which was opposed by the latter. It ap- pears from Cicero that Valgius had obtained much confiscated property in the time of Sulla. (Cic. de Leg. Agr. iii. 1.) 2. A. Valgius, the son of a senator, deserted the Pompeian party in the Spanish war b. c. 45, and went over to Caesar. (Auctor, B. Hisp. 13.) 3. C. Valgius Hippianus, the son of Q. Hip- pius, was adopted by a certain C. Valgius. (Cic. ad Fam. xiii. 76.) For details see Hippius. C. VA'LGIUS RUFUS. 1. Horace, in the tenth satire of his first book, composed, according to Bentley, not later than B. c. 38, where he de- fends and explains the criticism he had formerly passed upon Lucilius, ranks Valgius (b. 81) along with Varius, Maecenas and Virgil among those friends of genius and sound judgment whose ap- probation far more than compensated for the an- noyance caused by the attacks of his detractors. 2. Again, in the ninth ode of the second book, written about b. c. 23 or 20, he endeavours to con- sole Valgius whom he represents as giving vent in tearful strains to the grief caused by the loss of his favourite Mystes. The personage here addressed is termed by the old scholiast upon Horace " Val- gium consularem." 3. Servius, in his commentary on Virgil, twice refers {(.id Virg. vii. 22, ad Aen. xi. 457) to " Val- gius in elegis." From the expressions used in the first passage we might infer that this Valgius was a contemporary of Virgil, in the second a couplet is quoted from his poems. Another couplet from " Valgius " is to be found in Isidorus {Orig. xix. 4. s. V. remuhum). 4. C. Valgius appears from some Fasti to have been consul suffectus in B.C. 12. Comp. Gruter, p. ccxcviii. 1. 5. Pliny {H. N. xxv. 2) makes mention of a " C. Valgius eruditione spectatus," who commenced a treatise upon medicinal plants which he dedicated to Augustus, but did not complete the work. 6. In the Panegyric on Messala contained among the works of TibuUus we read (180) " Est tibi, qui possit magnis se accingere rebus, Valgius, aeterno propior non alter Homero," from which it has been concluded that Valgius was the author of heroic strains. No epic poet of that name, however, is mentioned by Quintilian, nor is any notice to be discovered in the grammarians of a work which, if the above couplet be not ridicu- lously hyperbolical, must have attracted general attention. This circumstance, however, need oc- casion little surprise when we recollect that the piece in which these lines occiu* is believed by the best critics not to be the production of TibuUus but a rhetorical essay belonging to a much later period. 7. Philargyrius {ad Virg. Georg. iii. 176) cites two hexameter lines from " Valgius " which ap- pear to be taken from a pastoral. 8. Charisius (p. 84, ed. Putsch.) produces a verse from " Valgius in epigrammate " to illustrate the gender of the word margarita. 9. Donatus, in his life of Terence, quotes three Iambics from " Valgius in Actaeone," which affirm that Terence published, under his own name, dramas 4i 2