Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/275

Rh PHILEMON. Arganthonian promontory in thePropontis(Etymol. M. s. V. 'ApyayObSy) ; of Assos, Gargara, and An- tandros (Macrob. I.e.); of Antheia, a Milesian colony on the Propontis (Steph. Byz. s. v.) ; of Andria, a Macedonian town (Steph. Byz. s. v.) ; of Thermopylae (Harpocrat. Phot. s. v.) ; of the Thesprotian Ambracia (Steph. Byz. s. v). Even the coast of Italy was included in the work (Steph. Byz. A'. V. "A^ySot). For a further account of this writer, see Osann, C/e6er den Geographen Phileas und sein Zeitaltei in the Zeitsclirift fur die Alter- t/minxtvissenscha/t., 1841, p. 635, &.c. 2. Bishop of Thmuitae in Egypt, in the third century of the Christian aera, and a martyr, wrote a work in praise of martyrdom. (Hieronym. Script. III. 78 ; Euseb. //. E. viii. 10 ; Niceph. vii. 9 ; Fabric. BiU. Graec. vol. vii. p. 306.) PHI'LEAS (jA.eas), an Argive sculptor, of un- known date, whose name is found, with that of his son Zeuxippus, in an inscription on a statue- base found at Hermione, in Argolis, i. e. iiXeas kcCl Zeu^iTTTros 4>iAea eiroir)aav. (Bockh, Corp. Inscr. vol. i. p. 603, No. 1229 ; VVelcker, KunsiblatU 1827, p. 330 ; R. Kochette, Lettre a ili. 6'c/iorw, p. 380.) [P.S.] PHILE'MENUS (*iA7}^6j/os), a noble youth of Tarentum, who took a leading part in the con- spiracy to betray that city into the hands of Han- nibal, B.C. 212. Under pretence of pursuing the pleasures of the chase, he used frequently to go out of the city and return in the middle of the night, and thus established an intimacy with some of the gate keepers, so that they used to admit him on a private signal at any hour. Of this he availed himself on a night previously concerted with the Carthaginian general, and succeeded in seizing on one of the gates, by which he introduced a body of lOOO African soldiers into the city, while Nicon admitted Hannibal himself by another entrance (Polyb. viii. 26—32 ; Li v. xxv. 8—10). When Tarentum was recovered by Fabius, B. c. 209, Phileraenus perished in the conflict that ensued within the city itself ; but in what manner was unknown, as his body could never be found. (Li v. xxvii. 16.) [E. H. B.] PHILE'MON (^iMjuwr), an aged Phrygian and husband of Baucis. Once Zeus and Hermes, assuming the appearance of ordinary mortals, visited Phrygia, and no one was willing to receive the strangers, until the hospitable hut of Philemon and Baucis was opened to them, where the two gods were kindly treated. Zeus rewarded the good old couple by taking them with him to an eminence, while all the neighbouring district was visited with a sudden inundation. On that eminence Zeus ap- pointed them the guardians of his temple, and granted to them to die both at the same moment, and then metamorphosed them into trees. (Ov. .V/c/. viii. 621, &c.) [L. S.] PHILE'MON i^iKnfxwv). 1. A person whom Aristophanes attacks as not being of pure Athenian descent, but tainted with Phrygian blood. (Arist. Av. 763.) 2. An actor mentioned by Aristotle as having supported the principal part in the TepovTOfxavia and the Eua-egets of Ana^andrides. The great critic praises him for the excellence of his delivery and for the way in which he carried off by it pas- sages which contained repetitions of the same PHILEMON. 263 words, and which an inferior actor would have murdered. (Ariat. Rhet. iii. 12. § 3.) [E E 1 PHILF/MON(*iA7f^cov), literary. 1. Thefir'st in order of time, and the second in celebrity, of the Athenian comic poets of the New Comedy, was the son of Damon, and a native of Soli in Cilicia, according to Strabo (xiv. p. 671): others make him a Syracusan ; but it is certain that he went at an early age to Athens, and there received the citizenship (Suid. Eudoc Hesych., Anon, de Com. p. XXX.). Meineke suggested that he came to be considered as a native of Soli because he went there on the occasion of his banishment, of which we shall have to speak presently ; but it is a mere conjecture that he went to Soli at all upon that occasion ; and Meineke himself withdraws the sug- gestion in his more recent work {Frag. Com. Graec vol. ii. p. 52). There can be no doubt that Philemon is rightly assigned to the New Comedy, although one autho- rity makes him belong to the Middle (Apul. Flor. § 16), which, if not a mere error, may be explained by the well-known fact, that the beginning of the New Comedy was contemporary with the closing period of the Middle. There is, however, nothing in the titles or fragments of Philemon which can be at all referred to the Middle Comedy. He was placed by the Alexandrian grammarians among the six poets who formed their canon of the New Comedy, and who were as follows : — Philemon, Menander, Diphilus,Philippides, Poseidippus, Apol- lodorus. ( Anon, de Com. p. xxx. Trj j Se vias kw- ficfdias yeyouaai (xkv TroiTjral |S', d^ioXoydTaroL S^ TOVTuu ^iXrixwv, MevauSpos, AicptXos, ^LXnriridT^s, noo-et'StTTTToj, 'ATToWoSupos ; comp. Ruhnken, Hist. Crit. Orat. Graec. p. xcv.) He flourished in the reign of Alexander, a little earlier than Menander (Suid.), whom, however, he long survived. He began to exhibit before the 1 13th Olympiad (Anon. L €.), that is, about b. c. 330. He was, therefore, the first poet of the New Comedy*, and shares with Menander, who appeared eight years after him, the honour of its invention, or rather of re- ducing it to a regular form ; for the elements of the New Comedy had appeared already in the Middle, and even in the Old, as for example in the Cocalus of Aristophanes, or his son Araros. It is possible even to assign, with great likelihood, the very play of Philemon's which furnished the fii-st example of the New Comedy, namely the Il^/poboliinaeus., which was an imitation of the Cocalus. (Clem. Alex. Strom, vi. p. 267 ; Anon, de Vit. Arist. pp. 13, 14. 8. 37, 38.) Philemon lived to a very great age, and died, according to Aelian, during the war between Athens and Antigonus (ap. Suid. s. v.), or, according to the more exact date of Diodorus (xxiii. 7), in 01. 1 29. 3, B. c. 262 (see Wesseling, ad loc), so that he may have exhibited comedy nearly 70 years. The statements respecting the age at which he died vary between 96, 97, 99^ and 101 years (Lucian, Macrob. 25 ; Diod. /. c. ; Suid. s. v.). He must, therefore, have been born about B. c. 360, and was about twenty years older than Menander. The manner of his death is differently related ; some ascribing it to excessive laughter at a ludicrous in- cident (Suid. Hesych. Lucian, I.e.; Val. Max. ix. 12. ext. 6) ; others to joy at obtaining a victory in a placed before him, see Philippides. s4
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 * Respecting the error by which Philippides is