Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/40

 IloWck jii^v dWa <ro(j)ov iroii^fxaTa Koi rSS' 'Ovara "Epyov, Si Aiytvri yeivaro iraiSa MIkcov. There is no authority for ascribing to Onatas more than this one statue in the group. (Paus v. 25. §5. s. 8— 10.) . The bronze chariot, with a figure of a man in it, which was dedicated at Olympia by Deino- menes, the son of Hieron, in memory of his father's victories. On each side of the chariot were riding- horses, with figures of boys upon them ; these were made by Calarais. (Paus. vi. 12. § 1, viii. 42. § 4. s. 8.) This work is one authority for the date of Onatas, since Hieron died b. c. 467. . A group dedicated at Delphi by the Taren- tines, being the tithe of the booty taken by them in a war with the Peucetii. The statues, which were the work of Onatas and Calynthus (but tlie passage is here corrupt), represented horse and foot soldiers intermixed ; Opis, the king of the lapy- gians, and the ally of the Peucetians, was seen prostrate, as if slain in the battle, and standing over him were the hero Taras and the Lacedaemo- nian Phalanthus, near whom was a dolphin. (Paus. X. 13. § 5. s. 10.)

Onatas was a painter, as well as a statuary ; but only one of his works is mentioned : this one, however, forms another authority for his date, and proves the estimation in which he was held ; for he was employed in conjunction with Polygnotus to decorate the temple in which this picture was painted. The temple was that of Athena Areia at Plataeae, and the picture, which was painted on one of the walls of the portico (pronaos), represented the expedition of the Argive chieftains against Thebes ; Euryganeia, the mother of Eteocles and Polyneices (according to the tradition which Pau- sanias followed), was introduced into the picture, lamenting the mutual fratricide of her sons. (Paus. ix. 4. § 1. 8. 2, 5. § 5. s. 11) : it should be ob- served, however, that in the second passage the MSS. have 'Ouaarias, which Sylburg corrected into 'Ovdras, on the authority of the first passage ; see also M.'leT, Aeffinetica, p. 107: but Bekker and Dindorf, on the contrar}'-, correct the former pas- sage by the latter, and read *Ovaaias in both.) The scattered information of Pausanias respect- ing Onatas has been critically gathered up by MUller and Thiersch. Rathgeber has managed to extend the subject over thirtt/ columns of Ersch and Gruber's Encyclop'ddie. [P. S.]

ONATAS, a Pythagorean philosopher of Croton, from whose work, UfpX ^eov /col ^eiov^ some ex- tracts are preserved by Stobaeus. (Eel. Fhys. i. 38, p. 92, &c., ed. Heeren.)

ONCA (''O7K0), a surname of Athena, which she derived from the town of Oncae in Boeotia, where she had a sanctuary. (Aeschyl. Sept. 166, 489 ; Paus. ix. 12. § 2 j Schol. ad Eurip. Phoen. 1062.) IL. S.]

ONCAETTS ('07Ka?oj), a surname of Apollo, derived from Onceium on the river Ladon in Ar- cadia, where he had a temple. (Paus. viii. 25. § 5, &c.) [L. S.]

ONCHESTUS ('07xwr(^s% a son of Poseidon, and founder of the town of Onchestus, where the Onchestian Poseidon had a temple and a statue. (Paus. ix. 26. § 3 ; Steph. Byz. s. v.; Hom. //. ii. 506.) Another tradition called this Onchestus a son of Boeotus. [L. S.]

ONCUS ("Oy/coj), a son of Apollo, and founder of Onceium in Arcadia. Demeter, after being me tamorphosed into a horse, mixed among his herds, and gave him the horse Arion, of which she was the mother by Poseidon. (Paus. viii. 25. § 4, «&c.; comp. Steph. Byz. s. v.) [L. S.]

ONEIROS ("Oj/eipos), a personification of dream, and in the plural of dreams. According to Homer Dreams dwell on the dark shores of the western Oceanus {Od. xxiv. 12), and the deceitful dreams come through an ivory gate, while the true ones issue from a gate made of horn. {Od. xix. 562, &c.) Hesiod {Theog. 212) calls dreams the children of night, and Ovid {Met. xi. 633), who calls them children of Sleep, mentions three of them by name, viz. Morpheus, Icelus or Phobetor, and Phantasus. Euripides called them sons of Gaea, and conceived them as genii with black wings. [L. S.]

ONE'SAS ('Oj/Tjo-ay), a gem engraver, whose name appears on a beautiful intaglio, representing a young Hercules, crowned with laurel, and on another gem, representing a girl playing the cithara, both in the Florentine collection. (Stosch. Pierres Gravies^ No. 46 ; Bracci, tav. 89.) [P. S.]

ONESrCRlTUS {'Ou-naiKpiTos), a Greek his- torical writer, who accompanied Alexander on his campaigns in Asia, and wrote a history of them, which is frequently cited by later authors. He is called by some authorities a native of Astj'palaea, by others of Aegina (Diog. Laert. vi. 75, 84 ; Arr. I?id. 18 ; Aelian, H.N. xvi. 39) : it was probably to this island origin that he was indebted for the skill in nautical matters which afterwards proved so advantageous to him. He must have been al- ready advanced, in years, as we are told that he had two sons grown up to manhood, when his at- tention was accidentally attracted to the philosophy of Diogenes the Cynic, of which he became an ardent votary, so as to have obtained a name of eminence among the disciples of that master. (Diog. Laert. I. c. ; Plut. Alex. 65.) We have no account of the circumstances which led him to accompany Alexander into Asia, nor does it appear in what capacity he attended on the conqueror ; but during the expedition into India he was sent by the king to hold a conference with the Indian philosophers or Gymnosophists, the details of which have been transmitted to us from his own account of the interview. (Strab. XV. p. 715 ; Plut. Alex. 65.) When Alexander constructed his fleet on the Hydaspes, he appointed Onesicritus to the important station of pilot of the king's ship, or chief pilot of the fleet (apxiKuSepj/Tjrrjs), a post which he held not only during the descent of the Indus, but throughout the long and perilous voyage from the mouth of that river to the Persian gulf. In this capacity he discharged his duties so much to the satisfaction of Alexander that, on his arrival at Susa, he was rewarded by that monarch with a crown of gold, at the same time as Nearchus. (Arr. Anab. vi. 2. § 6, vii. 5. § 9, Ind. 18 ; Curt. ix. 10. § 3, X. 1. § 10 ; Plut. Alea;. 66, de Fort. Alex. p. 331, f.) Yet Arrian blames him for want of judgment, and on one occasion expressly ascribes the safety of the fleet to the firmness of Nearchus in overruling his advice. (Anab. vii. 20, Ifid. 32.) We know nothing of his subsequent fortunes ; but from an anecdote related by Plutarch it seems probable that he attached himself to Lysimachus, and it was perhaps at the court of that monarch that he composed his historical work (Plut. Alejc. 46),