Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/771

Rh SCYLITZES. to follow the opinion of Niebuhr, who supposes the writer to have lived in the first half of the reign of Philip of Macedonia, the father of Alexander the Great (Philip began to reign B.C. 360). Niebuhr shows from internal evidence that the Periplus must have been composed long after the time of Herodotus ; whilst, from its omitting to mention any of the cities founded by Alexander, such as Alexandria in Egypt, as well as from other circum- stances, we may conclude that it was drawn up before the reign of Alexander. It is probable, how- ever, that the author, Avhoever he was, may not have borne the name of Scylax himself, but prefixed to his work that of Scylax of Carj-anda, on account of the celebrity of the navigator in the time of Dareius Ilystaspis. Aristotle is the first writer who refers to Scylax {Pol. iii. 1 4) ; but it is evident, from hia reference, as Avell as from the quotations from Scylax in other ancient writers (Philostr. Apollon. iii. 47 ; Harpocrat. p. 174, ed. Gronov. ; Tzetz. Chil. vii. 144), v/hich refer to matters not con- tained in the Periplus come down to us, that we possess only an abridgment of the original work. The Periplus of Scylax was first published by Hoeschel, with other minor Greek geographers, Augsburg, 1600, 8vo. ; next by Is. Vossius, Am- sterdam, 1639, 4to. ; subsequently by Hudson, in his " Geographi Graeci Minores," and in the re- print of the same work by Gail, Paris, 1826 ; and last of all by R. H. Klausen, attached to his frag- ments of Hecataeus, Berlin, 1831. (Fabric. Bihl Grace, vol. iv. p. 606, &c. ; Vossius, de Hist. Graecis, p. 166, ed.Westermann ; Sainte-Croix, in Mem. de VAcad. des Inscriptions., vol. xlii. p. 350 ; Niebuhr, Ueher das Alter des Kustenheschreibers Skylax von Karyanda., in his /'C/ezrte&7i7T/J:en,vol.i. p. 105, &c., translated in the Philological Museum., vol. i. p. 245, &c. ; Ukert, Geographie der Grieehen und Roiner, vol. i. pt. ii. p. 285, &c. ; the dissertations prefixed to Hudson's and Klausen's editions.) SCYLAX (2/cuAa|), an engraver of precious stones, whose time is unknown, but from whose hand we still possess some beautiful gems. (Stosch, 58, 59 ; Bracci, 101, 102, 103). [P. S.] SCYLES (SkuAtjs), son and successor of Aria- peithes, king of the Scythians in the time of He- rodotus. His mother was a Greek of Istria, who taught him her own language, and imbued him with an attachment to Greek customs and modes of life. The tastes thus acquired he used to gratify at Olbia, a Milesian colony (as its inhabitants pro- fessed), at the mouth of the Borysthenes, where he passed a great part of his time, having built a house there, and married a woman of the place. Here he was detected by some of his countrymen in the celebration of the Bacchic mysteries, where- upon they withdrew their allegiance from him, and set up his brother, Octamasades, as king. Scyles, upon this, fled to Sitalces, king of Thrace ; but the latter, on the invasion of his kingdom by a Scythian army, surrendered him to Octamasades, who caused him to be beheaded. (Herod, iv. 78 —80.) [E. E.] SCYLITZES or SCYLITZA, JOANNES, a Byzantine historian, of the later period of the empire, sumamed, from his office, Curopalates {'Iwdvvris KovpoTraXaTTis 6 '2,KviTCr}s) ; probably also called (apud Cedren. Compend. sub init.) Joannes Thracesius, and, from his office, Pro- TOVESTIARIUS (o TTO'tfTogecTTiapjos ^IwdvvTis 6 &pa- SCYLITZES. 759 KTjo-jos TO iTTicpufiov). Accordiug to the account given by Fabricius and Cave, and which is now ge- nerally received, he was a native of the Thracesian Thema (which nearly corresponded to the Roman proconsular Asia), and attained successively at the Byzantine court, the dignities of protovestiarius (high chamberlain), magnus dningarius vigiliarum (captain of the guards), and curopalates. He flou- rished as late as a. n. 1081, if not later. While he was protovestiarius he published the first edition of his great historical work, which came down to a. d. 1057 ; and in or after a. d. 1081, when he was curopalates, he published either a supplement, or a second and enlarged edition, bringing the work down to about A. D. 1080. Several parts of this account are, however, very questionable, as we shall take occasion to show. It has been already observed [Cedrenus, Georgius] that the portion of the history of Cedrenus which extends from the death of the emperor Nicephorus I. (a. d. 811) to the close of the work (a. d. 1057), is found almost verbatim in the history of Joannes Scylitzes, which commences from the death of Ni- cephorus I. (a. d. 811), and extends, in the printed copies, to the reign of Nicephorus Botaniotes (a, d. 1078 — 1081). From this circumstance two questions arise. Did Cedrenus borrow from Scy- litzes, or Scylitzes from Cedrenus ? and, did Scy- litzes publish two editions of his history, or only one ? The former question is the more important. As the history of Scylitzes, in its present form, extends to a period more than twenty years after that at which Cedrenus closes his work, the natural inference, if we judged from this circumstance alone, would be that Scylitzes was the later writer. And this was the opinion of Fabrot, the Parisian editor of Cedrenus ; and of Henschenius. (Acta Sanctorum Februar. a. d. xi. Comment, de Imj)era- trice Tlieodora, § 90, 97.) As, however, the dates indicate that they were nearly contemporary, such an extensive incorporation as must have been prac- tised by one or the other could hardly have been practised without its being known ; and, if known, there could be no reason why the borrower should not avow the obligation. The question then turns upon this point, has either of the two mentioned or referred to the other ?^ Scylitzes, in his Prooemium, which is given in the original Greek by Montfaucon {Biblioth. Coislin. p. 207, &c.), from a MS. appa- rently of the twelfth century, mentions Georgius Syncellus [Georgius, lit. and eccles. No. 46] and Theophanes [Theophanes], as the only writers who, since the time of the ancients, had success- fully written history ; and says that, after them, no one had devoted himself to the production of similar works ; that those who had attempted to write history had either given mere catalogues of sovereigns, or had been influenced by the desire of panegyrising or vituperating some prince or pa- triarch or personal friend ; by which we suppose lie means that they had written biography, and that partially, instead of history. He enumerates many writers of this class, as Theodorus Daph- nopates [Theodorus], Nicetas Paphlago [Nice- TAS, Byzantine writers, No. 9], Joseph Genesius [Gknesius], &c. But in neither class does he notice Cedrenus, whom, as the author of a recent work of such extent, and to the merit of which, had he transcribed it, he would thereby have borne a virtual testimony, lie could hardly have over- looked. His silence, therefore, furnishes a strong, 3c 4