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THEISS

1899

THEODORIC THE GREAT

It is said to have been founded by a colony of Phoenicians under Cadmus, after whom the city was called Cadmeia, a name afterwards applied only to the citadel. Nothing certain is known of the rjlace till its unsuccessful war with Athens in the 6th century B. C. During the Persian War Thebes sided with Xerxes against the other Greek cities, and for this desertion Athens wished to deprive it of its leadership of the Boeotian towns, but it was saved by the interference of jealous Sparta. It sided with Sparta in the Peloponnesian War, but soon afterwards, fearful of Sparta's great power, befriended the Athenians who fled from the oppression of the Thirty Tyrants, and sent a force of its citizens with Thrasybulus and his fellow-patriots to deliver Athens. Thebes became the foremost power in Greece after the long war (379-362 B. C.) in which, under the leadership of Bpaminondas, she triumphed over Sparta. Demosthenes induced Athens and Thebes to join hands against .the encroachments of Philip of Macedon; but it was too late, and in 338 the battle of Chseronea crushed the liberties of Greece; a second rising was put down by Alexander, who razed Thebes to the ground and sold the whole body of citizens — men, women and children — into slavery. Rebuilt in 315 by Cassander, it was destroyed by the Romans; was again a thriving town in the nth and i2th centuries; but now has only about 3,250 inhabitants.

Theiss (tis), an important branch of the Danube and the chief river of Hungary, is formed by the Black Theiss and the White Theiss in the Carpathian Mountains on the borders of Galicia. It flows through a mountain-pass, then in a zigzag course past Tokay and Szolnok, and for 300 miles parallels the Danube. It is navigable for large vessels to Szolnok, and is 828 miles long.

Themis (thefmis\ in Greek story, was the daughter of Uranos and Gaga (Heaven and Earth), the wife of Zeus and mother of the hours, fates, equity, justice and peace. In modern art Themis is represented as Justice with her eyes bandaged, holding a pair of evenly balanced scales in one hand and a sword in the other.

Themistocles (the-mis'td-klez}, a great Athenian general and statesman, was born about 514 B. C. In politics he became the rival of Aristides the Just, who was ostracized in 483 B. C., leaving Themistocles the foremost citizen of Athens. To get ready for the coming Persian invasion Themistocles persuaded the Athenians to set apart the proceeds of the government silver-mines for building a navy, believing that the only chance of victory was on the sea. The naval victories of Artemisium and Salamis (480) were won from the Persians chiefly through the efforts of Themistocles, though he allowed the standing claim of Sparta to the chief command, which was given to Eurybiades.

The victory at Salamis (q. v.) raised his reputation to the highest point. But his popularity lasted only till 471, when he was banished for bribery. The rest of his life was spent at the Persian court of Artaxerxes, where he was greatly honored. See Fyff e's Primer of Greek History.

Theocritus (the-ok'r%-ttis), a famous Greek poet, a native of Syracuse, who flourished about 272 B. C. About the close of the reign of Ptolemy Soter he visited Alexandria, where his first verses were written. Here Ptolemy Philadelphius became his patron, but later we find him back at the court of Hiero II of Syracuse. For some reason he became dissatisfied with court-life. Turning his attention to the scenes and life of the country, he wrote 30 unexampled idyls of the everyday life of the Sicilian peasantry, which keep their charms of freshness and nature even to the present day. Besides the idyls, a few lines of a poem called Berenice and some epigrams are all that are left of his writings.

Theod'olite, an instrument used by surveyors, specially constructed for measuring horizontal and vertical angles by means of a telescope the movements of which can be

Graduated and marked very accurately, or triangulation-work theodolites are usually made larger and more powerful than transits. In instruments made in this country the graduation is in ordinary degrees of 90 to the quadrant; though those constructed abroad, especially in France, have the centesimal division of 100 grades to the quadrant.

Theodoric (the-od''o-rik} the Great, the founder of the kingdom of the Ostrogoths, which embraced Italy, Sicily, southeastern Gaul,' Rhaetia, Noricum, Pannonia and Dal-matia, was born at Neusiedler Lake, south of Vienna, in 455 A. D. His father, Theode-mir, and two uncles had freed their nation from the yoke of the Huns on the death of Attila; part of the Goths had gone to Italy and Gaul; and Theodemir was left sole king of the Ostrogoths in Pannonia. Theodoric spent his boyhood as a hostage at the court of Constantinople, where he was brought up with Emperor Leo's children. After proving himself an able warrior, Theodoric became king of his people in 475. Two wars were now waged against Emperor Zeno, who, to save his capital from the Ostrogoths, urged Theodoric to conquer Italy, then ruled by Odoacer, the usurper. In 488 the young king led the whole nation, some 200,000, across the Alps, won four pitched battles, shut up Odoacer in Ravenna and after a three years' siege, captured both the usurper and the city. Once king of Italy, he governed the peninsula as well as it had ever been ruled under the Roman empire. He protected the Visigoths, checked the Franks and gained Provence. Near the end of his prosperous reign a conspiracy was