Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume I.djvu/471

 AMPHION AMPHITHEATRE 439 brother in the murder of their mother (see ALOM^EON), and subsequently joined the expe- dition against Troy. He was celebrated for his prophetic gifts, and had an oracle at Mallus in Cilicia (a city said to have been founded by Amphilochus and Mopsus), which was esteemed the most truthful of all oracles ; and at Athens, Oropus, and Sparta he shared in the divine honors paid to Amphiaraus. AMPHION, in Greek mythology, a son of Zeus and Antiope, the wife of Lycus, king of Thebes. He and his brother Zethus were ex- posed on Mount Cithaeron, but were found and brought up by shepherds. Mercury, or accord- ing to others Apollo or the muses, gave a lyre to Amphion, who from that moment devoted himself altogether to song and music. To avenge the wrongs of their mother, the brothers undertook an expedition against Thebes, which they captured and fortified, slaying both Lycus and his new wife Dirce. They then built a wall around the town, Amphion playing on his lyre, and the stones moving in obedience to its notes whither they were wanted till it was finished. Amphion married Niobe, by whom he had many sons and daughters, all of whom were killed by Apollo. AMPHIPOLIS (now Jenikeui), a city of ancient Macedonia, on the Strymon (now Struma, or Kara Su), near its mouth. It was originally called Ennea Hodoi (Nine Ways), and held by the Thracian Edonians, and received its his- torical name from an Athenian colony which occupied it in 437 B. 0. It was besieged by the Lacedaemonians under Brasidas during the Peloponnesian war, and compelled to sur- render to them (424). Later it fell into the hands of Philip of Macedon, and under the Romans it was the capital of a Macedonian district. In the middle ages it was called Po- polia. There are few remains of the town. AMPHISBJ3NA (Gr. a/Mj>iap<uva, an animal that can move or walk in both directions), the name of a genus of saurians. The head is so small and the tail so thick and short that it is difficult to distinguish one from the other at first sight ; and this peculiarity of form, in ad- dition to the animal's habit of proceeding with equal facility either backward or forward, has given rise to the popular belief in Brazil and other parts of South America, where the am- phisbasnu most abounds, that it possesses two heads, one at each extremity. These saurians are distinguished from others by their nearly uniform thickness of body from the head to the extremity of the tail, by their small mouths and extremely diminutive eyes, remarkably short tails, and numerous rings of small square scales, completely surrounding the body and the tail. The jaws are furnished with a single row of small conical teeth, few in number and distant from each other, and the palate is toothless. These reptiles are also destitute of fangs, and are therefore harmless. They live mostly on ants and other small insects, and in- habit ant hills and burrows which they make for themselves under ground. The genus am- phisbana contains only a few species, confined to Brazil, Guiana, and other tropical parts of the American continent. The A.fuliginosa is Amphisbiena fuliginosa (Sooty Amphistena). the best known species. It is found in the hotter regions .of South America, and does not inhabit Ceylon or any part of the East Indies, as Linnaeus and Lac6pMe were led to believe, on the authority of Seba. The general color of this animal is a deep brown, varied with shades of white, more or less clear, accord- ing to the season of casting the old and ac- quiring the new external coat or " skin." It grows to the length of 18 inches or 2 feet, the tail measuring only one inch or thereabouts. The body, about as thick as the wrist of a child of 10 years, is surrounded by upward of 200 rings, and the tail by 25 or 30. The eyes, exceedingly diminutive, are covered by a mem- brane which almost conceals them; and this has given rise to the popular opinion that the amphisbaBna has no eyes. AMPHITHEATRE, with the Romans, an open elliptical building, with an elliptical space in the centre called the arena, from the low wall surrounding which rose tiers of seats, sup- ported on arches, receding to near the summit of the outer wall. These buildings were used for public games or combats between men or beasts, and in later times also for exhibitions of mimic sea fights, and of crocodiles and other amphibious animals, by filling the arena with water. The arena was so called because sand (Lat. arena) was usually employed to give a firm footing and to dry up the blood. The wall around the arena varied in height from 8 to 18 feet. On a level with its top spread the first platform, where the chairs of the more honored spectators were placed. From the top of the wall that formed the back of this space rose the first tier of seats, reaching to an- other platform with another wall at its back, and so on to the top. The box (suggestus or