Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 07.djvu/305

* EUMENIDES. 271 EUNUCH. incut of guests. In the tragedies there ure indi- cations of a more genera] conception of them as guardians of the universal laws. They either take cngeaiice mi the living, or carry off the sinner to the lower world, where others can punish him. They are also the torturers of sinners in the other world. As pursuers of criminals they are represented in ,tlie short tunic and boots of the huntress or accompanied by hounds; as avengers they bear whips or burning torches; while the snake of chthonic divinities appears in their hair or carried in their hands. At first their number is not mentioned; Homer once uses the singular, and a Demeter Brinys was wor- shiped at Thelpusa in Arcadia. ^Eschylus brought fifteen on the stage in the Eumenides, but in Euripides the number is three, and later learning gave them the names Alecto, Megaera, Tisiphone. Their genealogy also was uncertain, llcsiod calls them daughters of (Jaa, and iEschy- lus of Night. Such dread deities, however, are terrible only to the sinner; to the devout wor- shiper they are bringers of blessing and protec- tion, and hence are truly called Eumenides, or at Athens Sefival — revered. They were honored at Sicyon, Argos, and elsewhere, but we are best informed about Athens, where they had a sanc- tuary near a cave on the east side of the Are- opagus, and a sacred inclosure at Colonus. Con- sult: /Eschylus, Eumenides; and Sophocles, CEdipus at Colonus. EUMOL'PUS (Lat., from Gk.Efv«>iros,.EM?noe- pos, the sweet singer, from ee, eu, well + /j.owr), molpe, song, from /iAir«v, melpein, to sing). In the later mythology of Greece, the son of Posei- don and Chione, daughter of Boreas and Orei- thyia. He was brought up in Ethiopia, whence he went to Thrace, and afterwards passed into Attica at the head of a body of Thracians, to assist the Eleusinians in their war against Ereehtheus, King of Athens. Eumolpus fell in the battle, and later the Eleusinians submitted to the Athenians, only reserving the celebration of the mysteries in their own hands. Eumolpus also appears as King of Eleusis, and it is to him that the Demeter communicates the mysteries. To him the hereditary priests of the goddess at Eleusis, the Eumolpidce. traced their descent. Other legends connected him with the mythical Thracian bard, Musaeus, either as pupil, son, or even father. To endeavor to harmonize the many contradictory stories about Eumolpus, some of the later mythographers distinguished three persons of this name. EUNA'PIUS (Lat., from Gk. Ewdirios) (c.346-?). A Greek sophist, born at Sardis. He was a Neoplatonist, a believer in the old religion and a bitter enemy of Christianity. In his youth he was a pupil of the Neoplatonist Chry- santhius, and from a.d. 362 to 3G6 he was a student at Athens, in the school of Prohseresius. In the latter year he returned to his native town and there set up a school for himself. His death occurred not earlier than a.d. 414. He wrote at the beginning of the fifth century a work entitled Lives of the Philosophers and Sophists, containing twenty-three biographies of repre- sentative Neoplatonists and Sophists; edited by Boissonade (Paris, 1849). This work is pre- served. He was also the author of a contem- porary history in forty books, designed to be a continuation of the history of Dexippus. It included the years from a.d. 270 to 404. We have only fragments of this history, but it stance is incorporated in the work ol Zosin EUTJICE (Lat., from Gk. Eivlxri, EunilcS). A Jewess of Lystra, mentioned in the New I inent i.cis wi. I; II. Tim. i. 5) ae thi mother of Timothy. Her husband was a Greek .wi. 1), in deference to whom probably she al- lowed their son In lvmaii rircumcised (Acts mi. 3). But she had given him a religious came [Timotheus — honoring God) and had faith- fully trained him from early years in the Jewish Scriptures (II. Tim. iii. 15). As she is rc- ferred to at the beginning of Paul's second mis sionary tour as a believer, it is likely thai she was one of the converts of his first missionary work. See Timothy. EUNO'MIUS (Lat., from Gk. EiM/uos) ( ?- C.392). The founder of the once numerous Arian sect of Eunomians, which disappeared in the fifth century, lie was born in the village of Dacora, in Cappadocia, and was first a lawyer, then a. soldier, and ultimately took holy orders. In 360 he was appointed Bishop of Cyzicus, and held his see till 304. In the great controversj regarding the nature of the Trinity which raged during the fourth century, Eunoinius was conspicuous by his advocacy of the extreme Arian view that the Father alone was eternal and supreme; that thi Son was generated of Him; and the Holy Spirit. again, of the Son. His doctrine of the Trinity is sometimes called the anomoian, 'dissimilar,' to distinguish it, on the one hand, from the homoi- ousian, 'similar,' held by the semi-Arians, and. on the other, from the homoousian, "identical,' held by the Athanasian or Trinitarian party. (See IIomoovsion. ) His life was much check- ered. He was banished from one place to an- other, until at length he obtained permission to retire to his native village, where he died about 3 ( ,I2. His writings are preserved only as frag- ments here and there in the works of hi ad versaries. Consult Klose, Geschichtr und Lehre des Eunoinius (Kiel, 1833). EUNUCH (Lat. eunuehus, Gk. ei/i/oCxos, from eifrij, eune, bed -f- *=x* iV, echein, to have). In general, a castrated man; specifically, such a man employed as keeper of a harem or in a priestly capacity. Eunuchism is of prehistoric origin, and prevails in some form or other among nearly all races and peoples. In earlier stages of cul- ture, reproduction is regarded as one of the deep- est of mysteries, and various beliefs and customs gather about the several processes, all grading into phallieism with recognition of the mascu- line clement ; and the more striking comprise introcision (or artificial hypospadia) among the Australian natives, circumcision among various peoples, castration chiefly in Asia and Northern Africa, and non-instrumental devirilizntion (commonly miscalled hermaphroditism) among American Indian and other tribes. Primarily the customs were religious, or at least fiducial, and ritualistic; and, with the possible exception of circumcision, they are all symbolic of feminiza- tion and hence of reproduction, though this mo- tive is largely obscured in the moderately ad- vanced culture in which eunuchism prevails. The so-called hermaphrodites of the Western Hemi- sphere are usually regarded as prostitute-, and they sometimes become protectors or keepers of the women of the tribe in the absence of the