Page:Travels & discoveries in the Levant (1865) Vol. 1.djvu/95

Rh Mytilene, each of whom probably had his appointed place marked by an inscription on his seat.$33$ Lesbonax, the father of Potamon, was a sophist and rheto- rician, who lived in the time of Augustus, and whose head the Mytilenæans put on their copper coins, with the inscription, "Lesbouax, the new hero." His son Potamon was, like his father, a sophist, and resided at Rome, where he gained the favour of the Emperor Tiberius, who, on the return of Potamon to his native coimtry, is said to have furnished him with a passport in this form:—"If any one dare to injure Potamon, the son of Lesbonax, let him consider whether he will be strong enough to wage war with Me."

Soon after seeing this chair I happened to be passing by an unfinished house just as the workmen had fixed a marble in the side of a window. Seeing that it had a Greek inscription, I stopped to examine it, and found that it was a dedication in honour of the same Potamon whose chair I had seen at the Arch- bishop's house. I ascertained from my dragoman that the house belonged to an Ionian, who was so obliging as to present the marble to me for the British Museum, on my providing him with another in its place.

Shortly after this I discovered another inscription in which the name of Potamon is associated with that of two other benefactors of Mytilene— Pompey and Theophanes.

The dedication to Pompey comes first; he is styled benefactor, saviour, and founder of Mytilene; the name of Theophanes follows, who is called saviour,