Listed 15 sub titles with search on: Biographies for wider area of: "FLIOUS Ancient city NEMEA" .
FLIOUS (Ancient city) NEMEA
Diocles (Diokles), of Athens, or, according to others, of Phlius, and perhaps in fact a Phliasian by birth and an Athenian by citizenship, was a comic poet of the old comedy, contemporary with Sannyrion and Philyllius. (Suid. s. v.) The following plays of his are mentioned by Suidas and Eudocia (p. 132), and are frequently quoted by the grammarians : Bakchai, Thalatta, Kuklopes (by others ascribed to Callias), Melittai. The Thuestes and Oneiroi, which are only mentioned by Suidas and Eudocia, are suspicious titles. He seems to have been an elegant poet.
320 - 230
Timon. The son of Timarchus of Phlius, a philosopher of the sect of the Sceptics,
and a celebrated writer of the species of satiric poems called Silli (silloi),
flourished in the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus, about B. C. 279, and onwards.
A pretty full account of his life is preserved by Diogenes Laertius, from the
first book of a work on the Silli (en toi protoi ton eis tous sillous hupomneaton)
by Apollonides of Nicaea ; and some particulars are quoted by Diogenes from Antigonus
of Carystus, and from Sotion (Diog. Laert. ix. c. 12.109-115). Being left an orphan
while still young, he was at first a choreutes in the theatre, but he abandoned
this profession for the study of philosophy, and, having removed to Megara, he
spent some time with Stilpon, and then he returned home and married. He next went
to Elis with his wife, and heard Pyrrhon, whose tenets he adopted, so far at least
as his restless genius and satirical scepticism permitted him to follow any master.
During his residence at Elis, he had children born to him, the eldest of whom,
named Xanthus, he instructed in the art of medicine and trained in his philosophical
principles, so that he might be his successor and representative (kai diadochon
biou katelipe; but these words may, however, mean that he left him heir to his
property). Driven again from Elis by straitened circumstances, he spent some time
on the Hellespont and the Propontis, and taught at Chalcedon as a sophist with
such success that he realised a fortune. He then removed to Athens, where he lived
until his death, with the exception of a short residence at Thebes. Among the
great men, with whom he became personally acquainted in the course of his travels,
which probably extended more widely about the Aegean and the Levant than we are
informed, were the kings Antigonus and Ptolemy Philadelphus. He is said to have
assisted Alexander Aetolus and Homerus in the composition of their tragedies,
and to have been the teacher of Aratus (Suid. s. v. Aragos). " These indications,"
says Mr. Clinton, " mark his time. He might have heard Stilpo at Megara twenty-five
years before the reign of Philadelphus". He died at the age of almost ninety.
Among his pupils were Dioscurides of Cyprus, Nicolochus of Rhodes, Euphranor of
Seleuceia, and Praylus of the Troad.
Timon appears to have been endowed by nature with a powerful and active
mind, and with that quick perception of the follies of men, which betrays its
possessor into a spirit of universal distrust both of men and truths, so as to
make him a sceptic in philosophy and a satirist in every thing. According to Diogenes,
Timon had that physical defect, which some have fancied that they have found often
accompanied by such a spirit as his, and which at least must have given greater
force to its utterances; he was a one-eyed man; and he used even to make a jest
of his own defect, calling himself Cyclops. Some other examples of his bitter
sarcasms are recorded by Diogenes; one of which is worth qoting as a maxim in
criticism : being asked by Aratus how to obtain the pure text of Homer, he replied,
" If we could find the old copies, and not those with modern emendations." He
is also said to have been fond of retirement, and of gardening; but Diogenes introduces
this statement and some others in such a way as to suggest a doubt whether they
ought to be referred to our Timon or to Timon the misanthrope, or whether they
apply equally to both.
The writings of Timon are represented as very numerous. According
to Diogenes, in the order of whose statement there appears to be some confusion,
he composed epe, kai tragoidias, kai saturous, kai dramata komika triakonta, tragika
de hexekonta, sillous te kai kinaidous. The double mention of his tragedies raises
a suspicion that Diogenes may have combined two different accounts of his writings
in this sentence; but perhaps it may be explained by supposing the words tragika
de hexekonta to be inserted simply in order to put the number of his tragedies
side by side with that of his comedies. Some may find another difficulty in the
passage, on account of the great number and variety of the poetical works ascribed
to Timon ; but this is nothing surprising in a writer of that age of universal
imitative literature; nor, when the early theatrical occupations of Timon are
borne in mind, is it at all astonishing that his taste for the drama should have
prompted him to the composition of sixty tragedies and thirty comedies, besides
satyric dramas. One thing, however, it is important to observe. The composition
of tragedies and comedies by the same author is an almost certain indication that
his dramas were intended only to be read, and not to be acted. No remains of his
dramas have come down to us.
Of his epic poems we know very little; but it may be presumed that
they were chiefly ludicrous or satirical poems in the epic form. Possibly his
Python (Puthon), which contained a long account of a conversation with Pyrrhon,
during a journey to Pytho, may be referred to this class; unless it was in prose
(Diog. ix. 64,105; Euseb. Praep. Ev. xiv.). It appears probable that his Arkesilaou
perideipnon or prodeipnon was a satirical poem in epic verse (Diog. ix. 115; Ath.
ix.). Whether he wrote parodies on Homer or whether he merely occasionally, in
the course of his writings, parodied passages of the Homeric poems, cannot be
determined with certainty from the lines in his extant fragments which are evident
parodies of Homer, such, for example, as the verse preserved by Diogenes:
Espete nun moi hosoi polupragmones este sophistai,
which is an obvious parody on the Homeric invocation (II. ii. 484),
Espete nun moi Mousai Olumpia domat echousai.
The most celebrated of his poems, however, were the satiric compositions called
Silli (silloi), a word of somewhat doubtful etymology, but which undoubtedly describes
metrical compositions, of a character at once ludicrous and sarcastic. The invention
of this species of poetry is ascribed to Xenophanes of Colophon. The Silli of
Timon were in three books, in the first of which he spoke in his own person, and
the other two are in the form of a dialogue between the author and Xenophanes
of Colophon, in which Timon proposed questions, to which Xenophanes replied at
length. The subject was a sarcastic account of the tenets of all philosophers,
living and dead; an unbounded field for scepticism and satire. They were in hexameter
verse, and, from the way in which they are mentioned by the ancient writers, as
well as from the few fragments of them which have come down to us, it is evident
that they were very admirable productions of their kind (Diog. l. c. ; Aristocles
ap. Euseb. Praep. Ev. xiv.; Suid. s. vv. sillainei, timon; Ath. passim; Gell.
iii. 17). Commentaries were written on the Silli by Apollonides of Nicaea, as
already mentioned, and also by Sotion of Alexandria (Ath. viii.). The poem entitled
Indalmoi, in elegiac verse, appears to have been similar in its subject to the
Silli (Diog. Laert. ix. 65). Diogenes also mentions Timon's iamboi (ix. 110),
but perhaps the word is here merely used in the sense of satirical poems in general,
without reference to the metre.
He also wrote in prose, to the quantity, Diogenes tells us, of twenty
thousand lines. These works were no doubt on philosophical subjects, but all we
know of their specific character is contained in the three references made by
Diogenes to Timon's works peri aistheseos, peri zeteseos, and kata sophias.
The fragments of his poems have been collected by H. Stephanus, in
his Poesis Philosophica, 1573, 8vo.; by J. F. Langenrich,at the end of his Dissertationes
Ill. de Timone Sillographo, Lips. 1720, 1721, 1723, 4to.; by Brunck, in his Analecta,
vol. ii. pp. 67, foil.; by F. A. Wolke, in his monograph De Graecorum Syllis,
Varsav. 1820, 8vo.; and by F. Paul, in his Dissertatio de Sillis, Berol. 1821,
8vo. (See also Creuzer and Daub's Studien, vol. vi. pp. 302, foll.; Ant. Weland,
Dissert. de praecip. Parodiarum Homericarum Scriptoribus apud Graecos, pp. 50,
foll. Gotting. 1833, 8vo.; Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. iii. pp. 623--625; Menag.
ad Diog. Laert. l. c. ; Welcker, die Griech. Tragod. pp. 1268, 1269; Bode, Gesch.
d. Hellen. Dichtk. vol. ii. pt. i. pp. 345--347; Ulrici, vol. ii. p. 317 ; Clinton,
F. H. vol. iii. p. 495).
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited July 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Timon. The son of Timarchus of Phlius, a philosopher of the
sect of the Skeptics, who flourished in the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus, about
B.C. 279 and onwards. He first studied philosophy at Megara, under Stilpo, and
then returned home and married. He next went to Elis with his wife, and heard
Pyrrho, whose tenets he adopted. Driven from Elis by straitened circumstances,
he spent some time on the Hellespont and the Propontis, and taught at Chalcedon
as a sophist with such success that he realized a fortune. He then removed to
Athens, where he passed the remainder of his life, with the exception of a short
residence at Thebes. He died at the age of almost ninety.
Timon appears to have been endowed by nature with a powerful
and active mind, and with that quick perception of the follies of men which betrays
its possessor into a spirit of universal distrust both of men and truths, so as
to make him a skeptic in philosophy and a satirist in everything. His agnosticism
(to use a modern term) is shown by his saying that man need only know three things--viz.
what is the nature of things, how we are related to them, and what we can gain
from them; but as our knowledge of things must always be subjective and unreal,
we can only live in a state of suspended judgment. He wrote numerous works both
in prose and poetry. The most celebrated of his poems were the satiric compositions
called silli (silloi), a word of somewhat doubtful etymology, but which undoubtedly
describes metrical compositions of a character at once ludicrous and sarcastic.
The invention of this species of poetry is ascribed to Xenophanes of Colophon.
The Silli of Timon were in three books, in the first of which he spoke in his
own person, and the other two are in the form of a dialogue between the author
and Xenophanes of Colophon, in which Timon proposed questions, to which Xenophanes
replied at length. The subject was a sarcastic account of the tenets of all philosophers,
living and dead--an unbounded field for skepticism and satire. They were in hexameter
verse, and from the way in which they are mentioned by the ancient writers, as
well as from the few fragments of them which have come down to us, it is evident
that they were very admirable productions of their kind.
This text is from: Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities. Cited Oct 2002 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
He started out teaching at the Academy of Athens and then became Stilpo’s disciple. Later he followed his friend Menedimus to his home-town, Eretria, and became one of the founders of the Eretria School of Philosophy.
Asclepiades, a cynic philosopher, a native of Phlius, and a contemporary of Crates of Thebes, who must consequently have lived about B. C. 330. (Diog. Laert. vi. 91; Tertull. c. Nat. ii. 14.) Whether he is the same as the one whom Cicero (Tusc. v. 39) states to have been blind, is uncertain.
Since the ancient times it had not been clearly defined where Echecrates came from. Some claim that the great philosopher, one of the last Pythagoreans, went to Phlious after the School of Sicily closed down. Phlious was Pythagoras’ place of origin. It is believed that Plato was one of Echecrates’ disciples and the one who described the circumstances of his death.
Author of Satyric dramas, father of Aristias.
Pratinas. A Greek dramatist, of Phlius, who lived about B.C. 496 at Athens. He was a contemporary and rival of Aeschylus, and is believed to have invented the satyric drama. At any rate, he was a very prolific writer in this department of literature. He also wrote tragedies, dithyrambs, and hyporchemata, of which we possess a fairly long and highly original fragment, preserved by Athenaeus (xiv. 617). His son Aristias was also a dramatic poet.
Pratinas, a native of Phlius, is said by Suidas to have contended against Choerilus and Aeschylus in the 70th Olympiad, i. e. at some time between 500 and 497 B.C. If the first year of the Olympiad is meant, the date would be the spring of 499 B.C. The tradition that he was the first to write satyr-plays is founded on the words of Suidas, protos egraphe saturous: but it can be traced further back, if Pratinae be read for Cratini in a note on the Ars Poetica (230) by Helenius Acron, the commentator on Terence and Horace (circ. 190 A.D.). The satyr-plays of Pratinas were presumably intended to preserve the old type of satyr-chorus, now threatened with extinction by the new improvements. Such an effort would have been natural for one whose native place was not far from Sicyon. Among the scanty fragments of Pratinas, which are almost wholly lyric, the most considerable is a passage of 20 lines from a huporchema (Bergk, Poet. Lyr. 953 ff.: cf. Nauck, Frag. Trag. p. 562). Suidas says that he wrote 60 plays, of which 32 were, satyric dramas; unless, with Boeckh, 32 should be altered to 12 (lb' to ib').
This extract is from: A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1890) (eds. William Smith, LLD, William Wayte, G. E. Marindin). Cited August 2004 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Satyric Drama
Aristias), a dramatic poet, the son of Pratinas, whose tomb Pausanias (ii. 13.5) saw at Phlius, and whose Satyric dramas, with those of his father, were surpassed only by those of Aeschylus. Aristias is mentioned in the life of Sophocles as one of the poets with whom the latter contended. Besides two dramas, which were undoubtedly Satyric, viz. the Keres and Cyclops, Aristias wrote three others, viz. Antaeus, Orpheus, and Atalante, which may have been tragedies. (Comp. Athen. xv.; Pollux, vii. 31)
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