Listed 5 sub titles with search on: Biographies for destination: "MAGNESIA Ancient city TURKEY".
A celebrated Greek traveller and geographer, a native of Lydia. He explored Greece, Macedonia, Asia, and Africa; and then, in the second half of the second century A.D., settled in Rome, where he composed a Periegesis (Periegesis) or Itinerary of Greece in ten books. Book I. includes Attica and Megaris; II., Corinth with Sicyon, Phlius, Argolis, Aegina, and the other neighbouring islands; III., Laconia; IV., Messenia; V., VI., Elis and Olympia; VII., Achaea; VIII., Arcadia; IX., Boeotia; X. , Phocis and Locris. The work is founded on notes, taken on the spot, from his own observation and inquiry from the natives of the country, on the subject of the religious cults and the monuments of art and architecture. Together with these there are topographical and historical notices, in working up which Pausanias took into consideration the accounts of other authors, especially of Polemon (A.D. 150), poets as well as prose writers. Although his account is not without numerous inaccuracies, omissions, and mistakes, it is yet of inestimable value for our knowledge of ancient Greece, especially with regard to its mythology, folk-lore, and religious cults, but above all for the history of Greek art. The composition of his work, especially in the earlier books, shows little skill in plan, execution, or style, and, while accurate, shows that he did not grasp the distinction between legend and history.
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
Greek traveller and geographer of the 2nd century A.D., lived in the
times of Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius. He was probably a native
of Lydia; he was certainly
familiar with the western coast of Asia
Minor, but his travels extended far beyond the limits of Ionia.
Before visiting Greece he
had been to Antioch, Joppa
and Jerusalem, and to the
banks of the river Jordan. In Egypt
he had seen the pyramids, while at the temple of Ammon he had been shown the hymn
once sent to that shrine by Pindar. In Macedonia
he had almost certainly viewed the traditional tomb of Orpheus. Crossing over
to Italy, he had seen something
of the cities of Campania,
and of the wonders of Rome.
His Description of Greece
takes the form of a tour in the Peloponnesus
and in part of northern Greece.
He is constantly describing ceremonial rites or superstitious customs. He frequently
introduces narratives from the domain of history and of legend and folklore; and
it is only rarely that he allows us to see something of the scenery. It is mainly
in the last section that he touches on the products of nature.
He is most at home in describing the religious art and architecture
of Olympia and of Delphi;
but, even in the most secluded regions of Greece,
he is fascinated by all kinds of quaint and primitive images of the gods, by holy
relics and many other sacred and mysterious things. In the topographical part
of his work, he is fond of digressions on the wonders of nature.
While he never doubts the existence of the gods and heroes, he sometimes
criticizes the myths and legends relating to them. His descriptions of the monuments
of art are plain and unadorned; they bear the impress of reality, and their accuracy
is confirmed by the extant remains. He is perfectly frank in his confessions of
ignorance. When he quotes a book at second hand he takes pains to say so.
This extract is cited July 2003 from the Malaspina Great Books URL below.
Diocles. Of Magnesia, was the author of a work entitled epidrome ton philosophon, and of a second on the lives of philosophers (peri bion philosophon), of both of which Diogenes Laertius appears to have made great use. (ii. 82, vi. 12, 13, 20, 36, 87, 91, 99, 103, vii. 48, 162, 166, 179, 181, ix. 61, 65, x. 12.)
Dionysius. Of Magnesia, a distinguished rhetorician, who taught his art in Asia between the years B. C. 79 and 77, at the time when Cicero, then in his 29th year, visited the east. Cicero on his excursions in Asia was accompanied by Dionysius, Aeschylus of Cnidus, and Xenocles of Adramyttium, who were then the most eminent rhetoricians in Asia. (Cic. Brut. 91; Plut. Cic. 4.)
Cleon, a Magnesian, appears to have been a philosopher, from the quotation which Pausanias makes from him. (x. 4.4)
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