in the Ægean sea, 17 miles from Delos. It is the same as Naxos.
_See:_ Naxos. _Ovid_, _Metamorphoses_, bk. 8, li. 157.――――Another on
the coast of Crete, now _Standia_.――――A city of Thrace,――――of Eubœa,
――――Peloponnesus,――――Lusitania,――――Italy, near the Alps,――――Scythia,
near the Phasis,――――Caria,――――Bithynia,――――and Thessaly.
=Diactorĭdes=, one of Agarista’s suitors. _Herodotus_, bk. 6, ch. 127.
――――The father of Eurydame the wife of Leutychides. _Herodotus_,
bk. 6, ch. 71.
=Diæus=, of Megalopolis, a general of the Achæans, who killed himself
when his affairs became desperate. _Pausanias_, bk. 7, ch. 16.
=Diadumeniānus=, a son of Macrinus, who enjoyed the title of Cæsar
during his father’s lifetime, &c.
=Diăgon= and =Diăgum=, a river of Peloponnesus, flowing into the
Alpheus, and separating Pisa from Arcadia. _Pausanias_, bk. 6,
ch. 21.
=Diagondas=, a Theban who abolished all nocturnal sacrifices. _Cicero_,
_de Legibus_, bk. 2, ch. 15.
=Diăgŏras=, an Athenian philosopher. His father’s name was Teleclytus.
From the greatest superstition, he became a most unconquerable
atheist, because he saw a man who laid a false claim to one of
his poems, and who perjured himself, go unpunished. His great
impiety and blasphemies provoked his countrymen, and the Areopagites
promised one talent to him who brought his head before their
tribunal, and two if he were produced alive. He lived about 416
years before Christ. _Cicero_, _de Natura Deorum_, bk. 1, ch. 23;
bk. 3, ch. 37, &c.――_Valerius Maximus_, bk. 1, ch. 1.――――An athlete
of Rhodes, 460 years before the christian era. Pindar celebrated
his merit in a beautiful ode still extant, which was written in
golden letters in a temple of Minerva. He saw his three sons crowned
the same day at Olympia, and died through excess of joy. _Cicero_,
_Tusculanæ Disputationes_, bk. 5.――_Plutarch_, _Pelopidas_.
――_Pausanias_, bk. 6, ch. 7.
=Diālis=, a priest of Jupiter at Rome, first instituted by Numa. He
was never permitted to swear, even upon public trials. _Varro_, _de
Lingua Latina_, bk. 4, ch. 15.――_Dionysius of Halicarnassus_, bk. 2.
――_Livy_, bk. 1, ch. 20.
=Diallus=, an Athenian who wrote a history of all the memorable
occurrences of his age.
=Diamastigōsis=, a festival of Sparta in honour of Diana Orthia, which
received that name, ἀπο του μαστιγουν, _from whipping_, because boys
were whipped before the altar of the goddess. These boys, called
Bomonicæ, were originally free-born Spartans; but, in the more
delicate ages, they were of mean birth, and generally of a slavish
origin. This operation was performed by an officer in a severe and
unfeeling manner; and that no compassion should be raised, the priest
stood near the altar with a small light statue of the goddess, which
suddenly became heavy and insupportable if the lash of the whip was
more lenient or less rigorous. The parents of the children attended
the solemnity, and exhorted them not to commit anything, either by
fear or groans, that might be unworthy of Laconian education. These
flagellations were so severe, that the blood gushed in profuse
torrents, and many expired under the lash of the whip without
uttering a groan, or betraying any marks of fear. Such a death
was reckoned very honourable, and the corpse was buried with much
solemnity, with a garland of flowers on its head. The origin of this
festival is unknown. Some suppose that Lycurgus first instituted
it to inure the youths of Lacedæmon to bear labour and fatigue, and
render them insensible to pain and wounds. Others maintain that it
was a mitigation of an oracle, which ordered that human blood should
be shed on Diana’s altar; and according to their opinion, Orestes
first introduced that barbarous custom, after he had brought the
statue of Diana Taurica into Greece. There is another tradition,
which mentions that Pausanias, as he was offering prayers and
sacrifices to the gods, before he engaged with Mardonius, was
suddenly attacked by a number of Lydians who disturbed the sacrifice,
and were at last repelled with staves and stones, the only weapons
with which the Lacedæmonians were provided at that moment. In
commemoration of this, therefore, the whipping of boys was instituted
at Sparta, and after that the Lydian procession.
=Diāna=, was the goddess of hunting. According to Cicero, there were
three of this name; a daughter of Jupiter and Proserpine, who became
mother of Cupid; a daughter of Jupiter and Latona; and a daughter
of Upis and Glauce. The second is the most celebrated, and to her
all the ancients allude. She was born at the same birth as Apollo;
and the pains which she saw her mother suffer during her labour,
gave her such an aversion to marriage, that she obtained from her
father the permission to live in perpetual celibacy, and to preside
over the travails of women. To shun the society of men, she devoted
herself to hunting, and obtained the permission of Jupiter to have
for her attendants 60 of the Oceanides, and 20 other nymphs, all of
whom, like herself, abjured the use of marriage. She is represented
with a bent bow and quiver, and attended with dogs, and sometimes
drawn in a chariot by two white stags. Sometimes she appears with
wings, holding a lion in one hand and a panther in the other, with
a chariot drawn by two heifers, or two horses of different colours.
She is represented taller by the head than her attendant nymphs, her
face has something manly, her legs are bare, well-shaped, and strong,
and her feet are covered with a buskin, worn by huntresses among the
ancients. Diana received many surnames, particularly from the places
where her worship was established, and from the functions over
which she presided. She was called Lucina, Ilythia, or Juno Pronuba,
when invoked by women in child-bed, and Trivia when worshipped in
the cross-ways, where her statues were generally erected. She was
supposed to be the same as the moon, and Proserpine or Hecate, and
from that circumstance she was called Triformis; and some of her
statues represented her with three heads, that of a horse, a dog,
and a boar. Her power and functions under these three characters
have been beautifully expressed in these two verses:
Terret, lustrat, agit, Proserpina, Luna, Diana,
Ima, suprema, feras, sceptro, fulgore, sagittâ.
She was also called Agrotera, Orthia, Taurica, Delia, Cynthia,
Aricia, &c. She was supposed to be the same as the Isis of the
Egyptians, whose worship was introduced into Greece with that of
Osiris under the name of Apollo. When Typhon waged war against the
gods, Diana is said to have metamorphosed herself into a cat, to
avoid his fury. The goddess is generally known in the figures that
represent her, by the crescent on her head, by the dogs which attend
her, and by her hunting habit. The most famous of her temples was
that of Ephesus, which was one of the seven wonders of the world.
_See:_ Ephesus. She was there represented with a great number of
breasts, and other symbols which signified the earth, or Cybele.
Though she was the patroness of chastity, yet she forgot her dignity
to enjoy the company of Endymion, and the very familiar favours
which, according to mythology, she granted to Pan and Orion are
well known. _See:_ Endymion, Pan, Orion. The inhabitants of Taurica
were particularly attached to the worship of this goddess, and they
cruelly offered on her altar all the strangers that were shipwrecked
on their coasts. Her temple in Aricia was served by a priest who
had always murdered his predecessor, and the Lacedæmonians yearly
offered her human victims till the age of Lycurgus, who changed this
barbarous custom for the sacrifice of flagellation. The Athenians
generally offered her goats, and others a white kid, and sometimes
a boar pig, or an ox. Among plants the poppy and the ditamy were
sacred to her. She, as well as her brother Apollo, had some oracles,
among which those of Egypt, Cilicia, and Ephesus are the most known.
_Ovid_, _Fasti_, bk. 2, li. 155; _Metamorphoses_, bk. 3, li. 156;
bk. 7, lis. 94 & 194, &c.――_Cicero_, _de Natura Deorum_, bk. 3.
――_Horace_, bk. 3, ode 22.――_Virgil_, _Georgics_, bk. 3, li. 302;
_Æneid_, bk. 1, li. 505.――_Homer_, _Odyssey_, bk. 5.――_Pausanias_,
bk. 8, chs. 31 & 37.――_Catullus._――_Statius_, bk. 3, _Sylvæ_, poem 1,
li. 57.――_Apollodorus_ bk. 1, ch. 4, &c.; bk. 3, ch. 5, &c.
=Dianasa=, the mother of Lycurgus. _Plutarch_, _Lycurgus_.
=Dianium=, a town and promontory of Spain, now cape _Martin_, where
Diana was worshipped.
=Diasia=, festivals in honour of Jupiter at Athens. They received
their name ἀπο του διος και της ἁτης, _from Jupiter and misfortune_,
because, by making application to Jupiter, men obtained relief from
their misfortunes, and were delivered from dangers. During this
festival things of all kinds were exposed for sale.
=Dibio=, a town of France, now _Dijon_ in Burgundy.
=Dicæa= and =Dicæarchea=, a town of Italy. _Silius Italicus_, bk. 13,
li. 385.
=Dicæus=, an Athenian who was supernaturally apprised of the defeat of
the Persians in Greece. _Herodotus_, bk. 8, ch. 65.
=Dice=, one of the Horæ, daughters of Jupiter. _Apollonius_, bk. 1,
ch. 3.
=Dicearchus=, a Messenian famous for his knowledge of philosophy,
history, and mathematics. He was one of Aristotle’s disciples.
Nothing remains of his numerous compositions. He had composed
a history of the Spartan republic, which was publicly read over
every year by order of the magistrates, for the improvement and
instruction of youth.
=Diceneus=, an Egyptian philosopher in the age of Augustus, who
travelled into Scythia, where he ingratiated himself with the king
of the country, and by his instruction softened the wildness and
rusticity of his manners. He also gained such an influence over
the multitude, that they destroyed all the vines which grew in
their country, to prevent the riot and dissipation which the wine
occasioned among them. He wrote all his maxims and his laws in a
book, that they might not lose the benefit of them after his death.
=Dicomas=, a king of the Getæ. _Plutarch_, _Antonius_.
=Dictæ= and =Dictæus mons=, a mountain of Crete. The island is often
known by the name of _Dictæa arva_. _Virgil_, _Eclogues_, poem 6;
_Æneid_, bk. 3, li. 171.――――Jupiter was called _Dictæus_, because
worshipped there, and the same epithet was applied to Minos.
_Virgil_, _Georgics_, bk. 2, li. 536.――_Ovid_. _Metamorphoses_,
bk. 8, li. 43.――_Ptolemy_, bk. 3, ch. 17.――_Strabo_, bk. 10.
=Dictamnum= and =Dictynna=, a town of Crete, where the herb called
_dictamnus_ chiefly grows. _Virgil_, _Æneid_, bk. 12, li. 412.
――_Cicero_, _de Natura Deorum_, bk. 2, ch. 50.
=Dictātor=, a magistrate at Rome, invested with regal authority.
This officer, whose magistracy seems to have been borrowed from
the customs of the Albans or Latins, was first chosen during the
Roman wars against the Latins. The consuls being unable to raise
forces for the defence of the state, because the plebeians refused
to enlist, if they were not discharged from all the debts they had
contracted with the patricians, the senate found it necessary to
elect a new magistrate, with absolute and incontrollable power to
take care of the state. The dictator remained in office for six
months, after which he was again elected, if the affairs of the
state seemed to be desperate; but if tranquillity was re-established,
he generally laid down his power before the time was expired. He
knew no superior in the republic, and even the laws were subjected
to him. He was called dictator, because _dictus_, named by the
consul, or _quoniam dictis ejus parebat populus_, because the people
implicitly obeyed his command. He was named by the consul in the
night, _vivâ voce_, and his election was confirmed by the auguries,
though sometimes he was nominated or recommended by the people. As
his power was absolute, he could proclaim war, levy forces, conduct
them against an enemy, and disband them at pleasure. He punished
as he pleased; and from his decision there was no appeal, at least
till later times. He was preceded by 24 lictors, with the _fasces_:
during his administration, all other offices, except the tribunes of
the people, were suspended, and he was the master of the republic.
But amidst all his independence he was not permitted to go beyond
the borders of Italy, and he was always obliged to march on foot in
his expeditions; and he never could ride in difficult and laborious
marches, without previously obtaining a formal leave from the people.
He was chosen only when the state was in imminent dangers from
foreign enemies or inward seditions. In the time of a pestilence, a
dictator was sometimes elected, as also to hold the _comitia_, or to
celebrate the public festivals, to hold trials, to choose senators,
or drive a nail in the Capitol, by which superstitious ceremonies
the Romans believed that a plague could be averted, or the progress
of an enemy stopped. This office, so respectable and illustrious
in the first ages of the republic, became odious by the perpetual
usurpations of Sylla and Julius Cæsar; and after the death of the
latter the Roman senate, on the motion of the consul Antony, passed
a decree, which for ever after forbade a dictator to exist in Rome.
The dictator, as soon as elected, chose a subordinate officer,
called his master of horse, _magister equitum_. This officer was
respectable, but he was totally subservient to the will of the
dictator, and could do nothing without his express order, though he
enjoyed the privilege of using a horse, and had the same insignia
as the pretors. This subordination, however, was some time after
removed; and during the second Punic war the master of the horse
was invested with a power equal to that of the dictator. A second
dictator was also chosen for the election of magistrates at Rome,
after the battle of Cannæ. The dictatorship was originally confined
to the patricians, but the plebeians were afterwards admitted to
share it. Titus Lartius Flavus was the first dictator, A.U.C. 253.
_Dionysius of Halicarnassus._――_Cicero_, _de Legibus_, bk. 3.
――_Dio Cassius._――_Plutarch_, _Fabius Maximus_.――_Appian_, bk. 3.
――_Polybius_, bk. 3.――_Paterculus_, bk. 2, ch. 28.――_Livy_, bk. 1,
ch. 23; bk. 2, ch. 18; bk. 4, ch. 57; bk. 9, ch. 38.
=Dictidienses=, certain inhabitants of mount Athos. _Thucydides_,
bk. 5, ch. 82.
=Dictynna=, a nymph of Crete, who first invented hunting nets. She
was one of Diana’s attendants, and for that reason the goddess is
often called _Dictynnia_. Some have supposed that Minos pursued her,
and that, to avoid his importunities, she threw herself into the
sea, and was caught in fishermen’s nets, δικτυα, whence her name.
There was a festival at Sparta in honour of Diana, called Dictynnia.
_Pausanias_, bk. 2, ch. 30; bk. 3, ch. 12.――――A city of Crete.
=Dictys=, a Cretan, who went with Idomeneus to the Trojan war. It is
supposed that he wrote a history of this celebrated war, and that
at his death he ordered it to be laid in his tomb, where it remained
till a violent earthquake, in the reign of Nero, opened the monument
where he had been buried. This convulsion of the earth threw out his
history of the ♦Trojan war, which was found by some shepherds, and
afterwards carried to Rome. This mysterious tradition is deservedly
deemed fabulous; and the history of the Trojan war, which is now
extant as the composition of Dictys of Crete, was composed in the
15th century, or, according to others, in the age of Constantine,
and falsely attributed to one of the followers of Idomeneus. The
edition of Dictys is by Mascellus Venia, 4to, Milan, 1477.――――A king
of the island of Seriphus, son of Magnes and Nais. He married the
nymph Clymene, and was made king of Seriphus by Perseus, who deposed
Polydectes, because he behaved with wantonness to Danae. _See:_
Polydectes. _Apollodorus_, bk. 1, ch. 9; bk. 2, ch. 4.――――A centaur,
killed at the nuptials of Pirithous. _Ovid_, _Metamorphoses_, bk. 12,
li. 334.
♦ ‘Trojon’ replaced with ‘Trojan’
=Didas=, a Macedonian who was employed by Perseus to render Demetrius
suspected to his father Philip. _Livy_, bk. 40.
=Didia lex=, _de Sumptibus_, by Didius, A.U.C. 606, to restrain the
expenses that attended public festivals and entertainments, and
limit the number of guests which generally attended them, not only
at Rome, but in all the provinces of Italy. By it, not only those
who received guests in these festive meetings, but the guests
themselves, were liable to be fined. It was an extension of the
Oppian and Fannian laws.
=Didius=, a governor of Spain, conquered by Sertorius. _Plutarch_,
_Sertorius_.――――A man who brought Cæsar the head of Pompey’s
eldest son. _Plutarch._――――A governor of Britain under Claudius.
――――Julianus, a rich Roman, who, after the murder of Pertinax,
bought the empire which the pretorians had exposed to sale, A.D.
192. His great luxury and extravagance rendered him odious; and when
he refused to pay the money which he had promised for the imperial
purple, the soldiers revolted against him, and put him to death,
after a short reign. Severus was made emperor after him.
=Dīdo=, called also _Elissa_, a daughter of Belus king of Tyre, who
married Sichæus, or Sicharbas, her uncle, who was priest of Hercules.
Pygmalion, who succeeded to the throne of Tyre after Belus, murdered
Sichæus, to get possession of the immense riches which he possessed;
and Dido, disconsolate for the loss of a husband whom she tenderly
loved, and by whom she was equally esteemed, set sail in quest of
a settlement, with a number of Tyrians, to whom the cruelty of the
tyrant became odious. According to some accounts, she threw into the
sea the riches of her husband, which Pygmalion so greatly desired;
and by that artifice compelled the ships to fly with her, that had
come by order of the tyrant to obtain the riches of Sichæus. During
her voyage, Dido visited the coast of Cyprus, where she carried away
50 women, who prostituted themselves on the sea-shore, and gave them
as wives to her Tyrian followers. A storm drove her fleet on the
African coast, and she bought of the inhabitants as much land as
could be covered by a bull’s hide, cut into thongs. Upon this piece
of land she built a citadel, called Byrsa [_See:_ Byrsa], and in the
increase of population, and the rising commerce among her subjects,
soon obliged her to enlarge her city and the boundaries of her
dominions. Her beauty, as well as the fame of her enterprise, gained
her many admirers; and her subjects wished to compel her to marry
Iarbas king of Mauritania, who threatened them with a dreadful war.
Dido begged three months to give her decisive answer; and during
that time, she erected a funeral pile, as if wishing, by a solemn
sacrifice, to appease the manes of Sichæus, to whom she had promised
eternal fidelity. When all was prepared, she stabbed herself on the
pile in presence of her people, and by this uncommon action obtained
the name of Dido, _valiant woman_, instead of Elissa. According
to Virgil and Ovid, the death of Dido was caused by the sudden
departure of Æneas, of whom she was deeply enamoured, and whom she
could not obtain as a husband. This poetical fiction represents
Æneas as living in the age of Dido, and introduces an anachronism
of near 300 years. Dido left Phœnicia, 247 years after the Trojan
war, or the age of Æneas; that is, about 953 years B.C. This
chronological error proceeds not from the ignorance of the poets,
but it is supported by the authority of Horace,
_Aut famam sequere, aut sibi convenientia finge._
While Virgil describes, in a beautiful episode, the desperate love
of Dido, and the submission of Æneas to the will of the gods, he
at the same time gives an explanation of the hatred which existed
between the republics of Rome and Carthage, and informs his readers
that their mutual enmity originated in their very first foundation,
and was apparently kindled by a more remote cause than the jealousy
and rivalship of two flourishing empires. Dido, after her death,
was honoured as a deity by her subjects. _Justin_, bk. 18, ch. 4,
&c.――_Paterculus_, bk. 1, ch. 6.――_Virgil_, _Æneid_.――_Ovid_,
_Metamorphoses_, bk. 14, fable 2; _Heroides_, poem 6.――_Appian_,
_Punic Wars_.――_Orosius_, bk. 4.――_Herodian._――_Dionysius of
Halicarnassus._
=Dĭdy̆ma=, a place of Miletus. _Pausanias_, bk. 2, ch. 9.――――An island
in the Sicilian sea. _Pausanias_, bk. 10, ch. 11.
=Dĭdy̆mæus=, a surname of Apollo.
=Dĭdy̆māon=, an excellent artist, famous for making suits of armour.
_Virgil_, _Æneid_, bk. 5, li. 359.
=Dĭdy̆me=, one of the Cyclades. _Ovid_, _Metamorphoses_, bk. 7, li. 469.
――――A city of Sicily. _Ovid_, _Fasti_, bk. 4, li. 476.――――One of
the Lipari isles, now _Saline_.――――A place near Miletus, where the
Branchidæ had their famous oracle.
=Dĭdy̆mum=, a mountain of Asia Minor.
=Dĭdy̆mus=, a freedman of Tiberius, &c. _Tacitus_, _Annals_, bk. 6,
ch. 24.――――A scholiast on Homer, surnamed Χαλκεντερος, flourished
B.C. 40. He wrote a number of books, which are now lost. The editions
of his commentaries are, that in 2 vols., Venice, by Aldus Manutius,
1528, and that of Paris, 8vo, 1530.
=Diēnĕces=, a Spartan, who, upon hearing, before the battle of
Thermopylæ, that the Persians were so numerous that their arrows
would darken the light of the sun, observed that it would be a great
convenience, for they then should fight in the shade. _Herodotus_,
bk. 7, ch. 226.
=Diespĭter=, a surname of Jupiter, as being the father of light.
=Digentia=, a small river which watered Horace’s farm, in the country
of the Sabines. _Horace_, bk. 1, ltr. 18, li. 104.
=Digma=, a part of the Piræus at Athens.