very numerous. Every object which causes terror, inspires gratitude,
or bestows affluence, received the tribute of veneration. Man
saw a superior agent in the stars, the elements, or the trees,
and supposed that the waters which communicated fertility to his
fields and possessions, were under the influence and direction of
some invisible power, inclined to favour and to benefit mankind.
Thus arose a train of divinities, which imagination arrayed in
different forms, and armed with different powers. They were endowed
with understanding, and were actuated by the same passions which
daily afflict the human race; and those children of superstition
were appeased or provoked as the imperfect being which gave them
birth. Their wrath was mitigated by sacrifice and incense, and
sometimes human victims bled to expiate a crime which superstition
alone supposed to exist. The sun, from its powerful influence
and animating nature, first attracted the notice, and claimed the
adoration, of the uncivilized inhabitants of the earth. The moon
also was honoured with sacrifices, and addressed in prayers; and
after immortality had been liberally bestowed on all the heavenly
bodies, mankind classed among their deities the brute creation,
and the cat and the sow shared equally with Jupiter himself, the
father of gods and men, the devout veneration of their votaries.
This immense number of deities have been divided into classes,
according to the will and pleasure of the mythologists. The Romans,
generally speaking, reckoned two classes of the gods, the _dii
majorum gentium_, or _dii consulentes_, and the _dii minorum
gentium_. The former were 12 in number, six males and six females.
_See:_ Consentes. In the class of the latter, were ranked all the
gods who were worshipped in different parts of the earth. Besides
these, there were some called _dii selecti_, sometimes classed with
the 12 greater gods; these were Janus, Saturn, the Genius, the Moon,
Pluto, and Bacchus. There were also some called demi-gods, that is,
who deserved immortality by the greatness of their exploits, and
for their uncommon services to mankind. Among these were Priapus,
Vertumnus, Hercules, and those whose parents were some of the
immortal gods. Besides these, there were some called _topici_, whose
worship was established at particular places, such as Isis in Egypt,
Astarte in Syria, Uranus at Carthage, &c. In process of time also,
all the passions and the moral virtues were reckoned as powerful
deities, and temples were raised to a goddess of concord, peace,
&c. According to the authority of Hesiod, there were no less than
30,000 gods that inhabited the earth, and were guardians of men,
all subservient to the power of Jupiter. To these succeeding ages
have added an almost equal number; and indeed they were so numerous,
and their functions so various, that we find temples erected, and
sacrifices offered, to unknown gods. It is observable, that all
the gods of the ancients have lived upon earth as mere mortals; and
even Jupiter, who was the ruler of heaven, is represented by the
mythologists as a helpless child; and we are acquainted with all
the particulars that attended the birth and education of Juno. In
process of time, not only good and virtuous men who had been the
patrons of learning and the supporters of liberty, but also thieves
and pirates, were admitted among the gods; and the Roman senate
courteously granted immortality to the most cruel and abandoned of
their emperors.
=Dii=, a people of Thrace, on mount Rhodope.
=Dimassus=, an island near Rhodes. _Pliny_, bk. 5, ch. 31.
=Dinarchus=, a Greek orator, son of Sostratus, and disciple to
Theophrastus at Athens. He acquired much money by his compositions,
and suffered himself to be bribed by the enemies of the Athenians,
307 B.C. Of 64 of his orations, only three remain. _Cicero_, _On
Oratory_, bk. 2, ch. 53.――――A Corinthian ambassador, put to death
by Polyperchon. _Plutarch_, _Phocion_.――――A native of Delos, who
collected some fables in Crete, &c. _Dionysius of Halicarnassus_.
=Dindy̆mus= (or a, orum), a mountain of Phrygia, near a town of the
same name in the neighbourhood of Cyzicus. It was from this place
that Cybele was called _Dindymene_, as her worship was established
there by Jason. _Strabo_, bk. 12.――_Statius_, bk. 1, _Sylvæ_, poem 1,
li. 9.――_Horace_, bk. 1, ode 16, li. 5.――_Virgil_, _Æneid_, bk. 9,
li. 617.
=Dinia=, a town of Phrygia. _Livy_, bk. 38, ch. 5.――――A town of Gaul,
now _Digne_ in Provence.
=Dinias=, a general of Cassander. _Diodorus_, bk. 19.――――A man of
Pheræ, who seized the supreme power at Cranon. _Polyænus_, bk. 2.
――――A man who wrote a history of Argos. _Plutarch_, _Aratus_.
=Dinĭche=, the wife of Archidamus. _Pausanias_, bk. 3, ch. 10.
=Dinŏchăres=, an architect who finished the temple of Diana at Ephesus,
after it had been burnt by Erostratus.
=Dinŏcrătes=, an architect of Macedonia, who proposed to Alexander to
cut mount Athos in the form of a statue, holding a city in one hand,
and in the other a basin, into which all the waters of the mountain
should empty themselves. This project Alexander rejected as too
chimerical, but he employed the talents of the artist in building
and beautifying Alexandria. He began to build a temple in honour of
Arsinoe, by order of Ptolemy Philadelphus, in which he intended to
suspend a statue of the queen, by means of loadstones. His death,
and that of his royal patron, prevented the execution of a work
which would have been the admiration of future ages. _Pliny_, bk. 7,
ch. 37.――_Marcellinus_, bk. 22, ch. 40.――_Plutarch_, _Alexander_.
――――A general of Agathocles.――――A Messenian, who behaved with great
effeminacy and wantonness. He defeated Philopœmen, and put him to
death, B.C. 183. _Plutarch_, _Titus Flamininus_.
=Dinŏdŏchus=, a swift runner. _Pausanias_, bk. 6, ch. 1.
=Dinolŏchus=, a Syracusan, who composed 14 comedies. _Ælian_, _de
Natura Animalium_, bk. 6, ch. 52.
=Dinŏmĕnes=, a tyrant of Syracuse. _Pausanias_, bk. 3, ch. 42.
=Dinon=, a governor of Damascus, under Ptolemy, &c. _Polyænus_, bk. 4.
――――The father of Clitarchus, who wrote a history of Persia in
Alexander’s age. He is esteemed a very ♦authentic historian by
_Cornelius Nepos_, _Conon_.――_Plutarch_, _Alexander_.――_Diogenes
Laërtius._
♦ ‘anthentic’ replaced with ‘authentic’
=Dinosthĕnes=, a man who made himself a statue of an Olympian victor.
_Pausanias_, bk. 6, ch. 16.
=Dinostrătus=, a celebrated geometrician in the age of Plato.
=Diŏclea=, festivals in the spring at Megara, in honour of Diocles,
who died in the defence of a certain youth to whom he was tenderly
attached. There was a contention on his tomb, and the youth who gave
the sweetest kiss was publicly rewarded with a garland. Theocritus
has described them in his _Idylls_, bk. 12, li. 27.――――A town on the
coast of Dalmatia. _Pliny_, bk. 3, ch. 23.
=Diocles=, a general of Athens, &c. _Polyænus_, bk. 5.――――A comic
poet of Athens.――――An historian, the first Grecian who ever wrote
concerning the origin of the Romans, and the fabulous history of
Romulus. _Plutarch_, _Romulus_.――――One of the four brothers placed
over the citadel of Corinth by Archelaus, &c. _Polyænus_, bk. 6.
――――A rich man of Messenia. _Pausanias_, bk. 4, ch. 2.――――A general
of Syracuse. _Diodorus_, bk. 13.
=Diocletianopŏlis=, a town of Thessaly, called so in honour of
Diocletian.
=Diocletiānus Caius Valerius Jovius=, a celebrated Roman emperor, born
of an obscure family in Dalmatia. He was first a common soldier, and
by merit and success he gradually rose to the office of a general,
and at the death of Numerian he was invested with the imperial
purple. In this high station, he rewarded the virtue and fidelity
of Maximian, who had shared with him all the subordinate offices
in the army, by making him his colleague on the throne. He created
two subordinate emperors, Constantius and Galerius, whom he called
_Cæsars_, whilst he claimed for himself and his colleague the
superior title of _Augustus_. Diocletian has been celebrated for
his military virtues; and though he was naturally unpolished by
education and study, yet he was the friend and patron of learning
and true genius. He was bold and resolute, active and diligent,
and well acquainted with the arts which endear a sovereign to his
people, and make him respectable even in the eyes of his enemies.
His cruelty, however, against the followers of christianity has
been deservedly branded with the appellation of unbounded tyranny,
and insolent wantonness. After he had reigned 21 years in the
greatest prosperity, he publicly abdicated the crown at Nicomedia,
on the 1st of May, A.D. 304, and retired to a private station at
Salona. Maximian, his colleague, followed his example, but not
from voluntary choice; and when he some time after endeavoured to
rouse the ambition of Diocletian, and persuade him to reassume the
imperial purple, he received for answer, that Diocletian took now
more delight in cultivating his little garden, than he formerly
enjoyed in a palace, when his power was extended over all the earth.
He lived nine years after his abdication in the greatest security
and enjoyment at Salona, and died in the 68th year of his age.
Diocletian is the first sovereign who voluntarily resigned his power;
a philosophical resolution, which, in a later age, was imitated by
the emperor Charles V. of Germany.
=Diŏdōrus=, an historian, surnamed _Siculus_, because he was born at
Argyra in Sicily. He wrote a history of Egypt, Persia, Syria, Media,
Greece, Rome, and Carthage, which was divided into 40 books, of
which only 15 are extant, with some few fragments. This valuable
composition was the work of an accurate inquirer, and it is said
that he visited all the places of which he has made mention in his
history. It was the labour of 30 years, though the greater part
may be considered as nothing more than a judicious compilation
from Berosus, Timæus, Theopompus, Callisthenes, and others. The
author, however, is too credulous in some of his narrations, and
often wanders far from the truth. His style is neither elegant
nor too laboured, but it contains great simplicity and unaffected
correctness. He often dwells too long upon fabulous reports and
trifling incidents, while events of the greatest importance to
history are treated with brevity, and sometimes passed over in
silence. His manner of reckoning, by the Olympiads and the Roman
consuls, will be found very erroneous. The historian flourished
about 44 years B.C. He spent much time at Rome to procure
information, and authenticate his historical narrations. The best
edition of his works is that of Wesseling, 2 vols., folio, Amsterdam,
1746.――――A disciple of Euclid, in the age of Plato. _Diogenes
Laërtius_, _Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers_.――――A
comic poet.――――A son of Echeanax, who, with his brothers Codrus
and Anaxagoras, murdered Hegesias the tyrant of Ephesus, &c.
_Polyænus_, bk. 6.――――An Ephesian, who wrote an account of the life
of Anaximander. _Diogenes Laërtius._――――An orator of Sardis, in
the time of the Mithridatic war.――――A stoic philosopher, preceptor
to Cicero. He lived and died in the house of his pupil, whom he
instructed in the various branches of Greek literature. _Cicero_,
_Brutus_.――――A general of Demetrius.――――A writer, surnamed
_Periegetes_, who wrote a description of the earth. _Plutarch_,
_Themistocles_.――――An African, &c. _Plutarch._
=Dioetas=, a general of Achaia, &c. _Polyænus_, bk. 2.
=Dīŏgēnes=, a celebrated Cynic philosopher of Sinope, banished from
his country for coining false money. From Sinope, he retired to
Athens, where he became the disciple of Antisthenes, who was at
the head of the Cynics. Antisthenes, at first, refused to admit him
into his house, and even struck him with a stick. Diogenes calmly
bore the rebuke, and said, “Strike me, Antisthenes, but never shall
you find a stick sufficiently hard to remove me from your presence,
whilst there is anything to be learnt, any information to be gained,
from your conversation and acquaintance.” Such firmness recommended
him to Antisthenes, and he became his most devoted pupil. He dressed
himself in the garment which distinguished the Cynics, and walked
about the streets with a tub on his head, which served him as
a house and a place of repose. Such singularity, joined to the
greatest contempt for riches, soon gained him reputation, and
Alexander the Great condescended to visit the philosopher in his tub.
He asked Diogenes if there was anything in which he could gratify
or oblige him. “Get out of my sunshine,” was the only answer which
the philosopher gave. Such an independence of mind so pleased the
monarch, that he turned to his courtiers, and said, “Were I not
Alexander, I would wish to be Diogenes.” He was once sold as a slave,
but his magnanimity so pleased his master, that he made him the
preceptor of his children, and the guardian of his estates. After a
life spent in the greatest misery and indigence, he died B.C. 324,
in the 96th year of his age. He ordered his body to be carelessly
thrown into a ditch, and some dust to be sprinkled over it. His
orders were, however, disobeyed in this particular, and his friends
honoured his remains with a magnificent funeral at Corinth. The
inhabitants of Sinope raised statues to his memory; and the marble
figure of a dog was placed on a high column erected on his tomb.
His biographer has transmitted to posterity a number of his sayings,
remarkable for their simplicity and moral tendency. The life of
Diogenes, however, shrinks from the eye of a strict examination; he
boasted of his poverty, and was so arrogant, that many have observed
that the virtues of Diogenes arose from pride and vanity, not from
wisdom and sound philosophy. His morals were corrupted, and he gave
way to his most vicious indulgencies, and his unbounded wantonness
has given occasion to some to observe, that the bottom of his tub
would not bear too close an examination. _Diogenes Laërtius_, _Lives
and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers_.――_Plutarch_, _Apophthegmata
Laconica_.――_Cicero_, _de Natura Deorum_, bk. 3, ch. 36, &c.――――A
stoic of Babylon, disciple of Chrysippus. He went to Athens, and was
sent as ambassador to Rome, with Carneades and Critolaus, 155 years
before Christ. He died in the 88th year of his age, after a life of
the most exemplary virtue. Some suppose that he was strangled by
order of Antiochus king of Syria, for speaking disrespectfully of
his family in one of his treatises. _Quintilian_, bk. 1, ch. 1.
――_Athenæus_, bk. 5, ch. 11.――_Cicero_, _de Officiis_, bk. 3, ch. 51.
――――A native of Apollonia, celebrated for his knowledge of philosophy
and physic. He was pupil to Anaxagoras. _Diogenes Laërtius_, _Lives
and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers_.――――Laërtius, an epicurean
philosopher, born in Cilicia. He wrote the lives of the philosophers
in 10 books, still extant. This work contains an accurate account
of the ancient philosophers, and is replete with all their anecdotes
and particular opinions. It is compiled, however, without any
plan, method, or precision, though much neatness and conciseness
are observable through the whole. In this multifarious biography
the author does not seem particularly partial to any sect, except
perhaps it be that of Potamon of Alexandria. Diogenes died A.D. 222.
The best editions of his works are that of Meibomius, 2 vols., 4to,
Amsterdam, 1692, and that of Lipscomb, 8vo, 1759.――――A Macedonian,
who betrayed Salamis to Aratus. _Pausanias_, bk. 2, ch. 8.――――There
was a philosopher of that name who attended Alexander in his Asiatic
expedition, for the purpose of marking out and delineating his march,
&c.
=Diogĕnia=, a daughter of Celeus. _Pausanias_, bk. 1, ch. 38.――――A
daughter of the Cephisus, who married Erechtheus. _Apollodorus._
=Diogĕnus=, a man who conspired with Dymnus against Alexander.
_Curtius_, bk. 6, ch. 7.
=Diognetus=, a philosopher who instructed Marcus Aurelius in
philosophy, and in writing dialogues.
=Diŏmēda=, a daughter of Phorbas, whom Achilles brought from Lemnos,
to be his mistress after the loss of Briseis. _Homer_, _Iliad_,
bk. 9, li. 661.――――The wife of Deion of Amyclæ.
=Diŏmēdes=, son of Tydeus and Deiphyle, was king of Ætolia, and one
of the bravest of the Grecian chiefs in the Trojan war. He engaged
Hector and Æneas, and by repeated acts of valour obtained much
military glory. He went with Ulysses to steal the Palladium from the
temple of Minerva at Troy; and assisted in murdering Rhesus king of
Thrace, and carrying away his horses. At his return from the siege
of Troy, he lost his way in the darkness of the night, and landed
in Attica, where his companions plundered the country, and lost the
Trojan Palladium. During his long absence, his wife Ægiale forgot
her marriage vows, and prostituted herself to Cometes, one of her
servants. This lasciviousness of the queen was attributed by some
to the resentment of Venus, whom Diomedes had severely wounded
in the arm in a battle before Troy. The infidelity of Ægiale was
highly displeasing to Diomedes. He resolved to abandon his native
country, which was the seat of his disgrace, and the attempts of
his wife to take away his life, according to some accounts, did not
a little contribute to hasten his departure. He came to that part
of Italy which has been called Magna Græcia, where he built a city
called Argyripa, and married the daughter of Daunus the king of
the country. He died there in extreme old age, or, according to a
certain tradition, he perished by the hand of his father-in-law. His
death was greatly lamented by his companions, who in the excess of
their grief were changed into birds resembling swans. These birds
took flight into a neighbouring island in the Adriatic, and became
remarkable for the tameness with which they approached the Greeks,
and for the horror with which they shunned all other nations. They
are called the birds of Diomedes. Altars were raised to Diomedes, as
to a god, one of which Strabo mentions at Timavus. _Virgil_, _Æneid_,
bk. 1, li. 756; bk. 11, li. 243, &c.――_Ovid_, _Metamorphoses_, bk.
14, fable 10.――_Apollodorus_, bk. 1, ch. 8; bk. 3, ch. 7.――_Hyginus_,
fables 97, 112, & 113.――_Pausanias_, bk. 2, ch. 30.――――A king of
Thrace, son of Mars and Cyrene, who fed his horses with human flesh.
It was one of the labours of Hercules to destroy him; and accordingly
the hero, attended with some of his friends, attacked the inhuman
tyrant, and gave him to be devoured by his own horses, which he had
fed so barbarously. _Diodorus_, bk. 4.――_Pausanias_, bk. 3, ch. 18.
――_Apollodorus_, bk. 2, ch. 5.――――A friend of Alcibiades. _Plutarch_,
_Alcibiades_.――――A grammarian.
=Diŏmēdon=, an Athenian general, put to death for his negligence at
Arginusæ. _Thucydides_, bk. 8, ch. 19.――――A man of Cyzicus, in the
interest of Artaxerxes. _Cornelius Nepos_, _Epaminondas_.
=Dion=, a Syracusan, son of Hipparinus, famous for his power and
abilities. He was related to Dionysius, and often advised him,
together with the philosopher Plato, who at his request had come to
reside at the tyrant’s court, to lay aside the supreme power. His
great popularity rendered him odious in the eyes of the tyrant, who
banished him to Greece. There he collected a numerous force, and
encouraged by the influence of his name, and the hatred of his enemy,
he resolved to free his country from tyranny. He entered the port
of Syracuse only with two ships, and in three days reduced under his
power an empire which had already subsisted for 50 years, and which
was guarded by 500 ships of war, and 100,000 foot and 10,000 horse.
The tyrant fled to Corinth, and Dion kept the power in his own hands,
fearful of the aspiring ambition of some of the friends of Dionysius.
He was, however, shamefully betrayed and murdered by one of his
familiar friends, called Callicrates, or Callipus, 354 years before
the christian era, in the 55th year of his age, and four years after
his return from Peloponnesus. His death was universally lamented by
the Syracusans, and a monument was raised to his memory. _Diodorus_,
bk. 16.――_Cornelius Nepos_, _Life of Dion_.――――A town of Macedonia.
_Pausanias_, bk. 9, ch. 36.――――Cassius, a native of Nicæa in
Bithynia. His father’s name was Apronianus. He was raised to the
greatest offices of state in the Roman empire by Pertinax and his
three successors. Naturally fond of study, he improved himself by
unwearied application, and was 10 years collecting materials for a
history of Rome, which he made public in 80 books, after a laborious
employment of 12 years in composing it. This valuable history began
with the arrival of Æneas in Italy, and was continued down to the
reign of the emperor Alexander Severus. The 34 first books are
totally lost, the 20 following are mutilated, and fragments are all
that we possess of the last 20. In the compilation of his extensive
history, Dion proposed to himself Thucydides for a model; but he is
not perfectly happy in his imitation. His style is pure and elegant,
and his narrations are judiciously managed, and his reflections
learned; but upon the whole he is credulous, and the bigoted
slave of partiality, satire, and flattery. He inveighs against the
republican principles of Brutus and Cicero, and extols the cause of
Cæsar. Seneca also is the object of his satire, and he represents
him as debauched and licentious in his morals. Dion flourished about
the 230th year of the christian era. The best edition of his works
is that of Reimarus, 2 vols., folio, Hamburg, 1750.――――A famous
christian writer, surnamed _Chrysostom_, &c.
=Diōnæa=, a surname of Venus, supposed to be the daughter of Jupiter
and Done.
=Diōne=, a nymph, daughter of Nereus and Doris. She was mother of
Venus by Jupiter, according to Homer and others. Hesiod, however,
gives Venus a different origin. _See:_ Venus. Venus is herself
sometimes called Dione. _Virgil_, _Æneid_, bk. 3, li. 19.――_Homer_,
_Iliad_, bk. 5, li. 381.――_Statius_, bk. 1, _Sylvæ_, poem 1, li. 86.