Movatterモバイル変換

1.  No doubt, my dear Celsus,¹ you think it aslight and trivial matter to bid me set down in a book and send you the historyof Alexander, the impostor of Abonoteichus, including all his clever schemes,bold emprises, and sleights of hand; but in point of fact, if one should aim toexamine each detail closely, it would be no less a task than to record theexploits of Philip's son Alexander. The one was as great in villainy as theother in heroism. Nevertheless, if it should be your intention to overlookfaults as you read, and to fill out for yourself the gaps in my tale, I willundertake the task for you and will essay to clean up that Augean stable, ifnot wholly, yet to the extent of my ability, fetching out some few basketsful,so that from them you may judge how great, how inexpressible, was the entirequantity of filth that three thousand head of cattlewere able to create in many years.

2.  I blush for both of us, I confess, both for youand for myself—for you because you want a consummate rascal perpetuated inmemory and in writing, and for myself because I am devoting my energy to suchan end, to the exploits of a man who does not deserve to have polite peopleread about him, but rather to have the motley crowd in a vast amphitheatre seehim being torn to pieces by foxes or apes. Yet if anyone brings this reproachagainst us, we shall be able to refer to an apt precedent. Arrian, the discipleof Epictetus, a Roman of the highest distinction, and a life-long devotee ofletters, laid himself open to the same charge, and so can plead our cause aswell as his own; he thought fit, you know, to record the life of Tillorobus,the brigand.² In our own case, however, we shall commemorate a far more savagebrigand, since our hero plied his trade not in forests and mountains, but incities, and instead of infesting just Mysia and Mount Ida and harrying a few ofthe more deserted districts of Asia, he filled the whole Roman Empire, I maysay, with his brigandage.

3.  First I shall draw you a word-picture of theman himself, making as close a likeness as I can, although I am notparticularly good at drawing. As regards his person—in order that I may exhibitthis also to you—he was tall and handsome in appearance, and really godlike;his skin was fair, his beard not very thick; his long hair was in part natural, inpart false, but very similar, so that most people did not detect that it wasnot his own. His eyes shone with a great glow of fervour and enthusiasm; hisvoice was at once very sweet and very clear; and in a word, no fault could befound with him in any respect as far as all that went.

4.  Such, then, was his outward appearance; but hissoul and his mind—O Heracles Forfender! O Zeus, Averter of Mischief! O TwinBrethren, our Saviours! may it be the fortune of our enemies and ill-wishers toencounter and have to do with the like of him! In understanding,quick-wittedness, and penetration he was far beyond everyone else; and activityof mind, readiness to learn, retentiveness, natural aptitude for studies—allthese qualities were his, in every case to the full. But he made the worstpossible use of them, and with these noble instruments at his service soonbecame the most perfect rascal of all those who have been notorious far andwide for villainy, surpassing the Cercopes, surpassing Eurybatus, or Phrynondas,or Aristodemus, or Sostratus.³ He himself, writing to his son-in-law Rutilianusonce upon a time and speaking of himself with the greatest reserve, claimed tobe like Pythagoras; but— with all due respect to Pythagoras, a wise man of morethan human intelligence—if he had been this man's contemporary, he would haveseemed a child, I am very sure, beside him!⁴  In the name of the Graces, do notimagine that I say this to insult Pythagoras, or in the endeavour to bring them into connection with one another bylikening their doings. On the contrary, if all that is worst and most opprobriousin what is said of Pythagoras to discredit him (which I for my part cannotbelieve to be true) should nevertheless be brought together for comparison, thewhole of it would be but an infinitesimal part of Alexander's knavery. In sum,imagine, please, and mentally configure a highly diversified soul-blend, madeup of lying, trickery, perjury, and malice; facile, audacious, venturesome,diligent in the execution of its schemes, plausible, convincing, masking asgood, and wearing an appearance absolutely opposite to its purpose. indeed,there is nobody who, after meeting him for the first time, did not come awaywith the idea that he was the most honest and upright man in the world—yes, andthe most simple and unaffected. And on top of all this, he had the quality ofmagnificence, of forming no petty designs but always keeping his mind upon themost important objects.

5.  While he was still a mere boy, and a very handsomeone, as could be inferred from the sere and yellow leaf of him, and could alsobe learned by hearsay from those who recounted his story, he trafficked freelyin his attractiveness and sold his company to those who sought it. Amongothers, he had an admirer who was a quack, one of those who advertiseenchantments, miraculous incantations, charms for your love-affairs, "sendings"⁵ for your enemies, disclosures of buried treasure, and successions toestates. As this man saw that he was an apt lad, more than ready to assist himin his affairs, and that the boy was quite as much enamoured withhis roguery as he with the boy's beauty, he gave him a thorough education andconstantly made use of him as helper, servant, and acolyte. He himself wasprofessedly a public physician, but, as Homer says of the wife of Thon, theEgyptian, he knew

"Many a drug that was good in a compound, andmany a bad one,"⁶

all of which Alexander inherited and took over.This teacher and admirer of his was a man of Tyana by birth, one of those whohad been followers of the notorious Apollonius, and who knew his whole bag oftricks. You see what sort of school the man that I am describing comes from!

6.  Alexander was just getting his beard when thedeath of the Tyanean put him in a bad way, since it coincided with the passingof his beauty, by which he might have supported himself. So he abandoned pettyprojects for ever. He formed a partnership with a Byzantine writer of choralsongs, one of those who enter the public competitions, far more abominable thanhimself by nature— Cocconas,⁷I think, was his nickname,— and theywent about the country practising quackery and sorcery, and "trimming thefatheads "—for so they style the public in the traditional patter of magicians.Well, among these they hit upon a rich Macedonian woman, past her prime butstill eager to be charming, and not only lined their purses fairly well at herexpense, but went with her from Bithynia to Macedon. She came from Pella, a place once flourishing inthe time of the kings of Macedon but now insignificant, with very fewinhabitants. [7] There they saw great serpents, quite tame and gentle, so thatthey were kept by women, slept with children, let themselves be stepped upon,were not angry when they were stroked, and took milk from the breast just likebabies. There are many such in the country, and that, probably, is what gavecurrency in former days to the story about Olympias; no doubt a serpent of thatsort slept with her when she was carrying Alexander.⁸ So they bought one of thereptiles, the finest, for a few coppers; [8] and, in the words of Thucydides:"Here beginneth the war!"⁹

As you might have expected of two consummaterascals, greatly daring, fully prepared for mischief, who had put their headstogether, they readily discerned that human life is swayed by two greattyrants, hope and fear, and that a man who could use both of these to advantagewould speedily enrich himself. For they perceived that both to one who fearsand to one who hopes, foreknowledge is very essential and very keenly coveted,and that long ago not only Delphi, but Delos and Clarus and Branchidae, hadbecome rich and famous because, thanks to the tyrants just mentioned, hope andfear, men continually visited their sanctuaries and sought to learn the futurein advance, and to that end sacrificed hecatombs and dedicated ingots of gold.By turning all this round and round in conference with one another and keeping it astir, they concoctedthe project of founding a prophetic shrine and oracle, hoping that if theyshould succeed in it, they would at once be rich and prosperous—which, in fact,befell them in greater measure than they at first expected, and turned outbetter than they hoped.

9.  Then they began planning, first about theplace, and next, what should be the commencement and the character of theventure. Cocconas thought Chalcedon a suitable and convenient place, close toThrace and Bithynia, and not far, too, from Asia¹⁰ and Galatia andall the peoples of the interior. Alexander, on the other hand, preferred hisown home, saying— and it was true—that to commence such a venture they needed"fat-heads" and simpletons to be their victims, and such, he said, were thePaphlagonians who lived up above Abonoteichus, who were for the most partsuperstitious and rich; whenÂ-ever a man but turned up with someone at his heelsto play the flute or the tambourine or the cymbals, telling fortunes with a sieve,as the phrase goes,¹¹ they were all agog over him on the instant andstared at him as if he were a god from heaven.

10.  There was no slight difference of opinion betweenthem on that score, but in the end Alexander won, and going to Chalcedon, sinceafter all that city seemed to them to have some usefulness, in the temple ofApollo, which is the most ancient in Chalcedon, they buried bronze tabletswhich said that very soon Asclepius, with his father Apollo, would move toPontus and take up his residence at Abonoteichus. The opportune discovery ofthese tablets caused this story to spread quickly to all Bithynia and Pontus,and to Abonoteichus sooner than anywhere else. Indeed, the people of that cityimmediately voted to build a temple and began at once to dig for thefoundations. Then Cocconas was left behind in Chalcedon, composing equivocal, ambiguous,obscure oracles, and died before long, bitten, I think, by a viper. [11] It wasAlexander who was sent in first; he now wore his hair long, had fallingringlets, dressed in a parti-coloured tunic of white and purple, with a whitecloak over it, and carried a falchion like that of Perseus, from whom heclaimed descent on his mother's side. And although those miserablePaphlagonians knew that both his parents were obscure, humble folk, theybelieved the oracle when it said:

"Here in your sight is a scion of Perseus, dearunto Phoebus;
This isdivine Alexander, who shareth the blood of the Healer!"

Podaleirius, the Healer, it would appear, wasso passionate and amorous that his ardour carried him all the way from Triccato Paphlagonia in quest of Alexander's mother! ¹²

An oracle by now had turned up which purportedto be a prior prediction by the Sibyl:

"On the shores of the Euxine sea, in the neighbourhood of Sinope,
There shall be born, by a Tower, in the days ofthe Romans, a prophet;
After the foremost unit and three times ten, hewill shew forth
Five moreunits besides, and a score told three times over,
Matching, with places four, the name of avaliant defender !"¹³

12.  Well, upon invading his native land with allthis pomp and circumstance after a long absence, Alexander was a man of markand note, affecting as he did to have occasional fits of madness anti causinghis mouth to fill with foam. This he easily managed by chewing the root ofsoapwort, the plant that dyers use; but to his fellow-countrymen even the foamseemed supernatural and awe-inspiring. Then, too, they had long ago preparedand fitted up a serpent's head of linen, which had something of a human look, was all painted up, andappeared very lifelike. It would open and close its mouth by means ofhorsehairs, and a forked black tongue like a snake's, also controlled byhorsehairs, would dart out. Besides, the serpent from Pella was ready inadvance and was being cared for at home, destined in due time to manifesthimself to them and to take a part in their show—in fact, to be cast for theleading rôle.

13.  When at length it was time to begin, he contrivedan ingenious ruse. Going at night to the foundations of the temple which werejust being excavated, where a pool of water had gathered which either issuedfrom springs somewhere in the foundations themselves or had fallen from thesky, he secreted there a goose-egg, previously blown, which contained a snakejust born; and after burying it deep in the mud, he went back again. In themorning he ran out into the market-place naked, wearing a loin-cloth (this toowas gilded),¹⁴carrying his falchion, and tossing his unconfined manelike a devotee of the Great Mother in the frenzy. Addressing the people from ahigh altar upon which he had climbed, he congratulated the city because it wasat once to receive the god in visible presence. The assembly—for almost thewhole city, including women, old men, and boys, had come running— marvelled,prayed and made obeisance. Uttering, a few meaningless words like Hebrew orPhoenician, he dazed the creatures, who did not know what he was saying save only that he everywhere broughtin Apollo and Asclepius. [14] Then he ran at full speed to the future temple, wentto the excavation and the previously improvised fountain-head of the oracle,entered 'the water, sang hymns in honour of Asclepius and Apollo at the top ofhis voice, and besought the god, under the blessing of Heaven, to come to thecity. Then he asked for a libation-saucer, and when somebody handed him one,deftly slipped it underneath and brought up, along with water and mud, that eggin which he had immured the god; the joint about the plug had been closed withwax and white lead. Taking it in his hands, he asserted that at that moment heheld Asclepius! They gazed unwaveringly to see what in the world was going tohappen; indeed, they had already marvelled at the discovery of the egg in thewater. But when he broke it and received the tiny snake into his hollowed hand,and the crowd saw it moving and twisting about his fingers, they at once raiseda shout, welcomed the god, congratulated their city, and began each of them tosate himÂ-self greedily with prayers, craving treasures, riches, health, andevery other blessing from, him. But Alexander went home again at full speed,taking with him the new-born Asclepius, "born twice, when other men are bornbut once,"¹⁵ whose mother was not Coronis,¹⁶by Zeus, nor yet a crow,but a goose! And the whole population followed, all full of religious fervourand crazed with expectations.

15.  For some days he remained at home, expectingwhat actually happened—that as the news spread, crowds of Paphlagonians wouldcome running in. When the city had become over-full of people, all of themalready bereft of their brains and sense, and not in the least likebread-eating humans, but different from beasts of the field only in theirlooks, he seated himself on a couch in a certain chamber, clothed in apparelwell suited to a god, and took into his bosom his Asclepius from Pella, who, as I have said, was of uncommon size and beauty.¹⁷ Coiling him about his neck, andletting the tail, which was long, stream over his lap and drag part of itslength on the floor, he concealed only the head by holding it under his arm—thecreature would submit to anything—and showed the linen head at one side of hisown beard, as if it certainly belonged to the creature that was in view.

16.  Now then, please imagine a little room, notvery bright and not admitting any too much daylight; also, a crowd ofheterogeneous humanity, excited, wonder-struck in advance, agog with hopes.When they went in, the thing, of course, seemed to them a miracle, that theformerly tiny snake within a few days had turned into so great a serpent, witha human face, moreover, and tame! They were immediately crowded towards theexit, and before they could look closely were forced out by those who keptcoming in, for another door had been opened on the opposite side as anexit. That was the way the Macedonians did, they say, in Babylon duringAlexander's illness, when he was in a bad way and they surrounded the palace,craving to see. him and say good-bye. This exhibition the scoundrel gave notmerely once, they say, but again and again, above all if any rich men werenewly arrived.

17.  In that matter, dear Celsus, to tell the truth,we must excuse those men of Paphlagonia and Pontus, thick-witted, uneducatedfellows that they were, for being deluded when they touched the serpent—Alexander let anyone do so who wished—and besides saw in a dim light whatpurported to be its head opening and shutting its mouth. Really the trick stoodin need of a Democritus, or even Epicurus himself or Metrodorus, or someoneelse with a mind as firm as adamant toward such matters, so as to disbelieveand guess the truth— one who, if he could not discover how it went, would atall events be convinced beforehand that though the method of the fraud escapedhim, it was nevertheless all sham and could not possibly happen.

18.  Little by little, Bithynia, Galatia, and Thracecame pouring in, for everyone who carried the news very likely said that he notonly had seen the god born but had subsequently touched him, after he had grownvery great in a short time and had a face that looked like a man's. Next camepaintings and statues and cult-images, some made of bronze, some of silver, andnaturally a name was bestowed upon the god. He was called Glycon in consequenceof a divine behest in metre; for Alexander proclaimed:

"Glycon am I, the grandson of Zeus, brightbeacon to mortals!"

19.  When it was time to carry out the purpose forwhich the whole scheme had been concocted—that is to say, to make predictionsand give oracles to those who sought them—taking his cue from Amphilochus inCilicia, who, as you know, after the death and disappearance of his fatherAmphiaraus at Thebes,¹⁸ was exiled from his own country, went to Cilicia, andgot on very well by foretelling the future, like his father, for the Ciliciansand getting two obols for each prediction—taking, as I say, his cue from him,Alexander announced to all comers that the god would make prophecies, and nameda date for it in advance. He directed everyone to write down in a scrollwhatever he wanted and what he especially wished to learn, to tie it up, and toseal it with wax or clay or something else of that sort. Then he himself, aftertaking the scrolls and entering the inner sanctuary—for by that time the templehad been erected and the stage set—proposed to summon in order, with heraldand priest, those who had submitted them, and after the god told him about eachcase, to give back the scroll with the seal upon it, just as it was, and thereply to it endorsed upon it; for the god would reply explicitly to any questionthat anyone should put.

20.  As a matter of fact, this trick, to a man likeyou, and if it is not out of place to say so, like myself also, was obvious andeasy to see through, but to those drivelling idiots it was miraculous andalmost as good as incredible. Having discovered various ways of undoing theseals, he would read all the questions and answer them as he thought best. Thenhe would roll up the scrolls again, seal them, and give them back, to the greatastonishment of the recipients, among whom the comment was frequent: "Why, howdid he learn the questions which I gave him very securely sealed withimpressionshard to counterfeit, unless there was really some god that knew everything?"

21.  "What were his discoveries, then?" perhaps youwill ask. Listen, therefore, in order to be able to show up such impostors. Thefirst, my dear Celsus, was a well-known method; heating a needle, he removedthe seal by melting through the wax underneath it, and after reading thecontents he warmed the wax once more with the needle, both that which was underthe thread and that which contained the seal, and so stuck it together withoutdifficulty. Another method was by using what they call plaster; this is acompound of Bruttian pitch, asphalt, pulverized gypsum, wax, and gum Arabic.Making his plaster out of all these materials and warming it over the fire, heapplied it to the seal, which he had previously wetted with saliva, and took amould of the impression. Then, since the plaster hardened at once, after easilyopening and reading the scrolls, he applied the wax and made an impression uponit precisely like the original, just as one would with a gem. Let me tell you athird method, in addition to these. Puttingmarble-dust into the glue with which they glue books and making a paste of it,he applied that to the seal while it was still soft, and then, as it grows hardat once, more solid than horn or even iron, he removed it and used it for theimpression. There are many other devices to this end, but they need not all bementioned, for fear that we might seem to be wanting in taste, especially in viewof the fact that in the book which you wrote against the sorcerers, a very goodand useful treatise, capable of preserving common-sense in its readers, youcited instances enough, and indeed a great many more than I have.¹⁹

22.  Well, as I say, Alexander made predictions andgave oracles, employing great shrewdness in it and combining guesswork with histrickery. He gave responses that were sometimes obscure and amÂ-biguous,sometimes downright unintelligible, for this seemed to him in the oracularmanner. Some people he dissuaded or encouraged as seemed best to him at aguess. To others he prescribed medical treatments and diets, knowing, as I saidin the beginning, many useful remedies. His "cytmides" were in highest favourwith him—a name which he had coined for a restorative ointment compounded ofbear's grease.²⁰Expectations, however, and advancements and successions to estates healways put off to another day, adding: "It shall all come about when I will,and when Alexander, my prophet, asks it of me and prays for you."

23.  A price had been fixed for each oracle, adrachma and two obols.²¹ Do not think that it was low, my friend, or that therevenue from this source was scanty! He gleaned as much as seventy or eightythousand²² a year, since men were so greedy as to send in ten and fifteenquestions each. What he received he did not use for himself alone nor treasureup to make himself rich, but since he had many men about him by this time asassistants, servants, collectors of information, writers of oracles, custodiansof oracles, clerks, sealers, and expounders, he divided with all, giving eachone what was proportionate to his worth.

24.  By now he was even sending men abroad to createrumours in the different nations in regard to the oracle and to say that hemade predictions, discovered fugitive slaves, detected thieves and robbers,caused treasures to be dug up, healed the sick, and in some cases had actuallyraised the dead. So there was a hustling and a bustling from every side, withsacrifices and votive offerings—and twice as much for the prophet and discipleof the god. For this oracle also had come out:

"Honour I bid you to give my faithful servant,the prophet;
No great store do I set upon riches, but muchon the prophet."

25.  When at last many sensible men, recovering, asit were, from profound intoxication, combined against him, especially all thefollowers of Epicurus, and when in the cities they began gradually to detectall the trickery and buncombe of the show, he issued a promulgation designed toscare them, saying that Pontus was full of atheists and Christians who had thehardihood to utter the vilest abuse of him; these he bade them drive away withstones if they wanted to have the god gracious. About Epicurus, moreover, hedelivered himself of an oracle after this sort; when someone asked him howEpicurus was doing in Hades, he replied:

"With leadenfetters on his feet in filthy mire he sitteth."

Do you wonder, then, that the shrine waxedgreat, now that you see that the questions of its visitors were intelligent andrefined?

In general, the war that he waged upon Epicuruswas without truce or parley, naturally enough. Upon whom else would a quack wholoved humbug and bitterly hated truth more fittingly make war than uponEpicurus, who discerned the nature of things and alone knew the truth in them?The followers of Plato and Chrysippus and Pythagoras were his friends, andthere was profound peace with them; but "the impervious Epicurus" —forthat is what he called him—was rightly his bitter enemy, since he consideredall that sort of thing a laughing-matter and a joke. So Alexander hatedAmastris most of all the cities in Pontus because he knew that the followers of Lepidus²³ and others like themwere numerous in the city; and he would never deliver an oracle to anAmastrian. Once when he did venture to make a prediction for a senator'sbrother, he acquitted himself ridiculously, since he could neither compose aclever response himself nor find anyone else who could do it in time. The man complained of colic, and Alexander, wishing to direct him to eat a pig's footcooked with mallow, said:

"Mallow with cummin digest in a sacred pipkinof piglets."

26.  Again and again, as I said before, he exhibitedthe serpent to all who requested it, not in its entirety, but exposing chieflythe tail and the rest of the body and keeping the head out of sight under hisarm. But as he wished to astonish the crowd still more, he promised to producethe god talking—delivering oracles in person without a prophet. It was nodifficult matter for him to fasten cranes' windpipes together and pass themthrough the head, which he had so fashioned as to be lifelike. Then he answeredthe questions through someone else, who spoke into the tube from the outside,so that the voice issued from his canvas Asclepius.²⁴

These oracles were called autophones, and werenot given to everybody promiscuously, but only to those who were noble, rich, and free-handed.[27] For example, the oracle given to Severianus in regard to his invasion ofArmenia was one of the autophones. Alexander encouraged him to the invasion bysaying:

"Under your charging spear shall fall Armeniansand Parthi;
Then you shall fare to Rome and the gloriouswaters of Tiber
Wearing upon your brow the chaplet studded withsunbeams."²⁵

Then when that silly Celt, being convinced,made the invasion and ended by getting himself and his army cut to bits byOsroes, Alexander expunged this oracle from his records and inserted another inits place

"Better for you that your forces againstArmenia march not,
Lest some man, like a woman bedight, despatchfrom his bowstring
Grim death, cutting you off from life and enjoymentof sunlight." ²⁶

28.  That was one of his devices, and a very cleverone—belated oracles to make amends for those in which he had made badpredictions and missed the mark. Often he would promise good health to sick men before their demise, and when they diedanother oracle would be ready with a recantation:

"Seek no more for assistance against thy bitteraffliction;
Death now standeth in view; 'tis beyond thypower to 'scape him."

29.  As he was aware that the priests at Clarus andDidymi and Mallus were themselves in high repute for the same sort ofdivination, he made them his friends by sending many of his visitors to them,saying:

"Now unto Clarus begone, to the voice of myfather²⁷to hearken."

and at another time,

Visit the fane of the Branchids and hear whatthe oracle sayeth,"

and again,

"Make thy way unto Mallus and let Amphilochusanswer."

30.  So far, we have been concerned with his doingsnear the frontier, extending over Ionia, Cilicia, Paphlagonia, and Galatia.But when the renown of his prophetic shrine spread to Italy and invaded thecity of Rome, everybody without exception, each on the other's heels, madehaste, some to go in person, some to send; this was the case particularly withthose who had the greatest power and the highest rank in the city. The firstand foremost of these was Rutilianus,²⁸ who, though a man of birth and breeding, put to the proof in many Romanoffices, nevertheless in all that concerned the gods was very infirm and heldstrange beliefs about them. If he but saw anywhere a stone smeared with holyoil or adorned with a wreath,²⁹ he would fall on his face forthwith, kiss hishand, and stand beside it for a long time making vows and craving blessingsfrom it.

When this man heard the tales about the oracle,he very nearly abandoned the office which had been committed to him and tookwing to Abonoteichus. Anyhow, he sent one set of messengers after another, andhis emissaries, mere illiterate serving-people, were easily deluded, so whenthey came back, they told not only what they had seen but what they had heardas if they had seen it, and threw in something more for good measure, so as togain favour with their master. Consequently, they inflamed the poor old man andmade him absolutely crazy. [31] Having many powerful friends, he went about not onlytelling what he had heard from his messengers but adding still more on his ownaccount. So he flooded and convulsed the city, and agitated most of the court,who themselves at once hastened to go and hear something that concerned them.

To all who came, Alexander gave a very cordialreception, made them think well of him by lavish entertainment and expensivepresents, and sent them back not merely to report the answers totheir questions, but to sing the praises of the god and to tell portentous liesabout the oracle on their own account. [32] At the same time, however, the plaguyscoundrel devised a trick which was really clever and not what one would expectof your ordinary swindler. In opening and reading the forwarded scrolls, if hefound anything dangerous and venturesome in the questions, he would keep themhimself and not send them back, in order to hold the senders in subjection andall but in slavery because of their fear, since they remembered what it wasthat they had asked. You understand what questions are likely to be put by menwho are rich and very powerful. So he used to derive much gain from those men,who knew that he had them in his net.

33.  I should like to tell you some of theresponses that were given to Rutilianus. Asking about his son by a formermarriage, who was then in the full bloom of youth, he enquired who should beappointed his tutor in his studies. The reply was:

"Be it Pythagoras; aye, and the good bard,master of warfare."

Then after a few days the boy died, and Alexanderwas at his wit's end, with nothing to say to his critics, as the oracle hadbeen shown up so obviously. But Rutilianus himself, good soul, made haste todefend the oracle by saying that the god had predicted precisely this outcome,and on account of it had bidden him to select as his tutor nobody then alive,but rather Pythagoras and Homer, who died long ago, with whom, no doubt, thelad was then studying in Hades. What fault, then, should we find withAlexander if he thought fit to amuse himself at the expense of such homunculi?

34.  At another time, when Rutilianus enquired whosesoul he had inherited, the reply was:

"Peleus' son wert thou at the first; thereafterMenander,
Then what thou seemest now, and hereafter shaltturn to a sunbeam.
Four score seasons of life shall be given theeover a hundred."

But as a matter of fact he died insane atseventy without awaiting the fulfilment of the god's promise! [35] This oracle toowas one of the autophones.

When one time he enquired about gettingmarried, Alexander said explicitly:

"Take Alexander's daughter to wife, who wasborn of Selene."

He had long before given out a story to theeffect that his daughter was by Selene; for Selene had fallen in love with himon seeing him asleep once upon a time—it is a habit of hers, you know, to adorehandsome lads in their sleep !³⁰ Without any hesitation that prince of sagesRutilianus sent for the girl at once, celebrated his nuptials as asexagenarian bridegroom, and took her to wife, propitiating his mother-in-law,the moon, with whole hecatombs and imagining that he  himself had become one ofthe Celestials!

36.  No sooner did Alexander get Italy in hand than he began to devise projects that were ever greater and greater, and sentoracle-mongers everywhere in the Roman Empire, warning the cities to be ontheir guard against plagues and conflagrations and earthÂ-quakes; he promisedthat he would himself afford them infallible aid so that none of thesecalamities should befall them. There was one oracle, also an autophone, whichhe despatched to all the nations during the pestilence³¹; it was but a singleverse:

"Phoebus, the god unshorn, keepeth off plague'snebulous onset."

This verse was to be seen everywhere writtenover doorways as a charm against the plague; but in most cases it had thecontrary result. By some chance it was particularly the houses on which theverse was inscribed that were depopulated! Do not suppose me to mean that theywere stricken on account of the verse—by some chance or other it turned outthat way, and perhaps, too, people neglected precautions because of theirconfidence in the line and lived too carelessly, giving the oracle noassistance against the disease because they were going to have the syllables todefend them and "unshorn Phoebus" to drive away the plague with his arrows!

37.  Moreover, Alexander posted a great number ofhis fellow-conspirators in Rome itself as his agents, who reported everyone'sviews to him and gave him advance information about the questions and theespecial wishes of those who consulted him, so that the messengers might findhim ready to answer even before they arrived

38.  He made these preparations to meet thesituation in Italy, and also made notable preparations at home. He established a celebration of mysteries, withtorchÂ-light ceremonies and priestly offices, which was to be held annually, forthree days in succession, in perpetuity. On the first day, as at Athens,³²there was a proclamation, worded as follows: "If any atheist or Christian orEpicurean has come to spy upon the rites, let him be off, and let those whobelieve in the god perform the mysteries, under the blessing of Heaven." Then,at the very outset, there was an "expulsion," in which he took the lead,saying: "Out with the Christians," and the wholemultitude chanted in response, "Out with the Epicureans!" Then there was thechild-bed of Leto, the birth of Apollo, his marriage to Coronis, and the birthof Asclepius. On the second day came the manifestation of Glycon, includingthe birth of the god. [39] On the third day there was the union of Podaleirius andthe mother of Alexander—it was called the Day of Torches, and torches wereburned. In conclusion there was the amour of Selene and Alexander, and thebirth of Rutilianus' wife. The torch-bearer and hierophant was our Endymion,Alexander. While he lay in full view, pretending to be asleep, there came downto him from the roof, as if from heaven, not Selene but Rutilia, a very prettywoman, married to one of the Emperor's stewards. She was genuinely in love withAlexander and he with her; and before the eyes of her worthless husband therewere kisses and embraces in public. If the torches had not been numerous, perhaps the thing wouldhave been carried even further. After a short time Alexander entered again, robedas a priest, amid profound silence, and said in a loud voice, over and overagain, "Hail, Glycon," while, following in his train, a number of would-beEumolpids and Ceryces³³ from Paphlagonia, with brogans on their feet and breathsthat reeked of garlic, shouted in response, "Hail, Alexander!"

40.  Often in the course of the torchlightceremonies and the gambols of the mysteries his thigh was bared purposely andshowed golden. No doubt gilded leather had been put about it, which gleamed inthe light of the cressets. There was once a discussion between two of ourlearned idiots in regard to him, whether he had the soul of Pythagoras, onaccount of the golden thigh, or some other soul akin to it.³⁴Theyreferred this question to Alexander himself, and King Glycon resolved theirdoubt with an oracle:

"Nay, Pythagoras' soul now waneth andother times waxeth;
His, with prophecy gifted, from God's mindtaketh its issue,
Sent by the Father to aid good men in thestress of the conflict;
Then it to God will return, by God's ownthunderÂ-bolt smitten."

41.  Although he cautioned all to abstain from intercoursewith boys on the ground that it was impious, for his own part this pattern ofpropriety made a clever arrangement. He commanded the cities in Pontus andPaphlagonia to send choir-boys for three years' service, to sing hymns to the god in hishousehold; they were required to examine, select, and send the noblest,youngest, and most handsome. These he kept under ward and treated like boughtslaves, sleeping with them and affronting them in every way. He made it a rule,too, not to greet anyone over eighteen years with his lips, or to embrace andkiss him; he kissed only the young, extending his hand to the others to bekissed by them. They were called "those within the kiss."

42.  He duped the simpletons in this way from firstto last, ruining women right and left as well as living with favourites.Indeed, it was a great thing that everyone coveted if he simply cast his eyesupon a man's wife; if, however, he deemed her worthy of a kiss, each husbandthought that good fortune would flood his house. Many women even boasted thatthey had had children by Alexander, and their husbands bore witness that theyspoke the truth!

43.  I want to include in my tale a dialogue betweenGlycon and one Sacerdos, a man of Tius, whose intelligence you will be able toappraise from his questions. I read the conversation in an inscription inletters of gold, at Tius, in the house of Sacerdos. "Tell me, Master Glycon," saidhe, "who are you?" "I am the latter-day Asclepius," he replied. "A differentperson from the one of former times? What do you mean?" "It is not permittedyou to hear that." "How many years will you tarry among us delivering oracles?""One thousand and three." "Then where shall you go?" "To Bactra and thatregion, for the barbarians too must profit by my presence among men." "What of the other prophetic shrines, theone in Didymi, the one in Clarus, and the one in Delphi—do they still have yourfather Apollo as the source of their oracles, or are the predictions now givenout there false?" "This too you must not wish to know; it is not permitted.""What about myself—what shall I be after my present life?" "A camel, then a horse,then a wise man and prophet just as great as Alexander."

That was Glycon's conversation with Sacerdos;and in conclusion he uttered an oracle in verse, knowing that Sacerdos was afollower of Lepidus:'

"Put notin Lepidus faith, for a pitiful doom is in waiting."

That was because he greatly feared Epicurus, asI have said before, seeing in him an opponent and critic of his trickery.

44.  Indeed, he seriously imperilled one of the Epicureanswho ventured to expose him in the presence of a great crowd. The man went upto him and said in a loud voice: "Come now, Alexander! You prevailed uponsuch-and-such a Paphlagonian to put his servants on trial for their livesbefore the governor of Galatia on the charge that they had murdered his son, astudent at Alexandria. But the young man is living, and has come back aliveafter the execution of the servants, whom you gave over to the wild beasts."What had happened was this. The young man cruised up the Nile as far as Clysma,³⁵and as a vessel was just putting to sea, was induced to join others in a voyageto India. Then because he was overdue, those ill-starred servantsconcluded that the young man either had lost his life during his cruise upon the Nile or had been made away with by brigands, who were numerous at thetime; and they returned with the report of his disappearance. Then followedthe oracle and their condemnation, after which the young man presentedhimself, telling of his travels.

45.  When he told this tale, Alexander, indignant atthe exposure and unable to bear the truth of the reproach, told the bystandersto stone him, or else they themselves would be accurst and would bear the nameof Epicureans. They had begun to throw stones when a man named Demostratus whohappened to be in the city, one of the most prominent men in Pontus,³⁶ flung hisarms about the fellow and saved him from death. But he had come very near tobeing overwhelmed with stones, and quite properly! Why did he have to be the only man of sense among all those lunatics and suffer from the idiocy of thePaphlagonians?

46.  That man, then, was thus dealt with. Moreover,if in any case, when men were called up in the order of their applications(which took place the day before the prophecies were given out) and the heraldenquired: "Has he a prophecy for So-and-so," the reply came from within: "Tothe ravens," nobody would ever again receive such a person under his roof orgive him fire or water, but he had to be harried from country to country as animpious man, an atheist, and an Epicurean—which, indeed, was their strongestterm of abuse.

47.  One of Alexander's acts in this connection wasmost comical. Hitting upon the "Established Beliefs" of Epicurus, which is thefinest of his books, as you know, and contains in summary the articles of the man's philosophic creed,³⁷ he brought it into the middle of the market-place,burned it on fagots of fig-wood just as if he were burning the man in person,and threw the ashes into the sea, even adding an oracle also:

"Burn with fire, I command you, the creed of apurblind dotard!"

But the scoundrel had no idea what blessingsthat book creates for its readers and what peace, tranquillity, and freedom itengenders in them, liberating them as it does from terrors and apparitions andportents, from vain hopes and extravagant cravings, developing in them intelligence and truth, and truly purifying their understanding, not withtorches and squills and that sort of foolery, but with straight thinking,truthfulness and frankness.

48.  Of all this blackguard's emprises, however,hear one, the greatest. Since he had no slight influence in the palace and atcourt through the favour which Rutilianus enjoyed, he published an oracle atthe height of the war in Germany, when the late Emperor Marcus himself had atlast come to grips with the Marcomanni and Quadi. The oracle recommended thattwo lions be cast into the Danube alive, together with a quantity of perfumesand magnificent offerings. But it will be better torepeat the oracle itself.

"Into thepools of the Ister, the stream that from Zeus taketh issue,
Hurl, I command you, a pair of Cybele'sfaithful attendants,
Beasts that dwell on the mountains, and all that the Indian climate
Yieldeth of flower and herb that is fragrant;amain there shall follow
Victory and great glory, and welcome peace intheir footsteps."

But when all this had been done as he haddirected, the lions swam across to the enemy territory and the barbariansslaughtered them with clubs, thinking them some kind of foreign dogs or wolves;and "amain" that tremendous disaster befel our side, in which a matter oftwenty thousand were wiped out at a blow. Then came what happened at Aquileia,and that city's narrow escape from capture. To meet this issue, Alexander wasflat enough to adduce the Delphian defence in the matter of the oracle givento Croesus, that the God had indeed foretold victory, but had not indicatedwhether it would go to the Romans or to the enemy.³⁸

49.  As by this time throngs upon throngs were pouringin and their city was becoming overcrowded on account of the multitude ofvisitors to the shrine, so that it had not sufficient provisions, he devised the so-called "nocturnal" responses. Takingthe scrolls, he slept on them, so he said, and gave replies that he pretendedto have heard from the god in a dream; which, however, were in most cases notclear but ambiguous and confused, particularly when he observed that the scrollhad been sealed up with unusual care. Taking no extra chances, he would appendat random whatever answer came into his head, thinking that this procedure toowas appropriate to oracles; and there were certain expounders who sat by withthat in view and garnered large fees from the recipients of such oracles forexplaining and unriddling them. Moreover, this task of theirs was subject to alevy; the expounders paid Alexander an Attic talent each.

50.  Sometimes, to amaze dolts, he would deliver anoracle for the benefit of someone who had neither enquired nor sent—who, infact, did not exist at all. For example:

"Seek thou out that man who in utmost secrecyshrouded
Tumbleth at home on the couch thy helpmeet Calligeneia,
Slave Protogenes, him upon whom thou fully reliest.
He was corrupted by thee, and now thy wife hecorrupteth,
Making a bitter return unto thee for his ownviolation.
Aye more, now against thee a baneful charm theyhave fashioned
So that thou mayst not hear nor see what deedsthey are doing;
This shalt thou find on the floor, beneath thybed, by the wall-side,
Close to the head; thy servant Calypso shareth the secret."

What Democritus³⁹ would not have been disturbedon hearing names amid places specified—and would not have been filled withcontempt soon afterward, when he saw through their stratagem?

52.^*  Again, to someone else who was not there anddid not exist at all, he said in prose: "Go back; he  who sent you was killedtoday by his neighbour Diodes, with the help of the bandits Magnus, Celer,and Bubalus, who already have been caught and imprisoned."

51.  I may say too that he often gave oracles tobarbarians, when anyone put a question in his native language, in Syrian or inCeltic; since he readily found strangers in the city who belonged to the samenation as his questioners. That is why the time between the presentation of the scrolls and the delivery ofthe oracle was long, so that in the interval the questions might be unsealed at leisure without risk and men might be foundwho would be able to translate them fully. Of this sort was the responsegiven to the Scythian:

"Morphen eubargoulis eis skian chnechikrageleipsei phaos."⁴⁰

53.  Let me also tell you a few of the responsesthat were given to me. When I asked whether Alexander was bald, and sealed thequestion carefully and conspicuously, a "nocturnal" oracle was appended:

"Sabardalachou malachaattealos en."⁴¹

At another time, I asked a single question ineach of two scrolls under a different name, "What was the poet Homer'scountry?" In one case, misled by my serving-man, who had been asked why he cameand had said, "To request a cure for a pain in the side," he replied:

"Cytmis⁴²I bid you apply, combinedwith the spume of a charger."

To the other, since in this case he had beentold that the one who sent it enquired whether it would be better for him to goto Italy by sea or by land, he gave an answer which had nothing to do with Homer:

"Make not your journey by sea, but travel afootby the highway."

54.  Many such traps, in fact, were set for him byme and by others. For example, I put a single question, and wrote upon the outside of the scroll, following the usual form: "Eight questions fromSo-and-so," using a fictitious name and sending the eight drachmas andwhatever it came to besides.⁴³Relying upon the fee that had been sent and upon the inscription on the roll, to the single question: "When will Alexander be caught cheating?" hesent me eight responses which, as the saying goes, had no connection with earthor with heaven, but were silly and nonsensical every one.

When he found out about all this afterward, andalso that it was I who was attempting to dissuade Rutilianus from the marriageand from his great dependence upon the hopes inspired by the shrine, he beganto hate me, as was natural, and to count me a bitter enemy. Once whenRutilianus asked about me, he replied:

"Low-voiced walks in the dusk are his pleasure,and impious matings."

And generally, I was of course the man he mosthated.

55.  When he discovered that I had entered the cityand ascertained that I was the Lucian of whom he had heard (I had brought, Imay add, two soldiers with me, a pikeman and a spearman borrowed from theGovernor of Cappadocia, then a friend of mine, to escort me to the sea), he atonce sent for me very politely and with great show of friendliness. When Iwent, I found many about him; but I had brought along my two soldiers, as luckwould have it. Heextended me his right hand to kiss, as his custom was with the public; Iclasped it as if to kiss it, and almost crippled it with a right good bite!

The bystanders tried to choke and beat me forsacrilege; even before that, they had been indignant because I had addressedhim as Alexander and not as "Prophet." But he mastered himself very handsomely, held them in check, and promised thathe would easily make me tame and would demonstrate Glycon's worth by showingthat he transformed even bitter foes into friends. Then he removed everybodyand had it out with me, professing to know very well who I was and what adviceI was giving Rutilianus, and saying, "What possessed you to do this to me, whenI can advance you tremendously in his favour?" By that time I was glad toreceive this proffer of friendship, since I saw what a perilous position I had taken up; so, after a little, Ireappeared as his friend, and it seemed quite a miracle to the observers thatmy change of heart had been so easily effected.

56.  Then, when I decided to sail—it chanced that Iwas accompanied only by Xenophon⁴⁴ during my visit, as I had previously sent myfather and my family on to Amastris—he sent me many remembrances and presents,and promised too that he himself would furnish a boat and a crew to transportme. I considered this a sincere and polite offer; but when I was inmid-passage, I saw the master in tears, disputing with the sailors, and began tobe very doubtful about the prospects. It was a fact that they had receivedorders from Alexander to throw us bodily into the sea. If that had been done,his quarrel with me would have been settled without ado; but by his tears themaster prevailed upon his crew to do us no harm. "For sixty years, as you see,"said he to me, "I have led a blameless and God-fearing life, and I should notwish, at this age and with a wife and children, to stain my hands with murder;" and he explained for what purposehe had taken us aboard, and what orders had been given by Alexander. [57]  He set usashore at Aegiali (which noble Homer mentions⁴⁵), and then they went back again.

There I found some men from the Bosporus whowere voyaging along the coast. They were going as ambassadors from King Eupatorto Bithynia, to bring the yearly contribution.⁴⁶I told them of theperil in which we had been, found them courteous, was taken aboard theirvessel, and won safely through to Amastris, after coming so close to losing mylife.

Thereupon I myself began to prepare for battlewith him, and to employ every resource in my desire to pay him back. Evenbefore his attempt upon me, I detested him and held him in bitter enmity onaccount of the vileness of his character. So I undertook to prosecute him, andhad many associÂ-ates, particularly the followers of Timocrates, the philosopherfrom Heraclea. But the then governor of Bithynia and Pontus, Avitus,⁴⁷ checkedme, all but beseeching and imploring me to leave off, because out of good willto Rutilianus he could not, he said, punish Alexander even if he should findhim clearly guilty of crime. In that way my effort was thwarted, and I left offexhibiting misplaced zeal before a judge who was in that state of mind.⁴⁸

58.  Was it not also a great piece of impudence onthe part of Alexander that he should petition the Emperor to change the name ofAbonoteichus and call it Ionopolis, and to strike a new coin bearing on oneside the likeness of Glycon and on the other that of Alexander, wearing thefillets of his grandÂ-father Asclepius and holding the falchion of his maternalancestor Perseus?⁴⁹

59.  In spite of his prediction in an oracle that hewas fated to live a hundred and fifty years and then die by a stroke oflightning, he met a most wretched end before reaching the age of seventy, in amanner that befitted a son of Podaleirius ;⁵⁰ for his leg became mortifiedquite to the groin and was infested with maggots. it was then that his baldnesswas detected when because of the pain he let the doctors foment his head, which they could not. have done unless his wig had been removed.

60.  Such was the conclusion of Alexander'sspectacular career, and such thedenouementof the whole play; being as it was, it resembled an act of Providence,although it came about by chance. It was inevitable, too, that he should havefuneral games worthy of his career—that a contest for the shrine should arise.The foremost of his fellow-conspirators and impostors referred it to Rutilianusto decide which of them should be given the preference, should succeed to theshrine, and should be crowned with the fillet of priest and prophet. Paetus wasone of them, a physician by profession, a greybeard, who conducted himself in away that befitted neither a physician nor a greybeard. But Rutilianus, theumpire, sent them off unfilleted, keeping the post of prophet for the masterafter his departure from this life.

61.  This, my friend, is but a little out of a greatdeal; I have thought fit to set it down as a specimen, not only to pleasure youas an associate and friend whom above all others I hold in admiration for yourwisdom, your love of truth, the gentleness and reasonableness of your ways,the peacefulness of your life, and your courtesy toward all whom you encounter,but mostly—and this will give greater pleasure to you also—to right the wrongsof Epicurus, a man truly saintly and divine in his nature, who alone trulydiscerned right ideals and handed them down, who proved himself the liberatorof all who sought his converse. I think too that to its readers the writingwill seem to have some usefulness, refuting as it does certain falsehoods andconfirming certain truths in the minds of all men of sense.

1 The scholiast thinks this Celsus the writerof theTrue Word,an attack upon Christianity, to which Origen repliedin his eight bookscontra Celsum.He is certainly identical with the manwhom Origen himself believed to be the author of that work, who, he says, wasan Epicurean living under Hadrian and the Antonines, author also of a treatiseagainst sorcery(videc. 21 and note). And theTrueWorditself, a large part of which is preserved in Origen, seems to havebeen written about A. D. 180. But as Origen is not sure who wrote it, and as itis considered Platonic rather than Epicurean in character, the prevailingopinion is that its author is not the Celsus of Lucian, but an otherwiseunknown Platonist of the same name and date.

2 There is no life of Tillorobus among theextant writings of Arrian, and we know nothing of him from any other source.His name is given in the g group of MSS. as Tilliborus, but compare C.I.L. vi,15295.

3 The Cercopes were two impish pests whocrossed the path of Heracles to their disadvantage. For the little that isknown about the other typical rascals, see the Index.

4 Yet Pythagoras was no mean thaumaturge; see Plutarch,Numa,65.

5 The word is borrowed from Kipling. A "sending"is a "visitation," seen from a different point of view.

6Odyssey 4,230.

7 Cocconas comes fromKOKKON(modernGreekKOUKOUNARI),pine-kernel, seed, nut. Cf.Anth. Pal.12,222.

8 The story was that Alexander was the son ofZeus, who had visited Olympias in the form of a serpent.

9 Thucydides ii, 1.

10 Asiahere and elsewhere in this piece refers to the Roman province of Asia—westernAsia Minor.

11 Proverbial for cheap trickery. Artemidorus(Dream-book1, 69) says that "if you dream of Pythagoreans, physiognomonics, astragaloinants, tyromants, gyromants,coscinomants,morphoscopes,chiroscopes, lecanomants, or necyomants, you must consider all that they sayfalse and unreliable; for their trades are such. They do not know even alittle bit about prophecy, but fleece their patrons by charlatanism and fraud."Oneiromants may of course be trusted!

The few allusions to coscinomancy in theancients give no clue to the method used. As practised in the sixteenth—seventeenth century, to detect thieves, disclose one's future wife, etc., thesieve was either suspended by a string or more commonly balanced on the top ofa pair of tongs set astride the joined middle fingers of the two hands (or oftwo persons); then, after an incantation, a list of names was repeated, and theone upon which the sieve stirred was the one indicated by fate. Or the sieve,when suspended, might be set spinning; and then the name it stopped on wasdesignated. See, in particular, Johannes Praetorius,de Coscinomantia, Odervom Sieb-Lauffe,etc., Curiae Variscorum, 1677.

12  Podaleirius and his brother Machaon, theHomeric healers(Iliad11, 833), were sons ofAsclepius and lived in Tricca (now Trikkala), Thessaly. According to theSackof Ilium(Evelyn-White,Hesiod,p. 524) Machaon specialized insurgery, Podaleirius in diagnosis and general practice.

13  Since in the Greek notation numbers aredesignated by letters, this combination (1, 30,5,60) isALEX(alex). Alexander seems to have been a little afraid that somerival might steal his thunder if he were not more specific: at all events thefirst two words of the last line give, in the Greek, the entire name (andros-alex).

14Why "this too"? The hilt of the falchion may have been gilt, but Lucianhas not said so. Perhaps Lucian is thinking of Alexander's golden thigh (c.40), and forgets that he has not yet told us of it.

15 Cf.Odyssey,12, 22: "Men of twodeaths, when other men die but once."

16 "Some say that the mother of Asclepius wasnot Arsinoe, daughter of Leucippus, but Coronis, daughter of Phlegyas"(Apollodorus, 3, 10, 3).

17  There was special significance in thisperformance. "Anyhow, 'God in the bosom' is a countersign of the mysteries ofSabazius to the adepts. This is a snake, passed through the bosom of theinitiates" Clement of Alexandria,Protrept,1, 2, 16).

18  In speaking of the "death and disappearance" ofAmphiaraus, Lucian is rationalizing the myth, according to which Zeus clove theearth with a thunderbolt and it swallowed him up alive (Pindar,Nem. 9,57).

19  St. Hippolytus (Refut. omn. Haeres. IV. 28-42) contains a highly interesting section "against sorcerors," including (34) a treatment of this subject.  It is very evidently not his own work; and K. F. Hermann thought it derived from the treatise by Celsus.  Ganschinietz, in Harnack'sTexte und Untersuchungen 39, 2, has disputed this but upon grounds that are not convincing. His commentary,however, is valuable.

20 It is a nice question whether this reading orthat of the other group of MSS., "goat's grease," is to bepreferred. Galen in his treatment of these ointments (Kuhn xiii, p. 1008) doesnot mention bear's grease. But he considers goat's grease only moderately good;and every Yankee knows that in America bear's grease only gave place to goosegrease (also mentioned by Galen) when bears became scarce.

21 Alexander's price was high.  Amphilochus got but two obols (one-fourth as much) at Mallus.  According to Lucian(Timon 6;12;Epist. Saturn.21) the wage of a day-labourer at this time was butfour obols. 

22  Drachmas.

23  An inscription from Amastris (C.I.G. 4149) honours"Tiberius Claudius Lepidus, Chief Priest of pontus and President of theMetropolis of Pontus" (i.e. Amastris).  This can be no other than theLepidus of Lucian.  The priesthood was that of Augustus.  Amastris isalmost due N. of Angora, on the Black Sea, W. of Abonoteichus.

24  St. Hippolytus(l.c.,28) mentions a tube made of wind. pipes of cranes, storks,or swans, and used in a similar way. Du Soul has a note in the Hemsterhuys-Reitz Lucian (ii, p. 234), telling of a wooden head constructed byThomas Irson and exhibited to Charles II, which answered questions in anylanguage and produced a great effect until a confederate was detected using aspeaking-tube in the next room. Du Soul had the story from Irson himself.

25  Thecorona radiata, worn by Augustus, Nero, andthe emperors after Caracalla.  This passage seems to point to its use (inaddition to the laurel wreath?) as one of the triumphal insignia.

26 The Parthians had been interfering with thesuccession to the throne in Armenia. Severianus, Roman governor of Cappadocia,entered Armenia with a small force in 161, and was disastrously defeated atElegeia by Chosroes. Accordin to Dio Cassius (71, 2) the entire force wassurrounded an wiped out. See also Lucian,deHist. Conscrib.21, 24, 25.

27  Apollo.

28  P. Mummius Sisenna Rutilianus.  What office hethen held (see below) is uncertain.  He eventually went through the wholecursushonorum, including the consulship (probably suffect) and the governorship ofUpper Moesia, and ending, about A.D. 170, with the proconsulship of theprovince of Asia.

29 For the Greek worship of stones, see Frazer'sPausanias, vol. iv, 154 sq.; v, 314 sq., 354. In the note last cited he quotesArnobiusadv. NationesI, 39: siquando conspexeram lubricatam lapidem et exolivi unguine sordidatam, tamquaminesset vie praesens adulabar adfabar, beneficia poscebam nihil sentiente detrunco. Add Clement of Alexandria,Strom.7, 4,26. [Greek snipped]

30  A reference to the story of Endymion.

31 The terrible plague which swept the wholeEmpire about A.D. 165.

32 The reference is to the proclamation thatpreceded the Eleusinian mysteries. Its entire content is unknown, but itrequired that the celebrants be clean of hand, pure of heart, and Greek inspeech. Barbarians, homicides, and traitors were excluded; and there was somesort of restriction in regard to previous diet.

33  Hereditary priesthoods in the Eleusinian mysteries.

34  As Pythagoras had a golden thigh (Plutarch,Numa, 65; Aelian,Var. Hist., 2, 26), a believer in metempsychosis might think that Alexander was a reincarnation of Pythagoras.

35 Probably Suez; the ancient canal from theNile to the Red Sea ended there.

36  I suspect that the Greek phrase is really atitle, but cannot prove it; the use ofPROTOSwithout the article seems to make the phrase mean "One of the FirstCitizens."

37 Quis enim vostrum non edidicit Epicuri,KURIAS DOXAS, idest, quasimaxume ratas, quia gravissumae sint ad beate vivendum breviter enuntiataesententiae? Cicero,de Fin. Bon. et Mal.,ii, 7, 20.

38  The invading tribes flooded Rhaetia, Noricum, upperand lower Pannonia, and Dacia, taking a vast number of Roman settlers prisoner,and even entered Italy, capturing and destroying Oderzo.  Details areuncertain; so is the exact date, which was probably between 167 and 169. On the column of Marcus Aurelius in Rome, one of the scenes depicts two animalsswimming across a river, near a boat.  These have been thought to be thelions of the oracle, and indeed they look like lions in therepresentation of Bartoli (Pl. XIII). But Petersen takes them to be bisons. Itis clear, too, from Lucian that Alexander's oracle was given before thecampaign depicted on the column.

39  Democritus of Abdera is adduced as a typicalhard-headed sceptic; see above, c. 17, and theLover of Lies, 32 (vol.iii, p.369).

* Chapters 51 and 52 transposed by Fritsche.

40  Of uncertain meaning, and perhaps corrupt.

41 In failing to submit this tothe official interpreters, Lucian lost a priceless opportunity.

42 Alexander's nostrum; cf c. 22.

43 Since the price of each oracle was onedrachma, two obols, the indefinite plus was sixteen obols, or 2dr. 4 obols.

44 Probably a slave or a freedman. He is notmentioned elsewhere in Lucian.

45 Iliad, 2, 855.

46.  Tiberius Julius Eupator succeeded Rhoemetalces asKing of the (Cimmerian) Bosporus, on the Tauric Chersonese; its capital wasPanticapaeum (Kertch).  The period of his reign is about A.D.154-171.  At this time the kingdom seems to have been paying tribute to theScythians annually as well as to the Empire (Toxaris, 44).

47 L.Lollianus Avitus, consul A.D. 144, proconsul Africaeca.156, praeses Bithyniae 165.

48 Ofcourse Lucian's case, as it stood, was weak, as Avitus tactfully hinted. Butthis does not excuse Avitus. The chances of securing enough evidence to convictAlexander in a Roman court were distinctly good, and fear of Alexander'sinfluence is the only reasonable explanation of the failure to proceed.

49  The request was granted, at least in part. Beginning with the reign of Verus, the legends IONOPOLEITON and GLYKON appear onthe coins; and the continue to bear the representation of a snake with human headto the middle of the third century (Head,Hist. Numm.,432, Cumontl.c.,p. 42). The modernname Inéboli is a corruption of Ionopolis.

50  As sonof Podaleirius, it was fitting, thinks Lucian, that his leg(poda-)should be affected.