Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 3.djvu/212

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200
PERICLES.
PERICTIONE.

foremost enemies. According to Plutarch a decree was passed that Pericles should be deprived of his command and pay a fine, the amount of which was variously stated. Thucydides merely says that he va» fined. The ill feeling of the people having found this vent, Pericles soon resumed his accus- tomed sway, and was again elected one of the generals for the ensuing year.

The military operations of B.C. 429 were doubt- less conducted binder the general superintendence of Pericles, though he does not appear to have con- ducted any in person. The plague carried otf most of his near connections. His son Xanthippus, a profligate and undutiful youth, his sister, and most of his intimate friends died of it. Still Pericles maintained unmoved his calm bearing and philo- sophic composure, and did not even attend the funeral rites of those who were carried off. At last his only surviving legitimate son, Paralus, a youth of greater promise than his brother, fell a victim. The firmness of Pericles then at last gave way ; as he placed the funeral garland on the head of the lifeless youth he burst into tears and sobbed aloud. He had one son remaining, his child by Aspasia. Either by a repeal of the law respecting legitimacy which he himself had before got passed, or by a special vote, he was allowed to enrol this son in his own tribe and give him his own name. In the autumn of b. c. 429 Pericles himself died of a lingering sickness, which, if a variety of the plague, was not attended by its usual violent symptoms, but was of such a nature that he wasted away by slow degrees, Theophrastus pre- served a storj', that he allowed the women who attended him to hang an amulet round his neck, which he showed to a friend to indicate the ex- tremity to which sickness had reduced him, when he could submit to such a piece of superstition. When at the point of death, as his friends were gathered round his bed, recalling his virtues and successes and enumerating his triumphs (in the course of his military career, in which he was equally remarkable for his prudence[1] and his cou- rage, he had erected as many as nine trophies), overhearing their remarks, he said that they had forgotten his greatest praise : that no Athenian through his means had been made to put on mourning. He survived the commencement of the war two years and six months (Thuc, ii. 65). His death was an irreparable loss to Athens. The policy he had laid down for the guidance of his fellow-citizens was soon departed from ; and those who came after him being far inferior to him in personal abilities and merit and more on a level with each other, in their eagerness to assume the reins of the state, betook themselves to unworthy modes of securing popular favour, and, so far from check- ing the wrong inclinations of the people, fostered and encouraged them, while the operations of the forces abroad and the counsels of the people at home were weakened by division and strife (Thuc. ii. 05).

The name of the wife of Pericles is not men- tioned. She had been the wife of Hipponicus, by whom she was the mother of Callias. [Callias, Vol. I. p. 567.J She bore two sons to Pericles, Xanthippus and Paralus. She lived unhappily with Pericles, and a divorce took place by mutual consent, when Pericles connected himself with Aspasia by a tie as close as the law allowed. His union with her continued in uninterrupted har- mony till his death. It is possible enough that Aspasia occasioned the alienation of Pericles from his wife ; but at the same time it appears that she had been divorced by her former husband likewise. By Aspasia Pericles had one son, who bore his name. Of his strict probity he left the decisive proof in the fact that at his death he was found not to have added a single drachma to his here- ditary property. Cicero {Brut. 7. § 27, de Oral. ii. 22. § 93) speaks of written orations by Pericles as extant. It is not unlikely that he was de- ceived by some spurious productions bearing his name. (Quint. /. O. iii. 1.) He mentions the tomb of Pericles at Athens {de Fin. v. 2). It was on the way to the Academy (Pans. i. 29. § o). There was also a statue of him at Athens (Paus. i. 28. § 2). (Plut. Pericles; Thiriwall, Hist. of Greece, vol, iii, cc. 17—20).

2. Son of the preceding, by Aspasia [Pericles, No. 1]. He was one of the generals at the battle of Arginusae, and was put to death in consequence of the unsuccessful issue of that battle. (Xen. Hellen. i. 5. U§ 6.) [C.P. M.]

PERICLY′MENUS (Περικλύμενος). 1. One of the Argonauts, was a son of Neleus and Chloris, and a brother of Nestor. (Hom. Od. xi. 285; Apollod. i. 9. § 15; Orph. Argon. 155.) Poseidon gave him the power of changing himself into different forms, and conferred upon him great strength, but he was nevertheless slain by Heracles at the taking of Pylos. (Apollod. i. 9. § 9, ii. 7. § 3; Apollon. Rhod. i. 156 with the Schol.; Ov. Met. xiii, 556, &c.; Eustath. ad Hom. p. 1685.) According to Hyginus (Fab. 10) Periclymenus escaped Heracles in the shape of an eagle.

2. A son of Poseidon and Chloris, the daughter of Teiresias, of Thebes. In the war of the Seven against Thebes he was believed to have killed Parthenopaeus (Apollod. iii. 6. § 8; Paus. viii. 18, in fin.; Eurip. Phoen. 1157), and when he pursued Amphiaraus, the latter by the command of Zeus was swallowed up by the earth. (Pind. Nem. ix. 57, &c. with the Schol.) [L. S.]

PERICLY′MENUS (Περικλύμενος), a statuary of unknown age and country, is enumerated by Pliny among those who made athletas et armalos et venatores sacrificantesque (H. N. xxxiv. 8. s. 19. § 34). One of his works, a female statue, is mentioned by Tatian (adv. Graec. 55. p. 118, ed. Worth.). [P. S.]

PERI'CLYTUS {UepiKXvTos), a sculptor, who belonojed to the best period and to one of the best schools of Grecian art, but of whom scarcely any- thing is known. He is only mentioned in a single passage of Pausanias (v. 17. § 4), from which we learn that he was the disciple of Polycleitus of Argos, and the teacher of Antiphanes, who was the teacher of Cleon of Sicyon. Since Polycleitus flourished about B. c. 440, and Antiphanes about B. c. 400, the date of Periclytus may be fixed at about B. c 420, In some editions of Pausanias his name occurs in another passnge (ii. 22. § 8), but the true reading is IIovKelTov, not llepiKelTov or UepiKXvTov. [Comp. Naucydes.] [P. S.]

PERICTIONE and PERICTYONE {mpi- KTiSurj^ UepiKTvouT], the former being the more common form), is said to have been the mother

  1. He used to say that as far as their fate depended upon him, the Athenians should be immortal.