PHANARIOTES, a name derived from Phanar, the chief Greek quarter at Stamboul, where the oecumenical patriarchate is situated, and applied to those members of families resident in the Phanar quarter who between the years 1711 and 1821 were appointed hospodars of the Danubian principalities; that period of Moldo-Wallachian history is also usually termed the Phanariote epoch. It is not to be understood as marking the introduction into the principalities of the Greek element, which had already established itself firmly in both provinces, to both of which Greek princes had been appointed before the 18th century. But whereas the Greek families of earlier introduction gradually became merged in their country of adoption, the later immigrants retained their separate nationality and grew to be powerful agents for furthering the spread of Graecism in the principalities. The person raised to the princely dignity was usually the chief dragoman of the Sublime Porte, and was consequently well versed in contemporary politics and the statecraft of the Ottoman government. The new prince, who was compelled to purchase his elevation with a heavy bribe, proceeded to the country which he was selected to govern, and of the language of which he was in nearly every case totally ignorant, accompanied by a horde of needy hangers-on; he and his acolytes counted on recouping themselves in as short a time as possible for their initial outlay and in laying by a sufficiency to live on after the termination of the prince's brief authority. It was the interest of the Porte to change the princes as often as possible, as the accession donation thus became due more frequently. When, owing to the numerous cases of treachery among the princes, the choice became limited to a few families the plan was hit upon of frequently shifting the prince from one province to the other: the prince of Wallachia, the richer of the two principalities, was always ready to pay a handsome douceur to avert his transfer to Yassy; the prince of Moldavia was equally ready to bribe his supporters at Constantinople to secure his appointment to Wallachia. To raise funds to satisfy the rapacity of the Porte the princes became past masters in the art of spoliation, and the inhabitants, liable to every species of tax which the ingenuity of their Greek rulers could devise, were reduced to the last stage of destitution. The active part taken by the Greek princes in the revolt of 1820–21 induced the Porte to revert to the appointment of native princes.
PHANIAS, of Eresus in Lesbos, Greek philosopher, important as an immediate follower of and commentator on Aristotle, came to Athens about 332 B.C., and joined his compatriot, Theophrastus, in the Peripatetic school. He wrote works entitled Analytica, Categoriae and De interpretatione, which were either paraphrases or critical commentaries, and seem to have added little to Aristotle's own writings. Alexander of Aphrodisias refers to a work πρὸς Διόδωρον, and Athenaeus quotes from another treatise, Against the Sophists. Outside philosophy, he and Theophrastus carried on the physical investigations of Aristotle, Athenaeus frequently quotes from a work on botany which manifests great care in definitions and accuracy of observation. From Plutarch (Life of Themistocles) we learn that he was regarded as an historian of importance. The chief of his historical works is the Prytaneis Eresii, which was either a history of his native place or a general history of Greece arranged according to the period of the Eresian magistracy. He wrote also works on the Tyrants of Sicily and on tyranny in general. The value of these books is attested by the frequency with which they are quoted on questions of chronology (e.g. by Plutarch, Suidas, Athenaeus). To the history of Greek literature he contributed works on the poets and on the Socratics, both of which are quoted.
He must be distinguished from another Phanias, a Stoic philosopher, disciple of Posidonius. Diogenes Laertius mentions a work of his wherein he compares Posidonius with Panaetius in arguing from physical principles.
PHANOCLES, Greek elegiac poet, probably flourished about the time of Alexander the Great. His extant fragments show resemblances in style and language to Philetas, Callimachus and Hermesianax. He was the author of a poem on paederasty. A lengthy fragment in Stobaeus (Florilegium, 64) describes the love of Orpheus for the youthful Calais, son of Boreas and his subsequent death at the hands of the Thracian women. It is one of the best extant specimens of Greek elegiac poetry.
See N. Bach, Philetae, Hermesianactis, et Phanoclis reliquiae (1829), L. Preller, Ausgewählte Aufsätze aus dem Gebiete der classischen Alterthumswissenschaft (1864).
PHANTASMAGORIA, a name invented by a certain Philipstal in 1802 (from Gr. φάντασμα, phantasm, apparition; and ἀγορά, assembly) for a show or exhibition of optical illusions produced by means of the projecting lantern (q.v.) The word has since been applied to any rapidly or strikingly changing scene, and especially to a disordered or fantastic scene or picture of the imagination.
PHARAOH (Parʽoh), the Hebraized title of the king of Egypt (q.v.), in Egyptian Per-ꜥo, Pheron in Herodotus represents the same. Its combination with the name of the king, as in Pharaoh-Necho, Pharaoh-Hophra, is in accordance with contemporary native usage: the name of the earher Pharaoh Shishak (Sheshonk) is rightly given without the title. In hieroglyphic a king bears several names preceded by distinctive titles. In the IVth Dynasty there might be four of the latter:
| (1) |
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identifying him with the royal god Horus, the name is commonly written in a frame
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representing the façade of a building, perhaps a palace or tomb, on which the falcon stands.
| (2) |
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connecting him with the vulture and uraeus goddesses, Nekhabi and Buto of the south and north.
| (3) |
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a hawk on the symbol of gold, signifying the victorious Horus.
| (4) |
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the old titles of the rulers of the separate kingdoms of Upper and Lower Egypt, to be read stni, “butcher(?)” and byti, “beekeeper(?)” The personal name of the king followed (4), and was enclosed in a cartouche
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apparently symbolizing the circuit of the sun which alone bounded the king's rule. Before the IVth Dynasty the cartouche is seldom found: the usual title is (1), and (3) does not occur. In the Vth Dynasty the custom began of giving the king at his accession a special name connecting him with the sun this was placed in the cartouche after (4), and a fifth title was added:
| (5) |
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Si-rē, “son of the Sun-god,” |
to precede a cartouche containing the personal name. The king was briefly spoken of by his title stni (see 4), or ḥnm-f, “his service,” or Ity, “liege-lord.” These titles were preserved in the sacred writing down to the latest age. An old term for the royal palace establishment and estate was Per-ꜥo, “the Great House,” and this gradually became the personal designation of Pharaoh (cf. the Grand Porte), displacing all others in the popular language. (F. Ll. G.)
PHARI, a town of Tibet. It is supposed to be the highest and
coldest town in the world, being 15,000 ft. above the sea. As it
commands the road between the Chumbi Valley and Lhasa and
also one of the chief passes into Bhutan, Phari is of considerable
military importance, and is defended by a large fort or Jong,
which was occupied by the British expedition of 1904. Phari
Jong is supposed to have been built about 1500 A.D., and was
enlarged or rebuilt in 1792, under Chinese advice, as a defence
against the British. It has the appearance of a medieval castle,
and seems to have been built in imitation of the European
style.
PHARISEES, a sect of the Jews first mentioned by Josephus, in his account (Ant. xiii. 5, 9) of the reign of Jonathan, the brother and successor of Judas Maccabaeus. The name, which may be translated “Separatists,” indicates their devotion to the ideal, enforced by Ezra and Nehemiah upon the reluctant Jews, of a nation separate from all other nations in virtue of its
