Apellicon

(Ἀπελλικῶν), a native of Teos, was a Peripatetic philosopher and a great collector of books. In addition to the number which his immense wealth enabled him to purchase, he stole several out of the archives of different Greek cities. His practices having been discovered at Athens, he was obliged to fly from the city to save his life. He afterwards returned during the tyranny of Aristion, who patronized him, as a member of the same philosophic sect with himself, and gave him the command of the expedition against Delos, which, though at first successful, was ruined by the carelessness of Apellicon, who was surprised by the Romans under Orobius, and with difficulty escaped, having lost his whole army. (Athen. v. pp. 214, 215.) His library was carried to Rome by Sulla. (B. C. 84.) Apellicon had died just before. (Strab. xiii. p.609.)

Apellicon's library contained the autographs of Aristotle's works, which had been given by that philosopher, on his death-bed, to Theophrastus, and by him to Neleus, who carried them to Scepsis, in Troas, where they remained, having been hidden and much injured in a cave, till they were purchased by Apellicon, who published a very faulty edition of them. Upon the arrival of the MSS. at Rome, they were examined by the grammarian Tyrannion, who furnished copies of them to Andronicus of Rhodes, upon which the latter founded his edition of Aristotle. [Andronicus of Rhodes.] [P.S]

(Ἀπελλικῶν). A Peripatetic philosopher, born at Teos in Asia Minor, and one of those to whom we owe the preservation of many of the works of Aristotle. The latter, on his deathbed, confided his works to Theophrastus, his favourite pupil and Theophrastus, by his will, left them to Neleus, who had them conveyed to Scepsis, in Troas, his native city. After the death of Neleus, his heirs, illiterate persons, fearing lest they might fall into the hands of the king of Pergamus, who was enriching in every way his newly-established library, concealed the writings of Aristotle in a cave, where they remained for more than 130 years, and suffered greatly from worms and dampness. At the end of this period Apellicon purchased them for a high price. His wish was to arrange them in proper order, and to fill up the lacunae that were now of frequent occurrence in the manuscripts, in consequence of their neglected state. Being, however, but little versed in philosophy, and possessing still less judgment, he acquitted himself ill in this difficult task, and published the works of the Stagirite full of faults. Subsequently the library of Apellicon fell, among the spoils of Athens, into the hands of Sulla , and was carried to Rome, where the grammarian Tyrannion had access to them. From him copies were obtained by Andronicus of Rhodes, which served for the basis of his arrangement of the works of Aristotle.

Ritter thinks that too much has been made of this story. On its authority it has even been pretended that the works of Aristotle have reached us in a more broken and ill-arranged shape than any other productions of antiquity. He thinks that the story arose out of some laudatory commendations of the edition of Aristotle by Andronicus, and that it is probable, not to say certain, that there were other editions, of the respective merits of which it was possible to make a comparison. At any rate, according to him, the acroamatic works of Aristotle have not reached us solely from the library of Neleus, and consequently it was not necessary to have recourse merely to the restoration by Apellicon, either to complete or retain the lacunae resulting from the deterioration of the manuscripts. See Aristoteles.