Paris
Frieze-Dennison Vergil
Could not find Paridem in Logeion dictionaries.
Paridem Proper-name noun: masculine accusative singular of Paris
- The son of Priam and Hecuba, also called Alexandros. As soon as he was born, on account of an ominous dream of his mother, he was exposed on Mount Ida to perish; he was there reared by the shepherds, and there he decided the dispute between Juno, Pallas, and Venus in favor of the last, who promised him Helen, the most beautiful of women, as a reward; by carrying her off to Troy, he was the cause of the Trojan war, in which he fell by the arrow of Philoctetes: quapropter Parim pastores nunc Alexandrum vocant, Enn. ap. Varr. L. L. 7, § 82 Müll. (Trag. v. 74 Vahl.): culpatus Paris, Verg. A. 2, 602: judicium Paridis spretaeque injuria formae, id. ib. 1, 27.—Voc.: Pari, Prop. 2, 2 (3), 47.—
- B Cicero sarcastically applies the name of Paris to C. Memmius, on account of his relations with the wives of Lucullus and Pompey, Cic. Att. 1, 18, 3.—
- II The name of an actor, a freedman of Domitia, Suet. Dom. 3; Tac. A. 13, 21; Juv. 6, 87.—
- III The name of a pantomime, Suet. Dom. 10.
(Πάρις), also called Alexander , was the second son of Priam and Hecabe. Previous to his birth Hecabe dreamed that she had given birth to a firebrand, the flames of which spread over the whole city. This dream was interpreted to her by Aesacus, or according to others by Cassandra (Eur. Andr. 298), by Apollo (Cic. De Divin. 1.21), or by a Sibyl (Paus. 10.12.1), and was said to indicate that Hecabe should give birth to a son, who should bring about the ruin of his native city, and she was accordingly advised to expose the child. Some state that the soothsayers urged Hecabe to kill the child, but as she was unable to do so, Priam exposed him. (Schol. ad Eur. Andr. 294, Iphig. Aul. 1285.) The boy accordingly was entrusted to a shepherd, Agelaus, who was to expose him on Mount Ida. But after the lapse of five days, the shepherd, on returning to mount Ida, found the child still alive, and fed by a she-bear. He accordingly took back the boy, and brought him up along with his own child, and called him Paris. (Eur. Tro. 921.) When Paris had grown up, he distinguished himself as a valiant defender of the flocks and shepherds, and hence received the name of Alexander, i. e. the defender of men. He now also succeeded in discovering his real origin, and found out his parents. (Apollod. 3.12.5.) This happened in the following manner: -- "Priam, who was going to celebrate a funeral solemnity for Paris, whom he believed to be dead, ordered a bull to be fetched from the herd, which was to be given as a prize to the victor in the games. The king's servants took the favourite bull of Paris, who therefore followed the men, took part in the games, and conquered his brothers. One of them drew his sword against him, but Paris fled to the altar of Zeus Herceius, and there Cassandra declared him to be her brother, and Priam now received him as his son." (Hyg. Fab. 91; Serv. ad Aen. 5.370.) Paris then married Oenone, the daughter of the river god Cebren. As she possessed prophetic powers, she cautioned him not to sail to the country of Helen; but as he did not follow her advice (Hom. Il. 5.64), she promised to heal him if he should be wounded, as that was the only aid she could afford him. (Apollod. 3.12.6; Parthen. Erot, 4.) According to some he became, by Oenone, the father of Corythus, who was afterwards sent off by his mother to serve the Greeks as guide on their voyage to Troy. (Tzetz. ad Lyc. 57.) Paris himself is further said to have killed his son from jealousy, as he found him with Helen. (Conon, Narr. 23; Parthen. Erot. 34.) It should, however, be mentioned that some writers call Corythus a son of Paris by Helen.
When Peleus and Thetis solemnized their nuptials, all the gods were invited, with the exception of Eris. But the latter appeared, nevertheless. but not being admitted, she threw a golden apple among the guests, with the inscription, "to the fairest." (Tzetz. ad Lyc. 93 ; Serv. ad Aen. 1.27.) Here, Aphrodite and Athena began to dispute as to which of them the apple should belong. Zeus ordered Hermes to take the goddesses to mount Gargarus, a portion of Ida, to the beautiful shepherd Paris, who was there tending his flocks, and who was to decide the dispute. (Eurip. Iphig. Aul. 1302, 1298 ; Paus. 5.19 § 1; Eustath. ad Hom. p. 986.) Hera promised him the sovereignty of Asia and great riches, Athena great glory and renown in war, and Aphrodite the fairest of women, Helen, in marriage. Hereupon Paris declared Aphrodite to be the fairest and deserving of the golden apple. This judgment called forth in Hera and Athena fierce hatred of Troy. (Hom. Il. 24.25, 29; Schol. ad Eurip. Hecub. 637, Troad. 925, &c., Helen. 23, &c., Androm. 284; Hyg. Fab. 92; Lucian, Dial. Deor. 20.) Under the protection of Aphrodite, Paris now carried off Helen, the wife of Menelaus, from Sparta. (Hom. Il. 3.46, &c.; Apollod. 3.12.6.) The accounts of this rape are not the same in all writers, for according to some Helen followed her seducer willingly and without resistance, owing to the influence of Aphrodite (Hom. Il. 3.174), while Menelaus was absent in Crete (Eur. Tro. 939); some say that the goddess deceived Helen, by giving to Paris the appearance of Menelaus (Eustath. ad Hom. p. 1946); according to others Helen was carried off by Paris by force, either during a festival or during the chase. (Lycoph. 106; Serv. ad Acn. 1.526; Dict. Cret. 1.3; Ptolem. Hephaest. 4.) Respecting the voyage of Paris to Greece, there likewise are different accounts. Once, it is said, Sparta was visited by a famine, and the oracle declared that it should not cease, unless the sons of Prometheus, Lycus and Chimaereus, who were buried at Troy, were propitiated. Menelaus accordingly went to Troy, and Paris afterwards accompanied him from Troy to Delphi. (Lycoph. 132; Eustath. ad Hom. p. 521.) Others say that Paris involuntarily killed his beloved friend Antheus, and therefore fled with Menelaus to Sparta. (Lycoph. 134, &c.) The marriage between Paris and Helen was consummated in the island of Cranae, opposite to Gytheium, or at Salamis. (Hom. Il. 3.445; Paus. 3.22.2; Lycoph. 110.) On his return with his bride to Troy, Paris passed through Egypt and Phoenicia, and at length arrived in Troy with Helen and the treasures which he had treacherously taken from the hospitable house of Menelaus. (Hom. Od. 4.228, Il. 6.291; Hdt. 2.113; Dict. Cret. 1.5.) In regard to this journey the accounts again differ, for according to the Cypria Paris and Helen reached Troy three days after their departure (Hdt. 2.117), whereas, according to later traditions, Helen did not reach Troy at all, for Zeus and Hera allowed only a phantom resembling her to accompany Paris to Troy, while the real Helen was carried to Proteus in Egypt, and remained there until she was fetched by Menelaus. (Eurip. Elect. 1280, &c., Helen. 33, &c., 243, 584, 670; Hdt. 2.118, 120; Lycoph. 113; Philostr. Her. 2.20, Vit. Apoll. 4.16; Serv. ad Aen. 1.651, 2.592.)
The carrying off of Helen from Sparta gave rise to the Trojan war. When the Greeks first appeared before Troy, Paris was bold and courageous (li. 3.16, &c.); but when Menelaus advanced against him, he took to flight. As Hector upbraided him for his cowardice, he offered to fight in single combat with Menelaus for the possession of Helen (3.70). Menelaus accepted the challenge, and Paris though conquered was removed from the field of battle by Aphrodite (3.380). The goddess then brought Helen back to him, and as she as well as Hector stirred hint up, he afterwards returned to battle, and slew Menesthius (6.503, 7.2, &c.). He steadily refused to give up Helen to the Greeks, though he was willing to restore the treasures he had stolen at Sparta (7.347, &c.). Homer describes Paris as a handsome man, as fond of the female sex and of music, and as not ignorant of war, but as dilatory and cowardly, and detested by his own friends for having brought upon them the fatal war with the Greeks. He killed Achilles by a stratagem in the sanctuary of the Thymbraean Apollo (Hom. Il. 22.359; Dict. Cret. 4.11; Serv. ad Aen. 3.85, 322, 6.57); and when Troy was taken, he himself was wounded by Philoctetes with an arrow of Heracles (Soph. Philoct. 1426), and then returned to his long abandoned first wife Oenone. But she, remembering the wrong she had suffered, or according to others being prevented by her father, refused to heal the wound, or could not heal it as it had been inflicted by a poisoned arrow. He then returned to Troy and died. Oenone soon after changed her mind, and hastened after him with remedies, but came too late, and in her grief hung herself. (Apollod. 3.12.6; Dict. Cret. 4.19.) According to others she threw herself from a tower, or rushed into the flames of the funeral pile on which the body of Paris was burning. (Lycoph. 65; Tzetz. ad Lyc. 61; Q. Smyrn. 10.467.) By Helena, Paris is said to have been the father of Bunicus (Bunomus or Bunochus), Corythus, Aganus, Idaeus, and of a daughter Helena. (Dict. Cret. 5.5; Tzetz. ad Lyc. 851; Parthen. Erot. 34; Ptolem. Hephaest. 4.) Paris was represented in works of art as a youthful man, without a beard and almost feminine beauty, with the Phrygian cap, and sometimes with an apple in his hand, which he presented to Aphrodite. (Comp. Mus. Pio-Clement. 2.37.) [L.S]
the name of two celebrated pantomimes in the time of the early Roman emperors.
1. The elder Paris lived in the reign of the emperor Nero, with whom he was a great favourite. He was originally a slave of Domitia, the aunt of the emperor, and he purchased his freedom by paying her a large sum of money. Domitia availed herself of his influence with Nero to attempt the ruin of Agrippina, whom she hated. The plot, however, failed, and Agrippina demanded the punishment of her accusers; but Paris stood too high in the monarch's favour to experience the punishment which was inflicted on his accomplices. Shortly after this Paris was declared, by order of the emperor, to have been free-born (ingenuus), and Domitia was compelled to restore to him the large sum which she had received for his freedom (Tac. Ain. 13.19-22, 27; Dig. 12. tit. 4. s. 3.5). Paris, however, was not fortunate enough to retain the favour of the emperor. The silly man wished to become a pantomime himself; and as he was unable to profit by the lessons in dancing which Paris gave him, and looked upon the latter as a dangerous rival, he had him put to death towards the end of his reign. (D. C. 63.18; Suet. Nero 54.)
2. The younger Paris, and the more celebrated of the two, lived in the reign of Domitian. He was originally a native of Egypt (hence called sales Nili by Martial, 11.13), and repaired to Rome, where his wonderful skill in pantomimic dances gained him the favour of the public, the love of the profligate Roman matrons, and such influence at the imperial court that he was allowed to promote his creatures to places of high office and trust. It is stated by the Pseudo-Suetonius, in his life of Juvenal, and by the ancient commentators, that this poet was banished to Egypt on account of his attack upon Paris (7.86-91), but there seems good reason for rejecting this story, as we have shown in the life of Juvenal [Juvenalis]. The popularity of Paris was at length his ruin. Domitia, the wife of the emperor, fell desperately in love with him; but when Domitian became acquainted with the intrigue, he divorced his wife, and had Paris murdered in the public street. So infuriated was he against the actor, that he even put to death a youth who was a pupil of Paris, merely because he bore a resemblance to his master in form and in skill. The people deeply deplored the death of their favourite; some strewed the spot where he fell with flowers and perfumes, for which act they were killed by the tyrant; and Martial only expressed the general feeling of the city, when he called him in the epithet (11.13) which he composed in his honour,
"Romani decus et dolor theatri."
(Dio Cass. ]17.3; Suet. Dom. 3, 10; Juv. 6.82_87, and Schol.)
the abbreviator of Valerius Maximus, is spoken of in the life of the latter. [Vol. II. p. 1002.]
(Πάρις), also called Alexander (Ἀλέξανδρος). The second son of Priam, king of Troy, by his wife Hecuba. When his mother, being about to give birth to a son, had dreamed that she brought forth a torch which set all Ilium in flames, the soothsayer Aesacus declared that the child would prove the ruin of his country, and recommended its exposure (Eurip. Andr. 298; Div. i. 21). As soon as born, the child was given to a servant to be left on Ida to perish. He obeyed, but, on returning at the end of five days, he found that a bear had been nursing the infant. Struck with this strange event, he took home the infant, reared him as his own son, and named him Paris. When Paris grew up he distinguished himself by his strength and courage in repelling robbers from the flocks, and the shepherds, in consequence, named him Alexander (“Man-protector”), or, according to the Greek form, Ἀλέξανδρος (ἀπὸ τοῦ ἀλέξειν τοὺς ἄνδρας). In this state of seclusion, too, he united himself to the nymph Oenoné, whose fate is elsewhere related. (See Oenone.) Their happiness was soon disturbed. At the marriage of Peleus and Thetis, the goddess of Discord, who had not been invited to partake of the entertainment, showed her displeasure by throwing into the assembly of the gods who were at the wedding celebration a golden apple, on which were written the words Ἡ καλὴ λαβέτω, “Let the beauty (among you) take me.” Heré, Athené, and Aphrodité laying claim to it, and Zeus being unwilling to decide, the god commanded Hermes to lead the three deities to Mount Ida, and to intrust the decision of the affair to the shepherd Alexander, whose judgment was to be final. The goddesses appeared before him, and each, to influence his decision, made him an alluring offer of future advantage, Heré by the promise of a kingdom, Athené by the gift of intellectual superiority and martial renown, and Aphrodité by offering him the fairest woman in the world for his wife. To Aphrodité he assigned the prize, and brought upon himself, in consequence, the unrelenting enmity of her two disappointed rivals, which was extended also to his whole family and the entire Trojan race.
Soon after this event, Priam proposed a contest among his sons and other princes, and promised to reward the conqueror with one of the finest bulls on Mount Ida. Persons were sent to procure the animal, and it was found in the possession of Paris, who reluctantly yielded it up. The shepherd, desirous of obtaining again this favourite animal, went to Troy, and entered the lists of the combatants. Having proved successful against every competitor, and having gained an advantage over Hector himself, that prince, irritated at seeing himself conquered by an unknown stranger, pursued him closely, and Paris must have fallen a victim to his brother's resentment had he not fled to the altar of Zeus. This place of refuge preserved his life; and Cassandra, the daughter of Priam, struck with the similarity of the features of Paris to those of her brothers, inquired his birth and his age. From these circumstances she soon discovered that he was her brother, and as such she introduced him to her father and to his children. Priam, thereupon, forgetful of the alarming predictions of Aesacus, acknowledged Paris as his son, and all enmity instantly ceased between the newcomer and Hector. Not long after this, at the instigation of Aphrodité, who had not forgotten her promise to him, Paris proceeded on a voyage to Greece, from which the soothsaying Helenus and Cassandra had in vain endeavoured to deter him. The ostensible object of the voyage was to procure information respecting his father's sister Hesioné, who had been given in marriage by Hercules to his follower Telamon, the monarch of Salamis. The real motive, however, which prompted the enterprise, was a wish to obtain, in the person of Helen, then the fairest woman of her time, a fulfilment of what Aphrodité had offered him when he was deciding the contest of beauty. Arriving at Sparta, where Menelaüs, the husband of Helen, was reigning, he met with a hospitable reception; but, Menelaüs soon after having sailed away to Crete, the Trojan prince availed himself of his absence, seduced Helen, and bore her away to his native city, together with a large portion of the wealth of her husband. Hence ensued the war of Troy, which ended in the total destruction of that illfated city. See Trojan War.
Paris, though represented in general as effeminate and vain of his personal appearance, yet distinguished himself during the siege of Troy by wounding Diomedes, Machaon, Antilochus, and Palamedes, and subsequently by discharging the dart which proved fatal to Achilles. Aphrodité took him under her special protection, and, in the single combat with Menelaüs, rescued him from the vengeance of the latter. On the capture of Troy, Paris was wounded by Philoctetes with one of the arrows of Heracles, and, falling ill, returned to Oenoné, whom he had so long before abandoned. Resenting her wrongs she refused to heal him, and he returned to Troy, where he died.
(1) A pantomimic actor in the reign of Nero, who greatly liked him and issued a special edict declaring him free-born (ingenuus), though in reality he had been the slave of the emperor's aunt, Domitia, and had purchased his freedom with a large sum of money. Later, when Nero himself began acting in pantomimes, he became jealous of the superior art of Paris and put him to death (Tac. Ann. xiii. 19-27; Suet. Nero, 54).
(2) An actor at Rome in the reign of Domitian, whose favourite he was until detected in an intrigue with the empress Domitia, when he was put to death (Dio Cass. lxvii. 3; Domit. 3, 10).
- Apollod. 3.12.4, Apollod. 3.12.5
- exposed on Mount Ida: Apollod. 3.12.5
- suckled by a bear: Apollod. 3.12.5
- painted by Polygnotus: Paus. 10.31.8
- afterwards surnamed Alexander: Apollod. 3.12.5
- Alexander