Xanthus
Xanthus, Xanthus, name of several rivers
Frieze-Dennison Vergil
- I A river of Troas, confounded by many with the Scamander, Plin. 5, 30, 33, § 124; 2, 103, 106, § 230; Verg. A. 1, 473; 5, 634 al.; Ov. M. 2, 245; 9, 646; Vitr. 8, 3 med.—
- II A river in Lycia, near a town of the same name, now Essenide, Mel. 1, 15, 3; Verg. A. 4, 143; id. Cul. 14; Hor. C. 4, 6, 26; Plin. 5, 27, 28, § 100; 6, 34, 39, § 214.—
- III A small stream in Epirus, Verg. A. 3, 350.
(Ξάνθος).
1. A son of Triopas and Oreasis, was a king of the Pelasgians at Argos, and afterwards settled in the island of Lesbos. (Hygin. Fab. 145 ; Diod. 5.81; Callim. Hymn. in Del. 41.)
2. A son of Phtaenops, and a brother of Theon, was slain by Diomedes in the Trojan war. (Hom. Il. 5.152.)
3. A son of Erymanthus, and father of Psophis. (Paus. 8.24.1.)
4. The last king of Thebes, was slain in single combat by Melanthus or Andropompus. (Strab. ix. p.393; Paus. 9.5.8.)
5. One of the sons of Aegyptus. (Hygin. Fab. 220.)
The name Xanthus is also given to some horses in Greek mythology, as to one of Achilles (Hom. Il. 16.149), and of Hector (8.185). [L.S]
(Ξάνθος), literary.
1. A lyric poet, older than Stesichorus, who mentioned him in one at least of his poems, and who borrowed from him in some of them. Among the rest, Stesichorus composed his poem entitled Oresteia (Ὀρέστεια), in imitation of Xanthus. We also learn from Megacleides, on the authority of Stesichorus himself, that Xanthus represented Heracles as equipped, not in the dress and arms ascribed to him by Stesichorus and the later poets, but in the fashion in which he is described by Homer. (Megacleid. apud Ath. xii. p. 513a.; Kleine, Stesich. Frag. xxxvii. p. 83; on the general subject of the mention of the older poets by their successors, see Kleine, p. 71.)
Xanthus is also mentioned by Aelian (V. H. 4.26), who quotes a statement respecting Electra, the daughter of Agamemnon, which is no doubt taken from the Oresteia. Clinton places Xanthus about B. C. 650, before Peisander, and 45 years before Stesichorus. No fragments of his poetry survive. (Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. ii. p. 159 ; Bode, Gesch. d. Hellen. Dichlkunst, vol. ii. pt. 2, pp. 82, 83; Clinton F. H. vol. i p. 365.)
2. A celebrated Lydian historian, older than Herodotus, who is said to have been indebted to the work of Xanthus (Ephor. apud Ath. xii. p. 515, Ἡροδότῳ τὰς ἀφορμὰς δεδωκότος; the statement about his influence on Herodotus is questioned by Dahlmann, de Herod. p. 121). Suidas makes him the son of Candaules, and a native of Sardis ; but there is reason to believe that these statements rest on no good authority. Strabo (xiii. p.628a.) mentions him in the following terms :--" And Xanthus, the ancient historian, is said to have been a Lydian; but whether he was of Sardis, we do not know." Suidas fixes his date "at the taking of Sardis," which, if there be any truth in it, must refer to the taking of Sardis by the Ionians in B. C. 499. This date, however, appears to be rather too high, when compared with the mention of Xanthus by Dionysius of Halicarnassus (de Jud. Thuc. p. 818), among the writers who were " a little older than the Peloponnesian war, and whose time reached down to that of Thucydides." There is another indication of the date of Xanthus, proving, if the quotation be genuine, that he wrote, or continued to write, his history after B. C. 464; for Strabo (i. p.49c.) tells us that he mentioned a great drought in the reign of Artaxerxes, who came to the throne in B. C. 464. It is therefore the opinion of critics, either that the date given by Suidas must be that of the birth of Xanthus, which is a most unusual sense of γεγονώς in Suidas, or else that the passage has been corrupted by a transcriber, who accidentally repeated the word Σάρδεων. (The passage is Ξάνθος, Κανδαύλου, Αυδὸς ἐκ Σάρδεων· ἱστορικός· γεγονὼς ἐπὶ τῆς ἁλώσεως Σάρδεων). This is the suggestion of Creuzer, who proposes to substitute Ἀθηνῶν for Σάρδεων, thus referring the time of Xanthus to the taking of Athens by Xerxes, in B. C. 480; but, though this correction may give a truer date for Xanthus, it can hardly be accepted as being what Suidas wrote. Works Histories
A far more important question, than this difference of twenty years or so in the date of Xanthus, is that of the genuineness of the Four Books of Lydian History (Λυδιακὰ βιβλία δ́, Suid.), which the ancients possessed, as well as an epitome of them by a certain Menippus (D. L. 6.101, [Μένιππος] ὁ γράψας τὰ περὶ Λυδῶν καὶ Ξάνθον ἐπιτεμόμενος), and of which some considerable fragments have come down to us. The genuineness of the work was questioned by some of the ancient grammarians themselves. The most important testimony on this subject is in the passage above cited from Athenaeus, who quotes a statement as made " by Xanthus the Lydian, or by the author of the Histories ascribed to him, namely Dionysius Scytobrachion, as Artemon of Cassandreia says (ἐν τῷ περὶ συναγωγῆς [ἀναγωγῆς] βιβλίων), not knowing that Ephorus the historian mentions him, &c" It will be at once seen that the reply of Athenaeus to the statement of Artemon only proves, what no one doubts, the existence and time of Xanthus, not the genuineness of the work ascribed to him. An argument in support of the genuineness of the work has been drawn by the exalted terms of praise in which Dionysius of Halicarnassus speaks of Xanthus (l.c. ἱστορίας παλαιᾶς εἰ καί τις ἄλλος ἔμπειρος ὢν, τῆς δὲ πατρίου καὶ βεβαιωτὴς ἂν οὐδενὸς ὑποδεέστερος νομισθείς). But here we have no reference to the genuineness of the work, the tacit assumption of which by such a writer as Dionysius can hardly be set up as a strong argument in reply to the positive critical judgment of Artemon; especially as instances might be quoted (see Müller, loc. inf : cit.) in which Dionysius has made similar references to other works, which more ancient writers have pronounced to be spurious; and moreover there is a passage in which Dionysius himself makes a passing allusion to the doubts respecting the genuineness of certain ancient writers, in a matter which seems to imply that he did not care to enter minutely into such questions; and it is very probable, when we consider the nature of the fragments which have come down to us under the name of Xanthus, as well as the character of the historical work of Dionysius himself, that the admiration of the latter for the former was rather excited by his richness in mythical stories, than caused by any sound critical estimate of his value as a trustworthy historian. Among modern scholars, Creuzer, in his edition of the fragments of Xanthus, has maintained the genuineness of the work, while Welcker has constructed an elaborate argument against it (Seebod's Archiv. 1830. pp. 70, foll.), a summary of which is given by C. Müller (loc. inf. cit.) who accepts the conclusion of Welcker. It is certain that much of the matter in the extant fragments is spurious; and the probability appears to be that the work from which they are taken is the production of an Alexandrian grammarian, founded upon the genuine work of Xanthus. C. Müller has pointed out those passages which, in his opinion, are most probably portions of the original work. They are of great value. On Magian Religion
A work on the Magian religion (μαγικά) was also ascribed to Xanthus (Clem. Al. Strom. iii. p. 185; Diog. Laert. Praef. 2). Life of Empedocles
the Life of Empedocles, which is mentioned by Diogenes Laertius (8.63) as the work of Xanthus, should probably be referred to another writer of the same name. Editions
Creuzer, Historicorum Graec. Antiquiss. Fragmenta, Heidelb. 1806, 8vo.; C. Müller, Fraqmenta Historicorum Graecorum pp. xx-23.36-44. Further Information
Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. ii. p. 159; Vossius, de Hist. Graec. pp. 32-34, ed. Westermann; K. O. Müller, Gesch. d. Griech. Lit. vol. i. p. 478, p. 264, Engl. trans. [P.S]
XANTHUS (Ξάνθος: Eth. Ξάνθιος), the greatest and most celebrated city of Lycia, was situated according to Strabo (14. p. 666) at a distance of 70 stadia from the mouth of the river Xanthus, and according to the Stadiasmus ( § 247) only 60 stadia. Pliny (Plin. Nat. 5.28) states the distance at 15 Roman miles, which is much too great. (Comp. Steph. B. s. r.;Ptol. 5.3.5; Mela, 1.15; Plb. 26.7.) This famous city was twice destroyed, on each of which occasions its inhabitants defended themselves with undaunted valour. The first catastrophe befell the city in the reign of Cyrus, when Harpagus besieged it with a Persian army. On that occasion the Xanthians buried themselves,, with all they possessed, under the ruins of their city. (Hdt. 1.176.) After this event the city must have been rebuilt; for during the Roman civil wars consequent upon the murder of Caesar, Xanthus was invested by the army of Brutus, as its inhabitants refused to open their gates to him. Brutus, after a desperate struggle, took the city by assault. The Xanthians continued the fight in the streets, and perished with their wives and children in the flames, rather than submit to the Romans. (Dio Cass.; Appian, App. BC 4.18, foll.) After this catastrophe, the city never recovered. The chief buildings at Xanthus were temples of Sarpedon (Appian, l. c.), and of the Lycian Apollo. (Diod. 5.77.) At a distance of 60 stadia down the river and 10 stadia from its mouth, there was a sanctuary of Leto on the bank of the Xanthus. (Strab. l. c.) The site of Xanthus and its magnificent ruins were first discovered and described by Sir C. Fellows in his Excursion in Asia Minor, p. 225, foll. (comp. his Lycia, p. 164, foll.) These ruins stand near the village of Koonik, and consist of temples, tombs, triumphal arches, walls, and a theatre. The site, says Sir Charles, is extremely romantic, upon beautiful hills, some crowned with rocks, others rising perpendicularly from the river. The city does not appear to have been very large, but its remains show that it was highly ornamented, particularly the tombs. The architecture and sculptures of the place, of which many specimens are in an excellent state of preservation, and the inscriptions in a peculiar alphabet, have opened up a page in the history of Asia Minor previously quite unknown. The engravings in Fellows' works furnish a clear idea of the high perfection which the arts must have attained at Xanthus. (See also Spratt and Forbes, Travels in Lycia, 1. p. 5, and ii., which contains an excellent plan of the site and remains of Xanthus; E. Braun, Die Marmorwerke von Xanthos in Lykia, Rhein. Mus. Neue Folge, vol. 3. p. 481, foll.)
A large collection of marbles, chiefly sepulchral, discovered at Xanthus by Sir C. Fellows, and brought to England in 1842 and 1843, has been arranged in the British Museum. Of these a full account is given in the Supplement to the Penny Cyclopaedia, vol. 2. p. 713, foil.
[L.S]X´ANTHUS (Ξάνθος), an important river in the W. of Lycia, which is mentioned even in Homer (Hom. Il. 2.877, 5.479), and which, according to Strabo (14. p. 665), was anciently called Sirbes, that is in Phoenician and Arabic reddish yellow,s o that the Greek name Xanthus is only a translation of the Semitic Sirbes or Zirba. The Xanthus has its sources in Mount Taurus, on the frontiers between Lycia and Pisidia, and flows as a navigable river in a SW. direction through an extensive plain (Ξάνθου πεδίον, Hdt. 1.176), having Mount Bragus on the W. and Massicytes on the E., towards the sea, into which it discharges itself about 70 stadia S. of the city of Xanthus, and a little to the NW. of Pinara. (Herod. l. c.;Ptol. 5.3.2; Dion. Per. 848; Ov. Met. 9.645; Mela, 1.15; Plin. Nat. 5.28.) Now the Etshen or Essenide. (Fellows, Lycia, pp. 123, 278.) Respecting Xanthus as a name of the Trojan river Scamander, see SCAMANDER
[L.S]XANTHUS [BUTHROTUM]
(Ξάνθος). (1) See Scamander.
(2) Now the Echen Chai; the chief river of Lycia, rises in Mount Taurus, and flows south through Lycia, between Mount Cragus and Mount Massicytus, falling at last into the Mediterranean Sea a little west of Patara. It is navigable for a considerable part of its course.
(Ξάνθος). Now Gunik; the most famous city of Lycia, standing on the west bank of the river of the same name, sixty stadia from its mouth. Twice in the course of its history it sustained sieges, which terminated in the self-destruction of the inhabitants with their property, first against the Persians under Harpagus, and long afterwards against the Romans under Brutus. The city was never restored after its destruction on the latter occasion. Xanthus was rich in temples and tombs, and other monuments of a most interesting character, and several important remains of its works of art are now exhibited in the British Museum.
(Ξάνθος). A Greek historian. See logographi.
- in Lycia: Paus. 6.13.3
- a town in Lycia, resistance of the Xanthians to the Persians, and their defeat: Hdt. 1.176
- given by Poseidon to Peleus: Apollod. 3.13.5
- Paus. 8.24.1
- king of Thebes, slain by Andropompus: Paus. 9.5.16