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GAIUS	One of the most accomplished professors of Roman law and writers on the subject. He was a native of the Asiatic provinces, and spent his days in Rome under Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, and Marcus Aurelius (about 110-180 A.D.). His writings were numerous: but we possess in a tolerably complete form nothing but his Institutiones, or introduction to the private law of the Romans. This was discovered in 1816, having before been known in quotations only. The work is in four books, the first of which treats of the family, the second and third of property, and the fourth of legal procedure. Popular and intelligible without being superficial, it was a favourite handbook of law, and served as a foundation for the Institutiones of Justinian.
GALATEA	A sea-nymph, daughter of Nereus and Doris. According to a Sicilian story, which the poets Philoxenus and Theocritus have made famous, she was pursued by the uncouth monster Polyphemus, being herself in love with the beautiful Acis. The jealous giant crushes Acis with a rock, and the nymph changes her beloved into the Sicilian river which bears his name.
GALENUS	was the most celebrated physician in antiquity after Hippocrates, and at the same time one of the most prolific among ancient writers. He was born at Pergamon in 131 A.D., received a careful education in philosophy, and afterwards devoted himself to medical studies in his native city, at Smyrna, Corinth, and Alexandria. He returned to Pergamon in 168, and undertook the medical treatment of gladiators, as giving him the best opportunity for increasing his stock of surgical knowledge. In 164 he moved to Rome, and here won a considerable reputation by his success in practice and his public lectures on anatomy. After three years he was driven by the attacks of jealous rivals to leave Rome. He undertook scientific journeys through Greece and Asia, and then settled again in his native city. But he was soon recalled by the emperors Marcus Aurelius and Lucius Verus, and in 170 appointed private physician to the young Commodus. He died in his seventieth year, after winning the high esteem of his contemporaries. Part of his writings were destroyed in a fire; in all 125 of his books are lost. About 100 of his genuine treatises have been preserved: of 19 we have fragments, more or less considerable; the genuineness of 18 is doubted, 24 are spurious. Many have not yet been printed, while others exist only in Latin, Syriac, Hebrew and Arabic translations. For during the Middle Ages, down to the 16th century, the authority of Galen was, throughout the East and West, held, especially by the Arabians, to be unassailable. A prolific writer like Galen was naturally careless of his style. His writings leave no branch of medicine untouched. They comprise anatomy, physiology, pathology, pharmacology, and treatment. Among them should be mentioned the following: On Anatomical Procedure, in 9 books; On the Use of Parts of the Human Body (17 books); On the Parts Affected (6 books); On the Composition of Medicines (three works, including 26 books); On Method in Therapeutics (14 books). His book on medicine, a complete sketch of therapeutics, was immensely popular. He was also the author of 18 books, of commentaries on Hippocrates, whom he claimed as his master. These still survive. His books contain important notices on the history of philosophy, of which he professes his knowledge and enthusiastic admiration. Some of his writings deal specially with this subject.
GAMES
GANYMEDES	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 The son of Tros, king of Dardania, brother of Ilus and Assaracus. According to Homer he was carried away by the gods for his beauty, to be the cup-bearer of Zeus, and one of the immortals. In the later legend he is carried away by Zeus himself in the shape of an eagle, or by the eagle of Zeus. To make amends to his father, Zeus presented him with four immortal horses for his chariot. Ganymedes was afterwards regarded as the genius of the sources of the Nile, and the astronomers made him into the constellation Aquarius. The rape of Ganymede was represented in a group by the sculptor Leochares (see LEOCHARES ).
GARGILLUS MARTIALIS	flourished in the 3rd century A.D. and was the author of a great work, based upon Greek and Latin sources, on agriculture and veterinary science. Considerable fragments remain, dealing with the treatment of cattle (De Cura Boum) and the medical uses of herbs and fruit (Medicina ex Holeribus et Pomis).
GELANOR	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 A descendant of Inachus king of Argos. When Danaus, likewise a descendant of Inachus, came to Argos, and laid claim to the sovereign power, the citizens were doubtful in whose favour they should decide. While they were hesitating, a wolf fell upon the cattle which were feeding before the city, and killed the bull who was defending them. The citizens regarded this as a sign from heaven, and, interpreting the wolf as meaning Danaus, they compelled Gelanor to retire in his favour. (See DANAUS.) In the Supplices of Aeschylus, Pelasgus is king of Argos. He gives Danaus a friendly welcome, and defends him against the sons of Aegyptus. But he is vanquished by them, retires from the sovereignty spontaneously in favour of the stranger, and leaves the country.
GELLIUS	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 Gnaeus. See ANNALISTS.
GELLIUS	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 Aulus. A Roman writer of the age of the Antonines, about 130-170 A.D. After receiving his education in rhetoric at Rome, he went to Athens, in his thirtieth year or thereabouts, to study philosophy. Here he saw much of Herodes Atticus. Besides studying philosophy, he spent the long winter nights in wide and various reading, which he took up again with ardour after his return to Italy. From the material thus collected he composed the twenty books of his Noctes Atticoe, written in remembrance of his days at Athens. One book, the eighth, is lost, and only the headings of the chapters remain. The remaining nineteen are a series of excerpts, loosely strung together, from all kinds of Greek and Latin authors, especially the ante-classical writers. They also contain a mass of information, and a number of opinions orally delivered by contemporary scholars. The whole forms a valuable storehouse of notes on questions of historical, antiquarian, and literary interest. Gellius' style is sober, and, like that of an admirer of Fronto (see FRONTO), full of archaic expressions.
GEMS	The art of cutting precious stones was early learned by the Greeks from the Egyptians and Orientals, who had practised it from remote antiquity. The cuttings were originally only concave, and the gems set in rings and used as seals. Cameos, or stones carved in relief, first came into use, it would seem, in the time of Alexander the Great, and were used for ornament. For cameos precious stones of various colours were used, especially the onyx. The layers of the stone were so treated, that the figures stood out bright on a dark ground. Muesarchus of Samos, the father of the philosopher Pythagoras (about 600 B.C.) is the oldest Greek jeweller whose name has come down to us. In the 4th century B.C. the most celebrated master was Pyrgoteles, the only artist whom Alexander the Great would allow to cut his likeness. In the age of Augustus we hear of Dioscorides, who cut the emperor's likeness on a stone which was used as a seal by the succeeding Caesars. The Etruscans and Romans took up the art very early, but never attained the same perfection as the Greeks. The fancy for making collections of beautiful gems arose as early as the 1st century B.C. The intaglios, or cut stones, have come down to us in greater numbers than any Of the monuments of ancient art. Those which belonged to the advanced periods of style present examples of the most beautiful workmanship, the most original composition, and the most interesting subjects, the latter being mainly taken from mythology. Among the remaining Greek cameos an important place, both for size and beauty, must be given to the Gonzaga Cameo in St. Petersburg. This, it has been conjectured, represents the bust of Ptolemy Philadelphus and Arsinoe, his sister and wife; [but it more probably commemorates Nero and Agrippina, fig. 7.] The largest and most splendid of the cameos which have come down from the Roman period are those at Vienna (fig. 8) and Paris, representing, in groups and figures, the family of Augustus. Whole vessels were sometimes made of single stones, and adorned with reliefs An instance is the Mantuan vase now at Brunswick, 6 1/3 inches high, 2 1/3 inches thick, consisting of a single onyx. The lid, handle and base are of gold. Two parallel lines of gold divide the surface into three parts, the midmost of which has twelve figures, representing the festival of the Thesmophoria, in three groups; while the highest and lowest are adorned with leaves, flowers, ears of corn, fruits, bulls' heads, and other objects connected with the worship of Demeter. Works of this kind are sometimes made of coloured glasses. The most celebrated instance of this sort is the Portland Vase now in the British Museum. Its height is about 10 inches. The material is a dark blue transparent glass, with beautiful reliefs in white opaque enamel (fig. 9). [See Catalogue of Engraved Gems in the British Museum, 1888, pp. 225-8; and (on the subject in general) Introduction, pp. 1-38.]
GENIUS	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 The Italian peoples regarded the Genius as a higher power which creates and maintains life, assists at the begetting and birth of every individual man, determines his character, tries to influence his destiny for good, accompanies him through life as his tutelary spirit, and lives on in the Lares after his death. (See LARES.) As a creative principle, the Genius is attached strictly speaking, to the male sex only. In the case of women his place is taken by Juno, the personification of woman's life. Thus, in house inhabited by a man and his wife a Genius and a Juno are worshipped together. But in common parlance it was usual to speak of the Genius of a house, and to this Genius the marriage bed was sacred. A man's birthday was naturally the holiday of his attendant Genius, to whom he offered incense, wine, garlands, cakes, everything in short but bloody sacrifices, and in whose honour he gave himself up to pleasure and enjoyment. For the Genius wishes a man to have pleasure in the life he has given him. And so the Romans spoke of enjoying oneself as indulging one's Genius, and of renunciation as spiting him. Men swore by their Genius as by their higher self, and by the Genius of persons whom they loved and honoured. The philosophers originated the idea of a man having two Genii, a good and a bad one; but in the popular belief the notion of the Genius was that of a good and beneficent being. Families, societies, cities and peoples had their Genius as well as individuals. The Genius of the Roman people (Genius Publicus, or Populi Romani) stood in the forum, represented in the form of a bearded man crowned with a diadem, a cornucopia in his right hand, and a sceptre in his left. An annual sacrifice was offered to him on the 9th October. Under the Empire the Genius of Augustus, the founder of the Empire, and of the reigning emperor, were publicly worshipped at the same time. Localities also, such as open spaces, streets, baths, and theatres, had their own Genii. These were usually represented under the form of snakes (see cut); and hence the common habit of keeping tame snakes.
GENNETAE	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 This was the Athenian term for the members of the 360 ancient families (gennoe), thirty of which made up one of the twelve phratrioe of the four old Ionic tribes. These families consisted of some thirty houses, who referred their origin and name to a common ancestor, and observed a common worship, with special priests to superintend it. The objects of this worship were Zeus Herkeios (the god of house and home), Apollo Patroos (the god of the family), the heros of the family, and other tutelary deities. Supposing that a family worship rose to the dignity of a state ceremony, the priestly office remained hereditary in the family (genna). If there were no nearer relations, the members of the genna had a law of inheritance which they observed among themselves. Maintained by these religious and legal ties, the gennoe and the phratrioe survived the old Ionic tribes, after the abolition of the latter by Cleisthenes. The president of the genna superintended the enrolment of new members into it at the feast of the Apaturia, the occasion italics>on which the new members of the phratrioe were also enrolled. (See APATURIA.) A citizen who did not belong to a genna could only become member of one by adoption, and under certain conditions.
GENS	A family (in the widest sense of the word) descended on the male line from a common ancestor, and therefore bearing a commcn name. So long as the patricians were the only citizens with full rights, there could of course be no gentes not patrician. The oldest gentes belonged to the tribes of the Latin Ramnes and the Sabine Tities. Besides these there were the gentes belonging to the Alban families, brought to Rome by King Tullus Hostillus; and embodied by the other gentes in the community as a third tribe, the Luceres. These, the most ancient, were called gentes maiores as distinguished from the gentes minores, which included the plebeians whom Tarquinius Priscus raised to the rank of patricians. There were italics>in later times instances of plebeian gentes being raised to patrician rank: but these became rarer and rarer, so that the number of patrician gentes was very much reduced. During the last years of the Republic we hear of only fourteen still in existence, including thirty familioe (or families in the narrower sense). Many large gentes were divided into houses (stirpes) who had a common cognomen in addition to the name of their gens; thus the gens Cornelia included the Cornelii Maluginenses, Cornelii Cossi, Cornelii Scipiones, Cornelii Rufini, Cornelii Lentuli, Cornelii Dolabelloe, Cornelii Cethegi, Cornelii Cinnoe, Cornelii Sulloe. Among the plebeians, as among the patricians, the familia naturally developed into a larger circle of relationship; but gentes in the old sense were not formed by the process. Though the plebeian had his gentile name, and afterwards his cognomen, he had not the real ius gentilicium. All gentiles or members of a gens had a right to its common property, which included a common burial-place. They also had a testamentary law of their own which lasted on into the imperial period. When the member of a gens died without heirs of his body, italics>the next to inherit (as in the case of the plebeians) were the agnati, or gentiles on the male side, who could prove their relationship: failing these, the gentiles divided the inheritance. The existence of this law rendered it, in old times, necessary to obtain the consensus of the whole gens in cases of adoption and testamentary bequest. Another consequence of it was, that it was the duty of the gentiles to provide a curator for insane persons and spendthrifts, and a guardian for minors. Every gens had its meetings, at which resolutions were passed binding its individual members in matters affecting the gens. It was a decree of the gens Manlia, for instance, which forbade any one of its members to bear the proenomen Marcus. As every familia, whether patrician or plebeian, had certain sacrifices which it was bound to perform, so had every gens, as a larger or extended familia. All members of the gens were entitled, and indeed bound, to take part in the sacra gentilicia, or common worship of the gens. These sacra ceased to exist with the extinction of a gens: and if a member of a gens left it, this right and duty also came to an end. It should be added that certain public religious services were assigned to particular gentes, that of Hercules, for instance, to the gens Pinaria.
GEOGRAPHY	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 Geographical research and literature took their rise, like historical literature, among the Ionians of Asia Minor. Their extended commerce and their activity in founding colonies enlarged their geographical horizon. The necessity was thus felt of utilizing and registering the knowledge already acquired for the purpose of discovering the form and constitution of the earth. The first attempt at sketching a map of the world was made by Aristagoras of Miletus about 550 B.C. His kinsman Hecataeus, one of the writers called Logographi, who flourished about fifty years later, corrected and enlarged this map, and added a commentary. (See LOGOGRAPHI.) This commentary, of which only fragments are preserved in quotations, is the oldest piece of purely geographical writing in Greek. The geographical chapters in the history of Herodotus (about 450 B.C.) compensate us to a certain extent for the loss of this work, and of the other works of the Logographi on history and geography. But they only treat the eastern half of the known world. It became indeed, in the absence of a regular tradition of geographical science, a usual thing for historians to insert geographical disquisitions into their works. The writings of Thucydides, Xenophon, Ctesias, Ephorus, Theopompus, Timaeus, and others down to Polybius, afford examples of this. The first purely geographical work which has come down to us in a complete state is the Periplus bearing the name of Scylax, written in the first part of the 4th century B.C. This is a description of the coast of the Mediterranean. About the same time the astronomer Eudoxus of Cnidus made a great advance in the theory of physical geography. He was the first who adduced mathematical proof of the spherical shape of the earth, which had been asserted before his time by Pythagoras. The division of the globe into five zones (two frigid, two temperate, and one torrid) is also due to him. About 330 B.C. Pytheas of Massilia explored towards the N.W. as far as the northern end of the British Islands and the coasts of the German Ocean. About the same time the campaigns of Alexander the Great opened up Asia as far as India to Greek research. Nearchus made a report of exceptional value on his coast voyage from the Indus to the Euphrates. All these discoveries were embodied, about 320 B.C. in a new map by Dicaearchus of Messana, a disciple of Aristotle. He was the first savant who treated physical geography in a scientific manner. He assumed the existence of a southern hemisphere, and made an estimate of the earth's circumference, to which he gave the exaggerated measurement of 40,000 miles. His map remained for a long time the standard work of the kind. The southern and eastern parts of India were still further opened out under Alexander's successors, in consequence of the campaigns of the Seleucidae, and several journeys undertaken by ambassadors, among which that of Megasthenes should be mentioned. The commercial expeditions of the Ptolemies brought in fresh knowledge of the coasts of Arabia and E. Africa. The first man who arranged the mass of geographical materials hitherto collected, into a really scientific system, was Eratosthenes of Cyrene (about 276-175 B.C.). His materials he found in the rich collections of the Alexandrian library, Alexandria being then the central point of the commerce of the world. He was fully equipped for his task by his acquirements both in physical science and mathematics, and in history and philology. He endeavoured for the first time to estimate the earth's circumference by a measurement of degrees carried out over a space of 16 degrees of latitude. The imperfection of his method brought out too large a quantity, 25,000 geographical miles. The name of Hipparchus of Nicaea (about 140 B.C.) marks a considerable advance. He may be called the founder of mathematical geography, as he applied geographical length and breadth to determine the position of places on the earth's surface. He also superseded the rectangular and equidistant projection of parallels and meridians, hitherto used in maps, by a projection which, with few modifications, is identical with the one now in use. The parallels were represented by segments of a circle, the meridians by straight lines or curves, corresponding with the portion of surface to be represented, drawn at distances corresponding to the actual distances on the surface of the globe. The estimate of the earth's circumference which was accepted as correct down to the 10th century A.D., was that of Posidonius of Apamea (about 90 B.C.). Taking as his basis the measurement of the shortest distance from Alexandria to Rhodes, he brought out the result as 18,000 geographical miles, instead of 21,600 (or about 25,000 English miles.) Only fragments remain of the writings of these geographers, and others contemporary with them. But we possess the great work of Strabo of Amaseia, finished about 20 A.D., the most important monument of descriptive geography and ethnology which has come down from Greek antiquity. Thanks to the Roman conquest, he was in a position to give a more accurate description of the West than his predecessors. Up to this time all that the Romans had done for geographical research was to open up Western Europe and Northern Africa to the Greek savants. An immense service was rendered to science by Agrippa, under the direction of Augustus. He measured and indicated on a map the distance between the stations on the great military roads and along the coasts of the Roman empire, thus contributing enormously to our knowledge of ancient topography, and laying a foundation for our maps. These data formed the basis of a new map of the world, which was first set up in Rome. Numerous copies were probably taken for the larger cities of the empire, and smaller portable ones distributed among the military and the administrating officials. It is probably upon copies of this kind that the Tabula Peutingeriana and the Iteneraria are based. (See PEUTINGER; ITENERARIA.) In the 1st century A.D. much was added to geographical knowledge by the expeditions of the Romans into the interior of North Africa and the North of Europe. The most important literary works of the Romans on geography belong to this period. These are (1) the compendium of Pomponius Mela; (2) the geographical books of Pliny the Elder's great encyclopaedia, a dreary uncritical compilation, but the only representative we have of a number of lost works; (3) the Germania of Tacitus, an essay mainly of an ethnographical character. The last great contribution made to geographical science in antiquity is the work of the Alexandrian astronomer Ptolemy (about 140 A.D.). This consists mainly of lists of the places marked in the current maps which he makes his authorities, with their latitude and longitude. After Ptolemy, the geographical literature of the Greeks and Romans alike has nothing to show but compilations and extracts. Towards the end of the 6th century, Stephanus of Byzantium compiled a dictionary of geography, which is valuable for the quantity of information taken from the older and lost writings which it embodies. The book of Pausanias (about 175 A.D.) is valuable as bearing on the special topography of Greece.
GEOMORI	In many Doric states, particularly in Syracuse, this term denoted the territorial aristocracy. But in Athens it was applied to the landed commonalty, distinguished from the Eupatridgoe, or nobles, on the one side, and the Demiurgi, or mechanics, on the other.
GEOPONOCI	The ancient writers on agriculture: for instance (among the Greeks), the philosopher Democritus, and in later times, Xenophon, in his OEconomicus. No other Greek works of the kind have come down to us, except the collection called Geoponica. This consists of twenty books, and contains extracts from writers of the most widely distant periods. The compiler was a Bithynian, Cassianus Bassus, who lived about the middle of the 10th century A.D., and undertook the work at the suggestion of the Emperor Constantine VII. He based it upon a collection of extracts made by a certain Vindanios Anatolios. Agriculture was hold in high esteem by the Romans, and the subject was in consequence a favourite one with their men of letters. A number of their works on it have come down to us: the Res Rustica of the elder Cato, a similar work by the encyclopaedic scholar, Marcus Terentius Varro, the Georgics of Vergil, and after Christ the writings of Columella, Gargillus Martialis, and Palladius. The Georgics of Vergil are a poem: and one book of Columella is in verse.
GERMANICUS CAESAR	The son of Nero Claudius Drusus, adopted son of his uncle Tiberius, and grandson of Livia, the wife of Augustus. He was celebrated for his campaigns against the Germans. He was born 15 B.C., and died 19 A.D. Distinguished as much for culture as for military accomplishments, he was an orator and author as well as a general. Ovid, who dedicated to him the 2nd edition of his Fasti, praises his poetry. His paraphrase of the Phoenomena of Aratus in 725 lines, and three fragments (246 lines) of a paraphrase of the same writer's Prognostica, still survive. They are remarkable for knowledge, command of metre, and a pleasant style. The Phoenomena are dedicated to Tiberius, and described by the author himself as the work of a beginner. These poems used erroneously to be attributed to Domitian, who did not take the title of Germanicus until he was emperor. Three collections of scholia upon them, by no means without value, have also survived.
GERUSIA	The supreme deliberative authority among the Spartans, according to the constitution of Lycurgus. It consisted of twenty-eight men of at least sixty years of age, called Gerontes, elected by the public assembly for life. The meetings of the Gerusia were presided over by the two kings, who had the right of voting. The number of the council therefore amounted to thirty. It was their duty to deliberate beforehand on all important affairs of state, and prepare preliminary resolutions upon them, to be voted upon by the public assembly. They had also jurisdiction in the case of all offences which were punishable by death or loss of civil rights. They satin judgment, if necessary, even on the kings, in later times associating the ephors with them in this function. Their authority, like that of the kings, suffered considerable restriction at the hands of the ephors. They had a similar position in the Cretan constitution, according to which only the members of the highest magistracy, called the Cosmoi, or regulators, could enter the council, and that after a blameless term of administration.
GERYON, OR GERYONES	A giant with three bodies and powerful wings, the son of Chrysaor and Callirrhoe. He dwelt in the island of Erytheia, lying in the ocean, in the extreme west; and was the possessor of a herd of red cattle, watched by the shepherd Eurytion, and a two-headed dog called Orthros. It was one of the twelve labours of Heracles to carry off these cattle, and after a violent contest to slay the pursuing Geryon with his arrows.
GIGANTES	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 In Homer the Gigantes are a wild and gigantic race of aborigines, kinsmen of the gods, as are the Cyclopes and Phaeacians. With their king Eurymedon, they are destroyed for their wickedness. Hesiod makes them the sons of Gaea, sprung from the blood of the mutilated Uranus. Neither Hesiod nor Homer know anything of their struggle with the gods (Gigantomachia ), the story of which seems to be a reflexion of the myth of the Titans, and their contest with the gods, and to be associated with local legends. The two are often confused by later poets. The place of the contest was Phlegra, or the place of burning. Phlegra, was always localized in volcanic regions. In the earlier stories it is on the Macedonian peninsula of Pallene; and in later times on the Phlegraean plains in Campania between Cumae and Capua, or again at Tartessus in Spain. Led on by Alcyoneus and Porphyrion, they hurled rocks and burning trunks of trees against heaven. But the gods called Heracles to their assistance; a prophecy having warned them that they would be unable to destroy the giants without the aid of a mortal. Heracles slow not only Alcyoneus, but gave the others, whom the gods had struck down, their quietus with his arrows. As Enceladus was flying, Athene threw the island of Sicily upon him. Polybotes was buried by Poseidon under the island of Nisyros, a piece of the island of Cos, which Poseidon had broken off with his trident, with all the giants who had fled there. Besides these, the following names are given among others: Agrios, Ephialtes, Pallas, Clytios, Eurytos, Hippolytos, Thoon. In the oldest works of art the Giants are represented in human form and armed with harness and spears. But in course of time their attributes became terrific, awful faces, long hanging hair and beard, the skins of wild animals for garments, trunks of trees and clubs for weapons. In the latest representations, but not before, their bodies end in two scaly snakes instead of feet (see cut). In the Gigantomachia of Pergamos, the grandest representation of the subject in antiquity, we find a great variety of forms; some quite human, others with snakes' feet and powerful wings, others with still bolder combinations of shape; some are naked, some clothed with skins, some fully armed, and others slinging stones. (See PERGAMENE SCULPTURES.)
GLADIATORES	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 The Latin name for the combatants who fought each other for life or death at the public shows. They first appear in Rome in 264 B.C., and only at the celebrations of private funerals, or in games given in memory of a private individual. Entertainments of this kind were often provided for in wills. The custom, like others of the same kind, seems to have come from Etruria, where it was a survival of the human sacrifices formerly usual at funerals. These gladiatorial contests soon became a very favourite form of popular entertainment, and in the last century of the republic were hold to be an excellent means of winning the favour of the populace at elections. Indeed, custom at length imposed an obligation on some magistrates, for instance on the aediles, to give gladiatorial games on their assumption of office; and they would try to outbid each other in the number of contending couples and in general expenditure. From Rome the fashion soon spread into the provinces. Campania was the part of Italy where it most prevailed. It was not, however, till the time of Domitian that quaestors designate were regularly compelled to give the great gladiatorial ex-ibitions, which occupied ten days in the month of December. In the Western Empire they survived at least down to the beginning of the 5th century A.D. They were at first given in the forum, but afterwards generally in the amphitheatres (see AMPHITHEATRE, and in the circus, if the exhibition was to be on a very large scale. The gladiators were sometimes condemned criminals; but it must be remembered that originally Roman citizens could not be sentenced to the arena, and it was not till later times that this punishment was extended to criminals of low condition. Sometimes they were prisoners of war, slaves, or volunteers. Under the Empire it was not so uncommon, even in the upper classes, to volunteer as a gladiator. Sometimes the step was the last refuge of a ruined man; sometimes the emperor would force a man to it. These volunteers were called auctorati (=bound over), to distinguish them from the rest; their pay was termed auctoramentum. Troops of gladiators were sometimes owned by Romans in good society, who often, towards the end of the republican age, employed them in streetfights against their political opponents. Sometimes they were the property of speculators, who often carried on at the same time the disreputable trade of a fencing master (lanista). These men would hire out or sell their gladiators to persons who were giving their shows, or would exhibit them for money to the public on their own account. The gladiators were trained in special schools (ludi). Under the Empire things went so far that the emperors kept schools of their own under the supervision of procuratores of equestrian rank. After Domitian's time there were four of these in Rome. A building for this purpose, large enough for a hundred gladiators, is preserved in Pompeii. To strengthen their muscles they were put on a very nourishing diet. Every style of fighting had its special professor (doctor or mdgister), and the gladiator was usually instructed only in one style. The novice (tiro) began with fence-practice against a wooden stake, at first with light wooden arms, but afterwards with weapons of full weight. If a man were intending to give a show of gladiators (manus gladiatorium) he advertised it by notices (programmata ) put up on the walls of houses, numerous copies of these being at the same time widely distributed. These notices stated the date and occasion of the show, the name of the giver (editor), the number of pairs of gladiators, and the different kinds of combats. The performance began with a gala procession (pompa) of the gladiators to the arena and through it. Then came the testing of the weapons by the editor, who, though he might be a private individual, had the right of wearing the insignia of a magistrate during the show. A preliminary skirmish or prolusio, with wooden swords and darts, next took place, till the trumpets sounded, and the serious fighting began. This took place to the accompaniment of music in a space, measured out by the fencing master. The gladiators sometimes fought, not in pairs, but in troops. The timid were driven on with whips and red-hot irons. If a gladiator was wounded in single combat, he raised his fore-finger to implore the mercy of the people, with whom, after the last years of the republic, the giver of the games usually left the decision. The sign of mercy (missio ) was the waving of handkerchiefs: the clenched fist and downward thumb indicated that the combat was to be fought out till death. Condemned criminals had no chance of mercy. The slain, or nearly slain, were carried on the biers which stood ready for them, to a particular door (porta Libitinensis), into a place where they were, stripped ( spoliarium). There, if they had not actually expired, they were put to death. The victors received palms, with branches adorned with fillets. Under the Empire they sometimes got presents of money a& well. If a gladiator, by repeated proofs of cleverness and bravery, succeeded in gaining the favour of the people, he was, at the public request, presented with a kind of wooden rapier (rudis),[1] as a token that he was now free from all further service. In this case he was called rudiarius. This did not make him an absolutely free man; but if he chose to fight again, he did so as a free man, and could accordingly claim a high remuneration. Gladiators were armed in various styles, as the pairs of combatants were usually armed, not with the same, but with different weapons, The weapons of gladiators, and notably their helmets, were quite different in form from the arms of soldiers (see fig. 1). Gladiators were classed according to their equipment. Thus the retiarius was armed with a net, was bareheaded, and had nothing on but a short tunic and a girdle; his left arm was in a sleeve; his arms were a net (iaculum), a trident (fuscina), and a dagger. The net he tried to throw over his pursuing adversary, and to despatch him with dagger or trident, if successful. The secutor, or pursuer, was so called, because he was generally set to fight with the retiarius, who retired before him (fig. 2). He was as lightly equipped as his adversary, but armed with helmet, sword, and shield. The myrmillo (fig. 3), who was also often matched against the retiarius, was armed in Gallic fashion with helmet, sword and shield, and named after the figure of a fish (mormylos, which adorned his helmet. The Samnis, or Samnite, was so called after his Samnite equipment. This consisted of a large shield (scutum), a sleeve of leather or metal on the right arm, with a shoulder piece (galerus), rising above the shoulder, a girdle, a greave on the left foot, a visored helmet with crest and plume, and a short sword. The Thrax, or Thracian, wore, like his countrymen, a small round shield (parma) and a dagger (sica) curved in the form of a sickle, or bent at right angles. In other respects his equipment was more complete than the Samnite's, for he had greaves on both legs.The hoplomachus, or heavily armed gladiator, wore a breastplate, as well as visored helmet, and greaves. In later times the place of the retiarius was sometimes taken by the laquearius, who wore the same light armour, but carried a short sword and a noose (laqueus), which he threw over his adversary and pulled him to the ground. The dimachaeri, or men who fought with two swords, are also apparently the production of a later time. The essedarii (from essedum, a British war-car with two horses) fought in chariots. The andabatoe (fig. 4) fought on horseback, armed with small round shield and spear (spiculum), and a visored helmet without eyeholes, and charged each other in the dark. There are many representations of gladiatorial combats in works of art, the most comprehensive of which is a large bas-relief in Pompeii. [Overbeck's Pompeii, figs. 106-112; or Schreiber's Bilderatlas , I xxx figs. 2-8.]
GLADIUS	The Roman military sword, which was attacbed to a shoulder-strap round the neck, or to the girdle round the waist. The common soldiers wore it on the right side; the officers, having no shield like the common soldiers, on the left. It was a short, sharp, two-edged weapon, used more for thrusting than cutting. In the republican period it was only worn by magistrates when acting as military officers; but under the Empire it was the emblem of imperial power, and in consequence one of the insignia of the emperor and the commanders nominated by him. After the introduction of the sword instead of the axe in executions, the ius gladii was the term expressing the full criminal jurisdiction confered by the emperor on the provincial governors.
GLASS	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 Glass was for a long time procured by the Greeks and Romans from Phoenicia and Egypt, where its manufacture had been carried on since very ancient times, and the art had reached an uncommon degree of perfection. The ancients produced glass-work of great beauty, both in form and colours. In later times it was the manufacturers of Alexandria whose reputation stood the highest. The manufacturers carried on, down to the times of the later Empire, a considerable export trade in coloured blown-glass and mosaics. It is uncertain whether the Greeks manufactured their own glass in more ancient times. It was certainly a very costly article down to the time of the Peloponnesian War, and only came into general use at a late period. In Italy the manufacture of glass began at the commencement of the imperial period, first in Campania and afterwards in Rome, where they were ambitious of surpassing the art of Alexandria. From Italy it spread to Gaul and Spain and the more distant provinces, and before long, glass cups, saucers, and bottles became an ordinary part of household furniture. The remains discovered at Herculaneum and Pompeii show that glass windows were not unknown in the imperial age. The ancients were familiar with the manufacture of pure, white, transparent, crystal glass, which was much in request, as well as with the art of colouring glass in every tint. They could imitate every kind of stone, produce varying prismatic tints, and spread layers of different colours upon each other. The art of cutting and polishing glass was very advanced. From bits of glass, cut and polished, were made great numbers of mock pearls, or mock precious stones, and pastes, which were worn, instead of real stones, in rings, tut in intaglio or relief. The most important productions of art were: (1) the vasa diatreta. In these cups the outer side was made of filigree work, cut out of the hard mass. The outer network was of a different colour from the ground, with which it was connected by nothing but slender glass talks. (2) The vessels which exhibit reliefs of white opaque glass on a dark and transparent ground, like the celebrated Portland Vase (See GEMS). Glass tablets, intended for mural decoration, were sometimes ornamented with reliefs of this kind.
GLAUCE	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 also called Creusa. The daughter of Creon king of Corinth, who was betrothed to Jason, and slain out of jealousy by Medea by means of a poisoned robe. (See ARGONAUTS, conclusion.)
GLAUCUS	King of Corinth, son of Sisyphus and father of Bellerophontes. At the funeral games of Pelias in Iolcus, he was thrown and torn to pieces by his own horses, which Aphrodite in her wrath had driven mad. His ghost was said to appear to the horses racing at the Isthmian games and terrify them. He was accordingly worshipped on the Isthmus, under the name of Taraxippos, or Terrifier of Horses.
GLAUCUS	Great-grandson of (3): grandson of 1 The swords used by gladiators often resembled rapiers: see fig. 1. ellerophoutes, and son of Hippolochus, prince of the Lycians. With his kinsman Sarpedon, he was leader of the Lycian auxiliaries of Priam, and met Diomedes in the melee. The two chieftains recognised each other as friends and guests of their grandfather Bellerophoutes, and (Eneus, and exchanged armour, Glaucus parting with his golden suit for the brazen arms of Diomedes. When the Greek entrenchments were stormed, Glaucus had reached the top of the wall when he was put to flight by an arrow shot by Teucer. He protected Hector when wounded by Achilles; with Apollo's aid he avenged Sarpedon, and took a prominent part in the struggle for the body of Patroclus. He finally met his death at the hand of Ajax.
GLAUCUS	Son of the Cretan Minos and Pasiphae. When playing in his infancy he fell into a jar of honey, and was stifled. His father, after a vain search for him, was told by the Curetes that only one person could find the child and bring him to life again. That was the man who should devise a suitable comparison for a cow in his herd, which became white, red, and black, alternately at intervals of four hours. The seers of the country being unable to solve the difficulty, Minos called in the seer Polyidus of Argos, the, great-grandson of Melampus. He read the riddle by comparing the cow to a blackberry or mulberry, which is white, red, and black at various stages of its growth. The corpse of the child he found by aid of the flight of a bird. Professing himself unable to revive the corpse, Minos, in anger, ordered him to be shut up with it in a vault. A snake crept up to the corpse, and Polyidus killed it: he then saw another snake revive its dead fellow by laying a herb upon it. With this herb he brought the dead child to life again. Finally Minos compelled him to teach the boy the art of prophecy. But on his return to Argos, Polyidus made the child spit into his mouth, which caused him to forget all that he bad learned.
GLAUCUS	A god of the sea, therefore commonly called Pontios, who possessed the gift of prophecy. Originally a fisherman and diver of Anthedon in Boeotia, he once chanced to eat of a herb which he had seen fish feed on to refresh themselves when tired. It drove him mad, and he threw himself into the sea, on which he was changed into a sea-god by Oceanus and Tethys. According to another story he threw himself into the sea for love of the young sea-god Melicertes, with whom he was sometimes identified. He was also said to have been the builder and the pilot of the Argo, and to have been changed into a god in a wonderful way after the battle of the Argonauts with the Tyrrhenians. According to common belief he visited all the coasts and islands of the Mediterranean every year, prophesying, and lamenting that he could not die. He, and the Nereides with him, were said to have uttered oracles in Delos. The stories had much to tell of his loves, notably of those of Scylla and Circe. He was represented in works of art as an old man with a fish's tail, with sea-blue scales, long hair and beard, and breast covered with sea-weed and shells.
GLYCON	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 An Athenian artist, who probably flourished in the let century B.C. He executed the famous colossal statue of the Farnese Hercules, now at Naples (See HERACLES).
GNOMON	The Greek term for the sundial, the use of which in Greece is said to date from Anaximenes or Anaximander (500 B.C.) The first sundial used in Rome (solarium) was brought there in 263 B.C. from Catana in Sicily, and set up in public. It was not, however, till 164 B.C. that one adapted to the latitude of Rome was constructed. From that time the use of sundials became so common throughout the empire, that it was assumed in legislation during the imperial period, and all private business was regulated by the hours marked on the dial.
GOLD AND IVORY
GORGLAS	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 A Greek rhetorician of the second half of the 1st century B.C. He was tutor to the younger Cicero, and was the author of a treatise on the figures of speech, which is in part preserved in a Latin paraphrase by Rutilius Lupus. (See RUTILIUS LUPUS.)
GORGLAS	A Greek sopbist and rhetorician, a native of Leontini in Sicily. In 427 B.C., when already advanced in years, he came to Athens on an embassy from his native city, to implore aid against the Syracusans. The finished style of his speaking excited general admiration. He was successful in the object of his mission, and immediately returned home. But he soon came back to Athens, which he made his headquarters, travelling through Greece, like the other Sophists, and winning much popularity and emolument from a large number of disciples. He survived Socrates, who died in 399, and ended his days at Larissa in Thessaly in his hundredth year. His philosophy was a nihilistic system, which he summed up in three propositions: (a) nothing exists; (b) if anything existed, it could not be known; (c) did anything exist, and could it be known, it could not be communicated. Ile declined to assume the name of Sophist, preferring that of rhetorician. He professed to teach not virtue, but the art of persuasion; in other words, to give his disciples such absolute readiness in speaking, that they should be able to convince their hearers independently of any knowledge of the subject. He did not found his instruction on any definite rhetorical system, but gave his pupils standard passages of literature to learn by art and imitate, practising them in the application of rhetorical figures. He appeared in person, on various occasions, at Delphi, Olympia, and Athens, with model speeches which he afterwards published. It must not be forgotten that it was Gorgias who transplanted rhetoric to Greece, its proper soil, and who helped to diffuse the Attic dialect as the literary language of prose. Two highly rhetorical exercises, the genuineness of which is doubtful, have come down to us under his name, the Encomium of Helen, and the Defence of Palamedes against the charge of high treason brought against him by Odysseus.
GORGO
GORTYN	[An archaic Greek inscription discovered in 1884 by Halbherr, in the bed of a mill-stream at Hagios Deka in Crete, the site of the Greek city of Gortyn. After many difficulties, the whole of it was copied and published at the end of the year. It was found to be inscribed in 12 columns on the inside wall of a circular building about 100 feet in diameter, which was probably a theatre, and covers a space of about 30 feet in length, to a height of between 5 and 6 feet from the ground. The lines are written alternately from left to right and from right to left. Two fragments of it had been discovered before, one of them being in the Louvre at Paris, and with the addition of these fragments the inscription was found to be practically complete. It contains a collection of laws regulating the private relations of the inhabitants of Gortyn. These laws deal chiefly with such subjects as Inheritance, Adoption, Heiresses, Marriage and Divorce, and incidentally afford much information on the slave system, the tenure of land and property, the organization of the courts, and other matters of interest. Its chief value is perhaps as throwing light upon the laws of the earlier Athenian legislators. The inscription is probably to be dated a few years before 400 B.C.]- C. A. M.Pond.
GRAIAE	i.e. the gray-haired women, were in Greek mythology, the protectresses of the Gorgons, and, like them, the daughters of Keto and Phorcys, the aged god of the seas. Hesiod knows of only two, Pephredo and Enyo; the later story adds a third, Deino. Their very names suggest panic and terror, Born with gray hair, and having only one eye and tooth between them, which they pass from one to the other, they are the very personifications of old age. Perseus found it easy to rob them of their tooth. Their dwelling-place was in the boundary of the Gorgonian plain at the farthest end of Libya, where no sun or moon ever shone.
GRAMMATEUS	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 The Greek word for a writer, secretary, or clerk. At Athens the officials had numerous clerks attached to them, who were paid by the state and belonged to the poorer class of citizens. But there were several higher officials who bore the title of Grammateus. The Boule or senate, for instance, chose one of its members by show of hands to be its clerk or secretary for one year. His duty was to keep the archives of the senate. So, too, a secretary was chosen by lot from the whole number of senators for each prytany, to draft all resolutions of the senate. (See PRYTANY.) His name is therefore generally given in the decrees next to that of the president and the proposer of the decree. The name of the grammateus of the first prytany was also given with that of the archon, as a means of marking the year with more accuracy. At the meetings of the Ecclesia a clerk, elected by the people, had to read out the necessary documents. The office of the antigrapheis, or checking clerks, was of still greater importance. The antigrapheus of the senate, elected at first by show of hands, but afterwards by lot, had to take account of all business affecting the financial administration. The antigrapheus of the administration had to make out, and lay before the public, a general statement of income and expenditure, and exercised a certain amount of control over all financial officials. In the Aetolian and Achaean federations the grammateus was the highest officer of the League after the strategi and hipparchi.
GRAMMATICA	Rome. After the middle of the 2nd century B.C., a lively interest in the history of literature and the study of language arose in Rome. It had been excited by the lectures on Greek authors given by Crates during his sojourn in Rome as ambassador (B.C. 159). Not only writers of repute, such as Accius and Lucilius, but men like Aelius Stilo, a member of the equestrian order, who was actively engaged in public life, took up these studies with eagerness. What was afterwards known of the primitive Latin language we owe mainly to Aelius Stilo. He was the master of the great encyclopaedist Marcus Terentius Varro, Cicero's contemporary. This great scholar left his mark on every department of philological research, and his writings were the storehouse from which the following generations mainly drew their information. Besides Varro, other men of mark occupied themselves with grammatical study in the Ciceronian age, notably Nigidius Figulus. Julius Caesar was the author of a treatise on accidence. There were numerous scholars in the Augustan age, among whom Verrius Flaccus and Hyginus deserve especial notice. In the 1st century A.D. we have Remmius Palaemon, Asconius Pedianus, Valerius Probus, and the elder Pliny. It was Remmius Palaemon who is mainly responsible for having made Vergil the Centre of scholastic instruction for the Latin world, as Homer was for the Greek. During the 2nd century, under Hadrian and the Antonines, we notice a revived interest in the older literature. This period is distinguished by the names of Suetonius, Terentitis Scaurus, and Aulus Gellius. Suetonius aspired to the many sided learning of Varro, and, like Varro, was much quoted by later writers. After this time the grammarians tend more and more to confine their studies to points of language, to abandon independent research, and to depend on the labours of their predecessors. The chief value of their writings consists in the fact that they have preserved some fragments of ancient learning. Their extracts are usually made for school purposes, and put together in artes, or manuals of accidence, orthography, prosody, and metre. Such are the books of Marius Victorinus, Donatus, Servius, Charisius, Diomedes, who are all assigned to the 4th Century A.D. Nonius Marcellus belongs to the same period. He is the author of a work (De Compendiosa Doctrina) which, though dreary and uncritical, is invaluable for the stores of old Latin which it has preserved. The 6th century is marked by the name of Priscian. We may further notice Terentianus Maurus, the author of a versified treatise on metre in the 3rd century; Macrobius, who in the 6th century composed a miscellany of antiquities called Saturnalia; and Isidore, Bishop of Seville, in the 7th century, whose Origines is the last work founded on a real study of ancient authorities.
GRAMMATICA	Greece. The term grammatica, in the scientific sense, included, in antiquity, all the philological disciplines, grammar proper, lexicography, prosody, the lower and higher criticism, antiquities, everything, in short, necessary to the understanding and explanation of grammata, or the treasures of literature, whether their form or their matter be in question. It was first developed into a special science during the Alexandrian age, in Alexandria and Pergamon, where the great libraries gave ample opportunity for philological studies on the scale above indicated. It was the restoration of the text of the Homeric poems, and the explanation of their words and contents, that primarily exercised the wits of the scholars. Hesiod, the lyric poets, the dramatists, and certain prose writers next engaged their attention. The progress and development of philology is marked by the names of Zenodotus (about 280 B.C.), Aristophanes of Byzantium (260-183), and Aristarchus (about 170), the three chief representatives of the Alexandrian school. To these must be added Crates (about 160), the head of the school of Pergamon, and the opponent of the Alexandrians. The name of Aristarchus represents the highest point of philological learning and criticism in antiquity. He was the founder of the celebrated school of the Aristarcheans, which continued to exist and to maintain an uninterrupted tradition, down to the first century of the imperial age. His disciple Dionysius Thrax wrote the oldest manual of grammar that we possess. By far the most celebrated of the later Aristarcheans was Didymus, born about 63 B.C. His writings are the chief foundation of the Byzantine collections of scholia. The science of grammatica gradually narrowed its scope till it confined itself to grammar in the restricted sense of the word, namely, accidence and syntax, combined with lexical researches into the dialects, and into the usages of special periods of literature, and special groups of authors. The most eminent scholars of the Empire are Apollonius Dyscolus (about 150 A.D.), who endeavoured to reduce the whole of empirical grammar to a system, and his son, Aelius Herodianus, a still more important personage. The writings of the latter form one of the chief authorities of the later grammarians, such as Arcadius. The lexical writings of the earlier scholars were often very comprehensive, and have only survived in fragments, or in later extracts, such as that of Hesychius. They had consisted mainly in collections of glosses, or strange and antiquated expressions. But in the 2nd Century A.D. the influence of the reviving sophistic literature and education turned the attention of lexicographers to the usage of the Attic writers. This tendency is represented in the surviving works of Pollux, Harpocration, and others. To the same period belongs Hephaestion's manual of prosody, which is the only complete treatise on this subject. Athenaeus, at the beginning of the 3rd century, wrote a work (the Deipnosophistoe) of inestimable value to the student of antiquities. Longinus, who died 273 A.D., may be regarded as the last considerable scholar of the ancient world. The later grammarians restricted themselves to compiling extracts from the works of earlier ages.
GRAMMATICUS	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 See EDUCATION.
GRANIUS LICINIANUS	A Roman historian, who probably flourished in the 2nd century A.D. He was the author of a work compiled in the style of annales, ending with the death of Caesar. Some considerable fragments have been found in modern times of books 28-36, covering the history of the years 163-78 B.C.
GRATIUS	Faliscus. A Roman poet, contemporary with Ovid. He was the author of a poem on the chase (Cynegeticon), of which only the first book has been preserved, and that mutilated towards the close The fragment consists of some 535 hexameters, in which the subject is treated with much talent in an even and classical style, but with considerable dryness in many parts. Grattius has been styled Faliscus because, in one passage, he apparently indicates that the Falisci were his countrymen.
GROMA	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 The measuring instrument used by land surveyors, who were called Gromatici from it. See AGRIMENSORES.
GYMNASIUM	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 The Greek name for the place where the youths who had alreadyreat variety of gymnastic exercises, and the increasing inclination of grown men to look on at them and take part in them, the gymnasia often adorned with beautiful sculptures, grow in extent and splendour of equipment. (Seecut.) The great court comprised a number of spaces serving a variety of purposes: for instance, the ephebeion, or hall where the ephebi practised, rooms for dressing and anointing, sanding or dusting the body, cold-water baths and dry sudatoria, spaces for playing at ball, open and covered passages for running, wrestling, or walking. Attached to the colonnades on the outside were semicircular niches, furnished with stone seats, called exedra,. In these philosophers and rhetoricians would sit and talk with their disciples. A stadion, with a space for spectators to look on, and walksplanted with trees, were often attached to the gymnasium. The whole was under the superintendence of a gymnasiarchos. The conduct of the youths was under the supervision of sophronistoe. At Athens these officers were ten in number, and elected annually. The exercises were directed by the gymnastoe. For similar arrangements under the Roman empire see THERMAe.
GYMNASTICS	Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 Deprecated: Function split() is deprecated in /www/www-ccat/data/classics/myth/php/tools/dictionary.php on line 64 I Grecian. The art of physical exercises, so called because the Greeks practised them unclothed (gymnos). Various exercises of the kind, carried on in view of contests on festive occasions, are mentioned as early as Homer. After the Homeric time they were, at all periods, widely practised among the Greeks, and more so after they were legally prescribed as part of the regular educational course, especially at Athens and Sparta. They were, moreover actively encouraged by the great national games, particularly the Olympian games, of which they formed the chief part. Heracles and Hermes were the tutelary gods of gymnastics, which attained in Athens their highest and most varied development. The object of the art was to develop the body harmoniously in health, activity, and beauty. Boys went through certain preliminary stages of gymnastics in the paloestroe, a carried on their further training to perfection in the gymnasia. (See GYMNASIUM The different kinds of exere ses were as follows: (1) Running (dromos or stadion). This was the oldest of all, and for a long time the only one practised in the public games. In later times, indeed, it stood at the head of the list. The course was either single (stadion, nearly the eighth of a mile), or double (diaulos). The runner was sometimes equipped with helmet and greaves, but in later times only with the latter. The hardest of all was the long course or dolichos. This was a distance of 24 stadia, between two and three English miles, which had to be run without stopping. (2) Leaping (halma). This included the high and wide jump, and jumping downwards. To strengthen the power of spring and secure the equilibrium of the body, especially in leaping downwards, it was common to use piece of iron called halteres, not unlike our dumb-bells. (3) Wrestling (pale). This was the piece de resistance of the Greek gymnastic. The combatants were allowed certain tricks which are now forbidden, as throttling, pushing, and twisting the fingers. Standing upright, each wrestler tried to throw the other down, and if one of them was thrown thrice, he was regarded as beaten, unless the contest was continued on the ground. In this case the one who was thrown tried to get up, while the other tried to hinder him, until he owned himself vanquished. Before all gymnastic exercises the body was well rubbed with oil to make the limbs supple. But before wrestling it was also sprinkled with dust, partly to afford a firm hold, partly to prevent excessive perspiration. (4) Discobolia, or throwing the discus. (See Discus.) (5) Throwing the javelin (akontismos). These five exercises together formed the pentathlon, or set of five, in which no one was accounted victorious who had not conquered in all. Besides these there was (6) The dangerous game of boxing (pyx,pygme). In this the combatants struck out with each hand alternately, their hands being bound round with thongs so as to leave fingers and thumb free to form a clenched fist (See engraving). Athletes often fitted the thongs with strips of sharp and hardened leather, or with nails and leaden knobs. The blow was directed against the upper part of the body, head, and face. (7) The Pancration was a combination of boxing and wrestling, but nothing was worn on the hands, and the blow was delivered, not with the clenched fist, bat with the fingers bent. This exercise was not introduced into the public games until 650 B.C. Indeed, the two latter exercises were generally confined to the professional athletes. (See ATHLETES.) In Sparta they were not practised at all. II Roman. Among the Romans from the oldest times until the imperial period, the youths used to assemble for exercises in the Campus Martins, the object of the exercises being exclusively to prepare them for military service. (See EDUCATION.) The Greek gymnastic was not introduced at Rome until the decline of Roman tradition had set in, and professional athleticism had become fashionable. The Roman sense of propriety was offended by the Greek practice of exercising unclothed, and the only game which they really adopted was that of throwing the discus.
GYMNETAE	(troops without defensive armour). A name for the different sorts of sharpshooters employed in the Greek armies after the Persian Wars, in place of the lightarmed slaves. It was only after the expedition of the Ten Thousand that they came to form an essential part of a Greek army. They were generally recruited from the barbarous nations who were specially distinguished in the use of particular missiles. The archers (toxotoe), for instance, were generally Cretans, the slingers (sphendonetoe) Rhodians and Thessalians, while the javelin men (akontistoe) were taken from the semi-Hellenic populations in the west of Greece, notably the Etolians and Acarnanians. The common characteristic of all these troops was the absence of all defensive weapons. It was among the Lacedemonians that they were introduced latest. Alexander the Great had a corps of 2,000 of them, with which he opened his campaign against the Persians. Half of these were spearmen, taken from the Agriani, in the mountains of northern Macedonia; the other half archers, from the lowest class of the Macedonian population.
GYMNOPAIDIA	A great festival held at Sparta from the 6th to the 10th of July. It was an exhibition of all kinds of accomplishments in gymnastics, music, and dancing, given by boys, youths, and men for the benefit of the citizens and of the numerous strangers who flocked to Sparta for the occasion, and were hospitably entertained there. Festal hymns were written for the occasion, in honour not only of the gods but of brave citizens, notably those who had fallen at Thyrea, and later at Thermopylae.
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