HELLANICUS

Form: Hellanikos.

One of the Greek logographi or chroniclers, born at Mytilene in Lesbos about 480 B.C. He is said to have lived till the age of 85, and to have gone on writing until after B.C. 406. In the course of his long life he composed a series of works on genealogy, chorography, and chronology. He was the first writer who attempted to introduce a systematic chronological arrangement into the traditional periods of Greek, and especially Athenian, history and mythology. His theories of the ancient Attic chronology were accepted down to the time of Eratosthenes.