Apollonius of Tyana, the Philosopher-Reformer of the First Century A.D Part 11

[67] ?? ?p??e????? t?? f???s?f?a? ????et?. The term ?p??e?????

occurs only in this pa.s.sage, and I am therefore not quite certain of its meaning.

[68] This Life by Mragenes is casually mentioned by Origenes, Contra Celsum, vi. 41; ed. Lommatzsch (Berlin; 1841), ii. 373.

[69] ?????? da???????.

[70] Seldom is it that we have such a clear indication, for instance, as in i. 25; The following is what _I_ have been able to learn ... about Babylon.

[71] See E. A. Schwanbeck, Megasthenis Indica (Bonn; 1846), and J. W. MCrindle, Ancient India as described by Megasthenes and Arrian (Calcutta, Bombay, London; 1877), The Commerce and Navigation of the Erythran Sea (1879), Ancient India as described by Ktesias (1882), Ancient India as described by Ptolemy (London; 1885), and The Invasion of India by Alexander the Great (London; 1893, 1896).

[72] Another good example of this is seen in the disquisition on elephants which Philostratus takes from Jubas History of Libya (ii. 13 and 16).

[73] Perhaps a t.i.tle, or the king of the Purus.

[74] Not that Philostratus makes any disguise of his embellishments; see, for instance, ii. 17, where he says: Let me, however, defer what _I_ have to say on the subject of serpents, of the manner of hunting which Damis gives a description.

[75] Legends of the wonderful happenings at his birth were in circulation, and are of the same nature as all such birth-legends of great people.

[76] ????t? t??? s?f?a ?????ae.

[77] Sci., than his tutor; namely, the memory within him, or his dmon.

[78] This ther was presumably the mind-stuff.

[79] That is to say presumably he was encouraged in his efforts by those unseen helpers of the temple by whom the cures were wrought by means of dreams, and help was given psychically and mesmerically.

[80] Where are you hurrying? Are you off to see the youth?

[81] Compare Odyssey, xx. 18.

[82] I am inclined to think, however, that Apollonius was still a youngish man when he set out on his Indian travels, instead of being forty-six, as some suppose. But the difficulties of most of the chronology are insurmountable.

[83] f?sa? ??? ?????p?? ?a?t? de??, ???' ??d???.

[84] ?d??t??pa.

[85] to?? o?t? f???s?f???ta?.

[86] That is to say, presumably, spend the time in silent meditation.

[87] That is the Brahmans and Buddhists. Sarman is the Greek corruption of the Sanskrit Sama?a and Pli Sama?o, the technical term for a Buddhist ascetic or monk. The ignorance of the copyists changed Sarmanes first into Germanes and then into Hyrcanians!

[88] This shows that Apollonius was still young, and not between forty and fifty, as some have a.s.serted. Tredwell (p.

77) dates the Indian travels as 41-54 A.D.

[89] See especially iii. 15, 41; v. 5, 10; vii. 10, 13; viii.

28.

[90] ??fat??sata.

[91] See especially vii. 13, 14, 15, 22, 31.

[92] The list is full of gaps, so that we cannot suppose that Damis notes were anything like complete records of the numerous itineraries; not only so, but one is tempted to believe that whole journeys, in which Damis had no share, are omitted.

[93] Here at any rate they came in sight of the giant mountains, the Imaus (Himavat) or Himalayan Range, where was the great mountain Meros (Meru). The name of the Hindu Olympus being changed into Meros in Greek had, ever since Alexanders expedition, given rise to the myth that Bacchus was born from the thigh (_meros_) of Zeus--presumably one of the facts which led Professor Max Mller to stigmatise the whole of mythology as a disease of language.

[94] Referring to his instructors he says, I ever remember my masters and journey through the world teaching what I have learned from them (vi. 18).

[95] According to some, Apollonius would be now about sixty-eight years of age. But if he were still young (say thirty years old or so) when he left for India, he must either have spent a very long period in that country, or we have a very imperfect record of his doings in Asia Minor, Greece, Italy, and Spain, after his return.

[96] For the most recent study in English on the subject of sculapius see The Cult of Asclepios, by Alice Walton, Ph.D., in No. III. of The Cornell Studies in Cla.s.sical Philology (Ithaca, N.Y.; 1894).

[97] He evidently wrote the notes of the Indian travels long after the time at which they were made.

[98] This shows that Philostratus came across them in some work or letter of Apollonius, and is therefore independent of Damis account for this particular.

[99] I--ar?as, ar?a(t)s, arhat.

[100] Tantalus is fabled to have stolen the cup of nectar from the G.o.ds; this was the am?ita, the ocean of immortality and wisdom, of the Indians.

[101] The words ??de? ?e?t?????? ? t? p??t??, which Philostratus quotes twice in this form, can certainly not be changed into ?d?? ?e?t?????? t? p??t?? ??e?? without doing unwarrantable violence to their meaning.

[102] See Tacitus, Historia, ii. 3.

[103] Berwick, Life of Apollonius, p. 200 _n._

[104] He also built a precinct round the tomb of Leonidas at Thermopyl (iv. 23).

[105] A great centre of divination by means of dreams (see ii.

37).

[106] The word ????? (naked), however, usually means lightly clad, as, for instance, when a man is said to plough naked, that is with only one garment, and this is evident from the comparison made between the costume of the Gymnosophists and that of people in the hot weather at Athens (vi. 6).

[107] For they had neither huts nor houses, but lived in the open air.

[108] He spent, we are told, no less than a year and eight months with Vardan, King of Babylon, and was the honoured guest of the Indian Rajah Phraotes.

[109] See i. 22 (cf. 40), 34; iv. 4, 6, 18 (cf. v. 19), 24, 43; v. 7, 11, 13, 30, 37; vi. 32; viii. 26.

[110] This expression is, however, perhaps only to be taken as rhetorical, for in viii. 8, the incident is referred to in the simple words when he departed (?p???e) from the tribunal.

[111] That is to say not in a form, but in his own nature.

[112] See in this connection L. v. Schroeder, Pythagoras und die Inder, eine Untersuchung ber Herkunft und Abstammung der pythagoreischen Lehren (Leipzig; 1884).

[113] This has reference to the preserved hunting parks, or paradises, of the Babylonian monarchs.

[114] Reading f???s?f? for f???s?f??.