Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 1.djvu/889

CRASSINUS. Phocis, in which the office of priest was always held by youths below the age of puberty, and for the space of five years by each youth. (Paus. x. 34. §4.) [L. S.] CRANA'US (KpavaSs), an autochthon and king of Attica, who reigned at the time of the flood of Deucalion. He was married to Pedias, by whom he became the father of Cranae, Cranaechme, and Attliis, from the last of whom Attica was believed to have derived its name. He was deprived of his kingdom by Amphictyon, his son-in-law, and after his death he was buried in the demos of Lamprae, where his tomb was shewn as late as the time of Pausanias. (ApoUod. iii. 14. § 5, &c. ; Paus. i. 2. §5, 31. §2.) [L.S.] CRANE. [Cardka.] GRANTOR (Kpdurup), of Soli in Cilicia, left his native countrj', and repaired to Athens, in order to study philosophy, where he became a pupil of Xenocrates and a friend of Polemo, and one of the most distinguished supporters of the philosophy of the older Academy. As Xenocrates died a c. 315, Grantor must have come to Athens previous to that year, but we do not know the date of his birth or his death. He died before Polemo and Grates, and the dropsy was the cause of his death. He left his fortune, which amounted to twelve talents, to Arcesilaiis; and this may be the reason why many of Grantor's writings were ascribed by the ancients to Arcesilaiis. His works were very numerous. Diogenes Laertius says, that he left behind Gommentaries (uTrojUi^juaTo), which consisted of 30,000 lines ; but of these only fragments have been preserved. They appear to have related principally to moral subjects, and, accordingly, Horace {Ep. i. 2. 4) classes him with Ghrysippus as a moral philosopher, and speaks of him in a manner which proves that the writings of Grantor were much read and generally known in Rome at that time. The most popular of Grantor's works at Rome seems to have been that " On Grief " (De Ltictu, riepl Yiiv6ovs which was addressed to liis friend Hippocles on the death of his son, and from which Gicero seems to have taken almost the whole of the third book of his Tusculan Disputa- tions, The philosopher Panaetius called it a " golden " work, which deserved to be learnt by heart word for word. (Gic. Acad. ii. 44.) Gicero also made great use of it while writing his cele- brated " Gonsolatio" on the death of his daughter, Tullia ; and several extracts from it are preserved in Plutarch's treatise on Gonsolation addressed to Apollonius, which has come down to us. Grantor was the first of Plato's followers who wrote commentaries on the works of his master. He also made some attempts in poetry ; and Dio- genes Laertius relates, that, after sealing up a col- lection of his poems, he deposited them in the temple of Athena in his native city. Soli. He is accordingly called by the poet Theaetetus, in an epitaph which he composed upon him, the friend of the Muses ; and we are told, that his chief fa- vourites among the poets were Homer and Euri- pides. (Diog. Laert. iv. 24 — 27 ; Orelli, Onom. Tull. ii. p. 201; Schneider in Zimmermann's Zeit- schriftfur Alterthumstmssenschqf}, 1836, Nos. 104, 105; Kayser, De Crantore Academico, Heidelb. 1841.) [A. S.] CRASSI'NUS or CRASSUS, a surname borne in early times by many members of the patrician Claudia gens. [Claudius, p. 767.] CRASSITIUS. 871 CRASSIPES, " thick-footed," the name of a patrician family of the Furia gens. 1. M. FuRius Crassipe.s, was one of the three commissioners appointed in B. c. 194 to found a Latin colony among the Bnitii, and he with his colleagues accordingly led, two years afterwards, 3700 foot soldiers and 300 horsemen to Vibo, which had been previously called Hipponium. Grassipes was elected praetor, in B.C. 187, and obtained the province of Gaul. Desiring to obtain a pretext for a war, he deprived the Cenonuvni of their arms, though they had been guilty of no of- fence ; but when this people appealed to the senate at Rome, Grassipes was commanded to restore them their arms, and to depart from the province. He obtained the praetorship a second time in B.C. 173, and received Sicily as his province. (Li v. xxxiv. 53, XXXV. 40, xxxviii. 42, xxxix. 3, xli. 28. s. 33, xlii. 1.) 2. FuRius Grassipes, married Tullia, the daughter of M. Tullius Gicero, after the death of her first husband, G. Piso Frugi. The maniage con- tract (sponsalia) was made on the 6th of April, B.C. 56. She was, however, shortly afterwards divorced from Grassipes, but at what time is uncertain ; it must have been before B. c. 50, as she was married te Dolabella in that year. Gicero notwithstanding continued to live on friendly terms with Grassipes, and mentions to Atticus a conversation he had had with him, when Pompey was setting out from Brundisium, in B. c. 49. (Gic. ad Qu. Fr. ii. 4, v. 1, vi. 1, ad Fam. i. 7. § U, 9. § 20, ad Att. iv. 5, 12, vii. 1, ad Att. ix. 11.) There is a letter of Cicero's {ad Fain. xiii. 9) addressed to Grassipes, when he was quaestor in Bithynia, B. c. 51, recommending to his notice the company that farmed the taxes ia that province. 3. P. FuRius Grassipes, curule aedile, as wa learn from coins (a specimen of which is given below), but at what time is uncertain. The ob- verse of the coin annexed represents a woman's head crowned with a tower, and by the side a foot, through a kind of jocular allusion to the name of Grassipes ; on the reverse is a curule seat. L. CRASSITIUS, a Latin grammarian, was a native of Tarentum and a freedman, and was sur- naraed Pasicles, which he afterwards changed into Pansa. He was first employed in assisting the writers of the mimes for the stage, afterwards gave lectures on grammar, and at length wrote a com- mentary on the obscure poem of C. Helvius Ginna, entitled Smyrna, which gained him great re- nown : his praises were celebrated in an epigram preserved by Suetonius, but the meaning of it is difficult to understand. He taught the sons of many of the noblest families at Rome, and among others Julius Antonius, the son of the triumvir, but eventually he gave up his school, in order to be compared to Verrius Flnccus, and betook himself to the study of philosophy. (Suet. lUustr. Gramin, 18 ; Weichert, Poct. Latin. Reliqu. p. 184.) It is not impossible that this Crassitius was ori- ginally the slave of the Crassitius or Crassicius,