Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 2.djvu/1054

1040 MENES. by Celsus {De Medic, vi. 9, p. 129), is not the same person, and must have lived at least a century earlier. [W. A. G.] MENE'NIA GENS, was a very ancient and illustrious patrician house at Rome from B. c. 503 to B. c. 376. Its only cognomen is Lanatus. [La- NATUS.] Cicero (ad Fam. xiii. 9) mentions a Menenian tribe, and Appian a Menenius who was proscribed by the triumvirs in B. c. 43, and rescued from death by the self-devotion of one of his slaves. (B. a iv. 44.) [ W. B. D.] MENEPHRON, an Arcadian, who is said to have lived in incestuous intercourse Avith his mother Blias and his daughter Cyllene. (Ov. Met. vii. 386 ; Hygin. Fab. 253, who calls him Me- nophrus.) [L. S.] MENES (M^j/Tjs), a Thracian, from whom the town of Menebria or Meserabria was said to have received its name. (Strab. vii. p. 319.) [L. S.] MENES (MTj^r/s). This is the most usual form of the name, which, however, we also find written as Menas, Menis, Meinis, Men, Min, and Mein (Mr}vds, Mrjvis, Melvis, Mtjj^, M'lV, MeTf). Menes was the first king of Egypt, according to the tra- ditions of the Egyptians themselves. Herodotus records of hmi that he built Memphis on a piece of ground which he had rescued from the river by turning it from its former course, and erected therein a magnificent temple to Hephaestus (.Pthah). (Comp. Diod. i. 50; Wess. ad loc.) Diodorus tells us that he introduced into Egypt the worship of the gods and the practice of sacrifices, as well as a more elegant and luxurious style of living. As the author of this latter innovation, his memory was dishonoured many generations after- wards by king Tnephachthus, the father of Boc- choris ; and Plutarch mentions a pillar at Thebes in Egypt, on which was inscribed an imprecation Against Menes, as the introducer of luxury. There is a legend also, preserved by Diodorus, which re- lates (in defiance of chronology, unless Mendes is to be substituted for Menas), that he was saved from drowning in the lake of Moeris by a crocodile, in gratitude for which he established the worship of the animal, and built a city near the lake called the City of Crocodiles, erecting there a pyramid to serve as his own tomb. That he was a conqueror, like other founders of kingdoms, we learn from an extract from Manetho preserved by Eusebius. By Marsham and others he has been identified with the Mizraira of Scripture. According to some ac- counts he was killed by a hippopotamus. (Herod, ii. 4, 99 ; Diod. i. 43, 45, 89 ; Wess. ad loc. ; Plut. De Is. et Osir. 8 ; Perizon. Oriy. Aegypt. c. 5 ; Shuckford's Cvnneciion, bk. iv. ; Bunsen, Aegyptens Sielle in der Wdtgeschichie, vol, ii. pp. 38 ^45.) [E. E.] MENES (McVtjs), a citizen of Pella, son of Dionysius, was one of the oificers of Alexander the Great ; and after the battle of Issus (b. c. 333) was admitted by the king into the number of his body-guards, in the room of Balacrus, who was promoted to the satrapy of Cilicia. In B. c. 331, after Alexander had occupied Susa, he sent Menes down to the Mediterranean to Uike the govern- ment of Syria, Phoenicia, and Cilicia, entrusting him at the same time with 3000 talents, a portion of which he was to transmit to Antipater for his war with the Lacedaemonians and the other con- federate states of Greece. ApoUodorus of Amphi- polis was joined with him in this command. (Arr. MENESTHEUS. Anal), ii. 12, iii. 16 ; Diod. xvii. 64 ; Curt. v. 1 ; Freinsh. ad loc.) [E. E.] MENESAECHMUS (Mej/eVatXMoOi an Athe- nian, an inveterate enemy of the orator Lycurgus, by whom he was impeached on a charge of impiety and convicted. When Lycurgus felt his end drawing near, he had himself brought into the council to give an account of his public conduct, and Menesaechmus was the only man who ven- tured to find fault with it. He continued his hos- tility to the sons of Lycurgus after their father's death, and so far succeeded in a prosecution against them, that they were delivered into the custody of the Eleven. They were released, however, on the remonstrance of Demosthenes. (Pseudo-Plut, Vit. X. Oral. Lycurg. ; Phot. Bibl. Cod. 268 ; Suid. s. vv. AvKovpyos^ irporfpoaicu ; Harpocr. s. vv, 'Ap/cucopo5, ArjXiaffrai.) [E. E.] MENESAECHMUS. [Mnesaechmus.] MENESTHES, an architect, whose pseudo- dipteral temple of Apollo is mentioned by Vitruvius (iii. 2. § 6. ed. Schneid.). [P. S.] MENESTHEUS (Mej/eo-eei/'s), a son of Peteus, an Athenian king, who led the Athenians against Troy, and surpassed all other mortals in arranging the war-steeds and men for battle (Hom. //. ii. 552, &c., iv. 327 ; Philostr. Her. ii. 16 ; Pans. ii. 25. § 6). With the assistance of the Tyndarids, he is said to have driven Theseus from his king- dom, and to have died at Troy (Plut. T/ies. 32, 35 ; Pans. i. 17. § 6). A second personage of this name occurs in Virgil. (Aen. x. 129.) [L. S.] MENESTHEUS (Me»/eo-0ei;s), son of Iphicrates, the famous Athenian general, by the daughter of Cotys, king of Thrace. Hence he said that he owed more to his mother than to his father ; for that the latter, as far as in him lay, had made him a Thracian ; the former had made him an Athe- nian. (Nep. 7p/i. 3; comp. Vol. II. p. 617, a.) He was born probably about b. c. 377 (see Rehdantz, Vit. Jphic. Chahr. Timoih. ii. § 4) ; and, as he grew up, his great height and size caused him to be thought older than he really was, so that he was called on, while yet a boy, to undertake Kenovp- yiai, a demand which Iphicrates resisted. (Arist. Bhet. ii. 23. § 17.) He married the daughter of Timotheus ; and in B. c. 356 was chosen com- mander in the Social war, his father and his father- in-law, according to C. Nepos, being appointed to aid him with their counsel and experience. They were all three impeached by their colleague, Chares, for alleged misconduct and treachery in the campaign ; but Iphicrates and Menestheus were acquitted in b. c. 355. (Nep. Zim. 3 ; Dion Hal. Dem. p. 667 ; Rehdantz, Vit. Jphic. &c., vi, § 7, vii. §§ 5, 7 ; comp. Diod. xvi. 21 ; Wess. ad loc. ; Isocr. irep avTiS. § 1 37.) Menestheus was distinguished for his military skill ; and we find him again appointed commander of a squadron of 100 galleys, sent out, in B.C. 335, to check the Macedonians, who had intercepted some Atheniaa ships on their voyage down from the Euxine. We do not know the exact period of his death, but it took place before a c. 325. (Plut. Fhoc. 7; Psendo-Dem., Trepi tuv irpos 'AA<|. ffwfl. p. 217, Epid. iii. p. 1482 ; Rehdantz, Vit. Iphic. &c., vij § 8.) [Iphicrates.] [E. E.] MENESTHEUS, a sculptor whose name ha been preserved by a fragment of a statue, beap»l ing MENEC0ETC MENECeECOC A*POAICIET EnOIEI. (Gruter, p. 1021, 2.) [P. S.] I