Page:Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1870) - Volume 2.djvu/921

MALCHUS. with Apollonius of Alabanda, who was surnaraed d MaKanSs. [Apollonius.] [C. P. M.J MALALAS. [Malelas.] MALAS, of Chios, a sculptor, mentioned by Pliny {H. N. xxxvi. 5. s. 4) as having lived before Dipoenus and Scyllis. He was the grandfather of Antherinus, and must therefore have flourished about the 35th or 40th Olympiad. [P. S.] MALCHUS or MALICHUS (Ma'^xos, Mc^At- Xos), historical. This name is in fact a mere title and signifies " a king." (Gesenius, Li?i(j, Phoen. Man. p. 409 ; and Kuster, ad Snid. s. v. Ylopcpvpios.) 1. A Carthaginian leader who, according to Justin, was one of the first that extended the power and dominion of his country, first, by suc- cessful wars against the African tribes, and after- wards by the subjugation of great part of Sicily. But, having subsequently crossed into Sardinia, he was defeated in a great battle ; on account of which disaster he was disgraced and banished by his countrymen. In revenge for this he led his army to Carthage and laid siege to the city. His son Carthalo was in vain sent to intercede with him ; he was crucified by order of Malchus him- self within sight of the walls. Yet, having at length made himself master of the city, he was content with putting to death ten of the principal senators, and left the rest in possession of the chief power, of which they soon after availed themselves to bring him to trial and condemn him to death. (Justin, xviii. 7.) Orosius, who has merely abridged the narrative of Justin, adds that these events took place during the reign of Cyrus the Great (Oros. iv. 6), but this is probably a mere inference from the statement of Justin, that Mal- chus was followed in the command by Mago. [Mago, No. 1.] The chronology of these events is in fact extremely uncertain. 2. One of the chief leaders among the Jews at the time that Cassius Longinus was in Syria, B. c. 43. He had failed in payment of the tribute which he was appointed to collect, on which ac- count Cassius was about to put him to death, and he was with difficulty saved by the intercession of Hyrcanus and Antipater. But, far from being grateful to Antipater for the service thus rendered him, Malichus began to form designs against his life, and at length succeeded in removing him by poison. Herod, the son of Antipater, for a time dissembled his desire of vengeance, and pretended to be reconciled to Malichus, who obtained a high place in the favour of Hyrcanus ; but he soon took an opportunity to have him assassinated by a band of soldiers. (Joseph. Ani. xiv. 11. §§ 2 — 6, B.J.i. 11. $§2—8.) 3. King of Arabia Petraea (probably the same who is mentioned by Hirtius, B. Alex. 1, as send- ing an auxiliary force of cavalry to Caesar in Egypt, and is termed by him king of the Na- bathaeans), was contemporary with Herod the Great, who fled to him for refuge when he was driven out of Jerusalem by Antigonus and the Parthians, B. c. 40. But Malchus, though bound by many obligations to Herod and his father An- tipater, refused to receive him in his adversity, and forbade him to enter his territories. At a subsequent period (b. c. 32) hostilities arose be- tween Malchus and Herod, in consequence of the refusal of the former to pay the appointed tribute to Cleopatra, which Herod was charged by Antony to exact by force of arms. The war continued MALCHUS. 907 nearly two years with various changes of fortune, but seems to have been terminated by the decisive defeat of the Arabian monarch. We however again hear of Malchus, at a subsequent period, as fomenting the intrigues of Alexandra and Hyrca- nus against Herod. (Joseph. Ant. xiv. 14. §§1 2, XV. 4. §§ 2, 4, 5, 6. § 2, B. J. i. 14, §§ 1, 2, 19.) [E.H.B.] MALCHUS (Mdxos literary. 1 . Of Byzan- tium. [No. 4.] 2. Of Maronia. [No. 3.] 3. Monachus, the Monk, author of a curious autobiography, dictated by him in his extreme old age to Jerome, then a young man residing at Maronia, a hamlet about thirty miles from Antioch. (Hieronym. Vita Malchi, Opera, vol. ii. col. 41, &c. ed. Vallarsii.) 4. Of Philadelphia. Among the writers from whom the 'EKoya irept irp^crS^wv, Excerpta de Legatio7iibus, compiled by order of Constantine Porphyrogenitus, are taken, was Malchus the so- phist {MaKxos ao(piarris). According to Suidas and Eudocia is. v. MaXxos) Malchus was a By- zantine ; but the statement of Photius that he was a native of Philadelphia, is preferable ; and his Syriac name makes it probable that Philadelphia was the city so called (the ancient Rabbah) in the country of Ammonitis, east of the Jordan. Mal- chus probably followed his profession of rhetorician or sophist at Constantinople, and the statement that he was a native of that city may have arisen from that circumstance. According to Suidas and Eudocia, he wrote a history extending from the reign of Constantine to that of Anastasius ; but the work in seven books, of which Photius has given an account {Bibl. cod. 78), and to which he gives the title Bv^avra'iKot., comprehended only the period from the final sickness of the Eastern em- peror Leo L (a. d. 473 or 474), to the death of Nepos, emperor of the West (a. d. 480). It has been supposed that this was an extract from the work mentioned by Suidas, or a mutilated copy : that it was incomplete is attested by Photius him- self, who says that the commencement of the first of the seven books showed that the author had already written some previous portions, and that the close of the seventh book showed his intention of carrying it further, if his life was spared. Some eminent critics, among whom is Valesius (A'b^. in Excerpt, de Legat), have thought that the history of Malchus began with Leo's sickness, and that he was the continuator of Prisons, whose history ia supposed to have left off at that point. Niebuhr {De Hidoricis, ^c, prefixed to the Bonn edition of the Excerpta) supposed that this coincidence arose from Photius having met with a portion only of the work of Malchus, which had been inserted iu some historical Catena after the work of Priscua ; or that the history of the antecedent period had been given by Malchus in another work. As, how- ever, Suidas and Eudocia speak of the history in its whole extent, as one work, we are rather disposed to think it was published in successive parts, as the author was able to finish it (a sup- position which best coincides with the notice in Photius of the continuation being contingent on the longer duration of the author's life) ; and that Photius had met with only one part. Photius praises the style of Malchus as a perfect model of historical composition ; pure, free from redundancy and consisting of well-selected words and phrases.