Ptolemais

“ In 409 or 410 Synesius, whose Christianity had until then been by no means very pronounced, was popularly chosen to be bishop of Ptolemais, and, after long hesitation on personal and doctrinal grounds, he ultimately accepted the office thus thrust upon him, being consecrated by Theophilus at Alexandria. ”

“ Hearing there that Ptolemy’s general Nicolaus was besieging Theodotus in Ptolemais, he left his heavy-armed troops behind with orders to their leaders to besiege Brochi,—the stronghold which commands the road along the lake,—and led his light-armed troops forward himself, with the intention of raising the siege of Ptolemais. But Nicolaus had already got intelligence of the king’s approach; and had accordingly retired from Ptolemais himself, and sent forward Diogoras the414 Cretan and Dorymenes the Aetolian to occupy the passes at Berytus. ”

“ Some it may satisfy, but thou knowest that more turn empty away; and all of them understand that the Greeks will feed their desires full. Come now: tell me, I pray thee: this very year how many are gone hence to seek fortune in the markets of Ptolemais? How many to the court of Antiochus, aye! from the noblest of our families? How many to be made captains in his armies and in Ptolemy’s? ”

“ Such of these children as reached Ptolemais must have created terror as well as astonishment, by making the Christians of the East believe that Europe had no longer any government or laws, no longer any wise or prudent men, either in the councils of princes or those of the Church. ”

“ If some Oriental chronicles may be believed, the project of Bibars then was to attack Ptolemaïs; and in so great an enterprise, he did not disdain the assistance of treachery. The prince of Tyre, says Ibn-Ferat, united with the Genoese, was to attack Ptolemaïs with a numerous fleet on the sea side, whilst the Mamelukes attacked it by land. Bibars in fact presented himself before Ptolemaïs, but his new auxiliaries no doubt repented of the promises they had made him ”

“ John of Brienne arrived at Ptolemaïs with the train of a king, but he only brought with him three hundred knights to defend his kingdom; his new subjects, however, still full of hopes, looked upon him no less as a liberator. His marriage was celebrated in the presence of the barons, the princes, and the bishops of Ptolemaïs. As the truce was about to expire, the Saracens resumed their arms, and disturbed the festivities of the coronation. Malek-Adel entered Palestine at the head of an army, and the infidels not only laid siege to Tripoli, but threatened Ptolemaïs. ”

“ Ptolemais, a new city, 82 miles to the westward of Cyrene, assumed the metropolitan honors of the Pentapolis, or Upper Libya, which were afterwards transferred to Sozusa.]
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[ Synesius had previously represented his own disqualifications. He loved profane studies and profane sports; he was incapable of supporting a life of celibacy; he disbelieved the resurrection; and he refused to preach fables to the people unless he might be permitted to philosophize at home. Theophilus primate of Egypt, who knew his merit, accepted this extraordinary compromise.] ”

“ So the Jewish ambassadors interceded with him, and entreated him that he would determine nothing that was severe about their queen or nation. He commended them for the respects they paid him at so great a distance, and gave them good hopes of his favor. But as soon as Ptolemais was taken, news came to Tigranes, that Lucullus, in his pursuit of Mithridates, could not light upon him, who was fled into Iberia, but was laying waste Armenia, and besieging its cities. ”

“ Ptolemāis, a town of Thebais in Egypt, called after the Ptolemies, who beautified it. There was also another city of the same name in the territories of Cyrene. It was situate on the sea-coast, and, according to some, it was the same as Barce. See: Barce.――A city of Palestine, called also Acon. Mela, bk. 1, ch. 8; bk. 3, ch. 8.—Pliny, bk. 2, ch. 73.—Strabo, bk. 14, &c.
Ptoly̆cus, a statuary of Corcyra, pupil to Critias the Athenian. Pausanias, bk. 6, ch. 3.
Ptous, a son of Athamas and Themisto, who gave his name to a mountain of Bœotia, upon which he built a temple to Apollo, surnamed Ptous. ”

“ This Ptolemais is a maritime city of Galilee, built in the great plain. It is encompassed with mountains: that on the east side, sixty furlongs off, belongs to Galilee; but that on the south belongs to Carmel, which is distant from it a hundred and twenty furlongs; and that on the north is the highest of them all, and is called by the people of the country, The Ladder of the Tyrians, which is at the distance of a hundred furlongs. The very small river Belus 12 runs by it, at the distance of two furlongs ”

“ Both those kings were in the case of wrestlers, who finding themselves deficient in. strength, and yet being ashamed to yield, put off the fight by laziness, and by lying still as long as they can. The only hope they had remaining was from the kings of Egypt, and from Ptolemy Lathyrus, who now held Cyprus, and who came to Cyprus when he was driven from the government of Egypt by Cleopatra his mother. So the people of Ptolemais sent to this Ptolemy Lathyrus, and desired him to come as a confederate, to deliver them, now they were in such danger, out of the hands of Alexander. ”

“ In 356 Serras, together with Secundus, deposed bishop of Ptolemais, proposed to consecrate Aetius; he refused on the ground that they were tainted with Orthodoxy. Phil. iii. 19. In 359 he subscribed the decrees of Seleucia as bishop of Parætonium (Al Bareton W. of Alexandria) (Epiph. Hær. lxxiii. 20) . Now he is deposed (360) by the Constantinopolitan Synod. Vide Dict. Christ. Biog. s.v. Stephanus, a Libyan bishop ordained by Secundus of Ptolemais, and concerned with him in the murder of the Presbyter Secundus, as described by Athan. in Hist. Ar. ”

“ So far as we can see Ptolemy's personality through the mists of time, he was a robust, full-blooded Macedonian, with the sound common sense which often characterizes the leaders of a people of country farmers, the shrewd caution which looks a long way ahead, and likes to play a safe game and secure solid advantages, an animal lustihood which made him take joy in many women, a genial bonhomie which attracted soldiers of fortune to his standard from all Greek lands — a man rather of vigorous bodily and mental constitution than of fine fibre. ”

“ When she reached Egypt, as she heard that Ptolemy had received an embassy from Antigonus, and was told that although the Achæans wished to come to terms with him, he had feared on her account to make peace with them without consulting Ptolemy, she wrote to him bidding him act worthily of Sparta, and consult her interests, and not fear to displease Ptolemy because of what he might do to an old woman and an infant. So great a spirit is she said to have shown in her misfortunes. ”

“ Certain arms in an army of the period were almost always furnished, not by Macedonian regulars, but by mercenaries from some particular region — archers from Crete, javelineers from Thrace. Of the Cretans, Thracians, Athenians, Spartans, Boeotians, Sicilians, who came in this way to Egypt, many apparently stayed there. Ptolemy seems to have exerted himself to be known all over the Greek world as the kind of genial, free-handed, valiant gentleman whom any young man inclined to the life of a soldier might cross the sea to serve. ”

“ And Ptolemy on one occasion, flouting a grammarian for his ignorance, asked him who was the father of Peleus, and he answered, "I will tell you, if you tell me first who was the father of Lagus." This was a jeer at the obscure birth of the king, and all his courtiers were indignant at it as an unpardonable liberty; but Ptolemy said, "If it is not kingly to take a flout, neither is it kingly to give one." ”

“ Through the forty years of struggle which followed between the great Macedonian chiefs — the men who had learnt war under Alexander — Ptolemy, the son of Lagus, remained in his African province, safe as a tortoise in his shell, while armies marched to and fro across Asia and rival fleets battled in the Aegean. To some extent, indeed, he stretched forth out of his shell to mingle in the mellay, for the power ruling Egypt was now one of Hellenistic character, having various connexions, political, economic, cultural, with the other states of the Greek world. ”

“ We only once hear of a Ptolemy having a native Egyptian woman even among his mistresses. [53]
Ptolemy at the age of eighty-two wished to pass his power on to his successor, less, probably, because he desired rest than because he wanted to see his favourite son securely established upon the throne before he died. He had loved Berenice more than Eurydice, and although Eurydice's son Ptolemy was the elder of the two, it was Berenice's son Ptolemy whom his father determined to make king. [54] Possibly Eurydice had made herself odious, when her waiting-woman, Berenice, was exalted into her place. ”

“ Ptolemy who flourished at Alexandria around 130 A.D. was the greatest scientist of his era and his influence was powerful for fifteen centuries. It was he who developed the Ptolemaic theory which viewed the earth as the center of the universe, with the sun and other bodies revolving around it. That theory very naturally tended to increase man’s idea of his own importance. Ptolemy was a geographer and mathematician as well as an astronomer. His great work was called Almagest by the Arabs. Ptolemy discussed the persistence of vision, the laws of reflection and made studies of refraction. ”

“ It is unjust to term Ptolemy a plagiarist from Marinus, as he himself fully acknowledges his obligations to that writer, from whom he derived the whole mass of his materials, which he undertook to arrange and present to his readers in a scientific form. It is this form, unique among those ancient geographical treatises which have survived, that constitutes one great merit of Ptolemy’s work. At the same time it shows the increased knowledge of Asia and Africa acquired since Strabo and Pliny. ”

“ The Chaldæans, Genethliacs, and Planetarians, have been always held in disrepute, because they professed to know not only more than they actually did know, but also more than is allowed to man to know. Even Ptolemy, while he employs himself in his present work upon the Doctrine of Nativities, is scarcely free from the charge of superstition and vanity: perhaps, in a Pagan, this may be forgiven; but it is hardly to be tolerated, that persons professing Christianity should be led away by such an empty study, in which there is no solid utility, and the whole pleasure of which is puerile. ”

“ The Geography, as far as Britain is concerned, is said to be in Dr. Henry's History of Great Britain, 1788. Some works in harmonics appear in lists as translations or close imitations of Ptolemy, as John Keeble's, 1785, Francis Styles, Phil. Trans. vol. li. Various dissertations on minor pieces exist: but there is no English translation of the Almagest, &c., though it exists in French (see Smith's Biograph. Dict. art. PTOLEMY) . If an English reader wants to know Ptolemy's astronomical methods and hypotheses, nothing will suit him better than Narrien's History of Astronomy. ”

“ The work of the other great teacher at Alexandria which was to influence mankind next to that of Euclid, was not destined to withstand the critical study of succeeding generations, though it served for some 1,500 years as the basis of their thinking in astronomy. This was the work of Ptolemy, the great professor of astronomy at Alexandria of the first century after Christ. It is easy for us now to see the absurdity of Ptolemy's system. It is even hard for us to {82} understand how men could have accepted it. ”

“ Ptolemæus II., son of Ptolemy I., succeeded his father on the Egyptian throne, and was called Philadelphus by antiphrasis, because he killed two of his brothers. He showed himself worthy in every respect to succeed his great father, and, conscious of the advantages which arise from an alliance with powerful nations, he sent ambassadors to Italy to solicit the friendship of the Romans, whose name and military reputation had become universally known for the victories which they had just obtained over Pyrrhus and the Tarentines. ”

“ New books were continually acquired. The librarians had orders to pay any sum for the original of the works of great masters. The Ptolemies were not only patrons of learning but were themselves highly educated. Ptolemy Soter was an historian of no mean talent, and his son Philadelphus, as a pupil of the poet Philetas and the philosopher Strabo, was a man of great learning. Ptolemy III. was a mathematician, and Ptolemy Philopator, who had erected and dedicated a temple to Homer, was the writer of a tragedy. ”

“ Claudius Ptolemy lived in Egypt about the middle of the second century after Christ. His great reputation is due not so much to his superior genius as to the fortunate circumstance that a vast work compiled by him, preserved and transmitted to later times almost all the knowledge of the ancients on astronomical and geographical subjects. In this way it has happened that his name has become attached to various doctrines and views respecting the universe, though these probably were not originated by him. ”

“ During the wars of the Diadochi, all the powers who at any time found themselves Ptolemy’s pawns in the mighty war game then played on a board stretching from India to Thrace, thought to curry favour with their rich ally by giving countenance to his new religion. An association of Sarapiasts or worshippers of Serapis held their meetings in the Piraeus not long after the institution of the Alexandrian cult [162] ; and before the death of Ptolemy Soter, a Serapeum was built in Athens over against the Acropolis itself [163] . ”