Chapter 6

Authorities.—C. Fellows,Journal in Asia Minor(1839) andDiscoveries in Lycia(1841); T. A. B. Spratt and E. Forbes,Travels in Lycia(1847); O. Benndorf and G. Niemann,Reisen im südwestlichen Kleinasien(1884); E. Petersen and F. von Luschan,Reisen in Lykien(1889); O. Treuber,Geschichte der Lykier(1887); G. Perrot and C. Chipiez,Histoire de l’art dans l’antiquité, v. (1890); P.Kretschmer,Einleitung in die Geschichte der griechischen Sprache(1896); S. Bugge,Lykische Studien(from 1897); A. Torp,Lykische Beiträge(from 1898); V. Thomsen,Études lyciennes(1899); E. Kalinka and R. Heberdey,Tituli Asiae Minoris, i. (1901); see also articlesXanthus,Myra,Patara.

(A. H. S.)

LYCK,orLyk, a town of Germany, in the Prussian province of East Prussia, 112 m. by rail S.E. of Königsberg, and close to the frontier of Poland, on a lake and river of the same name. Pop. (1900) 11,386. It is the chief town of the region known as Masuria. On an island in the lake is a castle formerly belonging to the Teutonic order, and dating from 1273, now used as a prison. There are iron-foundries, distilleries, breweries, tanneries, paper mills and flour mills, and a trade in grain and cattle.

LYCOPHRON,Greek poet and grammarian, was born at Chalcis in Euboea. He flourished at Alexandria in the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus (285-247B.C.). According to Suïdas, he was the son of Socles, but was adopted by Lycus of Rhegium. He was entrusted by Ptolemy with the task of arranging the comedies in the Alexandrian library, and as the result of his labours composed a treatiseOn Comedy. His own compositions, however, chiefly consisted of tragedies (Suïdas gives the titles of twenty, of which very few fragments have been preserved), which secured him a place in the Pleiad of Alexandrian tragedians. One of his poems,AlexandraorCassandra, containing 1474 iambic lines, has been preserved entire. It is in the form of a prophecy uttered by Cassandra, and relates the later fortunes of Troy and of the Greek and Trojan heroes. References to events of mythical and later times are introduced, and the poem ends with a reference to Alexander the Great, who was to unite Asia and Europe in his world-wide empire. The style is so enigmatical as to have procured for Lycophron, even among the ancients, the title of “obscure” (σκοτεινός). The poem is evidently intended to display the writer’s knowledge of obscure names and uncommon myths; it is full of unusual words of doubtful meaning gathered from the older poets, and many long-winded compounds coined by the author. It has none of the qualities of poetry, and was probably written as a show-piece for the Alexandrian school. It was very popular in the Byzantine period, and was read and commented on very frequently; the collection of scholia by Isaac and John Tzetzes is very valuable, and the MSS. of theCassandraare numerous.1A few well-turned lines which have been preserved from Lycophron’s tragedies show a much better style; they are said to have been much admired by Menedemus of Eretria, although the poet had ridiculed him in a satyric drama. Lycophron is also said to have been a skilful writer of anagrams.

Editio princeps (1513); J. Potter (1697, 1702); L. Sebastiani (1803); L. Bachmann (1830); G. Kinkel (1880); E. Scheer (1881-1908), vol. ii. containing the scholia. The most complete edition is by C. von Holzinger (with translation, introduction and notes, 1895). There are translations by F. Dehèque (1853) and Viscount Royston (1806; a work of great merit). See also Wilamowitz-Möllendorff,De Lycophronis Alexandra(1884); J. Konze,De Dictione Lycophronis(1870). The commentaries of the brothers Tzetzes have been edited by C. O. Müller (1811).

1Two passages of theCassandra, 1446-1450 and 1226-1282, in which the career of the Roman people and their universal empire are spoken of, could not possibly have been written by an Alexandrian poet of 250B.C.Hence it has been maintained by Niebuhr and others that the poem was written, by a later poet mentioned by Tzetzes, but the opinion of Welcker that these paragraphs are a later interpolation is generally considered more probable.

LYCOPODIUM,the principal genus of the Lycopodiaceae, a natural order of the Fern-allies (seePteridophyta). They are flowerless herbs, with an erect, prostrate or creeping widely-branched stem, with small simple leaves which thickly cover the stem and branches. The “fertile” leaves are arranged in cones, and bear spore-cases (sporangia) in their axils, containing spores of one kind only. The prothallium developed from the spore is a subterranean mass of tissue of considerable size, and bears the male and female organs (antheridiaandarchegonia). There are about a hundred species widely distributed in temperate and tropical climates; five occur in Britain on heaths and moors, chiefly in mountainous districts, and are known as club-mosses The commonest species,L. clavatum, is also known as stag-horn moss.

Fig. 1.—Lycopodium clavatum.

A, Old prothallus.

B, Prothallus bearing a young sporophyte.

G, Polian of a mature plant, showing the creeping habit, the adventitious roots and the specialized erect branches bearing the strobile or cones.

H, Sporophyte bearing the single sporangium on its upper surface.

J, Spore.

Gerard, in 1597, described two kinds of lycopodium (Herball, p. 1373) under the namesMuscus denticulatusandMuscus clavatus(L. clavatum) as “Club Mosse or Woolfes Clawe Mosse,” the names being in Low Dutch, “Wolfs Clauwen,” from the resemblance of the club-like or claw-shaped shoots to the toes of a wolf, “whereupon we first named itLycopodion.” Gerard also speaks of its emetic and many other supposed virtues.L. SelagoandL. catharticum(a native of the Andes) have been said to be, at least when fresh, cathartic; but, with the exception of the spores ofL. clavatum(“lycopodium powder”), lycopodium as a drug has fallen into disuse. The powder is used for rolling pills in, as a dusting powder for infants’ sores, &c. Atinctura lycopodii, containing one part of the powder to ten of alcohol (90%), has been given, in doses of 15 to 60 minims, in cases of irritation and spasm of the bladder. The powder is highly inflammable, and is used in pyrotechny and for artificial lightning on the stage. If the hand be covered with the powder it cannot be wetted on being plunged into water. Another use of lycopodium is for dyeing; woollen cloth boiled with species of lycopodium, asL. clavatum, becomes blue when dipped in a bath of Brazil wood.

LYCOSURA(mod.PalaeokastroorSiderokastro), a city of Arcadia, reputed to be the most ancient city in Greece, and to have been founded by Lycaon the son of Pelasgus. Its fame in later times was chiefly associated with the temple of Despoena, containing the colossal group made by Damophon of Messene, of Despoena and Demeter seated, with Artemis and the Titan Anytus standing beside them. The temple and considerable remains of the group of sculpture were found in 1889. The date of both has been a matter of dispute, Damophon being placed at dates varying from the 4th centuryB.C.to the age of Hadrian. But it has now been shown that he lived in the 2nd centuryB.C.Remains of a portico, altars and other structures have also been found.

SeeΠρακτικὰ τῆς Ἀρχ. Ἑταιρίας(1896); G. Dickens,Annual of British Schoolat Athens, xii. and xiii.

LYCURGUS(Gr.Λυκοῦργος), in Greek history, the reputed founder of the Spartan constitution. Plutarch opens hisbiography of Lycurgus with these words: “About Lycurgus the lawgiver it is not possible to make a single statement that is not called in question. His genealogy, his travels, his death, above all, his legislative and constitutional activity have been variously recorded, and there is the greatest difference of opinion as to his date.” Nor has modern historical criticism arrived at any certain results. Many scholars, indeed, suppose him to be in reality a god or hero, appealing to the existence of a temple and cult of Lycurgus at Sparta as early as the time of Herodotus, (i. 66), and to the words of the Delphic oracle (Herod. i. 65)—

δίζω ἤ σε θεὸν μαντεύσομαι ἤ ἄνθρωπον.ἀλλ᾿ ἔτι καὶ μᾶλλον θεὸν ἔλπομαι, ὦ Λυκόοργε.

δίζω ἤ σε θεὸν μαντεύσομαι ἤ ἄνθρωπον.

ἀλλ᾿ ἔτι καὶ μᾶλλον θεὸν ἔλπομαι, ὦ Λυκόοργε.

If this be so, he is probably to be connected with the cult of Apollo Lycius or with that of Zeus Lycaeus. But the majority of modern historians agree in accepting Lycurgus as an historical person, however widely they may differ about his work.

According to the Spartan tradition preserved by Herodotus, Lycurgus was a member of the Agiad house, son of Agis I. and brother of Echestratus. On the death of the latter he became regent and guardian of his nephew Labotas (Leobotes), who was still a minor. Simonides, on the other hand, spoke of him as a Eurypontid, son of Prytanis and brother of Eunomus, and later the tradition prevailed which made him the son of Eunomus and Dionassa, and half-brother of the king Polydectes, on whose death he became guardian of the young king Charillus. According to Herodotus he introduced his reforms immediately on becoming regent, but the story which afterwards became generally accepted and is elaborated by Plutarch represented him as occupying for some time the position of regent, then spending several years in travels, and on his return to Sparta carrying through his legislation when Charillus was king. This latter version helped to emphasize the disinterestedness of the lawgiver, and also supplied a motive for his travels—the jealousy of those who accused him of trying to supplant his nephew on the throne. He is said to have visited Crete, Egypt and Ionia, and some versions even took him to Spain, Libya and India.

Various beliefs were held as to the source from which Lycurgus derived his ideas of reform. Herodotus found the tradition current among the Spartans that they were suggested to Lycurgus by the similar Cretan institutions, but even in the 5th century there was a rival theory that he derived them from the Delphic oracle. These two versions are united by Ephorus, who argued that, though Lycurgus had really derived his system from Crete, yet to give it a religious sanction he had persuaded the Delphic priestess to express his views in oracular form.

The Reforms.—Herodotus says that Lycurgus changed “all the customs,” that he created the military organization ofἐνωμοτίαι(enomoties),τριηκάδες(triecades) andσυσσίτια(syssitia), and that he instituted the ephorate and the council of elders. To him, further, are attributed the foundation of the apella (the citizen assembly), the prohibition of gold and silver currency, the partition of the land (γῆς ἀναδασμός) into equal lots, and, in general, the characteristic Spartan training (ἀγωγή). Some of these statements are certainly false. The council of elders and the assembly are not in any sense peculiar to Sparta, but are present in the heroic government of Greece as depicted in the Homeric poems. The ephors, again, are almost universally held to be either an immemorial heritage of the Dorian stock or—and this seems more probable—an addition to the Spartan constitution made at a later date than can be assigned to Lycurgus. Further, the tradition of the Lycurgan partition of the land is open to grave objections. Grote pointed out (History of Greece, pt. ii. ch. 6) that even from the earliest historical times we find glaring inequalities of property at Sparta, and that the tradition was apparently unknown to all the earlier Greek historians and philosophers down to Plato and Aristotle: Isocrates (xii. 259) expressly denied that a partition of land had ever taken place in the Spartan state. Again, the tradition presupposes the conquest by the Spartans of the whole, or at least the greater part, of Laconia, yet Lycurgus must fall in the period when the Spartans had not yet subjugated even the middle Eurotas plain, in which their city lay. Finally, we can point to an adequate explanation of the genesis of the tradition in the ideals of the reformers of the latter part of the 3rd century, led by the kings Agis IV. and Cleomenes III. (q.v.). To them the cause of Sparta’s decline lay in the marked inequalities of wealth, and they looked upon a redistribution of the land as the reform most urgently needed. But it was characteristic of the Greeks to represent the ideals of the present as the facts of the past, and so such a story as that of the Lycurganγῆς ἀναδασμόςmay well have arisen at this time. It is at least noteworthy that the plan of Agis to give 4500 lots to Spartans and 15,000 to perioeci suspiciously resembles that of Lycurgus, in whose case the numbers are said to have been 9000 and 30,000 respectively. Lastly, the prohibition of gold and silver money cannot be attributed to Lycurgus, for at so early a period coinage was yet unknown in Greece.

Lycurgus, then, did not create any of the main elements of the Spartan constitution, though he may have regulated their powers and defined their position. But tradition represented him as finding Sparta the prey of disunion, weakness and lawlessness, and leaving her united, strong and subject to the most stable government which the Greek world had ever seen. Probably Grote comes near to the truth when he says that Lycurgus “is the founder of a warlike brotherhood rather than the lawgiver of a political community.” To him we may attribute the unification of the several component parts of the state, the strict military organization and training which soon made the Spartan hoplite the best soldier in Greece, and above all the elaborate and rigid system of education which rested upon, and in turn proved the strongest support of, that subordination of the individual to the state which perhaps has had no parallel in the history of the world.

Lycurgus’s legislation is very variously dated, and it is not possible either to harmonize the traditions or to decide with confidence between them. B. Niese (Hermes, xlii. 440 sqq.) assigns him to the first half of the 7th centuryB.C.Aristotle read Lycurgus’s name, together with that of Iphitus, on the discus at Olympia which bore the terms of the sacred truce, but even if the genuineness of the document and the identity of this Lycurgus with the Spartan reformer be granted, it is uncertain whether the discus belongs to the so-called first Olympiad, 776B.C., or to an earlier date. Most traditions place Lycurgus in the 9th century: Thucydides, whom Grote follows, dates his reforms shortly before 804, Isocrates and Ephorus go back to 869, and the chronographers are divided between 821, 828 and 834B.C.Finally, according to a tradition recorded by Xenophon (Resp. Laced. x. 8), he was contemporary with the Heraclidae, in which case he would belong to the 10th centuryB.C.

Authorities.—Our chief ancient authorities, besides Plutarch’s biography, are:—Herodotus i. 65; Xenophon,Respublica Lacedaemoniorum; Ephorusap. Strabo x. 481, 482; Aristotle,Politics, ii.; Pausanias iii. and v. 4; and scattered passages in Plato, Isocrates, Polybius, Diodorus, Polyaenus, &c. Of modern works the most important are: E. Meyer, “Lykurgos von Sparta,” inForschungen zur alten Geschichte(Halle, 1892), i. 211 sqq.; A. Kopstadt,De rerum Laconicarum constitutionis Lycurgeae origine et indole(Greifswald, 1849); H. K. Stein,Kritik der Überlieferung über den spartanischen Gesetzgeber Lykurg(Glatz, 1882); S. Wide, “Bemerkungen zur spartanischen Lykurglegende,” inSkand.Archiv. i. (1891), 90 sqq.; E. Nusselt,Das Lykurgproblem(Erlangen, 1898); H. Bazin,De Lycurgo(Paris, 1885); C. Reuss,De Lycurgea quae fertur agrorum divisione(Pforzheim, 1878); A. Busson,Lykurgos und die grosse Rhetra(Innsbruck, 1887); H. Gelzer, “Lykurg und die delphische Priesterschaft” inRhein.Mus. xxviii. 1 sqq.; F. Winicker,Stand der Lykurgischen Frage(Graudenz, 1884); G. Attinger,Essai sur Lycurgue et ses institutions(Neuchâtel, 1892); the general Greek histories, and the works on the Spartan constitution cited underSparta.

(M. N. T.)

LYCURGUS(c. 396-325B.C.), one of the “ten” Attic orators. Through his father, Lycophron, he belonged to the old Attic priestly family of the Eteobutadae. He is said to have been a pupil both of Plato and of Isocrates. His early career is unknown, but after the real character of the struggle with Philip of Macedon became manifest he was recognized, with Demosthenes and Hypereides, as one of the chiefs of the national party. He left the care of external relations to his colleagues, and devoted himself to internal organization and finance. Hemanaged the finances of Athens for twelve successive years (338-326), at first directly as treasurer of the revenues (ὁ ἑπὶ τῇ διοικήσει) for four years, and in two succeeding terms, when the actual office was forbidden him by law, through his son and a nominal official chosen from his party. Part of one of the deeds in which he rendered account of his term of office is still preserved in an inscription. During this time he raised the public income from 600 to 1200 talents yearly. He increased the navy, repaired the dockyards, and completed an arsenal, theσκευοθήκηdesigned by the architect Philo. He was also appointed to various other offices connected with the preservation and improvement of the city. He was very strict in his superintendence of the public morals, and passed a sumptuary law to restrain extravagance. He did much to beautify the city; he reconstructed the great Dionysiac theatre and the gymnasium in the Lyceum, and erected the Panathenaic stadium on the Ilissus. He is mentioned as the proposer of five laws, of which the most famous was that statues of the three great tragedians should be erected in the theatre, and that their works should be carefully edited and preserved among the state archives. For his services he was honoured with crowns, statues and a seat in the town hall; and after his death his friend Stratocles drew up a decree (still extant in pseudo-Plutarch,Vit. dec. orat.p. 851; see also E. L. Hicks,Greek Historical Inscriptions, 1st ed., No. 145), ordering the erection of a statue of bronze to Lycurgus, and granting the honours of the Prytaneum to his eldest son. He was one of the orators whose surrender was demanded by Alexander the Great, but the people refused to give him up. He died while president of the theatre of Dionysus, and was buried on the road leading to the Academy at the expense of the state.

Lycurgus was a man of action; his orations, of which fifteen were published, are criticized by the ancients for their awkward arrangement, harshness of style, and the tendency to digressions about mythology and history, although their noble spirit and lofty morality are highly praised. The one extant example,Against Leocrates, fully bears out this criticism. After the battle of Chaeroneia (338), in spite of the decree which forbade emigration under pain of death, Leocrates had fled from Athens. On his return (probably about 332) he was impeached by Lycurgus, but acquitted, the votes of the judges being equally divided.

The speech has been frequently edited. Editio princeps (Aldine, 1513); F. G. Kiessling (1847) with M. H. E. Meier’s commentary on pseudo-Plutarch’sLife of Lycurgusand the fragments of his speeches; C. Rehdantz (1876); T. Thalheim (1880); C. Scheibe (1885); F. Blass (ed. major, 1889), with bibliography of editions and articles (ed. minor, 1902); E. Sofer (Leipzig, 1905), with notes and introd. There is an index to Andocides, Lycurgus and Dinarchus by L. L. Forman (Oxford, 1897). The exhaustive treatise of F. Dürrbach,L’Orateur Lycurgue(1890), contains a list of the most important review articles on the financial and naval administration of Lycurgus and on his public works; see also C. Droege,De Lycurgo publicarum pecuniarum administratore(Minden, 1880). Several fragments of his various laws have been preserved in inscriptions (Corpus inscriptionum atticarum, ii. 162, 163, 173, 176, 180). On the history of the period see authorities underDemosthenes.

LYCURGUS,“the Logothete” (1772-1851), Greek leader in the War of Independence, was born in the island of Samos. He was educated at Constantinople, received the usual training, and followed the customary career of a Phanariot Greek. He accompanied Constantine Ypsilanti when he was appointed hospodar of Walachia, as secretary, and served Ypsilanti’s successor, Alexander Soutzos, as treasurer and chancellor (Logothete). In 1802 he returned to Samos, and having become suspected by the Turkish government was imprisoned. He fled to Smyrna, when he was pardoned and released by the Turks. When the War of Independence began he induced his countrymen to declare Samos independent, and was chosen ruler. His share in the War of Independence is chiefly memorable because he provoked the massacre of Chios in 1822. Lycurgus conducted an expedition of 2500 to that island, which was held by a Turkish garrison under Velna Pasha. His force was insufficient, the time was ill-chosen, for a strong Turkish fleet was at sea, and Lycurgus displayed utter incapacity as a military leader. After these events, he was deposed by the Samians, but recovered some influence and had a share in the defence of Samos against the Turks in 1824. When the island was left under the authority of Turkey by the protocol of the 3rd of February 1830, he helped to obtain autonomy for the Samians. He retired to Greece and died on the 22nd of May 1851.

See G. Finlay,History of the Greek Revolution(London, 1861).

LYDD,a market town and municipal borough in the southern parliamentary division of Kent, England, 71½ m. S.E. by E. of London by a branch of the South-Eastern & Chatham railway. Pop. (1901) 2675. It lies in the open lowland of Dunge Marsh. To the south-east are the bare shingle banks of the promontory of Dungeness. Its church of All Saints has a beautiful Perpendicular tower with rich vaulting within. The neighbourhood affords pasture for large flocks of sheep. On the land known as the Rypes, in the neighbourhood, there is a military camp, with artillery and rifle ranges; hence the name given to the explosive “lyddite.” The town is governed by a mayor, 4 aldermen and 12 councillors. Area, 12,043 acres.

The first settlement at Lydd (Hlide, Lide, Lyde) was probably due to its convenience as a fishing-station. After the Conquest it became a seaport of some consequence and although now, owing to the alteration of the coast, it stands nearly 3 m. inland a number of its inhabitants are still fishermen. In 774 land in Lydd was granted by Offa to the monks of Christ Church, Canterbury, and the archbishop of Canterbury evidently held the lordship of the town from an early date. At some time before the reign of Edward I. Lydd was made a member of the Cinque Port of Romney, and in 1290 was granted the same liberties and free customs as the Cinque Ports on condition of aiding the service of its head-port to the crown with one ship. This charter was confirmed by Edward III. in 1365. The corporation also possesses documents of 1154, 1399 and 1413, granting to the archbishop’s men of Lydd the privileges enjoyed by the Cinque Ports and confirming all former privileges. Lydd is called a borough in the Hundred Rolls. Its incorporation under a bailiff, of which there is evidence in the 15th century, may have been due to the archbishop or to the court of Shepway, but it was not incorporated by the crown until 1885, when, by a charter under the Municipal Acts, the last bailiff was elected the first mayor. In 1494 a grant was made to the bailiff, jurats and commonalty of a yearly fair on the 12th of July and two days following. A fair was held under this grant until 1874.

LYDENBURG,a town and district of the Transvaal, South Africa. The town is 60 m. by rail N.N.E. of Belfast on the Pretoria-Delagoa Bay railway. Pop. (1904) 1523. It is picturesquely situated on the Spekboom tributary of the Olifants river at an altitude of 4900 ft. Some 15 m. E. is the Mauchberg (8725 ft.), the highest point in the Transvaal. The town is the chief centre for the Lydenburg goldfields. Next to Lydenburg the most important settlement in these goldfields is Pilgrim’s Rest, pop. (1904) 1188, 23 m. N.E. of Lydenburg. Lydenburg (the town of suffering) was founded in 1846 by Boers who two years previously had established themselves farther north at Ohrigstad, which they abandoned on account of the fever endemic there. Lydenburg at once became the capital of a district (of the same name) which then embraced all the eastern part of the Transvaal. In 1856 the Boers of Lydenburg separated from their brethren and proclaimed an independent republic, which was, however, incorporated with the South African Republic in 1860. The discovery of gold near the town was made in 1869, and in 1873 the first successful goldfield in the Transvaal was opened here. It was not until 1910, however, that Lydenburg was placed in railway communication with the rest of the country. The present district of Lydenburg consists of the north-east and central parts of the original district. In the Lulu Mountains, a spur of the Drakensberg, and some 40 m. N.W. of Lydenburg, was the stronghold of the Kaffir chief Sikukuni, whose conflict with the Boers in 1876 was one of the causes which led to the annexation of the Transvaal by Great Britain in 1877. (SeeTransvaal:History.)

LYDFORD,orLidford, a village, once an important town, in the western parliamentary division of Devonshire, England, near the western confines of Dartmoor, 27 m. N. of Plymouth by the London & South-Western railway. From its Perpendicular church of St Petrock fine views of the Dartmoor tors are seen. The village stands on the small river Lyd, which traverses a deep narrow chasm, crossed by a bridge of single span; and at a little distance a tributary stream forms a cascade in an exquisite glen. Close to the church are slight remains of the castle of Lydford.

Lydford (Lideford) was one of the four Saxon boroughs of Devon, and possessed a mint in the days of Æthelred the Unready. It first appears in recorded history in 997, when the Danes made a plundering expedition up the Tamar and Tavy as far as “Hlidaforda.” In the reign of Edward the Confessor it was the most populous centre in Devonshire after Exeter, but the Domesday Survey relates that forty houses had been laid waste since the Conquest, and the town never recovered its former prosperity; the history from the 13th century centres round the castle, which is first mentioned in 1216, when it was granted to William Briwere, and was shortly afterwards fixed as the prison of the stannaries and the meeting-place of the Forest Courts of Dartmoor. A gild at Lideford is mentioned in 1180, and the pipe roll of 1195 records a grant for the reestablishment of the market. In 1238 the borough, which had hitherto been crown demesne, was bestowed by Henry III. on Richard, earl of Cornwall, who in 1268 obtained a grant of a Wednesday market and a three days’ fair at the feast of St Petrock. The borough had a separate coroner and bailiff in 1275, but it was never incorporated by charter, and only once, in 1300, returned members to parliament. Lydford prison is described in 1512 as “one of the most hainous, contagious and detestable places in the realm,” and “Lydford Law” was a by-word for injustice. At the time of the Commonwealth the castle was entirely in ruins, but in the 18th century it was restored and again used as a prison and as the meeting-place of the manor and borough courts.

LYDGATE, JOHN(c. 1370-c. 1451), English poet, was born at the village of Lydgate, some 6 or 7 m. from Newmarket. It is, however, with the Benedictine abbey of Bury St Edmunds that he is chiefly associated. Probably he was educated at the school attached to the monastery, and in hisTestamenthe has drawn a lively picture of himself as a typical orchard-robbing boy, who had scant relish for matins, fought, and threw creed and paternoster at the cock. He was ordained sub-deacon in 1389, deacon in 1393, and priest in 1397. These dates are valuable as enabling us to fix approximately the date of his birth, which must have occurred somewhere about 1370. Lydgate passed as a portent of learning, and, according to Bale, he pursued his studies not only at both the English universities but in France and Italy. Koeppel (seeLaurents de Premierfait und John Lydgates Bearbeitungen von Boccaccios De Casibus, Munich, 1885) has thrown much doubt on this statement as regards Italy, but Lydgate knew France and visited Paris in an official capacity in 1426. Bale is also the authority for another assertion that figures in what has been aptly termed the poet’s “traditional biography,” viz. that Lydgate, on completing his own education, kept school for the sons of noblemen and gentlemen. This “traditional biography” prolongs his life to the year 1461, but it is quite improbable that he lived many years after 1446, when Abbot Curteys died and John Baret, treasurer of Bury, signed an extant receipt for a pension which he shared with Lydgate, and which continued to be paid till 1449. If it be true, as Bishop Alcock of Ely affirms, that Lydgate wrote a poem on the loss of France and Gascony, it seems necessary to suppose that he lived two years longer, and thus indications point to the year 1451, or thereabouts, as the date of his death.

Lydgate had a consuming passion for literature, and it was probably that he might indulge this taste more fully that in 1434 he retired from the priorate of Hatfield Broadoak (or Hatfield Regis), to which he had been appointed in June 1423. After 1390—but whilst he was still a young man—he made the acquaintance of Geoffrey Chaucer, with whose son Thomas he was on terms of considerable intimacy. This friendship appears to have decided Lydgate’s career, and in hisTroy-bookand elsewhere are reverent and touching tributes to his “master.” The passages in question do not exaggerate his obligations to the “well of English.” The themes of all his more ambitious poems can be traced to Chaucerian sources.The Story of Thebes, for instance, was doubtless suggested by the “romance” which Cressida and her companions are represented as reading when interrupted by Pandarus (Troilus and Cressida, II. xii.-xvi.). TheFalls of Princes, again, is merely theMonk’s Tale“writ large.”

Lydgate is a most voluminous writer. TheFalls of Princesalone comprises 7000 stanzas; and his authentic compositions reach the enormous total of 150,000 lines. Cursed with such immoderate fluency Lydgate could not sustain himself at the highest level of artistic excellence; and, though imbued with a sense of the essentials of poetry, and eager to prove himself in its various manifestations, he stinted himself of the self-discipline necessary to perfection of form. As the result the bulk of his composition is wholly or comparatively rough-hewn. That he was capable of better work than is suggested by his average accomplishment is shown by two allegorical poems—theComplaint of the Black Knightand theTemple of Glass(once attributed to Hawes). In these he reveals himself as a not unworthy successor of Chaucer, and the pity of it is that he should have squandered his powers in a futile attempt to create an entire literature. For a couple of centuries Lydgate’s reputation equalled, if it did not surpass, that of his master. This was in a sense only natural, since he was the real founder of the school of which Stephen Hawes was a distinguished ornament, and which “held the field” in English letters during the long and dreary interval between Chaucer and Spenser. One of the most obvious defects of this school is excessive attachment to polysyllabic terms. Lydgate is not quite so great a sinner in this respect as are some of his successors, but his tendency cannot be mistaken, and John Metham is amply justified in his censure—

Eke John Lydgate, sometime monk of Bury,His books indited with terms of rhetoricAnd half-changed Latin, with conceits of poetry.

Eke John Lydgate, sometime monk of Bury,

His books indited with terms of rhetoric

And half-changed Latin, with conceits of poetry.

Pedantry was an inevitable effect of the early Renaissance. French literature passed through the same phase, from which indeed it was later in emerging; and the ultimate consequence was the enrichment of both languages. It must be conceded as no small merit in Lydgate that, in an age of experiment he should have succeeded so often in hitting the right word. Thomas Warton remarks on his lucidity. Since his writings are read more easily than Chaucer’s, the inference is plain—that he was more effectual as a maker of our present English. In spite of that, Lydgate is characteristically medieval—medieval in his prolixity, his platitude, his want of judgment and his want of taste; medieval also in his pessimism, his Mariolatry and his horror of death. These attributes jarred on the sensitive Ritson, who racked his brains for contumelious epithets such as “stupid and disgusting,” “cart-loads of rubbish,” &c.; and during the greater part of the 18th and 19th centuries Lydgate’s reputation was at its lowest ebb. Recent criticism has been far more impartial, and almost too much respect has been paid to his attainments, especially in the matter of metre, though Lydgate himself, with offensive lightheartedness, admits his poor craftsmanship.

Lydgate’s most doughty and learned apologist is Dr Schick, whose preface to theTemple of Glassembodies practically all that is known or conjectured concerning this author, including the chronological order of his works. With the exception of theDamage and Destruction in Realms—an account of Julius Caesar, his wars and his death—they are all in verse and extremely multifarious—narrative, devotional hagiological, philosophical and scientific, allegorical and moral, historical, satirical and occasional. TheTroy-book, undertaken at the command of Henry V., then prince of Wales, dates from 1412-1420; theStory of Thebesfrom 1420-1422; and theFalls of Princestowards 1430. His latest work wasSecreta SecretorumorSecrets of Old Philosophers, rhymed extracts from a pseudo-Aristotelian treatise. Lydgate certainly possessed extraordinary versatility,which enabled him to turn from elaborate epics to quite popular poems like theMumming at Hertford,A Ditty of Women’s HornsandLondon Lickpenny. The humour of this last is especially bright and effective, but, unluckily for the author, the piece is believed to have been retouched by some other hand. The longer efforts partake of the nature of translations from sundry medieval compilations like those of Guido di Colonna and Boccaccio, which are in Latin.See publications of the Early English Text Society, especially theTemple of Glass, edited by Dr Schick; Koeppel’sLydgate’s Story of Thebes, eine Quellenuntersuchung(Munich, 1884), and the same scholar’sLaurents de Premierfait und John Lydgates Bearbeitungen von Boccaccios De Casibus Illustrium Virorum(Munich, 1885); Warton’sHistory of English Poetry; Ritson’sBibliotheca Anglo-Poetica; Furnivall’sPolitical Poems(E. E. T. S.); and Sidney Lee’s article in theDict. Nat. Biog.

See publications of the Early English Text Society, especially theTemple of Glass, edited by Dr Schick; Koeppel’sLydgate’s Story of Thebes, eine Quellenuntersuchung(Munich, 1884), and the same scholar’sLaurents de Premierfait und John Lydgates Bearbeitungen von Boccaccios De Casibus Illustrium Virorum(Munich, 1885); Warton’sHistory of English Poetry; Ritson’sBibliotheca Anglo-Poetica; Furnivall’sPolitical Poems(E. E. T. S.); and Sidney Lee’s article in theDict. Nat. Biog.

(F. J. S.)

LYDIA,in ancient geography, a district of Asia Minor, the boundaries of which it is difficult to fix, partly because they varied at different epochs. The name is first found under the form ofLuddiin the inscriptions of the Assyrian king Assur-bani-pal, who received tribute from Gyges about 660B.C.In Homer we read only of Maeonians (Il. ii. 865, v. 43, x. 431), and the place of the Lydian capital Sardis is taken by Hydē (Il. xx. 385), unless this was the name of the district in which Sardis stood (see Strabo xiii. p. 626).1The earliest Greek writer who mentions the name is Mimnermus of Colophon, in the 37th Olympiad. According to Herodotus (i. 7), the Meiones (called Maeones by other writers) were named Lydians after Lydus, the son of Attis, in the mythical epoch which preceded the rise of the Heraclid dynasty. In historical times the Maeones were a tribe inhabiting the district of the upper Hermus, where a town called Maeonia existed (Pliny,N.H.v. 30; Hierocles, p. 670). The Lydians must originally have been an allied tribe which bordered upon them to the north-west, and occupied the plain of Sardis or Magnesia at the foot of Tmolus and Sipylus. They were cut off from the sea by the Greeks, who were in possession, not only of the Bay of Smyrna, but also of the country north of Sipylus as far as Temnus in the pass (boghaz), through which the Hermus forces its way from the plain of Magnesia into its lower valley.2In a Homeric epigram the ridge north of the Hermus, on which the ruins of Temnus lie, is called Sardenē. Northward the Lydians extended at least as far as the Gygaean Lake (Lake Coloe, mod. Mermereh), and the Sardenē range (mod. Dumanli Dagh). The plateau of the Bin Bir Tepē, on the southern shore of the Gygaean Lake, was the chief burial-place of the inhabitants of Sardis, and is still thickly studded with tumuli, among which is the “tomb of Alyattes” (260 ft. high). Next to Sardis the chief city was Magnesia ad Sipylum (q.v.), in the neighbourhood of which is the famous seated figure of “Niobe” (Il. xxiv. 614-617), cut out of the rock, and probably intended to represent the goddess Cybele, to which the Greeks attached their legend of Niobe. According to Pliny (v. 31), Tantalis, afterwards swallowed up by earthquake in the pool Salē or Saloē, was the ancient name of Sipylus and “the capital of Maeonia” (Paus. vii. 24; Strabo xii. 579). Under the Heraclid dynasty the limits of Lydia must have been already extended, since according to Strabo (xiii. 590), the authority of Gyges reached as far as the Troad. Under the Mermnads Lydia became a maritime as well as an inland power. The Greek cities were conquered, and the coast of Ionia included within the Lydian kingdom. The successes of Alyattes and of Croesus finally changed the Lydian kingdom into a Lydian empire, and all Asia Minor westward of the Halys, except Lycia, owned the supremacy of Sardis. Lydia never again shrank back into its original dimensions. After the Persian conquest the Maeander was regarded as its southern boundary, and in the Roman period it comprised the country between Mysia and Caria on the one side and Phrygia and the Aegean on the other.

Lydia proper was exceedingly fertile. The hill-sides were clothed with vine and fir, and the rich broad plain of Hermus produced large quantities of corn and saffron. The climate of the plain was soft but healthy, though the country was subject to frequent earthquakes. The Pactolus, which flowed from the fountain of Tarnē in the Tmolus mountains, through the centre of Sardis, into the Hermus, was believed to be full of golden sand; and gold mines were worked in Tmolus itself, though by the time of Strabo the proceeds had become so small as hardly to pay for the expense of working them (Strabo xiii. 591). Maeonia on the east contained the curious barren plateau known to the Greeks as the Katakekaumenē (“Burnt country”), once a centre of volcanic disturbance. The Gygaean lake (where remains of pile dwellings have been found) still abounds with carp.

Herodotus (i. 171) tells us that Lydus was a brother of Mysus and Car. The statement is on the whole borne out by the few Lydian, Mysian and Carian words that have been preserved, as well as by the general character of the civilization prevailing among the three nations. The race was probably a mixed one, consisting of aborigines and Aryan immigrants. It was characterized by industry and a commercial spirit, and, before the Persian conquest, by bravery. The religion of the Lydians resembled that of the other civilized nations of Asia Minor. It was a nature worship, which at times became wild and sensuous. By the side of the supreme god Medeus stood the sun-god Attis, as in Phrygia the chief object of the popular cult. He was at once the son and bridegroom of Cybele (q.v.) or Cybebe, the mother of the gods, whose image carved by Broteas, son of Tantalus, was adored on the cliffs of Sipylus (Paus. iii. 22). The cult may have been brought westward by the Hittites who have left memorials of themselves in the pseudo-Sesostris figures of Kara-bel (between Sardis and Ephesus) as well as in the figure of the Mother-goddess, the so-called Niobe. At Ephesus, where she was adored under the form of a meteoric stone, she was identified with the Greek Artemis (see alsoGreat Mother of the Gods). Her mural crown is first seen in the Hittite sculptures of Boghaz Keui (seePteriaandHittites) on the Halys. The priestesses by whom she was served are depicted in early art as armed with the double-headed axe, and the dances they performed in her honour with shield and bow gave rise to the myths which saw in them the Amazons, a nation of woman-warriors. The pre-Hellenic cities of the coast—Smyrna, Samorna (Ephesus), Myrina, Cyme, Priene and Pitane—were all of Amazonian origin, and the first three of them have the same name as the Amazon Myrina, whose tomb was pointed out in the Troad. The prostitution whereby the Lydian girls gained their dowries (Herod, i. 93) was a religious exercise, as among the Semites, which marked their devotion to the goddess Cybele. In the legend of Heracles, Omphale takes the place of Cybele, and was perhaps her Lydian title. Heracles is here the sun-god Attis in a new form; his Lydian name is unknown, since E. Meyer has shown (Zeitschr. d. Morg. Gesell.xxxi. 4) that Sandon belongs not to Lydia but to Cilicia. By the side of Attis stood Manes or Men, identified later with the Moon-god.

According to the native historian Xanthus (460B.C.) three dynasties ruled in succession over Lydia. The first, that of the Attiads, is mythical. It was headed by a god, and included geographical personages like Lydus, Asies and Meies, or such heroes of folk-lore as Cambletes, who devoured his wife. To this mythical age belongs the colony which, according to Herodotus (i. 94), Tyrsenus, the son of Attis, led to Etruria. Xanthus, however, puts Torrhebus in the place of Tyrsenus, and makes him the eponym of a district in Lydia. It is doubtful whether Xanthus recognized the Greek legends which brought Pelops from Lydia, or rather Maeonia, and made him the son of Tantalus. The second dynasty was also of divine origin, but the names which head it prove its connexion with the distant East. Its founder, a descendant of Heracles and Omphale, was, Herodotus tells us (i. 7), a son of Ninus and grandson of Belus. The Assyrian inscriptions have shown that the Assyrians had never crossed the Halys, much less known the name of Lydia, before the age of Assur-bani-pal, and consequently the theory which brought the Heraclids from Nineveh must be given up. But the Hittites, another Oriental people, deeply imbued with the elements of Babylonian culture, had overrun Asia Minor and established themselves on the shores of the Aegean before the reign of the Egyptian king Rameses II.

The subject allies who then fight under their banners include the Masu or Mysians and the Dardani of the Troad, while theHittites have left memorials in Lydia. G. Dennis discovered an inscription in Hittite hieroglyphics attached to the figure of “Niobe” on Sipylus, and a similar inscription accompanies the figure (in which Herodotus, ii. 106, wished to see Sesostris or Rameses II.) in the pass of Karabel. We learn from Eusebius that Sardis was first captured by the Cimmerii 1078B.C.; and since it was four centuries later before the real Cimmerii (q.v.) appeared on the horizon of history, we may perhaps find in the statement a tradition of the Hittite conquest. As the authority of the Hittite satraps at Sardis began to decay the Heraclid dynasty arose. According to Xanthus, Sadyattes and Lixus were the successors of Tylon the son of Omphale. After lasting five hundred and five years, the dynasty came to an end in the person of Sadyattes, as he is called by Nicolas of Damascus, whose account is doubtless derived from Xanthus. The name Candaules, given him by Herodotus, meant “dog strangler” and was a title of the Lydian Hermes. Gyges (q.v.) put him to death and established the dynasty of the Mermnads, 687B.C.Gyges initiated a new policy, that of making Lydia a maritime power; but towards the middle of his reign the kingdom was overrun by the Cimmerii. The lower town of Sardis was taken, and Gyges sent tribute to Assur-bani-pal, as well as two Cimmerian chieftains he had himself captured in battle. A few years later Gyges joined in the revolt against Assyria, and the Ionic and Carian mercenaries he despatched to Egypt enabled Psammetichus to make himself independent. Assyria, however, was soon avenged. The Cimmerian hordes returned, Gyges was slain in battle (652B.C.), and Ardys his son and successor returned to his allegiance to Nineveh. The second capture of Sardis on this occasion was alluded to by Callisthenes (Strabo xiii. 627). Alyattes, the grandson of Ardys, finally succeeded in extirpating the Cimmerii, as well as in taking Smyrna, and thus providing his kingdom with a port. The trade and wealth of Lydia rapidly increased, and the Greek towns fell one after the other before the attacks of the Lydian kings. Alyattes’s long reign of fifty-seven years saw the foundation of the Lydian empire. All Asia Minor west of the Halys acknowledged his sway, and the six years’ contest he carried on with the Medes was closed by the marriage of his daughter Aryenis to Astyages. The Greek cities were allowed to retain their own institutions and government on condition of paying taxes and dues to the Lydian monarch, and the proceeds of their commerce thus flowed into the imperial exchequer. The result was that the king of Lydia became the richest prince of his age. Alyattes was succeeded by Croesus (q.v.), who had probably already for some years shared the royal power with his father, or perhaps grandfather, as V. Floigl thinks (Geschichte des semitischen Alterthums, p. 20). He reigned alone only fifteen years, Cyrus the Persian, after an indecisive battle on the Halys, marching upon Sardis, and capturing both acropolis and monarch (546B.C.). The place where the acropolis was entered was believed to have been overlooked by the mythical Meles when he carried the lion round his fortress to make it invulnerable; it was really a path opened by one of the landslips, which have reduced the sandstone cliff of the acropolis to a mere shell, and threaten to carry it altogether into the plain below. The revolt of the Lydians under Pactyas, whom Cyrus had appointed to collect the taxes, caused the Persian king to disarm them, though we can hardly credit the statement that by this measure their warlike spirit was crushed. Sardis now became the western capital of the Persian empire, and its burning by the Athenians was the indirect cause of the Persian War. After Alexander the Great’s death, Lydia passed to Antigonus; then Achaeus made himself king at Sardis, but was defeated and put to death by Antiochus. The country was presented by the Romans to Eumenes, and subsequently formed part of the proconsular province of Asia. By the time of Strabo (xiii. 631) its old language was entirely supplanted by Greek.

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