to throw off his yoke, and a few years afterwards we find the Agyrinaeans on friendly terms with Hieron king of Syracuse, for which they were rewarded by the gift of half the territory that had belonged to Ameselum. (Diod. xxii. Exc. Hoesch. pp. 495, 499.) Under the Roman government they continued to be a flourishing and wealthy community, and Cicero speaks of Agyrium as one of the most considerable cities of Sicily. Its wealth was chiefly derived from the fertility of its territory in corn: which previous to the arrival of Verres found employment for 250 farmers (aratores), a number diminished by the exactions of his praetorship to no more than 80. (Cic. Verr. iii. 18, 27-31, 51, 52.) From this period we have little further notice of it, in ancient times. It is classed by Pliny among the "populi stipendiarii" of Sicily, and the name is found both in Ptolemy and the Itineraries. In the middle ages it became celebrated for a church of St. Philip with a miraculous altar, from whence the modern name of the town is derived. It became in consequence a great resort of pilgrims from all parts of the island, and is still a considerable place, with the title of a city and above 6000 inhabitants. (Plin. iii. 8. 14; Ptol. iii. 4. § 13; Fazell. de Reb. Sicul. vol. i. p. 435; Ortolani, Diz. Geogr. della Sicilia, p. 111.) The historian Diodorus Siculus was a native of Agyrium, and has preserved to us several particulars concerning his native town. Numerous memorials were preserved there of the pretended visit of Heracles: the impression of the feet of his oxen was still shown in the rock, and a lake or pool four stadia in circumference was believed to have been excavated by him. A Temenos or sacred grove in the neighbourhood of the city was consecrated to Geryones, and another to Iolaus, which was an object of peculiar veneration: and annual games and sacrifices were celebrated in honour both of that hero and of Heracles himself. (Diod. i. 4, iv. 24.) At a later period Timoleon was the chief benefactor of the city, where he constructed several temples, a Bouleuterion and Agora, as well as a theatre which Diodorus tells us was the finest in all Sicily, after that of Syracuse, (Id. xvi. 83.) Scarcely any remains of these buildings are now visible, the only vestiges of antiquity being a few undefined fragments of masonry. The ruined castle on the summit of the hill, attributed by some writers to the Greeks, is a work of the Saracens in the tenth century. (Amico, ad Fazell. p. 440; Lex. Topogr. Sic. vol. i. p. 22.) [E. H. B.] ATYPINAIAN COIN OF AGYRIUM. AHARNA, a town of Etruria, mentioned only by Livy (x. 25) during the campaign of Fabius in that country, B.C. 295. He affords no clue to its position, which is utterly unknown. Cluverius and other writers have supposed it to be the same with ARNA, but this seems scarcely reconcilable with the circumstances of the campaign. (Cluver. Ital p. 626.) [E. H. B.] AIAS or AEAS (Atas opos, Ptol. iv. 5. § 14; Plin. vi. 29. s. 33), was a headland of the limestone | range which separates Upper Egypt from the Red Sea. It was in the parallel of Thebes, and S. of the modern Koseir (Philoteras), in lat. 29. The district occupied by the Icthyophagi commenced a little to the north of the headland of Aias. [W. B. D.] ALABANDA (ἡ ̓Αλάβανδα, τὰ ̓Αλάβανδα: Εth. 'Aλabavõeús, Alabandeus, Alabandensis, Alabandenus: Adj. Alabandicus), a city of Caria, was situated 160 stadia S. of Tralles, and was separated from the plain of Mylasa by a mountain tract. Strabo describes it as lying at the foot of two hills (as some read the passage), which are so close together as to present the appearance of an ass with its panniers on. The modern site is doubtful; but Arab Hissá, on a large branch of the Maeander, now called the Tshina, which joins that river on the S. bank, is supposed by Leake to represent Alabanda; and the nature of the ground corresponds well enough with Strabo's description. The Tshina may probably be the Marsyas of Herodotus (v. 118). There are the remains of a theatre and many other buildings on this site; but very few inscriptions. Alabanda was noted for the luxurious habits of the citizens. Under the Roman empire it was the seat of a Conventus Juridicus or court house, and one of the most flourishing towns of the province of Asia. A stone called "lapis Alabandicus," found in the neighbourhood, was fusible (Plin. xxxvi. 8. s. 13), and used for making glass, and for glazing vessels. Stephanus mentions two cities of the name of Alabanda in Caria, but it does not appear that any other writer mentions two. Herodotus, however (vii. 195), speaks of Alabanda in Caria (Tŵv év Tỷ Kapin), which is the Alabanda of Strabo. The words of description added by Herodotus seem to imply that there was another city of the name; and in fact he speaks, in another passage (viii. 136), of Alabanda, a large city of Phrygia. This Alabanda of Phrygia cannot be the town on the Tshina, for Phrygia never extended so far as there. [G. L.] ALABASTRA or ALABASTRON ('Aλаbασтρà, 'Aλábaσтpwv wóλis, Ptol. iv. 5. § 59; Plin. v. 9. s. 11, xxxvii. 8. s. 32), a city of Egypt, whose site is differently stated by Pliny and Ptolemy. Pliny places it in Upper Egypt; Ptolemy in the Heptanomis. It would accordingly be either south or north of the Mons Alabastrites. It was doubtless connected with the alabaster quarries of that mountain. If Alabastra stood in the Heptanomis, it was an inland town, connected with the Nile by one of the many roads which pervade the region between that river and the Arabian hills. [W. B. D] ALABASTRITES MONS ('Αλαβάστρινὸν ὄρος, Ptol. iv. 5. § 27), formed a portion of the limestone rocks which run westward from the Arabian hills into Upper and Middle Egypt. This upland ridge or spur was to the east of the city of Hermopolis Magna, in lat. 274, and gave its name to the town of Alabastra. It contained large quarries of the beautifully veined and white alabaster which the Egyptians so largely employed for their sarcophagi and other works of art: The grottoes in this ridge are by some writers supposed to occupy the site of the city Alabastra (see preceding article), but this was probably further from the mountain. They were first visited by Sir Gardner Wilkinson in 1824. The grottoes of Koum-el-Ahmar are believed to be the same with the ancient excavations. They contain the names of some of the earliest Egyptian kings, but are inferior in size and splendour to the similar G grottoes at Benihassan. The sculptures in these catacombs are chiefly devoted to military subjects -processions, in which the king, mounted on a chariot, is followed by his soldiers on foot, or in war-chariots, with distinctive weapons and standards. The monarch is also represented as borne in a kind of open litter or shrine, and advancing with his offerings to the temple of Phtai. His attendants seem, from their dress, to belong to the military caste alone. (Wilkinson, Topography of Thebes, p. 386.; Mod. Egypt, vol. ii. p. 43.) [W. B. D.] ALABIS, ALABUS or ALABON ('Aλаbúv, Steph. Byz., Diod.; "Aλasos, Ptol.; ALABIS, Sil. Ital. xiv. 227), a small river on the E. coast of Sicily, flowing into the Sinus Megarensis. Diodorus describes it as a considerable stream issuing from a large basin, of artificial construction, which was regarded as the work of Daedalus, and emptying itself after a short course into the sea. (Diod. iv. 78; Vib. Sequest. p. 4.) This description exactly accords with that given by Cluverius of a stream called Lo Cantaro, which issues from a very copious source only half a mile from the coast, and flows into the sea just opposite the modern city of Augusta. Some traces of buildings were in his time still visible around the basin of its source. (Cluver. Sicil. p. 133; Fazell. vol. i. p. 158.) It is probable that the ABOLUS (A60λos) of Plutarch, on the banks of which Timoleon defeated Mamercus, the tyrant of Catana, in a pitched battle, is no other than the Alabus. (Plut. Timol. 34.) A town of the same name with the river is mentioned by Stephanus of Byzantium (v. 'Aλabúv), but is not noticed by any other writer. [E. H. B.] ALAESA or HALE'SA ("Aλawa, Diod.; Strab.; Ptol.; Halesa, Sil. Ital. xiv. 218; Halesini, Cic. Plin.), a city of Sicily, situated near the north coast of the island, between Cephaloedium and Calacta. It was of Siculian origin, and its foundation is related by Diodorus, who informs us that in B. c. 403 the inhabitants of Herbita (a Siculian city), having concluded peace with Dionysius of Syracuse, their ruler or chief magistrate Archonides determined to quit the city and found a new colony, which he settled partly with citizens of Herbita, and partly with mercenaries and other strangers who collected around him through enmity towards Dionysius. He gave to this new colony the name of Alaesa, to which the epithet Archonidea was frequently added for the purpose of distinction. Others attributed the foundation of the city, but erroneously, to the Carthaginians. (Diod. xiv. 16.) It quickly rose to prosperity by maritime commerce: and at the commencement of the First Punic War was one of the first of the Sicilian cities to make its submission to the Romans, to whose alliance it continued steadily faithful. It was doubtless to its conduct in this respect, and to the services that it was able to render to the Romans during their wars in Sicily, that it was indebted for the peculiar privilege of retaining its own laws and independence, exempt from all taxation: :-an advantage enjoyed by only five cities of Sicily. (Diod. xiv. 16, xxiii. Exc. H. p. 501; Cic. Verr. ii. 49, 69, iii. 6.) In consequence of this advantageous position it rose rapidly in wealth and prosperity, and became one of the most flourishing cities of Sicily. On one occasion its citizens, having been involved in disputes among themselves concerning the choice of the senate, C. Claudius Pulcher was sent, at their own request in B. c. 95, to regulate the matter by a law, which he did to But their privi the satisfaction of all parties. leges did not protect them from the exactions of Verres, who imposed on them an enormous contribution both in corn and money. (Id. ib. 73-75; Ep. ad Fam. xiii. 32.) The city appears to have subsequently declined, and had sunk in the time of Augustus to the condition of an ordinary municipal town (Castell. Inscr. p. 27): but was still one of the few places on the north coast of Sicily which Strabo deemed worthy of mention. (Strab. vi. p. 272.) Pliny also enumerates it among the "stipendiariae civitates" of Sicily. (H. N. iii. 8.) Great difference of opinion has existed with regard to the site of Alaesa, arising principally from the discrepancy in the distances assigned by Strabo, the Itinerary, and the Tabula. Some of these are undoubtedly corrupt or erroneous, but on the whole there can be no doubt that its situation is correctly fixed by Cluverius and Torremuzza at the spot marked by an old church called Sta. Maria le Palate, near the modern town of Tusa, and above the river Pettineo. This site coincides perfectly with the expression of Diodorus (xiv. 16), that the town was built "on a hill about 8 stadia from the sea:" as well as with the distance of eighteen M. P. from Cephaloedium assigned by the Tabula. (The Itinerary gives 28 by an easy error.) The ruins described by Fazello as visible there in his time were such as to indicate the site of a large city, and several inscriptions have been found on the spot, some of them referring distinctly to Alaesa. One of these, which is of considerable length and importance, gives numerous local details concerning the divisions of land, &c., and mentions repeatedly a river ALAESUS, evidently the same with the HALESUS of Columella (x. 268), and which is probably the modern Pettineo; as well as a fountain named IPYRRHA. This is perhaps the same spoken of by Solinus (5. § 20) and Priscian (Perieges. 500), but without mentioning its name, as existing in the territory of Halesa, the waters of which were swoln and agitated by the sound of music. Fazello describes the ruins as extending from the sea-shore, on which were the remains of a large building (probably baths), for the space of more than a mile to the summit of a hill, on which were the remains of the citadel. About 3 miles further inland was a large fountain (probably the Ipyrrha of the inscription), with extensive remains of the aqueduct that conveyed its waters to the city. All trace of these ruins has now disappeared, except some portions of the aqueduct: but fragments of statues, as well as coins and inscriptions, have been frequently discovered on the spot. (Fazell. de Reb. Sic. ix. 4; Cluver. Sicil. pp. 288–290; Boeckh, C. I. tom. iii. pp. 612-621; Castelli, Hist. Alaesae, Panorm. 1753; Id. Inscr. Sic. p. 109; Biscari, Viaggio in Sicilia, p. 243.) [E. H. B.] COIN OF ALAESA. ANIZAS ALAGO'NIA ('Aλayovía), a town of Laconia near the Messenian frontier, belonging to the Eleu ALALCOMENAE. thero-Lacones, containing temples of Dionysus and Artemis. This town was distant 30 stadia from Gerenia, but its site is unknown. (Paus. iii. 21. § 7, iii. 26. § 11.) ALANI. Under Alans) among the generic names applied at different 'Axavov of Dionysius Periegetes, v. 308); and they 2. Or ALCOMENAE ('Aλkoμevaí), said to be a town in Ithaca (Plut. Quaest. Graec. 43; Steph. B. s. v.), or in the small island Asteris in the neigh-speaks of them as Scythians, a name which was bourhood of Ithaca. (Strab. p. 456.) ALA'LIA. [ALERIA.] Ptolemy, who wrote under the Antonines, mentions the European Alani, by the name of 'AXaûvot Erúear, as one of the seven chief peoples of Sarmatia Europaea, namely, the Venedae, Peucini, Bastarnae, Iazyges, Roxolani, Hamaxobii, and Alauni Scythae; of whom he places the lazyges and Roxolani along the W. of Pannonia, no doubt the whole shore of the Maeotis, and then the last two further inland (iii. 5. § 19). He also mentions (ii. 14. § 2) Alauni vaguely used in his time for all the barbarians of NW. Asia (cont. Alanos, 30), he speaks of them ALANDER, a river of Phrygia (Liv. xxxviii. elsewhere (Tact. 4) in close connection with the 15, 18), which is twice mentioned by Livy, in his Sauromatae (Sarmatians), as practising the same account of the march of Cn. Manlius. It was pro- mode of fighting for which the Polish lancers, debably a branch of the Sangarius, as Hamilton (Re-scendants of the Sarmatians, have been renowned. searches in Asia Minor, vol. i. pp. 458, 467) conjectures, and the stream which flows in the valley of Beiad; but he gives no modern name to it. [G.L.] ALA'NI ('Aλavol, 'Aλaûvoi), a people, found both in Asia and in Europe, whose precise geographical positions and ethnographical relations are difficult to determine. They probably became first known to the Romans through the Mithridatic war, and the expedition of Pompey into the countries about the Caucasus; when they were found in the E. part of Caucasus, in the region which was called Albania by the Romans, but Alania by Greek writers, and where Alani are found down to a late period of the Greek empire. (Joseph. Ant. Jud. xviii. 4. s. 6; Lucan, x. 454; Procop. Pers. ii. 29, Goth. iv. 4; Const. Porph. de Adm. Imp. 42.) Valerius Flaccus (Arg. vi. 42) mentions them among the people of the Caucasus, near the Heniochi. Ammianus Marcellinus, who tells us more about the Alani than any other ancient writer, makes Julian encourage his soldiers by the example of Pomwho, breaking his way through the Albani pey, and the Massagetae, whom we now call Alani, saw the waters of the Caspian" (xxiii. 5). In the latter half of the first century we hear of the Alani in two very remote positions. On the one hand, Josephus, who describes them as Scythians dwelling about the river Tanaïs (Don) and the Lake Maeotis (Sea of Azov), relates how, in the time of Vespasian, being permitted by the king of Hyrcania to traverse "the pass which Alexander had closed with iron gates," they ravaged Media and Armenia, and returned home again. On the other hand, they are mentioned by Seneca (Thyest. 629) as dwelling on the Ister (Danube); and Martial (Epigr. vii. 30) expressly calls them Sarmatians; and Pliny (iv. 12. s. 25) mentions Alani and Roxalani (i. e. Russ a body who, in course of invasion, had established G 2 They within the Imaus, near the "Unknown Land ;" and here, too, we find mountains of the same name (rà 'Aλavá opn, §§ 3, 11), E. of the Hyperborei M.; he is generally supposed to mean the N. part of the Ural chain, to which he erroneously gives a direction W. and E. the art of war. They despise going on foot. In person they are nearly all tall and handsome; their hair is slightly yellow; they are terrible for the tempered sternness of their eyes. The lightness of their armour aids their natural swiftness; a circum. stance mentioned also, as we have seen, by Arrian, and by Josephus (B.J. vii. 7. §4), from whom we find that they used the lasso in battle: Lucian, too, describes them as like the Scythians in their arms and their speech, but with shorter hair (Toxaris, 51, vol. ii. p. 557). In general, proceeds Ammianus, they resemble the Huns, but are less savage in form and manners. Their plundering and hunting excursions had brought them to the Maeotis and the Cimmerian Bosporus, and even into Armenia and Media; and it is to their life in those parts that the description of Ammianus evidently refers. Danger and war was their delight; death in battle bliss; the loss of life through decay or chance stamped disgrace on a man's memory. Their greatest glory was to enemies were hung to their horses for trappings. They frequented neither temple nor shrine; but, fixing a naked sword in the ground, with barbaric rites, they worshipped, in this symbol, the god of war and of their country for the time being. They practised divination by bundles of rods, which they released with secret incantations, and (it would seem) from the way the sticks fell they presaged the future. Slavery was unknown to them: all were of noble birth. Even their judges were selected for their long-tried pre-eminence in war. Several of these particulars are confirmed by Jornandes (de Rebus Geticis, 24). Claudian also mentions the Alani as dwelling on the Maeotis, and connects them closely with the Massagetae (In Rufin. i. 312): 66 Our fullest information respecting the Alani is derived from Ammianus Marcellinus, who flourished during the latter half of the fourth century (about 350-400). He first mentions them with the Roxolani, the Iazyges, the Maeotae, and the laxamatae, as dwelling on the shores of the Palus Maeotis (xxii. 8. § 30); and presently, where the Riphaei M. subside towards the Maeotis, he places the Arimphaei, and near them the Massagetae, Alani, and Sargetae, with many other peoples little known (obscuri, quorum nec vocabula nobis sunt nota, nec mores). Again (§ 48) on the NW. of the Euxine, about the river Tyras (Dniester), he places "the European Alani and the Costobocae, and innumerable tribes of Sey-kill a foe in battle, and the scalps of their slain thians, which extend to lands beyond human know. ledge;" a small portion of whom live by agriculture; the rest wander through vast solitudes and get their food like wild beasts; their habitations and scanty furniture are placed on waggons made of the bark of trees; and they migrate at pleasure, waggons and all. His more detailed account of the people is given when he comes to relate that greater westward movement of the Huns which, in the reign of Valens, precipitated the Goths upon the Roman empire, A. D. 376. After describing the Huns (xxxi. 2), he says that they advanced as far as "the Alani, the ancient Massagetae," of whom he undertakes to give a better account than had as yet been published. From the Ister to the Tanaïs dwell the Sauromatae; and on the Asiatic side of the Tanaïs the Alani inhabit the vast solitudes of Scythia; having their name from that of their mountains (ex montium appellatione cognominati, which some understand to mean that Alani comes from ala, a word signifying a mountain). By their conquests they extended their name, as well as their power, over the neighbouring nations; just as the Persian name was spread. He then describes these neighbouring nations; the Neuri, inland, near lofty mountains; the Budini and Geloni; the Agathyrsi; the Melanchlaeni and Anthropophagi; from whom a tract of uninhabited land extended E.wards to the Sinae. At another part the Alani bordered on the Amazons, towards the E. (the Amazons being placed by him on the Tanaïs and the Caspian), whence they were scattered over many peoples throughout Asia, as far as the Ganges. Through these immense regions, but often far apart from one another, the various tribes of the Alani lived a nomade life and it was only in process of time that they came to be called by the same name. He then describes their manners. They neither have houses nor till the land; they feed on flesh and milk, and dwell on waggons. When they come to a pasture they make a camp, by placing their waggons in a circle; and they move on again when the forage is exhausted. Their flocks and herds go with them, and their chief care is for their horses. They are never reduced to want, for the country through which they wander consists of grassy fields, with fruit-trees interspersed, and watered by many rivers. The weak, from age or sex, stay by the waggons and perform the lighter offices; while the young men are trained together from their first boyhood to the practice of horsemanship and a sound knowledge of Massagetes, caesamque bibens Macotida Alanus." Being vanquished by the Huns, who attacked them in the plains E. of the Tanaïs, the great body of the Alani joined their conquerors in their invasion of the Gothic kingdom of Hermanric (A. D. 375), of which the chief part of the European Alani were already the subjects. In the war which soon broke out between the Goths and Romans in Maesia, so many of the Huns and Alani joined the Goths, that they are distinctly mentioned among the invaders who were defeated by Theodosius, A. D. 379-382. Henceforth we find, in the W., the Alani constantly associated with the Goths and with the Vandals, so much so that Procopius calls them a tribe of the Goths (Torikov Ovos: Vand. i. 3). But their movements are more closely connected with those of the Vandals, in conjunction with whom they are said to have settled in Pannonia; and, retiring thence through fear of the Goths, the two peoples invaded Gaul in 406, and Spain in 409. (Procop. l. c.; Jornandes, de Reb. Get. 31; Clinton, F. R. s. a.; comp. Gibbon, c. 30, 31.) In 411 the Alani are found in Gaul, acting with the Burgundians, Alamanni, and Franks. (Clinton, s. a.) As the Goths advanced into Spain, 414, the Alani and Vandals, with the Silingi, retreated before them into Lusitania and Baetica. (Clinton, s. a. 416.) In the ensuing campaigns, in which the Gothic king Wallia conquered Spain (418), the Alans lost their king Ataces, and were so reduced in numbers that they gave up their separate nationality, and transferred their allegiance to Gunderic, the king of the Vandals. (Clinton, s. a. 418.) After Gunderic's death, in 428, the allied barbarians ALANI. partitioned Spain, the Suevi obtaining Gallaecia, the Alani Lusitania and the province of New Carthage, and the Vandals Baetica. (Clinton, s. a.) Most of them accompanied Geiseric in his invasion of Africa in the following year (429: AFRICA, VANDALI), and among other indications of their continued consequence in Africa, we find an edict of Huneric addressed, in 483, to the bishops of the Vandals and Alans (Clinton, s. a.); while in Spain we hear no more of them or of the Vandals, but the place of both is occupied by the Suevi. Meanwhile, returning to Europe, at the time of Attila's invasion of the Roman empire, we find in his camp the descendants of those Alans who had at first joined the Huns; and the personal influence of Aëtius with Attila obtained the services of a body of Alani, who were settled in Gaul, about Valence and Orleans. (Gibbon, c. 35.) When Attila invaded Gaul, 451, he seems to have depended partly on the sympathy of these Alani (Gibbon speaks of a promise from their king Sangiban to betray Orleans); and the great victory of Chalons, where they served under Theodoric against the Huns, was nearly lost by their defection (451). Among the acts recorded of Torismond, in the single year of his reign (451-452), is the conquest of the Alani, who may be supposed to have rebelled. (Clinton, s. a.) In the last years of the W. empire the Alans are mentioned with other barbarians as overrunning Gaul and advancing even into Liguria, and as resisted by the prowess of Majorian (Clinton, s. a. 461; Gibbon, c. 36); but thenceforth their name disappears, swallowed up in the great kingdom of the Visigoths. So much for the Alani of the West. All this time, and later, they are still found in their ancient settlements in the E., between the Don and Volga, and in the Caucasus. They are mentioned under Justinian; and, at the breaking out of the war between Justin II. and Chosroës, king of Persia, they are found among the allies of the Armenians, under their king Saroes, 572-3. (Theo phylact. ap. Phot. Cod. lxv. p. 26, b. 37, ed. Bekker.) The Alani of the Caucasus are constantly mentioned, both by Byzantine and Arabian writers, in the middle ages, and many geographers suppose the Ossetes of Daghestan to be their descendants. The medieval writers, both Greek and Arab, call the country about the E. end of Caucasus Alania. ALATRIUM. the Scythians of the latter, that is, the people of [P.S.] ALATA CASTRA (πτερωτὸν στρατόπεδον, ALATRIUM or ALETRIUM ('Aλérpiov, Strab.; Amidst these materials, conjecture has naturally been busy. From the Affghans to the Poles, there is scarcely a race of warlike horsemen which has not been identified with the Alani; and, in fact, the The modern town of Alatri, which contains a name might be applied, consistently with the ancient accounts, to almost any of the nomade peoples, confounded by the ancients under the vague name of Scy-population of above 8000 inhabitants, and is an thians, except the Mongols. They were evidently a branch of that great nomade race which is found, in the beginning of recorded history, in the NW. of Asia and the SE. of Europe; and perhaps we should not be far wrong in placing their original seats in the country of the Kirghiz Tartars, round the head of the Caspian, whence we may suppose them to have spread W.-ward round the Euxine, and especially to have occupied the great plains N. of the Caucasus between the Don and Volga, whence they issued forth into W. Asia by the passes of the CauTheir permanent settlement also in Sarclearly established, and a matia (in S. Russia) comparison of the description of them by Ammianus Marcellinus with the fourth book of Herodotus can leave little doubt that they were a kindred race to casus. episcopal see, retains the site of the ancient city, or. G 3 |