(), or AGATHARCHUS (
An enumeration of the works of Agatharchides is given by Photius (
The first three of these only had been read by Photius.
Agatharchides composed his work on the Erythraean Sea, as he tells us himself, in his old age (p. 14, ed. Huds.), in the reign probably of Ptolemy Soter II. It appears to have contained a great deal of valuable matter. In the first book was a discussion respecting the origin of the name. In the fifth he described the mode of life amongst the Sabaeans in Arabia, and the Ichthyophagi, or fish-eaters, the way in which elephants were caught by the elephant-eaters, and the mode of working the gold mines in the mountains of Egypt, near the Red Sea. His account of the Ichthyophagi and of the mode of working the gold mines, has been copied by Diodorus. (3.12-18.) Amongst other extraordinary animals he mentions the camelopard, which was found in the country of the Troglodytae, and the rhinoceros.
Agatharchides wrote in the Attic dialect. His style, according to Photius, was dignified
and perspicuous, and abounded in sententious passages, which inspired a favourable opinion of
his judgment. In the composition of his speeches he was an imitator of Thucydides, whom he
equalled in dignity and excelled in clearness. His rhetorical talents also are highly praised
by Photius. He was acquainted with the language of the Aethiopians (de Rubr.
M. p. 46), and appears to have been the first who discovered the true cause of the
yearly inundations of the Nile. (
An Agatharchides, of Samos, is mentioned by Plutarch, as the author of a work on Persia,
and one Geogr. Script. Gr. Minores; Clinton, Fasti Hell. iii
p. 535.) [C.P.M]
There is a curious observation by Agatharchides preserved by Plutarch (Sympos. 8.9.3), of the species of worm called Filaria Medinensis,
or Guinea Worm, which is the earliest account of it that is to be met
with. See Justus Weihe, De Filar. Medin. Comment., Berol. 1832, 8vo.,
and especially the very learned work by G. H Welschins, De Vena Medinensi,
&c., August. Vindel. 1674, 4to