(Ναυκράτης), literary.
1. Surnamed Erythraeus, and termed by Suidas (s. v. Isocrates) Ἐρυθραίος Ναυκρατίτης, was a disciple of Isocrates. He is mentioned among the orators who competed (B. C. 352) for the prize offered by Artemisia for the best funeral oration delivered over Mausolus. (Suidas, s. v. Theodectes, et l.c.; Gel. 10.68.) He wrote on the subject of rhetoric. From the incidental notice taken of his writings by Cicero (De Orat. 3.44), we may infer that he shared in and defended the technical refinement of his master. In one of his treatises we learn from Quintilian (3.6) that he applied the word στάσις, as the appropriate technical term for the status or quaestio, the consideration of a case in its most general aspect, and that some regarded him as the inventor of the term so applied.
As Isocrates wrote models for judicial and political orations, Naucrates furnished models (none of which are extant) of funeral orations, celebrating men of public fame. (Dionys. vol. ii p. 39, ed. Sylburg.)
Eustathius twice refers to a commentary on Homer by Naucrates Erythraeus, who may, perhaps, be regarded as identified with the rhetorician by the term Sophista which he applies to him. (Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. i. pp. 484, 517.) But the manner in which the commentator is mentioned by Stephanus Byzantinus (s. v. Ἐρυθρὰ), solely in connection with the commentary, renders it doubtful whether there may not have been two of the same name.