27. SETH or SETHUS, Σηθ, or SETHI, Σήθι; or perhaps THE SON of SETHUS or SETH, a Byzantine writer of some importance of the eleventh century. He is known also by the titles which he bore of
Magister et Philosophus, Μάγιστρος καὶ Φιλόσοφος, and of PROTOVESTIARIUS ANTIOCHI, Πρωτοβεστάρχης τῶν Ἀντιόχου, i. e. Master of the Robes in the palace of Antiochus (Flavius Antiochus the Eunuch, who was consul, A. D. 431) at Constantinople, in which the imperial jewels or costly articles were kept. (Comp. Ducange, Glossar. Med. et Infim. Graecitat. s. v. πρωτοβεστάρχης τῶν Ἀντιόχου, inter derivat. voc. Βέστης; and Constantinop. Christiana, lib. ii. sect. 13.5.) By a corruption of his title he has been improperly styled ANTIOCHENUS, Ἀντιοχεὺς, and MAGISTER ANTIOCHIAE, Μάγιστρος Ἀντιοχείας, and BESTUS, Βέστος. It is probable
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that he is the Symeon Protovestiarius (Συμεὼν πρωτοβεστιάριος) mentioned by Cedrenus (Compend. p. 737, ed. Paris, vol. ii. p. 511, ed. Bonn) as having been banished in A. D. 1034, by the Emperor Michael the Paphlagonian [MICHAEL IV. PAPHLAGO] on account of his sympathy with the Patrician Dalassenus. Symeon had been one of the personal attendants of the Emperor Constantine IX. (or VIII. as some reckon, brother and colleague of Basil II.), whose death occurred A. D. 1028. Symeon, on his banishment, retired to a monastery founded by himself near mount Olympus ; and appears to have spent the rest of his life in literary pursuits and monastic duties (Cedren. l.c.). As one of his works is dedicated to the Emperor Michael Ducas, he must have survived the accession of that prince in A. D. 1071. Nothing beyond this appears to be known of his personal history.