A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology

3. Of RAVENNA, a distinguished sophist and rhetorician, who lived about A. D. 225, in the reign of Alexander Severus. He was educated by his father Demetrianus, who was himself a skilful rhetorician; afterwards he was also a pupil of Pausanias and Hippodromus, and then travelled to various parts of the ancient world, as a companion of the emperor and of some other persons. He obtained the principal professorship of rhetoric at Rome, which he held until his death at an advanced age. At Rome he also began his long rhetorical controversy with Philostratus of Lemnos, which was afterwards continued by other disputants in Ionia. Aspasius was also secretary to the emperor, but his letters were censured by his opponent Pausanias, for their declamatory character and their want of precision and clearness. He is said to have written several orations, which, how ever, are now lost. They are praised for their simplicity and originality, and for the absence of all pompous affectation in them. (Philostr. Vit. Soph. 2.33; Eudoc. p. 66; Suidas, s. v. Ἀσπάσιος.)