A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology

Smith, William

A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. William Smith, LLD, ed. 1890

4. Of Nicaea, repeatedly referred to by Athenaeus, who names three works of his. These are, 1. Διαδοχαί, which seem to have been memoirs of the various schools of philosophy (vi. p. 273d., xiii. p. 592a.). 2. Ἀρκαδικά, which may have been an account of Arcadian usages, perhaps a portion of a larger work on Greek local usages (xiii. p. 609e., where Athenaeus simply speaks of him as Νικίας). 3. A history Περὶ τῶν Φιλοσοφῶν (iv. p. 162e.). But by comparing this passage, wherein he quotes Sotion, as the writer of the Διαδοχαί, with another (xi. p. 505b.c.), where he mentions their names together, we think that we may justly conclude, that, through inadvertence, or an error in the text, the names of Nicias and Sotion have become interchanged, and that the history is to be transferred to Sotion. We have no means of ascertaining his age, except that he must have lived after Plato. (Athen. ll. cc.; Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. iii. p. 770.)