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

(Σίμων), literary and ecclesiastical.

1. APOLLONIDES. By a misunderstanding of a passage in Diogenes Laertius (9.109), founded on an erroneous reading of the text, that author has been supposed to cite a Simon Apollonides of Nicaea when his citation is from Apollonides of Nicaea [APOLLONIDES, No. 5]. The name Simon is in other and more correct MSS. Timon (Τίμων), and is not a part of the text, but the title of the section the subject of which is Timon of Phlius [TIMON]. (Allatius, De Simeon. Scriptis, p. 203.)

2. Of ATHENS. [No. 10.]

3. Of ATHENS, one of the disciples of Socrates, and by trade a leather-cutter (σκυτοτόμος), which is usually Latinised CORIARIUS. Socrates was accustomed to visit his shop, and converse with him on various subjects. These conversations Simon afterwards committed to writing, as far as he could remember them; and he is said to have been the first who recorded, in the form of conversations, the words of Socrates. His philosophical turn attracted the notice of Pericles, who offered to provide for his maintenance, if he would come and reside with him; but Simon refused, on the ground that he did not wish to surrender his independence. The favourable notice of such a man as Pericles may be considered as overbalancing the unfavourable or sneering judgment of those who characterised his Dialogues as "leathern." He reported thirtythree conversations, Διάλογοι, Dialoyi, which were contained in one volume. Diogenes Laertius (2.122, 123), from whom we derive our knowledge of Simon, enumerates the subjects, the variety of which shows the activity and versatility of Simon's mind. The twelfth of the so-called Socratis et

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Socraticorum Epistolae is written ia the name of Simon, and professes to be addressed to Aristippus, Σίμων Αριστίππῳ, Simon Aristippo. [ARISTIPPUS.] The concluding passage of it is cited by Stobaeus, in his Ἀνθολόγιον, Florileigium, xvii. Περὶ ἐγκρατείας, De Continentia, § 11. A translation of this letter is given in Stanley's Hist. of Philosophy, part iii. p. 119, ed. 1655-1660, p. 125, ed. 1743. (Allatius, De Simeonum Scriptis, p. 197; Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. i. p. 693, vol. ii. p. 719, ed. Harles.)

4. CANANITES, CANANAEUS, or ZELOTES (Κανανίτης, Καναναῖος, s. Ζηλωτής), one of the twelve Apostles. There are extant in MSS. under his name certain Κανόνες ἐκκλησιαστικοί, Canones Ecclesiastici. (Lambec. Comment. de Biblioth. Cuesaruea, vol. viii. p. 906, ed. Kollar; Bandini, Catalog. Codd. MStorum Medic. Laurent. vol. i. pp. 396, 468.)

5. CONSTANTINOPOLITANUS. [No. 22.]

6. CORIARIUS. [No. 3.]

7. CRETENSIS. [No. 22.]

8. GYRACII EPISCOPUS. [No. 22.]

9. HIEROMONACHUS. [No. 22.]

10. HIPPIATRICUS s. DE ARTE VETERINARIA SCRIPTOR. Several ancient authors refer to or quote from Simon, a writer on horses, and, in most cases, in terms which show that his thorough acquaintance with the subject had rendered him quite an authority on such matters. He is first mentioned by Xenophon (De Re Equestri, 100.1.1, 3, 100.11.6), according to whom he dedicated the brazen statue of a horse, in the Eleusinium at Athens and had engraved his own works (τὰ ἑαυτοῦ ἔργα) on the base. This statue is also noticed by Hierocles, the veterinarian [HIEROCLES], whose description of the sculpture on the base does not agree with that of Xenophon (Artis Veterinariae Libri duo, ed. Basil. 1537, p. 3). It is probable that Simon was an Athenian, from the place in which his offering was deposited; and by Suidas, who has quoted Simon (s. v. Τρίλλη), he is expressly called an Athenian.

According to Suidas, in one of the above places (s. v. Κίμων), he was banished from Athens, by ostracism, on account of his having committed incest.

Of the age of Simon we can only form an approximate estimate. He was not earlier than the painter Micon, who lived about B. C. 460 [MICON, artists, 1], for he criticised the works of that artist (Pollux, Onomasticon, lib. 2.69); and he wrote earlier than Xenophon (who, as we see below, cites him), but how much earlier we have no means of knowing, except that his treatise had already acquired a good reputation.

11. IACUMAEUS or IATUMAEUS. [No. 22.]

12. MACCABAEUS. Of this eminent Jew an account is given elsewhere [MACCABAEI, No. 3]. He is introduced here merely on account of an unfounded opinion of Michael de Medina, that he was the writer of the second book of the Maccabees. (Ailat. De Simeonum Script. p. 200.)

13. Of MAGNESIA. [SIMUS.]

14. MAGUS. In the various accounts of this remarkableman, who has been very commonly regarded as the earliest of the heretics that troubled the Christian church, fable is so largely intermingled, that it is difficult to tell what truth there is in any thing reported of him, beyond the brief notice in the New Testament (Acts, 8.9-13, 18-24). According to Justin Martyr (Apolog. Prima, 100.26, p. 190, ed. Hefele), the next authority in point of time, and, from his being also a Samaritan by birth, probably the next also in point of trustworthiness, Simon was a Samaritan, born in the village of Gitti or Gitthi; Γίττων or Γιττῶν in the Genitive, as Justin and Eusebius (Euseb. Hist. Eccl. 2.13) write it, Γιτθῶν, as Theodoret (Haeret. Fabul. Compend. 1.1) writes it. If, as some think, he is the Simon mentioned by Josephus (J. AJ 20.7.2), he was, according to that writer, a Jew by religion and a Cyprian by birth. The discrepancy between this statement and that already cited it has been proposed to reconcile, by the supposition that Justin's statement originated in the substitution or mistake of Γιττιεύς for Κιττιεύς, and consequently that Simon was really a native of Cittium in Cyprus. But we are disposed to prefer the statement of Justin as it now stands, and to think that either Josephus was mistaken, or, which is more likely, that the Simon mentioned by him was a different person altogether. According to the account in the Recognitiones and the Clementina of the pseudo Clemens [CLEMENS ROMANUS], which account is professedly given by Aquila, who had been a friend and disciple of Simon, the latter was the son of Antonius and Rachel, and was a native of the "vicus Gythorum," in the district of Samaria. He is described as well versed in Greek literature and in magic; and as being vainglorious and boastful to an extraordinary degree. According to the same very dubious authorities, he had professed himself a follower of Dositheus, an heretical teacher who first promulgated his doctrines about the time of John the Baptist's death, and who was accompanied by a female, whom he designated Luna, " the Moon," and by a chosen band of disciples, whose number, thirty, corresponded to the number of days in a lunar month. Into this chosen number, on a vacancy occurring, Simon obtained admission. According to the Clementina Simon had studied at. Alexandria, and both he and Dositheus had been disciples of John the Baptist. In the same work we find also many fabulous tales about Simon ; but it is likely that the representation, which we find in this work, that Simon was first the disciple and afterwards the successor of Dositheus, as the leader of a sect, is founded on truth Comp. Origen In Matthaeum Commentar, 100.33. s. It alii, tract. xxvii., Contra Celsum, lib. 1. c.57, lib. 6. c.11, Periarchon, s. De Pricipiis, lib. 4. c.17, ed. Delarue ; Euseb. Hist. Eccl. 4.22). In the Constitutiones Apostolicae (lib. 6. c.8) Simon is represented as a disciple of Dositheus, and as having, with the aid of a fellow-disciple, Cleobius, deprived him of his leadership.

These notices furnish nearly all that is reported of Simon previous to the time at which the deacon Philip met him at a Samaritan city, of which the name is not given, and those transactions occurred which are noticed in the New Testament (l.c.), and which need not be repeated here. The latter part of Simon's career appears to have

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been passed at Rome. Here, according to Justin Martyr (l.c. and 100.56), he arrived in the time of Claudius, and obtained such high credit, both with senate and people, as to have been accounted a god, and to have had a statue erected to him ἐν τῷ Τίβερι ποταμῷ, "in the river Tiber" (usually interpreted to mean, in the island formed by the division of the channel of the river), "between the two bridges," with the inscription in Latin, SIMONI DEO SANCTO. The minuteness of Justin's description, and his distinct appeal (100.56) that the statue might be removed, render it difficult to dispute his statement; yet the fact that an inscription existed in the island of the Tiber (where it was seen and read, A. D. 1662 by Marquardus Gudius), SEMONI SANCO DEO FIDIO SACRUM, has given reason to suspect that Justin inadvertently mistook a statue of the Sabine deity, Semo Sancus or Sangus [SANCUS], to whom several inscriptions have been found, for one of Simon the Samaritan (Gruter, Inscriptiones, vol. i. p. xcvi. No. 5, comp. 6, 7, 8, ed. Graev.). Irenaeus, who says it was reported that Claudius Caesar had erected a statue to Simon (Adv. Haeres. lib. 1. c.20), Tertullian (Apologet. 100.13), and the other fathers, who repeat the statement, can be regarded only as re-echoing the account of Justin (see, however, Burton, Bampton Lectures, note 42). Whether Simon ever encountered Peter after their interview in the Samaritan city, cannot be determined : it is not impossible that they may have met, and that some conference or discussion may have taken place between them. The Recognitiones (lib. ii. &c.) and the Clementina (Hom. iii.) give a long report of disputations between the two; but the scene is laid at Caesaraea Palaestinae (Recog. 1.12; Clem. Hom. 1.15). The Constitutiones Apostolicae (lib. 6. c.9) also place the conference at Caesaraea. According to the Clementina (Homil. iv. &c.), Simon, being overcome by Peter, fled from the Apostle, who, eager to renew the contest, followed his flying opponent from town to town along the Phoenician coast. According to an account which may be traced from Arnobius (Adv. Gentes, 2.7), through the Constitutiones Apostolicae (ibid. and lib. 2. c.14), Cyril of Jerusalem (l.c.), and later writers, Simon came to his death through another encounter with Peter; for, having at Rome raised himself into the air, by the aid of evil spirits, he was, at the prayer of Peter and Paul, who were then at Rome, precipitated from a great height, and died from the consequences of his fall. Whether this legend has any foundation in fact it is hard to say. Dr. Burton (Bampton Lectures, lect. iv. p. 94, and note) attempts to get some truth out of the indubitably fabulous circumstances with which the death of Simon has been interwoven. The ancient authorities for the history of Simon have been cited in the course of this article. Among modern writers Tillemont (Mémoires, vol. ii. p. 35. &c), Ittigius (De Haeresiarchis, sect. i. c. ii), Mosheim (De Rebus Christian. ante Constantinum, saec. 1. §§ lxvi. lxvii), Burton (Bampton Lectures, lect. iv.), Milman (Hist. of Christ. vol. ii. p. 96, &c.).

Simon is usually reckoned the first heresiarch : but the representation is not correct, if heresy be understood, in its modern acceptation, to mean a corrupted form of Christianity; for Simon was not a Christian at all, except for a very short period, and his doctrines did not include any recognition of the claims of Jesus Christ, of whom Simon was not the disciple, but the rival. Origen is clear on this point; for, in reply to Celsus, who had confounded the Simonians with the Christians, he says (Contra Cels. 5.62), "Celsus is not aware that the Simonians by no means acknowledge Jesus to be the son of God; but they say that Simon is the power of God." The representation has become erroneous, from the change in the meaning of the word αἵρεσις, haeresis, which anciently meant "sect ;" and was applied (e.g. by Epiphanius) to the religious sects of the Jews, and the philosophical sects of the heathens, as well as to the bodies which split off from the so-called Catholic Church. (Comp. Burtoin, Bampton Lectures, lect. iv.)

Simon appears to have written some works, the titles of which are unknown. The author of the Constitutiones Apostolicae, lib. 6. c.16, says that Simon and Cleobius, with their followers, forged and circulated books in the name of Christ and his disciples. Jerome (Comment. in Matt. xxiv. ad vs. 5) gives a brief citation, and Moses Bar Cepha, a Syriac writer of the tenth century, quotes several passages from Simon. The Praefatio Arabica ad Concilium Nicaenum (Concilia, vol. ii. col. 386, ed. Labbe) speaks of a spurious Gospel of the Simonians, or perhaps a corrupted copy of the Canonical Gospels, divided into four parts, and named after the four cardinal points of the compass. (Grabe, Spicilegium Patrum, vol. i. p. 305, &c.; Fabric. Codex Apocryph. N. T. vol. i. pp. 140, 377, ed. Hamb. 1719.)

15. OF NICAEA. [No. 1.]

16. PETRUS or PETER. [PETRUS, No. 6.]

17. EX PRAEDICATORUM ORDINE. [No. 22.]

18. DE RHETORICA ARTE SCRIPTOR. Diogenes Laertius (2.123) mentions Simon as a writer on Rhetoric (ῥητορικὰς τέχνας γεγραφώς), but gives no clue to his age or country.

19. Of SAMARIA. [No. 14.]

20. SOPHISTA. Aristophanes (Nubes, 350) has adverted to Simon as guilty of robbing the public treasury, but without mentioning of what city. According to Eupolis (Apud Scholiast. in Aristophan. l.c.) he robbed the treasury of the city of Heraclaea. The rapacity thus held up by two of the great comic dramatists of Athens passed into a proverb, Σίμωνος ἁρπακτικώτερος. Suidas, who gives the proverb (s. v. Σίμων adds the information that Simon was a sophist, and the Scholiast on Aristophanes (Nubes, l.c.) adds that he was one of the persons then conspicuous in political affairs (τῶν ἐν πολιτείᾳ διαπρεπόντων τότε), we may presume at Athens. Aristophanes also brands Simon, apparently the same person, as guilty of perjury (Nubes, 398). (Allatius, De Simeonibus, pp. 196, 197; Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. xi. p. 301.)

21. TACUMAEUS. [No. 22.]

22. Of THEBES. Allatius (De Simeon. p. 202) speaks of Simon Constantinopolitanus, or Simon of Constantinople, an ecclesiastic of the order of preachers, as having, in three treatises, strenuously maintained the doctrine of the Western Church of the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Son as well as from the Father, in opposition to the divines of the Greek church. The treatises were inscribed respectively, 1. To Manuel Holobelus, or Holobolus, a different person from Manuel Holobolus mentioned elsewhere. [MANUEL, literary and ecclesiastical, No. 8.] 2. To Sophonias. 3. To Joannes Nomophylax. From the last of these treatises Allatius has given long extracts (Adv. Hottinger. p. 334 and 502; De Octava Synodo Photiana,

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p. 453.) Allatius identifies the writer with the " Simon Hieromonachus ex ordine Praedicatorum." mentioned by Georgius Trapezuntius, or George of Trebizond [GEORGIUS, literary and ecclesiastical, No. 48], as being a native of Crete, ardent for the divine doctrines (sc. those of the Western Church), who went to Rome, and obtained of the Pope the office of Inquisitor and Judge of Heretics in Crete (Georg. Trapezunt. ad Cretenses Epistola, apud Allat. Graecia Orthodoxa, vol. i. p. 537). Allatius supposes that he got his name Constantinopolitanus from the circumstance of his family having belonged to that city, just as Georgius, who mentions him, was called Trapezuntius, for a similar reason. Allatius (De Simeon. p. 202) further identifies him with the Simon Iatumaeus (Possevino, in his Apparatus Sacer, misquotes the name as Iacumaeus, and Allatius (l.c.) further misquotes it as Tacumaeus) mentioned by Sixtas of Sena (Biblioth. Sancta, lib. iv.), as having been first bishop of Gyracium, and afterwards archbishop of Thebes, and as having flourished about A. D. 1400. It is to be observed that Sixtus says Simon Iatumaeus was born at Constantinople ; but perhaps Sixtus was misled by the epithet Constantinopolitanus. He speaks of him as versed in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew literature, and as an assiduous student of the Bible : and states that he prepared a revision of the Greek text of the New Testament; translated it most faithfully, word for word (verbum de verbo) into Hebrew and into Latin; and formed a triglott Testament, by arranging the Greek text and the two versions in three parallel columns on the same page, so that line corresponded to line, and word to word. (Sixtus Senens. l.c.) Allatius (l.c. p. 203) says he had read some poems addressed to Joannes Cantacuzenus, with the inscription Σίμωνος ἀρχιεπισκόπου Θηβῶν, " Simonis Archiepiscopi Thebarum." Of these poems he quotes a few lines : from which they appear to have been addressed to Cantacuzenus about the time of his abdication, in the middle of the fourteenth century. If, therefore, Simon flourished, as Sixtus of Sena states, in A. D. 1400, he must have attained a considerable age. Cave inclines to the opinion that the Simon who wrote the three treatises on the Holy Spirit was a distinct person from the Simon Jacumaeus (he adds `alias Sacumaeus'), of Sixtus of Sena. He thinks that if they were the same, the date given by Sixtus, A. D. 1400, is incorrect. (Allatius, l.c. ; Fabricius, Bibl. Graec. vol. xi. pp. 301, 334; Cave, Hist. Litt. ad ann. 1276 and 1400, vol. ii. p. 322; and Appendix, p. 87, ed. Oxford, 1740-1743.)

23. THRENI SCRIPTOR. Harpocration (Lexicon, s. v. Ταμήναι), mentions Simon as the author of a poem entitled or described as Εἰς Λυσίμαχον τὸν Ἐρετριέα Θρῆνος, In Lysimachum Eretriensem Threnus. It is probable that Simon is a mistake for Simonides. [SIMONIDES.] (Allat. De Simeon. Scriptis, p. 200.)

[J.C.M]

(Σίμων), a physician of Magnesia, who is mentioned by Herophilus (ap. Soran. De Arte Obstetr. p. 100), and who lived, therefore, in or before the fourth century B. C. He is probably the same person who is mentioned by Diogenes Laertius (2.123), and said by him to have lived in the time of Seleucus Nicanor.

[W.A.G]

(Σίμων), of Aegina, a celebrated statuary in bronze, who flourished about Ol. 76, B. C. 475, and made one of the horses and one of the charioteers, in the group which was dedicated at Olympia by Phormis, the contemporary of Gelon and Hieron; the other horse and charioteer were made by DIONYSIUS of Argos (Paus. 5.27.1). Pliny states that he made a dog and an archer in bronze. (H. N. 34.8. s. 19.33.) He is also mentioned by Diogenes Laertius (2.123).

To these passages should probably be added two others, in which the name of Simon is concealed by erroneous readings. Clemens Alexandrinus (Protrept. p. 31, Sylburg) mentions, on the authority of Polemon, a statue of Dionysus Morychus, at Athens, made of the soft stone called φελλείτης, as the work of Sicon, the son of Eupalamus ; and the same statue is ascribed by Zenobius (5.13) to Simmias, the son of Eupalamus. We know nothing either of Sicon or of Simmias; but in the former passage nothing can be simpler than the correction of Σίκωνος into Σίμωνος, and in the latter it is obvious how easily the two names may have been confounded, each beginning with the syllable Σιμ, says especially if, as is frequently the case in old MSS., that syllable only was written as an abbreviation for Σίμωνος. These corrections are supported by the authority of Müller (Aegin. 104) and Thiersch (Epochen, p. 127), and no sound critic will hesitate to prefer them to Sillig's method of correcting the passage of Clement from that of Zenobius, and reading Σιμμίον in both.

Thiersch supposes Simon, the son of Eupalamus, to have lived at an earlier period than Simon of Aegina, and to have been one of the Attic Daedalids. This is possible, but by no means necessary ; for although the manner in which the statue of Dionysus is mentioned, and the significant name Eapalamus concur to place Simon with the so-called Daedalian, or archaic period of art, yet that period comes down so far as to include the age immediately before that of Pheidias, and Onatas, the contemporary of Simon of Aegina, is expressly mentioned as belonging to it. [DAEDALUS. ONATAS.]

[P.S]