Historical Dissertation on Abaris

continues from previous page: Epiphanius... And the most learned Richard Bentley (α) asserts that Pythagoras lived in the times of Cyrus, and in his Disputation on the Epistles of Phalaris he agrees with the opinion of William Lloyd and decides with him that Pythagoras was born in the 43rd Olympiad. This he also confirms in the very erudite Apology for this disputation against the most Illustrious Earl Charles Boyle (β). The most famous Henry Dodwell (γ) defends the parts contrary to these, who says that Pythagoras was procreated in the last year of the 52nd Olympiad. From whose opinion Edward Simson (δ) also does not recede so far, who reports that Pythagoras was born in the 53rd Olympiad. Clement of Alexandria (ε) also seems to support these, who affirms that he was famous in the 62nd Olympiad: "Pythagoras," he says, "is found during the time of the tyrant Polycrates, about the sixty-second Olympiad." I discover Iamblichus (ζ) also approaching this opinion, when he says that Pythagoras came into Italy in the 62nd Olympiad. "And if it is necessary," he says, "to also memorize the details of what he did and said, it must be said that he arrived in Italy during the sixty-second Olympiad." Pliny the Elder (η), however, makes him much older, when he says that Pythagoras had already discovered the nature of a certain star in the 42nd Olympiad: "Below the sun," he says, "orbits a huge star called Venus, wandering in a second path, and rivaling the Sun and Moon in its very names. For, preceding and rising before the morning, it receives the name Lucifer, as another Sun hastening the day; conversely, shining from the setting, it is called Vesper, as prolonging the light and returning the turn of the Moon. Which nature of it Pythagoras of Samos was the first to discover in about the 42nd Olympiad." I said above that there is the greatest controversy among the most learned men regarding the age of Phalaris. But since I, out of a desire for brevity, would wish for what I have reported up to this point to be said only in passing, I deservedly omit the review of the various opinions about the age of Phalaris. Especially since the most famous Henry Dodwell (θ) has now made a sufficiently prolix Disputation on this argument.