PHO-PHY
Phocus
Son of Æacus and the nymph Psamathe who was slain by his half-brothers Peleus and Telamon.
Phocylides
Poet from Miletus, born about 540 B.C., who wrote in hexameters and elegiac meter.
Phoebus
Name for Apollo.
Phoenix
Son of Amyntor and Hippodamia who taught Achilles and then accompanied him to Troy.
Pholus
Pholus was a centaur who tried to be hospitable to Hercules, but the scent of his wine drew more raucous centaurs to the scene where a fight with poisoned arrows ensued. Pholus died as the result of poisoning from one such arrows that fell out on his foot.
Phorcys
A Greek sea god, son of Pontus and Gaia, brother of Nereus, father of the Graiae, the Gorgons, and the dragon Ladon, guard of the apples of the Hesperides.
Phoroneus
Son of Inachus and ocean nymph Melia, the founder of Argos and all culture and order in the Peloponnesus. His daughter was the mortal Niobe whom Zeus loved.
Phratria
Subdivision of the phyle. In Attica, the four Ionic phylae each held three phratriae. Each phrtria held 30 families. After Cleisthenes, phratries remained signifiacant religiously.
Phrixus
Son of Athamas and Nephele. Escaped his stepmother Ino, with his sister Helle on a golden fleeced ram. Helle drowned by Phrixus made it to Colchis.
Phrynichus
Athenian tragic poet and contemporary of Aeschylus who won his first victory in 511 B.C. He introduced the first not choral actor.
Phrynichus
In 405 B.C. his comedy Muses won second prize behind Aristophanes' Frogs.
Phylarchus
Greek historian from about 210 B.C. who wrote about the fifty years from Pyrrhus' invasion to the death of Cleomenes, king of Sparta.
Phyllis
Daughter of Thracian king, engaged to marry Demophoon. When he was late getting to the wedding, she killed herself and was turned into an almond tree.
Return to Ancient History Glossary
