(Fabula) Praetextata

Roman tragedies about native subjects. Named because heroes wore the toga praetexta edged with purple of Roman magistrates.

Prandium

The Romans' second morning meal.

Praxiteles

One of the most Greek sculptors, born about 390 B.C.

Priam

Last king of Troy, son of Laomedon and Strymo.

Priapeia

A collection of about 80 indecent Latin poems in various meters, on Priapus.

Priapus

Probably the son of Dionysus and Aphrodite, a fertility god.

Procne

Sister of Philomela and married to Thracian prince Tereus who betrayed her. When he was on the verge of killing her, she and her sister were turned into birds, one a nightingale and the other a swallow. Tereus was turned into a hoopee or hawk.

Procris

Daughte of Erectheus; wife of Cephalus.

Promachus

Fighter in the front rank; An epithet of Athena.

Prometheus

Son of Titan Iapetus and ocean nymph Clymene, brother of Atlas, Menoetius, and Epimetheus. Father of Deucalion. He brought fire to man.

Pronaos

Entrance hall to the temple (naos).

Propertius

Romanelegiac poet from Umbria; probably born about 50 B.C.

Propylaea

Building at the west entrance of the Acropolis.

Protagoras

Born about 480 B.C. Protagoras was a Greek sophist from Abdera.

Protesilaus

Son of Iphiclus, king of Phylace, in Thessaly, the first Greek to leap on Trojan soil although he knew that to do so meant he must die.

Proteus

A sea gof with the girt of prophecy and shapeshifting.

Psyche

Personification of the human soul and wife of Eros.

Psychopompos

The guider of souls; Hermes.

Pubilius Syrus

(Fl. 43 B.C.) A Syrian writer of mimes.

Pudicitia

Roman goddess of modesty and chastity.

Pyanepsia

Festival celebrated in Athens on the seventh day of Pyanepsion (end of October) in honor of departing summer god, Apollo.

Pygmalion

King of Cyprus who fell in love with a statue he was sculpting. Aphrodite brought it to life. They married and had a son Paphos.

Pyramus And Thisbe

Two Babylonian lovers from hostile families.

Pyrrha

Daughter of Epimetheus, wife of Deucalion.

Pythagoras

Greek philosopher from Samos from about 580 B.C. Said to have been the first to style himself a philosopher.

Pythia

The oracle for Apollo at Delphi.

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