This MedLibrary.org supplementary page on Abaris the Hyperborean is provided directly from the open source Wikipedia as a service to our readers. Please see the note below on authorship of this content, as well as the Wikipedia usage guidelines. To search for other content from our encyclopedia supplement, please use the form below:
Related Sponsors
- Abaris redirects here. For the Baroque opera see Les Boréades
Abaris the Hyperborean (Αβάρις Υπερβορέος, Abaris Hyperboreos), son of Seuthes, was a legendary sage, healer, and priest of Apollo known to the Ancient Greeks. He was supposed to have learned his skills in his homeland of Hyperborea, near the Caucasus,[1] which he fled during a plague. He was said to be endowed with the gift of prophecy, and by this as well as by his Scythian dress and simplicity and honesty he created great sensation in Greece, and was held in high esteem.[2]
Contents |
Legend
According to Herodotus he was said to have traveled around the world with an arrow symbolizing Apollo, eating no food.[3] Heraclides Ponticus wrote that Abaris flew on it, like a witch's broomstick. Plato (Charmides 158C) classes him amongst the "Thracian physicians" who practice medicine upon the soul as well as the body by means of "incantations" (epodai). A temple to Persephone at Sparta was attributed to Abaris by Pausanias (9.10).
Phalaris
A particularly rich trove of anecdote is found in Iamblichus's Vita Pythagorica. Here, Abaris is said to have purified Sparta and Knossos, among other cities, from plagues (VP 92-93). Abaris also appears in a climactic scene alongside Pythagoras at the court of the Sicilian tyrant Phalaris. The two sages discuss divine matters, and urge the obstinate tyrant towards virtue (ibid. 215-221). Iamblicus also attributes to Abaris a special expertise at extispicy, the art of predicting future events through the examination of anomalies in the entrails of animals.[4] The Suda attributes a number of books to Abaris, including a volume of Scythian Oracles in dactylic hexameter, a prose theogony, a poem on the marriage of the river Hebrus, a work on purifications, and an account of Apollo's visit to the Hyperboreans. But such works, if they were really current in ancient times, were no more genuine than his reputed correspondence with Phalaris the tyrant.[5]
A more securely historical Greco-Scythian philosopher, who travelled among the Hellenes in the early sixth century, was Anacharis.
Modern impact
- A Secret Senior Society at Dartmouth College is named Abaris after this figure; it is one of eight Senior Societies among Dartmouth College student groups.
- Abaris is featured in Therion songs "An Arrow From The Sun", "The Wand of Abaris", and "The Falling Stone".
References
Footnotes
- ^ Ovid, Metamorphoses v. 86
- ^ Strabo, Geographica Book 7, Chapter 3, verse 8
- ^ Herodotus, Histories 4.36
- ^ "...and instead of divining by the entrails of beasts, he [Pythagoras] revealed to him the art of prognosticating by numbers conceiving this to be a method purer, more divine and more kindred to the celestial numbers of the Gods." from Iamblichus' Vita Pythagorica (trans. K. S. Guthrie).
- ^ Schmitz, Leonhard (1867), "Abaris", in Smith, William, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, 1, pp. 1
Other sources
- Plato's Charmides in the most famous passage concerning Αβάρις Υπερβορέος.
- History of Herodotus, in the classical translation of George Rawlinson (ed. and tr., vol. 3, Book 4, Chapters 2-36, 46-82. New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1885.)
- Plato, Platonis Opera, ed. John Burnet. Oxford University Press. 1903.
- Entry for Abaris from the Suda, courtesy of the Suda online.
- Ancient Library
- This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
- This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology by William Smith (1870).
Wikipedia content modification information:
- This page was last modified on 7 September 2008, at 22:46.
Wikipedia Authorship and Review
Wikipedia content provided here is not reviewed directly by MedLibrary.org. Wikipedia content is authored by an open community of volunteers and is not produced by or in any way affiliated with MedLibrary.org.
Wikipedia Usage Guidelines
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article on "Abaris the Hyperborean".
The URL for this specific entry is:
All Wikipedia text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. (See Copyrights for details). Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.