POLLUX

POLLUX, Julius, a Greek writer of antiquity, was born at Naurates, a town in Egypt, and flourished in the reign of the Emperor Commodus. He was educated under the Sophists, and made great progress in grammatical and critical learning. Having taught rhetoric at Athens, he became so famous that he was made preceptor of the Emperor Commodus. He drew up for the use of the latter, and inscribed to him, whilst his father Marcus Antoninus was living, an Onomasticon, or Greek vocabulary, which he divided into ten books. It is extant, and contains a vast variety of synonymous words and phrases, ranged under the general classes of things. It was intended to facilitate the knowledge of the Greek language to the young prince; and it is still very useful to all who have a mind to be perfect in that tongue. The first edition of the Onomasticon was printed at Venice by Aldus in 1502, and a Latin version was afterwards published along with it; but there was no correct and handsome edition of this work till that of Amsterdam, 1706, in folio, by Lederlinus and Hemsterhusius. Lederlinus went through the first seven books, and corrected the text and the version, subjoining his own along with the notes of Salmasius, Vossius, Valesius, and Kuhnus. Pollux wrote many other things, none of which remains. He lived to the age of fifty-eight. Philostratus and Lucian have both treated him with much contempt and ridicule. (Philostrat. de Vit. Sophist. lib. ii.; and Lucian in Rhetorum Praeceptore.)