the most celebrated painter of antiquity. He was born, according to Ovid and Pliny, in the island of Cos, and flourished in the time of Alexander the Great, whom he probably accompanied in his Asiatic expedition. Alexander gave him a remarkable proof of his regard; for when he employed Apelles to draw Campaspe, one of his mistresses, having found that he had conceived an affection for her, he resigned her to him. Either she, or Phryne, is said to have been the model of his Venus Anadyomene. It is well known that Alexander forbade any one besides Apelles to paint his portrait. We are not, however, to conclude from this that Alexander was a more skilful judge of painting than he was of poetry. Like Augustus, he cherished the fine arts more from vanity than taste. A remarkable proof is given of this prince's inability to discern merit, and of the painter's freedom in expressing the mortification he felt when a work of his was not sufficiently commended. "Alexander," says Ælian, Var. Hist., lib. ii. c. 3., "having viewed the picture of himself at Ephesus, did not praise it as it deserved. But when a horse was brought in, and neighed at seeing the figure of a horse in the picture, O king! said Apelles, this horse seems to be a far better judge of painting than you." It is related that on one occasion he had painted a horse returning from battle, and had succeeded to his wishes in describing every other mark that could indicate a mettlesome steed impatient of restraint; there was wanting nothing but a foam of a bloody hue issuing from the mouth. He again and again endeavoured to express this, but his attempts were unsuccessful. At last, in his vexation, he threw against the reins of the horse a sponge tinged with many colours; the mixture of which produced the very effect he had desired.

One of the chief excellencies of Apelles's pictures was their exact resemblance to the originals; but the quality of grace was claimed by him as his peculiar characteristic. His pencil was so famous for drawing fine lines, that Protogenes discovered by a single line that Apelles had been at his house. Protogenes lived at Rhodes: Apelles sailed thither, and went to his house with great eagerness to see the works of an artist who was known to him only by name. Protogenes was gone from home, but an old woman was left in charge of a large canvass, which was fitted in a frame for painting. She told Apelles that Protogenes was gone out; and asked him his name, that she might inform her master who had inquired for him. "Tell him," said Apelles, "he was inquired for by this person;" at the same time taking up a pencil, he drew on the canvass a line of great delicacy. When Protogenes returned, the old woman acquainted him with what had happened. That artist, upon contemplating the fineness of the stroke, at once pronounced it to be the work of none other than Apelles; but drawing a still finer line of another colour within the first, he ordered the old woman to show that line to Apelles if he came again; and to say, "This is the person for whom you are inquiring." Apelles returned and saw the line: he would not for shame be overcome; and therefore, in a colour different from either of the former, he divided the line of Protogenes by a third so exquisitely delicate as to leave no space for the smallest touch of the pencil. Protogenes now confessed the superiority of Apelles, flew to the harbour in search of him, and resolved to leave the canvass with the lines on it for the astonishment of future artists. It was afterwards carried to Rome and preserved as a most wonderful work of art in the palace of the Caesars.

Apelles was the first who made the works of Protogenes to be valued as they deserved among the Rhodians. He acknowledged that Protogenes was in some respects superior to himself; but that in one particular he himself excelled, viz., in knowing when to take his hand from the picture, an art which Protogenes had not yet learned, and therefore overworked his pieces. Apelles equally disapproved of too elaborate diligence, or too hasty negligence in execution. A studied work of Protogenes he esteemed less on the one account; and on the other, when a silly painter once brought him a picture, and said, "This I painted in a hurry," he replied, "Though you had not told me so, I perceived it was painted in haste; but I wonder you could not execute more such pieces in the same time."

It was customary with Apelles to expose to public view the works which he had finished, and to hide himself behind the picture, in order to hear the remarks of the passers by. He once overheard himself blamed by a shoemaker for a Apollion fault in the shoes of one of his figures: on the following day the shoemaker, finding the fault corrected, began to animad- vert on the legs; upon which Apelles with some anger looked out from behind the canvass, and bade him keep to his own province,—whence the proverb, "Ne sutor ultra crepidam."

The works of Apelles, of which a list is given by Pliny, were all admired; but the most celebrated were the picture of Alexander in the temple of Artemis at Ephesus, and that of Aphrodite emerging from the sea. Alexander was drawn with a thunder-bolt in his hand; and such was the effect produced by the chiaro-scuro, that the hand and the thunder-bolt seemed to start out from the canvass. This celebrated picture gave rise to the saying that there were two Alexanders; the one invincible, the son of Philip, the other inimitable, the offspring of Apelles. His Aphrodite Anadyomene, representing the goddess of beauty rising out of the sea, was esteemed the most exquisite figure which ever pencil had created.—(Pliny, xxv. 36, § 10, 11, &c.)

APPELLICON, a native of Teos, who lived at Athens, and is chiefly remarkable for having collected a fine library, in which was then the only extant copy of the works of Aristotle. Sylla purchased this library, and brought it to Rome.—See Plutarch.