(i.e., well-doer, or benefactor), a title of honour frequently conferred by the Greeks on those who had done the state some service. This title was also assumed by several of the Greco-Egyptian kings and others. The most notable of these kings to whom this name was applied was Ptolemy III., eldest son and successor of Ptolemy II. Philadelphus. Receiving his hereditary dominions from his father in a high state of prosperity and civilization, he greatly enlarged their original boundaries by his conquests in Asia. He first invaded Syria, to punish the cruelty and misgovernment of his brother-in-law, Antiochus II., king of that country. Many Syrian cities voluntarily opened their gates to him, and he seems to have penetrated as far as Antioch without meeting any opposition. Here, instead of crossing the Taurus, he turned his arms eastwards, reduced Mesopotamia, Babylonia, and Susiana, and received the submission of the countries lying between these points and the confines of Asia. In the course of this expedition he recovered all the statues of the Egyptian gods which had been carried off by Cambyses, and by restoring these to their original temples, earned the gratitude of his subjects, who conferred upon him that title by which he is known in history as the benefactor of his people. On his return home he seems to have directed his chief attention to the internal administration of his kingdom, and to have turned his arms against the Ethiopian tribes on its southern frontier. He was no less careful than his father had been to protect and encourage letters. He added so much to the Alexandrian Library, that he is sometimes, though erroneously, reputed to have been its founder. After raising his kingdom to a pitch of power and prosperity such as it had never attained before, he died, B.C. 222, not with- EUG

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Eugene out a suspicion of having been poisoned by his son, whose after career afforded only too good grounds for the rumour.