515 



HYNDFORD, JOHN CABMICHAEL, EARL OF. 



HYSTASPES. 



543 



name, and it is by no means clear to which of them the various works 

 really belong. 



HYNDFORD, JOHN CARMICHAEL, Third EARL OF, a Scottish 

 nobleman of some diplomatic celebrity in the reign of George II., was 

 born in 1701, and succeeded to the family honours in 1737. He 

 represented, as one of the Sixteen Peers, the Scottish nobility in 

 several parliaments, acted for two successive years (1739, 1740) as 

 Royal Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church of j 

 Scotland, and held the dignity of lord-lieutenant of the county of I 

 Lanark, in the upper district of which the family estates were [ 

 situated. His diplomatic life begau upon the occasion of the seizure 

 of Silesia by Frederick the Great in 1741, when his lordship was 

 deputed envoy extraordinary and plenipotentiary to the Prussian 

 court. In this mission he succeeded in effecting an accommodation 

 between that unscrupulous prince and the Empress-Queen Maria 

 Theresa, by a treaty concluded the following year at Breslau. So 

 sensible were the contracting parties of the value of his lordship's 

 mediation and services, that by a grant from the King of Prussia, 

 ratified subsequently at Vienna by the empress-queen, he was per- 

 mitted to assume, in addition to the family armorial bearings, the 

 Silesian eagle, with the motto " ex bene merito," and was moreover 

 honoured by his own king with the national decoration of the order 

 of the Thistle. At Berlin he became acquainted, through the intro- 

 duction of Frederick, with the famous Baron Trenck, who gratefully 

 acknowledges in his 'Memoirs' the "parental trouble" which his 

 lordship took in counselling him and promoting his interests when 

 they met some years after at Moscow. In 1744 Lord Hyndford was 

 sent ambassador to Russia, where he became a great favourite with 

 the Empress Elizabeth, who took an active port in behalf of Maria 

 Theresa; and he was highly instrumental in bringing about, in 1748, 

 the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, which terminated what is known in 

 history as the war of the Austrian Succession. In this mission his 

 lordship continued till the end of 1749, and on his return was con- 

 stituted a privy councillor and lord of the bed-chamber. In 1752 he 

 was sent to the court of Vienna on his third embassy, with which, 

 after a few months, hia career as a diplomatist terminated, though he 

 did not altogether withdraw from political life. In 1764 he received 

 a further mark of the king's esteem in the appointment of lord vice- 

 admiral of Scotland. After his return from Vienna his time was 

 divided between London and the family seat at Carmichael, in the 

 vicinity of which the memory of the ' ambassador ' is still cherished 

 with almost filial regard by the descendants of those who benefited 

 by the munificence and public spirit which he never ceased to manifest 

 in promoting the interests of his county. During his whole lifetime, 

 and particularly his latter years, his attention was unremittingly 

 devoted to hia estates, which he enhanced in value by extensive 

 improvements, and enlarged by judicious purchases and advantageous 

 exchanges. He died in 1767, leaving no issue. His official corres- 

 pondence, extending to twenty-three volumes in manuscript, is now 

 deposited in the British Museum, to which it was secured by purchase 

 in 1838. 



HYPATIA of Alexandria was the daughter of Theon the younger, 

 by whom she was instructed in mathematics and philosophy. Like her 

 father, she professed the old heathen doctrines, and she was regarded 

 as one of their most eloquent advocates. So eminent did she become 

 in the ancient philosophy, that in the early part of the 5th century 

 the publicly lectured on Aristotle and Plato, both at Athens aud 

 Alexandria, with immense success. At Alexandria he presided over 

 the neo-platouic school of Plotinus, and attracted a large number of 

 students. But it is her miserable fate, far more than her extraordinary 

 ability, which has preserved her memory. We give the narrative of 

 the ecclesiastical historian Socrates (from Wells's translation, 1709, of 

 the Latin of Valerius) ; and his simple manner of relating, in all its 

 enormity, a circumstance which it was so much the interest of his 

 party to conceal, or at least to soften, might have been a lesson to his 

 successors in the task of writing history : " There was a woman at 

 Alexandria by name Hypatia. She was daughter to Theon the 

 philosopher. She had arrived to so emineut a degree of learning that 

 she excelled all the philosophers of her own times, and succeeded in 

 that Platonic school derived from Tlotinus, and expounded all the 

 precepts of philosophy to those who would hear her. Wherefore, all 

 persons who were studious about philosophy flocked to her from all 

 parts. By reason of that eminent confidence and readiness of expres- 

 sion, wherewith she had accomplished herself by her learning, she 

 addressed frequently even to the magistrates with a singular modesty. 



Nor was she ashamed of appearing in a public assembly of men, for 

 all persons revered and admired her for her eximious modesty. Envy 

 armed itself against this woman at that time ; for, because she had 

 frequent conferences with Orestes [the prefect of Alexandria], for this 

 reason a calumny was framed against her among the Christian popu- 

 lace, as if she hindered Orestes from coming to a reconciliation with 

 the bishop. Certain persons therefore, of fierce aud over-hot minds, 

 who were headed by one Peter, a reader, conspired against the woman, 

 and observed her returning home from some place ; and having pulled 

 her out of her chariot, they dragged her to the church named Caesa- 

 reum, where they stripped her and murdered her. And when they 

 had torn her piecemeal, they carried all her members to a place called 

 Cinaron and consumed them with fire. This fact brought no small 

 disgrace upou Cyrillus and the Alexandrian Church." 



Cyril's alleged share in this horrible murder, and some other par- 

 ticulars connected with it, are noticed under CYRIL. The death of 

 Hypatia occurred in 415. Damascius (the author of the 'Life of 

 Isidore,' in Photius) says that Hypatia was the wife of this Isidore, 

 and that Cyril was the instigator of the murderers. Some particu- 

 lars are added in Suidas ("titea-la), who states that Hypatia wrote 

 commentaries on Diophantus, and the Conies of Apollonius, and also 

 an astronomical canon. The story of Hypatia, as will be remembered, 

 has been made the subject of a novel by the Rev. Charlea Kiugeley. 



HYPERI'DES, or HYPE'RIDES, an Athenian orator, a contem- 

 porary of Demosthenes, and one of the ten from whose writings the 

 Lexicon of Harpocration was formed. According to Arriau, Hyperides 

 was one of the orators whom Alexander demanded of the Athenians 

 after the destruction of Thebes ; but the list which the author of the 

 ' Life of Demosthenes ' (attributed to Plutarch) gives as the most 

 trustworthy, does not contain the name of Hyperides. He was engaged 

 in the Lamian war, which immediately followed the death of Alex- 

 ander (B. c. 323), and he spoke a funeral oration over those who fell in 

 the battle, which was highly commended by antiquity. A considerable 

 fragment of this oration is preserved by Stobaeus. (Serm. 123.) In 

 B. c. 322, Hyperides, with Demosthenes aud others, having fled from 

 Athens, was condemned to death, and the sentence was carriel into 

 effect by Antipater. (Arrian, ' History of Alexander's Successors," 

 Photius, c. 92.) These two great orators, who had been in their life- 

 time both friends and enemies, died in the same year. There is no 

 extant oration of Hyperides. The critics of antiquity unite in the 

 highest eulogiums of Hyperides as an orator. Dionysius of Halicar- 

 nassus, in his remarks on Dinarchus (c. 5, &c.), characterises his stylj 

 as marked by excellences of the highest order. 



HYRCA'NUS, JOHN, one of the Asmontean rulers of Judooa, 

 succeeded his father Simon in the high priesthood, B.C. 135. His 

 father and his two elder brothers, Judas and Mattathias, were treacher- 

 ously murdered at a feast by Ptolemaeus the son-in-law of Simon ; and 

 it was with great difficulty that Hyrcanus, who was not with them 

 when they were murdered, escaped to Jerusalem. During the first year 

 of his reign (B.C. 134) Jerusalem win besieged by Antiochus Sidetes ; 

 and after a long siege Hyrcanus was obliged to submit. The walls of 

 Jerusalem were destroyed, and a tribute imposed upon the city. 

 Hyrcanus afterwards accompanied Antiochus in his expedition against 

 the Parthians ; but returned to Jerusalem before the defeat of the 

 Syrian army. After the defeat and death of Antiochus, B.C. 130, 

 Hyrcanus took several cities belonging to the Syrian kingdom, and 

 completely established his own independence. He strengthened his 

 power by an alliance with the Romans ; and extended his dominions 

 by the conquest of the Idumaeans, whom he compelled to submit to 

 circumcision and to observe the Mosaic law ; and also by taking 

 Samaria, which he levelled to the ground, and flooded the spot on 

 which it had stood. The latter part of his reign was troubled by 

 disputes between the Pharisees and Sadducees. Hyrcanus had origi- 

 nally belonged to the Pharisees; but had quitted their party in 

 consequence of an insult he received at an entertainment from Eleazar, 

 a person of importance among the Pharisees. By uniting himself 

 to the Sadducees, Hyrcanus, notwithstanding the benefits he had 

 conferred upou his country by his wise and vigorous government, 

 became very unpopular with the common people, who were for the 

 most attached to the Pharisees. Hyrcanus died B.C. 106, and was 

 succeeded by his son Aristobulus, who was the first of the Asmoiucuu 

 princes who assumed the royal title. 

 HYRCA'NUS II. [ASMON.EANS.] 

 HYSTASPES. [DAEICS I.] 



T A'MBLICHUS (!AMBLICHUS CUALCIDENUS), a celebrated neo-Platonist 

 of the 4th century, was born at Chalcis in Ccelo-syria, and is dis- 

 tinguished by his birth-place from another of the same name and of 

 the same school and century, born at Apamca in Syria, of whom how- 

 ever little is known. From his admirers and disciples lamblichus 

 received the flattering titles of " moat divine teacher " and " wonder- 

 ful," and enjoyed a reputation among hia contemporaries which cast 

 BIOO. BIT. VOL. in. 



into the shade the fame of his teacher Porphyry, whom nevertheless 

 he was far from equalling either in extent of learning or in powers of 

 mind. The literary career of lamblichus extends from the reign of 

 Constantino the Great to that of Julian the Apostate, whose esteem 

 and favour he obtained, not only on account of his general adherence 

 to and defence of the old national religion, but particularly for his 

 ' Life of Pythagoras.' (' lamblichi do Vita Pythagoricfl, liber, Gr. et 



2 N 



