P H R 
P H R 
301 
bafe : branches oppofite, few, upright". Leaves oppofite, 
fuhpetioled, wedge-fhaped, rounded above, equal in length 
and breadth, nine-toothed, thickifh. Seed filling up the 
calyx and burfting it, compreffed a little, fubcylindric, 
compreffed, wedge-fhaped at the bafe, two-celled. The 
calyx and corolla are regular in this ; and, as the fruit 
ripens, the calyx burfts longitudinally, ex poling the feed 
naked, almoft as in Lythrum cuphea. This plant is affo- 
ciated with the preceding, till it is better known; though 
it has a different appearance. Thunberg found it at the 
Cape of Good Hope. Linn. Svppl. 
PHRY'NE, was a famous proftitute, who flourilhed at 
Athens about 328 years before the Chriftian era. She 
was miftrefs of Praxiteles, who drew her piiflure, which 
was one of his heft pieces, and was placed in the temple 
of Apollo, at Delphi. We are told that Apelles painted 
his Venus Anadyomene after he had feen Phryne on the 
fea-fhore naked, and with dilhevelled hair. Phryne 
became fo very rich by the liberality of her lovers, that 
Hie offered to rebuild Thebes at her own expenfe, which 
Alexander had deftroyed, provided this infcription was 
placed on the walls : Alexander diruit, fed meretrix Phryne 
re.fecit ; but this was refuted.- See Pliny, xxxiv. 8 . 
PHRYN'ICUS, a. tragic poet of Athens, difciple to 
Thefpis, and the inftrubtorof AEfchylus, flourilhed about 
the fourth century before Chrift. Though he is fcarcely 
known (his works having perifhed), yet, as the matter of 
./Efchylus, he mutt be confidered as the father of the 
tragic drama of modern Europe ; for, though Thefpis 
invented the dialogue, yet, as Bentley fays, “ all his plays 
were farcical interludes with Bacchus and the Satyrs; 
and Phrynicus and .ZEfchylus were the introducers of 
real tragedy.” Of Phrynicus only a very few lines are 
extant; two preserved by Athenaeus, one in the argument 
of iEfchylus’s Peris, one by Tzetzes on Lycophron, and 
an Epigram in Plut. Symph. Q. viii. Yet the heavy 
fine impofed upon him for exciting too much commifera- 
tion by his play of the MiAwor Ahuoig, (a faff recorded 
by Strabo, Herodotus, and others,) leems to fpeak highly 
in praife of his tragic powers. Strabo, lib. xiv. 
There was alfo a comic poet of the fame name, who 
flourilhed about a century later. 
PHRYN'ICUS, furnarned Arrhabius, a Greek fophift 
or orator, was a native of Bithynia, and flourilhed in the 
reigns of Marcus Antoninus and Commodus. Two 
works of his are fpoken of; one called “ Apparatus So- 
phitticus,” and the other “ Dibtiones Attics but, as 
the firtt is faid to have been a collebricn of words and 
phrafes, it was probably the fame with the lecond. 
There is extant an abridgment of the latter, which was 
firtt printed at Rome under the title of “ Eclogae Nomi- 
num et Verborum Atticorum,” Gr. and Lat. 1517. The 
heft edition of this work is that of J. Corn, de Pauw, 
Traj. 4to. 1739. 
PHRY'NIS, a mufician of Mitylene, the firtt who ob¬ 
tained a muficai prize at the Panathensa at Athens. He 
added two firings to the lyre, which had been ufed with 
feven by all his predeceflbrs. He flourilhed about 438 
years before the Chriftian era. We are told that 
he was originally a cook in the houfe of Hiero king of 
Sicily. 
PHRYN'IUM, f. [a name borrowed by Willdenow 
from the ancient Greeks, whofe (pfvvtot was l’o called from 
1 pfi'vc, a red kind of land-toad, reputed venomous, to 
which the plant in queftion, being armed with fpineS, 
was thought to. be hoftile. Our Phrynium, however, is 
a fmooth herb, growing in damp lliady places, and rather 
affording flielter to various reptiles than dangerous to 
any.] In botany, a genus of the clafs monandria, order 
monogynia, natural order of fcitaminese, Linn, (cannae, 
Brown Prod. Nov. Holl. p.307.) Generic characters— 
Calyx: fpathes many, acute, imbricate, many-flovrered; 
perianthium three-leaved; leaflets awl-fhaped, erebt, 
equal. Corolla: tubular; border feven-cleft; the three 
outer fegments acute, almoft equal, reflex; the four inner 
Vol. XX. No. 1369. 
obtufe, erebl, unequal. Nebtary long, channelled, erebt; 
(the four inner fegments belong properly to this.) Sta¬ 
mina : filament one, awl-fhaped, fhort, growing to the fide 
of the neblary at bottom; antherae oblong, irregular, 
emitting little balls of pollen diftinguilhable by the naked 
eye. Piftilium : germ ovate-three-cornered, inferior; 
flyle thick, fhort, rather longer than the ftattien ; ftigma 
concave, inclined towards the antherae. Pericarpium: 
capfule obtufely triangular, three-celled. Seed : nuts 
three, ovate, I'mooih.—Ejjential Charader. Calyx three¬ 
leaved ; petals three, equal, growing to the long chan¬ 
nelled tube of the neblary ; neblary, tube filiform, border 
four-parted; capfule three-celled ; nuts three. 
Phrynium capitatum, the only lpecies. Perrenial, 
ftemlefs, five feet high; on four fifths of it are very 
ftraight round regular fhining petioles. Leaves a foot 
long, ovate-oblong, fharp, quite entire, flat, obliquely 
grooved, fmooth, coriaceous. Flowers white, collected 
into a large feflile hemifpherical cyme, burfting out below 
themiddleof the gaping petiole, from which circumftance 
Loureiro named it P/iyllodes. Native of Malabar, China, 
and Cochinchina, in fhady wet places. 
It differs entirely from Pontederia, with which Linnaeus 
aflociated it; and approaches to Thalia fo near, that it 
may perhaps be a lpecies of that genus. According to 
Willdenow it is tnoft nearly allied to Maranta, differing 
from it only in the feven-cleft border of the corolla, and 
the long channelled tube of the nebtary. The leaves are 
ufed for wrapping up cakes, &c. in the oven, whence 
Loureiro’s trivial name o i placentaria : when tender, and 
not yet unfolded, they infufe them in fpirit of rice or 
lugar diluted with three times its quantity of water, to 
make vinegar. Linn. Tranj. viii. 341. 
PHRYX'US, in fabulous hiftcry, was a foil of Athamas 
king of Thebes, by Nephele. When his mother was 
repudiated, he was perfecuted with the moft inveterate 
fury by his ftep-mother Ino, becaufe he was to fit on the 
throne of Atlianias, in preference to the children of a 
fecond wife. His mother apprifed him of Ino’s inten¬ 
tions upon his life; or, according to others, his precep¬ 
tor ; and, the better to make his efcape, he fecured part 
of his father’s treafures, and privately left Boeotia with his 
fitter Helle, to go to their friend and relation iEetes king 
of Colchis. They embarked on-board a fhip, or, as we 
are informed by the fabulous account of the poets and 
mythologifts, they mounted on the back of a ram, whofe 
fleece was of gold; and proceeded on their journey 
through the air. The height to which they were carried 
made Helle gidfly, and fhe fell into the fea. Phryxus gave 
his fitter a decent burial on the fea-fhore ; and, after he 
had called the place Iiellefpont from her name, he conti¬ 
nued his flight, and arrived fafe in the kingdom of vEetes, 
where he offered the ram on the altars of Mars. The 
king received him with great tendernels, and gave him 
Chalciope his daughter in marriage. She had by him 
Phrontis Melas, Argos Cylindrus, whom fome call Cyto- 
rus. He was afterwards murdered by his father-in-law, 
who envied him the pofieflion of the golden fleece; and 
Chalciope, to prevent her children from fharing their 
father’s fate, fent them privately from Colchis to 
Bceotia, as nothing was to be dreaded there from the 
jealoufy or refentment of Ino, who was then dead. 
Phryxus was placed among the conftellations of heaven 
after death. The ram which carried him to Alia is faid 
to have been the fruit of Neptune’s amour with Theo- 
phane the daughter of Altis. This ram the gods had 
given to Atbamas in order to reward his piety and reli¬ 
gious life ; and Nephele procured it for her children, juft 
as they were going to be facrificed to the jealouly of Ino. 
Phryxus’s murder was fome time after amply revenged 
by the Greeks; it having occafioned the famous expedi¬ 
tion achieved under Jafon and many of the princes of 
Greece, which had tor its objebl the recovery of the 
golden fleece, and the punifhment of the king of Colchis 
for his cruelty to the ton of Athamas. 
4H 
The 
