A similar story is mentioned by Plutarch.

Ammonius asks Plutarch what he, being a Boeotian, has to say for Cadmus, the Phoenician who reputedly settled in Thebes and introduced the alphabet to Greece, placing alpha first because it is the Phoenician name for ox — which, unlike Hesiod, the Phoenicians considered not the second or third, but the first of all necessities.

Plutarch tells a story that at Bactra, in 327 BC in a debate with Callisthenes, he advised all to worship Alexander as a god even during his lifetime, is with greater probability attributed to the Sicilian Cleon.

We know little more of the life of Andronicus, but he is of special interest in the history of philosophy, from the statement of Plutarch, that he published a new edition of the works of Aristotle and Theophrastus, which formerly belonged to the library of Apellicon, and were brought to Rome by Sulla with the rest of Apellicon's library in 84 BC.

Concerning the liberal use of the death penalty in the Draconic code, Plutarch states: " It is said that Drakon himself, when asked why he had fixed the punishment of death for most offences, answered that he considered these lesser crimes to deserve it, and he had no greater punishment for more important ones.

Plutarch is the source also for the story that the victorious Spartan generals, having planned the demolition of Athens and the enslavement of its people, grew merciful after being entertained at a banquet by lyrics from Euripides's play Electra: " they felt that it would be a barbarous act to annihilate a city which produced such men " ( Life of Lysander )

Plutarch isn't sure exactly how Fabius came up with this number, although he believes it was to honor of the perfection of the number three, as it is the first of the odd numbers, and one of the first of the prime numbers.

Plutarch states that, when questioned by Scipio as to who was the greatest general, Hannibal is said to have replied either Alexander or Pyrrhus, then himself, or, according to another version of the event, Pyrrhus, Scipio, then himself.

Upon crossing the Rubicon, Caesar, according to Plutarch and Suetonius, is supposed to have quoted the Athenian playwright Menander, in Greek, " the die is cast ".

Whatever conflicts existed between the two men, Antony remained faithful to Caesar but it is worth mentioning that according to Plutarch ( paragraph 13 ) Trebonius, one of the conspirators, had ' sounded him unobtrusively and cautiously ... Antony had understood his drift ... but had given him no encouragement: at the same time he had not reported the conversation to Caesar '.

Seleucus is known from the writings of Plutarch.

According to Plutarch, Seleucus even proved the heliocentric system, but it is not known what arguments he used ( except that he correctly theorized on tides as a result of Moon's attraction ).

Most information we have on the myths of Osiris is derived from allusions contained in the Pyramid Texts at the end of the Fifth Dynasty, later New Kingdom source documents such as the Shabaka Stone and the Contending of Horus and Seth, and much later, in narrative style from the writings of Greek authors including Plutarch and Diodorus Siculus.

Plutarch mentions that ( for much later period ) two days after the beginning of the festival " the priests bring forth a sacred chest containing a small golden coffer, into which they pour some potable water ... and a great shout arises from the company for joy that Osiris is found ( or resurrected ).

His earliest work was a biography of the Greek statesman Philopoemen ; this work was later used as a source by Plutarch when composing his Parallel Lives, however the original Polybian text is lost.

The traditional account of Roman history, which has come down to us through Livy, Plutarch, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, and others, is that in Rome's first centuries it was ruled by a succession of seven kings.

In a letter to Melanchthon of April 22, 1519, Erasmus specifically adduced the Cretans of Plutarch as an example of his adage " Concord is a mighty rampart ".

His mother is more obscure ; according to Plutarch, she was either a Thracian woman called Abrotonon, or Euterpe, a Carian from Halicarnassus.

Since it was his long-standing advocacy of Athenian naval power which enabled the Allied fleet to fight at all, and it was his stratagem that brought about the Battle of Salamis, it is probably not an exaggeration to say, as Plutarch does, that Themistocles " is thought to have been the man most instrumental in achieving the salvation of Hellas ".

All three chroniclers agree that Themistocles's next move was to contact the Persian king ; in Thucydides, this is by letter, while Plutarch and Diodorus have a face-to-face meeting with the king.

It is based primarily upon the Life of Themistocles and Life of Aristides from Plutarch.

According to Plutarch, Seleucus was the first to prove the heliocentric system through reasoning, but it is not known what arguments he used.

Plutarch also states that Spartans treated the Helots " harshly and cruelly ": they compelled them to drink pure wine ( which was considered dangerous – wine usually being cut with water ) "... and to lead them in that condition into their public halls, that the children might see what a sight a drunken man is ; they made them to dance low dances, and sing ridiculous songs ..." during syssitia ( obligatory banquets ).

Among ancient sources, the poet Simonides, another near-contemporary, says the campaign force numbered 200, 000 ; while a later writer, the Roman Cornelius Nepos estimates 200, 000 infantry and 10, 000 cavalry, of which only 100, 000 fought in the battle, while the rest were loaded into the fleet that was rounding Cape Sounion ; Plutarch and Pausanias both independently give 300, 000, as does the Suda dictionary.

By this, Plutarch probably means that as Plebeian Tribune, Metilius had the Plebeian Council, a popular assembly which only Tribunes could preside over, grant Minucius quasi-dictatorial powers.

She preferred that parents or teachers read aloud those texts ( such as Plutarch and the Old Testament ), making omissions only where necessary.

In Plutarch, he consented to the kingship only at the death-bed insistence of Tanaquil, not for his own advantage but for the benefit of the Roman people.

Plutarch wrote that, according to Volumnius, Brutus repeated two verses, but Volumnius was only able to recall the one quoted.

Plutarch also states that Set steals and dismembers the corpse only after Isis has retrieved it.

Fragments of the axones were still visible in Plutarch's time but today the only records we have of Solon's laws are fragmentary quotes and comments in literary sources such as those written by Plutarch himself.

According to the historian Plutarch ( in his Livesof the Gracchi ), only Scipio Nasica was directly involved in leading the senators to kill Tiberius.

Plutarch states that the only child that Octavian killed out of Antony ’ s children was Marcus Antonius Antyllus.

According to the Greek historian Plutarch ( in De defectu oraculorum, " The Obsolescence of Oracles "), Pan is the only Greek god ( other than Asclepius ) who actually dies.

The only reward he would accept was a branch of the sacred olive, and a promise of perpetual friendship between Athens and Cnossus ( Plutarch, Life of Solon, 12 ; Aristotle, Ath.

Information regarding the life of Demetrius are drawn mainly from inscription as only Plutarch writes of him, in Life of Aratus, and Polybius makes scarce mentions of him.

Plutarch reports that some authors credited him with only a single daughter, Pompilia.

The only histories of Sparta are from the writings of Xenophon, Thucydides, Herodotus and Plutarch, none of whom were Spartans.

He wrote some fifty works, of which only fragments have survived preserved by writers such as Diogenes Laërtius, Stobaeus, Cicero, Seneca and Plutarch.

Plutarch also reported that " after the battle, Pompey set out to march to the Caspian Sea, but was turned back by a multitude of deadly reptiles when he was only three days march distant, and withdrew into Lesser Armenia ".

His only considerable enterprise in prose was a revision of a 17th century translation of Plutarch ( called the " Dryden Translation ," but actually the product of translators other than Dryden ) which occupied him from 1852, and was published as Plutarch's Lives ( 1859 ).

The accounts of Plutarch and Diogenes Laërtius recount that they exchanged only a few words: while Diogenes was relaxing in the sunlight in the morning, Alexander, thrilled to meet the famous philosopher, asked if there was any favour he might do for him.

Plutarch also states that Spartans treated the Helots " harshly and cruelly ": they compelled them to drink pure wine ( which was considered dangerous-wine usually being diluted with water ) "… and to lead them in that condition into their public halls, that the children might see what a sight a drunken man is ; they made them to dance low dances, and sing ridiculous songs …" during syssitia ( obligatory banquets ) However, he notes that this rough treatment was inflicted only relatively late, after the 465 BC earthquake.

Armed gladiators were unable to resist organized Roman soldiers ; and although Marius offered freedom to any slave that would fight with him against Sulla ( an offer which Plutarch says only three slaves accepted ) he and his followers were forced to flee the city.

In his Life of Pyrrhus, Plutarch wrote that Caius Fabricius said of this battle that it was not the Epirots who had beaten the Romans, but only Pyrrhus who had beaten Laevinus.

Plutarch states that Seleucus's son Antiochus was in command of the cavalry on the left wing, traditionally the weaker wing in the Macedonian system, intended only to skirmish.

This ' elephant manoeuvre ' was the decisive moment in the battle, but it is not clear how it came about ; Plutarch only says that " the elephants were thrown in his way ".

The presence of " nines " in Antony's fleet at Actium is recorded by Florus and Cassius Dio, although Plutarch makes explicit mention only of " eights " and " tens ".