In the 2nd and 3rd century CE, those at Didyma and Clarus pronounced the so-called " theological oracles ", in which Apollo confirms that all deities are aspects or servants of an all-encompassing, highest deity.

The type is represented by neo-Attic Imperial Roman copies of the late 1st or early 2nd century, modelled upon a supposed Greek bronze original made in the second quarter of the 5th century BCE, in a style similar to works of Polykleitos but more archaic.

In the late 2nd century CE floor mosaic from El Djem, Roman Thysdrus, he is identifiable as Apollo Helios by his effulgent halo, though now even a god's divine nakedness is concealed by his cloak, a mark of increasing conventions of modesty in the later Empire.

The earliest known written documentation of the Chinese abacus dates to the 2nd century BC.

It was one of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd century AD astronomer Ptolemy, and it remains one of the 88 modern constellations.

* Metrodorus of Stratonicea ( late 2nd century BC )

* Gotama ( c. 2nd – 3rd century CE ), wrote Jaimini, author of Purva Mimamsa Sutras.

* Alcinous ( philosopher ) ( 2nd century AD )

* Take two: Aspirin, New uses and new dangers are still being discovered as aspirin enters its 2nd century.

Akkadian gradually replaced Sumerian as a spoken language somewhere around the turn of the 3rd and the 2nd millennium BC ( the exact dating being a matter of debate ), but Sumerian continued to be used as a sacred, ceremonial, literary and scientific language in Mesopotamia until the 1st century AD.

A 2nd century AD papyrus of Alcaeus, one of the many such fragments that have contributed to our greatly improved knowledge of Alcaeus ' poetry during the 20th century ( P. Berol.

Alcamenes () was an ancient Greek sculptor of Lemnos and Athens, who flourished in the 2nd half of the 5th century BC.

), one 2nd century BC ( Basil Mandilaras, ' A new papyrus fragment of the Certamen Homeri et Hesiodi Platon 42 ( 1990 ) 45 – 51 ) and one 2nd or 3rd century AD ( University of Michigan pap.

Alexander was a native of Aphrodisias in Caria and came to Athens towards the end of the 2nd century.

The document is dated to the 2nd century BC and, in the form of a vision, briefly discusses dualism and the Watchers:

* Andronicus ben Meshullam, a Jewish scholar of the 2nd century BC

The numerals used in the Bakhshali manuscript, dated between the 2nd century BCE and the 2nd century CE.

The temple seems to have been burnt again during the Third Sacred War ( 355 – 346 BCE ), and was in a very dilapidated state when seen by Pausanias in the 2nd century CE, though some restoration, as well as the building of a new temple, was undertaken by Emperor Hadrian.

The Ajanta Caves ( Ajiṇṭhā leni ; Marathi: अज िं ठ ा ल े ण ी) in Aurangabad district of Maharashtra, India are 30 rock-cut cave monuments which date from the 2nd century BCE to the 600 CE.

The visions in the latter half of Daniel are theorized to be written by an anonymous author in the Maccabean era, who assembled the legends with the visions as one book, in the 2nd century BCE.

According to this theory, the anonymous author attributed these events to Daniel, as prophecies that were witnessed by this writer in the 2nd century BCE.

With the discovery of the Dead Sea scroll, 4QDan < sup > c </ sup > at Qumran, dating 125 BCE, it does not reassure critics that Daniel was written in the 2nd century BCE.

There are three main versions of the Book of Daniel: the twelve-chapter version preserved in the Masoretic text and two longer Greek versions ( the original Septuagint version, c. 100 BCE, and the later Theodotion version, c. 2nd century CE ).

The Greek additions to Esther ( which do not appear in the Jewish / Hebrew ; see " Additions to Esther " below ) are dated to around the late 2nd century or early 1st BCE.

Malachi was apparently known to the author of Ecclesiasticus early in the 2nd century BCE.

Greek historian Plutarch discusses an argument between Chrysippus ( 3rd century BCE ) and Hipparchus ( 2nd century BCE ) of a rather delicate enumerative problem, which was later shown to be related to Schröder numbers.

A 2nd century CE Greek known as Heraclitus the paradoxographer --- not to be confused with the 5th century BCE Greek philosopher Heraclitus --- claimed Euhemeristically that Cerberus had two pups which were never away from their father, as such Cerberus was in fact a normal ( however very large ) dog but artists incorporating the two pups into their work made it appear as if his two children were in fact extra heads.

Hanukkah (, Tiberian:, usually spelled, pronounced in Modern Hebrew ; also romanized as Chanukah, Chanukkah, Chanuka, or Khanukah ), also known as the Festival of Lights, is an eight-day Jewish holiday commemorating the rededication of the Holy Temple ( the Second Temple ) in Jerusalem at the time of the Maccabean Revolt of the 2nd century BCE.

1 Esdras, probably from the late 2nd / early 1st centuries BCE, preserves a Greek text of Ezra and a part of Nehemiah distinctly different from that of Ezra-Nehemiah-in particular it eliminates Nehemiah from the story and gives some of his deeds to Ezra, as well as telling events in a different order.

The early 2nd century BCE Jewish author Ben Sira praises Nehemiah, but makes no mention of Ezra.

The Essenes ( in Modern but not in Ancient Hebrew:, Isiyim ; Greek: Εσσήνοι, Εσσαίοι, or Οσσαίοι ; Essēnoi, Essaioi, Ossaioi ) were a sect of Second Temple Judaism that flourished from the 2nd century BCE to the 1st century CE which some scholars claim seceded from the Zadokite priests.

Walls in the 2nd century BCE " Italian Agora " at Delos were decorated with paintings of gladiators.

It has been claimed, for example by Maurits Gysseling, that the placenames of this region show evidence of an early presence of Germanic languages, already in the 2nd century BCE.

The Jewish calendar's epoch ( reference date ), 1 Tishrei 1 AM, is equivalent to Monday, 7 October 3761 BCE in the proleptic Julian calendar, the equivalent tabular date ( same daylight period ) and is about one year before the traditional Jewish date of Creation on 25 Elul AM 1, based upon the Seder Olam Rabbah of Rabbi Yossi ben Halafta, a 2nd century CE sage.

In the 2nd century BCE, Antiochus IV Epiphanes ( ruler of the Seleucid Empire ) tried to eradicate Judaism in favour of Hellenistic religion.

Yehud was absorbed into the subsequent Hellenistic kingdoms that followed the conquests of Alexander the Great, but in the 2nd century BCE the Judaeans revolted against the Hellenist Seleucid Empire and created the Hasmonean kingdom.

Athenaeus ( writing in the 1st or 2nd century BCE, and drawing on the etymological speculation of Apollodorus of Athens ) notes that the red mullet is sacred to Hecate, " on account of the resemblance of their names ; for that the goddess is trimorphos, of a triple form ".

Later authors combined Daoism with Confucianism and Legalism, such as Liu An ( 2nd century BCE ), whose Huainanzi ( The Philosophers of Huai-nan ) also added to the fields of geography and topography.

The ( 2nd century BCE ) Huainanzi ( 8, tr.

The ( 2nd century BCE ) Huainanzi uses Yinglong 應龍 in three chapters.

Gao Yu's ( 2nd century CE ) Huainanzi commentary glosses yinglong 應龍 as a " winged dragon " and qiu 虯 as a " hornless dragon ".

The ( 2nd century BCE ) Huainanzi refers to qi and shen with xing 形 " form ; shape ; body ".

* Huainanzi, 2nd century BCE Chinese philosophical