Theodosius of Alexandria (grammarian)

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Theodosius of Alexandria was an Ancient Greek grammarian, purported to have lived about the time of Constantine the Great. A terminus ante quem is yielded by a letter of Synesius (floruit ca. 400 CE) to the "wonderful grammarian Theodosuis". Theodosius himself cited Apollonius Dyscolus and Herodian in his works.

The Alexandrine grammarians were philologists and textual scholars who flourished in Hellenistic Alexandria in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BCE, when that city was the center of Hellenistic culture. Despite the name, the work of the Alexandrine grammarians was never confined to grammar, and in fact did not include it, since grammar in the modern sense did not exist until the first century BC. In Hellenistic and later times, "grammarian" refers primarily to scholars concerned with the restoration, proper reading, explanation and interpretation of the classical texts, including literary criticism. However unlike Atticism, their goal was not to reform the Greek in their day.

Constantine the Great Roman emperor

Constantine the Great, also known as Constantine I, was a Roman Emperor who ruled between 306 and 337 AD. Born in Naissus, in Dacia Ripensis, city now known as Niš, he was the son of Flavius Valerius Constantius, a Roman Army officer of Illyrian origins. His mother Helena was Greek. His father became Caesar, the deputy emperor in the west, in 293 AD. Constantine was sent east, where he rose through the ranks to become a military tribune under Emperors Diocletian and Galerius. In 305, Constantius was raised to the rank of Augustus, senior western emperor, and Constantine was recalled west to campaign under his father in Britannia (Britain). Constantine was acclaimed as emperor by the army at Eboracum after his father's death in 306 AD. He emerged victorious in a series of civil wars against Emperors Maxentius and Licinius to become sole ruler of both west and east by 324 AD.

Synesius, a Greek bishop of Ptolemais in ancient Libya, a part of the Western Pentapolis of Cyrenaica after 410, was born of wealthy parents at Balagrae near Cyrene between 370 and 375.

Theodosius' main work were the Κανόνες εἰσαγωγικοί περὶ κλίσεως ὀνομάτων καὶ ῤημάτων (Introduction to The Rules of Noun and Verb Declension), essentially an epitome of Dionysius Thrax's Art of Grammar , from where he mechanically copied the verb and noun inflectional paradigms. This work, and most importantly the scholia on it by Georgius Choeroboscus, constituted the main primary source for the grammarians later onwards down to the Renaissance. Theodosius was also known as the author of Περὶ ὅρου and other grammatical works.

An epitome is a summary or miniature form, or an instance that represents a larger reality, also used as a synonym for embodiment. Epitomacy represents, "to the degree of." An abridgment differs from an epitome in that an abridgment is made of selected quotations of a larger work; no new writing is composed, as opposed to the epitome, which is an original summation of a work, at least in part.

Dionysius Thrax was a Hellenistic grammarian and a pupil of Aristarchus of Samothrace. He was long considered to be the author of the earliest grammatical text on the Greek language, one that was used as a standard manual for perhaps some 1,500 years, and which was until recently regarded as the groundwork of the entire Western grammatical tradition.

Scholia are grammatical, critical, or explanatory comments, either original or extracted from pre-existing commentaries, which are inserted on the margin of the manuscript of an ancient author, as glosses. One who writes scholia is a scholiast. The earliest attested use of the word dates to the 1st century BC.

The Κανόνες, amplified by the additions of later Byzantine grammarians, were published by Karl Wilhelm Göttling under the title of Theodosii Alexandrini Grammatica (Leipzig, 1822), the Preface having been published before in Osann's Philemonis grammatici quae supersunt (Berlin, 1821), and a portion of this work, entitled Theodosii Grammatici Alex. Canones de Declinatione Nominum et Conjugatione Verborum, was included by August Immanuel Bekker in the third volume of his Anecdota Graeca (Vol. 3, Berlin, 1821).

Karl Wilhelm Göttling German philologist

Karl Wilhelm Göttling was a German philologist and classical scholar.

Leipzig Place in Saxony, Germany

Leipzig is the most populous city in the German federal state of Saxony. With a population of 587,857 inhabitants as of 2018, it is Germany's eighth most populous city as well as the second most populous city in the area of former East Germany after (East) Berlin. Together with Halle (Saale), the largest city of the neighbouring state of Saxony-Anhalt, the city forms the polycentric conurbation of Leipzig-Halle. Between the two cities lies Leipzig/Halle International Airport.

Berlin Capital of Germany

Berlin is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3,748,148 (2018) inhabitants make it the second most populous city proper of the European Union after London. The city is one of Germany's 16 federal states. It is surrounded by the state of Brandenburg, and contiguous with Potsdam, Brandenburg's capital. The two cities are at the center of the Berlin-Brandenburg capital region, which is, with about six million inhabitants and an area of more than 30,000 km², Germany's third-largest metropolitan region after the Rhine-Ruhr and Rhine-Main regions.

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William Smith (lexicographer) English lexicographer

Sir William Smith was an English lexicographer. He also made advances in the teaching of Greek and Latin in schools.

<i>Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology</i> encyclopedia/biographical dictionary

The Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology is an encyclopedia/biographical dictionary. Edited by William Smith, the dictionary spans three volumes and 3,700 pages. It is a classic work of 19th-century lexicography. The work is a companion to Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities and Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography.


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