probably were not different parts of a single composition, and only On Marvels was a truly
paradoxographical compilation.
Moreover, the work heralds a new step in the genre’s development. Omitting the staple
zoological, botanical, and mineralogical subjects, it focuses exclusively on wonders pertain-
ing to the human world. Stories featuring revenants and hermaphrodites, and reports on
living hippocentaurs and births from males outnumber those concerning unusual natural
phenomena (giant bones, multiple births). Tellingly, the scientific underpinning of reported
curiosities (through detailed source-citations) has largely passed from fashion, the work
rather exhibiting a penchant for pure and unadulterated sensationalism. Even so, like the
wonder-books of K and P catering to the Ptolemies’ interest
in paradoxa, Phlego ̄n’s On Marvels may well have appealed to his patron Hadrian, omnium
curiositatum explorator ( Tert. Apol. 5.7).
Ed.: FGrHist 257; PGR 169 – 219.
RE 18.3 (1949) 1137–1166 (§19, 1157–1159), K. Ziegler; Giannini (1964) 129–130; A. Stramaglia,
“Sul Peri thaumasion di Flegonte di Tralle,” SCO 45 (1995) 191–234; Guido Schepens and K. Delcroix,
“Ancient Paradoxography,” in: O. Pecere and A. Stramaglia, edd., La Letteratura di Consumo nel Mondo
Greco-Latino (1996) 373–460 at 430–433, 449–451; W. Hansen, Phlegon of Tralles’ Book of Marvels
(1996).
Jan Bollansée, Karen Haegemans, and Guido Schepens
Phoibos, Ulpius (100 BCE – ca 350 CE)
Quoted by A for a remedy for sore back in horses (Hippiatrica Parisina 223,
reappearing without attribution in Hippiatrica Berolinensia 26.34) and described as eparkhikos,
the equivalent of consularis.
McCabe (2007).
Anne McCabe
Phokos of Samos (before 330 BCE?)
Probably the author of a Nautical Astronomy (also attributed to T), which presumably
described the phases of some fixed stars and constellations (D L 1.23).
DK 5; DK 11A18; O. Wenskus, Astronomisches Zeitangaben von Homer bis Theophrast = Hermes S.55
(1990), p. 53.
Henry Mendell
Phulakos (?) (10 BCE – 95 CE)
A P., in G CMGen 5.4 (13.805 K.), indicates that Phulakos
employed the dittany-containing anti-venom of D L. The archaic
name (cf. H, Iliad 2.695, 6.35; H 8.39, 8.85) is not attested after the 2nd c.
BCE (LGPN), but Phulax was in use in south Italy in the imperial era (LGPN 3A.469), the
probable date of this possible pharmacist. Cf. perhaps P?
Fabricius (1726) 370.
PTK
PHULAKOS (?)