Alko ̄n (40 – 55 CE)
Surgeon working in Rome, famously wealthy and famously fined: P 29.22, Iosephus,
Ant. Iud. 19.157 (Alkuo ̄n). Cited by Martial 6.70.6, 11.84.5, as an example of the surgeon
(Kay, Martial Book XI [1985] ad loc.); cf. D. Pliny 1.ind.28 cites BIALCON as a source,
perhaps a Bios Alkontos.
PIR2 A-493; Korpela (1987) 164.
PTK
Alupios (ca 300 – 400 CE)
His fragmentary Introduction to music preserves a short section, reflecting the later Aristoxenian
tradition (K, A Q, and G), followed by the
most complete surviving tabulation of ancient Greek musical notation, arranged in two sets
(one for text and one for instruments), according to a system of fifteen tonoi in the diatonic,
chromatic, and enharmonic genera. The tables for the enharmonic genus, however, are
incomplete and most probably defective. Each tonos (a basic two-octave scale with three
alternative notes in the middle, for a total of 18 notes) following the lowest (the Hypodorian)
is one semitone higher overall, resulting in a total range of three octaves and a tone between
the lowest note of the lowest tonos and the highest note of the highest tonos. The Alupian
system of symbols largely accords with the notation found in the surviving fragments of
music, enabling them to be transcribed with reasonable confidence.
Alupios is mentioned by C (Institutiones 2.5) in the list of important Greek
musical authors. B (De institutione musica 4.3–4) reproduces the Alupian notational
symbols for the Lydian tonos in all three genera, but they are not attributed to Alupios and
could have been derived from other sources. Nothing is known of his life. The date-range is
assigned on the basis of the name (not otherwise attested prior to 300), the content of the
opening prose section, and the general disregard for musical notation by writers securely
dated prior to 200.
Ed.: MSG 367 – 406.
Mathiesen (1999) 593–607; NGD2 1.435–37.
Thomas J. Mathiesen
Alupios of Antioch (358 – 371 CE)
Possibly a Kilikian, educated in Antioch. He had a brother Caesarius and a son Hierokle ̄s,
named after his uncle (L Ep. 324). In 358 when Alupius was uicarius Britanniarum, he
formed a friendship with the later emperor Julian (Julian Ep. 9 Bidez and Cumont), to whom
Alupios soon presented a map “which was better drawn than the older ones,” together with
an epigram (Julian Ep. 10 Bidez and Cumont). In 363 Alupios (maybe serving as a comes) was
in charge of rebuilding the temple at Jerusalem. The project failed immediately (Ammianus
Marcellinus 23.1.2; P HE 7.9; Rufin. Hist. 10.38). In 371, Alupios was
tried for poisoning at Antioch, and condemned to exile, but soon pardoned (Ammianus
Marcellinus 29.1.44).
RE 1.2 (1894) 1709 (#1) O. Seeck; PLRE 1 (1971) 46–47; BNP 1 (2002) 553, W. Portmann.
Andreas Kuelzer
ALKO ̄N