for medicines to treat jaundice (Askle ̄piade ̄s in Gale ̄n, CMLoc 9.1 [13.232–233 K.]) employ
quantities (“handfuls”) of chickpeas, asparagus, rosemary, and common fennel, mixed with
wine. Embedded in the medical poetry of D (Gale ̄n, Antid. 2.15 [14.196– 201
K.]) is Nike ̄ratos’ multi-ingredient antidote against poisons and the bites of rabid animals.
As probably recorded by S, C A, Chron. 2.86 (Drabkin, p. 620;
CML 6.1.1, p. 596), cites and approves Nike ̄ratos’ tract Katale ̄psis (“seizure”). The remnants of
Nike ̄ratos’ medical, and especially pharmaceutical works, indicate a prominent practitioner
whose pharmacological expertise included the full range of drugs fashioned from animals
(e.g. coral, beaver castor, and pill-bugs), common foodstuffs, and several gum-exudates
that ensured successful administration as pills and pastilles to patients for a number of
diseases.
M. Wellmann, Die Schrift des Dioskurides Peri haplo ̄n pharmako ̄n: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Medizin (1914);
RE 17.1 (1936) 314, K. Deichgräber; V. Gazza, “Prescrizione mediche nei papiri dell’Egitto greco-
romano,” Aegyptus 35 (1955) 86–110, and 36 (1956) 73–114; John Scarborough, “Nicander Theriaca
811,” CPh 75 (1980) 138–140; Beavis (1988) 13–19 (“Arthropoda: Diplopoda and Isopoda”).
John Scarborough
N M ⇒ H M
Nike ̄te ̄s (of Athens?) (250 BCE – 90 CE)
A P., in G CMLoc 4.8 (12.765 K.), records his collyrium prescribed
for great pain and eye-infections, composed of calamine, roasted copper, spodos, gal-
banum, myrrh, and opium, in water. The name is rare outside Athens (LGPN); emendation
to ΝΙΚΗ<ΡΑ>ΤΟΥ (i.e., N) is possible but unnecessary.
Fabricius (1726) 346.
PTK
Nikias of Mallos (125 BCE – 75 CE?)
Lapidary writer whose On stones is cited by -P, D F 20.4 (1163A),
regarding a stone similar to sardonyx. It is debated, however, if the Nikias Maleo ̄te ̄s, quoted
by pseudo-Plutarch; (Parall. min. 13A: on He ̄rakle ̄s’ attempt to seize Iole ̄), is to be identified
with our author: the ethnic hinders such an interpretation. Moreover, P 37.36 also
mentions, in discussing electrum, a certain Nikias and an Homeric scholium about Helen’s
rape by Alexander (FHG 4.463–464), which is similar in content to the Parallela minora:
presumably the homonymous Homeric grammarian.
Ed.: FGrHist 60.
J. Tolkiehn, Philologische Streifzüge (1916) 11–19; F. Atenstadt, “Zwei Quellen des sogennanten Plutarch
de fluviis,” Hermes 57 (1922) 219–246, esp. 237–238; Schlereth (1931) 118–120; Bidez (1935) 31;
Jacoby (1940) 129, n. 1; De Lazzer (2003) 85–86.
Eugenio Amato
Nikias of Mile ̄tos (ca 300 – 250 BCE)
Poet and physician, friend of Theokritos, who addressed him in Idd. 11 (asserting poetry was
the only remedy for love) and 13, described a cedar statue which Nikias dedicated to Askl-
e ̄pios (Ep. 8), and also composed Id. 28 to accompany a distaff for Nikias’ wife Theugenis.
NIKE ̄TE ̄S (OF ATHENS?)