MENELAl.
 

MENESTHEUS
 

eal pursuits, but took an active part in the polit-

!cal affairs of his native city, and came to be

th** leading man in the state.  He went on vari¬

ous embassies to Lysimachus, Demetrius, and

others ; but, being suspected of the treacherous

intention of betraying Eretria into the power of

Antigonus, he quitted his native city secretly,

and took refuge with Antigonus in Asia.   Here

he starved himself to death in the seventy-fourth

year of his age, probably about B.C. 277.  Of

the philosophy of Menedemus little  is known,

except that it  closely resembled that of the Me-

garian school.   Vid. Euolides, No. 2.

  Menelai or -us,  Portus  (MeveX&iog  Xlpnv,

MeveXaog :  now Marsa-Toubrouk, or  Ras-el-

Milhr?), an ancient  city on the coast of Mar¬

marica, in Northern Africa, founded, according

to tradition, by Menelaus.  It is remarkable in

history as the place  where  Agesilaus died.

  Menelaium  (Meve?idlov), a mountain in La¬

eonia, southeast of  Sparta, near Therapne, on

which the heroum of Menelaus was situated, the

foundations of which temple were discovered

in the year 1834.

  Menelaus (MeveXaog, MeveXeag, or MeveXag).

1. Son of Plisthenes or Atreus, and younger

brother of Agamemnon.  His eaily  life  is re¬

lated  under Agamemnon.   He was king of La¬

cedaemon, and married  to the beautiful Helen,

by whom he  became the father of Hermione.

When Helen had been carried off by Paris, Men¬

elaus and Ulysses sailed to Troy in order to

denand her restitution.  Menelaus was hospi-

taoly  treated  by Antenor, but the journey was

61" no avail; and the Trojan Antimachus even

advised his fellow-citizens to kill Menelaus and

Uljsses.  Thereupon Menelaus and his brother

Agamemnon  resolved to march against Troy

with  all the forces that Greece could muster.

Agamemnon  was chosen  the commander in-

chief.   In the Trojan war Menelaus was under

the special protection of Juno (Hera) and Mi¬

nerva (Athena), and distinguished himself by

his bravery in battle.  He killed many illustri¬

ous Trojans,  and would have slain Paris also

in single combat, had not the latter been carried

off by Venus (Aphrodite) in a cloud.  Menelaus

was one of the heroes concealed in the wooden

horse ;  and as soon as Troy was taken, he and

Ulysses hastened to the house of Deiphobus,

who had married Helen after the death of Paris,

and put him  to death in a barbarous manner.

Menelaus is said to have  been secretly intro¬

duced into the chamber of Deiphobus by Helen,

who thus became reconciled to her former hus¬

band.  He was among the first that sailed away

from  Troy, accompanied by his wife  Helen and

Nestor ; but he was eight years wandering about

the shores of the Mediterranean  before he

reached home.  He arrived at Sparta  on  the

very  day on  whieh Orestes was  engaged  in

Burying Olytaemnestra and iEgisthus.  Hence¬

forward he lived with Helen at Sparta in peace

and wealth, and his palace shone in its splendor

like the sun or the moon.   When Telemachus

visited Sparta to inquire after his father, Mene¬

laus was solemnizing the marriage of his daugh¬

ter Hermione with Neoptolemus, and of his son

Megapenthes with a daughter of Alector.  In

the Homeric poems Menelaus is described as a

?oan  of an a thletic figure ;  he  spoke little, but I
 

 what he said was always impressive;  he was

 brave and courageous, but milder  than Aga.

 memnon, intelligent and  hospitable.  Accotd-

 ing to the prophecy of Proteus in the Odyssey,

 Menelaus and Helen were not to die,  but the

 gods were to conduct them to Elysium.  Ac

 cording to a later tradition, he and Helen went

 to the Taurians, where they were sacrificed by

 Iphigenia to  Diana (Artemis).  Menelaus was

 worshipped  as  a hero at Therapne, where his

 tomb and that of Helen were shown.  Respect¬

 ing the tale that Helen never went to Troy, but

 was  detained in Egypt, vid. Helena.—2. Son

 of Lagus, and brother of  Ptolemy Soter, held

 possession of Cyprus for his brother, but was

 defeated and driven out of the island by Deme¬

 trius Poliorcetes, B.C. 306.—3. A Greek mathe¬

 matician, a native of Alexandrea, the author of

 an extant treatise in three books, on the  Sphere.

 He  made some astronomical observations at

 Rome in the first year of the Emperor  Trajan,

 A.D. 98.

  Menelaus (MeveXaog), a city of Lower Egypt,

 on the Canopic branch of the Nile, named after

 the brother of  Ptolemy the son of Lagus.  It

 was  made the capital of  the district between

 the lakes of Mceris and Mareotis (voubg Meve-

 Xatrng).

  Menenius Lanatus  1.  Agrippa, consul B.C.

 503,  conquered the Sabines.  It was owing to

 his mediation that the first great rupture be

 tween the patricians and plebeians, when the

 latter seceded to the Sacred Mount, was  brought

 to  a happy and peaceful  termination in 493,

 and it was upon this occasion he is said to have

 related to the  plebeians his well-known fable

 of  the belly and its members.—2. T., consul

 477,  was defeated by the Etruscans.   He had

 previously allowed the Fabii to be destroyed by

 the Etruscans, although he might have assisted

 them with his army.  For this act of treachery-

 he was brought to trial by the tribunes and con

 demned to pay a fine.  He took his punishment

 so  much to  heart,  that he shut himself  up in

 his house and died  of grief.

   Menes (Mijvng), first king of Egypt, according

 to the traditions of the Egyptians themselves.

 Herodotus records  of him that he built Mem¬

 phis on a piece of ground which he had  rescued

 from the river by turning it from  its former

 course, and erected therein a magnificent tem¬

 ple to Hephaestus (Phthah).  Diodorus  tells us

 that  he  introduced into Egypt  the worship of

 the gods a:,d the practice of sacrifices, as well

 as  a more elegant and luxurious style of living.

 That he was a conqueror, like other founders

 of kingdoms, we learn from an extract from

 Manetho preserved by Eusebius. By Marsham

 and others he has been identified with the Miz-

 raim of Scripture.  According to some accounts

 he was killed by a hippopotamus.

   Menesthei Poetus (now Puato de S.  Maria),

 a harbor in Hispania Baatica, not far from Gades,

 with an oracle of Menestheus, who is said in

 some legends to have settled in Spain

   [Menesthes (MevecBvg), a Greek warrior al

 the siege of Troy, slain by Hector ]

   Menestheus (MeveoBevg).  1. Son of Peteus,

 an Athenian king, who led the Athenians against

 ■Vroy, and surpassed all other mortals in  arrang-

I ing  the war-steeds and men for battle.  Witt

                                501