Marsyas

, a celebrated piper of Celænæ, in Phrygia, son of Olympus, or of Hyagnis, or Œagrus. He was so skilful in playing on the flute, that he is generally deemed the inventor of it. According to the opinion of some, he found it when Minerva had thrown it aside on account of the distortion of her face when she played upon it. Marsyas was enamoured of Cybele, and he travelled with her as far as Nysa, where he had the imprudence to challenge Apollo to a trial of his skill as a musician. The god accepted the challenge, and it was mutually agreed that he who was defeated should be flayed alive by the conquerer. The Muses, or according to Diodorus, the inhabitants of Nysa, were appointed umpires. Each exerted his utmost skill, and the victory, with much difficulty, was adjudged to Apollo. The god, upon this, tied his antagonist to a tree, and flayed him alive. The death of Marsyas was universally lamented; the Fauns, Satyrs, and Dryads wept at his fate, and from their abundant tears, arose a river of Phrygia, well known by the name of Marsyas. The unfortunate Marsyas is often represented on monuments as tied, his hands behind his back, to a tree, while Apollo stands before him with his lyre in his hand. In independent cities among the ancients the statue of Marsyas was generally erected in the forum, to represent the intimacy which subsisted between Bacchus and Marsyas, as the emblems of liberty. It was also erected at the entrance of the Roman forum, as a spot where usurers and merchants resorted to transact busine , being principally intended in terrorem litigatorum ; a circumstance to which Horace seems to allude, bk. 1 , satire 6, li. 120 . At Celænæ, the skin of Marsyas was shown to travellers for some time; it was suspended in the public place in the form of a bladder, or a foot-ball. Hyginus , fable 165.— Ovid , Fasti , bk. 6 , li. 707 ; Metamorphoses , bk. 6 , fable 7.— Diodorus , bk. 3 .— Silius Italic us , bk. 8 , li. 503 .— Pliny , bk. 5 , ch. 29 ; bk. 7 , ch. 56 .— Pausanias , bk. 10 , ch. 30 .— Apollo dor us , bk. 1 , ch. 4 .――The sources of the Marsyas were near those of the Mæander, and those two rivers had their confluence a little below the town of Celænæ. Livy , bk. 38 , ch. 13 .— Ovid , Metamorphoses , bk. 2 , li. 265 .— Lucan , bk. 3 , li. 208 .――A writer who published a history of Macedonia, from the first origin and foundation of that empire till the reign of Alexander, in which he lived.――An Egyptian who commanded the armies of Cleopatra against her brother Ptolemy Physcon, whom she attempted to dethrone.――A man put to death by Dionysius the tyrant of Sicily.