Python

, a native of Byzantium, in the age of Philip of Macedonia. He was a great favourite of the monarch who sent him to the Thebes, when that city, at the instigation of Demosthenes, was going to take arms against Philip. Plutarch , Demosthenes .— Diodorus. ――One of the friends of Alexander, put to death by Ptolemy Lagus.――A man who killed Cotys king of Thrace at the instigation of the A then i ans.――A celebrated serpent sprung from the mud and stagnated waters which remained on the surface of the earth after the deluge of Deucalion. Some, however, suppose that it was produced from the earth by Juno, and sent by the godde to persecute Latona, who was then pregnant by Jupiter. Latona escaped his fury by means of her lover, who changed her into a quail during the remaining months of her pregnancy, and afterwards restored her to her original shape in the island of Delos, where she gave birth to Apollo and Diana. Apollo, as soon as he was born, attacked the monster and killed him with his arrows, and in commemoration of the victory which he had obtained, he instituted the celebrated Pythian games. Strabo , bk. 8 .— Pausanias , bk. 2 , ch. 7 ; bk. 10 , ch. 6 .— Hyginus. — Ovid , Metamorphoses , bk. 1 , li. 438 , . — Lucan , bk. 5 , li. 134 .