The San Francisco call., 1897-04-18
RESOURCES.
ERRORS MADE BY HISTORIANS.
Diogenes' Tub a Myth-The Hannibal
Fable-Lies About Cleopatra.

The same year that Alexander died at
Babylon Diogenes died at Corinth, 323 B.
c.; but not, we lnay be sure, in tub, be-
cause he never made such fool of him
self as to live in one. The story that he
did so had no better origin than a COM
ment by his biographer Seneca who was
not born till more than 800 years after the
cynic's death. "a man so grabbed ought
to have lived in a tub like dog"
In 2l6 B. c., Hannibal, with about
$4,000 men, nearly annihilated the Roman
army of about 80, 900 at Canine, in Apu-
liza, Italy, but it is all fable to say that
he sent three bushels of gold rings plucked
from the hands of dead Roman knig hts
back to Carthage as evidence of his VIC
tory. The messenger who carried the
news back to the Carthaginian Senate.
on concluding his report. "opened his
robe ana threw out a number of gold
rings gathered on the field of battle"
Four years later the Romans, under
Marcellus, attacked and captured Syra-
cuse, belonging to Greece, because of it's
alliance with Hannibal against Rome.
AS the invading ships approached Arch
imedes Is said TO have set some of them
on fire with immense burning glasses;
however, modern science has so well wa
tered this story that it only rem aims to
add that even at this day the feat would
be impossible.
In tne year 80 B. c. Cleopatra killed her.
self to avoid being bited at Rome in
the triumph ot Octavianus, who had m ade
war upon her and Antony because the lat
ter had divorced HE (Octavianus' sister on
the Queens account. But did she die
from snakes oite? 1t is better to think
not. ''If her death had been caused by
any serpent, the small viper would rather
have been chosen than the large asp; bu.
the story IS dlsproved by her having
decked herself in the royal ornaments
and being found dead without any marks
of suspicion of poison on her body"
Death from serpents bite could not
have been mistaken, and her vanity would
not have allowed her to choos one which
would have disfgured her in so frightfui
manner.
Other poisons were well understood and
easy of access, and no boy would have
ventuTed to carry an asp in a basket of
figs, some Of which he even offered to the
guards as he passed, and even Plutarch
shows that the story of the asp was
doubted. Nor is the statue carried In
Augustus triumph, which had an asp
upon It, any proof of his belief in it. since
the snake was the mblem of EGYPTIAN
royalty; the statue (or the crown) of Cleo
patra could not have been without one.
and this was probably the origin of the
whole story.
Here one may naturally ask: Who has
not heard of Cleopatras wondrous pearls.
one of which, al a banquet given in An
tony's honor, she dissolved in vinegar.
Either this story also is fictitious, or vine
gar was evidently different in those DAYS
from the present kind, which will not m cit
pearls.
1t was nearly 100 years later that the
Emperor Nero also killed himself, SO A.
fah oh
though, and of this we make no question.
What we wish 10 say about him is that he
was not so bad monster as usually i'm
agined. His mother, Agrippina, was not
put to death by his order, nor did he play
upon his harp and sing 1.-THE Burning Of
Troy" while Rome was on fire.
Our knowledge OF him is gained mostly
from Tacitus, who hated him, and from
Petronius Arbiter. who was put to death
for conspiracy against him. "Even in
Rome itself the common people strewed
flowers on the grave of Nero"