John Laurentius Lydus.--A Byzantine writer, born at Philadelphia (the city of Revelation, III, 7), in 490 A.D. Although he was famed during his lifetime as a poet, all his verses have perished. The work cited in our Fragments,--"Concerning the Offices of the Roman Republic, in Three Books,"--had a curious history. For centuries it was regarded as lost, but about 1785 nine tenths of it was discovered by De Villoison in a MS. in the suburbs of Constantinople. It was published in Paris, 1811.--Laurentius in the course of his career held important political posts and received two important literary appointments from the Emperor Justinian I. Suidas.--A lexicographer of the tenth century, composer of the most comprehensive Greek dictionary of early times. It is a manual at once of language and of antiquities. Inestimable as its value is, the workmanship is careless and uneven. The arrangement is alphabetical. John Tzetzes.--A Greek grammarian of the twelfth century. His learning was great but scarcely equaled his self-conceit, as repeatedly displayed in passages of his works. Many of his writings are still extant. One of these is called _Chiliades_ (or _Thousands_), a name bestowed by its first editor, who divided the work into sections of one thousand lines each. The subject-matter consists of the most miscellaneous historical or mythological narratives or anecdotes, absolutely without connection. Tzetzes copied these accounts from upward of four hundred writers,--one of them being Cassius Dio. The _Chiliades_ is written in the so-called _Versus politicus_, or "political verse," which is really not verse at all, but a kind of decadent doggerel.--A minor treatise by the same author is the _Exegesis of the Iliad of Homer_, published by Hermann (Leipzig, 1812). Isaac Tzetzes, who has attracted less attention than his brother John, is best known as the author of a commentary on the _Cassandra_ of Lycophron (a poem of 1474 iambic verses by a post-classical tragedian, about 285 B.C., embodying the warnings of the royal prophetess and couched in appropriately incomprehensible expressions). It was hardly worth all the care that Tzetzes lavished upon it. From manuscript evidence and various claims of John Tzetzes it seems that John worked over, improved, and enlarged the commentary of his brother. Isaac's name, however, still remains associated with this particular exposition.