=Metellus=: Q. Caecilius Metellus, who successfully conducted the Numidian War against Jugurtha (109 B.C.) until superseded by Marius. A man of high character, military ability, and intellectual culture. =Mētrodórus=: favourite pupil of Epicurus (q.v.) and almost co-master of his school. Died 277 B.C. =Mithridátes=: Mithridates VI, or the Great, king of Pontus 120-63 B.C., a Hellenized oriental famed for his physical and intellectual ability, his ambition and daring; of importance in history for his wars with the Romans under Lucullus and Pompey. He made a special study of poisons and their antidotes. =Mnēsíphȋlus=: Athenian statesman of sound practical ability, taken by Themistocles as his model. It was he who urged Themistocles to force on the battle of Salamis (480 B.C.). In the _Dinner-Party_ Plutarch borrows the name for an imaginary friend of Solon. =Molycréa=: a town just inside the entrance to the Corinthian Gulf on the north side. =Myrōn=: Boeotian sculptor; _fl._ 430 B.C. Best known by his Discobolus and his ‘Cow’. His work included animal forms, and human figures in a state of muscular activity or tension. =Mýrsȋlus=: see Pittacus. =Naucrătis=: a Greek town in the Delta of Egypt, thirty miles from the sea. At first only a trading-station, it was granted privileges of internal self-government by Amasis (q.v.). =Neoptólĕmus=: see Eumenes. =Nestor=: the typical wise old man of the _Iliad_. =Nicander=: poet and physician of Colophon; _fl._ in earlier half of second century B.C. Two of his poems are extant: the _Theriaca_ on venomous animals, and the _Alexipharmaca_ (or ‘_Antidotes_‘) on poisons and their remedies. The verse in itself is poor. =Nícias=: (1) Athenian general in the calamitous expedition against Syracuse (415-413 B.C.). A man of wealth, but religious to the point of disastrous superstition; a commander of experience, though wanting in promptitude and self-reliance. He was put to death by the victors. (2) painter of Athens, _fl._ _c._ 310 B.C., particularly noted for his chiaroscuro and for improvements in encaustic painting. =Nilóxĕnus=: a character probably invented by Plutarch, with a name geographically suitable. =Numa=: Numa Pompilius, second king of Rome, famed for his piety and the excellence of his legislation. Much of his history is legendary. =Olympias=: wife of Philip (q.v.) and mother of Alexander. An imperious and vindictive woman, with good reasons for jealousy, who often figures in Macedonian feuds. =Olynthus=: a Greek town on the Chalcidic peninsula, south of Thessalonica. =Ómphălë=: queen of Lydia, to whom Heracles was for a time enslaved and for whom he played an effeminate part. In a sense she played the Delilah to his Samson. =Orchómĕnus=: a very ancient town in Boeotia. =Oromazdes=: = Ahuramazda, the great God of the Zoroastrians; deity of light and good, as opposed to Ahrimanes. =Pándărus=: a Lycian warrior on the Trojan side, famous for his skill as an archer.