#prima pars

[promptuarium]

ATLAS, brother of Prometheus, is said to have invented the first globe and astrology. From here comes the story that he supported the sky on his shoulders. Vergil’s Aeneid, book 6:

…where the sky-bearer Atlas

Turns the heavens around his shoulder, bound with burning stars.

See Pliny book 2, ch. 6, and book 7, ch. 56.

[promptuarium]

ANDROGEUS, son of Minos, a youth of splendid talent, was killed by the Athenians, whom he had beaten in athletics. This was the cause of war. Volaterranus, book 33.

[promptuarium]

LEAH was the wife of Jacob, whose sons were Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulon, and the girl Dinah. Zilpah, Leah’s slave-girl, bore Gad and Asher. Genesis 29 and 30.

RACHEL was also the wife of Jacob. Her sons were Joseph and Benjamin, who she died giving birth to. Genesis ch. 29, 30, and 35. Bilhah, Rachel’s slave-girl, bore Dan and Naphtali.

[promptuarium]

CECROPS Two-Natured, first king of the Athenians, began to reign in the 2408th year of the world, the 1554th before Christ was born. He founded Athens, according to Cassiodorus. Justin, book 2, also says this about him:

Before the time of Deucalion the Athenians had Cecrops as king, who, according to all the ancient stories, was said to have two forms, because he was the first to join male and female in marriage. Under his reign Athens was either resettled or founded.

See Augustine, City of God book 18 ch. 8, Berossus book 5, Eusebius in the preface to the Chronicle.

[promptuarium]

The Persian SIBYL, also called the Chaldean or Hebrew Sibyl, or by her proper name Sambetha, was born at the Red Sea. Her father was Berossus and her mother was Erymanthe. She wrote 84 books, and prophesied of Christ countless times. The other Sibyls agreed with her, but everyone says she was the first.

Nicanor, who wrote the Deeds of Alexander the Great, recalled her. See Lactantius, The Divine Institutes, book 1, ch. 6; and Augustine, The City of God, book 18, ch. 23. This prophecy is attributed to this Sibyl:

Behold, O beast, you will be trampled, and a lord will be born on the earth, and the womb of a virgin will be the salvation of the nations, and her feet will be for the health of mankind, and the invisible word will be made plain.

[promptuarium]

DIONYSIUS [sic], son of Ammon, took up arms and drove Rhea and Camesenuus from the kingdom of his father, and kept their son Osiris for himself, adopting him as his son. He named him Ammon Jupiter, after his father, and Olympicus after his master Olympus, and he gave him the whole kingdom of Egypt in the 1948th year of the world and the 2014th year before the birth of Christ. After nine years, Barzanes the son of Sabatius was conquered in Armenia by Ninus. See Berossus book 5.

[promptuarium]

JANUS, in the tenth year of the aforementioned Ninus, went from Africa to the Celtiberians, where he set up two colonies, named Noelas and Noeglas. And in the 19th year of Ninus, Janus went to Italy. When he had found that Camesenuus (who is Ham) was corrupting the youth more than expected, for three years he bore this level-headedly. Then, assigning him a few people from the colonies, he commanded him to leave Italy, and he commanded all the corrupted colonies of Gomer to tend the highlands across the broad river Janiculum. And he gave them his daughter Crana Helerna, that is, they elected her by suffrage and raised her to be queen with a white scepter. He gave the Janigenes their surname Razenua, and taught them physics and astronomy; he wrote down divinations and rituals, in the 1948th year of the world and the 2014th year before Christ was born. Therefore they followed his teaching, the same names and divine venerations as were used in Armenia-Saga. Berossus book 5.

[promptuarium]

ZOROASTER, as many say, was the same as the son of Noah named Ham. He was the first king of the Bactrians, and the first inventor of the arts of magic, and the seven liberal arts, and the courses of the sky and the stars. There are those who will report that he laughed as he was born. This should not be taken as a good omen; common people wail while being born. And so he was conquered by Ninus, and Ninus was also struck by an arrow; he died of this wound, leaving behind his son and heir, who was named Ninias. Ninus built the city of Nineveh, which took three days to walk around, and which Cyrus, King of the Assyrians, destroyed. Augustine, City of God, book 21, chapter 4; Eusebius; Pliny, book 30, chapter 7.