Wikipedia
Iamblichus, also known as Iamblichus Chalcidensis, or Iamblichus of Apamea (, probably from Syriac or Aramaic ya-mlku, "He is king"; c. 245 – c. 325 AD), was a Syrian Neoplatonist philosopher who determined the direction taken by later Neoplatonic philosophy.
Iamblichus (; fl. c. 165–180 AD) was an Ancient Syrian Greek novelist.
Iamblichus was an Emesene who achieved wide prominence in the 2nd century. He describes himself on being having "descended from the ancient dynasts", including the Priest Kings of the Emesani Dynasty. Iamblichus had the knowledge of three languages: Assyrian, Babylonian and Greek.
Iamblichus was educated in Babylon, and didn’t become acquainted with the Greek language until later in his life. After having lived at Babylon for a number of years, he was taken prisoner and sold as a slave to a Syrian, who, however, appears to have set him free again. He is said to have acquired such a perfect knowledge of Greek that he even distinguished himself as a rhetorician. For a time, he lived in Armenia, when it was ruled by the Roman Client King; his fellow Emesene and distant relative Sohaemus.
Iamblichus was the author of the (Babyloniaka, "Babylonian History"), a romance novel in Greek, which, if not the earliest, was at least one of the first productions of this kind in Greek literature. It contained the story of two lovers, Rhodanes and Sinonis. According to the Suda, it consisted of 39 books; but Photios, who gives a tolerably full epitome of the work, mentions only 17. A perfect copy of the work in MS. existed down to the year 1671, when it was destroyed by fire. A few fragments of the original work are still extant.
The epitome of Photios and the fragments are collected in Chardon de la Rochette's Melanges de Critique et de Philologie, Vol. 1, pp. 18, 34 and 53, and in Franz Passow's Corpus Erotic., vol. i.; comp. Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. viii. p. 152; Gerardus Vossius, De Hist. Graec. p. 275, ed. Westermann.
Iamblichus may refer to the following people of ancient Syria:
- members of the royal family of Emesa, such as:
- Iamblichus (flourished 2nd century BC), paternal grandfather of Sampsiceramus I
- Iamblichus (died 31 BC), also known as "Iamblichus I", one of the sons of Sampsiceramus I
- Iamblichus II, son of Iamblichus I, Roman client priest king who reigned between 20 and 14 BC
- Iamblichus (flourished 2nd century), Syrian novelist
- Iamblichus (c. 245 – 325), Syrian philosopher
- Iamblichus of Apameia (flourished 4th century), Syrian philosopher
Iamblichus I (flourished 1st century BC - died 31 BC) was one of the phylarchs, or petty princes of the Arab tribe of the Emesenes in Emesa (now Homs, Syria). He was the son of Sampsiceramus I and is first mentioned by Marcus Tullius Cicero in a despatch, which he sent from Rome to Cilicia in 51 BC, and in which he states that lamblichus had sent him intelligence respecting the movements of the Parthians, and he speaks of him as well disposed to the republic.
In the war between Octavianus and Mark Antony in 31 BC, lamblichus supported the cause of the latter; but after Gnaeus Domitius had gone over to Octavianus, Antony became suspicious of treachery, and accordingly put lamblichus to death by torture, along with several others.
Antony's suspicions were apparently excited against lamblichus by his own brother Alexio I, who obtained the sovereignty after his brother's execution, but was shortly afterwards taken by Octavianus to Rome to grace his triumph, and then put to death. At a later period (20 BC) his son, Iamblichus II, obtained from Augustus the restoration of his father's dominions.