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πύρφορ-ος (parox.), ον,
A.fire-bearing, esp. of lightning, “π. κεραυνός” Pi.N.10.71, A.Th.444, S.OC1658; “ἀστραπαί” Id.OT200 (lyr.); “Διὸς ἔγχος” Ar.Av.1749 (lyr.); “πυρφόρος αἰθέρος ἀστήρ” Id.Th.1050 (lyr.).
b. π. οἰστοί arrows with combustibles tied to them, so that they may set fire to woodwork, Th.2.75, Arr.An.2.21.3; “τοῖς μὲν π . . . τοῖς δ᾽ ἄλλοις βέλεσι” D.S.20.96; οἱ π. ibid.; πυρφόρα, τά, ib. 88; πυρφόρος, ὁ, engine for throwing fire, fire-dart, Plb.21.7.1 (dub.), Jul.Or.2.62d.
II. in special senses,
1. epith. of several divinities, as of Zeus in reference to his lightnings, S.Ph.1198 (anap.); of Demeter, prob. in reference to the torches used by her worshippers, E.Supp.260; similarly π. θεαί of Demeter and Persephone, IG4.666.9 (Lerna), E.Ph.687 (lyr.); “π. Ἀρτέμιδος αἴγλας” S.OT 206 (lyr.); Προμηθεὺς π. the Fire-bringer, title of a satyric play of A., cf.S.OC55; also of Capaneus, A.Th.432, S.Ant.135 (lyr.); of Eros, AP5.87 (Rufin.); but, θεὸς π. the fire-bearing god, the god who produces plague or fever, S.OT27.
2. bearer of sacred fire in the worship of Asclepius, Ἀσκληπιοῦ δμῶα π. IG3.693; of the Syrian Goddess, Luc. Syr.D.42.
b. πυρφόρος, ὁ, in the Spartan army, the priest who kept the sacrificial fire, which was never allowed to go out, X.Lac.13.2: hence prov. of a total defeat, “ἔδει δὲ μηδὲ πυρφόρον . . περιγενέσθαι” Hdt.8.6, cf. D.C.39.45; οὐκ ἔσται π. (v.l. πυροφόρος）“ τῷ οἴκῳ Ἠσαύ” LXX Ob.18.
3. π. ἡ ἐκ Δελφῶν bearer of sacred fire from Delphi, SIG711 D 22 (ii B.C.), cf. 728I (i B.C.); “Φοίβου πυρφόροι” IG4.666.15 (Lerna); also in a Bacchic thiasos, AJA37.253 (Latium, ii A.D.).
Henry George Liddell. Robert Scott. A Greek-English Lexicon. revised and augmented throughout by. Sir Henry Stuart Jones. with the assistance of. Roderick McKenzie. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1940.

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  • Cross-references in general dictionaries from this page (21):
    • Aeschylus, Seven Against Thebes, 432
    • Aeschylus, Seven Against Thebes, 444
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    • Euripides, Suppliants, 260
    • Herodotus, Histories, 8.6
    • Sophocles, Antigone, 135
    • Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus, 55
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    • Sophocles, Oedipus Tyrannus, 27
    • Sophocles, Philoctetes, 1198
    • Thucydides, Histories, 2.75
    • Xenophon, Constitution of the Lacedaimonians, 13.2
    • Polybius, Histories, 21.7.1
    • Lucian, De Syria dea, 42
    • Arrian, Anabasis, 2.21.3
    • Diodorus, Historical Library, 20.96
    • Cassius Dio, Historia Romana, 39.45
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