Lagus1, son of Ptolemy I and Thais2, dates of birth and death unknown3, winner of a chariot race at the Lycaean festival in Arcadia in 308/74.
[1] PP VI 14527. Gr: LagoV Ý
[2] Athenaeus 13.576e. On the suggestion of E. R. Bevan, House of Ptolemy 53 that Lagos was another name for his brother Leontiscus, see discussion under Leontiscus. Ý
[3] The Lycaean victory suggests that he was at least 14 or 15 years old at the time, i.e. a birth date in or before c. 323. D. Ogden, in P. McKechnie & P. Guillaume (eds), Ptolemy II Philadelphus and his World, 353 at 354, reasonably presumes he was fully adult and therefore dates his birth to 326 at the latest.
Athenaeus 13.576e names him after his brother Leontiscus, which might suggest that he was the younger of the two, but the fact that he has his grandfather's name rather suggests he was the older.
The Alexandrian Hippodrome, the Lageion, was named after "a certain Lagos", according to Herodian, Technici Reliquiae 1.371. Horappolon, writing in the fifth century, not unnaturally interpreted this Lagos to be the father of Ptolemy I, but S. Remeijsen, IJHS 26, 246 at 256, argued that Herodian could be expected to know the identity of the father of Ptolemy I, and for this reason suggests that the Lageion was actually named after his son, who presumably was in charge of its construction. If this speculation is correct, Lagus must have survived well into the period of the construction of Alexandria. Ý
[4] SIG3 314 = IG V.2.250. Ý
Update Notes:
8-9 Feb 2002: Added individual trees
12 Feb 2002: Split out into separate entry
11 Mar 2005: Added Greek transcription, link to
discussion of Bevan's suggestion to identify the two sons of Thais
22 Nov 2007: Added link to PHI
18 Sep 2010: Discusss chronology; note Remeijsen's
speculation on the Lageion.
15 Jan 2011: Note Ogden's view that he already
adult in 308/7.
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