This many-named and enigmatical tribe was of considerable importance in the history of India and Persia in the 5th and 6th centuries, and was known to the Byzantine writers, who call them 'E40aXiroL, Ei)Owytroi, NecbOaAtroc or 'A(3b€Xoi.
The new monarch was a reserved, enigmatical prince, who seldom laughed, spoke little and wrote less - a striking contrast to Christian IV.
On the other hand the enigmatical motion of the perihelion of Mercury has not yet found any plausible explanation except on the hypothesis that the gravitation of the sun diminishes at a rate slightly greater than that of the inverse square - the most simple modification being to suppose that instead of the exponent of the distance being exactly - 2, it is - 2.000 000 161 2.
This points, we may here assume, to the Nero redivivus legend, which could not have arisen for a full generation after Nero's death, and the assumption receives large confirmation from the most probable interpretation of the enigmatical words, xiii.
The style is so enigmatical as to have procured for Lycophron, even among the ancients, the title of "obscure" (oKor€Lvos).
