Opramoas was an important civic benefactor in the 2nd century CE. He is the best known ancient
euergete. He was a
magnate
The magnate term, from the late Latin ''magnas'', a great man, itself from Latin ''magnus'', "great", means a man from the higher nobility, a man who belongs to the high office-holders, or a man in a high social position, by birth, wealth or ot ...
from the small
Lycia
Lycia ( Lycian: 𐊗𐊕𐊐𐊎𐊆𐊖 ''Trm̃mis''; el, Λυκία, ; tr, Likya) was a state or nationality that flourished in Anatolia from 15–14th centuries BC (as Lukka) to 546 BC. It bordered the Mediterranean Sea in what is ...
n town of
Rhodiapolis (southern
Anatolia, in modern
Turkey
Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in ...
). His activities are recorded in extensive
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
inscriptions on the walls of his
mausoleum
A mausoleum is an external free-standing building constructed as a monument enclosing the interment space or burial chamber of a deceased person or people. A mausoleum without the person's remains is called a cenotaph. A mausoleum may be consi ...
at Rhodiapolis.
"...apart from his gifts of games and a mass of civic buildings, we have recently found him offering to pay for the primary schooling of all the citizen-children at Xanthus, boys and girls alike"..."he gave funds for burial to people in need and paid the dowries of poor families' daughters"
[ R. Lane Fox, ''Pagans and Christians'', London, 1986, p. 60]
He is mentioned in the French author
Marguerite Yourcenar
Marguerite Yourcenar (, , ; born Marguerite Antoinette Jeanne Marie Ghislaine Cleenewerck de Crayencour; 8 June 1903 – 17 December 1987) was a Belgian-born French novelist and essayist, who became a US citizen in 1947. Winner of the '' Prix Fe ...
's novel ''
Memoirs of Hadrian
''Memoirs of Hadrian'' (french: link=no, Mémoires d'Hadrien) is a novel by the Belgian-born French writer Marguerite Yourcenar about the life and death of the Roman Emperor Hadrian. First published in France in French in 1951 as ''Mémoires ...
''.
References
2nd-century Greek people
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