Dion of Syracuse

Dion of Syracuse was a Sicilian Greek aristocrat and political figure connected with Plato and the court of Dionysius II. His attempt to overthrow tyranny in Syracuse made him a key figure in fourth-century BC Greek political thought and Sicilian history.

Dion was a wealthy adviser and relative of Dionysius I who became a committed follower of Plato and hoped philosophical education could moderate Syracusan tyranny. Dionysius II exiled him, but in 357 BC Dion returned to Sicily with a small mercenary force and seized most of Syracuse. His increasingly authoritarian rule and conflicts with former allies eroded his support, and he was assassinated in 354 BC.

In Diodorus Siculus’ The Library, Books 16-20, the settlement at Babylon, the Lamian War, the regencies of Perdiccas and Antipater, the campaigns of Eumenes and Antigonus, the struggles involving Olympias and Cassander, and the emergence of the Ptolemaic and other successor kingdoms unfold alongside Agathocles’s seizure of power at Syracuse and his extraordinary invasion of Carthaginian North Africa. In Mary Renault’s The Mask of Apollo, Nikeratos, an Athenian tragic actor, carries an old mask of Apollo as a professional talisman and moral guide. His career takes him through Greek theatres and brings him into contact with Plato and Dion, whose plans for Syracuse promise a rare alliance between philosophy and political power.