Abantidas the son of Paseas

Paseas

Paseas was a tyrant of the ancient Greek city-state of Sicyon in the 3rd century BC. He succeeded his son, Abantidas, in 252 BC. However, he was assassinated by Nicocles in 251 BC....

, became tyrant of the ancient Greek

Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...

 city-state

City-state

A city-state is an independent or autonomous entity whose territory consists of a city which is not administered as a part of another local government.-Historical city-states:...

 of Sicyon

Sicyon

Sikyon was an ancient Greek city situated in the northern Peloponnesus between Corinth and Achaea on the territory of the present-day prefecture of Corinthia...

 after murdering Cleinias

Cleinias (disambiguation)

Cleinias may refer to a number of people from ancient Greek history:*Members of the Alcmaeonidae family**Cleinias, father of the Athenian statesman and general Alcibiades**Cleinias, brother of Alcibiades, younger brother of the famous general...

, the father of Aratus

Aratus

Aratus was a Greek didactic poet. He is best known today for being quoted in the New Testament. His major extant work is his hexameter poem Phaenomena , the first half of which is a verse setting of a lost work of the same name by Eudoxus of Cnidus. It describes the constellations and other...

, 264 BC. After the assassination, Abantidas had the remaining friends and relations of Cleinias banished or put to death; Aratus, who was then only seven years old, narrowly escaped death by fleeing into the house of Soso, Abantidas' sister, who happened to be married to Prophantus, the late Cleinias' brother. Abantidas was fond of literature, and was accustomed to attending the philosophical

Philosophy

Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...

 discussions of Deinias

Deinias

Deinias was an ancient Greek writer of the 4th century BC, and is possibly the person mentioned by Demosthenes as a skilled orator.-References:*] by Smith and others]...

 and Aristotle the dialectician

Aristotle of Argos

Aristotle of Argos , was a dialectic philosopher, and a friend of Aratus of Sicyon. He contrived and successfully executed a plot to kill Abantidas, the tyrant of Sicyon...

, in the agora

Agora

The Agora was an open "place of assembly" in ancient Greek city-states. Early in Greek history , free-born male land-owners who were citizens would gather in the Agora for military duty or to hear statements of the ruling king or council. Later, the Agora also served as a marketplace where...

 of Sicyon: on one of these occasions, with the complicity of the two rhetors

Rhetoric

Rhetoric is the art of discourse, an art that aims to improve the facility of speakers or writers who attempt to inform, persuade, or motivate particular audiences in specific situations. As a subject of formal study and a productive civic practice, rhetoric has played a central role in the Western...

, he was murdered by his enemies (252 BC). He was succeeded as tyrant of Sicyon by his father, Paseas, who was later put to death by Nicocles.