Chapter XLIV: Book II: chap. iii. and Book V. chap. xii.) is supposed to be the

Vedic Ribhu. Orpheus is a very important figure in Greek legend, whose existence is denied by Aristotle, but to whom are attributed many writings such as the _Argonautica_, _Lithica_, _Bacchica_, _Orphica_, etc.

REFERENCES.--“La Grande Encyclopédie,” Vol. XXV. pp. 607–608;
“Biog. Générale,” Vol. XXXVIII. pp. 868–877; “English
Cyclopædia,” Vol. IV. pp. 592–593.

=Oviedus=, GONZALUS--Gonzalo Fernandez de Oviedo y Valdès--was one of the earliest historiographers of the New World (1478–1557), whose principal work--“Summario de las Indias Occidentales,” printed 1525--Gilbert says (_De Magnete_, Book I. chap. i.) contains earliest mention of the fact that in the meridian of the Azores there is no variation.

REFERENCES.--The complete edition of Oviedus’s writings which
appeared in 1850; “Thesaurus Liter. Botanicæ,” 1851, p. 218;
Ticknor (George), “Hist. of Span. Lit.,” 1849.

=Parmenides=, an ancient philosopher, native of Southern Italy, living in fifth century A.D., and the most prominent of the followers of the Eleatic School (founded by him and Xenophanes), has embodied a brief summary of his tenets in a work called “Nature,” of which an able analyzation is to be found in the ninth “Encycl. Brit.,” Vol. XVIII. pp. 315–317. Gilbert’s only allusion to him is at Book V. chap. xii. of _De Magnete_, where he says that the ancient philosophers, as Thales, Heraclides, Anaxagoras, Archelaus, Pythagoras, Empedocles, Parmenides, Plato and the Platonists--nor Greek philosophers alone, but also the Egyptian and the Chaldean--all seek in the world a certain universal soul, and declare the whole world to be endowed with a soul.

Parmenides has also left fragments of a poem on astronomy which was published by Scaliger.

REFERENCES.--Ritter (Dr. Heinrich), “Hist. de la Philos.” (tr.
M. Tissot), Vol. I; Fabricius (Johann Albert), “Biblioth.
Græca,” Vol. I. p. 798; “Diog. Lært.,” IX. 23; Houzeau et
Lancaster, “Bibl. Gén.,” Vol. II. p. 220; Larousse, “Dict.
Univ.,” Vol. XII. p. 307; “Biog. Gén.,” Vol. XXXIX. pp. 227–230;
Dr. Friedrich Ueberweg, “Hist. of Philosophy,” New York, 1885,
Vol. I. pp. 54–57; Paul Tannery, “Pour l’Histoire de la Science
Hellène,” Paris, 1887, Chap. IX. pp. 218–246.

=Paulum Venetum.= _See_ Marco Polo, at A.D. 1271–1295.

=Paulus Venetus.= _See_ Sarpi, Pietro at A.D. 1623.

=Philolaus=, the Pythagorean, was born at Crotona and flourished about 374 B.C. He was a disciple of Archytas, was the first known writer on the subject of physics, and it is said his writings were so highly esteemed that Plato employed three books of Philolaus for the composition of his “Timæus.” Gilbert says (_De Magnete_,