Atlas


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  ATLAS, according to some mythographers, was chief of the Titaus that made war against Jupiter, who, to punish, sentenced him to support the heavens.  The account of him, divested of fable, is that Atlas was a philosopher of royal rank, whose territories lay in north-western Africa, and who, having been accustomed to make astronomical observations on a high mountain of Mauritania, gave his name to it, and also to the ocean (Atlantic), on which it borders.-Vaillant (Pr. iii. p. 124) gives a brass medallion of Antoninus Pius, the epigraph on the reverse of which is TR. POT. XX. COS. IIII.; and the type, Jupiter standing with hasta and fulmen, and eagle at his feet, and Atlas bearing a globe on his shoulders.  There is in the French Cabinet another brass medallion, mounted in a large circle, struck under the above-named emperor, the reverse legend of which is the same as that already quoted; but the type differs from it.  Jupiter, in the latter instance, stands before an altar; and this altar is ornamented with a bas-relief, representing Jupiter striking the Titans with his thunderbolts.  On the altar is an eagle with expanded wings.  Behind Jupiter is Atlas on his knees sustaining the globe.-See Jupiter.

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