ALITYROS (ALITURUS):
Actor, of Jewish birth, at the court of Nero. Through him Josephus became acquainted with the empress Poppæa—whose special favorite the actor always had been—and obtained the pardon for those priests whom Felix, the procurator of Judea, had sent to Rome. In the novel by Sienkiewicz, "Quo Vadis," Alityros instructs Nero in the art of gesticulation, and accompanies the emperor to Greece.
Bibliography:
- Josephus, Life, § 4;
- Vogelstein and Rieger, Gesch. d. Jud. in Rom, i. 21, 63, 101.
