（Διδώ), also called Elissa, which is probably her more
genuine name in the eastern traditions, was a Phoenician
princess, and the reputed founder of Carthage. The substance
of her story is given by Justin (18.4, &c.), which has been
embellished and variously modified by other writers,
especially by Virgil, who has used the story very freely, to
suit the purposes of his poem. (See especially books i. and
iv.) We give the story as related by Justin, and refer to
the other writers where they present any differences. After
the death of the Tyrian king, Mutgo (comp. Joseph. c. Apion.
1.18, where he is called Matgenus ; Serv. ad Aen. 1.343,
642, who calls him Methres ; others again call him Belus or
Agenor), the people gave the government to his son,
Pygmalion; and his daughter Dido or Elissa married her
uncle, Acerbas (Verg. A. 1.343, calls him Sichaeus, and
Servius, on this passage, Sicharbas), a priest of Heracles,
which was the highest office in the state next to that of
king. Acerbas possessed extraordinary treasures, which he
kept secret, but a report of them reached Pygmalion, and led
him to murder his uncle. (Comp. Verg. A. 1.349, &c., where
Sichaeus is murdered at an altar; whereas J. Malalas, p.
162, &c., ed. Bonn, and Eustath. ad Dionys. Pericg. 195,
represent the murder as having taken place during a journey,
or during the chase.) Hereupon, Dido, who according to
Virgil and others was informed of her husband's murder in a
dream, pretended that, in order to forget her grief, she
would in future live with her brother Pygmalion, while in
secret she made all preparations for quitting her country.
The servants whom Pygmalion sent to assist her in the change
of her residence were gained over by her, and having further
induced some noble Tyrians, who were dissatisfied with
Pygmalion's rule, to join her, she secretly sailed away in
search of a new home. The party first landed in the island
of Cyprus, where their number was increased by a priest of
Zeus, who joined them with his wife and children, and by
their carrying off by force eighty maidens to provide the
emigrants with wives. In the mean time, Pygmalion, who had
heard of the flight of Dido, prepared to set out in pursuit
of her; but he was prevented by the entreaties of his mother
and by the threats of the gods (Serv.ad Aen. 1.363, gives a
different account of the escape of Dido); and she thus
safely landed in a bay on the coast of Africa. Here she
purchased (according to Serv. ad Aen. 1.367, and Eustath.
l.c., of king Hiarbas) as much land as might be covered with
the hide of a bull ; but she ordered the hide to be cut up
into the thinnest possible stripes, and with them she
surrounded a great extent of country, which she called
Byrsa, from βύρσα, i. e. the hide of a bull. (Comp. Verg. A.
1.367; Servius, ad loc. and ad 4.670; Silius Ital. Pun.
1.25; Appian, App. Pun. 1.) The number of strangers who
flocked to the new colony from the neighbouring districts,
for the sake of commerce and profit, soon raised the place
to a town community. The kinsmen of the new colonists,
especially the inhabitants of Utica, supported and
encouraged them (Procop. Bell. Vandal. 2.10); and Dido, with
the consent of the Libyans, and under the promise of paying
them an annual tribute, built the town of Carthage. In
laying the foundations of the city, the head of a bull was
found, and afterwards the head of a horse, which was a still
more favourable sign. (Verg. A. 1.443, with Servius's note;
Sil. Ital. Pun. 2.410, &c.) As the new town soon rose to a
high degree of power and prosperity, king Hiarbas or Jarbas,
who began to be jealous of it, summoned ten of the noblest
Carthaginians to his court, and asked for the hand of Dido,
threatening them with a war in case of his demand being
refused. The deputies, who on their return dreaded to inform
their queen of this demand, at first told her that Hiarbas
wished to have somebody who might instruct him and his
Libyans in the manners of civilized life; and when they
expressed a doubt as to whether anybody would be willing to
live among barbarians, Dido censured them, and declared that
every citizen ought to be ready to sacrifice everything,
even life itself, if he could thereby render a service to
his country. This declaration roused the courage of the ten
deputies, and they now told her what Hiarbas demanded of
her. The queen was thus caught by the law which she herself
had laid down. She lamented her fate, and perpetually
uttered the name of her late husband, Acerbas; but at length
she answered, that she would go whithersoever the fate of
her new city might call her. She took three months to
prepare herself, and after the lapse of that time, she
erected a funeral pile at the extreme end of the city: she
sacrificed many animals under the pretence of endeavouring
to soothe the spirit of Acerbas before celebrating her new
nuptials. She then took a sword into her hand, and having
ascended the pile, she said to the people that she was going
to her husband, as they desired, and then she plunged the
sword into her breast, and died. (Comp. Serv. ad Aen. 1.340,
4.36, 335, 674.) So long as Carthage existed, Dido was
worshipped there as a divinity. (Sil. Ital. Pun. 1.81, &c.)
With regard to the time at which Dido is said to have
founded Carthage, the statements of the ancients differ
greatly. According to Servius (Serv. ad Aen. 4.459), it took
place 40 years before the foundation of Rome, that is, in B.
C. 794 ; according to Velleius Paterculus (1.6), it was 65
years, and according to Justin (18.6) and Orosius (4.6), 72
years, before the building of Rome. Josephus (c. Apion.
1.18; comp. Syncellus, p. 143) places it 143 years and eight
months after the building of the temple of Solomon, that is,
B. C. 861; while Eusebius (Chron. n. 971, apud Syncell. p.
345; comp. Chron. n. 1003) places the event 133 years after
the taking of Troy, that is, in B. C. 1025; and Philistus
placed it even 37 or 50 years before the taking of Troy.
(Euseb. Chron. n. 798 ; Syncell. p. 324; Appian, App. Pun.
1.) In the story constructed by Virgil in his Aeneid, he
makes Dido, probably after the example of Naevius, a
contemporary of Aeneas, with whom she falls in love on his
arrival in Africa. As her love was not returned, and Aeneas
hastened to seek the new home which the gods had promised
him, Dido in despair destroyed herself on a funeral pile.
The anachronism which Virgil thus commits is noticed by
several ancient writers. (Serv. ad Aen. 4.459, 682, 5.4;
Macr. 5.17, 6.2; Auson. Epigr. 118.) - A Dictionary of Greek
and Roman biography and mythology, William Smith, Ed.
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