HYGINUS, GAIUS JULIUS

flourished 1st century AD Latin author and scholar who, according to Suetonius (De Grammaticis, 20), was appointed by Augustus superintendent of the Palatine library. He went to Rome from Spain or Alexandria as a slave or perhaps a prisoner of war and was freed by Augustus. Hyginus was a pupil of the learned Cornelius Alexander Polyhistor and a friend of Ovid. Of his numerous works, including topographical and biographical treatises, commentaries on Helvius Cinna and the poems of Virgil, and disquisitions on agriculture and beekeeping, nothing has survived.