Life Antigenes the Historian (Ἀντιγένης) was a 4th-century BCE Greek author known only from a single citation by Athenaeus of Naucratis in the Deipnosophistae [1]. No biographical details survive. His dating is inferred from his work’s subject matter, which belongs to the post-Alexander interest in Persian customs.

Works His sole known work is On the Extravagance of the Persian Kings (Περὶ τῆς Περσῶν τρυφῆς), preserved only in a fragment by Athenaeus (4.145a) [1]. The fragment describes the Persian king dining alone behind a curtain, served by eunuchs.

Significance Antigenes is a fragmentary source for ancient Greek perceptions of Persian court luxury (τρυφή). His work represents the broader Hellenistic genre of ethnographic writing about Persia. He exemplifies the many minor historians whose traces survive almost exclusively in Athenaeus’s compilatory work.

Sources 1. Perseus Digital Library: Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae, 4.145a (Tufts University): http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0008.tlg001.perseus-grc1:4.145a