Onesicritus, or Onesicrates, of Aegina or Astypaleia (probably simply the old city of Aegina) was one of the writers on Alexander the Great. Aegina (Greek: Αίγινα Egina), one of the Saronic Islands of Greece in the Saronic Gulf, 31 miles (50 km) from Athens. ... Alexander the Great (in Greek , transliterated Megas Alexandros) (July 356 BC – June 11, 323 BC), King of Macedon (336–323 BC), is considered one of the most successful military commanders in world history, conquering most of the world known to the ancient Greeks before his death. ...

At an advanced age he became a pupil of Diogenes the Cynic, and gained such repute as a student of philosophy that he was selected by Alexander to hold a conference with the Indian Gymnosophists. When the fleet was constructed on the Hydaspes, Onesicritus was appointed chief pilot (in his vanity he calls himself commander), and in this capacity accompanied Nearchus on the voyage from the mouth of the Indus River to the Persian Gulf. Diogenes, the Cynic, Greek philosopher, was born at Sinope about 412 BC, and died in 323 at Corinth, according to Diogenes Laërtius, on the day on which Alexander the Great died at Babylon. ... Gymnosophists is the name (meaning naked philosophers) given by the Greeks to certain ancient Indian philosophers who pursued asceticism to the point of regarding food and clothing as detrimental to purity of thought. ... Hydaspes is the ancient Greek name for the modern-day Jhelum river. ... Nearchus (or Nearchos) was one of the officers in the army of Alexander the Great. ... The Indus River in Northern Areas of Pakistan, near the rock Aornus. ... Map of the Persian Gulf. ...

He wrote a diffuse biography of Alexander, which in addition to historical details contained descriptions of the countries visited, especially India. After the king's death, Onesicritus appears to have completed his work at the court of Lysimachus, king of Thrace. Its historical value was considered small, it being avowedly a panegyric, and contemporaries (including even Alexander himself) regarded it as untrustworthy. Strabo especially takes Onesicritus to task for his exaggeration and love of the marvellous. His Periplus (or description of the coasts of India) probably formed part of the work, and, incorporated by Juba II of Mauretania with the accounts of coasting voyages by Nearchus and other geographers, and circulated by him under the name of Onesicritus, was largely used by Pliny. Lysimachus (c. ... A Panegyric is a formal public speech delivered in high praise of a person or thing, a generally high studied and undiscriminating eulogy. ... the Greek georgapher Strabo, in a 16th‑century engraving. ... A periplus in the ancient navigation of Phoenicians, Greeks, and Romans is a manuscript document that lists in order the ports and coastal landmarks, with approximate distances between, that the captain of a vessel could expect to find along a shore. ... Pliny the Elder: an imaginative 19c portrait. ...

References

• Arrian, Anabasis, vi. 2; Indica, 32
• Diogenes Laertius vi. 75
• Plutarch, Alexander, 46, 65
• Strabo xv. 698
• Pliny, Nat. Hist. vi. 26
• Aulus Gellius ix. 4
• fragments and life in C. W. Muller, appendix to F. Dubner's Arrian (1846)
• monograph by F. Lilie (Bonn, 1864)
• E. H. Bunbury, Hist. of Ancient Geography, i. (1879);
• Meier in Ersch and Grubers Allgemeine Encyclopadie

This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain. Lucius Flavius Arrianus Xenophon (c 92-c 175), known in English as Arrian, was a Roman historian. ... Diogenes Laërtius, the biographer of the Greek philosophers, is supposed by some to have received his surname from the town of Laerte in Cilicia, and by others from the Roman family of the Laërtii. ... Plutarch Mestrius Plutarchus (c. ... the Greek georgapher Strabo, in a 16th‑century engraving. ... Pliny the Elder: an imaginative 19c portrait. ... Aulus Gellius (c. ... Encyclopædia Britannica, the 11th edition The Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition (1910–1911) is perhaps the most famous edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica. ... The public domain comprises the body of all creative works and other knowledge—writing, artwork, music, science, inventions, and others—in which no person or organization has any proprietary interest. ...