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Academy · Biography & Mythology

Gessius

Γέσσιος·

(Γέσσιος·), an eminent physician, called by Stephanus Byzantinus (s. v. Γέα) ὁ περιφανέστατος ἰατροσοφίστης, was a native of Gea, a place near Petra, in Arabia, and lived in the reign of the emperor Zenon, A. D. 474-491. He was a pupil of Domnus, whose reputation he eclipsed, and whose scholars he enticed from him by his superior skill. He was an ambitious man, and acquired both riches and honours; but his reputation as a philosopher, though he wished to be considered such, was not very great. (Damascius ap. Suid s. v. Γέσιος, and Phot. Bibl. 242. p. 352b. 3, ed. Bekker.) He may perhaps be the physician mentioned by one of the scholiasts on Hippocrates. (Dietz, Schol. in Hippocr. et Gal. vol. ii. p. 343, note.) The little medical work that bears the name of Cassius Iatrosophista has been by some persons attributed to (Gesius, but without sufficient reason. (Fabric. Bibl. Graec. vol. xiii. p. 170, ed. Vet.)

From William Smith (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology. Text provided under a CC BY-SA license by Perseus Digital Library, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities and Tufts University. Data accessed from https://github.com/PerseusDL/canonical-pdlrefwk/ on 17 October 2026.