Chapter Peu-à-Peu to Pharaoh of P by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Letters of Phalaris, certain apocryphal letters ascribed to Phalaris the tyrant, and published at Oxford, in 1718, by Charles Boyle. There was an edition in 1777 by Walckenaer; another in 1823 by G. H. Schæfer, with notes by Boyle and others. Bentley maintained that the letters were forgeries, and no doubt he was right.

Phaleg, James Forbes, a Scotchman, who had been travelling tutor to the family of the duke of Ormond; and was accused of repaying his patron’s favours by a scandalous intrigue.—Absalom and Achitophel by Dryden and Tate.

Here Phaleg, the lay Hebronite [Scotchman], is come,
’Cause, like the rest, he could not live at home. …
Slim Phaleg … at the table fed,
Returned the grateful product to the bed.
   —Part ii. 329-350 (1682).

Phallas, the horse of Heraclius. (Greek, phalios, “a grey horse.”)

Phantom Ship (The), Carlmilhan or Carmilhan, the phantom ship on which the kobold of the Cape sits, when he appears to doomed vessels.

… that phantom ship, whose form
Shoots like a meteor thro’ the storm …
And well the doomed spectators know
Tis harbinger of wreck and woe.
   —Sir W. Scott: Rokeby, ii. 11 (1812).

Phaon, a young man who loved Claribel, but, being told that she was unfaithful to him, watched her. He saw, as he thought, Claribel holding an assignation with some one he supposed to be a groom. Returning home, he encountered Claribel herself, and “with wrathfull hand he slew her innocent.” On the trial for murder, “the lady” was proved to be Claribel’s servant. Phaon would have slain her also, but while he was in pursuit of her he was attacked by Furor.—Spenser: Faërie Queene, ii. 4, 28, etc. (1590).

Shakespeare’s Much Ado about Nothing is a similar story. Both are taken from a novel by Belleforest, copied from one by Bandello. Ariosto, in his Orlando Furioso, has introduced a similar story (bk. v.), and Turbervil’s Geneura is the same tale.

Pharamond, king of the Franks, who visited, incognito, the court of king Arthur, to obtain by his exploits a place among the knights of the Round Table. He was the son of Marcomir, and father of Clodion.

(Calprenéde has an heroic romance so called, which (like his Cleopatra and Cassandra) is a Roman de Longue Haleine, 1612–1666.)

Pharamond, prince of Spain, in the drama called Philaster or Love Lies ableeding, by Beaumont (?) and Fletcher (date uncertain, probably about 1662).

Beaumont died 1616.

Pharaoh, the titular name of all the Egyptian kings till the time of Solomon, as the Roman emperors took the titular name of Cæsar. After Solomon’s time, the titular name Pharaoh never occurs alone, but only as a forename: as Pharaoh Necho, Pharaoh Hophra, Pharaoh Shishak. After the division of Alexander’s kingdom, the kings of Egypt were all called Ptolemy, generally with some distinctive aftername, as Ptolemy Philadelphos, Ptolemy Euergetês, Ptolemy Philopator, etc.—Selden: Titles of Honour, v. 50 (1614).

(1) Pharaohs before Solomon (mentioned in the Old Testament)—

1. Pharaoh contemporary with Abraham (Gen.. xii. 15). I think this was Osirtesen I. (dynasty xii.).

2. The good Pharaoh who advanced Joseph (Gen. xli.). I think this was Apophis (one of the Hyksos).

3. The Pharaoh who “knew not Joseph” (Exod. i. 8). I think this was Amenophis I. (dynasty xviii.). There seem to have been great political changes even before Joseph’s death: evidently his power was considerably less, and the honoured strangers in Goshen were apparently beginning to feel the effects of the change,