Life of Nicias
E350217
Life of Nicias is one of Plutarch’s biographical essays, portraying the character and political career of the Athenian general Nicias within the Parallel Lives.
All labels observed (2)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Life of Nicias canonical | 4 |
| Plutarch's Life of Nicias | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T3315740 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Life of Nicias Context triple: [Plutarch’s Parallel Lives, hasPart, Life of Nicias]
-
A.
Life of Alcibiades
Life of Alcibiades is one of Plutarch’s biographical essays in Parallel Lives, recounting the character and exploits of the controversial Athenian statesman and general Alcibiades.
-
B.
Life of Timoleon
Life of Timoleon is one of Plutarch’s biographical essays, recounting the life and character of the Corinthian statesman and general Timoleon.
-
C.
Life of Cimon
Life of Cimon is one of Plutarch’s biographical essays in Parallel Lives, focusing on the life and character of the Athenian statesman and general Cimon.
-
D.
Life of Agesilaus
Life of Agesilaus is one of Plutarch’s biographical sketches, focusing on the life and character of the Spartan king Agesilaus II.
-
E.
Life of Pelopidas
Life of Pelopidas is one of Plutarch’s biographical essays in Parallel Lives, recounting the character and exploits of the Theban statesman and general Pelopidas.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Life of Nicias Target entity description: Life of Nicias is one of Plutarch’s biographical essays, portraying the character and political career of the Athenian general Nicias within the Parallel Lives.
-
A.
Life of Alcibiades
Life of Alcibiades is one of Plutarch’s biographical essays in Parallel Lives, recounting the character and exploits of the controversial Athenian statesman and general Alcibiades.
-
B.
Life of Timoleon
Life of Timoleon is one of Plutarch’s biographical essays, recounting the life and character of the Corinthian statesman and general Timoleon.
-
C.
Life of Cimon
Life of Cimon is one of Plutarch’s biographical essays in Parallel Lives, focusing on the life and character of the Athenian statesman and general Cimon.
-
D.
Life of Agesilaus
Life of Agesilaus is one of Plutarch’s biographical sketches, focusing on the life and character of the Spartan king Agesilaus II.
-
E.
Life of Pelopidas
Life of Pelopidas is one of Plutarch’s biographical essays in Parallel Lives, recounting the character and exploits of the Theban statesman and general Pelopidas.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (45)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
ancient Greek biography
ⓘ
biographical essay ⓘ work by Plutarch ⓘ |
| author | Plutarch ⓘ |
| countryOfOrigin |
Greek Antiquity
ⓘ
surface form:
Ancient Greece
|
| describesEvent |
Athenian defeat in Sicily
ⓘ
Athenian politics during the Peloponnesian War ⓘ |
| focusesOnEvent | Sicilian Expedition ⓘ |
| focusesOnTheme |
caution in leadership
ⓘ
fortune and misfortune ⓘ piety ⓘ responsibility of commanders ⓘ |
| genre |
biography
ⓘ
moral biography ⓘ |
| hasCharacterizationOf |
Nicias as devout and superstitious
ⓘ
Nicias as overly cautious ⓘ |
| hasComparativeFunction | compares Greek and Roman leaders through pairing with Crassus ⓘ |
| hasMoralPurpose | yes ⓘ |
| historicalFigureDepicted |
Alcibiades
ⓘ
Cleon ⓘ Gylippus ⓘ Lamachus ⓘ Pericles ⓘ |
| includedIn | Moralia and Lives manuscript tradition ⓘ |
| influenced | later biographical writing on Nicias ⓘ |
| language | Ancient Greek ⓘ |
| literaryForm | prose ⓘ |
| literaryMovement |
Middle Platonism
ⓘ
surface form:
Middle Platonism (intellectual context of author)
|
| mainSubject | Nicias ⓘ |
| narrativePerspective | third-person ⓘ |
| originalScript | Greek alphabet ⓘ |
| pairedWith | Life of Crassus ⓘ |
| partOf | Parallel Lives ⓘ |
| placeOfComposition | Roman Empire ⓘ |
| portrays |
Nicias
ⓘ
surface form:
Athenian general Nicias
character of Nicias ⓘ political career of Nicias ⓘ |
| setInPeriod | Peloponnesian War ⓘ |
| subjectCitizenship | Athens ⓘ |
| subjectOccupation | general ⓘ |
| timeOfComposition | early 2nd century CE (approximate) ⓘ |
| tradition | Greco-Roman biography ⓘ |
| usesSource | Thucydides ⓘ |
| workInSeries | Parallel Lives ⓘ |
| workType | ancient historiography ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Life of Nicias Description of subject: Life of Nicias is one of Plutarch’s biographical essays, portraying the character and political career of the Athenian general Nicias within the Parallel Lives.
Referenced by (5)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.