Elpidius

(Ἐλπίδιος), is called a remarkable nan and fond of learning. Leontius, in his commentary on the " Phaenomena" of Aratus, says, that he had constructed for Elpidius a sphaera according to the description of Aratus, and Fabricius (Bibl. Gr. iv. p. 94, note) supposes that this Elpidius is the same as the patrician who was sent as ambassador to Chaganus, king of the Avari, in the first year of the reign of the emperor Mauritius, and who is mentioned by Cedrenus and other writers of that period. [L.S]

(Ἐλπίδιος), or Helpidius, one of the physicians of Theodoric the Great, king of the Ostrogoths, A. D. 493-526, whom he attended in his last illness. (Procop de Bello Goth. lib. i. p. 167, ed. Höschel.) He was a Christian, and in deacon's orders, and probably a native of Milan. There is extant a letter to him from king Theodoric (ap. Cassiod. Vrariar. 4.24), and four from Ennodius (Epist. vii 7, 8.8, 9.14, 21; ap. Sirmondi Opera, vol. i.) [W.A.G]