Aglaias, Byzantius

Aglaias of Byzantium was an obscure ancient Greek physician who is associated, in the later medical compilation tradition, with eye remedies — in particular a preparation said to treat incipient cataracts. Almost nothing about him can be established with confidence. His Byzantine origin is reflected in his name (Byzantium, the later Constantinople), but his exact dates are unknown; he is conventionally placed somewhere in the Hellenistic or early Roman period among the many minor compounders of eye-salves whose recipes were handed down in later medical collections such as those associated with Galen and Aetius of Amida. The single remedy attributed to him is essentially the only trace he has left, and even that attribution rests on slender evidence.