ARISTAENETUS, Greek letter-writer, flourished in the 5th or 6th century A.D. He was formerly identified with Aristaenetus of Nicaea, who perished in an earthquake at Nicomedia, A.D. 358, hut internal evidence points to a much later date. Under his name two books of love stories, in the form of letters, are extant; the subjects are borrowed from the erotic elegies of Alexandrian writers, and the language is a patchwork of phrases from Plato, Lucian, Alciphron and others. • See: for text Boissonade (1822), Hercher, Epistolographi Graeci (1873). English translations: Boyer (17oi) ; Thomas Brown (1715) ; R. B. Sheridan and Halked (17 71 and later) .