.GELON, " tyrant" of Gela and Syracuse, was the son of Deinomenes, and was a native of the former city. His family was one of the oldest and most distinguished in the place. Gelon himself first figures in history as one of the body-guards in the service of Hippocrates, tyrant of Gela. On the death of the latter, he 'contrived tb obtain the supreme power (491 u.c.), and about 485 B.C., he made himself master of Syracuse also, which then became the seat of his government, and to which lie transferred the major ity of the inhabitants of Gela. His influence soon extended itself over the half of Sicily. Gelon refused to aid the Greeks against Xerxes, as they declined to comply with his demand that he should he appointed commander-in-chief. About the same tune, Teril lus, ruler of Himera, in Sicily, invoked the aid of the Carthaginians against Theron of .Agrigentum, who had dispossessed him of his state. Gelon, who was in alliance with Theron, hastened to the assistance of the latter, and on the same day (according to tra dition) on which the Greeks won the battle of Salamis, he gained a complete victory over the invaders at Himera. The consequence was an immediate treaty of peace
between him and the Carthaginians, who were compelled to pay all the expenses of war. His clemency and the wisdom of his measures rendered him so generally beloved, that when he appeared unarmed in an assembly of the people, and declared himself ready to resign his power, he was unanimously hailed as the deliverer and sovereign of Syracuse. The story current in later times, that one of the conditions on which he granted peace to the Carthaginians was, that their human sacrifices should lie abolished, has probably no historical foundation, hut it illustrates the general belief in the humanity of his character. Gelon died 478 B.C. The people, who, contrary to his desire, had erected a splendid monument to his memory, paid him honors as a hero, and at a later period, when all the brazen statues were sold under Timolcon, his statue was made an exception to the general rule. He was succeeded by his brother Hicro.