Resumen de Mōchos the phoenician sage in Ampelius
Ampelius 2.7 explains that Libra honors the inventor of the balance, the puzzling and much-emended personal name MOCHOS. Emendation is unnecessary: "Mochos" is attested as an early Phoenician sage of Sidon, by Poseidonios, and in a translation by the Platonist Ofellius Laetus (ca. 75 CE). Ampelius may have drawn Mochos and Libra from Ofellius, or like much of his lore on zodiacal constellations, from Nigidius, or from another unknown source. Ampelius explains two other zodiacal constellations similarly: Capricorn (2.10) honors Pan's defeat of Typhon in Egypt, and Pisces (2.12) honors Venus' birth from an egg found in the Euphrates.
