Athenaeus, a celebrated physician, who was the founder of the sect of the Pneumatici. He was born in Cilicia, at Attaleia, according to Galen (De Element. ex Hippocr. i. 6. vol. i. p. 457; Defin. Med. prooem. vol. xix. pp. 347, 356 ; De Trem. Palpit., &c. c. 6. vol. vii. p. 609; De Differ. Puls. iv. 10. vol. viii. p. 749), or at Tarsus according to Caelius Aurelianus. (De Morb. Acut. ii. 1. p. 74.) The exact years of his birth and death are unknown, but as Agathinus was one of his followers, he must have lived in the first century after Christ. (Gal. De Dignosc. Puls. i. 3. vol. viii. p. 787.) He was tutor to Theodorus (Diog. Laërt. ii. 104), and appears to have practised at Rome with great success. Some account of his doctrines and those of the Pneumatici is given in the Dict. of Ant. s. v. Pneumatici, but of his personal history no further particulars are known. He appears to have been a voluminous writer, as the twenty-fourth volume of one of his works is quoted by Galen (De Caus. Symptom. ii. 3. vol. vii. p. 165), and the twenty-ninth by Oribasius. (Coll. Medic. ix. 5. p. 366.) Nothing, however, remains but the titles, and some fragments preserved by Oribasius. (Coll. Medic. i. 2. p. 206, v. 5. p. 263, ix. 5. 12. pp. 366, 368.) For further information the reader may consult Le Clere's Hist. de la Méd. ; Haller's Biblioth. Medic. Pract. vol. i. p. 190; Osterhausen, De Sectae Pneumaticorum Medicorum Historia, Altorf, 1791, 8vo.; and Sprengel's Hist. de la Méd.

There is in the Royal Library at Paris a Greek MS. of the sixteenth century, containing a treatise on Urine, Peri Ouron Synopsis Akribes, by a person of the name of Athenaeus, but it is not known for certain whether he is the same individual as the founder of the Pneumatici.