GELON, succeeded Hippocrates as tyrant of Gela in 491 b.c., and, by supporting the plebs of Syracuse in their quarrels against the aristocracy, became tyrant also of that city in 485 b.c. He used his power so discreetly that under him Syracuse attained an extraordinary degree of wealth and influence. The great event in Gelon’s subsequent history was his defeat of the Carthaginians under Hamilcar at Himera, according to tradition on the same day that the Greeks defeated Xerxes at Salamis, 480 b.c., the result of his victory being that he obtained the lordship of the whole of Sicily. After Gelon had thus established his power, he made a show of resigning it; but his proposal was rejected by the multitude, and he reigned without opposition till his death 478 b.c. His memory was held in such respect that, 150 years after his death, when Timoleon was erasing from Sicily every vestige of the tyrants that had once reigned there, he spared the statues of Gelon. See Syracuse.