• XANTIPPE.  Wife of Socrates. Was supposed to have made the philosopher's life unbearable by her shrewish tongue and quarrelsome nature.
• XAVIER, Francis (1506-52).  Spanish saint.  Ignatius Loyola persuaded him to become a missionary in 1529, and together they helped found the Society of Jesus, in 1534.  They travelled together to Italy in 1536 where Xavier became a priest in 1537 and became secretary for the Jesuits.  On being appointed papal nuncio to the Indies in 1541, he went to India on behalf of the king of Portugal, landing in Goa in 1542.  He established Christian settlements at Travancore and visited Ceylon, Malacca and the Moluccas.  He did the same in Japan in 1549-51.  He died  in China in 1552.  He was canonised in 1622.
• XENOCRATES (396-314 B.C.)  Greek philosopher.  He was a pupil of Aeschines and Plato, and a companion of Aristotle.  Made president of the Academy in 339, but lost power under the growing influence of Macedonia, and by 322 barely escaped being sold as a slave.  He wrote upon the ethical value of philosophy, but was not as good as his master.  He was at first a revered figure in Athens.
• XENOPHANES (c.570-480 B.c.)  Greek philosopher.  Migrating to Elea in Italy, he founded the Eleatic school, a system of philosophy in which the anthromorphic deity was negatived.   He was a theologian rather than a philosopher for he discounted the value of knowledge, considering it opinion, and worked out his system mainly through  criticism of existing mythology.
• XENOPHON (c.430-c.354 B.C.)  Greek historian and soldier.  An Athenian noble, he played some part in the overthrow of the Thirty.  In 401 he joined a band of Greeks under the Persian prince Cyrus the Younger in his expedition against his brother Artaxerxes.  After the death of Cyrus and the murder of the Greek officers by Tissaphernes, he attained the leadership of the 10,000 Greek contingent, organising their retreat to the coast.   This took 5 months through unknown country, and warlike tribes. Once the Greeks reached Scutari, Xenophon took service with the Spartan army in Asia.  During their campaign against the Persians, he ransomed a wealthy Persian which made him quite well off.  On his return to Greece he served under the Spartan king in his army against Athens in 394. For this,  he was banished by the Athenians.  After settling on the island of Elis, he was compelled to fly to Corinth, after the defeat of the Spartans at Leuctra in 371.   His most famous writings are the Anabasis, the story of the march of the Ten thousand, the Hellenica, which continues the history of Thucydides down to the year 362, and Memorabilia, a vindication of the character of Socrates.   His minor works were the Oeconomics on husbandry, the Hipparchicus, on the duties of a cavalry officer, the Agesilaus, a eulogy of the famous Spartan king, and the Symposium, a short essay on Socrates.
• XERXES (c.519-465 B.C.).  Persian king. Son of Darius I.  Succeeded to the throne in 485 B.C.  He put down a revolt in Egypt, 485, abolished the kingdom of Babel, 484 and began preperation for an expedition against Greece in 483.  Setting out from Sardis, his army crossed the hellespont in the spring of 480.  They swept all before them reaching Thermopyhlae by August.  His fleet sailed to Artemisium winning a great victory also.  After defeating Leonidas and his 6000 men by attacking them from the rear by means of a secret path. Xerxes marched south-east unhindered taking Elatea, Thebes, Acharnae and Athens.  However he was deceived by a message from Themistocles into ordering his fleet to attack the Greeks at Salamis.  The fleet was unprepared and were defeated in unfavourable conditions.  Without ships to transport supplies to his huge army in Greece  and faced with revolt throughout his empire, Xerxes withdrew the greater part of his forces.  The small force left behind was defeated in 479 B.C. Xerxes never again attempted a military and naval expedition on such a scale and  the expenses of his campaign left Persia economically crippled.  He was murdered in 465 B.C. by Artabanus, his vizier and was succeeded by Artaxerxes I.
• XIMENES DE CISNEROS, Francisco (1436-1517).  spanish ecclesiastic.  Entered holy orders and lived in Rome 1459-65.  Made vicar-general of Siguenza in 1481, he then entered the Franciscan order and practised asceticism, acquiring a high reputation in spain.  Became confessor to Queen Isabella in 1492, was made archbishop of Toldeo in 1495.  In 1499 his attempt to convert the Moors of Granada caused a revolt among them.  Following the death or Isabella in 1504 he was vertual ruler of the country until Ferdinand returned to Spain in 1507.  He was then made a cardinal and grand inquisitor of Castile and Leon.  In 1505 he had formed an expedition to Oran combining missionary with military aims, and accompanied a second expedition to Africa, taking Oran and conquering Mers-el-Kebir.  When Ferdinand died in 1616 Ximenes became regent of Castile for Charles V. and displayed great ability in this position.  He was the founder of the Alcala de Henares university, 1500, a generous patron of literature, and undertook the printing of the edition of the Bible in its original text known as the Complutensian Polyglot, 1502-14.
• XIMENES DE QUESADA, Gonzalo (c.1500-1579).  Spanish soldier.  Went  to South America in 1535 and commanded an expedition into the interior the following year. In 1538 he founded the capital of modern day Colombia, then called New Granada.   He returned to Spain in 1539 after being ousted by his rivals, but was refused powers of government.  Returning to New Granada in 1550 he led another expedition into the interior in 1569 in which all but 25 of his company of 600 perished.