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Athenaeus of Naucratis

A Greek rhetorician and grammarian of the late second century AD, Athenaeus of Naucratis lived in the times of Marcus Aurelius and Commodus, who died in 192. Although several of his books are lost, the fifteen-volume Deipnosophistae (“dinner-table philosophers”) mostly survives and belongs to the literary tradition inspired by the use of the symposium — the Greek banquet. The first two books, and parts of the third, eleventh and fifteenth, are extant only in epitome. The text offers the interested reader an immense store-house of information, chiefly on matters connected with dining, but also containing remarks on music, songs, dances, games, courtesans and luxury. Nearly 800 writers and 2500 separate works are referred to by Athenaeus, preserving many rare fragments otherwise lost. Were it not for Athenaeus, much valuable information about the ancient world would be missing and many ancient Greek authors, such as Archestratus, would be almost entirely unknown.

The Deipnosophistae professes to be an account given by an individual named Athenaeus to his friend Timocrates of a banquet held at the house of Larensius, a wealthy book-collector and patron of the arts. Therefore, the text serves as a dialogue within a dialogue, in the manner of Plato, though the conversation extends to an enormous length. The twenty-four guests include individuals named Galen and Ulpian, but they are all probably fictitious personages and the majority take no part in the conversation.

The topics for discussion generally arise from the course of the dinner itself, but extend to literary and historical matters of every description, including abstruse points of grammar, while the guests supposedly quote from memory. The actual sources of the material preserved in the Deipnosophistae remain obscure, but much of it likely comes at second-hand from early scholars.

The complete version of the text, with the noted lacunae, is preserved in only one manuscript, conventionally referred to as A. The epitomised version of the text is preserved in two manuscripts, usually known as C and E. The encyclopaedist and author Sir Thomas Browne wrote a short essay upon Athenaeus, demonstrating a revived interest in the book amongst scholars during the seventeenth century, after its publication in 1612 by the Classical scholar Isaac Casaubon.

The author of the Deipnosophists was an Egyptian, born in Naucratis, a town on the left side of the Canopic Mouth of the Nile. The age in which he lived is somewhat uncertain, but his work, at least the latter portion of it, must have been written after the death of Ulpian the lawyer, which happened A. D. 228.

Athenæus appears to have been imbued with a great love of learning, in the pursuit of which he indulged in the most extensive and multifarious reading; and the principal value of his work is, that by its copious quotations it preserves to us large fragments from the ancient poets, which would otherwise have perished. There are also one or two curious and interesting extracts in prose; such, for instance, as the account of the gigantic ship built by Ptolemæus Philopator, extracted from a lost work of Callixenus of Rhodes.

The work commences, in imitation of Plato’s Phædo, with a dialogue, in which Athenæus and Timocrates supply the place of Phædo and Echecrates. The former relates to his friend the conversation which passed at a banquet given at the house of Laurentius, a noble Roman, between some of the guests, the best known of whom are Galen and Ulpian.

The first two books, and portions of the third, eleventh, and fifteenth, exist only in an Epitome, of which both the date and author are unknown. It soon, however, became more common than the original work, and eventually in a great degree superseded it. Indeed Bentley has proved that the only knowledge which, in the time of Eustathius, existed of Athenæus, was through its medium.

Athenæus was also the author of a book entitled, “On the Kings of Syria,” of which no portion has come down to us.

The text which has been adopted in the present translation is that of Schweighäuser.

C. D. Y.

The Deipnosophists, or the Banquet of the Learned [1]

1. Athenæus is the author of this book; and in it he is discoursing with Timocrates: and the name of the book is the Deipnosophists. In this work Laurentius is introduced, a Roman, a man of distinguished fortune, giving a banquet in his own house to men of the highest eminence for every kind of learning and accomplishment; and there is no sort of gentlemanly knowledge which he does not mention in the conversation which he attributes to them; for he has put down in his book, fish, and their uses, and the meaning of their names; and he has described divers kinds of vegetables, and animals of all sorts. He has introduced also men who have written histories, and poets, and, in short, clever men of all sorts; and he discusses musical instruments, and quotes ten thousand jokes: he talks of the different kinds of drinking cups, and of the riches of kings, and the size of ships, and numbers of other things which I cannot easily enumerate, and the day would fail me if I endeavoured to go through them separately.

 

 

And the arrangement of the conversation is an imitation of a sumptuous banquet; and the plan of the book follows the arrangement of the conversation. This, then, is the delicious feast of words which this admirable master of the feast, Athenæus, has prepared for us; and gradually surpassing himself, like the orator at Athens, as he warms with his subject, he bounds on towards the end of the book in noble strides.

2. And the Deipnosophists who were present at this banquet were, Masyrius, an expounder of the law, and one who had been no superficial student of every sort of learning; Magnus . . . [Myrtilus] a poet; a man who in other branches of learning was inferior to no one, and who had devoted himself in no careless manner to the whole circle of arts and learning; for in everything which he discussed, he appeared as if that was the sole thing which he had studied; so great and so various was his learning from his childhood. And he was an iambic poet, inferior to no one who has ever lived since the time of Archilochus. There were present also Plutarchus, and Leonidas of Elis, and Æmilianus the Mauritanian, and Zöilus, all the most admirable of grammarians.

And of philosophers there were present Pontianus and Democritus, both of Nicomedia; men superior to all their contemporaries in the extent and variety of their learning; and Philadelphus of Ptolemais, a man who had not only been bred up from his infancy in philosophical speculation, but who was also a man of the highest reputation in every part of his life. Of the Cynics, there was one whom he calls Cynulcus, who had not only two white dogs following him, as they did Telemachus when he went to the assembly, but a more numerous pack than even Actæon had. And of rhetoricians there was a whole troop, in no respect inferior to the Cynics. And these last, as well, indeed, as every one else who ever opened his mouth, were run down by Uppianus the Tyrian, who, on account of the everlasting questions which he keeps putting every hour in the streets, and walks, and booksellers’ shops, and baths, has got a name by which he is better known than by his real one, Ceitouceitus. This man had a rule of his own, to eat nothing without saying κεῖται; ἢ οὐ κεῖται; In this way, “Can we say of the word ὥρα, that it κεῖται, or is applicable to any part of the day? And is the word μέθυσος, or drunk, applicable to a man? Can the word μήτρα, or paunch, be applied to any eatable food? Is the name σύαγρος a compound word applicable to a boar?” — And of physicians there were present Daphnus the Ephesian, a man holy both in his art and by his manners, a man of no slight insight into the principles of the Academic school; and Galenus of Pergamos, who has published such numbers of philosophical and medical works as to surpass all those who preceded him, and who is inferior to none of the guests in the eloquence of his descriptions. And Rufinus of Mylæa. — And of musicians, Alcides of Alexandria, was present. So that the whole party was so numerous that the catalogue looks rather like a muster-roll of soldiers, than the list of a dinner party.

3. And Athenæus dramatises his dialogue in imitation of the manner of Plato. And thus he begins: —

TIMOCRATES. ATHENÆUS.

Tim. Were you, Athenæus, yourself present at that delightful party of the men whom they now call Deipnosophists; which has been so much talked of all over the city; or is it only from having heard an account of it from others that you spoke of it to your companions?

Ath. I was there myself, Timocrates.

Tim. I wish, then, that you would communicate to us also some of that agreeable conversation which you had over your cups;

Make your hand perfect by a third attempt,

as the bard of Cyrene[2] says somewhere or other; or must we ask some one else?

4. Then after a little while he proceeds to the praises of Laurentius, and says that he, being a man of a munificent spirit, and one who collected numbers of learned men about him, feasted them not only with other things, but also with conversation, at one time proposing questions deserving of investigation, and at another asking for information himself; not suggesting subjects without examination, or in any random manner, but as far as was possible with a critical and Socratic discernment; so that every one marvelled at the systematic character of his questions. And he says, too, that he was appointed superintendant of the temples and sacrifices by that best of all sovereigns Marcus;[3] and that he was no less conversant with the literature of the Greeks than with that of his own countrymen. And he calls him a sort of Asteropæus,[4] equally acquainted with both languages. And he says that he was well versed in all the religious ceremonies instituted by Romulus, who gave his name to the city, and by Numa Pompilius; and that he is learned in all the laws of politics; and that he has arrived at all this learning solely from the study of ancient decrees and resolutions; and from the collection of the laws which (as Eupolis, the comic writer, says of the poems of Pindar) are already reduced to silence by the disinclination of the multitude for elegant learning. He had also, says he, such a library of ancient Greek books, as to exceed in that respect all those who are remarkable for such collections; such as Polycrates of Samos, and Pisistratus who was tyrant of Athens, and Euclides who was himself also an Athenian, and Nicorrates the Samian, and even the kings of Pergamos, and Euripides the poet, and Aristotle the philosopher, and Nelius his librarian; from whom they say that our countryman Ptolemæus, surnamed Philadelphus, bought them all, and transported them with all those which he had collected at Athens and at Rhodes to his own beautiful Alexandria. So that a man may fairly quote the verses of Antiphanes and apply them to him: —

You court the heav’nly muse with ceaseless zeal, And seek to open all the varied stores Of high philosophy.

And as the Theban lyric poet[5] says: —

Nor less renown’d his hand essays

To wake the muse’s choicest lays,

Such as the social feast around

Full oft our tuneful band inspire.

And when inviting people to his feasts, he causes Rome to be looked upon as the common country of all of them. For who can regret what he has left in his own country, while dwelling with a man who thus opens his house to all his friends. For as Apollodorus the comic poet says: —

Whene’er you cross the threshhold of a friend, How welcome you may be needs no long time To feel assured of; blithe the porter looks, The house-dog wags his tail, and rubs his nose Against your legs; and servants hasten quick, Unbidden all, since their lord’s secret wish Is known full well, to place an easy chair To rest your weary limbs.

5. It would be a good thing if other rich men were like him; since when a man acts in a different manner, people are apt to say to him, “Why are you so mean? Your tents are full of wine.”

Call the elders to the feast, Such a course befits you best.

Such as this was the magnanimity of the great Alexander. And Conon, after he had conquered the Lacedæmonians in the sea-fight off Cnidus, and fortified the Piræus, sacrificed a real hecatomb, which deserved the name, and feasted all the Athenians. And Alcibiades, who conquered in the chariot race at the Olympic games, getting the first, and second, and fourth prizes, (for which victories Euripides wrote a triumphal ode,) having sacrificed to Olympian Jupiter, feasted the whole assembly. And Leophron did the same at the Olympic games, Simonides of Ceos writing a triumphal ode for him. And Empedocles of Agrigentum, having gained the victory in the horse race at the Olympic games, as he was himself a Pythagorean, and as such one who abstained from meat, made an image of an ox of myrrh, and frankincense, and the most expensive spices, and distributed it among all who came to that festival. And Ion of Chios, having gained the tragic crown at Athens, gave a pot of Chian wine to every Athenian citizen. For Antiphanes says: —

For why should any man wealth desire, And seek to pile his treasures higher, If it were not to aid his friends in their need, And to gain for himself love’s and gratitude’s meed? For all can drink and all can eat, And it is not only the richest meat, Or the oldest wine in the well-chased bowl Which can banish hunger and thirst from the soul.

And Xenophanes of Chalcedon, and Speusippus the Academic philosopher, and Aristotle, have all written drinking songs.

And in the same manner Gellias of Agrigentum, being a very hospitable man, and very attentive to all his guests, gave a tunic and cloak to every one of five hundred horsemen who once came to him from Gela in the winter season.

6. The sophist uses the word Dinnerchaser, on which Clearchus says that Charmus the Syracusan adopted some little versicles and proverbs very neatly to whatever was put on the table. As on seeing a fish, he says: —

I come from the salt depths of Ægeus’ sea.

And when he saw some ceryces he said —

Hail holy heralds (κήρυκες), messengers of Jove.

And on seeing tripe,

Crooked ways, and nothing sound.

When a well-stuffed cuttlefish is served up,

Good morrow, fool.

When he saw some pickled char,

O charming sight; hence with the vulgar crowd.

And on beholding a skinned eel,

Beauty when unadorn’d, adorn’d the most.

Many such men then as these, he says, were present at Laurentius’s supper; bringing books out of their bags, as their contribution to the picnic. And he says also that Charmus, having something ready for everything that was served up, as has been already said, appeared to the Massenians to be a most accomplished man; as also did Calliphanes, who was called the son of Parabrycon, who having copied out the beginnings of many poems and other writings, recollected three or four stanzas of each, aiming at a reputation for extensive learning. And many other men had in their mouths turbots caught in the Sicilian sea, and swimming eels, and the trail of the tunny-fish of Pachynum, and kids from Melos, and mullets from Symæthus. And, of dishes of less repute, there were cockles from Pelorum, anchovies from Lipara, turnips from Mantinea, rape from Thebes, and beet-root from the Ascræans. And Cleanthes the Tarentine, as Clearchus says, said everything while the drinking lasted, in metres. And so did Pamphilus the Sicilian, in this way: —

Give me a cup of sack, that partridge leg, Likewise a pot, or else at least a cheesecake.

Being, says he, men with fair means, and not forced to earn their dinner with their hands, —

Bringing baskets full of votes.

7. Archestratus the Syracusan or Geloan, in his work to which Chrysippus gives the title of Gastronomy, but Lynceus and Callimachus of Hedypathy, that is Pleasure, and which Clearchus calls Deipnology, and others Cookery, (but it is an epic poem, beginning,

Here to all Greece I open wisdom’s store;)

says,

A numerous party may sit round a table, But not more than three, four, or five on one sofa; For else it would be a disorderly Babel, Like the hireling piratical band of a rover.

But he does not know that at the feast recorded by Plato there were eight and twenty guests present.

How keenly they watch for a feast in the town, And, asked or not, they are sure to go down;

says Antiphanes; and he adds —

Such are the men the state at public cost Should gladly feed;

and always

Treat them like flies at the Olympic games And hang them up an ox to feast upon.

8.

Winter produces this, that summer bears;

says the bard of Syracuse.[6] So that it is not easy to put all sorts of things on the table at one time; but it is easy to talk of all kinds of subjects at any time. Other men have written descriptions of feasts; and Tinachidas of Rhodes has done so in an epic poem of eleven books or more; and Numenius the Heraclean, the pupil of Dieuchas the physician; and Metreas of Pitane, the man who wrote parodies; and Hegemon of Thasos, surnamed Phacè, whom some men reckon among the writers of the Old Comedy. And Artemidorus, the false Aristophanes, collected a number of sayings relating to cookery. And Plato, the comic writer, mentions in his Phaon the banquet of Philoxenus the Leucadian.

A.	But I have sought this tranquil solitude,
	To ponder deeply on this wondrous book.
B.	I pray you, what’s the nature of its treasures?
A.	“Sauce for the million,” by Philoxenus.
B.	Oh, let me taste this wisdom.
A.	Listen then;
	“I start with onions, and with tunnies end.”
B.	With tunnies? Surely, then, he keeps the best
	And choicest of his dishes for the last.
A.	Listen. In ashes first your onions roast
	Till they are brown as toast,
	Then with sauce and gravy cover;
	Eat them, you’ll be strong all over.
	So much for earth; now list to me,
	While I speak of the sons of the sea.

And presently he says: —

A good large flat dish is not bad, But a pan is better when ’tis to be had.

And presently again: —

Never cut up a sardine Or mackarel of silv’ry sheen, Lest the gods should scorn a sinner Such as you, and spoil your dinner; But dress them whole and serve them up, And so you shall most richly sup. Good sized polypus in season Should be boil’d, — to roast them’s treason; But if early and not big, Roast them; boil’d ain’t worth a fig. Mullets, though the taste is good, Are by far too weakening food; And the ills it brings to master You will need a scorpion plaster.

9. And it is from this Philoxenus that the Philoxenean cheesecakes are named; and Chrysippus says of him, “I know an epicure, who carried his disregard of his neighbours to such an extent, that he would at the bath openly put in his hand to accustom it to the warm water, and who would rinse out his mouth with warm water, in order to be less affected by heat. And they said that he used to gain over the cooks to set very hot dishes before him, so that he might have them all to himself, as no one else could keep up with him. And they tell the same story about Philoxenus of Cythera, and about Archytas, and many more, one of whom is represented by Cromylus, the comic writer, as saying: —

I’ve fingers Idæan[7] to take up hot meat, And a throat to devour it too; Curries and devils are my sweetest treat, Not more like a man than a flue.

But Clearchus says that Philoxenus would, after he had bathed, both when in his own country and in other cities, go round to men’s houses, with his slaves following him, carrying oil, and wine, and pickle juice, and vinegar, and other condiments; and that so, going into other persons’ houses, he would season what was dressed for them, putting in whatever was requisite; and then, when he had finished his labours, he would join the banquet. He, having sailed to Ephesus, finding the market empty, asked the reason; and learning that everything had been bought up for a wedding feast, bathed, and without any invitation went to the bridegroom’s house, and then after the banquet he sang a wedding song, which began —

O Marriage, greatest of the gods,

in such a manner as to delight every one, for he was a dithyrambic poet. And the bridegroom said, “Philoxenus, are you going to dine here to-morrow?” “Certainly,” said he, “if no one sells any meat in the market.”

10. But Theophilus says:— “We should not act like Philoxenus, the son of Eryxis; for he, blaming, as it seems, the niggardliness of nature, wished to have the neck of a crane for the purposes of enjoyment. But it would be better still to wish to be altogether a horse, or an ox, or a camel, or an elephant; for in the case of those animals the desires and pleasures are greater and more vehement; for they limit their enjoyments only by their power. And Clearchus says that Melanthius did pray in this way, saying, “Melanthius seems to have been wiser than Tithonus; for this last, having desired immortality, is hung up in a basket; being deprived of every sort of pleasure by old age. But Melanthius, being devoted to pleasure, prayed to have the neck of an ostrich, in order to dwell as long as possible on sweet things.”

The same Clearchus says that Pithyllus, who was called Tenthes, not only had a covering to his tongue made of skin, but that he also wrapped up his tongue for the sake of luxury, and then that he rubbed it clean again with the skin of a fish. And he is the first of the epicures who is said to have eaten his meat with fingerstalls on, in order to convey it to his mouth as warm as possible. And others call Philoxenus Philicthus;[8] but Aristotle simply calls him Philodeipnus,[9] writing in this way:— “Those who make harangues to the multitude, spend the whole day in looking at jugglers and mountebanks, and men who arrive from the Phasis or the Borysthenes; having never read a book in their lives except The Banquet of Philoxenus, and not all of that.”

11. But Phanias says that Philoxenus of Cythera, a poet, being exceedingly fond of eating, once when he was supping with Dionysius, and saw a large mullet put before him and a small one before himself, took his up in his hands and put it to his ear; and, when Dionysius asked him why he did so, Philoxenus said that he was writing Galatea, and so he wished to ask the fish some of the news in the kingdom of Nereus; and that the fish which he was asking said that he knew nothing about it, as he had been caught young; but that the one which was set before Dionysius was older, and was well acquainted with everything which he wished to know. On which Dionysius laughed, and sent him the mullet which had been set before himself. And Dionysius was very fond of drinking with Philoxenus, but when he detected him in trying to seduce Galatea, whom he himself was in love with, he threw him into the stone quarries; and while there he wrote the Cyclops, constructing the fable with reference to what had happened to himself; representing Dionysius as the Cyclops, and the flute-player as Galatea, and himself as Ulysses.

12. About the time of Tiberius there lived a man named Apicius; very rich and luxurious; from whom several kinds of cheesecakes are called Apician. He spent myriads of drachms on his belly, living chiefly at Minturnæ, a city of Campania, eating very expensive crawfish, which are found in that place superior in size to those of Smyrna, or even to the crabs of Alexandria. Hearing too that they were very large in Africa, he sailed thither, without waiting a single day, and suffered exceedingly on his voyage. But when he came near the place, before he disembarked from the ship, (for his arrival made a great noise among the Africans,) the fishermen came alongside in their boats and brought him some very fine crawfish; and he, when he saw them, asked if they had any finer; and when they said that there were none finer than those which they brought, he, recollecting those at Minturnæ, ordered the master of the ship to sail back the same way into Italy, without going near the land. But Aristoxenus, the philosopher of Cyrene, a real devotee of the philosophy of his country, (from whom, hams cured in a particular way are called Aristoxeni,) out of his prodigious luxury used to syringe the lettuces which grew in his garden with mead in the evening, and then, when he picked them in the morning, he would say that he was eating green cheesecakes, which were sent up to him by the Earth.

13. When the emperor Trajan was in Parthia, at a distance of many days’ journey from the sea, Apicius sent him fresh oysters, which he had kept so by a clever contrivance of his own; real oysters, not like the sham anchovies which the cook of Nicomedes, king of the Bithynians, made in imitation of the real fish, and set before the king, when he expressed a wish for anchovies, (and he too at the time was a long way from the sea.) And in Euphron, the comic writer, a cook says: —

A.	I am a pupil of Soterides,
	Who, when his king was distant from the sea
	Full twelve days’ journey, and in winter’s depth,
	Fed him with rich anchovies to his wish,
	And made the guests to marvel.
B.	How was that?
A.	He took a female turnip, shred it fine
	Into the figure of the delicate fish;
	Then did he pour on oil and savoury salt
	With careful hand in due proportion.
	On that he strew’d twelve grains of poppy seed,
	Food which the Scythians love; then boil’d it all.
	And when the turnip touch’d the royal lips,
	Thus spake the king to the admiring guests:
	“A cook is quite as useful as a poet,
	And quite as wise, and these anchovies show it.”

14. Archilochus, the Parian poet, says of Pericles, that he would often come to a banquet without being invited, after the fashion of the Myconians. But it seems to me that the Myconians are calumniated as sordid and covetous because of their poverty, and because they live in a barren island. At all events Cratinus calls Ischomachus of Myconos sordid.

A.	But how can you be generous, if the son
	Of old Ischomachus of Myconos?
B.	I, a good man, may banquet with the good,
	For friends should have all their delights in common.

Archilochus says: —

You come and drink full cups of Chian wine, And yet give no return for them, nor wait To be invited, as a friend would do. Your belly is your god, and thus misleads Your better sense to acts of shamelessness.

And Eubulus, the comic writer, says somewhere: —

We have invited two unequall’d men, Philocrates and eke Philocrates. For that one man I always count as two, I don’t know that I might not e’en say three. They say that once when he was ask’d to dinner, To come when first the dial gave a shade Of twenty feet, he with the lark uprose, Measuring the shadow of the morning sun, Which gave a shade of twenty feet and two. Off to his host he went, and pardon begg’d For having been detain’d by business; A man who came at daybreak to his dinner!

Amphis, the comic writer, says: —

A man who comes late to a feast, At which he has nothing to pay, Will be sure if in battle he’s press’d, To run like a coward away.

And Chrysippus says: —

Never shun a banquet gay, Where the cost on others falls; Let them, if they like it, pay For your breakfasts, dinners, balls.

And Antiphanes says: —

More blest than all the gods is he, Whom every one is glad to see, Who from all care and cost is free.

And again: —

Happy am I, who never have cause To be anxious for meat to put in my jaws.

I prepared all these quotations beforehand, and so came to the dinner, having studied beforehand in order to be able to pay my host a rent, as it were, for my entertainment.

For bards make offerings which give no smoke.

The ancients had a word, μονοφαγεῖν, applied to those who eat alone. And so Antiphanes says: —

But if you sulk, μονοφαγῶν, Why must I, too, eat alone?

And Ameipsias says: —

And if she’s a μονοφάγος, plague take her, I’d guard against her as a base housebreaker.

15. Dioscorides, with respect to the laws praised in Homer, says, “The poet, seeing that temperance was the most desirable virtue for young men, and also the first of all virtues, and one which was becoming to every one; and that which, as it were, was the guide to all other virtues, wishing to implant it from the very beginning in every one, in order that men might devote their leisure to and expend their energies on honourable pursuits, and might become inclined to do good to, and to share their good things with others; appointed a simple and independent mode of life to every one; considering that those desires and pleasures which had reference to eating and drinking were those of the greater power, and of the highest estimation, and moreover innate in all men; and that those men who continued orderly and temperate in respect of them, would also be temperate and well regulated in other matters. Accordingly, he laid down a simple mode of life for every one, and enjoined the same system indifferently to kings and private individuals, and young men and old, saying: —

The tables in fair order spread, They heap the glittering canisters with bread, Viands of simple kinds allure the taste, Of wholesome sort, a plentiful repast.[10]

Their meat being all roasted, and chiefly beef; and he never sets before his heroes anything except such dishes as these, either at a sacred festival, or at a marriage feast, or at any other sort of convivial meeting. And this, too, though he often represents Agamemnon as feasting the chiefs. And Menelaus makes a feast on the occasion of the marriage of his daughter Hermione; and again on the occasion of the marriage of his son; and also when Telemachus comes to him —

The table groan’d beneath a chine of beef, With which the hungry heroes quell’d their grief.[11]

For Homer never puts rissoles, or forcemeat, or cheesecakes, or omelettes before his princes, but meat such as was calculated to make them vigorous in body and mind. And so too Agamemnon feasted Ajax after his single combat with Hector, on a rumpsteak; and in the same way he gives Nestor, who was now of advanced age, and Phœnix too, a roast sirloin of beef. And Homer describes Alcinous, who was a man of a very luxurious way of life, as having the same dinner; wishing by these descriptions to turn us away from intemperate indulgence of our appetites. And when Nestor, who was also a king and had many subjects, sacrificed to Neptune on the sea-shore, on behalf of his own dearest and most valued friends, it was beef that he offered him. For that is the holiest and most acceptable sacrifice to the gods, which is offered to them by religious and well-disposed men. And Alcinous, when feasting the luxurious Phæacians, and when entertaining Ulysses, and displaying to him all the arrangements of his house and garden, and showing him the general tenor of his life, gives him just the same dinner. And in the same way the poet represents the suitors, though the most insolent of men and wholly devoted to luxury, neither eating fish, nor game, nor cheesecakes; but embracing as far as he could all culinary artifices, and all the most stimulating food, as Menander calls it, and especially such as are called amatory dishes, (as Chrysippus says in his Treatise on Honour and Pleasure,) the preparation of which is something laborious.

16. Priam also, as the poet represents him, reproaches his sons for looking for unusual delicacies; and calls them

The wholesale murderers of lambs and kids.[12]

Philochorus, too, relates that a prohibition was issued at Athens against any one tasting lamb which had not been shorn, on an occasion when the breed of sheep appeared to be failing. And Homer, though he speaks of the Hellespont as abounding in fish, and though he represents the Phæacians as especially addicted to navigation, and though he knew of many harbours in Ithaca, and many islands close to it, in which there were large flocks of fishes and of wild birds; and though he enumerates among the riches of the deep the fact of its producing fish, still never once represents either fish or game as being put on the table to eat. And in the same way he never represents fruit as set before any one, although there was abundance of it; and although he is fond of speaking of it, and although he speaks of it as being supplied without end. For he says, “Pears upon pears,” and so on. Moreover, he does not represent his heroes as crowned, or anointed, or using perfumes; but he portrays even his kings as scorning all such things, and devoting themselves to the maintenance of freedom and independence.

In the same way he allots to the gods a very simple way of life, and plain food, namely, nectar and ambrosia; and he represents men as paying them honour with the materials of their feasts; making no mention of frankincense, or myrrh, or garlands, or luxury of this sort. And he does not describe them as indulging in even this plain food to an immoderate extent; but like the most skilful physicians he abhors satiety.

But when their thirst and hunger were appeased;[13]

then, having satisfied their desires, they went forth to athletic exercises; amusing themselves with quoits and throwing of javelins, practising in their sport such arts as were capable of useful application. And they listened to harp players who celebrated the exploits of bygone heroes with poetry and song.

17. So that it is not at all wonderful that men who lived in such a way as they did were healthy and vigorous both in mind and body. And he, pointing out how wholesome and useful a thing moderation is, and how it contributes to the general good, has represented Nestor, the wisest of the Greeks, as bringing wine to Machaon the physician when wounded in the right shoulder, though wine is not at all good for inflammations; and that, too, was Pramnian wine, which we know to be very strong and nutritious. And he brings it to him too, not as a relief from thirst, but to drink of abundantly; (at all events, when he has drank a good draught of it, he recommends him to repeat it.)

Sit now, and drink your fill,

says he; and then he cuts a slice of goat-milk cheese, and then an onion,

A shoeing-horn for further draughts of wine;[14]

though in other places he does say that wine relaxes and enervates the strength. And in the case of Hector, Hecuba, thinking that then he will remain in the city all the rest of the day, invites him to drink and to pour libations, encouraging him to abandon himself to pleasure. But he, as he is going out to action, puts off the drinking. And she, indeed, praises wine without ceasing; but he, when he comes in out of breath, will not have any. And she urges him to pour a libation and then to drink, but he, as he is all covered with blood, thinks it impiety.

Homer knew also the use and advantages of wine, when he said that if a man drank it in too large draughts it did harm. And he was acquainted, too, with many different ways of mixing it. For else Achilles would not have bade his attendants to mix it for him with more wine than usual, if there had not been some settled proportion in which it was usually mixed. But perhaps he was not aware that wine was very digestible without any admixture of solid food, which is a thing known to the physicians by their art; and, therefore, in the case of people with heartburn they mix something to eat with the wine, in order to retain its power. But Homer gives Machaon meal and cheese with his wine; and represents Ulysses as connecting the advantages to be derived from food and wine with one another when he says —

Strengthen’d with wine and meat, a man goes forth:[15]

and to the reveller gives sweet drink, saying —

There, too, were casks of old and luscious wine.[16]

18. Homer, too, represents the virgins and women washing the strangers, knowing that men who have been brought up in right principles will not give way to undue warmth or violence; and accordingly the women are treated with proper respect. And this was a custom of the ancients; and so too the daughters of Cocalus wash Minos on his arrival in Sicily, as if it was a usual thing to do. On the other hand, the poet, wishing to disparage drunkenness, represents the Cyclops, great as he was, destroyed through inebriety by a man of small stature, and also Eurytian the Centaur. And he relates how the men at Circe’s court were transformed into lions and wolves, from a too eager pursuit of pleasure. But Ulysses was saved from following the advice of Mercury, by means of which he comes off unhurt. But he makes Elpenor, a man given to drinking and luxury, fall down a precipice. And Antinous, though he says to Ulysses —

Luscious wine will be your bane,[17]

could not himself abstain from drinking, owing to which he was wounded and slain while still having hold of the goblet. He represents the Greeks also as drinking hard when sailing away from Troy, and on that account quarrelling with one another, and in consequence perishing. And he relates that Æneas, the most eminent of the Trojans for wisdom, was led away by the manner in which he had talked, and bragged, and made promises to the Trojans, while engaged in drinking, so as to encounter the mighty Achilles, and was nearly killed. And Agamemnon says somewhere about drunkenness —

Disastrous folly led me thus astray, Or wine’s excess, or madness sent from Jove:

placing madness and drunkenness in the same boat. And Dioscorides, too, the pupil of Isocrates, quoted these verses with the same object, saying, “And Achilles, when reproaching Agamemnon, addresses him —

Tyrant, with sense and courage quell’d by wine.”

This was the way in which the sophist of Thessalia argued, from whence came the term, a Sicilian proverb, and Athenæus is, perhaps, playing on the proverb.

19. As to the meals the heroes took in Homer, there was first of all breakfast, which he calls ἄριστον, which he mentions once in the Odyssey,

Ulysses and the swineherd, noble man, First lit the fire, and breakfast then began.[18]

And once in the Iliad,

Then quickly they prepared to break their fast.[19]

But this was the morning meal, which we call ἀκρατισμὸς, because we soak crusts of bread in pure wine (ἄκρατος), and eat them, as Antiphanes says —

While the cook the ἄριστον prepares.

And afterwards he says —

Then when you have done your business, Come and share my ἀκρατισμὸς.

And Cantharus says —

A.	Shall we, then, take our ἀκρατισμὸς there?
B.	No; at the Isthmus all the slaves prepare
	The sweet ἄριστον, —

using the two words as synonymous. Aristomenes says —

I’ll stop awhile to breakfast, then I’ll come, When I a slice or two of bread have eaten.

But Philemon says that the ancients took the following meals — ἀκράτισμα, ἄριστον, ἑσπέρισμα, or the afternoon meal, and δεῖπνον, supper; calling the ἀκρατισμὸς breakfast, and ἄριστον[20] luncheon, and δεῖπνον the meal which came after luncheon. And the same order of names occur in Æschylus, where Palamedes is introduced, saying —

The different officers I then appointed, And bade them recollect the soldiers’ meals, In number three, first breakfast, and then dinner, Supper the third.

And of the fourth meal Homer speaks thus —

And come thou δειελιήσας.[21]

That which some call δειλινὸν is between what we call ἄριστον and δεῖπνον; and ἄριστον in Homer, that which is taken in the morning, δεῖπνον is what is taken at noon, which we call ἄριστον, and δόρπον is the name for the evening meal. Sometimes, then, ἄριστον is synonymous with δεῖπνον; for somewhere or other Homer says —

δεῖπνον they took, then arm’d them for the fray.

For making their δεῖπνον immediately after sunrise, they then advance to battle.

20. In Homer they eat sitting down; but some think that a separate table was set before each of the feasters. At all events, they say a polished table was set before Mentes when he came to Telemachus, arriving after tables were already laid for the feast. However, this is not very clearly proved, for Minerva may have taken her food at Telemachus’s table. But all along the banqueting-room full tables were laid out, as is even now the custom among many nations of the barbarians,

Laden with all dainty dishes,

as Anacreon says. And then when the guests have departed, the handmaidens

Bore off the feast, and clear’d the lofty hall, Removed the goblets and the tables all.

The feast which he mentions as taking place in the palace of Menelaus is of a peculiar character; for there he represents the guests as conversing during the banquet; and then they wash their hands and return to the board, and proceed to supper after having indulged their grief. But the line in the last book of the Iliad, which is usually read,

He eat and drank, while still the table stood,

should be read,

He eat and drank still, while the table stood,

or else there would be blame implied for what Achilles was doing at the moment; for how could it be decent that a table should be laid before Achilles, as before a party of revellers, down the whole length of a banqueting-room? Bread, then, was placed on the table in baskets, and the rest of the meal consisted wholly of roast meat. But Homer never speaks of broth, Antiphanes says,

He never boil’d the legs or haunches, But roasted brains and roasted paunches, As did his sires of old.

21. And portions of the meat were then distributed among the guests; from which circumstances he speaks of “equal feasts,” because of their equal division. And he calls suppers δαῖτας, from the word δατέομαι, to divide, since not only was the meat distributed in that way, but the wine also.

Their hunger was appeased, And strength recruited by the equal feast.[22]

And again,

Come, then, Achilles, share this equal feast.[23]

From these passages Zenodotus got the idea that δαῖτα ἐΐσην meant a good feast; for as food is a necessary good to men, he says that he, by extension of the meaning of the word, called it ἐΐσην. But men in the early times, as they had not food in sufficient abundance, the moment any appeared, rushed on it all at once, and tore it to pieces with violence, and even took it away from others who had it; and this disorderly behaviour gave rise to bloodshed. And it is from this that very probably the word ἀτασθαλία originated, because it was in θάλιαι, another name for banquets, that men first offended against one another. But when, by the bounty of Ceres, food became abundant, then they distributed an equal portion to each individual, and so banquets became orderly entertainments. Then came the invention of wine and of sweetmeats, which were also distributed equally: and cups, too, were given to men to drink out of, and these cups all held the same quantity. And as food was called δαὶς, from δαίεσθαι, that is, from being divided, so he who roasted the meat was called δαιτρὸς, because it was he who gave each guest an equal portion. We must remark that the poet uses the word δαὶς only of what is eaten by men, and never applies it to beasts; so that it was out of ignorance of the force of this word that Zenodotus, in his edition writes: —

αὐτοὺς δὲ ἑλώρια τεῦχε κύνεσσιν οἰωνοῖσί τε δαῖτα,[24]

calling the food of the vultures and other birds by this name, though it is man alone who has come to an equal division after his previous violence, on which account it is his food alone that is called δαὶς, and the portion given to him is called μοῖρα. But the feasters mentioned in Homer did not carry home the fragments, but when they were satisfied they left them with the givers of the feast; and the housekeeper took them in order, if any stranger arrived, to have something to give him.

22. Now Homer represents the men of his time as eating fish and birds: at all events, in Sicily the companions of Ulysses catch

All fish and birds, and all that come to hand With barbed hooks.[25]

But as the hooks were not forged in Sicily, but were brought by them in their vessel; it is plain that they were fond of and skilful in catching fish. And again, the poet compares the companions of Ulysses, who were seized by Sylla, to fish caught with a long rod and thrown out of doors; and he speaks more accurately concerning this act than those who have written poems or treatises professedly on the subject. I refer to Cæcilius of Argos, and Numenius of Heraclea, and Pancrates the Arcadian, and Posidonius the Corinthian, and Oppianus the Cilician, who lived a short time ago; for we know of all those men as writers of heroic poems about fishing. And of prose essayists on the subject we have Seleucus of Tarsus, and Leonidas of Byzantium, and Agathocles of Atracia. But he never expressly mentions such food at his banquets, just as he also forbears to speak of the meat of young animals, as such food was hardly considered suitable to the dignity of heroes of reputation. However, they did eat not only fish, but oysters; though this sort of food is neither very wholesome nor very nice, but the oysters lie at the bottom of the sea, and one cannot get at them by any other means, except by diving to the bottom.

An active man is he, and dives with ease;[26]

as he says of a man who could have collected enough to satisfy many men, while hunting for oysters.

23. Before each one of the guests in Homer is placed a separate cup. Demodocus has a basket and a table and a cup placed before him,

To drink whene’er his soul desired.[27]

Again the goblets are crowned with drink; that is to say, they are filled so that the liquor stands above the brim, and the cups have a sort of crown of wine on them. Now the cupbearers filled them so for the sake of the omen; and then they pour out

πᾶσιν, ἐπαρξάμενοι δεπάεσσιν,[28]

the word πᾶσιν referring not to the cups but to the men. Accordingly Alcinous says to Pontonous,

Let all around the due libation pay To Jove, who guides the wanderer on his way;[29]

and then he goes on,

All drink the juice that glads the heart of man.

And due honour is paid at those banquets to all the most eminent men. Accordingly, Tydides is honoured with great quantities of meat and wine; and Ajax receives the compliment of a whole chine of beef. And the kings are treated in the same way: —

A rump of beef they set before the king:[30]

that is, before Menelaus. And in like manner he honours Idomeneus and Agamemnon

With ever brimming cups of rosy wine.[31]

And Sarpedon, among the Lycians, receives the same respect, and has the highest seat, and the most meat.

They had also a way of saluting in drinking one another’s health; and so even the gods,

In golden goblets pledged each other’s health;

that is, they took one another by the right hand while drinking. And so some one δείδεκτ’ Ἀχιλλέα, which is the same as if he had said ἐδεξιοῦτο, that is, took him by the right hand. He drank to him, proffering him the goblet in his right hand. They also gave some of their own portion to those to whom they wished to show attention; as, Ulysses having cut off a piece of chine of beef which was set before himself, sent it to Demodocus.

24. They also availed themselves at their banquets of the services of minstrels and dancers; as the suitors did, and in the palace of Menelaus

A band amid the joyous circle sings High airs attempered to the vocal strings; While, warbling to the varied strain, advance Two sprightly youths to form the bounding dance.[32]

And though Homer uses μολπὴ, warbling, here, he is really speaking only of the exercise of the dance. But the race of bards in those days was modest and orderly, cultivating a disposition like that of philosophers. And accordingly Agamemnon leaves his bard as a guardian and counsellor to Clytæmnestra: who, first of all, going through all the virtues of women, endeavoured to inspire her with an ambition of excelling in virtuous and ladylike habits; and, after that, by supplying her with agreeable occupation, sought to prevent her inclinations from going astray after evil thoughts: so that Ægisthus could not seduce the woman till he had murdered the bard on a desert island. And the same is the character of that bard who sings under compulsion before the suitors; who bitterly reproached them for laying plots against Penelope. We find too that using one general term, Homer calls all bards objects of veneration among men.

Therefore the holy Muse their honour guards In every land, and loves the race of bards.[33]

And Demodocus the bard of the Phæacians sings of the intrigue between Mars and Venus; not because he approves of such behaviour, but for the purpose of dissuading his hearers from the indulgence of such passions, knowing that they have been brought up in a luxurious way, and therefore relating to them tales not inconsistent with their own manners, for the purpose of pointing out to them the evil of them, and persuading them to avoid such conduct. And Phemius sings to the suitors, in compliance with their desire, the tale of the return of the Greeks from Troy; and the sirens sing to Ulysses what they think will be most agreeable to him, saying what they think most akin to his own ambition and extensive learning. We know, say they,

Whate’er beneath the sun’s bright journey lies, Oh stay and learn new wisdom from the wise.[34]

25. The dances spoken of in Homer are partly those of tumblers and partly those of ball-players; the invention of which last kind Agallis, the Corcyrean authoress, who wrote on grammar, attributes to Nausicaa, paying a compliment to her own countrywoman; but Dicæarchus attributes it to the Sicyonians. But Hippasus gives the credit of both this and gymnastic exercises to the Lacedæmonians. However, Nausicaa is the only one of his heroines whom Homer introduces playing at ball. Demoteles, the brother of Theognis the Chian sophist, was eminent for his skill in this game; and a man of the name of Chærephanes, who once kept following a debauched young man, and did not speak to him, but prevented him from misbehaving. And when he said, “Chærephanes, you may make your own terms with me, if you will only desist from following me;” “Do you think,” said he, “that I want to speak to you?” “If you do not,” said he, “why do you follow me?” “I like to look at you,” he replied, “but I do not approve of your conduct.”

The thing called φούλλικλον, which appears to have been a kind of small ball, was invented by Atticus the Neapolitan, the tutor in gymnastics of the great Pompey. And in the game of ball the variation called ἁρπαστὸν used to be called φαινίνδα and I think that the best of all the games of ball.

26. There is a great deal of exertion and labour in a game of ball, and it causes great straining of the neck and shoulders. Antiphanes says,

Wretch that I am, my neck’s so stiff;

and again Antiphanes describes the φαινίνδα thus: —

The player takes the ball elate, And gives it safely to his mate, Avoids the blows of th’ other side, And shouts to see them hitting wide; List to the cries, “Hit here,” “hit there,” “Too far,” “too high,” “that is not fair,” — See every man with ardour burns To make good strokes and quick returns.

And it was called φαινίνδα from the rapid motion of those who played, or else because its inventor, as Juba the Mauritanian says, was Phænestius, a master of gymnastics. And Antiphanes,

To play Phæninda at Phænestius’ school.

And those who played paid great attention to elegance of motion and attitude; and accordingly Demoxenus says: —

A youth I saw was playing ball, Seventeen years of age and tall; From Cos he came, and well I wot The Gods look kindly on that spot. For when he took the ball or threw it, So pleased were all of us to view it, We all cried out; so great his grace, Such frank good humour in his face, That every time he spoke or moved, All felt as if that youth they loved. Sure ne’er before had these eyes seen, Nor ever since, so fair a mien; Had I staid long most sad my plight Had been to lose my wits outright, And even now the recollection Disturbs my senses’ calm reflection.

Ctesibius also of Chalcis, a philosopher, was no bad player. And there were many of the friends of Antigonus the king who used to take their coats off and play ball with him. Timocrates, too, the Lacedæmonian, wrote a book on playing ball.

27. But the Phæacians in Homer had a dance also unconnected with ball playing; and they danced very cleverly, alternating in figures with one another. That is what is meant by the expression,

In frequent interchanges,

while others stood by and made a clapping noise with their fore-fingers, which is called ληκεῖν. The poet was acquainted also with the art of dancing so as to keep time with singing. And while Demodocus was singing, youths just entering on manhood were dancing; and in the book which is called the Manufacture of the Arms, a boy played the harp,

Danced round and sung in soft well measured tune.

And in these passages the allusion is to that which is called the hyporchematic[35] style, which flourished in the time of Xenodemus and Pindar. And this kind of dance is an imitation of actions which are explained by words, and is what the elegant Xenophon represents as having taken place, in his Anabasis, at the banquet given by Seuthes the Thracian. He says:

“After libations were made, and the guests had sung a pæan, there rose up first the Thracians, and danced in arms to the music of a flute, and jumped up very high, with light jumps, and used their swords. And at last one of them strikes another, so that it seemed to every one that the man was wounded. And he fell down in a very clever manner, and all the bystanders raised an outcry. And he who struck him having stripped him of his arms, went out singing Sitalces. And others of the Thracians carried out his antagonist as if he were dead; but in reality, he was not hurt. After this some Ænianians and Magnesians rose up, who danced the dance called Carpæa, they too being in armour. And the fashion of that dance was like this: One man, having laid aside his arms, is sowing, and driving a yoke of oxen, constantly looking round as if he were afraid. Then there comes up a robber; but the sower, as soon as he sees him, snatches up his arms and fights in defence of his team in regular time to the music of the flute. And at last the robber, having bound the man, carries off the team; but sometimes the sower conquers the robber, and then binding him alongside his oxen, he ties his hands behind him, and drives him forward. And one man,” says he, “danced the Persian dance, and rattling one shield against another, fell down, and rose up again: and he did all this in time to the music of a flute. And the Arcadians rising up, all moved in time, being clothed in armour, the flute-players playing the tune suited to an armed march; and they sung the pæan, and danced.”

28. The heroes used also flutes and pipes. At all events Agamemnon hears “the voice of flutes and pipes,” which however he never introduced into banquets, except that in the Manufacture[36] of Arms, he mentions the flute on the occasion of a marriage-feast. But flutes he attributes to the barbarians. Accordingly, the Trojans had “the voice of flutes and pipes,” and they made libations, when they got up from the feast, making them to Mercury, and not, as they did afterwards, to Jupiter the Finisher. For Mercury appears to be the patron of sleep: they drop libations to him also on their tongues when they depart from a banquet, and the tongues are especially allotted to him, as being the instruments of eloquence.

Homer was acquainted also with a variety of meats. At all events he uses the expression “various meats,” and

Meats such as godlike kings rejoice to taste.

He was acquainted, too, with everything that is thought luxurious even in our age. And accordingly the palace of Menelaus is the most splendid of houses. And Polybius describes the palace of one of the Spanish kings as being something similar in its appointments and splendour, saying that he was ambitious of imitating the luxury of the Phæacians, except as far as there stood in the middle of the palace huge silver and golden goblets full of wine made of barley. But Homer, when describing the situation and condition of Calypso’s house, represents Mercury as astonished; and in his descriptions the life of the Phæacians is wholly devoted to pleasure:

We ever love the banquet rich, The music of the lyre,

and so on. And

How goodly seems it, etc. etc.

lines which Eratosthenes says ought to stand thus: —

How goodly seems it ever to employ Far from all ills man’s social days in joy, The plenteous board high heap’d with cates divine, While tuneful songs bid flow the generous wine.[37]

When he says “far from all ills,” he means where folly is not allowed to exhibit itself; for it would be impossible for the Phæacians to be anything but wise, inasmuch as they are very dear to the gods, as Nausicaa says.

29. In Homer, too, the suitors amused themselves in front of the doors of the palace with dice; not having learnt how to play at dice from Diodorus of Megalopolis, or from Theodorus, or from Leon of Mitylene, who was descended from Athenian ancestors: and was absolutely invincible at dice, as Phanias says. But Apion of Alexandria says that he had heard from Cteson of Ithaca what sort of game the game of dice, as played by the suitors, was. For the suitors being a hundred and eight in number, arranged their pieces opposite to one another in equal numbers, they themselves also being divided into two equal parties, so that there were on each side fifty-four; and between the men there was a small space left empty. And in this middle space they placed one man, which they called Penelope. And they made this the mark, to see if any one of them could hit it with his man; and then, when they had cast lots, he who drew the lot aimed at it. Then if any one hit it and drove Penelope forward out of her place, then he put down his own man in the place of that which had been hit and moved from its place. After which, standing up again, he shot his other man at Penelope in the place in which she was the second time. And if he hit her again without touching any one of the other men, he won the game, and had great hopes that he should be the man to marry her. He says too that Eurymachus gained the greatest number of victories in this game, and was very sanguine about his marriage. And in consequence of their luxury the suitors had such tender hands that they were not able to bend the bow; and even their servants were a very luxurious set.

Homer, too, speaks of the smell of perfumes as something very admirable: —

Spirit divine! whose exhalation greets The sense of gods with more than mortal sweets.[38]

He speaks, too, of splendid beds; and such is the bed which Arete orders her handmaids to prepare for Ulysses. And Nestor makes it a boast to Telemachus that he is well provided with such things.

30. But some of the other poets have spoken of the habits of expense, and indolence of their own time as existing also at the time of the Trojan war; and, so Æschylus very improperly introduces the Greeks as so drunk as to break their vessels about one another’s heads; and he says —

This is the man who threw so well The vessel with an evil smell, And miss’d me not, but dash’d to shivers The pot too full of steaming rivers Against my head, which now, alas! sir, Gives other smells besides macassar.

And Sophocles says in his banquet of the Greeks,

He in his anger threw too well The vessel with an evil smell Against my head, and fill’d the room With something not much like perfume; So that I swear I nearly fainted With the foul steam the vessel vented.

But Eupolis attacks the man who first mentioned such a thing, saying —

I hate the ways of Sparta’s line, And would rather fry my dinner; He who first invented wine Made poor man a greater sinner, And through him the greater need is Of the arts of Palamedes.[39]

But in Homer the chiefs banquet in Agamemnon’s tent in a very orderly manner; and if in the Odyssey Achilles and Ulysses dispute and Agamemnon exults, still their rivalry with one another is advantageous, since what they are discussing is whether Troy is to be taken by stratagem, or by open-hand fighting. And he does not represent even the suitors as drunk, nor has he ever made his heroes guilty of such disorderly conduct as Æschylus and Sophocles have, though he does speak of the foot of an ox being thrown at Ulysses.

31. And his heroes sit at their banquets, and do not lie down. And this was sometimes the case at the feasts of Alexander the king, as Dures says. For he once, when giving a feast to his captains to the number of six thousand, made them sit upon silver chairs and couches, having covered them with purple covers. And Hegesander says that it was not the custom in Macedonia for any one to lie down at a banquet, unless he had slain a boar which had escaped beyond the line of nets; but with that exception, every one sat at supper. And so Cassander, when he was thirty-five years of age, supped with his father in a sitting posture, not being able to perform the above-mentioned exploit, though he was of man’s estate, and a gallant hunter.

But Homer, who has always an eye to propriety, has not introduced his heroes feasting on anything except meat, and that too they dressed for themselves. For it caused neither ridicule nor shame to see them preparing and cooking their own food: for they studied to be able to wait upon themselves; and they prided themselves, says Chrysippus, on their dexterity in such matters. And accordingly Ulysses boasts of being a better hand than any one else at making a fire and cutting up meat. And in the book of the Iliad called The Prayers,[40] Patroclus acts as cupbearer, and Achilles prepares the supper. And when Menelaus celebrates a marriage feast, Megapenthes the bridegroom acts as cupbearer. But now we have come to such a pitch of effeminacy as to lie down while at our meals.

32. And lately baths too have been introduced; things which formerly men would not have permitted to exist inside a city. And Antiphanes points out their injurious character:

Plague take the bath! just see the plight In which the thing has left me; It seems t’ have boil’d me up, and quite Of strength, and nerve bereft me. Don’t touch me, curst was he who taught a Man to soak in boiling water.

And Hermippus says,

As to mischievous habits, if you ask my vote, I say there are two common kinds of self-slaughter, One, constantly pouring strong wine down your throat, T’other plunging in up to your throat in hot water.

But now the refinements of cooks and perfumers have increased so much, that Alexis says that even if a man could bathe in a bath of perfume he would not be content. And all the manufactories of sweetmeats are in great vigour, and such plans are devised for intercourse between people, that some have proposed even to stuff the sofas and chairs with sponge, as on the idea that that will make the occupiers more amorous. And Theophrastus says that some contrivances are of wondrous efficacy in such matters; and Phylarchus confirms him, by reference to some of the presents which Sandrocottus, the king of the Indians, sent to Seleucus; which were to act like charms in producing a wonderful degree of affection, while some, on the contrary, were to banish love. Music, too, has been cultivated now, in a way which is a great perversion of its legitimate use: and extravagance has descended even to our clothes and shoes.

33. But Homer, though he was well acquainted with the nature of perfume, has never introduced any of his heroes as perfumed except Paris; when he says, “glittering with beauty,” as in another place he says that Venus —

With every beauty every feature arms, Bids her checks glow, and lights up all her charms.[41]

Nor does he ever represent them as wearing crowns, although by some of his similes and metaphors he shows that he knew of garlands. At all events he speaks of

That lovely isle crown’d by the foaming waves,[42]

And again he says —

For all around the crown of battle swells.[43]

We must remark, too, that in the Odyssey he represents his characters as washing their hands before they partake of food. But in the Iliad there is no trace of such a custom. For the life described in the Odyssey is that of men living easily and luxuriously owing to the peace; on which account the men of that time indulged their bodies with baths and washings. And that is the reason why in that state of things they play at dice, and dance, and play ball. But Herodotus is mistaken when he says that those sports were invented in the time of Atys to amuse the people during the famine. For the heroic times are older than Atys. And the men living in the time of the Iliad are almost constantly crying out —

Raise the battle cry so clear, Prelude to the warlike spear.

34. Now to go back to what we were saying before. The Athenians made Aristonicus the Carystian, who used to play at ball with Alexander the king, a freeman of their city on account of his skill, and they erected a statue to him. And even in later times the Greeks considered all handicraft trades of much less importance than inventions which had any reference to amusement. And the people of Histiæa, and of Oreum, erected in their theatre a brazen statue holding a die in its hand to Theodorus the juggler. And on the same principle the Milesians erected one to Archelaus the harp-player. But at Thebes there is no statue to Pindar, though there is one to Cleon the singer, on which there is the inscription —

Stranger, thou seest Pytheas’ tuneful son, While living oft with vict’ry’s garlands crown’d, Sweet singer, though on earth his race is run, E’en the high heavens with his name resound.

Polemo relates that when Alexander razed Thebes to the ground, one man who escaped hid some gold in the garments of this statue, as they were hollow; and then when the city was restored he returned and recovered his money after a lapse of thirty years. But Herodotus, the logomime as he was called, and Archelaus the dancer, according to Hegesander, were more honoured by Antiochus the king than any others of his friends. And Antiochus his father made the sons of Sostratus the flute-player his body guards.

35. And Matreas, the strolling player of Alexandria, was admired by both Greeks and Romans; and he said that he was cherishing a beast which was eating itself. So that even now it is disputed what that beast of Matreas’s was. He used to propose ridiculous questions in parody of the doubts raised by Aristotle, and then he read them in public; as “Why is the sun said to set, and not to dive?” “why are sponges said to suck up, and not to drink?” and “why do we say of a tetradrachm that it καταλλάττεται,[44] when we never speak of its getting in a passion?” And the Athenians gave Pothimos the puppet-master the use of the very stage on which Euripides had exhibited his noble dramas. And they also erected a statue of Euripides in the theatre next to the statue of Æschylus. Xenophon the conjuror, too, was very popular among them, who left behind him a pupil of the name of Cratisthenes, a citizen of Phlias; a man who used to make fire spout up of its own accord, and who contrived many other extraordinary sights, so as almost to make men discredit the evidence of their own senses. And Nymphodorus the conjuror was another such; a man who having quarrelled with the people of Rhegium, as Duris relates, was the first man who turned them into ridicule as cowards. And Eudicus the buffoon gained great credit by imitating wrestlers and boxers, as Aristoxenus relates. Straton of Tarentum, also, had many admirers; he was a mimic of the dithyrambic poets; and so had Œnonas the Italian, who mimicked the harp-players; and who gave representations of the Cyclops trying to sing, and of Ulysses when shipwrecked, speaking in a clownish fashion. And Diopeithes the Locrian, according to the account of Phanodemus, when he came to Thebes, fastened round his waist bladders full of wine and milk, and then, squeezing them, pretended that he was drawing up those liquids out of his mouth. And Noëmon gained a great reputation for the same sort of tricks.

There were also in Alexander’s court the following jugglers, who had all a great name. Scymnus of Tarentum, and Philistides of Syracuse, and Heraclitus of Mitylene. And there were too some strolling players of high repute, such as Cephisodorus and Pantaleon. And Xenophon makes mention also of Philip the buffoon.

36. Rome may fairly be called the nation of the world. And he will not be far out who pronounces the city of the Romans an epitome of the whole earth; for in it you may see every other city arranged collectively, and many also separately; for instance, there you may see the golden city of the Alexandrians, the beautiful metropolis of Antioch, the surpassing beauty of Nicomedia; and besides all these that most glorious of all the cities which Jupiter has ever displayed, I mean Athens. And not only one day, but all the days in an entire year, would be too short for a man who should attempt to enumerate all the cities which might be enumerated as discernible in that uranopolis of the Romans, the city of Rome; so numerous are they. — For indeed some entire nations are settled there, as the Cappadocians, the Scythians, the people of Pontus, and many others. And all these nations, being so to say the entire population of the world, called the dancer who was so famous in our time Memphis, comparing him, on account of the elegance of his movements, to the most royal and honourable of cities; a city of which Bacchylides sings —

Memphis, which winter dares not to assail, And lotus-crowned Nile.

As for the Pythagorean philosophy, Athenæus explains that to us, and shows us everything in silence more intelligibly than others who undertake to teach the arts which require talking.

37. Now of tragic dancing, as it was called, such as it existed in his time, Bathyllus of Alexandria was the first introducer; whom Seleucus describes as having been a legitimate dancer. This Bathyllus, according to the account of Aristonicus, and Pylades too, who has written a treatise on dancing, composed the Italian dance from the comic one which was called κόρδαξ, and from the tragic dance which was called ἐμμέλεια, and from the Satyric dance which was called σίκιννις, (from which also the Satyrs were called σικιννισταί,) the inventor of which was a barbarian named Sicinnus, though some say that Sicinnus was a Cretan. Now, the dance invented by Pylades was stately, pathetic, and laborious; but that of Bathyllus was in a merrier style; for he added to his a kind of ode to Apollo. But Sophocles, in addition to being eminent for personal beauty, was very accomplished in music and dancing, having been instructed in those arts while a boy by Lamprus, and after the naval victory of Salamis, he having no clothes on, but only being anointed with oil, danced round the trophy erected on that occasion to the music of the lyre, but some say that he had his tunic on; and when he exhibited his Thamyris he himself played the harp; and he also played at ball with great skill when he exhibited his Nausicaa. And Socrates the Wise was very fond of the dance Memphis; and as he was often caught dancing, as Xenophon relates, he said to his friends that dancing was a gymnastic exercise for every limb; for the ancients used the word ὀρχέομαι for every sort of motion and agitation. Anacreon says —

The fair-hair’d maids of mighty Jove Danced lightly in the mystic grove;

and Ion has the expression —

This strange occurrence makes my heart to dance.

38. And Hermippus says, that Theophrastus used to come to the walks at a regular hour, carefully and beautifully dressed; and that then he would sit down and enter upon an argument, indulging in every sort of motion and gesture imaginable; so that once while imitating an epicure he even put out his tongue and licked his lips.

Those men were very careful to put on their clothes neatly; and they ridiculed those who did not do so. Plato, in the Theætetus, speaks of “a man who has capacity to manage everything cleverly and perfectly, but who has no idea how to put on even proper clothes like a gentleman, and who has no notion of the propriety of language, so as to be able to celebrate the life of gods and men in a becoming manner.” And Sappho jests upon Andromeda: —

Sure by some milkmaid you’ve been taught To dress, whose gown is all too short To reach her sturdy ancles.

And Philetærus says —

Don’t let your gown fall down too low, Nor pull it up too high to show Your legs in clownish fashion.

And Hermippus says, that Theocritus of Chios used to blame the way in which Anaximenes used to wrap his cloak round him as a boorish style of dressing. And Callistratus the pupil of Aristophanes, in one of his writings, attacked Aristarchus severely for not being neatly dressed, on the ground, that attention to those minutiæ is no trifling indication of a man’s abilities and good sense. On which account Alexis says —

’Tis a sure sign of a degraded nature, To walk along the street in sloven’s guise; Having the means of neatness: which costs nothing; Is subject to no tax; requires no change; And creditable is to him who uses it, And pleasant to all those who witness it. Who then would ever disregard this rule, That wishes to be thought a man of sense?

39. But Æschylus was not only the inventor of becoming and dignified dress, which the hierophants and torch-bearers of the sacred festivals imitated; but he also invented many figures in dancing, and taught them to the dancers of the chorus. And Chamæleon states that he first arranged the choruses, not using the ordinary dancing-masters, but himself arranging the figures of the dancers for the chorus; and altogether that he took the whole arrangement of his tragedies on himself. And he himself acted in his own plays very fairly. And accordingly, Aristophanes (and we may well trust the comic writers in what they say of the tragedians) represents Æschylus himself as saying —

I myself taught those dances to the chorus, Which pleased so much when erst they danced before us.

And again, he says, “I recollect that when I saw ‘The Phrygians,’ when the men came on who were uniting with Priam in his petition for the ransom of his son, some danced in this way, some in that, all at random.” Telesis, or Telestes, (whichever was his right name,) the dancing-master, invented many figures, and taught men to use the action of their hands, so as to give expression to what they said. Phillis the Delian, a musician, says, that the ancient harp-players moved their countenances but little, but their feet very much, imitating the march of troops or the dancing of a chorus. Accordingly Aristotle says, that Telestes the director of Æschylus’s choruses was so great a master of his art, that in managing the choruses of the Seven Generals against Thebes, he made all the transactions plain by dancing. They say, too, that the old poets, Thespis, Pratinas, Carcinus, and Phrynichus, were called dancing poets, because they not only made their dramas depend upon the dancing of the chorus, but because, besides directing the exhibition of their own plays, they also taught dancing to all who wished to learn. But Æschylus was often drunk when he wrote his tragedies, if we may trust Chamæleon: and accordingly Sophocles reproached him, saying, that even when he did what was right he did not know that he was doing so.

40. Now the national dances are the following: — the Lacedæmonian, the Trœzenian, the Epizephyrian, the Cretan, the Ionian, the Mantinean, which Aristoxenus considers as the best of all, on account of its movement of the hands. And dancing was considered so creditable an employment, and one requiring so much talent, that Pindar calls Apollo a dancer: —

Prince of dancers, prince of grace, Hail, Phœbus of the silver quiver.

And Homer too, or one of the Homeridæ, in one of the hymns to Apollo, says —

How deftly Phœbus strikes the golden lyre, While strength and grace each moving limb inspire!

and Eumelus, or Arctinus, the Corinthian, somewhere or other introduces Jupiter himself as dancing, saying —

And gracefully amid the dancing throng, The sire of gods and mortals moved along.

But Theophrastus says that Andron of Catana, a flute-player, was the first person who invented motions of the body keeping time to music, while he played on the flute to the dancers; from whom dancing among the ancients was called Sicelizing. And that he was followed by Cleophantus of Thebes. Among the dancers of reputation there was Bulbus, mentioned by Cratinus and Callias; and Zeno the Cretan, who was in high favour with Artaxerxes, mentioned by Ctesias. Alexander also, in his letter to Philoxenus, mentions Theodorus and Chrysippus.

41. The Temple of the Muses is called by Timon the Phliasian, the satiric writer, the basket, by which term he means to ridicule the philosophers who frequent it, as if they were fattened up in a hen-coop, like valuable birds: —

Ægypt has its mad recluses, Book-bewilder’d anchorites, In the hen-coop of the Muses Keeping up their endless fights.

. . . . till these table orators got cured of their diarrhœa of words; a pack of men, who from their itch for talking appear to me to have forgotten the Pythian oracle, which Chamæleon quotes —

Three weeks ere Sirius burns up the wheat, And three weeks after, seek the cool retreat Of shady house, and better your condition By taking Bacchus for your sole physician.

And so Mnesitheus the Athenian says that the Pythia enjoined the Athenians to honour Bacchus the physician. But Alcæus, the Mitylenæan poet, says —

Steep your heart in rosy wine, for see, the dogstar is in view; Lest by heat and thirst oppress’d you should the season’s fury rue.

And in another place he says —

Fill me, boy, a sparkling cup; See, the dogstar’s coming up.

And Eupolis says that Callias was compelled to drink by Protagoras, in order that his lungs might not be melted away before the dogdays. But at such a time I not only feel my lungs dried up, but I may almost say my heart too. And Antiphanes says —

A.	Tell me, I pray you, how you life define.
B.	To drink full goblets of rich Chian wine.
	You see how tall and fine the forest grows
	Through which a sacred river ceaseless flows;
	While on dry soils the stately beech and oak
	Die without waiting for the woodman’s stroke.

And so, says he, they, disputing about the dogstar, had plenty to drink. Thus the word βρέχω, to moisten or soak, is often applied to drinking. And so Antiphanes says —

Eating much may bring on choking, Unless you take a turn at soaking.

And Eubulus has —

A.	I Sicon come with duly moisten’d clay.
B.	What have you drunk then?
A.	That you well may say.

42. Now the verb ἀναπίπτω, meaning to fall back, has properly reference to the mind, meaning to despair, to be out of heart. Thucydides says in his first book, “When they are defeated they are least of all people inclined to ἀναπίπτειν.” And Cratinus uses the same expression of rowers —

Ply your oars and bend your backs.

And Xenophon in his Œconomics says, “Why is it that rowers are not troublesome to one another, except because they sit in regular order, and bend forward in regular order, and (ἀναπίπτουσιν) lean back in regular order?” — The word ἀνακεῖσθαι is properly applied to a statue, on which account they used to laugh at those who used the word of the guests at a feast, for whom the proper expression was κατακεῖμαι. Accordingly Diphilus puts into the mouth of a man at a feast —

I for a while sat down (ἀνεκείμην):

and his friend, not approving of such an expression, says, Ἀνάκεισο. And Philippides has —

I supped too ἀνακειμένος in his house.

And then the other speaker rejoins —

What, was he giving a dinner to a statue?

But the word κατακεῖσθαι is used, and also κατακεκλῖσθαι, of reclining at meals: as Xenophon and Plato prove in their essays called the Banquet. Alexis too says —

’Tis hard before one’s supper to lie down, For if one does one cannot go to sleep; Nor give much heed to aught that may be said; One’s thoughts being fix’d on what there’ll be to eat.

Not but what the word ἀνακεῖσθαι is used in this sense, though rarely. The satyr in Sophocles says —

If I catch fire I’ll leap with a mighty Spring upon Hercules, as ἀνακεῖται.

And Aristotle says, when speaking of the laws of the Tyrrhenians, “But the Tyrrhenians sup, ἀνακειμένοι with the women under the same covering.” Theopompus also says —

Then we the goblets fill’d with mighty wine, On delicate couches κατακειμένος, Singing in turn old songs of Telamon.

And Philonides says —

I have been here κατακειμένος a long time.

And Euripides says in the Cyclops —

Ἀνέπεσε (which is the same as ἀνέκειτο) Breathing forth long and deep and heavy breath.

And Alexis says —

After that I bade her ἀναπεσεῖν by my side.

43. The ancients, too, used the word πάσασθαι for to taste. And so Phœnix says to Achilles, “You would not πάσασθαι anything in any one else’s house. And in another place we find —

When, they ἐπάσαντο the entrails:

for they only taste the entrails, so that a great multitude might have a taste of what exists in but a small quantity. And Priam says to Achilles —

Now I have tasted food, (πασάμην.)

For it was natural for a man suffering under such calamities as his, only just to taste food, for his grief would not permit him to go so far as to satisfy his hunger. And therefore, he who did not touch food at all is called “fasting,” ἄπαστος. But the poet never uses the word πάσασθαι of those who eat their fill; but in their case he uses words which express satiety: —

But when their minds were pleased (τάρφθεν) with wholesome food;

and,

When they had ceased to wish for meat and drink.

But more modern writers use the word πάσασθαι for being satisfied. Callimachus says —

I should like to satiate (πάσασθαι) myself with thyme;

and Eratosthenes —

They roasted their game in the ashes and ate it, (ἐπάσαντο) at least they all did who could get it.

44. We find in the Theban bard the expression, “glueing them together as one would glue one piece of wood to another.”

Seleucus says that the expression so common in Homer, δαῖτα θάλειαν, is the same as δίαιτα by a slight alteration of the arrangement of the letters; for he thinks that is too violent a change to consider it as derived from δαίσασθαι.

Carystius of Pergamos relates that the Corcyrean women sing to this day when playing at ball. And in Homer, it is not only men who play, but women also. And they used to play at quoits also, and at throwing the javelin, with some grace: —

They threw the quoit, and hurl’d the playful spear.

For any amusement takes away the feeling of ennui. And young men prosecute hunting as a sort of practice against the dangers of war; and there is no sort of chase which they avoid; and the consequence is that they are more vigorous and healthy than they otherwise would be.

As when they stand firm as unshaken towers, And face the foe, and pour forth darts in showers.

The men of those times were acquainted with baths also of all sorts, as a relief from fatigue. Refreshing themselves after toil by bathing in the sea; which of all baths is the best for the sinews; and having relaxed the excessive strains of their muscles in the bath, they then anointed themselves with ointment, in order to prevent their bodies from becoming too rigid as the water evaporated. And so the men who returned from a reconnoissance,

Wash’d off their heat in Neptune’s briny tides, And bathed their heads, and legs, and brawny sides.[45]

And then —

They to the polish’d marble baths repair, Anoint with fresh perfumes their flowing hair, And seek the banquet hall.

There was another way, too, of refreshing themselves and getting rid of their fatigue, by pouring water over the head: —

Then o’er their heads and necks the cooling stream The handmaids pour’d;[46]

for baths, in which the whole body is immersed, as the water surrounds all the pores on every side, prevents the escape of the perspiration, just as if a sieve were thrown into the water. For then nothing goes through the sieve, unless you lift it up out of the water, and so allow its pores, if one may call them so, to open, and make a passage through; as Aristotle says in his problems of natural philosophy, when he asks, “Why do men in a perspiration, when they come into warm or cold water no longer perspire, until they leave the bath again?”

45. Vegetables also were set before the ancient heroes when they supped. And that they were acquainted with the use of vegetables is plain from the expression,

He went down to the furthest bed In the well-order’d garden.

And they used onions too, though they have a very disagreeable smell: —

There was the onion, too, to season wine.

Homer represents his heroes also as fond of the fruit of trees: —

Figs after figs grow old, pears after pears.

On which account also he calls those trees which bear fruit beauteous: —

There many a beauteous tree appears — Pomegranates, apples, figs, and pears.

And those which are adapted for being cut down for timber he calls tall, distinguishing the epithets which he applies to each by their respective uses: —

There tall trees adorn the grove, The ash, and pine that towers above.

And the use of these trees was older than the Trojan war. And Tantalus, even after he is dead, is not cured of his fancy for these fruits; as the god, to punish him, waves such before his eyes (just as men lead on irrational animals by holding branches in front of them), and then prevents him from enjoying them, the moment he begins to entertain a hope of doing so. And Ulysses reminds Laertes of what he gave him when he was a child: “You gave me thirteen pears” — and so on.

46. And that they used to eat fish, Sarpedon proves plainly, when he compares the being taken prisoner to fish caught in a large net. Yet Eubulus, jesting in the way that the comic writers allow themselves, says —

I pray you, where in Homer is the chief Who e’er eat fish, or anything but beef? And, though, so much of liberty they boasted, Their meat was never anything but roasted.

Nor did those heroes allow the birds the free enjoyment of the air; setting traps and nets for thrushes and doves. And they practised the art of taking birds, and, suspending a dove by a small string to the mast of a ship, then shot arrows at it from a distance, as is shown in the book describing the funeral games. But Homer passed over the use of vegetables, and fish, and birds, lest to mention them should seem like praising gluttony, thinking besides there would be a want of decorum in dwelling on the preparation of such things, which he considered beneath the dignity of gods and heroes. But that they did in reality eat their meat boiled as well as roasted, he shows when he says —

But as a caldron boils with melting fat Of well-fed pig;

and the foot of the ox which was thrown at Ulysses proves it too, for no one ever roasts oxen’s feet. And the line too —

Then many a well-fill’d dish was duly set On the full board, with every kind of meat;

as this not only speaks of the variety of meats, such as birds, pigs, kids, and beef; but it also speaks of the way in which they were dressed as having varied, and not having been all of one kind, but carefully arranged. So that you may see here the origin of the Sicilian and Sybaritic and Italian ways of giving feasts, and the Chian fashion also. For the Chians are reported not to have been less studious than the other nations just mentioned in the art of dressing their meat. Timocles says —

The Chians Are splendid hands at dressing viands.

And in Homer, not only the young men, but the old men too, such as Phœnix and Nestor, sleep with the women; and Menelaus is the only man who has no woman allotted to him, inasmuch as he had collected the whole expedition for the sake of his wife, who had been carried away from him.

47. Pindar praises

Ancient wine and modern songs.

And Eubulus says —

Inconsistent it seems for a fair one to praise Old wine, and to say that such never can cloy; But bring her a man who has seen his best days, And she’d rather put up with a whiskerless boy.

And Alexis says very nearly the same thing word for word; only using the word little instead of never. Though in reality old wine is not only more pleasant, but also better for health; for it aids digestion more; and being thinner it is itself more digestible; it also invigorates the body; and makes the blood red and fluid, and produces untroubled sleep. But Homer praises that wine most which will admit of a copious admixture of water; as the Maronean. And old wine will allow of more water being added to it, because its very age has added heat to it. And some men say, that the flight of Bacchus to the sea is emblematic of the making of wine, as it was practised long ago; because wine is very sweet when sea-water is poured into it. And Homer praising dark-coloured wine, often calls it αἴθοψ. For the dark-coloured wine is the strongest, and it remains in the system of the drinkers of it longer than any other. But Theopompus says, that black wine was first made among the Chians; and, that the Chians were the first people who imparted the knowledge of planting and tending vines to the rest of mankind, having learnt it from Œnopion the son of Bacchus, who was the original colonizer of their island. But white wine is weak and thin; but yellow wine is very digestible, being of a more drying nature.

48. Respecting the Italian wines, Galen is represented by this sophist as saying, that the Falernian wine is fit to drink from the time that it is ten or fifteen years old, till it is twenty; but after that time it falls off, and is apt to give headaches, and affects the nervous system. There are two kinds of Falernian wine, the dry and the sweet. The sweet wine is made when the south wind blows through the vineyard; which also makes it darker in colour. But that which is not made at this time is dry and yellow. Of the Alban wine there are also two kinds, one sweet and one sour; and both are in their prime after they are fifteen years old. The wine of Surrentum begins to be drinkable when five-and-twenty years old; for as it has no oil of any sort in it, and is very thin, it is a long time ripening: and when it is old it is nearly the only wine that is wholesome to be drunk for a continuance. But the Rhegian wine, being richer than the Surrentine, may be used as soon as it is fifteen years old. The wine of Privernum too is very good, being thinner than the Rhegian wine, and one which does not take much effect on the head. And the Formian wine is like it; and is a wine which soon comes to its prime; it is, however, a richer wine than the other. But the Trifoline wine is slower ripening, and has a more earthy taste than the Surrentine. The Setine is a wine of the first class, like the Falernian wine, but lighter, and not so apt to make a man drunk. The wine of Tibur is thin, and evaporates easily, being at its best as soon as it is ten years old. Still it is better as it gets older. The Labican wine is sweet and oily to the taste, being something between the Falernian and the Alban: and you may drink that when it is ten years old. There is the Gauran wine too, a scarce and very fine wine, and likewise very powerful and oily; more so indeed than the wine of Præneste or of Tibur. The Marsic is a very dry wine; and very good for the stomach. Around Cumæ in Campania there is a wine made which is called Ulban, a light wine, fit to be drunk when five years old. The wine of Ancona is a fine wine, and rather oily. The Buxentine is like the Alban, as far as being rather sour; but it is a strong wine, and good for the stomach. The Veliternian wine is very sweet to drink and good for the stomach; but it has this peculiarity, that it does not taste like a pure wine, but always has an appearance as if some other was mixed with it. The Calenian wine is light, and better for the stomach than the Falernian. The Cæcuban is a noble wine, full of strength and easily affecting the head; but it does not come to its prime till after many years. The Fundan wine is strong, and nutritious, and affects the head and stomach, on which account it is not much used at banquets. But the Sabine wine is lighter than any of these, and is fit to be drunk from the time that it is seven years old till it is fifteen; and the Signine wine is available at six years old, but as it gets older it is far more valuable. The wine of Nomentum gets in season very early, and can be drunk as soon as it is five years old; it is not very sweet, and not very thin; but that of Spoletum is very sweet to the taste, and has a golden colour. The wine of Capua is in many respects like the Surrentine wine. The Barbine is very dry and continually improving. The Caucine too is a noble wine, and resembles the Falernian. The wine of Venafrum is good for the stomach, and light. The Trebellian wine, which is made round Naples, is of moderate strength, good for the stomach, and pleasant to the taste. The Erbulian wine is at first dark coloured, but in a few years it becomes white; and it is a very light and delicate wine. That of Marseilles is a fine wine, but it is scarce, and thick, with a good deal of body. The Tarentine, and all the other wines of that district, are delicate wines, without very much strength or body, sweet, and good for the stomach. The Mamertine is a foreign wine, made out of Italy. There is also another wine, made in Sicily, and called Iotaline; it is a sweet wine and light, but there is some strength in it.

Among the Indians a deity is worshipped, according to the account of Chares of Mitylene, who is called Soroadeus; which name, as interpreted in Greek, means Winemaker.

49. Antiphanes, that witty man, catalogues all the things which are peculiar to each city thus: —

Cooks come from Elis, pots from Argos, Corinth blankets sends in barges, Phlius wine, and Sicyon fish, While cheese is a Sicilian dish. Ægium sends flute-playing maids; Perfumers ply their dainty trades At Athens, under Pallas’ eye; Bœotia sends us eels to fry.

And Hermippus says,

Tell me, ye Muses, who th’ Olympic height Cheer with your holy songs and presence bright; Tell me what blessings Bacchus gave to man, Since first his vessel o’er the waters ran. Ox-hides from Libya’s coasts, and juicy kail: The narrow sea, still vocal with the wail Of lost Leander’s bride, the tunny sends, And our first meal with kipper’d salmon mends. Groats come from Italy, and ribs of beef; While Thrace sends many a lie and many a thief. Still do the Spartans scratch their sides in vain, Mad with the itching of th’ Odrysian pain. Then Syracuse gives cheese and well-fed pigs; Fair Athens olives sends, and luscious figs. Cursed of all islands let Corcyra be, Where no especial excellence we see. Sails come from Egypt, and this paper too; Incense from Syria; Crete upholds to view The cypress tall; and, dear to mighty Jove, In Paphlagonia grows the almond grove. The elephant sends its teeth from Afric’s sands; Pears and fat sheep grow on Eubœa’s lands; Rhodes sends us raisins, and beguiles the night With figs that make our dreams and slumbers light; From Phrygia slaves, allies from Arca’s land; The Pagasæan ports their hirelings brand; Phœnicia sends us dates across the billows, And Carthage, carpets rich, and well-stuff’d pillows.

50. Pindar too, in the Pythian ode addressed to Hiero, says,

Give me the noble Spartan hound With whose deep voice Eurotas’ banks resound; While the dark rocks Of Scyrus give the choicest flocks Of milky goats; and, prompt at war’s alarms, Brave Argos burnishes the well-proved arms, The Sicels build the rapid car, And the fierce Thebans urge the chariot to the war.[47]

Critias tells us —

Know ye the land of the fair Proserpine, Where the cottabus splashes the ominous wine; Where the lightest and handsomest cars . . . . * * * * * And what can for tired limbs compare With the soft and yielding Thessalian chair? But no town with Miletus vies In the bridal bed’s rich canopies. But none the golden bowl can chase, Or give to brass such varied grace, As that renowned hardy race That dwells by Arno’s tide; Phœnicia, mother of the arts, Letters to learned men imparts; Thebes scaled the mountain’s side, Bade the tough ash its trunk to yield, And fill’d with cars the battle-field; While Carians, masters of the seas, First launch’d the boat to woo the breeze. Offspring of clay and furnace bright, The choicest porcelain clear and light Boasts, as its birth-place, of the towers Which Neptune’s and Minerva’s powers From ills and dangers shield; Which beat back war’s barbaric wave When Mede and Persian found a grave In Marathon’s undying field.

And indeed the pottery of Attica is deservedly praised. But Eubulus says, “Cnidian pots, Sicilian platters, and Megarian jars.” And Antiphanes enumerates “mustard, and also scammony juice from Cyprus; cardamums from Miletus; onions from Samothrace; cabbages, kail, and assafœtida from Carthage; thyme from Hymettus, and marjoram from Tenedos.”

51. The Persian king used to drink no other wine but that called the Chalybonian, which Posidonius says is made in Damascus of Syria, from vines which were planted there by the Persians; and at Issa, which is an island in the Adriatic, Agatharchides says that wine is made which is superior to every other wine whatever. The Chian and Thasian wines are mentioned by Epilycus; who says that “the Chian and the Thasian wine must be strained.” And also, —

For all the ills that men endure, Thasian is a certain cure; For any head or stomach ache, Thasian wine I always take, And think it, as I home am reeling, A present from the God of healing.

Clearchus speaks of “Lesbian wine, which Maro himself appears to me to have been the maker of.”

And Alexis says —

All wise men think The Lesbian is the nicest wine to drink.

And again he says —

His whole thoughts every day incline To drink what rich and rosy wine From Thasos and from Lesbos comes, And dainty cakes and sugarplums.

And again —

Hail, O Bacchus, ever dear, You who from Lesbos drove dull care With sparkling rosy wine; He who would give one glass away, Too vile on cheerful earth to stay, Shall be no friend of mine.

And Ephippus sings —

Oh how luscious, oh how fine Is the Pramnian Lesbian wine! All who ‘re brave, and all who ‘re wise, Much the wine of Lesbos prize.

And Antiphanes —

There is good meat, and plenteous dainty cheer; And Thasian wine, perfumes, and garlands here; Venus loves comfort; but where folks are poor, The merry goddess ever shuns their door.

And Eubulus —

In Thasian wine or Chian soak your throttle, Or take of Lesbian an old cobwebb’d bottle.

He speaks too of Psithian wine —

Give me some Psithian nectar, rich and neat, To cool my thirst, and quench the burning heat.

And Anaxandrides mentions “a jar full of Psithian wine.”

52. Thesmophorius of Trœzene entitles the second Θεσμοφοριάζουσαι of Aristophanes Θεσμοφοριάσασαι. In that play the poet speaks of Peparethian wine: —

Shun, my boy, the Pramnian cup, Nor Thasian drink, nor Chian sup; Nor let your glass with Peparethian brighten — For bachelors that liquor’s too exciting.

Eubulus says —

As sweet as Wine from Leucas or Miletus.

Archestratus, the author of “The Art of giving a Banquet,” says, —

When a libation to the gods you make, Let your wine worthy be, and ripe and old; Whose hoary locks droop o’er his purple lake, Such as in Lesbos’ sea-girt isle is sold. Phœnicia doth a generous liquor bear, But still the Lesbian I would rather quaff; For though through age the former rich appear, You’ll find its fragrance will with use go off.

But Lesbian is the true ambrosial juice, And so the gods, whose home’s Olympus, think it; And if some rather the Phœnician choose, Let them, as long as they don’t make you drink it.

The Thasian isle, too, noble wine doth grow, When passing years have made its flavour mellow, And other places too; still all I know Is that the Lesbian liquor has no fellow.

I need not stop to tell you all the names Of towns which in the generous contest vie, Each for itself the vict’ry hotly claims; But still the Lesbian wine beats all, say I.

53. Ephippus, too, mentions the Phœnician wine, saying, “Nuts, pomegranates, dates, and other sweetmeats, and small casks of Phœnician wine.” And again, —

A cask of good Phœnician wine was tapp’d.

Xenophon, too, mentions it in his Anabasis. The Mendæan wine is mentioned by Cratinus: —

When a man tastes Mendæan wine, How rich, says he, how sweet, how fine! I wonder where it can be bought, or What’s the right quantity of water.

And Hermippus somewhere introduces Bacchus as mentioning several different kinds of wine: —

Mendæan wine such as the gods distil, And sweet Magnesian, cures for every ill, And Thasian, redolent of mild perfume; But of them all the most inviting bloom Mantles above old Homer’s Chian glass; That wine doth all its rivals far surpass. There is a wine, which Saprian they call, Soon as the seals from whose rich hogshead fall, Violets and roses mix their lovely scent, And hyacinths, in one rich fragrance blent; You might believe Jove’s nectar sparkled there, With such ambrosial odour reeks the air. This is the wine I’ll to my friends disclose; The Peparethian trash may suit my foes.

And Phanias the Eresian poet says that the Mendæans are in the habit of syringing the grapes with opening medicine, even while still on the vine; and that this makes the wine soft.

54. Themistocles received from the king of Persia Lampsacus, to supply him with wine; Magnesia, for bread; Myus, for meat; and Percope and Palæscepsis were to provide him with bedclothes and garments. The king moreover enjoined him to wear a cloak such as is worn by the barbarians, as he had previously bade Demaratus do; and he gave him the same presents as he had formerly given to Demaratus, and added also a robe such as is worn by the sons-in-law of the king, on condition of his never reassuming the Greek attire. And Cyrus the Great gave Pytharchus of Cyzicus, being a friend of his, seven cities, as is related by Agathocles of Babylon; namely, Pedasus, and Olympius, and Cama, and Tium, and Sceptra, and Artypsus, and Tortyra. But he, being made insolent and having his head turned by this liberality, attempted to make himself tyrant of his country, and collected an army for that purpose. On which the people of Cyzicus went out to battle against him, and attacked him eagerly, and so preserved their liberties.

Among the people of Lampsacus Priapus is held in high honour, being the same as Bacchus, and having this name Priapus only as an epithet, just as Thriambus and Dithyrambus are.

The Mitylenæans have a sweet wine which they call πρόδρομος, and others call it πρότροπος.

55. The Icarian wine, too, is held in high estimation, as Amphis says: —

Thurium gives the olive juice, Lentils Gela’s fields produce; Icarian wine well merits praise, And figs which the Cimolians raise.

The Pramnian wine, too, according to Eparchides, is produced in Icarus. It is a peculiar kind of wine; and it is neither sweet nor thick, but dry and hard, and of extraordinary strength; and Aristophanes says that the Athenians did not like it, for that “the Athenian people did not like hard and sour poets, nor hard Pramnian wines, which contract the eyebrows and the stomach; but they prefer a fragrant wine, ripe, and flavoured like nectar.” For Semus says that there is in Icarus a rock called the Pramnian rock; and near it is a great mountain, from which the Pramnian wine has its name, and some call it a medicinal wine. Now Icarus used formerly to be called the Fishy Icarus, from the number of fish around it; just as the Echinades had their name from the sea-urchins, and the promontory Sepias from the number of cuttle-fish which are taken near it. And in like manner the Lagussæ islands are so called from λαγὼς, a hare, as being full of hares. And other islands are called Phycussæ, and Lopadussæ, for similar reasons. And according to Eparchides, the vine which produces the Icarian Pramnian wine, is called by the strangers the Holy vine, and by the people of Œnoe the Dionysiac vine. And Œnoe is a city in the island.

But Didymus says that the Pramnian wine comes from a vine called Pramnian; and some say that the name means merely dark-coloured. But others affirm that it is a generic name for wine suitable for long keeping, as being παραμένιος, that is to say, such as can be kept. And some say that it is so called from πραΰνειν τὸ μένος, mollifying anger, because those who drink it become good-humoured.

56. Amphis praises also the wine which comes from the city of Acanthus, saying, —

A.	Whence do you come, friend? speak.
B.	From Acanthus I.
A.	Acanthus? then I trow,
	Since you’re a countryman of wine so strong,
	You must be fierce yourself;
	Your country’s name is thorny, but I hope
	Your manners are not quite so rough and prickly.

And Alexis mentions Corinthian wine as a harsh wine —

And foreign wine was there; for that from Corinth Is painful drinking.

He speaks, too, of wine from Eubœa —

Drinking deep draughts of harsh Eubœan wine.

The Naxian wine is compared by Archilochus to nectar. And he says in some one of his poems —

My spear finds corn, my spear finds wine, From Ismarus; on my spear I dine, And on it, when fatigued, recline.

But Strattis praises the wine of Sciathus —

The black Sciathian wine mix’d half and half, Invites the traveller to halt and quaff.

And Achæus praises the Bibline wine —

He pledged him in a cup of Bibline wine.

While it has its name from some district which is called by a similar appellation. And Philyllius says, —

I’ll give you Lesbian, Chian wine, Thasian, Mendæan, and Bibline; Sweet wines, but none so strong and heady As that you shall next day feel seedy.

But Epicharmus says that it is named from some mountains of a similar name. And Armenidas says that there is a district of Thrace called the Biblian, the same which was afterwards called Tisara, and Œsyma. And it was very natural for Thrace to be admired as a country producing fine wines; and indeed all the adjacent country deserves the same character.

Full of rich wine the ships from Lemnos came.

But Hippias the Rhegian says that the wine called the creeper was also called Biblian; and that Pollis the Argive, who was king of Syracuse, was the first person who brought it to Syracuse from Italy. And if that be true, probably the sweet wine which among the Sicilians is called Pollian, is the same as the Bibline wine. There is an ancient oracle: —

Drink wine where lees abound, since Fate has not Placed you amid Anthedon’s flowery plains, Or in the streets of sacred Hypera, Where purer wine abounds.

And there was a vine among the people of Trœzene, (as Aristotle says, in his book on their polity,) called Anthedonian, and another called Hyperian; from men of the name of Anthus and Hyperus, just as the Althephian vine is named after a man of the name of Althephias, one of the descendants of Alpheus.

57. Alcman somewhere speaks of a wine as free from fire, and smelling of flowers, which is produced from the Five Hills, a place about seven furlongs from Sparta. And he mentions another wine which comes from Denthiades, a small fortress, and another from Œnus, and another from Onoglæ and Stathmi. And these places are all near Pitane. Accordingly, he says, “And wine from Œnus, or from Denthis, or from Carystus, or from Onoglæ, or from Stathmi.” The Carystian wine is that which comes from Carystus in Laconia, on the borders of Arcadia. And he calls it “free from fire,” as not having been boiled; for they often used boiled wines. Polybius says that there was an admirable wine made at Capua; which was called ἀναδενδρίτης, to which no other wine was at all comparable. But Alciphron of the Mæander says, that there was a mountain village near the Ephesian territories, which was formerly called Latona’s, but is now called Latorea, from Latorea the Amazon; and that there also Pramnian wine is made. Timachidas the Rhodian calls a wine made at Rhodes ὑπόχυτος, or the adulterated wine, being near akin to sweet wine. But that wine is called γλύξις which goes through no process of decoction.

There is also a Rhodian wine, which Polyzelus calls αὐτίτης:[48] and another which Plato the comic writer calls καπνίας;[49] and this wine is made in the greatest perfection at Beneventum, a city in Italy. But the wine Amphis is spoken of as a very poor wine by Sosicrates. The ancients used also a certain wine made of spices, which they called τρίμμα. But Theophrastus, in his History of Plants, says, that a wine is made in Heræa in Arcadia which, when it is drunk, drives men out of their senses, and makes women inclined to pregnancy: and that around Cerunia in Achaia there is a kind of vine, from which a wine is made which has a tendency to cause abortion in pregnant women; and if they eat the grapes too, says he, they miscarry; — and the Trœzenian wine, he says, makes those who drink it barren: and at Thasos, says he, they make a wine which produces sleep, and another which causes those who drink it to keep awake.

58. But concerning the manufacture of scented wine, Phanias of Eresus says, “There is infused into the wine one portion of sea-water to fifty of wine, and that becomes scented wine.” And again he says, “Scented wine is made stronger of young than of old vines;” and he subjoins, “Having trodden on the unripe grapes they put the wine away, and it becomes scented.” But Theophrastus says, that “the wine at Thasos, which is given in the prytaneum, is wonderfully delicious; for it is well seasoned; for they knead up dough with honey, and put that into the earthen jars; so that the wine receives fragrance from itself, and sweetness from the honey.” And he proceeds to say, “If any one mixes harsh wine which has no smell with soft and fragrant wine, such, for instance, as the Heraclean wine with that of Erythræ, softness is derived from the one, and wholesomeness from the other.” And the Myrtite or Myrrhine wine is spoken of by Posidippus: —

A tasteless, dry, and foolish wine I consider the myrrhine.

Hermes, too, is mentioned by Strattis as the name of a drink. And Chæreas says, that a wine is made in Babylon which is called nectar.

The bard of Ceos says —

’Tis not enough to mix your wine with taste, Unless sweet converse seasons the repast; And Bacchus’ gifts well such regard deserve, That we should e’en the stones of grapes preserve.

59. Now of wines some are white, some yellow, and some red. The white is the thinnest in its nature, diuretic, and warm; and being a promoter of digestion it causes a heat in the head; for it is a wine which has a tendency to move upwards. But of red wine that which is not sweet is very nutritious, and is astringent; but that which is sweet (as is the case with even white and yellow wine also) is the most nutritious of all: for it softens all the ducts and passages, and thickens the fluid parts of the body, and does not at all confuse the head. For in reality the nature of sweet wine lingers about the ribs, and engenders spittle, as Diocles and Praxagoras assert. But Mnesitheus the Athenian says, “Red wine is the most nutritious; but white is the most diuretic and the thinnest; and the yellow is a dry wine, and that which most assists in the digestion of the food.”

Now the wines which have been very carefully prepared with sea-water never cause headaches; and they open the bowels, and sometimes gripe the stomach, and produce flatulency, and assist in the digestion of food. Of this character is the Myndian wine, and that of Halicarnassus. And so Menippus the Cynic calls Myndus “brine-drinking.” The Coan wine too has a good deal of sea-water in it. The Rhodian has not so much sea-water; but a great deal of that wine is good for nothing. Wine made in the islands is very good to drink, and not at all ill-calculated for daily use. But Cnidian wine makes blood, is nutritious, and keeps the bowels in a healthy state; though if it is drunk in great quantities it relaxes the stomach. The Lesbian wine is less astringent, and more diuretic. But the Chian is a nicer wine; and of all the Chian wine, that called the Aryusian is the best. And of this there are three varieties: for there is a dry kind, and a sweet kind; and that the flavour of which is between the two is called autocratic, that is, self-mixed. Now the dry kind is pleasant to the taste, nutritious, and more diuretic than the others; but the sweet kind is nutritious, filling, and apt to soften the bowels. The autocratic wine in its effects also is something between the two. But, generally speaking, the Chian wine is digestible, nutritious, a producer of good blood, mild, and filling, inasmuch as it has a great deal of body. But the nicest of all wines are the Alban and Falernian wines of Italy; but these, if they have been kept a length of time and are old, acquire a medicinal effect, and rapidly produce a sensation of heaviness. But the wine called Adrian relieves any oppression of the breath, is very digestible, and wholly free from all unpleasant consequences; but these wines require to be made with rapidity, and then to be set in an open place, so as to allow the thicker portions of their body to evaporate. But the best wine to keep a length of time is the Corcyrean. The Zacynthian and Leucadian wines also are apt to be bad for the head, because they contain chalk. There is a wine from Cilicia, called Abates, which has no effect except that of relaxing the bowels. But hard water, such as that from springs, or from rain if it is filtered, and has stood some time, agrees very well with Coan and Myndian and Halicarnassian wine, and indeed with every wine which has plenty of salt-water in it. And accordingly these wines are of the greatest use at Athens and Sicyon, because the waters in those cities are harsh. But for those wines which have no sea-water, and which are of a more astringent nature, especially for the Chian and Lesbian wine, the purest water is the most suitable.

Oh thou my tongue, whom silence long hath bound, How wilt thou bear this tale of thine t’ unfold? Hard is their fate to whom compulsion stern Leaves no alternative; which now compels thee To open what thy lord would fain conceal.

These are the words of Sophocles.

60. The Mareotic wine, which comes from Alexandria, had its name from a fountain in the district of Alexandria called Marea; and from a town of the same name which was close to it; which was formerly a place of great importance, but is now reduced to a petty village. And the fountain and town derived their name from Maro, who was one of the companions of Bacchus in his expedition. And there are many vines in that country, which produce grapes very good to eat when raw, and the wine which is made from them is excellent. For it is white, and sweet, and good for the breath, and digestible, and then, it never produces any ill effect on the head, and is diuretic. And still better than this is the wine called Tæniotic. The word ταινία means a riband; and there is in that district a long narrow riband of land, the wines produced from which are of a slightly green colour, with something oily in them, which is quickly dissolved when it is mixed with water; just as the Attic honey is dissolved by the same process. This Tæniotic wine, in addition to being sweet, has something aromatic in it, of a slightly astringent character. But there are vines near the Nile in great quantities as far as the river extends; and there are many peculiarities in those vines, both as to their colour and as to their use. However, the best of all the wines made in that district is that made near the city of Antylla (which is not far from Alexandria), the revenues from which the kings of those ages, both the Egyptian and Persian kings, used to give to their wives for pin-money. But the wine which is made in the Thebais, especially that near the city Coptos, is light, and easy of digestion, and also so great an assistant in the digestion of the rest of one’s food, that it is given to people in fevers without injury.

You praise yourself, as does Astydamas, woman!

(Astydamas was a tragic poet.)

61. Theopompus the Chian says, that the vine is found at Olympia, near the Alpheus; and that there is a place about eight furlongs from Elis where the natives at the time of the Dionysian games close up three empty brazen vessels, and seal them in the presence of all the people round about; and at a subsequent time they open them and find them full of wine. But Hellanicus says, that the vine was first discovered in Plinthina, a city of Egypt; on which account Dion, the academic philosopher, calls the Egyptians fond of wine and fond of drinking: and also, that as subsidiary to wine, in the case of those who, on account of their poverty, could not get wine, there was introduced a custom of drinking beer made of barley; and moreover, that those who drank this beer were so pleased with it that they sung and danced, and did everything like men drunk with wine. Now Aristotle says, that men who are drunk with wine show it in their faces; but that those who have drunk too much beer fall back and go to sleep; for wine is stimulating, but beer has a tendency to stupefy.

62. Now that the Egyptians really are fond of wine this is a proof, that they are the only people among whom it is a custom at their feasts to eat boiled cabbages before all the rest of their food; and even to this very time they do so. And many people add cabbage seed to potions which they prepare as preventives against drunkenness. And wherever a vineyard has cabbages growing in it, there the wine is weaker. On which account the citizens of Sybaris also, as Timæus says, used to eat cabbages before drinking. And so Alexis says —

Last evening you were drinking deep, So now your head aches. Go to sleep; Take some boil’d cabbage when you wake; And there’s an end of your headache.

And Eubulus says, somewhere or other —

Wife, quick! some cabbage boil, of virtues healing, That I may rid me of this seedy feeling.

For the ancients used to call cabbage ῥάφανος. And so Apollodorus of Carystus expressly says —

We call it ῥάφανος, and strangers κράμβη; But sure to women they must both the same be.

And Anaxandrides says —

If you butter and cabbage eat, All distempers you will beat, Driving off all headaches horrid, And clouds which hover round your forehead.

And Nicochares says —

Instead of cabbage, acorns boil to-morrow, Which equally rid you of all your sorrow.

And Amphis tells us —

When one’s been drunk, the best relief I know Is stern misfortune’s unexpected blow; For that at once all languor will dispel, As sure as cabbage.

And Theophrastus also speaks of the effect which the cabbage produces, saying that the vine as long as it lives always turns away from the smell of cabbage.

1. The conversation which you reported to me did not allow me to give up a considerable portion of the day to sleep, as it was of a very varied nature.

Nicander of Colophon says that wine, οἶνος, has its name from Œneus: —

 

Œneus pour’d the juice divine In hollow cups, and call’d it wine.

And Melanippides of Melos says —

’Twas Œneus, master, gave his name to wine.

 

 

But Hecatæus of Miletus says, that the vine was discovered in Ætolia; and adds, “Orestheus, the son of Deucalion, came to Ætolia to endeavour to obtain the kingdom; and while he was there, a bitch which he had brought forth a stalk: and he ordered it to be buried in the ground, and from it there sprang up a vine loaded with grapes. On which account he called his son Phytius. And he had a son named Œneus, who was so called from the vines: for the ancient Greeks,” says he, “called vines οἶναι. Now Œneus was the father of Ætolus.” But Plato in his Cratylus, inquiring into the etymology of the word oἶnos, says, that it is equivalent to οἰόνους, as filling the mind, νοῦς, with ὄιησις, or self-conceit. Perhaps, however, the word may be derived from ὄνησις, succour. For Homer, giving as it were the derivation of the word, speaks nearly after this fashion —

And then you will be succour’d (ὀνήσεαι) if you drink.

And he too constantly calls food ὀνείατα, because it supports us.

2. Now the author of the Cyprian poems, whoever he was, says —

No better remedies than wine there are, O king, to drive away soul-eating care.

And Diphilus the comic poet says —

O Bacchus, to all wise men dear, How very kind you do appear; You make the lowly-hearted proud, And bid the gloomy laugh aloud; You fill the feeble man with daring, And cowards strut and bray past bearing.

And Philoxenus of Cythera says —

Good store of wine which makes men talk.

But Chæremon the tragedian says, that wine inspires those who use it with

Laughter and wisdom and prudence and learning.

And Ion of Chios calls wine

Youth of indomitable might, With head of bull; the loveliest wight Who ever rank’d as Love’s esquire, Filling men with strength and fire.

And Mensitheus says —

Great was the blessing, when the gods did show Sweet wine to those who how to use it know; But where bad men its righteous use pervert, To such, I trow, it will be rather hurt. For to the first it nourishment supplies, Strengthens their bodies, and their minds makes wise; A wholesome physic ’tis when mix’d with potions, Heals wounds as well as plasters or cold lotions. Wine to our daily feasts brings cheerful laughter, When mix’d with proper quantities of water; Men saucy get if one-third wine they quaff; While downright madness flows from half-and-half; And neat wine mind and body too destroys; While moderation wise secures our joys. And well the oracle takes this position, That Bacchus is all people’s best physician.

3. And Eubulus introduces Bacchus as saying —

Let them three parts of wine all duly season With nine of water, who’d preserve their reason; The first gives health, the second sweet desires, The third tranquillity and sleep inspires. These are the wholesome draughts which wise men please, Who from the banquet home return in peace. From a fourth measure insolence proceeds; Uproar a fifth, a sixth wild licence breeds; A seventh brings black eyes and livid bruises, The eighth the constable next introduces; Black gall and hatred lurk the ninth beneath, The tenth is madness, arms, and fearful death; For too much wine pour’d in one little vessel, Trips up all those who seek with it to wrestle.

And Epicharmus says —

A.	Sacrifices feasts produce,
	Drinking then from feasts proceeds.
B.	Such rotation has its use.
A.	Then the drinking riot breeds;
	Then on riot and confusion
	Follow law and prosecution;
	Law brings sentence; sentence chains;
	Chains bring wounds and ulcerous pains.

And Panyasis the epic poet allots the first cup of wine to the Graces, the Hours, and Bacchus; the second to Venus, and again to Bacchus; the third to Insolence and Destruction. And so he says —

O’er the first glass the Graces three preside, And with the smiling Hours the palm divide; Next Bacchus, parent of the sacred vine, And Venus, loveliest daughter of the brine, Smile on the second cup, which cheers the heart, And bids the drinker home in peace depart. But the third cup is waste and sad excess, Parent of wrongs, denier of redress; Oh, who can tell what evils may befall When Strife and Insult rage throughout the hall? Content thee, then, my friend, with glasses twain; Then to your home and tender wife again; While your companions, with unaching heads, By your example taught, will seek their beds. But riot will be bred by too much wine, A mournful ending for a feast divine; While, then, you live, your thirst in bounds confine.

And a few lines afterwards he says of immoderate drinking —

For Insolence and Ruin follow it.

According to Euripides,

Drinking is sire of blows and violence.

From which some have said that the pedigree of Bacchus and of Insolence were the same.

4. And Alexis says somewhere —

Man’s nature doth in much resemble wine: For young men and new wine do both need age To ripen their too warm unseason’d strength, And let their violence evaporate. But when the grosser portions are worked off, And all the froth is skimm’d, then both are good; The wine is drinkable, the man is wise, And both in future pleasant while they last.

And according to the bard of Cyrene —

Wine is like fire when ’tis to man applied, Or like the storm that sweeps the Libyan tide; The furious wind the lowest depths can reach, And wine robs man of knowledge, sense, and speech.

But in some other place Alexis says the contrary to what I have just cited: —

A.	Man in no one respect resembles wine:
	For man by age is made intolerable;
	But age improves all wine.
B.	Yes; for old wines cheer us,
	But old men only snarl, abuse, and jeer us.

And Panyasis says —

Wine is like fire, an aid and sweet relief, Wards off all ills, and comforts every grief; Wine can of every feast the joys enhance, It kindles soft desire, it leads the dance. Think not then, childlike, much of solid food, But stick to wine, the only real good.

And again —

Good wine’s the gift which God has given To man alone beneath the heaven; Of dance and song the genial sire, Of friendship gay and soft desire; Yet rule it with a tighten’d rein, Nor moderate wisdom’s rules disdain; For when uncheck’d there’s nought runs faster, — A useful slave, but cruel master.

5. Timæus of Tauromenium relates that there was a certain house at Agrigentum called the Trireme, on this account: — Some young men got drunk in it, and got so mad when excited by the wine, as to think that they were sailing in a trireme, and that they were being tossed about on the sea in a violent storm; and so completely did they lose their senses, that they threw all the furniture, and all the sofas and chairs and beds, out of window, as if they were throwing them into the sea, fancying that the captain had ordered them to lighten the ship because of the storm. And though a crowd collected round the house and began to plunder what was thrown out, even that did not cure the young men of their frenzy. And the next day, when the prætors came to the house, there were the young men still lying, sea-sick as they said; and, when the magistrates questioned them, they replied that they had been in great danger from a storm, and had consequently been compelled to lighten the ship by throwing all their superfluous cargo into the sea. And while the magistrates marvelled at the bewilderment of the men, one of them, who seemed to be older than the rest, said, “I, O Tritons, was so frightened that I threw myself down under the benches, and lay there as low down and as much out of sight as I could.” And the magistrates forgave their folly, and dismissed them with a reproof, and a warning not to indulge in too much wine in future. And they, professing to be much obliged to them, said, “If we arrive in port after having escaped this terrible storm, we will erect in our own country statues of you as our saviours in a conspicuous place, along with those of the other gods of the sea, as having appeared to us at a seasonable time.” And from this circumstance that house was called the Trireme.

6. But Philochorus says that men who drink hard do not only show what sort of disposition they themselves are of, but do also reveal in their chattering the characters of every one else whom they know. Whence comes the proverb,

Wine and truth;[50]

and the sentence,

Wine lays bare the heart of man.

And so in the contests of Bacchus the prize of victory is a tripod: and we have a proverb of those who speak truth, that “they are speaking from the tripod;” in which the tripod meant is the cup of Bacchus. For there were among the ancients two kinds of tripods, each of which, as it happened, bore the name of λέβης, or bowl; one, which was used to be put on the fire, being a sort of kettle for bathing, as Æschylus says —

They pour’d the water in a three-legg’d bowl, Which always has its place upon the fire:

and the other is what is also called κρατὴρ, a goblet. Homer says —

And seven fireless tripods.

And in these last they mixed wine; and it is this last tripod that is the tripod of truth; and it is considered appropriate to Apollo, because of the truth of his prophetic art; and to Bacchus, because of the truth which people speak when drunk. And Semus the Delian says— “A brazen tripod, not the Pythian one, but that which they now call a bowl. And of these bowls some were never put on the fire, and men mixed their wine in them; and the others held water for baths, and in them they warmed the water, putting them on the fire; and of these some had ears, and having their bottom supported by three feet they were called tripods.”

Ephippus says somewhere or other —

A. That load of wine makes you a chatterer.

B. That’s why they say that drunken men speak truth.

And Antiphanes writes —

There are only two secrets a man cannot keep, One when he’s in love, t’ other when he’s drunk deep: For these facts are so proved by his tongue or his eyes, That we see it more plainly the more he denies.

7. And Philochorus relates that Amphictyon, the king of the Athenians, having learnt of Bacchus the art of mixing wine, was the first man who ever did mix it: and that it is owing to him that men who have been drinking on his system can walk straight afterwards, when before they used to blunder about after drinking sheer wine: and on this account he erected an altar to the Straight Bacchus in the temple of the Seasons; for they are the Nymphs who cherish the fruit of the vine. And near it he built also an altar to the Nymphs, as a memorial to all who use mixed drink; for the Nymphs are said to have been the nurses of Bacchus. And he made a law to bring an unmixed wine after meals only just enough to taste, as a token of the power of the Good Deity. But the rest of the wine was put on the table ready mixed, in whatever quantity any one chose. And then he enjoined the guests to invoke in addition the name of Jupiter the Saviour, for the sake of instructing and reminding the drinkers that by drinking in that fashion they would be preserved from injury. But Plato, in his second book of the Laws, says that the use of wine is to be encouraged for the sake of health. But on account of the look which habitual drunkards get, they liken Bacchus to a bull; and to a leopard, because he excites drunkards to acts of violence. And Alcæus says —

Wine sometimes than honey sweeter, Sometimes more than nettles bitter.

Some men, too, are apt to get in a rage when drunk; and they are like a bull. Euripides says —

Fierce bulls, their passion with their horns displaying.

And some men, from their quarrelsome disposition when drunk, are like wild beasts, on which account it is that Bacchus is likened to a leopard.

8. Well was it then that Ariston the Chian said that that was the most agreeable drink which partook at the same time of both sweetness and fragrance; for which reason some people prepare what is called nectar about the Olympus which is in Lydia, mixing wine and honeycombs and the most fragrant flowers together. Though I am aware indeed that Anaxandrides says that nectar is not the drink, but the meat of the gods: —

Nectar I eat, and well do gnaw it; Ambrosia drink, (you never saw it); I act as cupbearer to Jove, And chat to Juno — not of love; And oftentimes I sit by Venus, With marplot none to come between us.

And Alcman says —

Nectar they eat at will.

And Sappho says —

The goblets rich were with ambrosia crown’d, Which Hermes bore to all the gods around.

But Homer was acquainted with nectar as the drink of the gods. And Ibycus says that ambrosia is nine times as sweet as honey; stating expressly that honey has just one-ninth part of the power of ambrosia as far as sweetness goes.

9.

One fond of wine must be an honest man; For Bacchus, for his double mother famed, Loves not bad men, nor uninstructed clowns,

says Alexis. He adds, moreover, that wine makes all men who drink much of it fond of talking. And the author of the Epigram on Cratinus says —

If with water you fill up your glasses, You’ll never write anything wise But wine is the horse of Parnassus, That carries a bard to the skies.

And this was Cratinus’s thought, Who was ne’er with one bottle content, But stuck to his cups as he ought, And to Bacchus his heart and voice lent.

His house all with garlands did shine, And with ivy he circled his brow, To show he nought worshipp’d but wine, As, if he still lived, he’d do now.

Polemo says that in Munychia a hero is honoured of the name of Acratopotes:[51] and that among the Spartans statues of the heroes Matton and Ceraon were erected by some cooks in the hall of the Phiditia.[52] And in Achaia a hero is honoured called Deipneus, having his name from δεῖπνον, a supper. But from a dry meal there arise no jokes, nor extempore poems, though, on the other hand, such an one does not cause any boasting or insolence of mind; so that it is well said —

Where are the empty boasts which Lemnos heard When season’d dishes press’d the ample board, When the rich goblets overflow’d with wine?

though Aristarchus the grammarian put a mark against the line which represents the Greeks as getting insolent through much eating. For he said that it was not every sort of cheerfulness and satiety which engendered boasting and jesting and ridiculous actions; but that these things proceeded only from such revelling as made men beside themselves, and inclined them to falsehood, — from drunkenness, in fact.

10. On which account Bacchylides says: —

Sweet force, from wine proceeding, Now warms my soul with love, And on my spirit leading, With hopes my heart does move.

It drives dull care away, And laughs at walls and towers; And bids us think and say, That all the world is ours.

The man who drinks plenty of wine, Will never for wealth be wishing; For his cellar’s a ceaseless mine, And an undisturb’d heart he is rich in.

And Sophocles says —

Drinking is a cure for woe.

And other poets call wine —

Fruit of the field, which makes the heart to leap.

And the king of all poets introduces Ulysses saying —

Let generous food supplies of strength produce, Let rising spirits flow from sprightly juice, Let their warm heads with scenes of battle glow,[53]

and so on.

11. It is in consequence of wine that both comedy and tragedy were discovered in Icarium, a village of Attica; and it was at the time of the grape harvest that these inventions were first introduced, from which comedy was at first called τρυγῳδία.

Euripides, in the Bacchæ, says that Bacchus

Gave men the wine which every grief dispels; Where wine is not, there Venus never dwells, Nor any other thing which men hold dear.

And Astydamas says that Bacchus

Gave men the vine which cures all mortal grief, Parent of genial wine.

“For,” says Antiphanes, “a man who continually fills himself with wine becomes indifferent and careless; but he who drinks but little is very meditative.” And Alexis says —

I’m not beside myself with drink; nor have I so much taken As not to be quite understood by those to whom I’m speaking.

But Seleucus says that it was not an ancient custom to indulge in wine or any other luxury to excess, except, indeed, on the occasion of some sacred festival; which is the origin of the names θοῖναι, and θάλιαι, and μέθαι — Θοῖναι meaning that men thought it right διὰ θεοὺς οἰνοῦσθαι, to drink wine on account of the gods; θάλιαι meaning that χάριν θεῶν ἡλίζοντο, they assembled and met together in honour of the gods. And this comes to the same as the Homeric expression δαῖτα θάλειαν. And Aristotle says that the word μεθύειν is derived from the fact that men used wine μετὰ τὸ θύειν after sacrificing.

12. Euripides says that it is possible that

Those who with humble gifts approach the gods, May often holier be, than those who load The groaning altars with whole hecatombs;

and the word τέλος, which he employs in the first line, means “sacrifice.” And Homer uses the same word when he says —

God holds no sacrifice in more esteem, Than hearts where pious joy and pleasure beam.[54]

And we call those festivals which are of greater magnitude and which are celebrated with certain mysterious traditions, τελεταὶ, on account of the expense which is lavished on them. For the word τελέω means to spend. And men who spend a great deal are called πολυτελεῖς; and those who spend but little are called εὐτελεῖς. Alexis says —

Those who with fair prosperity are bless’d, Should always keep themselves before the world; Glad to display the bounty of the gods. For they, the givers of all good, deserve A holy gratitude; and they will have it. But if, when they their gifts have shower’d, they see The objects of their bounty live like churls, Useless to all around them; who can wonder If they recall what seems so ill bestow’d?

13. A man is not fond of wine who has been used from his earliest years to drink water. But —

’Tis sweet, at a banquet or festival meeting, To chat o’er one’s wine, when the guests have done eating,

says Hesiod in his Melampodia.

It has not occurred to any one of you to say a word about water, though wine is made of it, and though Pindar, the most grandiloquent of poets, has said that “water is the best of all things.” And Homer, too, the most divine of all poets, recognised it as a most nutritious thing, when he spoke of a grove of poplars nourished by the water. He also praises its transparent nature —

Four fountains flow’d with clearest water white;[55]

and the water which is of a lighter nature, and of greater value, he calls “lovely:” at all events he calls the Titaresius lovely which falls into the Peneus. And he mentions also some water as especially good for washing; and Praxagoras of Cos, following his example, speaks of a water as beauteous —

Beauteous it flows, to wash all dirt away.

And he distinguishes also between sweet water and brackish (πλατὺς) water; though when he calls the Hellespont πλατὺς, he uses the word in the sense of broad. But with respect to sweet water, he says —

Near the sweet waters then our ships we stay’d.[56]

14. He was acquainted too with the effect which warm water has on wounds: at all events he describes Eurypylus’s wounds as being washed with it; and yet, if the object was to stop the hæmorrhage, cold water would have been useful, since that contracts and closes up wounds; but with the view of relieving the pain, he bathes these with warm water, which has a soothing effect. And in Homer the word λιαρὸς is used for what we call θερμὸς, warm. And he shows that plainly enough in what he says about the fountains of the Scamander, saying —

Next by Scamander’s double source they bound, Where two famed fountains burst the parted ground; This warm, through scorching clefts is seen to rise, With exhalations steaming to the skies.[57]

Can we call that only warm from which a steam of fire, and a fiery smoke arises? But of the other source he says —

That, the green banks in summer’s heat o’erflows, Like crystal clear, and cold as winter’s snows.

And he often speaks of men newly wounded being bathed in warm water. In the case of Agamemnon he says —

With his warm blood still welling from the wound.[58]

And in the case of a stag fleeing after it had been wounded, he says, in a sort of paraphrase —

While his warm blood and mighty limbs were strong.[59]

The Athenians call χλιαρὸν, which is properly lukewarm, μετάκερας, as Eratosthenes uses the word, saying, “Watery by nature, and lukewarm, μετάκερας.”

15. And of other waters, those which come from rocks he calls “dark,” as being quite useless; and he prefers to all others the waters of springs, and those which rise to the surface from a great depth, and through rich soil. As also Hesiod says —

A ceaseless spring of clear untroubled flow.

And Pindar says —

Ambrosial water, like fresh honey sweet, Which from Tilphossa’s lovely fountains flows;

(Tilphossa is a fountain in Bœotia;) and Aristophanes says that Tiresias died from drinking of it, as at his advanced age he was unable to bear its extreme cold. And Theophrastus, in his book on Waters, says that the water of the Nile is the most productive and the sweetest of all waters, and that it is also very relaxing to the bowels of those who drink it, as it has in it a mixture of nitre. And again, in his book on Plants, he says that there is in some places water which has a procreative tendency; as for instance at Thespiæ: and at Pyrrha there is a water which causes barrenness. But it happened once when there was a drought in the district around the Nile, that the water of that river became unwholesome, and many of the Egyptians died. Theophrastus states, moreover, that not only do bitter waters sometimes change their nature, but that salt water does so too, and sometimes whole rivers do so; as in the case of the fountain in Cithæron, near which there is a temple of Jupiter; and of that in Cairo, near which there is a temple of Neptune: and the reason is, that many thunderbolts fall in those countries.

 

 

16. But there are some waters which have a good deal of body in them, and are of considerable weight; as that in Trœzen, — for that gives the mouths of those who taste it a feeling of fulness. And the waters near the mines in Pangæum, in winter, weigh ninety-six drachms to half a pint, but in summer they only weigh forty-six. For the cold contracts and condenses it; on which account that which is used in hour-glasses does not make the hours in winter the same as those in summer, but longer; for the flow is slower on account of the increased density of the water. And he says that the same is the case in Egypt, though the air there is softer. Brackish water is more earthy, and requires more working; as also does sea-water, the nature of which is warmer, and which is not exposed to the same changes as river-water. And there is one salt spring which is of invincible hardness, — I mean that of Arethusa. But as a general rule heavy waters are worse, and so are hard and cold waters, for the same reason; for they are not so easily prepared for use, some because they are very earthy, and some from the excess of cold. But those waters which are quickly warmed are light and wholesome. And in Crannon there is a spring of a gentle warmth, which keeps wine which is mixed with it of the same temperature for two or three days. But flowing waters, and waters from aqueducts, are, as a general rule, better than stagnant ones, being softer because of the collisions to which they are subjected; and on this account water derived from snow appears to be good, because its more drinkable qualities are brought to the surface, and are exposed to the influence of the air; and for the same reason they think it better than rain-water: and on the same ground, too, they prefer water from ice, because it is lighter; and the proof is, that ice is itself lighter than the rest of the water. But very cold water is hard, as being earthy; but that with much body in it, when it is warmed, is susceptible of greater heat, and when it is cold, descends to a more intense cold. And for the same reason water on the mountains is better to drink than water in the plains; for there is in such less admixture of earthy matter. And it is from the earthy particles present that waters vary in colour: at all events, the water of the lake at Babylon is red for some days after it is drawn; and that of the Borysthenes is for some time of a violet or dark colour, although it is unusually thin in quality; and a proof of this is, that at the point where it meets the Hypanis its waters flow above those of the latter while the north winds prevail.

17. And in many places there are fountains, some of which are good for drinking, and have a vinous flavour; as for instance, one in Paphlagonia, which they say the natives come to for the express purpose of drinking. Some, again, are salt, with a rather bitter flavour; as some among the Sicani in Sicily. And in the Carthaginian dominions there is a fountain on which there is something which floats resembling oil, but darker in colour, which they skim off and make into balls, and use for their sheep and cattle; and in other districts, too, there are fountains of a greasy nature, — like the one in Asia concerning which Alexander wrote a letter, saying that he had found a fountain of oil. And of waters which are warm by nature some are sweet, as that at Ægæ in Cilicia, and that at Pagasæ, and that at Larissa in the Troas, and that near Magnesia, and that in Melos, and that in Lipara, and that in Prusa, — the Prusa, I mean, near Mount Olympus in Mysia, — which is called the Royal fountain. But that in Asia near Tralles, and those near the river Characometes, and near the city of Mysia, are so oily that those who bathe in them have no need of oil. And there is a similar fountain in the village of Dascylum. There is also one at Carura of an exceeding dryness and heat: and there is another near Menoscome, which is a village in Phrygia, of a rougher and a more nitrous quality; as there is too in a village in Phrygia, called The Lion’s Village. And there is a spring near Dorylæum, which is very delicious to drink; but those which are at Baiæ or Baium, a harbour in Italy, are utterly undrinkable.

18. I myself weighed the water which comes from the fountain called Pirene in Corinth, and found it lighter than any other water in Greece. For I did not believe Antiphanes the comic writer, who says that in many respects Attica is superior to all other districts, and also that it has the best water of any; for he says: —

A.	Have you remark’d, my friend,
	That none can with this favour’d land contend
	In honey, loaves, and figs?
B.	Aye, figs indeed!
A.	In myrtles, perfumes, wools, in choicest breed
	Of cattle, and in cheese; and on what ground
	Can fountains like the Attic springs be found?

Eubulus, the writer of comedies, somewhere or other says that Chæremon the tragedian called water the body of the river: —

But when we pass’d the folds, and cross’d the water, The river’s lucid body, all our troops In the pure crystal bathed their weary limbs.

There is a fountain in Tenos the water of which cannot be mixed with wine. And Herodotus, in his fourth book, says that the Hypanis, at a distance of five days’ journey from its head, is thin and sweet to the taste; but that four days’ journey further on it becomes bitter, because some bitter spring falls into it. And Theopompus says that near the river Erigone all the water is sour; and that those who drink of it become intoxicated, just like men who have drunk wine.

19. But Aristobulus of Cassandra says that there is a fountain in Miletus called the Achillean, the stream of which is very sweet, while the sediment is brackish: this is the water in which the Milesians say that their hero bathed when he had slain Trambelus the king of the Leleges. And they say, too, that the water in Cappadocia never becomes putrid, but there is a great deal in that district, of an admirable quality, though it has no outlet unless it flows underground. And Ptolemy the king, in the Seventh Book of his Commentaries, says that as you go to Corinth through the district called Contoporia, when you have got to the top of the mountain there is a fountain whose waters are colder than snow, so that many people are afraid to drink of it lest they should be frozen; but he says that he drank of it himself. And Phylarchus states that at Cleitor there is a spring which gives those who drink of it a distaste for the smell of wine. And Clearchus tells us that water is called white, like milk; and that wine is called red, like nectar; and that honey and oil are called yellow, and that the juice which is extracted from the myrtle-berry is black. Eubulus says that “water makes those who drink nothing else very ingenious,

But wine obscures and clouds the mind;”

and Philetas borrows not only the thought, but the lines.

20. Athenæus then, having delivered this lecture on water, like a rhetorician, stopped awhile, and then began again.

Amphis, the comic writer, says somewhere or other —

There is, I take it, often sense in wine, And those are stupid who on water dine.

And Antiphanes says —

Take the hair, it well is written, Of the dog by whom you’re bitten. Work off one wine by his brother, And one labour with another; Horns with horns, and noise with noise, One crier with his fellow’s voice; Insult with insult, war with war, Faction with faction, care with care; Cook with cook, and strife with strife, Business with business, wife with wife.

The ancients applied the word ἄκρατον even to unmixed water. Sophron says —

Pour unmix’d water (ὕδωρ ἄκρατον) in the cup.

21. Phylarchus says that Theodorus the Larissæan was a water-drinker; the man, I mean, who was always so hostile to king Antigonus. He asserts also that all the Spaniards drink water, though they are the richest of all men, for they have the greatest abundance of gold and silver in their country. And he says, too, that they eat only once a day, out of stinginess, though they wear most expensive clothes. And Aristotle or Theophrastus speaks of a man named Philinus as never having taken any drink or solid food whatever, except milk alone, during the whole of his life. And Pythermus, in his account of the tyrants of Piræus, mentions Glaucon as having been a water-drinker. And Hegesander the Delphian says that Anchimolus and Moschus, sophists who lived in Elis, were water-drinkers all their lives; and that they ate nothing but figs, and for all that, were quite as healthy and vigorous as any one else; but that their perspiration had such an offensive smell, that every one avoided them at the baths. And Matris the Athenian, as long as he lived, ate nothing except a few myrtle-berries each day, and abstained from wine and every other kind of drink except water. Lamprus, too, the musician, was a water-drinker, concerning whom Phrynichus says, “that the gulls lamented, when Lamprus died among them, being a man who was a water-drinker, a subtle hypersophist, a dry skeleton of the Muses, an ague to nightingales, a hymn to hell.” And Machon the comic poet mentions Moschion as a water-drinker.

22. But Aristotle, in his book on Drunkenness, says, that some men who have been fond of salt meat have yet not had their thirst stimulated by it; of whom Archonides the Argive was one. And Mago the Carthaginian passed three times through the African desert eating dry meal and never drinking. And Polemo the Academic philosopher, from the time that he was thirty years of age to the day of his death, never drank anything but water, as is related by Antigonus the Carystian. And Demetrius the Scepsian says that Diocles of Peparethus drank cold water to the day of his death. And Demosthenes the orator, who may well be admitted as a witness in his own case, says that he drank nothing but water for a considerable length of time. And Pytheas says, “But you see the demagogues of the present day, Demosthenes and Demades, how very differently they live. For the one is a water-drinker, and devotes his nights to contemplation, as they say; and the other is a debauchee, and is drunk every day, and comes like a great potbellied fellow, as he is, into our assemblies.” And Euphorion the Chalcidean writes in this way:— “Lasyrtas the Lasionian never required drink as other men do, and still it did not make him different from other men. And many men, out of curiosity, were careful to watch him, but they desisted before they ascertained what was the truth. For they continued watching him for thirty days together in the summer season, and they saw that he never abstained from salt meat, and yet that, though drinking nothing, he seemed to have no complaint in his bladder. And so they believed that he spoke the truth. And he did, indeed, sometimes take drink, but still he did not require it.

A change of meat is often good, And men, when tired of common food, Redoubled pleasure often feel, When sitting at a novel meal.

23. The king of Persia, as Herodotus relates in his first book, drank no water, except what came from the river Choaspes, which flows by Susa. And when he was on a journey, he had numbers of four-wheeled waggons drawn by mules following him, laden with silver vessels containing this water, which was boiled to make it keep. And Ctesias the Cnidian explains also in what manner this water was boiled, and how it was put into the vessels and brought to the king, saying that it was the lightest and sweetest of all waters. And the second king of Egypt, he who was surnamed Philadelphus, having given his daughter Berenice in marriage to Antiochus the king of Syria, took the trouble to send her water from the river Nile, in order that his child might drink of no other river, as Polybius relates. And Heliodorus tells us, that Antiochus Epiphanes, whom Polybius calls Epimanes,[60] on account of his actions, mixed the fountain at Antioch with wine; a thing which Theopompus relates to have been also done by the Phrygian Midas, when he wished to make Silenus drunk in order to catch him. And that fountain is, as Bion relates, between the Mædi and the Pæonians, and is called Inna. But Staphylus says, that Melampus was the first who invented the idea of mixing wine with water. And Plistonicus says that water is more digestible than wine.

24. Now men who drink hard before eating, are usually not very comfortable in their digestion, which are apt to get out of order by such a system, and what they eat often turns sour on the stomach. So that a man who has a regard for his health, ought to take regular exercise, for the sake of promoting frequent perspiration; and he ought also to use the bath regularly for the sake of moistening and relaxing his body. And besides this, and before he bathes, he should drink water, as being an excellent thing, — drinking warm water usually in winter and spring, and cold water in summer, in order not to weaken the stomach. But he should only drink in moderation before the bath or the gymnasium, for the sake of diffusing what he drinks throughout his system beforehand, and in order to prevent the unmixed strength of wine from having too much effect on his extremities. And if any one thinks it too much trouble to live on this system, let him take sweet wine, either mixed with water or warmed, especially that which is called πρότροπος, the sweet Lesbian wine, as being very good for the stomach.

Now sweet wines do not make the head heavy, as Hippocrates says in his book on Diet, which some entitle, “The Book on Sharp Pains;” others, “The Book on Barleywater;” and others, “The Book against the Cnidian Theories.” His words are: “Sweet wine is less calculated to make the head heavy, and it takes less hold of the mind, and passes through the bowels easier than other wine.” But Posidonius says, that it is not a good thing to pledge one’s friends as the Carmani do; for they, when at their banquets they wish to testify their friendship for each other, cut the veins on their faces, and mingle the blood which flows down with the liquor, and then drink it; thinking it the very extremest proof of friendship to taste one another’s blood. And after pledging one another in this manner, they anoint their heads with ointment, especially with that distilled from roses, and if they cannot get that, with that distilled from apples, in order to ward off the effects of the drink, and in order also to avoid being injured by the evaporation of the wine; and if they cannot get ointment of apples, they then use that extracted from the iris or from spikenard, so that Alexis very neatly says —

His nose he anoints, and thinks it plain ’Tis good for health with scents to feed the brain.

25. But one ought to avoid thick perfumes, and to drink water which is thin and transparent, and which in respect of weight is light, and which has no earthy particles in it. And that water is best which is of a moderate heat or coldness, and which, when poured into a brazen or silver vessel, does not produce a blackish sediment. Hippocrates says, “Water which is easily warmed or easily chilled is always lighter.” But that water is bad which takes a long time to boil vegetables; and so too is water full of nitre, or brackish. And in his book upon Waters, Hippocrates calls good water drinkable; but stagnant water he calls bad, such as that from ponds or marshes. And most spring-water is rather hard. But Erasistratus says that some people test water by weight, and that is a most stupid proceeding. “For just look,” says he, “if men compare the water from the fountain Amphiaraus with that from the Eretrian spring, though one of them is good and the other bad, there is absolutely no difference in their respective weights.” And Hippocrates, in his book on Places, says that those waters are the best which flow from high ground, and from dry hills, “for they are white, and sweet, and are able to bear very little wine, and are warm in winter and cold in summer.” And he praises those most, the springs of which break towards the east, and especially towards the north-east, for they must inevitably be clear, and fragrant, and light. Diocles says that water is good for the digestion, and not apt to cause flatulency, that it is moderately cooling, and good for the eyes, and that it has no tendency to make the head feel heavy, and that it adds vigour to the mind and body. And Praxagoras says the same; and he also praises rain-water. But Euenor praises water from cisterns, and says that the best is that from the cistern of Amphiaraus, when compared with that from the fountain in Eretria.

26. But that water is undeniably nutritious is plain from the fact that some animals are nourished by it alone, as for instance, grasshoppers. And there are many other liquids which are nutritious, such as milk, barleywater, and wine. At all events, animals at the breast are nourished by milk; and there are many nations who drink nothing but milk. And it is said that Democritus, the philosopher of Abdera, after he had determined to rid himself of life on account of his extreme old age, and when he had begun to diminish his food day by day, when the day of the Thesmophorian festival came round, and the women of his household besought him not to die during the festival, in order that they might not be debarred from their share in the festivities, was persuaded, and ordered a vessel full of honey to be set near him: and in this way he lived many days with no other support than honey; and then some days after, when the honey had been taken away, he died. But Democritus had always been fond of honey; and he once answered a man, who asked him how he could live in the enjoyment of the best health, that he might do so if he constantly moistened his inward parts with honey, and his outward man with oil. And bread and honey was the chief food of the Pythagoreans, according to the statement of Aristoxenus, who says that those who eat this for breakfast were free from disease all their lives. And Lycus says that the Cyrneans (and they are a people who live near Sardinia) are very long-lived, because they are continually eating honey; and it is produced in great quantities among them.

27. When he says, men have adjourned the investigation into all such matters, he uses the word ἀνατιθέμενος instead of ἀναβαλλόμενος.

The word ἄνηστις is used in the same sense as νῆστις, i.e. fasting (just as we find στάχυς and ἄσταχυς) by Cratinus, when he says —

For you are not the first who’s come to supper After a lengthen’d fast,

And the word ὀξύπεινος is used by Diphilus for hungry —

I’m glad when those who set them up as wise, Are naked seen and hungry.

And Antiphanes says —

A.	At all events he’s one complaint,
	For he is hungry ever.
B.	The keen Thessalian race you paint,
	Who can be sated never.

And Eubulus says —

Then Zethus was advised to seek the plain, The holy plain of Thebes; for there men sell The cheapest loaves and cakes. Again advice came to the great Amphion, The sweet musician, pointing out to him The famous Athens for his resting-place. Whose sons at hunger ne’er repine, but feed On air and sweetest hopes.

28. The word μονοσιτῶν, eating once a day, occurs too in Alexis —

When you meet with a man who takes only one meal, Or a poet who music pretends not to feel; The man half his life, the bard half his art, loses; And sound reason to call either living refuses.

And Plato says, “he not only was not content with one meal a-day, but sometimes he even dined twice the same day.”

We know that men used to call sweetmeats νωγαλεύματα. Araros says in the Campylion —

These νωγαλείματα are very nice.

And Alexis says —

In Thasian feasts his friends he meets, And νωγαλίζει, sweatmeats eats.

And Antiphanes, in the Busiris, says —

Grapes, and pomegranates, and palms, And other νώγαλα.

Philonides used the word ἀπόσιτος for fasting; and Crobylus has the word αὐτόσιτος, writing παράσιτον, αὐτόσιτον.

Eupolis, too, used ἀναρίστητος for without breakfast; Crates has the word ἀναγκόσιτος, eating by force, and Nicostratus uses ἀναγκοσιτέω.

There is a youth most delicately curl’d, Whom I do feed by force beneath the earth.

And Alexis has the word ἀριστόδειπνον, breakfast-dinner —

By whom the breakfast-dinner is prepared.

29. After this we rose up and sat down again as each of us pleased, not waiting for a nomenclator to arrange us in order.

Now that rooms were fitted up with couches for three, and with couches for four, and for seven, and for nine, and for other successive numbers, in the time of the ancients, we may prove from Antiphanes, who says —

I bring you, since you are but three, To a room with equal couches.

And Phrynichus says —

One room had seven couches fine, While another boasted nine.

And Eubulus says —

A.	Place now a couch for seven.
B.	Here it is.
A.	And five Sicilian couches.
B.	Well, what next
A.	And five Sicilian pillows.

And Amphis says —

Will you not place a couch for three?

Anaxandrides —

A couch was spread, And songs to please the aged man. Open the supper rooms, and sweep the house, And spread the couches fair, and light the fire; Bring forth the cups, and fill with generous wine.

30. . . . . . And Plato the philosopher, “Men now distinguish the couches and coverings with reference to what is put round the couch and what is put under it.” And his namesake, the comic poet, says —

There the well-dress’d guests recline On couches rich with ivory feet; And on their purple cushions dine, Which rich Sardinian carpets meet.

For the art of weaving embroidered cloths was in great perfection in his time, Acesas and Helicon, natives of Cyprus, being exceedingly eminent for their skill in it; and they were weavers of very high reputation. And Helicon was the son of Acesas, as Hieronymus reports: and so at Pytho there is an inscription on some work —

Fair Venus’s isle did bring forth Helicon, Whose wondrous work you now do gaze upon; And fair Minerva’s teaching bade his name And wondrous skill survive in deathless fame.

And Pathymias the Egyptian was a man of similar renown.

Ephippus says —

Place me where rose-strewn couches fill the room, That I may steep myself in rich perfume.

Aristophanes says —

Oh you who press your mistress to your arms, All night upon sweet-scented couches lying.

Sophron too speaks of coverlets embroidered with figures of birds as of great value. And Homer, the most admirable of all poets, calls those cloths which are spread below λῖτα, that is to say, white, neither dyed nor embroidered. But the coverlets which are laid above he calls “beautiful purple cloths.”

31. The Persians, according to the account of Heraclides, are the people who first introduced the system of having particular servants to prepare the couches, in order that they might always be elegantly arranged and well made. And on this account Artaxerxes, having a high esteem for Timagoras the Cretan, or, as Phanias the Peripatetic says, for Entimus the Gortinian, who went up to the king in rivalry of Themistocles, gave him a tent of extraordinary size and beauty, and a couch with silver feet; and he sent him also expensive coverlets, and a man to arrange them, saying that the Greeks did not know how to arrange a couch. And so completely had this Cretan gained the favour of the king, that he was invited to a banquet of the royal family, an honour which had never been paid to any Greek before, and never has been since; for it was reserved as an especial compliment for the king’s relations. Nor was this compliment paid to Timagoras the Athenian, who submitted to offer adoration to the king, and who was held in the highest honour by him, though some of the things which were set before the king were sent to him from the royal table. The king of Persia, too, once took a chaplet from off his head and dipped it in perfume, and sent it to Antalcidas the Lacedæmonian. But he did this too, and many similar things, to Entimus; also, and in addition to everything else, he invited him to a banquet of the royal family. And the Persians were very indignant at this, thinking that it was making such an honour too common, and also because they thought they were on the eve of another expedition against Greece. He sent him also a couch with silver feet, and cushions for it, and a flowered tent surmounted with a canopy, and a silver chair, and a gilt parasol, and some golden vessels inlaid with precious stones, and a hundred large vessels of silver, and silver bowls, and a hundred girls, and a hundred boys, and six thousand pieces of gold, besides what was allowed him for his daily expenses.

32. There were tables with ivory feet, the top slabs of which were made of maple wood. Cratinus says —

Fair girls await you, and a table Of highly polish’d dappled maple.

And when one of the Cynics used the word τρίπους, meaning a table, Ulpian got indignant and said, “To-day I seem to have trouble coming on me arising out of my actual want of business; for what does this fellow mean by his tripod, unless indeed he counts Diogenes’ stick and his two feet, and so makes him out to be a tripod? At all events every one else calls the thing which is set before us τράπεζα.”

Hesiod, in his poem on the marriage of Ceyx, (although indeed the sons of the Grammarians deny that that poem is his work, but I myself think that it is an ancient piece,) does call tables τρίποδες. And Xenophon, a most accomplished writer, in the second book of the Anabasis, writes—”Τρίποδες were brought in for every one, to the number of about twenty, loaded with ready carved meats.” And he goes on, “And these τράπεζαι were placed for the most part where the strangers sat.” Antiphanes says —

The τρίπους was removed, we wash’d our hands.

Eubulus says —

A. Here are five τρίποδες for you; here five more.

B. Why I shall be quinquagenarian.

Epicharmus says —

A.	And what is this?
B.	A τρίπους.
A.	How is that?
	Has it not four feet? ’tis a τετράπους.
B.	It may be strictly; but its name is τριπους.
A.	Still I can see four feet.
B.	At all events
	You are no Œdipus, to be so puzzled.

And Aristophanes says —

A.	Bring me one τράπεζα more,
	With three feet, not one with four.
B.	Where can I a τρίπους τράπεζα find?

33. It was a custom at feasts, that a guest when he had lain down should have a paper given to him, containing a bill of fare of what there was for dinner, so that he might know what the cook was going to serve up.

We find a fruit called Damascenes. Now many of the ancient writers mention Damascus, a city of great reputation and importance; and as there is a great quantity of plum-trees in the territory of the Damascenes, and as they are cultivated there with exceeding care, the tree itself has got to be called a Damascene, as being a kind of plum different from what is found in other countries. The fruit is more like prunes. And many writers speak of them, and Hipponax says —

I have a garland of damascenes and mint.

And Alexis says —

A.	And in my sleep I thought I saw a prize.
B.	What was it?
A.	Listen — There came up to me,
	While still within th’ arena’s spacious bounds,
	One of my rivals, bringing me a crown —
	A ripe revolving crown of damascenes.
B.	Oh Hercules! and were the damascenes ripe?

And again he says —

Did you e’er see a sausage toasted, Or dish of tripe well stuff’d and roasted? Or damascenes stew’d in rich confection? — Such was that gentleman’s complexion.

Nicander says —

The fruit they call a plum, the cuckoo’s prize.

But Clearchus the Peripatetic says that the Rhodians and Sicilians call plums βράβυλα, and so Theocritus the Syracusan uses the word —

Heavy with plums, the branches swept the ground.

And again he says —

Far as the apple doth the plum surpass.

But the damascene is smaller in circumference than other plums, though in flavour it is very like them, except that it is a little sharper. Seleucus, in his Dictionary, says that βράβυλα, ἦλα, κοκκύμηλα, and μάδρυα are all different names for the same thing; and that plums are called βράβυλα, as being good for the stomach, and βορὰν ἐκ βάλλοντα, that is, assisting to remove the food; and ἦλα, which is the same word as μῆλα, meaning simply fruit, as Demetrius Ixion says in his Etymology. And Theophrastus says, κοκκύμηλα καὶ σποδιάς: σποδιὰς being a kind of wild plum. And Araros calls the tree which bears the fruit κοκκυμηλέα, and the fruit itself κοκκύμηλον. And Diphilus of Siphnos pronounces plums to be juicy, digestible, and easily evacuated, but not very nutritious.

34. There is another fruit, called Cherries. — Theophrastus says, in his book on Plants, that the Cherry-tree is a tree of a peculiar character, and of large size, for it grows to a height of four-and-twenty cubits,[61] and its leaf is like that of the medlar, but somewhat harder and thicker, and its bark like the linden; its flower is white, like that of the pear or the medlar, consisting of a number of small petals of a waxy nature; its fruit is red, like that of the lotus in appearance, and of the size of a bean; but the kernel of the lotus is hard, while that of the cherry is soft. And again he says, “The κράταιγος, which some call κραταίγων, has a spreading leaf like a medlar, only that is larger, and wider, and longer; and it has no deep grain in it as the medlar has. The tree is neither very tall nor very large; the wood is variegated, yellow, and strong: it has a smooth bark, like that of the medlar; and a single root, which goes down very deep into the earth; the fruit is round, of the size of an olive; when fully ripe it is of a yellow colour, becoming gradually darker; and from its flavour and juice it might almost be taken for a wild medlar.” By which description of the cratægus it appears to me that he means the tree which is now called the cherry.

35. Asclepiades of Myrlea speaks of a tree which he calls the Ground-cherry, and says, “In the land of the Bithynians there is found the ground-cherry, the root of which is not large, nor is the tree, but like a rose-bush; in all other respects the fruit is like the common cherry; but it makes those who eat much of it feel heavy, as wine does, and it gives them head-aches.” These are the words of Asclepiades. And it appears to me that he is speaking of the arbutus. For the tree which bears the arbutus-berry answers his description, and if a man eats more than six or seven of the berries he gets a headache. Aristophanes says —

And planted by no hand, the arbutus Makes red the sunny hills.

Theopompus says —

The myrtle berries and red arbutus.

Crates says —

Beauteous the breast of tender maid, As arbutus or apples red.

And Amphis —

Mulberries you see, my friend, are found On the tree which we know as the mulberry; So the oak bears the acorn round, And the arbutus shines with its full berry.

And Theophrastus tells us, “The κόμαρος (as he calls it) is the tree which bears the arbutus berry.”

There is question about the “Agen,” a satyric drama, whether it was composed by Python, (and if by him whether he was a native of Catana or of Byzantium,) or by the king Alexander himself.

Then Laurentius says— “You, O Greeks, lay claim to a good many things, as either having given the names to them, or having been the original discoverers of them. But you do not know that Lucullus, the Roman general, who subdued Mithridates and Tigranes, was the first man who introduced this plant into Italy from Cerasus, a city of Pontus; and he it was who gave the fruit the Latin name of Cerasus, cherry, after the name of the city, as our historians relate.”

Then Daphnis answers— “But there was a very celebrated man, Diphilus of Siphnos, many years more ancient than Lucullus, for he was born in the time of king Lysimachus, (who was one of the successors of Alexander,) and he speaks of cherries, saying, ‘Cherries are good for the stomach, and juicy, but not very nutritious; if taken after drinking cold water they are especially wholesome; but the red and the Milesian are the best kinds, and are diuretic.’”

36. There is a fruit usually called the συκάμινον, which the people of Alexandria call the μόρον, in which they differ from every one else; but it has no connexion with the Egyptian fig, which some call συκόμορον, and which the natives scrape slightly with a knife, and then leave on the tree; and then when it has been tossed about by the wind, within three days it becomes ripe and fragrant, (especially if the wind is west,) and very good to eat, as there is something in it which is moderately cooling for people in a fever, when made up with oil of roses into a plaster, so as to be put upon the stomach, and it is no slight relief to the patient. Now the Egyptian sycaminus bears its fruit on the main stem, and not on the branches. But the sycaminus is a mulberry, a fruit mentioned by Æschylus in his Phrygians, where he says of Hector,

His heart was softer than a mulberry.

And in his “Cretan Women” he says of the brier —

As the full branch to earth is weigh’d With mulberries, white and black and red.

And Sophocles has the lines —

First you shall see the full white ear of corn, And then the large round rosy mulberry.

And Nicander in his Georgics says that it is the first of all fruits to appear; and he calls the tree which bears it μορέα, as also do the Alexandrians —

The mulberry-tree, in which the young delight, Brown autumn’s harbinger.

37. Phanias of Eresus, the pupil of Aristotle, calls the fruit of the wild sycamine μόρον, or mulberry, being a fruit of the greatest sweetness and delicacy when it is ripe. And he writes thus: “The mulberry is a briery sort of tree,[62] and when the round fruit is dried it has small pips of seed, woven in like net-work, and the fruit is nutritious and juicy.” And Parthanius has the following words:—”Ἅβρυνα, that is to say, συκάμινα, which some call mulberries.” And Salmonius calls the same tree βάτιον, or brier. And Demetrius Ixion says the συκάμινον and μόρον are the same, being a very juicy fruit, superior to the fig. And Diphilus of Siphnos, who was a physician, writes thus: “The συκάμινα, which are also called μόρα, are moderately full of good juice, but have not much nourishment; they are good for the stomach and easily digested; and those which are not quite ripe have a peculiar quality of expelling worms.” But Pythemus states, according to Hegesander, that in his time the mulberry-trees produced no fruit for twenty years, and that during that time gout became so epidemic, that not only men, but even boys and girls, and eunuchs, and women, were afflicted with it; and even herds of goats were attacked with it, so that two-thirds of the cattle were afflicted with the same disorder.

38. With respect to the word κάρυα, the Attic writers and all other prose writers call nearly all berries by the generic name of κάρυα, nuts. And Epicharmus calls the almond “the nut,” by way of distinction, as we do, saying —

We eat roast nuts, that is, almonds.

Philyllius says —

Eggs, nuts, almonds.

And Heracleon the Ephesian writes— “They called almonds κάρυα, and chestnuts, which we now call καστάνεια.” The tree itself is called κάρυα by Sophocles, who says —

(κάρυαι,) nut-trees and ash-trees.

And Eubulus speaks of

Beeches, nut-trees, Carystian nuts.

There are some kinds of nuts, too, which are called μόστηνα.

39. With respect to Almonds. — The Naxian almonds are mentioned by the ancient writers; and those in the island of Naxos are superior to all others, as I am well persuaded. Phrynichus says —

He knock’d out all my grinders, so that now A Naxian almond I can hardly crack.

The almonds in the island of Cyprus also are very excellent, and in comparison of those which come from other quarters, they are very long, and slightly bent at the end. And Seleucus in his Dictionary says, that the Lacedæmonians call soft nuts μύκηροι. And the Servians give that name to sweet nuts. But Arnexias says that it is the almond which is called μύκηρος. We may add, there is nothing which is a greater provocative of drinking than almonds when eaten before meals. Eupolis says in his Taxiarchs —

Give me some Naxian almonds to regale me, And from the Naxian vines some wine to drink.

For there was a vine called the Naxian vine.

And Plutarch of Chæronea says, that there was in the retinue of Drusus the son of Tiberius Cæsar, a certain physician who surpassed all men in drinking, and who was detected in always eating five or six bitter almonds before he drank. But when he was prevented from eating them he was not able to stand even a very limited quantity of wine; and the cause of this was the great power of the bitterness of the almond, which is of a very drying nature, and which has the quality of expelling moisture.

Herodian of Alexandria says, that almonds derive the name of ἀμύγδαλαι, because beneath their green bark they have many ἀμυχαὶ, or lacerations.

Philemon says somewhere or other —

You, like an ass, come to the husks of the dessert;

and Nicander, in the second book of his Georgics, says —

Beech-trees, the ornament of Pan.

We also find the word ἀμύγδαλον in the neuter gender. Diphilus says —

“Sweetmeats, myrtle-berries, cheese-cakes, almonds,”

using the neuter ἀμύγδαλα.

40. Now with respect to the pronunciation and accent of the word ἀμυγδάλη, Pamphilus thinks that there ought to be a grave accent when it means the fruit, as it is in the case of ἀμύγδαλον. But he wants to circumflex the word when it means the tree, thus, ἀμυγδαλῆ like ῥοδῆ. And Archilochus says —

The lovely flower of the rose-tree (ῥοδῆς).

But Aristarchus marks the word, whether it means the fruit or the tree, with an acute accent indifferently; while Philoxenus would circumflex the word in either sense. Eupolis says —

You’ll ruin me, I swear it by the almond.

Aristophanes says —

A.	Come, now, take these almonds,
	And break them
(B.	I would rather break your head,) with a stone.

And Phrynichus says —

The almond is a good cure for a cough.

And others speak of almonds as beautiful. But Tryphon in his book on Attic Prosody accents ἀμυγδάλη, when meaning the fruit, with a grave accent, which we use in the neuter as ἀμύγδαλον. But he writes ἀμυγδαλῆ, with a circumflex for the tree; it being as it were a possessive form derived from the fruit, and as such contracted and circumflexed.

Pamphilus in his Dictionary says that the μυκηρόβατον is called the nut-cracker by the Lacedæmonians, when they mean the almond-cracker; for the Lacedæmonians call almonds μούκηροι.

41. Nicander mentions also nuts of Pontus, which some writers call λόπιμα; while Hermonax and Timachidas, in the Dictionary, say that the acorn of Jupiter, or walnut, is what is called the nut of Pontus.

But Heraclides of Tarentum asks, “Whether sweetmeats ought to be put on the table before supper, as is done in some parts of Asia and Greece; or whether they ought to be brought on after supper is over.” If it is decided that they are to be brought on at the end of supper, then it follows, that when a great deal of food has already been put into the stomach and bowels, the nuts which are eaten afterwards as provocatives of drinking, get entangled with the rest of the food, and produce flatulence, and also cause what has been eaten to turn on the stomach, because it is followed by what is by nature unmanageable and indigestible; and it is from such food that indigestions and attacks of diarrhœa arise.

42. Diocles asserts that almonds are nutritious and good for the stomach, and that they have a heating effect because they contain something like millet; but green almonds are less likely to have an injurious effect than dry ones; and almonds soaked in water have such an effect less than those which are not soaked; and when toasted less than when raw. But walnuts, which are also called nuts of Heraclea, and acorns of Jupiter, are not indeed so nutritious as almonds, but still they have something like millet in them, and something apt to rise to the surface; so, if they are eaten in any quantity they make the head feel heavy; they, however, are less likely to produce injurious effects when green than when dry.

Persian nuts too are as apt to produce headaches as the acorns of Jupiter; but they are more nutritious, though they make the throat and mouth feel rough; but when they are roasted they are less injurious, and when eaten with honey, they are the most digestible of all nuts. The broad Persian nuts have the greatest tendency to produce flatulence; but when boiled they are less injurious than when raw, or even when roasted. But Philotimus in his treatises on Nourishment says, “The broad nut, and that which is called the Sardinian nut, are both exceedingly indigestible when raw, and are very slow in dissolving in the stomach, as they are kept down by the phlegm in the stomach, and as they themselves are of an astringent nature. The Pontic nut too is oily and indigestible; but the almond is not so indigestible as that, and accordingly if we eat a number of them we do not feel any inconvenience; and they appear more oily, and give out a sweet and oily juice.”

Diphilus of Siphnos says— “There is a nut called the Royal nut, which causes severe headaches, and keeps rising in the stomach; and there are two sorts of them, one of which, that which is tender and white, is the more juicy and the better; but that which is roasted in ovens is not nutritious. Almonds have a tendency to make people thin, and are diuretic and cathartic, and far from nutritious; and the dry ones are far more apt to produce flatulence and are far more indigestible than the green ones, which do not give much juice, and which are not very nutritious; but those which are tender, and full, and white, being like milk, are more full of wholesome juice. And the Thasian and Cyprian nuts, being tender, are far more easily digested than dry ones. The nuts of Pontus are apt to produce headaches, but still they are not so indigestible as the Royal nuts.”

43. Moreover, Mnesitheus the Athenian, in his book on Comestibles, says, “The digestion of Eubœan nuts or chestnuts (for they are called by both names) is very difficult for the stomach, and is attended with a great deal of flatulence. And they are apt to thicken the juice, and to make people fat, unless their constitution is strong enough to neutralise them. But almonds, and likewise the nuts of Heraclea, and the Persian nuts, and all others of the same sort, are still worse than these: and it is desirable to touch absolutely none whatever of these things unless they are first cooked by fire; with the exception of, perhaps, the green almonds. But one should boil some of them, and roast others; for some of them are of an oily nature, as the dry almonds and the acorns of Jupiter; but some are hard and harsh, as the nuts of the beech and all that kind. And from the oily sorts the action of the fire extracts the oil, which is the worst part of them: but those which are hard and harsh are softened, and, so to say, ripened, if any one cooks them over a small and gentle fire.”

But Diphilus calls chestnuts also Sardinian acorns, saying that they are very nutritious, and full of excellent juice; but not very easy of digestion, because they remain a long time in the stomach; that, however, when they are roasted they are less nutritious, but more digestible; and that when boiled they are less apt to produce flatulence than the others, and more nutritious.

It is easily peel’d, and the Eubœans Call it a nut, but some people have call’d it an acorn,

says Nicander the Colophonian, in his Georgics. But Agelochus calls chestnuts ἄμωτα, and says, “Where the Sinopean nuts are produced the natives call the trees which produce them ἄμωτα.”

44. With respect to Vetches. — Crobylus says —

They took a green vetch, And toss’d it empty, as if playing cottabus. These are the sweetmeats of the wretched monkey.

And Homer says —

Black beans spring up, or vetches.

Xenophanes the Colophonian says, in his Parodies —

These are what one should talk of near the fire, In winter season, on soft couch reclined, After a plenteous meal, drinking rich wine, And eating vetches.[63] Then a man may ask, “Who are you? How old are you, my friend? How many years old were you when the Mede came?”

And Sappho says —

Golden vetches on the sea-shore grew.

But Theophrastus, in his book on Plants, calls some kinds of vetches κρεῖοι. And Sophilus says —

This maiden’s sire is far the greatest man, A regular κρεῖος vetch.

And Phænias says, in his book about Plants,— “While they are green and tender, the bean and vetch take the place of sweetmeats; but when they are dry they are usually eaten boiled or roasted.” Alexis says —

My husband is a poor old man, and I Am an old woman, and I have a daughter And a young son, And this good girl besides — we’re five in all — And three of them are now at supper, And we two who here remain share with them A little maize; and when we have nothing To eat, we utter a wail unsuited to the lyre. And as we never have any meat for dinner, Our countenance is become pale. These are the parts, And this is the arrangement of our life: Beans, lupins, cabbages, rape, Pulse, morepulse, mastnuts, onions, Grasshoppers, vetches, wild pears, And that which was given by my mother As an object of devout care, the fig, The great invention of the Phrygian fig.

Pherecrates says —

You must at once take care and make the vetches tender.

And in another place he says —

He was choked eating roasted vetches.

And Diphilus says— “Vetches are very indigestible, create moisture, they are also diuretic, and apt to cause flatulence.” And according to Diocles, they produce a sort of fermentation in the body. The white vetches are better than the black; and so also are the yellow or box-coloured. And the Milesian are better than those called κρεῖοι; and the green are better than the dry, and those which have been soaked are better than those which have not been. The discoverer of the vetch is said to have been Neptune.

45. With respect to Lupins. Alexis says —

A curse upon the man; Let him not come near me, who eats lupins in season, And then leaves the husks and shells in the vestibule. Why was he not choked while eating them? I know, I know most certainly, that Cleænetus the tragedian Did not eat them. For Cleænetus Never threw away the husk of a single vegetable, So exceedingly economical is that man.

And Lycophron of Chalcis, in a satiric drama which he wrote against Menedemus the philosopher, for the purpose of turning him into ridicule, (it was from Menedemus that the sect of the Eretrians derived its name,) laughs at the suppers of the philosophers, and says —

The lupin, common to all the people, in great plenty Danced upon the board, the companion of poor couches.

And Diphilus says —

There is no business more mischievous or degrading Than that of the pander. I would rather walk along the streets selling Roses, and radishes, and lupin-beans, and press’d olives, And anything else in the world, rather than give encouragement To such a miserable trade.

And you may observe, that he then uses the expression θερμοκύαμοι, lupin-beans, as they are called even now. Polemo says, that the Lacedæmonians call lupins λυσιλαΐδες. And Theophrastus, in his book about The Causes of Plants, tells us that the lupin, and the bitter vetch, and the common vetch, are the only kinds of green vegetable which do not produce animal life, because of their harshness and bitterness. But the vetch, says he, turns black as it decays. He says, also, that caterpillars come in vetches, and it is in the fourth book of the same treatise that he states this. Diphilus the Siphnian writer says that lupins are very apt to create moisture, and are very nutritious, especially those kinds which are rendered sweet by being soaked. On which account Zeno the Citiæan, a man of harsh disposition and very apt to get in a passion with his friends, when he had taken a good deal of wine, became sweet-tempered and gentle; and when people asked him what produced this difference in his disposition, he said, that he was subject to the same influences as lupins: for that they before they were cooked were very bitter; but that when they had been steeped in liquor they were sweet and wholesome.

46. With respect to Kidney Beans. — The Lacedæmonians in those suppers of theirs, which they call κοπίδες, give as sweetmeats, dry figs and beans, and green kidney beans. At least this is the statement of Polemo; and Epicharmus says —

Roast some kidney beans quickly, for Bacchus is fond of them.

And Demetrius says —

A fig, or kidney bean, or some such thing.

47. With respect to Olives. Eupolis says —

Cuttle-fish, and olives fallen from the tree.

And these the Romans call dryptæ. But Diphilus the Siphnian writer says that olives contain very little nourishment, and are apt to give headaches; and that the black ones are still worse for the stomach, and make the head feel heavy; but that those which we call κολυμβάδες, that is to say, preserved in pickle, are better for the stomach, and give strength to the bowels. But that the black when crushed are better for the stomach. Aristophanes too makes mention of crushed olives in “The Islands,” saying —

Bring some crushed olives;

and in another place he says —

Crush’d olives and pickled olives are not the same thing;

and a few lines after —

For it is better that they should be crush’d than pickled.

And Archestratus says, in his Gastronomy —

Let wrinkled olives, fallen from the tree, Be placed before you.

And Hermippus says —

Be sure that for the future you remember The ever-glorious Marathon for good, When you do all from time to time add μάραθον (that is to say, fennel) to your pickled olives.

And Philemon says— “The inferior olives are called πιτυρίδες, and the dark-coloured are called στεμφυλίδες.” And Callimachus, in his “Hecale,” gives a regular catalogue of the different kinds of olive —

Γεργέριμος and πίτυρις, and the white olive, which does not Become ripe till autumn, which is to float in wine.

And according to Didymus, they called both olives and figs which had fallen to the ground of their own accord, γεργέριμοι. Besides, without mentioning the name “olive,” the fruit itself was called by that name δρυπετὴς, without any explanatory addition. Teleclides says —

He urged me to remain, and eat with him Some δρυπετεῖς, and some maize, and have a chat with him.

But the Athenians called bruised olives στέμφυλα; and what we call στέμφυλα they called βρύτεα, that is to say, the dregs of the grapes after they have been pressed. And the word βρῦτος is derived from βότρυς, a bunch of grapes.

48. With respect to Radishes. — The Greek name ῥαφανὶς is derived from ῥᾳδίως φαίνεσθαι, because they quickly appear above ground; and in the plural the Attic writers either shorten or lengthen the penultima at pleasure. Cratinus writes —

Ταῖς ῥαφανῖσι δοκεῖ, it is like radishes, but not like other vegetables;

and Eupolis, on the other hand, says —

Ῥαφανίδες ἄπλυτοι, unwashed radishes and cuttle-fish.

For the word ἄπλυτοι, unwashed, must clearly refer to the radishes, and not to the cuttle-fish; as is shown by Antiphanes, in whom we find these lines: —

To eat ducks, and honeycombs of wild bees, and eggs, And cheese-cakes, and unwash’d radishes, And rape, and oatmeal-groats, and honey.

So that radishes appear to have been particularly called unwashed radishes; being probably the same as those called Thasian. Pherecrates says —

There one may have the unwash’d radish, and the warm Bath, and closely stewed pickles, and nuts.

And Plato, in his Hyperbolus, says, using the diminutive termination, φύλλιον ἢ ῥαφανίδιον, “a leaflet, or a little radish.” But Theophrastes, in his book on Plants, says that there are five kinds of radishes: the Corinthian, the Leiothasian, the Cleonæan, the Amorean, and the Bœotian; and that the Bœotian, which is of a round form, is the sweetest. And he says that, as a general rule, those the leaves of which are smooth, are the sweetest. But Callias used the form ῥάφανος for ῥάφανις; at all events, when discussing the antiquity of comedy, he says, “Broth, and sausages, and radishes (ῥάφανοι), and fallen olives, and cheese-cakes.” And indeed that he meant the same as what we call ῥαφανίδες, is plainly shown by Aristophanes, who in the Danaïdes alludes to such old forms, and says —

And then the chorus used to dance, Clad in worsted-work and fine clothes; And bearing under their arms ribs of beef, And sausages, and radishes.

And the radish is a very economical kind of food. Amphis says —

Whoever, when purchasing food, When it is in his power, O Apollo, to buy genuine fish, Prefers buying radishes, is downright mad!

49. With respect to Pine-cones. — Mnesitheus, the Athenian physician, in his book on Comestibles, calls the husks of the pine-cones ὀστρακίδες, and in another place he calls them κῶνοι. But Diocles of Carystus calls them πιτüίνα κάρυα, nuts of the pine-tree. And Alexander the Myndian calls them πιτυΐνους κώνους. And Theophrastus calls the tree πεύκη, and the fruit κῶνος. But Hippocrates, in his book on Barley-water, — (one half of which is considered spurious by everybody, and some people reckon the whole so,) — calls the fruit κόκκαλοι; but most people call it πυρῆνες: as Herodotus does, in speaking of the Pontic nut. For he says, “And this has πυρῆνα (a kernel), when it becomes ripe.” But Diphilus the Siphnian says, “Pine-cones” (which he calls στρόβιλοι) “are very nutritious, and have a tendency to soften the arteries, and to relieve the chest, because they have some resinous qualities contained in them.” While Mnesitheus says that they fill the body with fat, and are very free from all hindrances to the digestion; and, moreover, that they are diuretic, and that they are free from all astringent tendencies.

50. Now with respect to Eggs. — Anaxagoras, in his book on Natural Philosophy, says that what is called the milk of the bird is the white which is in the eggs. And Aristophanes says —

In the first instance, night brings forth a wind egg.

Sappho dissolves the word ὦον into a trisyllable, making it ὤïον, when she says —

They say that formerly Leda found an egg.

And again she says —

Far whiter than an egg:

in each case writing ὤïον. But Epicharmus spelt the word ὤεα; for so we find the line written —

The eggs of geese and other poultry.

And Simonides, in the second book of his Iambics, says —

Like the egg of a Mæandrian goose;

which he, too, writes ὤεον. But Alexandrides lengthens the word into a quadrisyllable, and calls it ὠάριον. And so does Ephippus, when he says —

And little casks of good wine made of palms, And eggs, and all other trifles of that kind.

And Alexis, somewhere or other, uses the expression, “hemispheres of eggs.” And wind eggs they called ἀνεμιαῖα, and also ὑπηνέμια. They called also the upper chambers of houses which we now call ὑπερῶον, ὦον; and accordingly Clearchus says, in his “Erotics,” that Helen, from having been born and brought up in a chamber of this sort, got the character, with a great many people, of having been born of an egg (ὠοῦ). And it was an ignorant statement of Neocles of Crotona, that the egg fell from the moon, from which Helen was born: for that women under the influence of the moon bring forth eggs, and that those who are born from such eggs are fifteen times as large as we are: as Herodotus of Heraclea also asserts. And Ibycus, in the fifth book of his Melodies, says of the Molionidæ —

And they slew the two young Molions, youths alike in face, Borne on white horses; of the same age; and Alike, too, in all their limbs, for both were born On one day, from one single silver egg.

And Ephippus says —

Cakes made of sesame and honey, sweetmeats, Cheese-cakes, and cream-cakes, and a hecatomb Of new-laid eggs, were all devour’d by us.

And Nicomachus makes mention of such eggs —

For when my father had left me a very little property, I scraped it so, and got the kernel out of it In a few months, as if I had been a boy sucking an egg.

And Eriphus makes mention of goose’s eggs —

Just see how white and how large these eggs are; These must be goose eggs, as far as I can see.

And he says, that it was eggs like this which were laid by Leda. But Epænetus and Heraclides the Syracusan, in their book on Cookery, say that the best of all eggs are peacock’s eggs; and that the next best are those of the foxgoose; and the third best are those of common poultry.

51. Now let us speak of provocatives to appetite, called Πρόπομα. — When they were brought round by the butler, Ulpian said, “Does the word πρόπομα occur in any ancient author in the sense in which we use it now?” and when every one joined in the question, “I will tell you,” said Athenæus; “Phylarchus the Athenian, (though some called him a native of Naucratis,) in the book where he speaks of Zelas the king of the Bithynians, who invited to supper all the leaders of the Galatians, and then plotted against them, and was killed himself also, says, if I recollect his words rightly, ‘A certain πρόπομα was brought round before supper, as was the custom of antiquity.’” And when Ulpian had said this, he asked for something to drink from the wine-cooler, saying, that he was in good humour with himself for having been able to remember this so very à propos. But there were things of all sorts, says Athenæus, used in these πρόποματα.

52. With respect to Mallows, Hesiod says —

Nor do men know how great may be the good Derived from asphodel and mallow food.

Μαλάχη is the Attic name for mallow. But I, says Athenæus, have found in many of the copies of the Minos of Antiphanes the word spelt with an ο; for instance, he speaks of men —

Eating the root of mallow (μολόχης).

And Epicharmus has —

I am milder than the mallow (μολόχης).

And Phanias says, in his book on Plants— “The seminal portions of the cultivated mallow are called ‘the cheese-cake,’ as being like a cheese-cake. For those pistils which are like the teeth of a comb have some resemblance to the edge of a cheese-cake; and there is a bosslike centre, like that in the middle of a cheese-cake. And the whole circumference of the rim is like the sea-fish denominated the sea-urchin.” But Diphilus the Siphnian makes a statement, that the mallow is full of pleasant and wholesome juice; having a tendency to smooth the arteries, separating from them the harshnesses of the blood by bringing them to the surface. And he adds that the mallow is of great service in irritations of the kidneys and the bladder, and that it is very tolerably digestible and nutritious. And moreover, that the wild mallow is superior to that which grows in a garden. But Hermippus, the follower of Callimachus, in his treatise on the Seven Wise Men, says that mallows are put in what he calls the ἄλιμον, that is to say, the preventive against hunger, and into the ἄδιψον, that is, the preventive against thirst; and that it is a very useful ingredient in both.

53. The next thing to be mentioned are Gourds. — Euthydemus, the Athenian, in his book on Vegetables, calls the long gourd, known as κολοκύντη, the Indian gourd; and it is called Indian because the seed was originally introduced from India. But the people of Megalopolis call the same the Sicyonian gourd. Theophrastus however says, that of the kind called κολοκύντη, there is not one species or genus only, but several, some better, some worse. While Menodorus, the follower of Erasistratus, the friend of Icesius, says, “Of the long gourds there is the Indian, which is the same which we call σικύα, and which is vulgarly called the κολοκύντη. Now the Indian gourd is usually boiled, but that called κολοκύντη is usually roasted.” And even to the present day the κολόκυνται are called by the Cnidians Indian gourds; while the people of the Hellespont call the long gourds σίκυαι, and the round gourds κολόκυνται. But Diocles states that the best round gourds are those grown near Magnesia; and, moreover, that the rape grown in that district runs to an exceedingly large size, and is sweet, and good for the stomach. He says, at the same time, that the best cucumbers are grown at Antioch, the best lettuce at Smyrna and Galatea, and the best rue at Myra. Diphilus says, “The gourd is far from nutritious, easily digested, apt to produce moisture in the skin, promotes the secretions of the body, and is full of agreeable and wholesome juice; but it is still more juicy when cooked. Its alterative qualities are increased when it is eaten with mustard, but it is more digestible, and it promotes the secretions more, when boiled.

Mnesitheus too says, “All the vegetables and fruits which are easily affected by the action of fire, such as the cucumber, and the gourd, and the quince, and the small quince, and everything else of the same sort, when they are eaten after having been roasted, afford nutriment to the body, in no great quantity indeed, but still such as is pleasant and promotes moisture. However all these vegetables and fruits have a tendency to produce constipation, and they ought to be eaten boiled rather than raw. But the Attic writers call the gourd by no other name but κολοκύντη. Hermippus says —

What a huge head he has; it is as big as a gourd!

And Phrynichus, using the diminutive, says —

Will you have a little maize (μάζιον) or gourd (κολοκύντιον)?

And Epicharmus says —

That is much more wholesome than a gourd (κολοκύντη)

54. And Epicrates the comic poet writes —

A.	What now is Plato doing?
	The grave Speusippus too and Menedemus?
	In what are they now spending all their time?
	What care is theirs, and what their conversation?
	What is their subject of deliberation?
	Tell me, I beg of you, by the mighty Terra,
	In learned language, if at least you know.
B.	Indeed, I can inform you most exactly.
	For at the great Panathenaic feast,
	I saw a company of youths assembled
	Within the schools of the old Academy,
	And heard some strange and marvellous assertions.
	For they were nature’s mysteries discussing,
	Drawing distinctions subtle ‘tween the life
	Of animated things, both men and beasts,
	And that of trees and all the race of herbs.
	And then, while occupied in these discussions
	They turned to gourds their deep investigations,
	Asking their species and their character.
A.	And to what sage conclusion did they come?
	What was their definition, of what genus
	Did they decide this plant to be, my friend?
	I pray you tell ’em, if you know at least.
B.	At first they all stood silent for a while,
	And gazed upon the ground and knit their brows
	In profound solemn meditation:
	Then on a sudden, while the assembled youths
	Were stooping still considering the matter,
	One said a gourd was a round vegetable;
	But others said it was a kind of grass;
	While others class’d it as a sort of tree.
	On hearing this, a certain old physician
	Coming from Sicily interrupted them
	As but a pack of triflers. They were furious,
	Greatly enraged, and all most loudly cried
	With one accord, that he insulted them;
	For that such sudden interruptions
	To philosophical discussion
	Were ill-bred and extremely unbecoming.
	And then the youths thought no more of the gourd.
	But Plato, who was present, mildly said,
	Not being at all excited by what pass’d,
	That the best thing that they could do would be
	The question to resume of the gourd’s nature.
	They would not hear him, and adjourn’d the meeting.

55. Alexis, that most witty poet, sets an entire course of πρόπομα before those who can understand him —

I came without perceiving it on a place Which was exceedingly convenient. Water was given me; and then a servant Entered, and bore a table for my use; On which was laid, not cheese, or tawny olives, Or any dainty side-dishes and nonsense, Which fill the room with scent, but have no substance; But there was set before me a huge dish Redolent of the Seasons and the joyful Hours — A sort of hemisphere of the whole globe. Everything there was beautiful and good: Fish, goats’ flesh, and a scorpion between them; Then there were eggs in half, looking like stars. On them we quickly laid our hands, and then Speaking to me, and giving me a nod, The host began to follow our example; So we’d a race, and never did I stop Till the whole dish was empty as a sieve.

56. With respect to Mushrooms. — Aristias says

The stony soil produced no mushrooms.

And Poliochus has the following passage —

Each of us twice a day received to eat Some small dark maize well winnow’d from the chaff, And carefully ground; and also some small figs. Meantime some of the party would begin And roast some mushrooms; and perhaps would catch Some delicate snails if ’twas a dewy morning, And vegetables which spontaneous grew. Then, too, we’d pounded olives; also wine Of no great strength, and no very famous vintage.

And Antiphanes says —

Our supper is but maize well fenced round With chaff, so as not to o’erstep the bounds Of well-devised economy. An onion, A few side-dishes, and a sow-thistle, A mushroom, or what wild and tasteless roots The place affords us in our poverty. Such is our life, not much exposed to fevers; For no one, when there’s meat, will eat of thyme, Not even the pupils of Pythagoras.

And a few lines afterwards he goes on —

For which of us can know the future, or The fate that shall our various friends befal? Take now these mushrooms and for dinner roast them, Which I’ve just picked beneath the maple shade.

Cephisodorus, the pupil of Isocrates, in the treatise which he wrote against Aristotle (and there are four books of it), reproaches the philosopher for not having thought it worth his while to collect proverbs, though Antiphanes had made an entire play which was called Proverbs: from which play he produces these lines —

For I, if I eat any of your dishes, Seem as if I was on raw mushrooms feeding, Or unripe apples, fit to choke a man.

57. Mushrooms are produced by the earth itself. But there are not many sorts of them which are good to eat; for the greater part of them produce a sensation of choking: on which account Epicharmus, when jesting, said —

You will be choked, like those who waste away By eating mushrooms, very heating food.

And Nicander, in his Georgics, gives a list of which species are poisonous; and says —

Terrible evils oftentimes arise From eating olives, or pomegranates, or from the trees Of maple, or of oak; but worst of all Are the swelling sticky lumps of mushrooms.

And he says in another place —

Bury a fig-tree trunk deep in the ground, Then cover it with dung, and moisten it With water from an everflowing brook, Then there will grow at bottom harmless mushrooms; Select of them what’s good for food, and not Deserving of contempt, and cut the root off.

But all the rest of that passage is in a mutilated state. The same Nicander in the same play writes —

And there, too, you may roast the mushrooms, Of the kind which we call ἀμάνιται.

And Ephippus says —

That I may choke you as a mushroom would.

Eparchides says that Euripides the poet was once staying on a visit at Icarus, and that, when it had happened that a certain woman being with her children in the fields, two of them being full-grown sons and the other being an unmarried daughter, eat some poisonous mushrooms, and died with her children in consequence, he made this epigram upon them: —

O Sun, whose path is through th’ undying heaven, Have you e’er before seen a misery such as this? A mother, a maiden daughter, and two sons, All dying on one day by pitiless fate?

Diocles the Carystian, in the first book of his treatise on the Wholesomes, says, “The following things which grow wild should be boiled, — beetroot, mallow, sorrel, nettles, spinach, onions, leeks, orach, and mushrooms.

58. Then there is a plant called sium. And Speusippus, in the second book of his treatise on Things Similar, says that its leaf resembles the marsh parsley; on which account Ptolemy the Second, surnamed Euergetes, who was king of Egypt, insists upon it that the line in Homer ought to be written thus —

And around were soft meadows of sium or parsley;

for that it is σία which are usually found in company with parsley, and not ἴα (violets).

59. Diphilus says that mushrooms are good for the stomach, and pass easily through the bowels, and are very nutritious, but still that they are not very digestible, and that they are apt to produce flatulence. And that especially those from the island of Ceos have this character. “Many are even poisonous to a fatal degree. But those which seem to be wholesome are those with the smoothest rinds, which are tender and easily crushed: such as grow close to elms and pine-trees. But those which are unwholesome are of a dark colour, or livid, or covered with hard coats; and those too which get hard after being boiled and placed on the table; for such are deadly to eat. But the best remedy for them when eaten unawares is drinking honey-water, and fresh mead, and vinegar. And after such a drink the patient should vomit. On which account, too, it is especially desirable to dress mushrooms with vinegar, or honey and vinegar, or honey, or salt: for by these means their choking properties are taken away. But Theophrastus, in his treatise about Plants, writes thus— “But plants of this kind grow both under the ground and on the ground, like those things which some people call fungi, which grow in company with mushrooms; for they too grow without having any roots; but the real mushrooms have, as the beginning by which they adhere to the ground, a stalk of some length, and they put forth fibres from that stalk.” He says also that in the sea which is around the Pillars of Hercules, when there is a high tide, mushrooms grow on the shore close to high-water mark, which they say are left there by the sun. And Phænias says, in his first book about Plants— “But these things neither put forth any bloom, nor any trace of seminal germination; as, for instance, the mushroom, the truffle, groundivy, and fern.” And in another place he says, “Πτερὶς (fern), which some people call βλάχνον.” But Theophrastus, in his book on Plants, says— “Plants with smooth rinds, as the truffle, the mushroom, the fungus, the geranium.”

60. Now with respect to Truffles. — They too spring of their own accord out of the ground; especially in sandy places. And Theophrastus says of them— “The truffle, which some people call the geranium, and all other such plants which grow beneath the earth.” And in another place he says— “The generation and production of these things which seed beneath the earth; as, for instance, of the truffle, and of a plant which grows around Cyrene, which they call misy. And it appears to be exceedingly sweet, and to have a smell like that of meat; and so, too, has a plant called itum, which grows in Thrace. And a peculiarity is mentioned as incidental to these things; for men say that they appear when there is heavy rain in autumn and violent thunder; especially when there is thunder, as that is a more stimulating cause of them: however, they do not last more than a year, as they are only annuals; they are in the greatest perfection in the spring, when they are most plentiful. Not but what there are people who believe that they are or can be raised from seed. At all events, they say that they never appeared on the shore of the Mitylenæans, until after a heavy shower some seed was brought from Tiaræ; and that is the place where they are in the greatest numbers. But they are principally found on the sea-shore, and wherever the ground is sandy; and that is the character of the place called Tiaræ. They are also found near Lampsacus, and also in Acarnania, and Alopeconnesus, and in the district of the Eleans. Lynceus the Samian says— “The sea produces nettles, and the land produces truffles;” and Matron, the man who wrote parodies, says in his “Supper” —

And he brought oysters, the truffles of Thetis the Nereid.

Diphilus says that truffles are by nature indigestible, but that they are full of wholesome juice, and have lenitive qualities, and are very easily evacuated; though, like mushrooms, some of them are apt to produce suffocation. And Hegesander the Delphian says that no truffles are found in the Hellespont, and no fish of the kind called γλαυκίσκος, and no thyme. On which account Nausiclides said of the country, that it had no spring and no friends. But Pamphilus says, in his “Languages,” that there is a plant called ὑδνόφυλλον, being a species of grass which grows on the top of the truffles, by which the truffle is discovered.

61. With respect to Nettles — Ἀκαλήφη is the name given by the Attic writers to a plant which is herbaceous and which produces itching. Aristophanes says, in his Phœnissæ, “that pot-herbs were the first things which grew out of the earth; and after them the rough stinging-nettles.”

62. The next thing to be considered is Asparagus — which is divided into mountain asparagus and marsh asparagus; the best kinds of which are not raised from seed; but they are remedies for every kind of internal disorder. But those which are raised from seed grow to an immense size. And they say that in Libya, among the Gætuli, they grow of the thickness of a Cyprian reed, and twelve feet long; but that on the mountain land and on land near the sea they grow to the thickness of large canes, and twenty cubits long. But Cratinus writes the word, not ἀσπάραγος, but ἀσφάραγος, with a φ. And Theopompus says —

And then seeing the aspharagus in a thicket.

And Ameipsias says —

No squills, no aspharagus, no branches of bay-tree.

But Diphilus says, that of all greens, that sort of asparagus which is especially called the bursting asparagus, is better for the stomach, and is more easily digested; but that it is not very good for the eyes: and it is harsh-flavoured and diuretic, and injurious to the kidneys and bladder. But it is the Athenians who give it the name of bursting; and they also give the flowering cabbage, or cauliflower, the same name. Sophocles says, in The Huntsmen —

Then it puts forth a stalk, and never ceases The germination;

because it is continually bursting out and putting forth shoots. However, Antiphanes always spells the word ἀσπάραγος, with a π; and he writes thus —

The asparagus was shining; the pale vetches had faded.

And Aristophon says— “Capers, pennyroyal, thyme, asparagus, garlic; radishes, sage, and rue.”

63. With respect to Snails. — Philyllius says —

I am not a grasshopper, nor a snail, O woman.

And in a subsequent passage he says —

Sprats, tunny fish, and snails, and periwinkles.

And Hesiod calls the snail,

The hero that carries his house on his back.

And Anaxilas says —

You are e’en more distrustful than a snail; Who fears to leave even his house behind him.

And Achæus speaks of them, and says —

Can such a vapour strange produce The snails, those horned monsters?

And an enigma, like a fishing-net, having reference to the snail, is often proposed at banquets, in these terms —

What is that spineless bloodless beast of the woods, Who makes his path amid the humid waters.

And Aristotle, in the fifth book of his treatise on the Parts of Animals, says— “Snails appear to become pregnant in the autumn and in spring, and they are the only animals with coverings of shells that have ever been detected in union.” But Theophrastus says, in his treatise about Animals which live in Holes— “Snails live in holes during the winter, and still more in the summer, on which account they are seen in the greatest numbers during the autumn rains. But their holes in the summer are made upon the ground, and in the trees.” There are some snails which are called σέσιλοι. Epicharmus says —

Instead of all these animals, they have locusts; But I hate above all things the shell of the sesilus.

And Apellas relates that the Lacedæmonians call the snail σέμελος. But Apollodorus, in the second book of his Etymologies, says that there are some snails which are called κωλυσιδειπνοι, interrupters of banquets.

64. The next vegetable to be mentioned is Onions. — In the Amalthea of Eubulus, Hercules is represented as refusing to eat them; saying —

Whether it’s hot, or whether it is dry, Or whether it is something ‘tween the two, Are points of more importance than old Troy. But I have not come here to fill myself With cabbages, or benjamin, or other Impious and bitter danties, or with onions. But that which tends the most to vigorous strength And health is food which I delight in chiefly. Meat of beef, boil’d and fresh, and plenty of it, And a large well-filled dish of oxen’s feet, Three roasting pigs besides, sprinkled with salt.

Alexis, while explaining the efficacy of onions in aphrodisiac matters, says —

Pinnas, beetles, snails, muscles, eggs, calves’-feet, And many other philters, may be found More useful still to one who loves his mistress.

Xenarchus, in the Butalion, says —

A house is ruined which has a master Whose fortune’s gone, and whom the evil genius Has struck. And so the once great house of the Pelops Is weak and nerveless. Nor can earth-born onion, Fair Ceres’ handmaid, who contracts the neck, Even when boiled, assist to check this evil. Nor e’en the polypus, who swells the veins, Born in dark eddies of the deepest sea, When taken in the net of stern necessity By hungry mortals, fill the broad deep bosom Of the large dish turn’d by the potter’s wheel.

And Archestratus says —

I love not onions, nor yet cabbages, Nor the sweet barberry-tree, nor all the other Dainties and sweetmeats of the second course.

65. Heraclides the Tarentine, in his Banquet, says— “The onion, and the snail, and the egg, and similar things, appear to be productive of seed; not because they are very nutritious, but because their original natures are similar, and because their powers resemble that.” And Diphilus says— “Onions are difficult to digest, but very nutritious, and good for the stomach. And, moreover, they are productive of moisture, and cleansing, but they dim the eyes, and excite the amatory propensities. But the proverb says —

The onion will do you no good if you have no strength yourself.

But those onions which are called the royal onions, really do stimulate the amatory propensities, for they are superior to the other kinds; and next to them are the red ones. But the white ones, and the Libyan onions, are something like squills. But the worst of all are the Egyptian.

66. But the white onions, called βόλβιναι, are fuller of good juice than the common onions; but they are not so good for the stomach, because the white portion of them has a certain thickness in it. Yet they are very tolerably wholesome, because they have a good deal of harshness in them, and because they promote the secretions. And Matron, in his Parodies, mentions the βολβίνη —

But sowthistles I will not even name, Plants full of marrow, crown’d on th’ heads with thorns; Nor the white onions, minstrels of great Jove, Which his dear Child, incessant rain, has nourish’d Whiter than snow storms, and like meal to view, Which, when they first appeared, my stomach loved.

67. Nicander extols the onions of Megara. But Theophrastus, in the seventh book of his treatise on Plants, says— “In some places the onions are so sweet, that they are eaten raw, as they are in the Tauric Chersonesus.” And Phænias makes the same statement:— “There is,” says he, “a kind of onion which bears wool, according to Theophrastus; and it is produced on the sea-shore. And it has the wool underneath its first coat, so as to be between the outer eatable parts and the inner ones. And from this wool socks and stockings and other articles of clothing are woven.” And Phænias himself adopts the statement. “But the onion,” he continues, “of the Indians is hairy.” But concerning the dressing of onions, Philemon says —

Now if you want an onion, just consider What great expense it takes to make it good: You must have cheese, and honey, and sesame, Oil, leeks, and vinegar, and assafœtida, To dress it up with; for by itself the onion Is bitter and unpleasant to the taste.

But Heraclides the Tarentine, limiting the use of onions at banquets, says— “One must set bounds to much eating, especially of such things as have anything glutinous or sticky about them; as, for instance, eggs, onions, calves’ feet, snails, and such things as those: for they remain in the stomach a long time, and form a lump there, and check the natural moisture.”

68. Thrushes, too, and crowds of other birds, formed part of the dishes in the propomata. Teleclides says —

But roasted thrushes with sweet cheese-cakes served Flew of their own accord down the guests’ throats.

But the Syracusans call thrushes, not κίχλαι, but κίχηλαι. Epicharmus says —

The thrushes (κίχηλαι) fond of eating the olive.

And Aristophanes also, in his “Clouds,” mentions the same birds. But Aristotle asserts that there are three kinds of thrushes; the first and largest kind of which is nearly equal to a jay; and they call it also the ixophagus, since it eats the mistletoe. The next kind is like a blackbird in size, and they call them trichades. The third kind is less than either of the before-mentioned sorts, and is called illas, but some call it tylas, as Alexander the Myndian does. And this is a very gregarious species, and builds its nest as the swallow does.

There is a short poem, which is attributed to Homer, and which is entitled ἐπικιχλίδες, which has received this title from the circumstance of Homer singing it to his children, and receiving thrushes as his reward, — at least, this is the account given by Menæchmus, in his treatise on Artists.

69. There is a bird called the συκαλὶς, or figpecker. And Alexander the Myndian asserts— “One of the tits is called by some people elæus, and by others pirias; but when the figs become ripe, it gets the name of sycalis.” And there are two species of this bird, the sycalis and the μελαγκόρυφος, or blackcap. Epicharmus spells the word with two λλ, and writes συκαλλίδες. He speaks of beautiful συκαλλίδες: and in a subsequent passage he says —

And herons were there with their long bending necks, And grouse who pick up seed, and beautiful sycallides.

And these birds are caught at the season when figs are ripe. And it is more correct to spell the name with only one λ; but Epicharmus put in the second λ because of the metre.

70. There is a kind of finch, too, which was sometimes eaten, of which Eubulus says,

* * * * *

And Ephippus says, in his “Geryones” —

When ’twas the Amphidromian festival, When ’tis the custom to toast bits of cheese O’ the Chersonesus; and to boil a cabbage, Bedewed with shining oil; and eke to bake The breasts of fat and well-fed lambs; to pluck The feathers from the thrushes, doves and finches; And also to eat cuttle-fish with anchovies, And baskets of rich polypus to collect, And to drink many cups of unmixed wine.

71. Then, too, there are blackbirds. — Nicostratus or Philetærus says —

A.	What then shall I buy? Tell me, I pray you.
B.	Go not to more expense than a neat table;
	Buy a rough-footed hare; some ducklings too,
	As many as you like; thrushes, and blackbirds,
	And other small birds; there are many wild sorts.
A.	Yes, and they’re very nice.

Antiphanes also reckons starlings among the eatable birds, numerating them in the following list— “Honey, partridges, pigeons, ducks, geese, starlings, jays, rooks, blackbirds, quails, and pullets.”

You are asking of us for a history of everything, and you do not allow us to say a single thing without calling us to account for it. The word στρουθάριον (a little bird) is found in many other authors, and also in Eubulus. He says, “Take three or four partridges, and three hares, and as many small birds as you can eat, and goldfinches, and parrots, and finches, and nightjars, and whatever other birds of this kind you can come across.”

72. Swine’s brains, too, was a not uncommon dish. Philosophers used to forbid our eating these, saying that a person who partook of them might as well eat a bear, and would not stick at eating his father’s head, or anything else imaginable. And they said, that at all events none of the ancients had ever eaten them, because they were the seat of nearly all sensation. But Apollodorus the Athenian says, that none of the ancients ever even named the brain. And at all events Sophocles, in his Trachiniæ, where he represents Hercules as throwing Lichas into the sea, does not use the word ἐγκέφαλον, brains, but says λευκὸν μυελὸς, white marrow; avoiding a word which it was thought ill-omened to use: —

And from his hair he forces the white marrow, His head being burst asunder in the middle, And the blood flows:

though he had named all the rest of his limbs plainly enough. And Euripides, introducing Hecuba lamenting for Astyanax, who had been thrown down by the Greeks, says —

Unhappy child, how miserably have Your native city’s walls produced your death, And dash’d your head in pieces! Fatal towers, Which Phœbus builded! How did your mother oft Cherish those curly locks, and press upon them With never-wearied kisses! now the blood Wells from that wound, where the bones broken gape; But some things are too horrid to be spoken.

The lines too which follow these are worth stopping to consider. But Philocles does employ the word ἐγκέφαλον —

He never ceased devouring even the brains (ἐγκέφαλον).

And Aristophanes says —

I would be content To lose two membranes of the ἐγκέφαλον.

And others, too, use the word. So that it must have been for the sake of the poetical expression that Sophocles said “white marrow.” But Euripides not choosing openly to display to sight an unseemly and disgusting object, revealed as much as he chose. And they thought the head sacred, as is plain by their swearing by it; and by their even venerating sneezes, which proceed from the head, as holy. And we, to this day, confirm our arrangements and promises by nodding the head. As the Jupiter of Homer says —

Come now, and I will nod my head to you.

73. Now all these things were put into the dishes which were served up as propomata: pepper, green leaves, myrrh, galingal, Egyptian ointment. Antiphanes says —

If any one buys pepper and brings it home, They torture him by law like any spy.

And in a subsequent passage he says —

Now is the time for a man to go and find pepper, And seed of orach, and fruit, and buy it, and bring it here.

And Eubulus says —

Just take some Cnidian grains, or else some pepper, And pound them up with myrrh, and strew around.

And Ophelion says —

Pepper from Libya take, and frankincense, And Plato’s heaven-inspired book of wisdom.

And Nicander says, in his Theriaca —

Take the conyza’s woolly leaves and stalks, And often cut new pepper up, and add Cardamums fresh from Media.

And Theophrastus, in his History of Plants, says— “Pepper indeed is a fruit: and there are two kinds of it; the one is round, like a vetch, having a husk, and is rather red in colour; but the other is oblong, black, and full of seeds like poppy-seeds. But this kind is much stronger than the other. Both kinds are heating, on which account they are used as remedies for, and antidotes against, hemlock.” And in his treatise on Suffocation, he writes— “And people who are suffocated are recovered by an infusion of vinegar and pepper, or else by the fruit of the nettle when crushed.” But we must recollect that, properly speaking, there is no noun of the neuter gender among the Greeks ending in ι, except μέλι alone; for the words πέπερι, and κόμμι, and κοῖφι are foreign.

74. Let us now speak of oil. — Antiphanes or Alexis makes mention of the Samian Oil, saying —

This man you see will be a measurer Of that most white of oils, the Samian oil.

Ophelion makes mention also of Carian oil, and says —

The man anointed was with Carian oil.

Amyntas, in his treatise on Persian Weights and Measures, says— “The mountains there bear turpentine and mastic trees, and Persian nuts, from which they make a great deal of oil for the king. And Ctesias says, that in Carmania there is made an oil which is extracted from thorns, which the king uses. And he, in his third book of his treatise on the Revenues derived from Asia, making a list of all the things which are prepared for the king for his supper, makes no mention of pepper, or of vinegar, which of itself is the very best of all seasonings. Nor does Deinon, in his Persian History; though he does say that ammoniac salt is sent up to the king from Egypt, and water from the Nile. Theophrastus also mentions an oil which he calls ὠμοτριβὲς, that is to say, extracted raw, in his treatise on Scents, saying that it is produced from the large coarse olives called phaulian, and from almonds. Amphis also speaks of the oil which is produced amongst the Thurians, as exceedingly fine —

Oil from the Thurians comes; from Gela lentils.

75. Pickle is a thing often mentioned. Cratinus says —

Your basket will be full of briny pickle.

And Pherecrates says —

His beard was all besmear’d with pickle juice.

And Sophocles, in his Triptolemus, says —

Eating this briny season’d pickle.

And Plato the comic writer says —

These men will choke me, steeping me in putrid pickle.

But the word γάρος, pickle, is a masculine noun. As Æschylus proves, when he says καὶ τὸν ἰχθύων γἁρον.

76. Vinegar too was much used by the ancients, and this is the only seasoning to which the Attics give the name of ἧδος, as if it were akin to ἡδὺς, sweet. And Chrysippus the philosopher says, that the best vinegar is the Egyptian and the Cnidian. But Aristophanes, in his Plutus, says —

Sprinkling it o’er with Sphettian vinegar.

Didymus explaining this verse says, “Perhaps he says Sphettian because the Sphettians are sour-tempered people.” And somewhere or other he mentions vinegar from Cleonæ, as being most excellent, saying, “And at Cleonæ there are manufactories of vinegar.” We find also in Diphilus —

A.	He first takes off his coat, and then he sups,
	After what fashion think you?
B.	Why, like a Spartan.
A.	A measure then of vinegar . . . .
B.	Bah!
A.	Why bah?
B.	A measure holds but such and such a quantity
	Of the best Cleonæan vinegar.

And Philonides says —

Their seasonings have not vinegar sufficient.

But Heraclides the Tarentine, in his Symposium, says, “Vinegar has a tendency to make the exterior parts coagulate, and it affects the strings within the stomach in a very similar manner; but any parts which are tumid it dissolves, because forsooth different humours are mixed up in us.” And Alexis used to admire above all others the Decelean vinegar, and says —

You have compell’d me to bring forth from thence Four half-pint measures full of vinegar From Decelea, and now drag me through The middle of the forum.

The word ὀξύγαρον must be spelt so, with a υ, and the vessel which receives it is called ὀξύβαφον. And so Lysias, in the speech against Theopompus when on his trial for an assault, says, “But I myself drink ὀξύμελι.” And so too we must call oil of roses mixed with vinegar ὀξυρόδινον, spelling all the words thus compounded in this manner with a υ.

77. Seasonings are mentioned even by Sophocles. In his Phæacians we find the expression,

And seasoning for food.

And in Æschylus too we read —

You are steeping the seasonings.

And Theopompus says— “Many bushels of seasonings, and many sacks and bags of books, and of all other things which may be useful for life.” In Sophocles too the expression is found —

I like a cook will cleverly season . . . .

And Cratinus says in the Glaucus —

It is not every one who can season, skilfully.

And Eupolis speaks of

Very bad vinegar seasoned in an expensive way.

And Antiphanes, in his Leucas, gives the following catalogue of seasonings: —

Dried grapes, and salt, and eke new wine Newly boiled down, and assafœtida, And cheese, and thyme, and sesame, And nitre too, and cummin seed, And sumach, honey, and marjoram, And herbs, and vinegar and oil And sauce of onions, mustard and capers mix’d, And parsley, capers too, and eggs, And lime, and cardamums, and th’ acid juice Which comes from the green fig-tree, besides lard And eggs and honey and flour wrapp’d in fig-leaves, And all compounded in one savoury forcemeat.

The ancients were well acquainted with the Ethiopian cardamum. We must take notice that they used the words θύμος and ὀρίγανος as masculine nouns. And so Anaxandrides says —

Cutting asparagus and squills and marjoram, (ὃς) Which gives the pickle an aristocratic taste, When duly mixed (μιχθεὶς) with coriander seed.

And Ion says —

But in a hurried manner in his hand He hides the marjoram (τὸν ὀρίγανον).

Plato however, or Cantharus, used it as feminine, saying —

She from Arcadia brought The harshly-tasted (τὴν δριμυτάτην) marjoram.

Epicharmus and Ameipsias both use it as a neuter noun; but Nicander, in his Melissurgica, uses θύμος as masculine.

78. Cratinus used the word πέπονες, which properly means merely full ripe, in speaking of the cucumbers which give seed, in his Ulysses —

Tell me, O wisest son of old Laertes, Have you e’er seen a friend of yours in Paros Buy a large cucumber that’s run to seed?

And Plato says in his Laius —

Do you not see That Meleager, son of mighty Glaucon, . . . . Goes about every where like a stupid cuckoo, With legs like the seedless πέπων cucumber?

And Anaxilas says —

His ankles swell’d Larger than e’en a πέπων cucumber.

And Theopompus says of a woman —

She was to me More tender than a πέπων cucumber.

Phænias says, “Both the σίκυος and the πέπων are tender to eat, with the stem on which they grow; however the seed is not to be eaten, but the outside only, when they are fully ripe; but the gourd called κολοκύντη, when raw is not eatable, but is very good either boiled or roasted. And Diocles the Carystian, in the first book of his treatise on Wholesome Things, says that “of wild vegetables the following should be boiled before eating: the lettuce (the best kind of which is the black); the cardamum; mustard from the Adriatic; onions (the best kinds are the Ascalonian, and that called getian); garlic, that other kind of garlic called physinga, the πέπων cucumber, and the poppy.” And a little afterwards he says, “The πέπων cucumber is better for the stomach and more digestible; though every cucumber when boiled is tender, never gives any pain, and is diuretic; but that kind called πέπων when boiled in mead has very aperient qualities. And Speusippus, in his treatise on Similarities, calls the πέπων by the name of σικύα. But Diocles having named the πέπων, does not any longer call it σικύα: and Speusippus after having named the σικύα never names the πέπων. Diphilus says, the πέπων is more full of wholesome juice, and moderates the humours of the body, but it is not very nutritious; it is easily digested, and promotes the secretions.

79. The lettuce was in great request as an article of food. Its name is θρῖδαξ, but the Attics call it θριδακίνη. Epicharmus says —

A lettuce (θρῖδαξ) with its stalk peel’d all the way up.

But Strattis calls lettuces θριδακινίδες, and says —

The leek-destroying grubs, which go Throughout the leafy gardens On fifty feet, and leave their trace, Gnawing all herbs and vegetables; Leading the dances of the long-tailed satyrs Amid the petals of the verdant herbs, And of the juicy lettuces (θριδακινίδες), And of the fragrant parsley.

And Theophrastus says, “Of lettuce (θριδακίνη) the white is the sweeter and the more tender: there are three kinds; there is the lettuce with the broad stalk, and the lettuce with the round stalk, and in the third place there is the Lacedæmonian lettuce — its leaf is like that of a thistle, but it grows up straight and tall, and it never sends up any side shoots from the main stalk. But some plants of the broad kind are so very broad in the stalk that some people even use them for doors to their gardens. But when the stalks are cut, then those which shoot again are the sweetest of any.”

80. But Nicander the Colophonian, in the second part of his Dictionary, says that the lettuce is called βρένθις by the Cyprians. And it was towards a plant of this kind that Adonis was flying when he was slain by the boar. Amphis in his Ialemus says —

Curse upon all these lettuces (θριδάκιναι)! For if a man not threescore years should eat them, And then betake himself to see his mistress, He’ll toss the whole night through, and won’t be equal To her expectations or his own.

And Callimachus says that Venus hid Adonis under a lettuce, which is an allegorical statement of the poet’s, intended to show that those who are much addicted to the use of lettuces are very little adapted for pleasures of love. And Eubulus says in his Astuti —

Do not put lettuces before me, wife, Upon the table; or the blame is yours. For once upon a time, as goes the tale, Venus conceal’d the sadly slain Adonis Beneath the shade of this same vegetable; So that it is the food of dead men, or of those Who scarcely are superior to the dead.

Cratinus also says that Venus when in love with Phaon hid him also in the leaves of the lettuce: but the younger Marsyas says that she hid him amid the grass of barley.

Pamphilus in his book on Languages says, that Hipponax called the lettuce τετρακίνη: but Clitarchus says that it is the Phrygians who give it this name. Ibycus the Pythagorean says that the lettuce is at its first beginning a plant with a broad leaf, smooth, without any stalk, and is called by the Pythagoreans the eunuch, and by the women ἄστυτις; for that it makes the men diuretic and powerless for the calls of love: but it is exceedingly pleasant to the taste.

81. Diphilus says that “the stalk of the lettuce is exceedingly nutritious, and more difficult of digestion than the leaves; but that the leaves are more apt to produce flatulence, and are still more nutritious, and have a greater tendency to promote the secretions. And as a general rule the lettuce is good for the stomach, cooling and wholesome for the bowels, soporific, full of pleasant and wholesome juice, and certainly has a great tendency to make men indifferent to love. But the softer lettuce is still better for the stomach, and still more soporific; while that which is harder and drier is both less good for the stomach and less wholesome for the bowels; that, however, is also soporific. But the black lettuce is more cooling, and is good for the bowels; and summer lettuce is full of wholesome juice, and more nutritious; but that which is in season at the end of autumn is not nutritious, and has no juice. And the stalk of the lettuce appears to be a remedy against thirst.” And the lettuce when boiled like asparagus in a dish, if we adopt the statement of Glaucias, is superior to all other boiled vegetables.

Among some of the other nations Theophrastus says that beetroot, and lettuce, and spinach, and mustard, and sorrel, and coriander, and anise, and cardamums, are all called ἐπίσπορα, things fit to be sown for the second crop. And Diphilus says that, as a general rule, all vegetables have but little nutriment in them, and have all of them a tendency to make people thin, and are devoid of wholesome juices, and moreover stay a long while in the stomach, and are not very digestible. But Epicharmus speaks of some as summer vegetables.

82. Artichokes were often eaten. And Sophocles, in his Colchian Women, calls an artichoke κινάρα, but in his Phœnix he writes the word κύναρος, saying —

The artichoke fills every field with its thorn.

But Hecatæus the Milesian, in his Description of Asia, at least if the book under this title is a genuine work of that author, (for Callimachus attributes it to Nesiotas;) however, whoever it was who wrote the book speaks in these terms— “Around the sea which is called the Hyrcanian sea there are mountains lofty and rough with woods, and on the mountains there is the prickly artichoke.” And immediately afterwards he subjoins— “Of the Parthian tribes the Chorasmians dwell towards the rising sun, having a territory partly champaign and partly mountainous. And in the mountains there are wild trees; the prickly artichoke, the willow, the tamarisk.” He says moreover that the artichoke grows near the river Indus. And Scylax, or Polemo, writes, “that that land is well watered with fountains and with canals, and on the mountains there grow artichokes and many other plants.” And immediately afterwards he adds, “From that point a mountain stretches on both sides of the river Indus, very lofty, and very thickly overgrown with wild wood and the prickly artichoke.”

But Didymus the grammarian, explaining what is meant by Sophocles when he speaks of the prickly artichoke (which he calls κύναρος), says, “Perhaps he means the dog-brier, because that plant is prickly and rough; for the Pythian priestess did call that plant a wooden bitch. And the Locrian, after he had been ordered by an oracle to build a city in that place in which he was bitten by a wooden bitch, having had his leg scratched by a dog-brier, built the city in the place where the brier had stood. And there is a plant called the dog-brier, something between a brier and a tree, according to the statement of Theophrastus, and it has a red fruit, like a pomegranate, and it has a leaf like that of the willow.

83. Phænias, in the fifth book of his treatise on Plants, speaks of one which he calls the Sicilian cactus, a very prickly plant. As also does Theophrastus, in his sixth book about Plants, who says, “But the plant which is called the cactus exists only in Sicily, and is not found in Greece: and it sends forth stalks close to the ground, just above the root. And the stalks are the things which are called cacti: and they are eatable as soon as they are peeled, and rather bitter; and they preserve them in brine. But there is a second kind, which sends up a straight stalk, which they call πτέρνιξ; and that also is eatable. The shell of the fruit, as soon as the outer soft parts have been taken away, is like the inside of a date: that also is eatable; and the name of that is ἀσκάληρον.” But who is there who would not place such belief in these assertions as to say confidently that this cactus is the same as that plant which is called by the Romans carduus, or thistle; as the Romans are at no great distance from Sicily, and as it is evidently the same plant which the Greeks call κινάρα, or the artichoke? For if you merely change two letters, κάρδος and κάκτος will be the same word.

And Epicharmus also shows us plainly this, when he puts down the cactus in his catalogue of eatable vegetables; in this way— “The poppy, fennel, and the rough cactus; now one can eat of the other vegetables when dressed with milk, if he bruises them and serves them up with rich sauce, but by themselves they are not worth much.” And in a subsequent passage he says— “Lettuces, pines, squills, radishes, cacti.” And again he says— “A man came from the country, bringing fennel, and cacti, and lavender, and sorrel, and chicory, and thistles, and ferns, and the cactus, and dractylus, and otostyllus, and scolium, and seni, and onopordus.” And Philetas the Coan poet says —

A fawn about to die would make a noise, Fearing the venom of the thorny cactus.

84. And, indeed, Sopater the Paphian, who was born in the time of Alexander the son of Philip, and who lived even till the time of the second Ptolemy king of Egypt, called the artichoke κίναρα just as we do, as he himself declares in one of the books of his history. But Ptolemy Euergetes the king of Egypt, being one of the pupils of Aristarchus the grammarian, in the second book of his Commentaries writes thus— “Near Berenice, in Libya, is the river Lethon, in which there is the fish called the pike, and the chrysophrys, and a great multitude of eels, and also of lampreys which are half as big again as those which come from Macedonia and from the Copaic lake. And the whole stream is full of fishes of all sorts. And in that district there are a great quantity of anchovies, and the soldiers who composed our army picked them, and ate them, and brought them to us, the generals having stripped them of their thorns. I know, too, that there is an island called Cinarus, which is mentioned by Semus.

85. Now with respect to what is called the Brain of the Palm. — Theophrastus, speaking of the plant of the palm-tree, states, “The manner of cultivating it, and of its propagation from the fruit, is as follows: when one has taken off the upper rind, one comes to a portion in which is what is called the brain.” And Xenophon, in the second book of the Anabasis, writes as follows: “There, too, the soldiers first ate the brain of the palm or date-tree. And many of them marvelled at its appearance, and at the peculiarity of its delicious flavour. But it was found to have a great tendency to produce headache; but the date, when the brain was taken out of it, entirely dried up.” Nicander says in his Georgics —

And at the same time cutting off the branches Loaded with dates they bring away the brain, A dainty greatly fancied by the young.

And Diphilus the Siphnian states— “The brains of the dates are filling and nutritious; still they are heavy and not very digestible: they cause thirst, too, and constipation of the stomach.”

But we, says Athenæus, O my friend Timocrates, shall appear to keep our brains to the end, if we stop this conversation and the book at this point.

Some Fragments omitted in the Second Book of the Deipnosophists of Athenæus.

86. Menander says —

It is a troublesome thing to fall in with An entire party of none but relations; Where as soon as he has taken his cup in his hand The father first begins the discourse, And stammers out his recommendations: Then after him the mother, in the second place; And then some old aunt gossips and chatters; And then some harsh-voiced old man, The father of the aunt aforesaid; then too Another old woman calls him her darling: And he nods assent to all that is said.

87. And a little afterwards he says —

Before the shade they wear a purple cloth, And then this comes after the purple; Being itself neither white nor purple, But a ray of the brilliancy of the woof as it were Of divers colours curiously blended.

* * * * *

Antiphanes says: “What do you say? Will you not bring something hither to the door which we may eat? and then I will sit on the ground and eat it as the beggars do: and any one may see me.”

* * * * *

The same man says in another place —

Prepare then A fanner to cool me, a dish, a tripod, a cup, An ewer, a mortar, a pot, and a spoon.

* * * * *

About the Ascent of the Nile.

88. Thales the Milesian, one of the seven wise men, says that the overflowing of the Nile arises from the Etesian winds; for that they blow up the river, and that the mouths of the river lie exactly opposite to the point from which they blow; and accordingly that the wind blowing in the opposite direction hinders the flow of the waters; and the waves of the sea, dashing against the mouth of the river, and coming on with a fair wind in the same direction, beat back the river, and in this manner the Nile becomes full to overflowing. But Anaxagoras the natural philosopher says that the fulness of the Nile arises from the snow melting; and so, too, says Euripides, and some others of the tragic poets. And Anaxagoras says that this is the sole origin of all that fulness; but Euripides goes further, and describes the exact place where this melting of the snow takes place; for in his play called “Archelaus” he speaks thus: —

Danaus, the noble sire of fifty daughters, Leaving the Nile, the fairest stream on earth, Fill’d by the summer of the Æthiop land, The negro’s home, when the deep snow does melt, And o’er the land the Sun his chariot drives.

And in the “Helen” he says something similar: —

These are the beauteous virgin streams of Nile, Which in the place of rain bedew the plain Of Egypt when the white snow melts on th’ hills.

And Æschylus says —

I know its history, and love to praise The race of the Æthiop land, where mighty Nile Rolls down his seven streams the country through, When the spring winds bring down the heavy waters; What time the sun shining along that land Dissolves the mountain snow; and the whole land Of flourishing Egypt, fill’d with th’ holy stream, Sends forth the vital ears of corn of Ceres.

89. And Callisthenes the historian argues against what I quoted just now as stated by Anaxagoras and Euripides: and he, too, declares his own opinion, — that as there is much very heavy and continued rain in Æthiopia about the time of the rising of the Dogstar, and from that period till the rising of Arcturus, and as the Etesian winds blow at about the same time, (for these are the winds which he says have the greatest tendency to bring the clouds over Æthiopia,) when the clouds fall upon the mountains in that region, a vast quantity of water bursts forth, in consequence of which the Nile rises. But Democritus says that about the winter solstice there are heavy falls of snow in the countries around the north; but that when the sun changes its course, at the summer solstice, the snow being melted and evaporated by the warmth, clouds are formed, and then the Etesian gales catch hold of them, and drive them towards the south; and when these clouds are all driven together towards Æthiopia and Libya, a mighty rain ensues, and the water from that flows down the mountains and fills the Nile. This, then, is the cause which Democritus alleges for this fulness of the Nile.

90. But Euthymenes the Massiliote says, speaking of his own knowledge, acquired in a voyage which he had made, that the sea outside the Pillars of Hercules flows towards Libya and turns up and proceeds towards the north; and that then, being driven back by the Etesian gales, it is raised to a height by the winds, and flows high at that time; but, when the Etesian gales cease, it recedes. He says moreover, that that sea is sweet to the taste, and that it contains monsters like the crocodiles and the hippopotami in the Nile.

But Œnopides the Chian says, that in winter the sources of the river are dried up, but in the summer they are thawed and flow; and so that for the sake of filling up the previous dryness, the rains from heaven cooperate with * * * * * * * * And on this account the river is smaller in winter and is full in summer.

But Herodotus gives an explanation quite contrary to that of the rest of those who have discussed this subject, but agreeing with the explanation of Œnopides; for he says that the stream of the Nile is of such magnitude as always to fill the river; but that the sun, as it makes its journey through Libya in the winter, dries up the river at that time; but that as it has gone off towards the north at the time of the summer solstice, then the river becomes full again, and overflows the plains.

Now these are the mouths of the Nile: — towards Arabia, the Pelusiac mouth; towards Libya, the Canopic: and the rest are, — the Bolbitic, the Sebennytic, the Mendesian, the Saitic, and the Opuntic.

1. Callimachus the grammarian said that a great book was equivalent to a great evil.

With respect to Ciboria, or Egyptian beans, Nicander says in his Georgics —

You may sow the Egyptian bean, in order in summer To make its flowers into garlands; and when the ciboria Have fallen, then give the ripe fruit to the youths Who are feasting with you, into their hands, as they have been a long time Wishing for them; but roots I boil, and then place on the table at feasts.

But when Nicander speaks of “roots,” he means the things which are called by the Alexandrians colocasia; as he says elsewhere —

Have peel’d the beans, and cut up the colocasia.

Now there is at Sicyon a temple to the Colocasian Minerva. There is also a kind of cup called κιβώριον.[64]

2. Theophrastus, in his book on Plants, writes thus: “The bean in Egypt grows in marshes and swamps; and its stalk is in length, when it is at the largest, about four cubits; but in thickness, it is as thick as one’s finger: and it is like a long reed, only without joints. But it has divisions within, running through the whole of it, like honeycombs. And on this stalk is the head and the flower, being about twice the size of a poppy; and its colour is like that of a rose, very full coloured; and it puts forth large leaves. But the root is thicker than the thickest reed, and it has divisions like the stalk. And people eat it boiled, and roasted, and raw. And the men who live near the marshes eat it very much. It grows, too, in Syria and in Cilicia, but those countries do not ripen it thoroughly. It grows, too, around Torone in Chalcidice, in a marsh of moderate size, and that place ripens it, and it brings its fruit to perfection there. But Diphilus the Siphnian says, “The root of the Egyptian bean, which is called colocasium, is very good for the stomach, and very nutritious, but it is not very digestible, being very astringent; and that is the best which is the least woolly. But the beans which are produced by the plant called ciborium, when they are green are indigestible, not very nutritious, easily pass through one, and are apt to cause flatulence; but when they are dry they are not so flatulent. And from the genuine ciborium there is a flower which grows which is made into garlands. And the Egyptians call the flower the lotus; but the Naucratitans tell me, says Athenæus, that its name is the melilotus: and it is of that flower that the melilotus garlands are made, which are very fragrant, and which have a cooling effect in the summer season.

3. But Phylarchus says, “that though Egyptian beans had never been sown before in any place, and had never produced fruit if any one had by chance sown a few, except in Egypt, still, in the time of Alexander the king, the son of Pyrrhus, it happened that some sprung up near the river Thyamis in Thesprotia in Epirus, in a certain marsh in that district; and for two years continuously they bore fruit and grew; and that on this Alexander put a guard over them, and not only forbade any one to pick them, but would not allow any one to approach the place: and on this the marsh dried up; and for the future it not only never produced the above-mentioned fruit, but it does not appear even to have furnished any water. And something very like this happened at Ædepsus. For at a distance from all other waters there was a spring sending forth cold water at no great distance from the sea; and invalids who drank this water were greatly benefited: on which account many repaired thither from great distances, to avail themselves of the water. Accordingly the generals of king Antigonus, wishing to be economical with respect to it, imposed a tax to be paid by those who drank it: and on this the spring dried up. And in the Troas in former times all who wished it were at liberty to draw water from the Tragasæan lake; but when Lysimachus became ruler there, and put a tax on it, that lake, too, disappeared: and as he marvelled at this, as soon as he remitted the tribute and left the place free, the water came again.

4. With respect to Cucumbers. — There is a proverb —

Eat the cucumber, O woman, and weave your cloak.

And Matron says, in his Parodies —

And I saw a cucumber, the son of the all-glorious Earth, Lying among the herbs; and it was served up on nine tables.[65]

And Laches says —

But, as when cucumber grows up in a dewy place.

Now the Attic writers always use the word σίκυον as a word of three syllables. But Alcæus uses it as a dissyllable, σίκυς; for he says, δάκῃ τῶν σικύων from the nominative σίκυς, a word like στάχυς, στάχυος. And Phrynichus uses the word σικύδιον as a diminutive, where he says —

Εντραγεῖν σικύδιον, to eat a little cucumber.

[From this point are the genuine words of Athenæus [66] ]

* * * * *

I will send radishes and four cucumbers.

* * * * *

And Phrynichus too used the word σικύδιον as a diminutive, in his Monotropus; where he says, κἀντραγεῖν σικύδιον.

5. But Theophrastus says that there are three kinds of cucumbers, the Lacedæmonian, the Scytalian, and the Bœotian; and that of these the Lacedæmonian, which is a watery one, is the best; and that the others do not contain water. “Cucumbers too,” says he, “contain a more agreeable and wholesome juice if the seed be steeped in milk or in mead before it is sown;” and he asserts in his book on the Causes of Plants, that they come up quicker if they are steeped either in water or milk before they are put in the ground. And Euthydemus says, in his treatise on Vegetables, that there is one kind of cucumber which is called δρακοντίας. But Demetrius Ixios states, in the first book of his treatise on Etymologies, that the name σίκυον is derived ἀπὸ τοῦ σεύεσθαι καὶ κιεῖν, from bursting forth and proceeding; for that it is a thing which spreads fast and wide. But Heraclides of Tarentum calls the cucumber ἡδύγαιον, which means growing in sweet earth, or making the earth sweet, in his Symposium. And Diocles of Carystos says that cucumber, if it is eaten with the sium in the first course, makes the eater uncomfortable; for that it gets into the head as the radish does; but that if it is eaten at the end of supper it causes no uncomfortable feelings, and is more digestible; and that when it is boiled it is moderately diuretic. But Diphilus says— “The cucumber being a cooling food is not very manageable, and is not easily digested or evacuated; besides that, it creates shuddering feelings and engenders bile, and is a great preventive against amatory feelings.” But cucumbers grow in gardens at the time of full moon, and at that time they grow very visibly, as do the sea-urchins.

6. With respect to Figs. — The fig-tree, says Magnus, (for I will not allow any one to take what I have to say about figs out of my mouth, not if I were to be hanged for it, for I am most devilishly fond of figs, and I will say what occurs to me;) “the fig-tree, my friends, was the guide to men to lead them to a more civilized life. And this is plain from the fact that the Athenians call the place where it was first discovered The Sacred Fig; and the fruit from it they call hegeteria, that is to say, “the guide,” because that was the first to be discovered of all the fruits now in cultivation. Now there are many species of figs; — there is the Attic sort, which Antiphanes speaks of in his Synonymes; and when he is praising the land of Attica, he says —

A.	What fruits this land produces!
	Superior, O Hipponicus, to the world.
	What honey, what bread, what figs!
Hipp.	It does, by Jove!
	Bear wondrous figs.

And Isistrus, in his “Attics,” says that it was forbidden to export out of Attica the figs which grew in that country, in order that the inhabitants might have the exclusive enjoyment of them. And as many people were detected in sending them away surreptitiously, those who laid informations against them before the judges were then first called sycophants. And Alexis says, in his “The Poet” —

The name of sycophant is one which does Of right apply to every wicked person; For figs when added to a name might show Whether the man was good and just and pleasant; But now when a sweet name is given a rogue, It makes us doubt why this should be the case.

And Philomnestus, in his treatise on the Festival of Apollo at Rhodes, which is called the Sminthian festival, says— “Since the sycophant got his name from these circumstances, because at that time there were fines and taxes imposed upon figs and oil and wine, by the produce of which imposts they found money for the public expenses; they called those who exacted these fines and laid these informations sycophants, which was very natural, selecting those who were accounted the most considerable of the citizens.

7. And Aristophanes mentions the fig, in his “Farmers;” speaking as follows: —

I am planting figs of all sorts except the Lacedæmonian, For this kind is the fig of an enemy and a tyrant: And it would not have been so small a fruit if it had not been a great hater of the people.

But he called it small because it was not a large plant. But Alexis, in his “Olynthian,” mentioning the Phrygian figs, says —

And the beautiful fig, The wonderful invention of the Phrygian fig, The divine object of my mother’s care.

And of those figs which are called φιβάλεοι, mention is made by many of the comic writers; and Pherecrates, in his “Crapatalli,” says —

O my good friend, make haste and catch a fever, And then alarm yourself with no anxiety, But eat Phibalean figs all the summer; And then, when you have eaten your fill, sleep the whole of the midday; And than feel violent pains, get in a fever, and holloa.

And Teleclides, in his Amphictyons, says —

How beautiful those Phibalean figs are!

They also call myrtle-berries Phibalean. As Antiphanes does in his “Cretans” —

. . . . . But first of all I want some myrtle-berries on the table, Which I may eat when e’er I counsel take; And they must be Phibalean, very fine, Fit for a garland.

Epigenes too mentions Chelidonian figs, that is, figs fit for swallows, in his Bacchea —

Then, in a little while, a well-fill’d basket Of dry Chelidonian figs is brought in.

And Androtion, or Philippus, or Hegemon, in the Book of the Farm, gives a list of these kinds of figs, saying— “In the plain it is desirable to plant specimens of the Chelidonian fig, of the fig called Erinean, of the Leukerinean, and of the Phibalean; but plant the Oporobasilis, the queen of autumn, everywhere; for each kind has some useful qualities; and, above all, the pollarded trees, and the phormynian, and the double-bearers, and the Megarian, and the Lacedæmonian kinds are desirable, if there is plenty of water.

8. Lynceus, too, mentions the fig-trees which grow in Rhodes, in his Epistles; instituting a comparison between the best of the Athenian kinds and the Rhodian species. And he writes in these terms:— “But these fig-trees appear to vie with Lacedæmonian trees of the same kind, as mulberries do with figs; and they are put on the table before supper, not after supper as they are here, when the taste is already vitiated by satiety, but while the appetite is still uninfluenced and unappeased.” And if Lynceus had tasted the figs which in the beautiful Rome are called καλλιστρούθια, as I have, he would have been by far more long-sighted than ever his namesake was. So very far superior are those figs to all the other figs in the whole world.

Other kinds of figs grown near Rome are held in high esteem; and those called the Chian figs, and the Libianian; those two named the Chalcidic, and the African figs; as Herodotus the Lycian bears witness, in his treatise on Figs.

 

 

9. But Parmeno the Byzantine, in his Iambics, speaks of the figs which come from Canæ, an Æolian city, as the best of all: saying —

I am arrived after a long voyage, not having brought A valuable freight of Canæan figs.

And that the figs from Caunus, a city of Caria, are much praised, is known to all the world. There is another sort of fig, called the Oxalian, which Heracleon the Ephesian makes mention of, and Nicander of Thyatira, quoting what is mentioned by Apollodorus of Carystus, in his play, called the “Dress-seller with a Dowry;” where he says —

Moreover, all the wine Was very sour and thin, so that I felt Ashamed to see it; for all other farms In the adjacent region bear the figs Ycleped Oxalian; and mine bears vines.

Figs also grow in the island of Paros, for those which are called by the Parians αἱμώνια are a different fig from the common one, and are not what I am alluding to here; for the αἱμώνια are the same with those which are called Lydian figs; and they have obtained this name on account of their red colour, since αἷμα means blood, and they are mentioned by Archilochus, who speaks in this manner: —

Never mind Paros, and the figs which grow Within that marble island, and the life Of its seafaring islanders.

But these figs are as far superior to the ordinary run of figs which are grown in other places as the meat of the wild boar is superior to that of all other animals of the swine tribe which are not wild.

10. The λευκερινεὸς is a kind of fig-tree; and perhaps it is that kind which produces the white figs; Hermippus mentions it in his Iambics, in these terms —

There are besides the Leucerinean figs.

And the figs called ἐρινεοὶ, or ἐρινοῖ, are mentioned by Euripides in his “Sciron” —

Or else to fasten him on the erinean boughs.

And Epicharmus says, in his Sphinx, —

But these are not like the erinean figs.

And Sophocles, in his play entitled “The Wedding of Helen,” by a sort of metaphor, calls the fruit itself by the name of the tree; saying —

A ripe ἐρινὸς is a useless thing For food, and yet you ripen others by Your conversation.

And he uses the masculine gender here, saying πέπων ἔρινος, instead of πέπον ἔρινον. Alexis also says in his “Caldron” —

And why now need we speak of people who Sell every day their figs in close pack’d baskets, And constantly do place those figs below Which are hard and bad; but on top they range The ripe and beautiful fruit. And then a comrade, As if he’d bought the basket, gives the price; The seller, putting in his mouth the coin, Sells wild figs (ἔρινα) while he swears he’s selling good ones.

Now the tree, the wild fig, from which the fruit meant by the term ἔρινα comes, is called ἐρινὸς, being a masculine noun. Strattis says, in his Troilus —

Have you not perceived a wild fig-tree near her?

And Homer says —

There stands a large wild fig-tree flourishing with leaves.

And Amerias says, that the figs on the wild fig-trees are called ἐρίνακαι.

11. Hermonax, in his book on the Cretan Languages, gives a catalogue of the different kinds of figs, and speaks of some as ἁμάδεα and as νικύλεα; and Philemon, in his book on Attic Dialects, says, that some figs are called royals, from which also the dried figs are called βασιλίδες, or royal; stating besides, that the ripe figs are called κόλυτρα. Seleucus, too, in his Book on Dialects, says that there is a fruit called γλυκυσίδη, being exceedingly like a fig in shape: and that women guard against eating them, because of their evil effects; as also Plato the comic writer says, in his Cleophon. And Pamphilus says, that the winter figs are called Cydonæa by the Achæans, saying, that Aristophanes said the very same thing in his Lacedæmonian Dialects. Hermippus, in his Soldiers, says that there is a kind of fig called Coracean, using these words —

Either Phibalean figs, or Coracean.

Theophrastus, in the second book of his treatise on Plants, says that there is a sort of fig called Charitian Aratean. And in his third book he says, that in the district around the Trojan Ida, there is a sort of fig growing in a low bush, having a leaf like that of the linden-tree; and that it bears red figs, about the size of an olive, but rounder, and in its taste like a medlar. And concerning the fig which is called in Crete the Cyprian fig, the same Theophrastus, in his fourth book of his History of Plants, writes as follows:— “The fig called in Crete the Cyprian fig, bears fruit from its stalk, and from its stoutest branches; and it sends forth a small leafless shoot, like a little root, attached to which is the fruit. The trunk is large, and very like that of the white poplar, and its leaf is like that of the elm. And it produces four fruits, according to the number of the shoots which it puts forth. Its sweetness resembles that of the common fig; and within it resembles the wild fig: but in size it is about equal to the cuckoo-apple.

12. Again, of the figs called prodromi, or precocious, the same Theophrastus makes mention in the third book of his Causes of Plants, in this way— “When a warm and damp and soft air comes to the fig-tree, then it excites the germination, from which the figs are called prodromi.” And proceeding further, he says— “And again, some trees bear the prodromi, namely, the Lacedæmonian fig-tree, and the leucomphaliac, and several others; but some do not bear them.” But Seleucus, in his book on Languages, says that there is a kind of fig called προτερικὴ, which bears very early fruit. And Aristophanes, in his Ecclesiazusæ, speaks of a double-bearing fig-tree —

Take for a while the fig-tree’s leaves Which bears its crop twice in the year.

And Antiphanes says, in his Scleriæ —

’Tis by the double-bearing fig-tree there below.

But Theopompus, in the fifty-fourth book of his Histories, says— “At the time when Philip reigned about the territory of the Bisaltæ, and Amphipolis and Græstonia, of Macedon, when it was the middle of spring, the fig-trees were loaded with figs, and the vines with bunches of grapes, and the olive-trees, though it was only the season for them to be just pushing, were full of olives. And Philip was successful in all his undertakings.” But in the second book of his treatise on Plants, Theophrastus says that the wild fig also is double-bearing; and some say that it bears even three crops in the year, as for instance, at Ceos.

13. Theophrastus also says, that the fig-tree if planted among squills grows up faster, and is not so liable to be destroyed by worms: and, in fact, that everything which is planted among squills both grows faster and is more sure to be vigorous. And in a subsequent passage Theophrastus says, in the second book of his Causes— “The fig called the Indian fig, though it is a tree of a wonderful size, bears a very small fruit; and not much of it; as if it had expended all its strength in making wood.” And in the second book of his History of Plants, the philosopher says— “There is also another kind of fig in Greece, and in Cilicia and Cyprus, which bears green figs; and that tree bears a real fig, σῦκον in front of the leaf, and a green fig, ὄλυνθος behind the leaf. And these green figs grow wholly on the wood which is a year old, and not on the new wood.” And this kind of fig-tree produces the green fig ripe and sweet, very different from the green fig which we have; and it grows to a much greater size than the genuine fig. And the time when it is in season is not long after the tree has made its wood. And I know, too, that there are many other names of fig-trees; there are the Royal, and the Fig Royal, and the Cirrocœladian, and the Hyladian, and the Deerflesh, and the Lapyrian, and the Subbitter, and the Dragon-headed, and the White-faced, and the Black-faced, and the Fountain fig, and the Mylaic, and the Ascalonian.

14. Tryphon also speaks of the names of figs in the second book of his History of Plants, and says that Dorion states, in his book of the Farm, that Sukeas, one of the Titans, being pursued by Jupiter, was received in her bosom as in an asylum by his mother Earth; and that the earth sent forth that plant as a place of refuge for her son; from whom also the city Sukea in Cilicia has its name. But Pherenicus the epic poet, a Heraclean by birth, says that the fig-tree, (συκῆ) is so called from Suke the daughter of Oxylus: for that Oxylus the son of Orius, having intrigued with his sister Hamadryas, had several children, and among them Carya (the nut-tree), Balanus (the acorn-bearing oak), Craneus (the cornel-tree), Orea (the ash), Ægeirus (the poplar), Ptelea (the elm), Ampelus (the vine), Suke (the fig-tree): and that these daughters were all called the Hamadryad Nymphs; and that from them many of the trees were named. On which account Hipponax says —

The fig-tree black, the sister of the vine.

And Sosibius the Lacedæmonian, after stating that the fig-tree was the discovery of Bacchus, says that on this account the Lacedæmonians worship Bacchus Sukites. But the people of Naxus, as Andriscus and Aglaosthenes related, state that Bacchus is called Meilichius, because of his gift of the fruit of the fig-tree: and that on this account the face of the god whom they call Bacchus Dionysus is like a vine, and that of the god called Bacchus Meilichius is like a fig. For figs are called μείλιχα by the Naxians.

15. Now that the fig is the most useful to man of all the fruits which grow upon trees is sufficiently shown by Herodotus the Lycian, who urges this point at great length, in his treatise on Figs. For he says that young children grow to a great size if they are fed on the juice of figs. And Pherecrates, who wrote the Persæ, says —

If any one of us, after absence, sees a fig, He will apply it like a plaster to his children’s eyes:

as if there were no ordinary medicinal power in the fig. And Herodotus, the most wonderful and sweet of all writers, says in the first book of his Histories, that figs are of the greatest good, speaking thus:— “O king, you are preparing to make war upon men of this character, who wear breeches of leather, and all the rest of their garments are made of leather; and they eat not whatever they fancy, but what they have, since they have but a rough country; moreover they do not, by Jove, use wine, but they drink water; they have no figs to eat, nor any other good thing.”

And Polybius of Megalopolis, in the twelfth book of his Histories, says— “Philip, the father of Perseus, when he overran Asia, being in want of provisions, took figs for his soldiers from the Magnesians, as they had no corn. On which account, too, when he became master of Myus, he gave that place to the Magnesians in return for their figs.” And Ananius, the writer of Iambics, says —

He who should shut up gold within his house, And a few figs, and two or three men, Would see how far the figs surpass the gold.

16. And when Magnus had said all this about figs, Daphnus the physician said: Philotimus, in the third book of his treatise on Figs, says, “There is a great deal of difference between the various kinds of figs when fresh; both in their sorts, and in the times when each is in season, and in their effects; not but what one may lay down some general rules, and say that the juicy ones and those which are full ripe are quickly dissolved and are digested more easily than any other fruit whatever, nor do they interfere with the digestion of other sorts of food; and they have the ordinary properties of all juicy food, being glutinous and sweet, and slightly nitrous in taste. And they make the evacuations more copious and fluid, and rapid and wholly free from discomfort; and they also diffuse a saltish juice, having a good deal of harshness, when they are combined with anything at all salt. They are very quickly dissolved by the digestion, because, though many heavy things may be taken into the stomach, we still after a short time feel as if we had become excessively empty: but this could not have happened if the figs had remained in the stomach, and were not immediately dissolved. And figs are dissolved more easily than any other fruit; as is proved not only by the fact that though we eat a great many times as great a quantity of figs as of all other fruits put together, we still never feel inconvenienced by them; and even if we eat a quantity of figs before dinner, and then eat as much of other things as if we had never touched them, we still feel no discomfort. It is plain, therefore, that if we can manage both them and the rest of our food, they must be easily digested; and that is why they do not interfere with the digestion of the rest of our food.

“Figs, then, have the qualities which I have mentioned. That they are glutinous and rather salt is proved by their being sticky and cleansing the hands; and we see ourselves that they are sweet in the mouth. And it certainly needs no arguments to prove that our evacuations after eating them take place without any convulsions or trouble, and that they are more numerous and more rapid and more easy in consequence. And they do not go through any great decomposition in the stomach, which arises not from their being indigestible, but because we drink while eating them, without waiting for the action of the stomach to soften them, and also because they pass through the stomach so quickly. And they generate a salt juice in the stomach, because it has been already shown that they contain something of nitre in them: and they will make that food taste rather salt and harsh which is combined with them. For salt increases the briny taste of anything, but vinegar and thyme increase the harsh qualities of food.”

17. Now Heraclides the Tarentine asks this question; “Whether it is best to drink warm water or cold after the eating of figs?” And he says, that those who recommend the drinking of cold water do so because they have an eye to such a fact as this, — that warm water cleanses one’s hands more quickly than cold; on which account it is reasonable to believe that food in the stomach will be quickly washed away by warm water. And with respect to figs which are not eaten, warm water dissolves their consistency and connexion, and separates them into small pieces; but cold coagulates and consolidates them. But those who recommend the drinking of cold water say, the taking of cold water bears down by its own weight the things which are heavy on the stomach; (for figs do not do any extraordinary good to the stomach, since they heat it and destroy its tone; on which account some people always drink neat wine after them;) and then too it quickly expels what is already in the stomach. But after eating figs, it is desirable to take an abundant and immediate draught of something or other; in order to prevent those things from remaining in the stomach, and to move them into the lower parts of the bowels.

18. Others however say, that it is not a good thing to eat figs at midday; for that at that time they are apt to engender diseases, as Pherecrates has said in his Crapatalli. And Aristophanes, in his Proagon, says —

But once seeing him when he was sick in the summer, In order to be sick too himself, eat figs at midday.

And Eubulus says, in his Sphingocarion —

No doubt it was; for I was sick, my friend, From eating lately figs one day at noon.

And Nicophon says, in the Sirens —

But if a man should eat green figs at noon, And then go off to sleep; immediately A galloping fever comes on him, accursed, And falling on him brings up much black bile.

19. Diphilus of Siphnos says, that of figs some are tender, and not very nutritious, but full of bad juice, nevertheless easily secreted, and rising easily to the surface; and that these are more easily managed than the dry figs; but that those which are in season in the winter, being ripened by artificial means, are very inferior: but that the best are those which are ripe at the height of the summer, as being ripened naturally; and these have a great deal of juice; and those which are not so juicy are still good for the stomach, though somewhat heavy. And the figs of Tralles are like the Rhodian: and the Chian, and all the rest, appear to be inferior to these, both in the quality and quantity of their juice. But Mnesitheus the Athenian, in his treatise on Eatables, says— “But with respect to whatever of these fruits are eaten raw, such as pears, and figs, and Delphic apples, and such fruits, one ought to watch the opportunity when they will have the juice which they contain, neither unripe on the one hand, nor tainted on the other; nor too much dried up by the season.” But Demetrius the Scepsian, in the fifteenth book of the Trojan Preparation, says, that those who never eat figs have the best voices. At all events, he says, that Hegesianax the Alexandrian, who wrote the Histories, was originally a man with a very weak voice, and that he became a tragedian and a fine actor, and a man with a fine voice, by abstaining from figs for eighteen years together. And I know too that there are some proverbs going about concerning figs, of which the following are samples: —

Figs after fish, vegetables after meat.

Figs are agreeable to birds, but they do not choose to plant them.

20. Apples are an universal fruit. Mnesitheus the Athenian, in his treatise on Eatables, calls them Delphian apples; but Diphilus says, that “those apples which are green and which are not yet ripe, are full of bad juice, and are bad for the stomach; but are apt to rise to the surface, and also to engender bile; and they give rise to diseases, and produce sensations of shuddering. But of ripe apples, he says, that the sweet ones are those with most juice, and that they are the most easily secreted, because they have no great inflammatory qualities. But that sharp apples have a more disagreeable and mischievous juice, and are more astringent. And that those which have less sweetness are still pleasant to the palate when eaten; and, on account of their having some strengthening qualities, are better for the stomach. And moreover, that of this fruit those which are in season in the summer have a juice inferior to the others; but those which are ripe in the autumn have the better juice. And that those which are called ὀρβίκλατα, have a good deal of sweetness combined with their invigorating properties, and are very good for the stomach. But those which are called σητάνια and also those which are called πλατώνια, are full of good juice, and are easily secreted, but are not good for the stomach. But those which are called Mordianian are very excellent, being produced in Apollonia, which is called Mordius; and they are like those which are called ὀρβίκλατα. But the Cydonian apples, or quinces, some of which are called στρούθια, are, as a general rule, better for the stomach than any other kind of apple, most especially when they are full ripe.”

But Glaucides asserts that the best of all fruits which grow upon trees are the Cydonian apples, and those which are called phaulia, and strouthia. And Philotimus, in his third book, and also in his tenth book of his treatise on Food, says— “Of apples, those which come in season in spring are by far more indigestible than pears, whether they are both unripe, or whether they are both ripe. But they have the properties of juicy fruits; the sharp apples, and those which are not yet ripe, resembling those pears which have a harsher taste and which are in a certain degree sour; and they diffuse over the body a juice which is said to be corrosive. And, as a general rule, apples are not so digestible as pears; on which account those who are less addicted to eating them are less troubled with indigestions, and those who are most fond of them are the most liable to such inconvenience. But, as I said before, a corrosive juice is engendered by them, as is stated by Praxagoras, and as is shown by the fact that those things which are not digested will have the juice thicker. (And I have already said that, as a general rule, apples are less digestible than pears.) And the harsh and sour apples are in the habit of engendering thicker juices.

But of those apples which are in season in the winter, the Cydonian give out the more bitter juices, and those called strouthian give out juice more sparingly; though what they do give out is not so harsh tasted, and is more digestible.” But Nicander of Thyatira says, that the Cydonian apples themselves are called στρούθεια; but he says this out of ignorance. For Glaucides asserts plainly enough that the best of all fruits which grow on trees are the Cydonian apples and those called phaulian and strouthian.

21. Stesichorus also mentions the Cydonian apples, in his Helena, speaking thus: —

Before the king’s most honour’d throne, I threw Cydonian apples down; And leaves of myrrh, and crowns of roses, And violets in purple posies.

Alcman mentions them too. And Cantharus does so likewise, in the Tereus; where he says —

Likening her bosom to Cydonian apples.

And Philemon, in his Clown, calls Cydonian apples strouthia. And Phylarchus, in the sixth book of his Histories, says that apples by their sweet fragrance can blunt the efficacy of even deadly poisons. At all events, he says, that some Phariacan poison having been cast into a chest still smelling from having had some of these apples stored away in it, lost all its effect, and preserved none of its former power, but was mixed and given to some people who were plotted against, but that they escaped all harm. And that afterwards it was ascertained, by an investigation and examination of the man who had sold the poison; and that he felt sure that it arose from the fact of the apples having been put away in the chest.

22. Hermon, in his Cretan Dialects, says that Cydonian apples are called κοδύμαλα. But Polemo, in the fifth book of the treatise against Timæus, says that some people affirm that the κοδύμαλον is a kind of flower. But Alcman asserts that it is the same as the στρούθιον apple, when he says, “less than a κοδύμαλον.” And Apollodorus and Sosibius understand the Cydonian apple by κοδύμαλον. But that the Cydonian apple differs from the στρούθιον, Theophrastus has asserted clearly enough in the second book of his History. Moreover, there are excellent apples grown at Sidus, (that is, a village in the Corinthian territory,) as Euphorion or Archytas says, in the poem called “The Crane:” —

Like a beautiful apple which is grown on the clayey banks Of the little Sidus, refulgent with purple colour.

And Nicander mentions them in his Transformed, in this manner: —

And immediately, from the gardens of Sidoeis or Pleistus He cut green apples, and imitated the appearance of Cadmus.

And that Sidus is a village of the Corinthian territory, Rhianus assures us, in the first book of the Heraclea; and Apollodorus the Athenian confirms it, in the fifth book On the Catalogue of the Ships. But Antigonus the Carystian says, in his Antipater —

More dear to me was he than downy apples Of purple hue, in lofty Corinth growing.

23. And Teleclides mentions the Phaulian apples, in his Amphictyons, in these terms: —

O men, in some things neat, but yet in others More fallen than phaulian apples!

And Theopompus also speaks of them, in the Theseus. But Androtion, in his Book of the Farm, says, that some apple-trees are called φαύλιαι, and others στρούθιαι; “for,” says he, “the apple does not fall from the footstalk of the strouthian apple-tree.” And that others are called spring-trees, or Lacedæmonian, or Siduntian, or woolly. But I, my friends, admire above all others the apples which are sold at Rome, which are called the Mattianian; and which are said to be brought from a certain village situated on the Alps near Aquileia. And the apples which grow at Gangra, a city of Paphlagonia, are not much inferior to them. But that Bacchus was the discoverer of the apple we have the testimony of Theocritus the Syracusan, who writes thus: —

Guarding the apples in the bosom of Bacchus; And having on his head a poplar garland, The silv’ry tree, sacred to Theban Hercules.

But Neoptolemus the Parian testifies himself, in his Dionysias, that the apple was discovered by Bacchus, as were all other fruits which grow on trees.

There is a fruit called epimelis; which is, says Pamphilus, a description of pear. But Timachides asserts, in the fourth book of The Banquet, that it is an apple, the same as that called the apple of the Hesperides. And Pamphilus asserts that at Lacedæmon they are set before the gods; and that they have a sweet smell, but are not very good to eat; and are called the apples of the Hesperides. At all events, Aristocrates, in the fourth book of his Affairs of Lacedæmon, says, “And besides that apples, and those which are called Hesperides.”

24. Walnuts are next to be mentioned. — Theophrastus, in the second book of his History of Plants, speaking of those whose fruit is not visible, says this among other things:— “Since the beginning of all the greater fruits is visible, as of the almond, the nut, the date, and other fruits of the same kind; except the walnut, in which that is not at all the case; and with the exception also of the pomegranate and of the female pear.” But Diphilus of Siphnos, in his book about “What should be eaten by People when Sick and by People in Health,” says— “The fruit called the Persian apple or peach, and by some the Persian cuckoo-apple, is moderately juicy, but is more nutritious than apples.” But Philotimus, in the second and third books of his treatise on Food, says that the Persian nut or walnut is more oily and like millet, and that being a looser fruit, when it is pressed it yields a great quantity of oil. But Aristophanes the grammarian, in his Lacedæmonian Dialects, says that the Lacedæmonians call the cuckoo-apples Persian bitter apples; and that some people call them ἄδρυα.

25. The Citron was next mentioned. — And with respect to this fruit there was a great discussion among the Deipnosophists, as to whether there is any mention made of it by the ancients. For Myrtilus said, proposing, as it were, to send us who made the inquiry to feed among the wild goats, that Hegesander the Delphian, in his Memorials, does make mention of this fruit; but that he did not recollect the exact words: and Plutarch, contradicting him, said, — But I indeed contend, that Hegesander never mentions the citron at all, for I read through the whole of his Memorials for the express purpose of seeing whether he did or no; since some other of our companions also asserted positively that he did, trusting to some scholastic commentaries of a man whom he considered respectable enough. So that it is time for you, my good friend Myrtilus, to seek for some other witness. But Æmilianus said, that Jobas the king of the Mauritanians, a man of the most extensive learning, in his History of Libya, does mention the citron, saying that it is called among the Libyans the Hesperian apple, and that they were citrons which Hercules carried into Greece, and which obtained the name of golden apples on account of their colour and appearance. But the fruit which is called the apples of the Hesperides, is said to have been produced by Terra, on the occasion of the marriage of Jupiter and Juno, according to the statement of Asclepiades, in the sixtieth book of his History of the Affairs of Egypt. On this, Democritus, looking towards the speakers, said, — If, indeed, Jobas asserts any of these things, let him take pleasure in his Libyan books, and in the nonsense of Hanno. But I repeat the assertion, that the name citron does not occur in the old authors. But the fruit which is described by Theophrastus the Eresian, in his Histories of Plants, is described in such a manner as to compel me to believe that he intended the citron by what he said.

26. For that philosopher says, in the fourth book of his History of Plants— “The Median territory, and likewise the Persian, has many other productions, and also the Persian or Median apple. Now, that tree has a leaf very like and almost exactly the same as that of the bay-tree, the arbutus, or the nut: and it has thorns like the prickly-pear, or blackthorn, smooth but very sharp and strong. And the fruit is not good to eat, but is very fragrant, and so too are the leaves of the tree. And if any one puts one of the fruits among his clothes, it keeps them from the moth. And it is useful when any one has taken poison injurious to life; for when given in wine it produces a strong effect on the bowels, and draws out the poison. It is serviceable also in the way of making the breath sweet; for if any one boils the inner part of the fruit in broth or in anything else, and then presses it in his mouth and swallows it, it makes his breath smell sweet. And the seed is taken out and is sown in spring in square beds, being very carefully cultivated; and then it is watered every fourth or fifth day; and when it has grown up it is again transplanted the next spring into a place where the ground is soft, and well-watered, and not very thin. And it bears fruit every year; some of which are fit to be gathered, and some are in flower, and some are becoming ripe at the same time. And those of the flowers which have a stem like a distaff projecting out of the centre are sure to produce good seed; but those which have no such stem are unproductive.” And in the first book of the same treatise he says the same thing about the distaff, and about the flowers which are productive. And I am induced by these things, my mates, and by what Theophrastus says of the colour and smell and leaves of the fruit, to believe that the fruit meant by him is the citron; and let no one of you marvel if he says that it is not good to eat; since until the time of our grandfathers no one was used to eat it, but they put it away as a treasure in their chests along with their clothes.

27. But that this plant really did come from that upper country into Greece, one may find asserted in the works of the Comic poets, who, speaking of its size, appear to point out the citron plainly enough. Antiphanes says, in his Bœotian —

A.	’Tis silly to say a word about roast meat
	To men who’re ne’er content. But now, my girl,
	Just take these apples.
B.	They are fine to look at.
A.	Indeed they are, and good too, O ye gods!
	For this seed has arrived not long ago
	In Athens, coming from the mighty king.
B.	I thought it came from the Hesperides;
	For there they say the golden apples grow.
A.	They have but three.
B.	That which is very beautiful
	Is rare in every place, and so is dear.

And Eriphus, in his Melibœa, quotes these selfsame Iambics of Antiphanes, and then proceeds in his own words: —

B.	I thought, I swear by Dian, that they came
	From out the garden of the Hesperides,
	For they, they say, do keep the golden apples.
A.	They have but three.
B.	That which is very beautiful
	Is rare in every place, and so is dear.
A.	I’ll sell you these now for a single penny,
	And even that I’ll put down in the bill.
B.	Are they not pomegranates? how fine they are!
A.	Fine! yes — they say that Venus did herself
	Plant this the parent tree in Cyprus, where it stands.
	Take it, my dear Berbeias.
B.	Thank you kindly.
A.	Take also these three; they are all I had.

And if any one is able to contradict this, and to show that these descriptions are not meant to apply to the fruit which we now call the citron, let him bring forward some clearer testimonies.

28. However, Phænias the Eresian compels us to entertain the idea that, perhaps, the name may be meant for cedron, as from the cedar-tree. For, in the fifth book of his treatise on Plants, he says that the cedar has thorns around its leaves; and that the same is the case with the citron is visible to everybody. But that the citron when eaten before any kind of food, whether dry or moist, is an antidote to all injurious effects, I am quite certain, having had that fact fully proved to me by my fellow-citizen, who was entrusted with the government of Egypt. He had condemned some men to be given to wild beasts, as having been convicted of being malefactors, and such men he said were only fit to be given to beasts. And as they were going into the theatre appropriated to the punishment of robbers, a woman who was selling fruit by the wayside gave them out of pity some of the citron which she herself was eating, and they took it and ate it, and after a little while, being exposed to some enormous and savage beasts, and bitten by asps, they suffered no injury. At which the governor was mightily astonished. And at last, examining the soldier who had charge of them, whether they had eaten or drunk anything, when he learnt of him that some citron had been given to them without any evil design; on the next day he ordered some citron to be given to some of them again, and others to have none given to them. And those who eat the citron, though they were bitten, received no injury, but the others died immediately on being bitten. And this result being proved by repeated experiments, it was found that citron was an antidote to all sorts of pernicious poison. But if any one boils a whole citron with its seed in Attic honey, it is dissolved in the honey, and he who takes two or three mouthfuls of it early in the morning will never experience any evil effects from poison.

29. Now if any one disbelieves this, let him learn from Theopompus the Chian, a man of the strictest truth and who expended a great deal of money on the most accurate investigation of matters to be spoken of in his History. For he says, in the thirty-eighth book of his History, while giving an account of Clearchus, the tyrant of the Heracleans who were in Pontus, that he seized violently upon a number of people and gave a great many of them hemlock to drink.— “And as,” says he, “they all knew that he was in the habit of compelling them to pledge him in this liquor, they never left their homes without first eating rue: for people who have eaten this beforehand take no harm from drinking aconite, — a poison which, they say, has its name from growing in a place called Aconæ, which is not far from Heraclea.” When Democritus had said this they all marvelled at the efficacy of citron, and most of them ate it, as if they had had nothing to eat or drink before. But Pamphilus, in his Dialects, says that the Romans call it not κίτριον, but κίτρον.

30. And after the viands which have been mentioned there were then brought unto us separately some large dishes of oysters, and other shell-fish, nearly all of which have been thought by Epicharmus worthy of being celebrated in his play of the Marriage of Hebe, in these words: —

Come, now, bring all kinds of shell-fish; Lepades, aspedi, crabyzi, strabeli, cecibali, Tethunachia, balani, porphyræ, and oysters with closed shells, Which are very difficult to open, but very easy to eat; And mussels, and anaritæ, and ceryces, and sciphydria, Which are very sweet to eat, but very prickly to touch; And also the oblong solens. And bring too the black Cockle, which keeps the cockle-hunter on the stretch. Then too there are other cockles, and sand-eels, And periwinkles, unproductive fish, Which men entitle banishers of men, But which we gods call white and beautiful.

31. And in the Muses it is written —

There is the cockle, which we call the tellis; Believe me, that is most delicious meat.

Perhaps he means that fish which is called the tellina, and which the Romans call the mitlus, — a fish which Aristophanes the grammarian names in his treatise on the Broken Scytale, and says that the lepas is a fish like that which is called the tellina. But Callias of Mitylene, in his discussion of the Limpet in Alcæus, says that there is an ode in Alcæus of which the beginning is —

O child of the rock, and of the hoary sea;

and at the end of it there is the line —

Of all limpets the sea-limpet most relaxes the mind.

But Aristophanes writes the line with the word tortoise instead of limpet. And he says that Dicæarchus made a great blunder when he interpreted the line of limpets; and that the children when they get them in their mouths sing and play with them, just as idle boys among us do with the fish which we call tellina. And so, too, Sopater, the compiler of Comicalities, says in his drama which is entitled the Eubulotheombrotus: —

But stop, for suddenly a certain sound Of the melodious tellina strikes my ears.

And in another place Epicharmus, in his Pyrrha and Prometheus, says —

Just look now at this tellina, and behold This periwinkle and this splendid limpet.

And in Sophron cockles are called melænides.

For now melænides will come to us, Sent from a narrow harbour.

And in the play which is called “The Clown and the Fisherman,” they are called the cherambe. And Archilochus also mentions the cherambe: and Ibycus mentions the periwinkle. And the periwinkle is called both ἀναρίτης and ἀνάρτας. And the shell being something like that of a cockle, it sticks to the rocks, just as limpets do. But Herondas, in his Coadjutrixes, says —

Sticking to the rocks as a periwinkle.

And Æschylus, in his Persæ, says —

Who has plunder’d the islands producing the periwinkle?

And Homer makes mention of the oyster.

32. Diocles the Carystian, in his treatise on the Wholesomes, says that the best of all shell-fish, as aperient and diuretic food, are mussels, oysters, scallops, and cockles. And Archippus says, in his poem called “Fishes,” —

With limpets and sea-urchins and escharæ, And with periwinkles and cockles.

And Diocles says that the strongest of all shell-fish are cockles, purple-fish, and ceryces. But concerning ceryces Archippus says this —

The ceryx, ocean’s nursling, child of purple.

But Speusippus, in the second book of his Similarities, says that ceryces, purple-fish, strabeli, and cockles, are all very nearly alike. And Sophocles makes mention of the shell-fish called strabeli in his Camici, in these words: —

Come now, my son, and look if we may find Some of the nice strabelus, ocean’s child.

And again Speusippus enumerates separately in regular order the cockle, the periwinkle, the mussel, the pinna, the solens; and in another place he speaks of oysters and limpets. And Araros says, in his Campylion —

These now are most undoubted delicacies, Cockles and solens; and the crooked locusts Spring forth in haste like dolphins.

And Sophron says, in his Mimi —

A.	What are these long cockles, O my friend,
	Which you do think so much of?
B.	Solens, to be sure.
	This too is the sweet-flesh’d cockle, dainty food,
	The dish much loved by widows.

And Cratinus also speaks of the pinna in his Archilochi —

She indeed like pinnas and sea oysters.

And Philyllius, or Eunicus, or Aristophanes, in the Cities, says —

A little polypus, or a small cuttle-fish, A crab, a crawfish, oysters, cockles, Limpets and solens, mussels and pinnas; Periwinkles too, from Mitylene take; Let us have two sprats, and mullet, ling, And conger-eel, and perch, and black fish.

But Agiastos, and Dercylus, in his Argolici, call the strabeli ἀστράβηλοι; speaking of them as suitable to play upon like a trumpet.

33. But you may find cockles spoken of both in the masculine and feminine gender. Aristophanes says, in his Babylonians —

They all gaped on each other, and were like To cockles (κόγχαι) roasted on the coals.

And Teleclides, in his Hesiodi, says, “Open a cockle (κόγχη);” and Sophron, in his Actresses, says —

And then the cockles (κόγχαι) as at one command All yawned on us, and each display’d its flesh.

But Æschylus uses the word κόγχος in the masculine gender, in his Glaucus Pontius, and says —

Cockles (κόγχοι), muscles, oysters.

And Aristonymus, in his Theseus, says —

There was a cockle (κόγχος) and other fish too drawn from the sea At the same time, and by the same net.

And Phrynichus uses the word in the same way in his Satyrs. But Icesius, the Erasistratean, says that some cockles are rough, and some royal; and that the rough have a disagreeable juice, and afford but little nourishment, and are easily digested; and that people who are hunting for the purple-fish use them as bait: but of the smooth ones those are best which are the largest, in exact proportion to their size. And Hegesander, in his Memorials, says that the rough cockles are called by the Macedonians coryci, but by the Athenians crii.

34. Now Icesius says that limpets are more digestible than those shell-fish which have been already mentioned; but that oysters are not so nutritious as limpets, and are filling, but nevertheless are more digestible.

But of mussels, the Ephesian ones, and those which resemble them, are, as to their juicy qualities, superior to the periwinkles, but inferior to the cockles; but they have more effect as diuretics than as aperients. But some of them are like squills, with a very disagreeable juice, and without any flavour; but there is a kind which is smaller than they are, and which are rough outside, which are more diuretic, and full of a more pleasant juice than the kind which resembles squills: but they are less nutritious, by reason of their sizes, and also because their nature is inferior. But the necks of the ceryces are exceedingly good for the stomach, and are not so nutritious as mussels and cockles and periwinkles; but for people who have a weak stomach, and who do not easily expel the food into the cavity of the bowels, they are useful, inasmuch as they do not easily turn on the stomach. For those things which are confessedly digestible are, on the contrary, very unwholesome for people of such a constitution, being very easily inclined to turn on the stomach, because they are tender and easily dissolved. On which account the bags containing their entrails are not suited to vigorous stomachs, but they are very good for those whose bowels are in a weak state. But what are more nutritious than the others, and far nicer in taste, are the entrails of the purple-fish; though they certainly are somewhat like the squill. For indeed all shell-fish are of the same character; but the purple-fish and the solen have this peculiar characteristic, that if they are boiled they yield a thick juice. But the necks of the purple-fish, when boiled by themselves, are exceedingly good for bringing the stomach into a good condition. And Posidippus speaks of them in his Locrians in these terms: —

It is time now to eat eels and crabs, Cockles, and fresh sea-urchins, and fish sounds, And pinnas, and the necks of fish, and mussels.

35. Balani, if they are of the larger sort, are easily digested, and are good for the stomach. But otaria (and they are produced in the island called Pharos, which is close to Alexandria) are more nutritious than any of the before-mentioned fish, but they are not easily secreted. But Antigonus the Carystian, in his book upon Language, says that this kind of oyster is called by the Æolians the Ear of Venus. Pholades are very nutritious, but they have a disagreeable smell; but common oysters are very like all these sorts of shell-fish, and are more nutritious. There are also some kinds which are called wild oysters; and they are very nutritious, but they have not a good smell, and moreover they have a very indifferent flavour. But Aristotle, in his treatise about Animals, says, “Oysters are of all the following kinds: there are the pinna, the mussel, the oyster, the cteis, the solen, the cockle, the limpet, the small oyster, the balanus. And of migratory fish there are the purple-fish, the sweet purple-fish, the sea-urchin, the strobelus. Now the cteis has a rough shell, marked in streaks; but the oyster has no streaks, and a smooth shell. The pinna has a smooth mouth; but the large oyster has a wide mouth, and is bivalve, and has a smooth shell. But the limpet is univalve, and has a smooth shell; and the mussel has a united shell. The solen and balanus are univalve, and have a smooth shell; and the cockle is a mixture of both kinds.” Epænetus also says, in his Cookery Book, that the interior part of the pinna is called mecon. But in the fifth book of his treatise on the Parts of Animals, Aristotle says, “The purple-fish are born about spring, and the ceryces at the end of the winter. And altogether,” says he, “all shell-fish appear in the spring to have what are called eggs; and in the autumn, too, except those kinds of sea-urchins which are good to eat. And these fish indeed have eggs in the greatest number at those seasons, but they are never without them; and they have them in the greatest numbers at the time of full moon, and in the warm weather, with the exception of those fish which are found in the Euripus of the Pyrrhæans; for they are best in the winter, and they are small, but full of eggs. And nearly all the cockle tribe appear to breed in like manner at about the same season.”

 

 

36. And continuing the subject, the philosopher says again, “The purple-fish therefore being all collected together in the spring at the same place, make what is called melicera. And that is something like honeycomb, but not indeed so elegant, but it is as if a great number of the husks of white vetches were fastened together; and there is no open passage in any of them: nor are the purple-fish born of this melicera, but they, and nearly all other shell-fish, are produced of mud and putrefaction; and this is, as it were, a kind of purification both for them and for the purple-fish, for they too make this melicera. And when they begin to make it, they emit a sort of sticky mass, from which those things grow which resemble husks. All these are eventually separated, and they drop blood on the ground. And in the place where they do so, there are myriads of little purple-fish born, adhering to one another in the ground, and the old purple-fish are caught while carrying them. And if they are caught before they have produced their young, they sometimes produce them in the very pots in which they are caught when collected together in them, and the young look like a bunch of grapes. And there are many different kinds of purple-fish; and some of them are of large size, like those which are found near Segeum and near Lesteum; and some are small, like those which are found in the Euripus, and around Caria. And those in the gulfs are large and rough, and most of them are of a black colour, but some of them are rather red; and some of the large ones even weigh a mina. But those which are found on the shore and around the coasts are of no great size, but are of a red colour: and again, those in the waters exposed to the north wind are black, and those in the waters exposed to the south wind are generally red.”

37. But Apollodorus the Athenian, in his Commentaries on Sophron, having first quoted the saying, “More greedy than a purple-fish,” says that it is a proverb, and that some say that it applies to the dye of purple; for that whatever that dye touches it attracts to itself, and that it imbues everything which is placed near it with the brilliancy of its colour: but others say that it applies to the animal. “And they are caught,” says Aristotle, “in the spring; but they are not caught during the dog-days, for then they do not feed, but conceal themselves and bury themselves in holes; and they have a mark like a flower on them between the belly and the throat. The fish called the ceryx has a covering of nearly the same sort as all the other animals of the snail kind from its earliest birth; and they feed by putting out what we call their shell from under this covering. And the purple-fish has a tongue of the size of a finger or larger, by which it feeds; and it pierces even shell-fish, and can pierce its own shell. But the purple-fish is very long-lived; and so is the ceryx: they live about six years, and their growth is known by the rings in their shell. But cockles, and cheme-cockles, and solens, and periwinkles, are born in sandy places.

38. But the pinnæ spring from the bottom of the sea. And they have with them a fish called the pinnophylax, or guard of the pinna, which some call καρίδιος, and others καρκίνιος; and if they lose him, they are soon destroyed. But Pamphilus the Alexandrian, in his treatise on Names, says that he is born at the same time with the pinna. But Chrysippus the Solensian, in the fifth book of his treatise on the Beautiful and Pleasure, says, “The pinna and the guard of the pinna assist one another, not being able to remain apart. Now the pinna is a kind of oyster, but the guard of the pinna is a small crab: and the pinna having opened its shell, remains quiet, watching the fish who are coming towards it; but the guard of the pinna, standing by when anything comes near, bites the pinna, so as to give it a sort of sign; and the pinna being bitten, closes its shell, and in this manner the two share together what is caught inside the pinna’s shell. But some say that the guard is born at the same time as the pinna, and that they originate in one seed.” And again, Aristotle says, “All the fish of the oyster kind are generated in the mud, — oysters in slimy mud, cockles in sandy mud, and so on; but the small oyster and the balanus, and other fish which come near the surface, such as limpets and periwinkles, are born in the fissures of the rocks. And some fish which have not shells are born in the same way as those which have shells, — as the sea-nettle, the sponge, and others, — in the crevices of the rocks.”

39. Now, of the sea-nettle there are two kinds. For some live in hollows, and are never separated from the rocks; but some live on smooth and level ground, and do separate themselves from what they are attached to, and move their quarters. But Eupolis, in the Autolycus, calls the κνίδη, or sea-nettle, ἀκαλήφη. And Aristophanes, in his Phœnissæ, says —

Know that pot-herbs first were given, And then the rough sea-nettles (ἀκάληφαι);

and in his Wasps he uses the same word. And Pherecrates, in his Deserters, says —

I’d rather wear a crown of sea-nettles (ἀκάληφαι).

And Diphilus the Siphnian, a physician, says, “But the sea-nettle (ἀκαλήφη) is good for the bowels, diuretic, and a strengthener of the stomach, but it makes those who collect them itch violently, unless they anoint their hands beforehand. And it is really injurious to those who hunt for it; by whom it has been called ἀκαλήφη, by a slight alteration of its original name. And perhaps that is the reason why the plant the nettle has had the same name given to it. For it was named by euphemism on the principle of antiphrasis, — for it is not gentle and ἁπαλὴ τῇ ἀφῇ, tender to the touch, but very rough and disagreeable.” Philippides also mentions the sea-nettle (calling it ἀκαλήφη) in his Amphiaraus, speaking as follows: —

He put before me oysters and sea-nettles and limpets.

And it is jested upon in the Lysistrata of Aristophanes —

But, you most valiant of the oyster race, Offspring of that rough dam, the sea-nettle;

for the τῆθος and the ὄστρεον are the same. And the word τῆθος is here confused in a comic manner with τήθη, a grandmother, and with μητὴρ, a mother.

40. And concerning the rest of the oyster tribe, Diphilus says this: “Of the thick chemæ, those of smaller size, which have tender flesh, are called oysters, and they are good for the stomach, and easily digested. But the thick ones, which are called royal chemæ by some people, and which are also called the huge chemæ, are nutritious, slow to be digested, very juicy, good for the stomach; and especially do these qualities belong to the larger ones. Of tellinæ there are numbers in Canopus, and they are very common at the place where the Nile begins to rise up to the higher ground. And the thinnest of these are the royal ones, and they are digestible and light, and moreover nutritious. But those which are taken in the rivers are the sweetest. Mussels, again, are moderately nutritious, and are digestible and diuretic. But the best are the Ephesian kind; and of them those which are taken about the end of autumn. But the female mussel is smaller than the male, and is sweet and juicy, and moreover nutritious. But the solens, as they are called by some, though some call them αὖλοι and δόνακες, or pipes, and some, too, call them ὄνυχες, or claws, are very juicy, but the juice is bad, and they are very glutinous. And the male fish are striped, and not all of one colour; but they are very wholesome for people affected with the stone, or with any complaint of the bladder. But the female fish is all of one colour, and much sweeter than the male: and they are eaten boiled and fried; but they are best of all when roasted on the coals till their shells open.” And the people who collect this sort of oyster are called Solenistæ, as Phænias the Eresian relates in his book which is entitled, The Killing of Tyrants by way of Punishment; where he speaks as follows:— “Philoxenus, who was called the Solenist, became a tyrant from having been a demagogue. In the beginning he got his livelihood by being a fisherman and a hunter after solens; and so having made a little money, he advanced, and got a good property.”— “Of the periwinkle the white are the most tender, and they have no disagreeable smell, and have a good effect on the bowels; but of the black and red kinds the larger are exceedingly nice to the taste, especially those that are caught in the spring. And as a general rule all of them are good for the stomach, and digestible, and good for the bowels, when eaten with cinnamon and pepper.” Archippus also makes mention of them in his Fishes —

With limpets and with sea-urchins, and escharæ, With needle-fishes, and with periwinkles.

But the fish called balani, or acorns, because of their resemblance to the acorn of an oak, differ according to the places where they are found. For the Egyptian balani are sweet, tender, delicious to the taste, nutritious, very juicy indeed, diuretic, and good for the bowels; but other kinds have a salter taste. The fish called ὤτια, or ears, are most nutritious when fried; but the pholades are exceedingly pleasant to the taste, but have a bad smell, and an injurious juice.

41. “Sea-urchins are tender, full of pleasant juice, with a strong smell, filling, and apt to turn on the stomach; but if eaten with sharp mead, and parsley, and mint, they are good for the stomach, and sweet, and full of pleasant juice. But the sweet-tasted are the red ones, and the apple-coloured, and the thickest, and those which if you scrape their flesh emit a milky liquid. But those which are found near Cephalenia and around Icaria, and in the Adriatic are — at least many of them are — rather bitter; but those which are taken on the rock of Sicily are very aperient to the bowels.” But Aristotle says that there are many kinds of sea-urchins: one of which is eaten, that, namely, in which is found what are called eggs. But the other two kinds are those which are called Spatangi, and those which are called Brysæ: and Sophron mentions the spatangi, and so does Aristophanes in his Olcades, using the following language: —

Tearing up, and separating, and licking My spatange from the bottom.

And Epicharmus, in his Marriage of Hebe, speaks of the sea-urchins, and says —

Then came the crabs, sea-urchins, and all fish Which know not how to swim in the briny sea, But only walk on foot along the bottom.

And Demetrius the Scepsian, in the twenty-sixth book of his Trojan Preparation, says that a Lacedæmonian once being invited to a banquet, when some sea-urchins were put before him on the table, took one, not knowing the proper manner in which it should be eaten, and not attending to those who were in the company to see how they ate it. And so he put it in his mouth with the skin or shell and all, and began to crush the sea-urchin with his teeth; and being exceedingly disgusted with what he was eating, and not perceiving how to get rid of the roughness of the taste, he said, “O what nasty food! I will not now be so effeminate as to eject it, but I will never take you again.” But the sea-urchins, and indeed the whole echinus tribe, whether living on land or sea, can take care of and protect themselves against those who try to catch them, putting out their thorns, like a sort of palisade. And to this Ion the Chian bears testimony in his Phœnix or in his Cæneus, saying —

But while on land I more approve the conduct Of the great lion, than the dirty tricks Of the sea-urchin; he, when he perceives The impending onset of superior foes, Rolls himself up, wrapp’d in his cloak of thorns, Impregnable in bristly panoply.

42. “Of limpets,” says Diphilus, “some are very small, and some are like oysters. But they are hard, and give but little juice, and are not very sharp in taste. But they have a pleasant flavour, and are easily digested; and when boiled they are particularly nice. But the pinnæ are diuretic, nutritious, not very digestible, or manageable. And the ceryces are like them; the necks of which fish are good for the stomach, but not very digestible; on which account they are good for people with weak stomachs, as being strengthening; but they are difficult to be secreted, and they are moderately nutritious. Now the parts of them which are called the mecon, which are in the lower part of their bellies, are tender and easily digested; on which account they also are good for people who are weak in the stomach. But the purple-fish are something between the pinna and the ceryx; the necks of which are very juicy, and very pleasant to the palate; but the other parts of them are briny, and yet sweet, and easily digestible, and mix very well with other food. But oysters are generated in rivers, and in lakes, and in the sea. But the best are those which belong to the sea, when there is a lake or a river close at hand: for they are full of pleasant juice, and are larger and sweeter than others: but those which are near the shore, or near rocks, without any mixture of mud or water, are small, harsh, and of pungent taste. But the oysters which are taken in the spring, and those which are taken about the beginning of the summer, are better, and full, and have a sort of sea taste, not unmixed with sweetness, and are good for the stomach and easily secreted; and when boiled up with mallow, or sorrel, or with fish, or by themselves, they are nutritious, and good for the bowels.

43. But Mnesitheus the Athenian, in his treatise on Comestibles, says— “Oysters, and cockles, and mussels, and similar things, are not very digestible in their meat, because of a sort of saline moisture which there is in them, on which account, when eaten raw, they produce an effect on the bowels by reason of their saltness. But when boiled they get rid of all, or at all events of most, of their saltness, which they infuse into the water which boils them. On which account, the water in which any of the oyster tribe are boiled is very apt to have a strong effect in disordering the bowels. But the meat of the oysters when boiled, makes a great noise when it has been deprived of its moisture. But roasted oysters, when any one roasts them cleverly, are very free from any sort of inconvenience; for all the evil properties are removed by fire; on which account they are not as indigestible as raw ones, and they have all the moisture which is originally contained in them dried up; and it is the moisture which has too great an effect in relaxing the bowels. But every oyster supplies a moist and somewhat indigestible kind of nourishment, and they are not at all good as diuretics. But the sea-nettle, and the eggs of sea-urchins, and such things as that, give a moist nourishment, though not in any great quantity; but they have a tendency to relax the bowels, and they are diuretic.

44. Nicander the Colophonian, in his book on the Farm, enumerates all the following kinds of oysters —

And all the oysters which the foaming brine Beneath its vasty bosom cherishes, The periwinkle, whilk, pelorias, The mussel, and the slimy tellina, And the deep shell which makes the pinna’s hole.

And Archestratus says, in his Gastronomy —

Ænus has mussels fine, Abydus too Is famous for its oysters; Parium produces Crabs, the bears of the sea, and Mitylene periwinkles; Ambracia in all kinds of fish abounds, And the boar-fish sends forth: and in its narrow strait Messene cherishes the largest cockles. In Ephesus you shall catch chemæ, which are not bad, And Chalcedon will give you oysters. But may Jupiter Destroy the race of criers, both the fish born in the sea, And those wretches which infest the city forum; All except one man, for he is a friend of mine, Dwelling in Lesbos, abounding in grapes; and his name is Agatho.

And Philyllius, or whoever is the author of the book called The Cities, says, “Chemæ, limpets, solens, mussels, pinnas and periwinkles from Methymna:” but ὄστρειον was the only form of the name for all these fish among the ancients. Cratinus says in his Archilochi —

Like the pinna or the oyster (ὄστρειον).

And Epicharmus says, in his Marriage of Hebe —

Oysters which have grown together.

Where he uses the same form ὄστρειον. But afterwards the form ὄστρεον like ὄρνεον began to be used. Plato, in his Phædrus, says, “bound together like oysters” (ὄστρεον). And in the tenth book of his Politia, he says, “oysters (ὄστρεα) stuck together;” “oysters (ὄστρεα) and seaweed.” But the peloris, or giant mussel, were so named from the word πελώριος, vast. For it is much larger than the cheme, and very different from it. But Aristotle says that they are generated in the sand. And Ion the Chian mentions the chema, in his Epidemiæ, and perhaps the shell-fish got the name of χήμη παρὰ τὸ κεχῃνέναι, from opening their mouths.”

45. But concerning the oysters which are grown in the Indian Ocean; (for it is not unreasonable to speak of them, on account of the use of pearls;) Theophrastus speaks in his treatise on Precious Stones, and says, “But among the stones which are much admired is that which is called the pearl, being transparent in its character; and they make very expensive necklaces of them. They are found in an oyster which is something like the pinna, only less. And in size the pearl resembles a large fish’s eye.” Androsthenes, too, in his Voyage along the Coast of India, writes in these terms— “But of strombi, and chærini, and other shell-fish, there are many different varieties, and they are very different from the shell-fish which we have. And they have the purple-fish, and a great multitude of other kinds of oysters. There is also one kind which is peculiar to those seas, which the natives call the berberi, from which the precious stone called the pearl comes. And this pearl is very expensive in Asia, being sold in Persia and the inland countries for its weight in gold. And the appearance of the oyster which contains it is much the same as that of the cteis oyster, only its shell is not indented, but smooth and shaggy. And it has not two ears as the cteis oyster has, but only one. The stone is engendered in the flesh of the oyster, just as the measles are in pork. And it is of a very golden colour, so as not easily to be distinguished from gold when it is put by the side of it; but some pearls are of a silvery appearance, and some are completely white like the eyes of fish. But Chares of Mitylene, in the seventh book of his Histories of Alexander, says— “There is caught in the Indian sea, and also off the coast of Armenia, and Persia, and Susiana, and Babylonia, a fish very like an oyster; and it is large and oblong, containing within the shell flesh which is plentiful and white, and very fragrant, from which the men pick out white bones which they call the pearl. And they make of them necklaces and chains for the hands and feet, of which the Persians are very fond, as are the Medes and all Asiatics, esteeming them as much more valuable than golden ornaments.”

46. But Isidorus the Characene, in his Description of Parthia, says, that “in the Persian sea there is an island where a great number of pearls are found; on which account there are quantities of boats made of rushes all about the island, from which men leap into the sea, and dive down twenty fathoms, and bring up two shells. And they say that when there is a long continuance of thunder-storms, and heavy falls of rain, then the pinna produces most young, and then, too, the greatest quantity of pearls is engendered, and those, too, of the finest size and quality. In the winter the pinna is accustomed to descend into chambers at the very bottom of the sea; but in summer they swim about all night with their shells open, which they close in the day-time: and as many as stick to the crags, or rocks, throw out roots, and remaining fixed there, they generate pearls. But they are supported and nourished by something which adheres to their flesh: and this also sticks to the mouth of the cockle, having talons and bringing it food: and it is something like a little crab, and is called the guardian of the pinna. And its flesh penetrates through the centre of the cockle-shell, like a root: and the pearl being generated close to it, grows through the solid portion of the shell, and keeps growing as long as it continues to adhere to the shell. But when the flesh gets under the excrescence, and cutting its way onwards, gently separates the pearl from the shell, then when the pearl is surrounded by flesh, it is no longer nourished so far as to grow at all; but the flesh makes it smoother, and more transparent, and more pure. And so, too, the pinna, which lives at the bottom, engenders the most transparent sort of pearl; and it produces them also very pure and of large size. But that which keeps near the surface, and is constantly rising, is of a smaller size and a worse colour, because it is affected by the rays of the sun. But those who hunt for pearls are in danger when they hastily put their hand into the opening of the shell, for immediately the fish closes its shell, and very often their fingers are sawn off; and sometimes they die immediately. But all those who put in their hand sideways easily draw off the shells from the rock. And Menander makes mention of Emeralds also, in his Little Boy —

There must be an emerald and a sardonyx.

And the word for emerald is more correctly written μάραγδος, without a σ. For it is derived from the verb μαρμαίρω, to glisten, because it is a transparent stone.

47. After this conversation some dishes were set on the table, full of many kinds of boiled meat: feet, and head, and ears, and loins; and also entrails, and intestines, and tongues; as is the custom at the places which are called boiled meat shops at Alexandria. For, O Ulpian, the word ἑφθοπώλιον, a boiled meat shop, is used by Posidippus, in his Little Boy. And again, while they were inquiring who had ever named any of these dishes, one of the party said, Aristophanes mentions entrails as things which are eatable, in his Knights —

I say that you are selling tripe and paunches Which to the revenue no tithe have paid.

And presently after he adds —

Why, my friend, hinder me from washing my paunches, And from selling my sausages? Why do you laugh at me?

And again he says —

But I, as soon as I have swallow’d down A bullock’s paunch, and a dish of pig’s tripe, And drunk some broth, won’t stay to wash my hands, But will cut the throats of the orators, and will confuse Nicias.

And again he says —

But the Virgin Goddess born of the mighty Father Gives you some boiled meat, extracted from the broth, And a slice of paunch, and tripe, and entrails.

And Cratinus, in his Pluti, mentions jawbones of meat —

Fighting for a noble jawbone of beef.

And Sophocles, in the Amycus, says —

And he places on the table tender jawbones.

And Plato, in his Timæus, writes, “And he bound up some jawbones for them, so as to give the appearance of a whole face.” And Xenophon says, in his book on Horsemanship, “A small jawbone closely pressed.” But some call it, not σιαγὼν, but ὑαγὼν, spelling the word with a υ, saying that it is derived from the word ὑς. Epicharmus also speaks of tripe, χορδαὶ as we call it, but he calls it ὄρυαι, having given one of his plays the title of Orya. And Aristophanes, in his Clouds, writes —

Let them prepare a dish of tripe, for me To set before these wise philosophers.

And Cratinus, in his Pytina, says —

How fine, says he, is now this slice of tripe.

And Eupolis speaks of it also, in his Goats. But Alexis, either in his Leucadia, or in his Runaways, says —

Then came a slice and good large help of tripe.

And Antiphanes, in his Marriage, says —

Having cut out a piece of the middle of the tripe.

48. And as for feet, and ears, and even noses of beasts, they are all mentioned by Alexis, in his Crateua or the Physic-seller. And I will adduce a slight proof of that presently, which contains a good many of the names about which we are inquiring. Theophilus says, in his Pancratiast —

A.	There are here near three minas’ weight of meat
	Well boiled.
B.	What next?
A.	There is a calf’s nose, and
	A heel of bacon, and four large pig’s-feet.
B.	A noble dish, by Hercules!
A.	And three calves-feet.

And Anaxilas says, in his Cooks —

A.	I would much rather roast a little fish,
	Than here repeat whole plays of Æschylus.
B.	What do you mean by little fish? Do you intend
	To treat your friends as invalids? ‘Twere better
	To boil the extremities of eatable animals,
	Their feet and noses.

And Anaxilas says, in the Circe —

For having an unseemly snout of pig, My dear Cinesias.

And in the Calypso —

Then I perceived I bore a swine’s snout.

Anaxandrides has mentioned also ears in the Satyrus. And Axionicus says, in his Chalcis —

I am making soup, Putting in well-warm’d fish, and adding to them Some scarce half-eaten fragments; and the pettitoes Of a young porker, and his ears; the which I sprinkle With savoury assafœtida; and then I make the whole into a well-flavour’d sausage, A meat most saleable. Then do I add a slice Of tender tripe; and a snout soak’d in vinegar. So that the guests do all confess, the second day Has beaten e’en the wedding-day itself.

And Aristophanes says, in his Proagon —

Wretch that I am, I’ve eaten tripe, my son: How can I bear to see a roasted snout?

And Pherecrates says, in his Trifles —

Is not this plainly now a porker’s snout?

And there is a place which is called Ῥύγχος, or Snout, near Stratos, in Ætolia, as Polybius testifies, in the sixth book of his Histories. And Stesichorus says, in his Boar Hunting —

To hide the sharpen’d snout beneath the earth.

And we have already said that the word ῥύγχος properly applies only to the snout of a swine; but that it is sometimes used for the nose of other animals, Archippus has proved, saying in jest, in his Second Amphitryon, of the human face —

And this, too, though you have so long a nose (ῥύγχος).

And Araros says, in his Adonis —

For the god turns his nose towards us.

49. And Aristophanes makes mention of the extremities of animals as forming a common dish, in his Æolosicon —

And of a truth, plague take it, I have boil’d Four tender pettitoes for you for dinner.

And in his Gerytades he says —

Pig’s pettitoes, and bread, and crabs.

And Antiphanes says, in his Corinthia —

A.	And then you sacrifice a pig’s extremities
	To Venus, — what a joke!
B.	That is your ignorance;
	For she in Cyprus is so fond of pigs,
	O master, that she drove away the herd
	Of swine from off the dunghill where they fed,
	And made the cows eat dirt instead of them.

But Callimachus testifies that, in reality, a pig is sacrificed to Venus; or perhaps it is Zenodotus who says so in his Historic Records, writing thus, “The Argives sacrifice a pig to Venus, and the festival at which this takes place is called Hysteria.” And Pherecrates says, in his Miners —

But whole pig’s feet of the most tender flavour Were placed at hand in dishes gaily adorned, And boil’d ears, and other extremities.

And Alexis says, in his Dice Players —

But when we had nearly come to an end of breakfast, And eaten all the ears and pettitoes.

And he says again, in his Pannuchis or in his Wool-weavers —

This meat is but half roasted, and the fragments Are wholly wasted; see this conger eel, How badly boiled; and as for the pettitoes, They now are wholly spoilt.

And Pherecrates also speaks of boiled feet, in his Slave-master —

A.	Tell us, I pray you now then, how the supper
	Will be prepared.
B.	Undoubtedly I will.
	In the first place, a dish of well-minced eel;
	Then cuttle-fish, and lamb, a slice of rich
	Well-made black pudding; then some pig’s feet boil’d;
	Some liver, and a loin of mutton,
	And a mighty number of small birds; and cheese
	In honey steep’d, and many a slice of meat.

And Antiphanes says, in his Parasite —

A.	The well-warm’d legs of pigs.
B.	A noble dish,
	I swear by Vesta.
A.	Then some boiled cheese
	Bubbled upon the board.

And Ecphantides says, in his Satyrs —

It is no great hardship, if it must be so, To buy and eat the boil’d feet of a pig.

And Aristophanes speaks of tongue as a dish, in his Tryers, in the following words —

I’ve had anchovies quite enough; for I Am stretch’d almost to bursting while I eat Such rich and luscious food. But bring me something Which shall take off the taste of all these dainties. Bring me some liver, or a good large slice Of a young goat. And if you can’t get that, Let me at least have a rib or a tongue, Or else the spleen, or entrails, or the tripe Of a young porker in last autumn born; And with it some hot rolls.

50. Now when all this conversation had taken place on these subjects, the physicians who were present would not depart without taking their share in it. For Dionysiocles said, Mnesitheus the Athenian, in his book about Comestibles, has said, “The head and feet of a pig have not a great deal in them which is rich and nutritious.” And Leonidas writes, “Demon, in the fourth book of his Attica, says that Thymœtes, his younger brother, slew Apheidas, who was king of Athens, he himself being a bastard, and usurped the kingdom. And in his time, Melanthus the Messenian was banished from his country, and consulted the Pythia as to where he should dwell: and she said wherever he was first honoured by gifts of hospitality, when men set before him feet and a head for supper. And this happened to him at Eleusis; for as the priestesses happened at the time to be solemnizing one of their national festivals, and to have consumed all the meat, and as nothing but the head and feet of the victim were left, they sent them to Melanthius.

51. Then a paunch[67] was brought in, which may be looked upon as a sort of metropolis, and the mother of the sons of Hippocrates, whom I know to have been turned into ridicule by the comic poets on account of their swinish disposition. And Ulpian, looking upon it, said, — Come now, my friends, whom does the paunch lie with? For we have now been minding the belly long enough, and it is time for us now to have some real conversation. And as for these cynics, I bid them be silent, now that they have eaten abundantly, unless they like to gnaw some of the cheeks, and heads, and bones, which no one will grudge their enjoying like dogs, as they are; for that is what they are, and what they are proud of being called.

The remnants to the dogs they’re wont to throw,

Euripides says, in his Cretan Women. For they wish to eat and drink everything, never considering what the divine Plato says in his Protagoras, “That disputing about poetry, is like banquets of low and insignificant persons. For they, because they are unable in their drinking parties to amuse one another by their own talents, and by their own voices and conversation, by reason of their ignorance and stupidity, make female flute-players of great consequence, hiring at a high price sounds which they cannot utter themselves, I mean the music of flutes, and by means of this music they are able to get on with one another. But where the guests are gentlemanly, and accomplished, and well educated, you will not see any flute-playing women, or dancing women, or female harpers, but they are able themselves to pass the time with one another agreeably, without all this nonsense and trifling, by means of their own voices, speaking and hearing one another in turn with all decency, even if they drink a great deal of wine.” And this is what all you Cynics do, O Cynulcus; you drink, or rather you get drunk, and then, like flute-players and dancing-women, you prevent all the pleasure of conversation: “living,” to use the words of the same Plato, which he utters in his Philebus, “not the life of a man, but of some mollusk, or of some other marine animal which has life in a shell-encased body.”

52. And Cynulcus, being very angry, said, — You glutton of a man, whose god is your belly, you know nothing else yourself, nor are you able to keep up an uninterrupted conversation, nor to recollect any history, nor to begin anything which may tend to throw a charm on any discussion. But you have been wasting all the time with questions of this sort, “Is there such and such a statement? Is there not? Has such and such a thing been said? Has it not been said?” And you attack and examine closely everything which occurs in anything which is said, collecting all your thorns — living continually

As if among thistles, or plants of rough borage —

never collecting any sweet flowers. Are you not the person who call that which is called by the Romans strena, being so named in accordance with some national tradition, and which is accustomed to be given to friends, epinomis? And if you do this in imitation of Plato, we should be glad to learn it; but if you find that any one of the ancients has ever spoken in such a manner, tell us who it is who has. For I know that there is some part of a trireme which is called epinomis, as Apollonius states in his treatise on what relates to Triremes. Are not you the man who called your new stout cloak, which had never yet been used by you, (for the proper name of it, my friend, is really φαινόλης,) useless? saying— “My slave Leucus, give me that useless cloak.” And once going to the bath, did not you say to a man who asked you, Whither now? I am going, said you, ἀπολούμενος (pronouncing the word as if it meant to kill yourself rather than to bathe). And that very day your beautiful garment was purloined from you by some bath robbers; so that there was great laughter in the bath, at this useless cloak being hunted for. At another time too, O my dear friends; (for the plain truth shall be told you,) he tripped against a stone and dislocated his knees. And when he was cured he again came into public: and when men asked him, What is the matter, O Ulpian? he said it was a black eye. And I (for I was with him at the time) being then unable to restrain my laughter, got anointed under the eyes with some thick ointment by a physician who was a friend of mine, and then said to those who asked me, What is the matter with you, that I had hurt my leg.

53. There is also another imitator of the same wisdom, Pompeianus the Philadelphian; a man not destitute of shrewdness, but still a terrible wordcatcher: and he, conversing with his servant, calling him by name with a loud voice, said— “Strombichides, bring me to the gymnasium those intolerable slippers (he used the word ἀφορήτους, intending it to mean what he had never worn) and my useless (he used the word ἄχρηστος, by which he meant which he had never used) cloak. For I, as soon as I have bound up my beard, shall address my friends. For I have got some roast fish. And bring me a cruet of oil. For first of all we will be crushed (he used the word συντριβησόμεθον, meaning to say we will rub ourselves well), and then we will be utterly destroyed (his word was ἀπολούμεθον, and he meant to say we will have a bath).” And this same sophist, in the month of February, as the Romans call it, (and Juba the Mauritanian says that this month has its name[68] from the terrors caused by the spirits under the earth, and from the means used to get rid of those fears, at which season the greatest severity of winter occurs, and it is the custom of them to offer libations for many days to those who are dead:) in the month of February, I say, he said to one of his friends— “It is a long time since you have seen me, because of the heat.” And when the festival of the Panathenæa was being celebrated, during which the courts of justice do not assemble, he said— “This is the birthday of the virgin goddess Minerva,” (but he pronounced the word ἀλέκτορος, as if he had meant of the cock of Minerva,) “and this day is unjust,” (for he called it ἄδικος, though he meant the word to have the sense of being a holiday for the courts of law). And once he called a companion of ours who came back from Delphi without having received an answer from the god, ἄχρηστον, (which never means anything but useless, but he used the word for unanswered). And once when he was making a public display of his eloquence, and going through a long panegyric on the Queen of cities, he said, Most admirable is the Roman dominion, and ἀνυπόστατος (he meant irresistible).[69]

54. Such now, my friends, are Ulpian’s companions, the sophists; men who call even the thing which the Romans call miliarium, that is to say, a vessel designed to prepare boiling water in, ἰπνολέβης, an oven-kettle; being manufacturers of many names, and far outrunning by many parasangs the Sicilian Dionysius: who called a virgin μένανδρος (from μένω and ἀνὴρ), because she is waiting for a husband; and a pillar μενεκράτης (from μένω and κράτος), because it remains and is strong. And a javelin he called βαλλάντιον, because (ἄντιον βάλλεται) it is thrown against something; and mouse-holes he called μυστήρια, mysteries, (from τηρεῖν τοὺς μῦς) because they keep the mice. And Athanis, in the first book of his History of the Affairs of Sicily, says that the same Dionysius gave an ox the name of γαρότας; and a pig he called ἴακχος. And Alexarchus was a man of the same sort, the brother of Cassander, who was king of Macedonia, who built the city called Uranopolis. And Heraclides Lembus speaks concerning him in the seventh book of his Histories, and says; “Alexarchus, who founded the city Uranopolis, imported many peculiar words and forms of speaking into the language: calling a cock ὀρθροβόας, or he that crows in the morn; and a barber βροτοκέρτης, or one who cuts men; and a drachm he called ἀργυρὶς, a piece of silver; and a chœnix he called ἡμεροτροφὶς, what feeds a man for a day; and a herald he called ἀπύτης, a bawler. And once he wrote a letter to the magistrates of the Cassandrians in this form:[70] — Ἀλέξαρχος ὁ μάρμων πρόμοις γαθεῖν. τοὺς ἡλιοκρεῖς οἰῶν οἶδα λιποῦσα θεωτῶν ἔργων κρατήτορας μορσίμῳ τύχᾳ κεκυρωμένας θεοῦ πόγαις χυτλώσαντες αὐτοὺς, καὶ φύλακας ὀριγένεις.” But what that letter means I think that even the Pythian Apollo himself could hardly tell. For, as Antiphanes says, in his Cleophanes, —

What is it then to be a tyrant, (or What would you call pursuing serious things,) In the Lyceum with the sophists; by Jove, They are but thin and hungry joyless men. And say the thing does not exist if now It is produced; for that is not as yet, Nor can already be produced, which now Is caused afresh. Nor if it did exist Before, can it be now made to exist. For there is nothing which has no existence. And that which never yet has taken place, Is not as if it had, since it has not. For it exists from its existence; but If there is no existence, what is there From which it can exist? The thing’s impossible. And if it’s self-existent, it will not Exist again. And one perhaps may say, Let be; whence now can that which has no being Exist, what can become of it? What all this means I say that e’en Apollo’s self can’t tell.

55. I know too that Simonides the poet, somewhere or other, has called Jupiter Ἀρίσταρχος, (meaning ἄριστος ἄρχων, best of rulers;) and Æschylus calls Pluto Ἀγησίλαος, (from ἄγειν τὸν λαὸν, collecting the people;) and Nicander the Colophonian called the asp, the animal, ἰοχέαιρα, poisonous, (from ἰὸs, poison, and χέω, to emit; though the word is usually applied to Diana in the sense of shooting arrows, because ἰὸs also means an arrow.)

And it is on account of these tricks and others like them that the divine Plato, in his Politics, after having said that some animals live on the dry land, and others in the water, and also, that there are some classes which are fed on dry food, others on moist food, and others which graze, giving the names of ξηροβατικὰ and ὑγροβατικὰ, and again, of ξηροτροφικὰ, ὑγροτροφικὰ and ξηρονομικὰ to the different kinds of animals, according as they live on the land, or in the water, or in the air — adds, by way of exhortation to those manufacturers of names to guard against novelty, the following sentence, word for word:— “And if you take care not to appear too anxious in making new names you will continue to old age with a greater reputation for prudence.” But I know that Herodes Atticus, a rhetorician, named the piece of wood which was put through his wheels when he was going in his chariot down steep places, τροχοπέδης, (as a fetter to the wheels.) Although Simaristus, in his Synonymes, had already given this piece of wood the name of ἐποχλεὺς, or the drag. And Sophocles the poet, in some one of his works, called a guardian a bolt, saying —

Be of good cheer, I am a mighty bolt To keep this fear away from you.

And, in another place, he has given an anchor the name of ἰσχὰς or the holder, because it κατέχει, holds the ship —

And the sailors let out the holder of the ship.

And Demades the orator said that Ægina was the “eyesore of the Peiræus,” and that Samos was “a fragment broken off from the city.” And he called the young men “the spring of the people;” and the wall he called “the garment of the city;” and a trumpeter he entitled “the common cock of the Athenians.” But this word-hunting sophist used all sorts of far more far-fetched expressions. And whence, O Ulpian, did it occur to you to use the word κεχορτασμένος for satiated, when κορέω is the proper verb for that meaning, and χορτάζω means to feed?

56. In reply to this Ulpian said with a cheerful laugh, — But do not bark at me, my friend, and do not be savage with me, putting on a sort of hydrophobia, especially now that this is the season of the dog-days. You ought rather to fawn upon and be gentle towards your messmates, lest we should institute a festival for dog killing, in the place of that one which is celebrated by the Argives. For, my most sagacious gentleman, χορτάζομαι is used by Cratinus in his Ulysses in this way: —

You were all day glutting yourselves with white milk.

And Menander, in his Trophonius, uses the word χορτασθεὶς in the same sense. And Aristophanes says in his Gerytades —

Obey us now, and glut us with your melodies.

And Sophocles in his Tyro has —

And we received him with all things which satisfy (πάγχορτα).

And Eubulus in his Dolon —

I, O men, have now been well satisfied (κεχόρτασμαι), And I am quite well filled; so that I could With all my energy but just contrive To fasten on my sandals.

And Sophilus says in his Phylarchus —

There will be an abundant deal of eating. I see the prelude to it; — I shall surely be Most fully satisfied; indeed, my men, I swear by Bacchus I feel proud already.

And Amphis says in his Uranus —

Sating herself till eve with every dainty.

Now these statements, O Cynulcus, I am able to produce without any preparation; but to-morrow, or the day after, for that (ἔνη) is the name which Hesiod gave to the third day, I will satiate you with blows, if you do not tell me in whose works the word κοιλιοδαίμων, Belly-god, is to be found. And as he made no answer, — But, indeed, I myself will tell you this, O Cynic, that Eupolis called flatterers this, in his play of the same name. But I will postpone any proof of this statement until I have paid you the blows I owe you.

57. And so when every one had been well amused by these jokes, — But, said Ulpian, I will also give you now the statement about paunches which I promised you. For Alexis, in his play which is entitled Ponticus, jesting in a comic manner, says that Callimedon the orator, who was surnamed the Crab (and he was one of those who took part in the affairs of the state in the time of Demosthenes the orator) —

Every one is willing to die for his country (πάτρας): And for a boiled paunch (μήτρας) Callimedon, The dauntless crab, would very probably Dare to encounter death.

And Callimedon was a man very notorious for his fondness for dainties.

And Antiphanes also speaks of paunches in his Philometor, using these words —

While the wood has pith in it (ἔμμητρον) it puts forth shoots. There is a metropolis but no patropolis. Some men sell paunches (μῆτραι), a delicious food. Metras, the Chian, is dear to the people.

And Euphron says in his Paradidomena —

But my master having prepared a paunch Set it before Callimedon; and when he ate it It made him leap with joy; from which he earn’d The name of crab.

And Dioxippus in his Antipornoboscus —

What food doth he delight in! Dainty is he! Most dainty in his eating, paunches, sausages!

And in his Historiographer, he says —

Amphides burst in the porch and made himself a way in; Holding up two paunches fine, See for what I’m paying, Said he, and send me all you have, or all that you can find me.

And Eubulus says in his Deucalion —

Liver, and tripe, and entrails, aye, and paunches.

58. But Lynceus the Samian, the friend of Theophrastus, was acquainted with the use of paunches when eaten with Cyrenaic sauce. And accordingly, writing an account of the Banquet of Ptolemy, he says:— “A certain paunch having been brought round in vinegar and sauce.” Antiphanes, too, mentions this sauce in his Unhappy Lovers, speaking of Cyrene —

I sail back to the self-same harbour whence We previously were torn; and bid farewell To all my horses, friends, and assafœtida, And two horse chariots, and to cabbages, And single-horses, and to salads green, And fevers, and rich sauces.

And how much better a paunch of a castrated animal is, Hipparchus, who wrote the book called The Ægyptian Iliad, tells us in the following words —

But above all I do delight in dishes Of paunches and of tripe from gelded beasts, And love a fragrant pig within the oven.

And Sopater says in his Hippolytus —

But like a beauteous paunch of gelded pig Well boil’d and white, and basted with rich cheese.

And in his Physiologus he says —

’Tis not a well boil’d slice of paunch of pig Holding within a sharp and biting gravy.

And in his Silphæ he says —

That you may eat a slice of boil’d pig’s paunch, Dipping it in a bitter sauce of rue.

59. But the ancients were not acquainted with the fashion of bringing on paunches, or lettuces, or anything of the sort, before dinner, as is done now. At all events Archestratus, the inventor of made dishes, as he calls himself, says that pledges in drinking, and the use of ointments, are introduced after supper —

And always at the banquet crown your head With flowing wreaths of varied scent and hue, Culling the treasures of the happy earth; And steep your hair in rich and reeking odours, And all day long pour holy frankincense And myrrh, the fragrant fruit of Syria, On the slow slumb’ring ashes of the fire: Then, when you drink, let slaves these luxuries bring — Tripe, and the boiled paunch of well-fed swine, Well soak’d in cummin juice and vinegar, And sharp, strong-smelling assafœtida; Taste, too, the tender well-roast birds, and game, Whate’er may be in season. But despise The rude uncivilized Sicilian mode, Where men do nought but drink like troops of frogs, And eat no solid seasoning. Avoid them. And seek the meats which I enjoin thee here. All other foods are only signs and proofs Of wretched poverty: the green boil’d vetch, And beans, and apples, and dried drums of figs. But praise the cheesecakes which from Athens come; And if there are none, still of any country Cheesecakes are to be eaten; also ask For Attic Honey, the feast’s crowning dish — For that it is which makes a banquet noble. Thus should a free man live, or else descend Beneath the earth, and court the deadly realms Of Tartarus, buried deep beneath the earth Innumerable fathoms.

But Lynceus, describing the banquet given by Lamia, the female flute-player, when she entertained Demetrius Poliorcetes, represents the guests the moment they come to the banquet as eating all sorts of fish and meat; and in the same way, when speaking of the feast given by Antigonus the king, when celebrating the Aphrodisiac festival, and also one given by King Ptolemy, he speaks of fish as the first course; and then meat.

60. But one may well wonder at Archestratus, who has given us such admirable suggestions and injunctions, and who was a guide in the matter of pleasure to the philosopher Epicurus, when he counsels us wisely, in a manner equal to that of the bard[71] of Ascra, that we ought not to mind some people, but only attend to him; and he bids us eat such and such things, differing in no respect from the cook in Damoxenus the comic writer, who says in his Syntrophi —

A.	You see me here a most attentive pupil
	Of Epicurus, wisest of the Greeks,
	From whom in two years and ten months or less,
	I scraped together four good Attic talents.
B.	What do you mean by this? I pray thee, tell me,
	Was he a cook, my master? That is news.
A.	Ye gods! and what a cook! Believe me, nature
	Is the beginning and the only source
	Of all true wisdom. And there is no art
	At which men labour, which contains more wisdom.
	So this our art is easy to the man
	Who has drunk deep of nature’s principles;
	They are his guides: and therefore, when you see
	A cook who is no scholar, nor has read
	The subtle lessons of Democritus,
	(Aye and he must remember them besides,)
	Laugh at him as an ass; and if you hire one
	Who knows not Epicurus and his rules,
	Discharge him straightway. For a cook must know,
	(I speak the words of sober truth, my friend,)
	How great the difference is in summer time
	Between the glaucisk of the winter-season;
	He must know all the fish the Pleiades
	Bring to us at their setting; what the solstice,
	Winter and summer, gives us eatable —
	For all the changes and the revolutions
	Are fraught with countless evil to mankind,
	Such changes do they cause in all their food.
	Dost thou not understand me? And remember,
	Whatever is in season must be good.
B.	How few observe these rules.
A.	From this neglect
	Come spasms, and the flatulence which ill
	Beseems a politic guest; — but all the food
	I give my parties, wholesome is, and good,
	Digestible and free from flatulence.
	Therefore its juice is easily dissolved,
	And penetrates the entire body’s pores.
B.	Juice, say you? This is not known to Democritus.
A.	But all meats out of season make the eater
	Diseased in his joints.
B.	You seem to me,
	To have studied too the art of medicine.
A.	No doubt, and so does every one who seeks
	Acquaintance with his nature’s mysteries.
	But see now, I do beg you by the gods,
	How ignorant the present race of cooks are.
	When thus you find them ignorant of the smell
	Of all the varied dishes which they dress,
	And pounding sesame in all their sauce.
	What can be bad enough for such sad blunderers?
B.	You seem to speak as any oracle.
A.	What good can e’er arise, where every quality
	Is jumbled with its opposite in kind,
	How different soever both may be?
	Now to discern these things is art and skill,
	Not to wash dishes nor to smell of smoke.
	For I do never enter a strange cook-shop,
	But sit within such a distance as enables
	My eyes to comprehend what is within.
	My friends, too, do the same; I tell them all
	The causes and results. This bit is sour,
	Away with it; the man is not a cook,
	Though he perhaps may be a music master:
	Put in some fire; keep an equal heat.
	The first dish scarcely suits the rest. Do you
	Not see the form of th’ art?
B.	O, great Apollo!
A.	What does this seem to you?
B.	Pure skill; high art.
A.	Then I no dishes place before my guests
	At random; but while all things correspond
	I regulate the whole, and will divide
	The whole as best may suit, in fours, or fives;
	And will consult each separate division —
	And satisfy each party. Then again,
	I stand afar off and directions give;
	Whence bring you that? what shall you mix with this?
	See how discordant those two dishes are!
	Take care and shun such blunders. That will do.
	Thus Epicurus did arrange his pleasures.
	Thus wisely did he eat. He, only wise,
	Saw what was good and what its nature was.
	The Stoics seek in vain for such discoveries,
	And know not good nor what the nature may be
	Of good; and so they have it not; nor know
	How to impart it to their friends and guests.
	Enough of this. Do’st not agree with me?
B.	Indeed I do, all things are plain to me.

61. Plato, too, in his Joint Deceiver, introduces the father of a young man in great indignation, on the ground that his son’s principles and way of living have been injured by his tutor; and he says —

A.	You now have been the ruin of my son,
	You wretch, you have persuaded him t’ embark
	In a course of life quite foreign to his habits
	And former inclinations. You have taught him
	To drink i’ th’ morning, quite beyond his wont.
B.	Do you blame me that he has learnt to live?
A.	Call you this living?
B.	So the wise do say:
	At all events the allwise Epicurus
	Tells us that pleasure is the only good.
A.	No doubt, and nobody can entertain
	A different opinion. To live well
	Must be to rightly live; is it not so?
	Tell me, I pray thee, hast thou ever seen
	Any philosopher confused with wine?
	Or overtaken with those joys of yours?
B.	Aye, all of them. Those who lift up their brows,
	Who look most solemn in the promenades,
	And in their daily conversation,
	Who turn their eyes away in high disdain
	If you put plaice or turbot on their board,
	Know for all that the fish’s daintiest part.
	Seek out the head, the fins; the sound, the roe,
	And make men marvel at their gluttony.

62. And in Antiphanes, in his Soldier or in his Tycho, a man is introduced delivering rules in this way, saying —

Whoever is a mortal man, and thinks This life has any sure possession, Is woefully deceived. For either taxes Take off his property; or he goes to law And loses all he seeks, and all he has: Or else he’s made a magistrate, and bears The losses they are subject to; or else The people bid him a choragus be, And furnish golden garments for a chorus; And wear but rags himself. Or as a captain Of some tall ship, he hangs himself; or else Takes the command, and then is taken prisoner: Or else, both waking and in soundest sleep, He’s helpless, pillaged by his own domestics. Nothing is sure, save what a man can eat, And treats himself to day by day. Nor then, Is even this too sure. For guests drop in To eat what you have order’d for yourself. So not until you’ve got it ‘twixt your teeth Ought you to think that e’en your dinner’s safe.

And he says the same in his Hydria.

63. Now if any one, my friends, were to consider this, he would naturally and reasonably praise the honest Chrysippus, who examined accurately into the nature of Epicurus’s philosophy, and said, “That the Gastrology of Archestratus was the metropolis of his philosophy;” which all the epicures of philosophers call the Theogony, as it were, that beautiful epic poem; to whom Theognetus, in his Phasma or in his Miser, says —

My man, you will destroy me in this way; For you are ill and surfeited with all The divers arguments of all the Stoics. “Gold is no part of man, mere passing rime. Wisdom’s his real wealth, solid like ice; No one who has it ever loses it.” Oh! wretched that I am; what cruel fate Has lodged me here with this philosopher? Wretch, you have learnt a most perverted learning; Your books have turn’d your whole life upside down; Buried in deep philosophy you talk Of earth and heaven, both of which care little For you and all your arguments.

64. While Ulpian was continuing to talk in this way, the servants came in bearing on some dishes some crabs bigger than Callimedon, the orator, who, because he was so very fond of this food was himself called the Crab. Accordingly, Alexis, in his Dorcis, or the Flatterer, (as also others of the comic poets do,) hands him down, as a general rule, as being most devoted to fish, saying —

It has been voted by the fish-sellers, To raise a brazen statue to Callimedon At the Panathenaic festival In the midst of the fish-market; and the statue Shall in his right hand hold a roasted crab, As being the sole patron of their trade, Which other men neglect and seek to crush.

But the taste of the crab is one which many people have been very much devoted to; as may be shown by many passages in different comedies; but at present Aristophanes will suffice, who in the Thesmophoriazusæ speaks as follows —

A.	Has any fish been bought? a cuttle-fish,
	Or a broad squill, or else a polypus;
	Or roasted mullet, or perhaps some beet-root?
B.	Indeed there was not.
A.	Or a roach or dace?
B.	Nothing of such a sort?
A.	Was there no black-pudding,
	Nor tripe, nor sausage, nor boar’s liver fried,
	No honeycomb, no paunch of pig, no eel,
	No mighty crab, with which you might recruit
	The strength of women wearied with long toil?

But by broad squills he must have meant what we call astaci, a kind of crab which Philyllius mentions in his Cities. And Archestratus, in that famous poem of his where he never once mentions the crab by the name of κάραβος, does speak of the ἄστακος. As he does also in the following passage —

But passing over trifles, buy an astacus, Which has long hands and heavy too, but feet Of delicate smallness, and which slowly walks Over the earth’s face. A goodly troop there are Of such, and those of finest flavour, where The isles of Lipara do gem the ocean: And many lie in the broad Hellespont.

And Epicharmus, in his Hebe’s Marriage, shows plainly that the ἄστακος spoken of by Archestratus is the same as the κάραβος, speaking as follows —

There are astaci and colybdænæ, both equipp’d With little feet and long hands, both coming under The name of κάραβος.

65. But the carabi, and astaci, and also carides or squills, are each a distinct genus. But the Athenians spell the name ἄστακος with an ο, ὄστακος, just as they also write ὀσταφίδας. But Epicharmus in his Earth and Sea says —

κᾀστακοὶ γαμψώνυχοι.

And Speusippus, in the second book of his Similarities, says that of soft-shelled animals the following are nearly like one another. The coracus, the astacus, the nymphe, the arctus, the carcinus, and the pagurus. And Diocles the Carystian says, “Carides, carcini, carabi, and astaci, are pleasant to the taste and diuretic.” And Epicharmus has also mentioned the colybdæna in the lines I have quoted above; which Nicander calls the beauty of the sea; but Heraclides in his Cookery Book gives that name to the caris. But Aristotle, in the fifth book of his Parts of Animals, says, “Of soft-shelled animals the carabi, the astaci, the carides, and others of the same sort, are propagated like quadrupeds; and they breed at the beginning of spring; as indeed is no secret to anybody; but at times they breed when the fig begins to ripen.

Now carabi are found in rough and rocky places; but astaci in smooth ground; neither kind in muddy places: on which account there are astaci produced in the Hellespont and about Thasos; and carabi off Cape Sigeum and Mount Athos. But the whole race of crabs is long-lived. But Theophrastus, in his book on Animals who dive in Holes, says that the astaci and carabi and carides all cast off their old age.

66. But concerning carides, Ephorus mentions in his first book that there is a city called Carides near the island of Chios; and he says that it was founded by Macar and those of his companions who were saved out of the deluge which happened in the time of Deucalion; and that to this very day the place is called Carides. But Archestratus, the inventor of made dishes, gives these recommendations —

But if you ever come to Iasus, A city of the Carians, you shall have A caris of huge size, but rare to buy. Many there are where Macedon is wash’d By the deep sea, and in Ambracia’s gulf.

But Araros in his Campylion has used the word καρῖδα with the penultima circumflexed and long —

The strangely bent carides did leap forth Like dolphins into the rope-woven vessel.

And Eubulus says in his Orthane —

I put a carid (καρῖδα) down and took it up again.

Anaxandrides says in his Lycurgus —

And he plays with little carids (καριδάριον), And little partridges, and little lettuces; And little sparrows, and with little cups, And little scindaries, and little gudgeons.

And the same poet says in his Pandarus —

If you don’t stoop, my friend, you’ll upright be. But she is like a carid (καριδόω) in her person; Bent out, and like an anchor standing firm.

And in his Cerkios he says —

I’ll make them redder than a roasted carid (καρῖδος).

And Eubulus says in his Grandmothers —

And carids (καρῖδες) of the humpback’d sort.

And Ophelion says in his Callæschrus —

There lay the crooked carids (καρῖδες) on dry ground.

And in his Ialemus we find —

And then they danced as crooked limbed carides (καρῖδες) Dance on the glowing embers.

But Eupolis, in his Goats, uses the word with the penultima short, (καρῐ´ δες), thus —

Once in Phæacia I ate carides (καρίδες).

And again in his People he says —

Having the face of a tough thick-skinn’d carid (καρίδος).

67. Now the carides were so called from the word κάρα, head. For the head takes up the greater part of them. But the Attic writers also use the word short in the same manner, in analogy with the quantity of κάρα, it being, as I said, called caris because of the size of its head; and so, as γραφὶς is derived from γραφὴ, and βολὶς from βολὴ, in like manner is καρὶς from κάρα. But when the penultima is made long the last syllable also is made long, and then the word is like ψηφὶς, and κρηπὶς, and τευθίς.

But concerning these shell-fish, Diphilus the Siphnian writes, “Of all shell-fish the caris, and astacus, and carabus, and carcinus, and lion, being all of the same genus, are distinguished by some differences. And the lion is larger than the astacus; and the carabi are called also grapsæi; but they are more fleshy than the carcini; but the carcinus is heavy and indigestible.” But Mnesitheus the Athenian, in his treatise on Comestibles, says, “Carabi and carcini and carides, and such like; these are all indigestible, but still not nearly so much so as other fish: and they are better and more wholesome roast than boiled.” But Sophron in his Gynæcea calls carides courides, saying —

Behold the dainty courides, my friend. And see these lobsters; see how red they are, How smooth and glossy is their hair and coats.

And Epicharmus in his Land and Sea says —

And red-skinned courides.

And in his Logos and Logina he spells the word κωρίδες with an ω —

Oily anchovies, crooked corides.

And Simonides says —

Beet-root with thunnies, and with gudgeons corides.

68. After this conversation there were brought in some dishes of fried liver; wrapped up in what is called the caul, or ἐπίπλοον, which Philetærus in his Tereus calls ἐπιπλοῖον. And Cynulcus looking on said, — Tell us, O wise Ulpian, whether there is such an expression anywhere as “liver rolled up.” And he replied, — I will tell you if you will first show me in whose works the word ἐπίπλους is used for the fat and the membrane which covers it. So as they were thus prepared for the discussion, Myrtilus said, The word ἐπίπλους is used by Epicharmus in the Bacchæ —

And wrapping up the bread in the ἐπίπλοος.

And again, in his Theari, he says —

Around the loins and ἐπίπλους.

And Ion of Chios, in his Epidemiæ, says —

Having wrapp’d it up in the ἐπίπλους.

So here, my friend Ulpian, you have plenty of authority for your ἐπίπλους. And you may wrap yourself up in it and burn yourself, and so release us from all these investigations. And, indeed, you ought to bear your own testimony to a liver having been prepared in this way; since you mentioned before, when we were inquiring about ears and feet, what Alexis said in his Crateua, or the Female Druggist. And the whole quotation is serviceable for many purposes, and since you at the moment fail to recollect it, I myself will repeat it to you.

The Comedian says this —

69.

First, then, I saw a man whose name was Nercus; With noble oysters laden; an aged man, And clad in brown sea-weed. I took the oysters And eke some fine sea-urchins; a good prelude To a rich banquet daintily supplied. When they were done, next came some little fish, Still quivering as if they felt a fear Of what should now befal them. Courage, said I, My little friends, and fear no harm from me; And to spare them I bought a large flat glaucus. Then a torpedo came; for it did strike me, That even if my wife should chance to touch it She from its shock would surely take no harm. So for my frying-pan I’ve soles and plaice, Carides, gudgeons, perch, and spars, and eels, A dish more varied than a peacock’s tail. Slices of meat, and feet, and snouts, and ears, And a pig’s liver neatly wrapp’d in caul. For by itself it looks too coarse and livid. No cook shall touch or e’er behold these dainties; He would destroy them all. I’ll manage them Myself; with skill and varied art the sauce I will compound, in such a tasty way That all the guests shall plunge their very teeth Into the dish for joy and eagerness; And the recipes and different modes of dressing I am prepared to teach the world for nothing, If men are only wise enough to learn.

70. But that it was the fashion for liver to be wrapped up in a caul is stated by Hegesander the Delphian in his Memorials, where he says that Metanira the courtesan, having got a piece of the lungs of the animal in the liver which was thus wrapped up, as soon as she had unfolded the outer coat of fat and seen it, cried out —

I am undone, the tunic’s treacherous folds Have now entangled me to my destruction.

And perhaps it was because of its being in this state that Crobylus the comic poet called the liver modest; as Alexis also does in his Pseudypobolemæus, speaking as follows —

Take the stiff feelers of the polypus, And in them you shall find some modest liver, And cutlets of wild goats, which you shall eat.

But Aristophanes uses the diminutive form ἡπάτιον in his Tagenistæ, and so does Alcæus in the Palæstra, and Eubulus in his Deucalion. And the first letter of ἧπαρ and ἡπάτιον must be aspirated. For a synalœpha is used by Archilochus with the aspirate; when he says —

For you do seem to have no gall ἐφ’ ἥπατι (in your liver).

There is also a fish which is called ἥπατος, which Eubulus himself mentions in his Lacedæmonians or Leda, and says that it has no gall in it —

You thought that I’d no gall; but spoke to me As if I’d been a ἥπατος: but I Am rather one of the melampyx class.

But Hegesander, in his Memorials, says, that the hepatos has in its head two stones, like pearls in brilliancy and colour, and in shape something like a turbot.

71. But Alexis speaks of fried fish in his Demetrius, as he does also in the before-mentioned play. And Eubulus says, in his Orthane —

Now each fair woman walks about the streets, Fond of fried fish and stout Triballian youths. Then there is beet-root and canary-grass Mix’d up in forcemeat with the paunch of lamb, Which leaps within one’s stomach like a colt Scarce broken to the yoke. Meanwhile the bellows Waken the watchful hounds of Vulcan’s pack, And stir the frying-pan with vapours warm. The fragrant steam straight rises to the nose, And fills the sense with odours. Then comes the daughter of the bounteous Ceres, Fair wheaten flour, duly mash’d, and press’d Within the hollow of the gaping jaws, Which like the trireme’s hasty shock comes on, The fair forerunner of a sumptuous feast.

I have also eaten cuttle-fish fried. But Nicostratus or Philetærus says, in the Antyllus — I never again will venture to eat cuttle-fish which has been dressed in a frying-pan. But Hegemon, in his Philinna, introduces men eating the roe fried, saying —

Go quickly, buy of them that polypus, And fry the roe, and give it us to eat.

72. Ulpian was not pleased at this; and being much vexed, he looked at us, and repeating these iambics from the Orthanus of Eubulus, said —

How well has Myrtilus, cursed by the gods, Come now to shipwreck on this frying-pan.

For certainly I well know that he never ate any of these things at his own expense; and I heard as much from one of his own servants, who once quoted me these iambics from the Pornoboscus of Eubulus —

My master comes from Thessaly; a man Of temper stern; wealthy, but covetous; A wicked man; a glutton; fond of dainties, Yet sparing to bestow a farthing on them.

But as the young man was well educated, and that not by Myrtilus, but by some one else, when I asked him how he fell in with the young Myrtilus, he repeated to me these lines from the Neottis of Antiphanes —

While still a boy, bearing my sister company, I came to Athens, by some merchant brought; For Syria was my birthplace. There that merchant Saw us when we were both put up for sale, And bought us, driving a most stingy bargain. No man could e’er in wickedness surpass him; So miserly, that nothing except thyme Was ever bought by him for food, not e’en So much as might have fed Pythagoras.

73. While Ulpian went on jesting in this manner, Cynulcus cried out — I want some bread; and when I say bread ἄrtos I do not mean Artus king of the Messapians, the Messapians, I mean, in Iapygia, concerning whom there is a treatise among Polemo’s works. And Thucydides also mentions him, in his seventh book, and Demetrius the comic writer speaks of him in the drama entitled Sicily, using the following language —

From thence, borne on by the south wind, we came Across the sea to the Italian shore, Where the Messapians dwelt; and Artus there, The monarch of the land, received us kindly, A great and noble host for foreigners.

But this is not the time for speaking of that Artus, but of the other, which was discovered by Ceres, surnamed Sito (food), and Simalis. For those are the names under which the Goddess is worshipped by the Syracusans, as Polemo himself reports in his book about Morychus. But in the first book of his treatise addressed to Timæus, he says, that in Scolus, a city of Bœotia, statues are erected to Megalartus (the God or Goddess of great bread), and to Megalomazus (the God or Goddess of abundant corn). So when the loaves were brought, and on them a great quantity of all kinds of food, looking at them, he said —

What numerous nets and snares are set by men To catch the helpless loaves;

as Alexis says in his play, The Girl sent to the Well. And so now let us say something about bread.

74. But Pontianus anticipating him, said; Tryphon of Alexandria, in the book entitled the Treatise on Plants, mentions several kinds of loaves; if I can remember t