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Transcriber's Notes: Greek words in this text have been transliterated
and placed between =equal signs=. Words in italics in the original are
surrounded by _underscores_. A row of asterisks represents either an
ellipsis in a poetry quotation or a place where the original Greek text
was too corrupt to be read by the translator. Other ellipses match the
original.
Variations in spelling and hyphenation have been left as in the
original.
There are numerous long quotations in the original, many missing the
closing quotation mark. Since it is often difficult to determine where a
quotation begins or ends, the transcriber has left quotation marks as
they appear in the original.
A few typographical errors have been corrected. A complete list follows
the text. Other notes also follow the text.
THE
DEIPNOSOPHISTS
OR
BANQUET OF THE LEARNED
OF
ATHENÆUS.
LITERALLY TRANSLATED
BY C. D. YONGE, B.A.
WITH AN APPENDIX OF POETICAL FRAGMENTS,
RENDERED INTO ENGLISH VERSE BY VARIOUS AUTHORS,
AND A GENERAL INDEX.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
LONDON:
HENRY G. BOHN, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN.
MDCCCLIV.
LONDON:
R. CLAY, PRINTER, BREAD STREET HILL.
PREFACE.
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.
CONTENTS.
BOOK I.--EPITOME.
The Character of Laurentius--Hospitable and Liberal Men--
Those who have written about Feasts--Epicures--The Praises
of Wine--Names of Meals--Fashions at Meals--Dances--Games
--Baths--Partiality of the Greeks for Amusements--Dancing
and Dancers--Use of some Words--Exercise--Kinds of Food--
Different kinds of Wine--The Produce of various places--
Different Wines 1-57
BOOK II.--EPITOME.
Wine--Drinking--The evils of Drunkenness--Praises of Wine
--Water--Different kinds of Water--Sweetmeats--Couches and
Coverlets--Names of Fruits--Fruit and Herbs--Lupins--Names
of--Plants--Eggs--Gourds--Mushrooms--Asparagus--Onions--
Thrushes--Brains--The Head--Pickle--Cucumbers--Lettuce--
The Cactus--The Nile 57-121
BOOK III.
Cucumbers--Figs--Apples--Citrons--Limpets--Cockles--
Shell-fish--Oysters--Pearls--Tripe--Pigs' Feet--Music at
Banquets--Puns on Words--Banquets--Dishes at Banquets--
Fish--Shell-fish--Fish--Cuttle-fish--Bread--Loaves--Fish--
Water Drinking--Drinking Snow--Cheesecakes--=Chondoos= 121-210
BOOK IV.
Feast of Caranus--Supper of Iphicrates--Cooks--Dancing at
Banquets--The Attic Banquet--Athenian Feasts--The Copis--
The Phiditia--Cleomenes--Persian Banquets--Alexander the
Great--Cleopatra--Banquets at Phigalea--Thracian Banquets
--Celtic Banquets--Roman Banquets--Gladiatorial Combats--
Temperance of the Lacedæmonians--The Theory of Euxitheus--
Lentils--Spare Livers--Persæus--Diodorus--Extravagance--
Luxury of the Tarentines--Extravagance of Individuals--
Cooks' Apparatus--Use of Certain Words--Tasters--The
Delphians--Musical Instruments--Kinds of Flutes--Wind
Instruments 210-287
BOOK V.
Banquets--Baths--Banquets--The Banquets described by Homer
--Banquets--The Palaces of Homer's Kings--Conversation at
Banquets--Customs in Homer's Time--Attitudes of Guests--
Feast given by Antiochus--Extravagance of Antiochus--
Ptolemy Philadelphus--Procession of Ptolemy Philadelphus--
A large Ship built by Ptolemy--The Ship of Ptolemy
Philopator--Hiero's Ship--Banquet given by Alexander--
Athenio--The Valour of Socrates--Plato's account of
Socrates--Socrates--The Gorgons 287-352
BOOK VI.
Tragedy--Fishmongers--Misconduct of Fishmongers--Use of
particular Words--Use of Silver Plate--Silver Plate--
Golden Trinkets--Use of Gold in different Countries--
Parasites--Gynæconomi--Parasites--Flatterers of Dionysius
--Flatterers of Kings--Flattery of the Athenians--
Flatterers--The Tyrants of Chios--The Conduct of Philip--
Flatterers and Parasites--The Mariandyni--Slaves--Drimacus
--Condition of Slaves--Slaves--Banquets--The Effects of
Hunger--The Mothaces--Slaves under the Romans--The Fannian
Law 353-432
BOOK VII.
The Phagesia--Fish--Epicures--Fish--Cooks--Sharks--Fish--
Glaucus--Eels--The Tunny-Fish--Fish--Pike--Fish--The
Polybus--Fish 433-521
THE DEIPNOSOPHISTS,
OR
THE BANQUET OF THE LEARNED.[1:1]
_The first two Books, and a portion of the third, as is known to the
scholar, exist only in Epitome._
BOOK I.--EPITOME.
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 =keitai? ê
ou keitai?= In this way, "Can we say of the word =hôra=, that it
=keitai=, or is applicable to any part of the day? And is the word
=methysos=, or drunk, applicable to a man? Can the word =mêtra=, or
paunch, be applied to any eatable food? Is the name =syagros= 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[3:1] 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;[3:2] 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,[4:1] 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[4:2] 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 (=kêrykes=), 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.[7:1] 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[8:1] 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;[9:1] but Aristotle simply calls him Philodeipnus,[9:2]
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, =monophagein=, applied to those who eat
alone. And so Antiphanes says:--
But if you sulk, =monophagôn=,
Why must I, too, eat alone?
And Ameipsias says:--
And if she's a =monophagos=, 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.[13:1]
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.[13:2]
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 Phoenix 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.[14:1]
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;[15:1]
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;[15:2]
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:[16:1]
and to the reveller gives sweet drink, saying--
There, too, were casks of old and luscious wine.[16:2]
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,[16:3]
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 =ariston=, which he mentions once in
the Odyssey,
Ulysses and the swineherd, noble man,
First lit the fire, and breakfast then began.[17:1]
And once in the Iliad,
Then quickly they prepared to break their fast.[17:2]
But this was the morning meal, which we call =akratismos=, because
we soak crusts of bread in pure wine (=akratos=), and eat them, as
Antiphanes says--
While the cook the =ariston= prepares.
And afterwards he says--
Then when you have done your business,
Come and share my =akratismos=.
And Cantharus says--
_A._ Shall we, then, take our =akratismos= there?
_B._ No; at the Isthmus all the slaves prepare
The sweet =ariston=,--
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--=akratisma,
ariston, hesperisma=, or the afternoon meal, and =deipnon=, supper;
calling the =akratismos= breakfast, and =ariston=[18:1] luncheon, and
=deipnon= 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 =deieliêsas=.[18:2]
That which some call =deilinon= is between what we call =ariston= and
=deipnon=; and =ariston= in Homer, that which is taken in the morning,
=deipnon= is what is taken at noon, which we call =ariston=, and
=dorpon= is the name for the evening meal. Sometimes, then, =ariston= is
synonymous with =deipnon=; for somewhere or other Homer says--
=deipnon= they took, then arm'd them for the fray.
For making their =deipnon= 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 =daitas=, from the word =dateomai=,
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.[19:1]
And again,
Come, then, Achilles, share this equal feast.[19:2]
From these passages Zenodotus got the idea that =daita eisên= 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 =eisên=. 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 =atasthalia= originated, because it was in
=thaliai=, 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 =dais=, from =daiesthai=, that is, from
being divided, so he who roasted the meat was called =daitros=, because
it was he who gave each guest an equal portion. We must remark that the
poet uses the word =dais= 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:--
=autous de helôria teuche kynessin
oiônoisi te daita=,[20:1]
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 =dais=,
and the portion given to him is called =moira=. 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.[20:2]
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;[21:1]
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.[21:2]
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
=pasin, eparxamenoi depaessin=,[21:3]
the word =pasin= 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;[21:4]
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:[21:5]
that is, before Menelaus. And in like manner he honours Idomeneus and
Agamemnon
With ever brimming cups of rosy wine.[22:1]
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 =deidekt' Achillea=, which is the same as if he had said
=edexiouto=, 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.[22:2]
And though Homer uses =molpê=, _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.[23:1]
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.[23:2]
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 =phoulliklon=, 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 =harpaston= used to be called =phaininda= 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 =phaininda= 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 =phaininda= 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 =lêkein=. 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[25:1] 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[26:1] 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.[27:1]
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.[28:1]
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.[28:2]
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,[29:1] 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.[30:1]
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,[30:2]
And again he says--
For all around the crown of battle swells.[30:3]
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
=katallattetai=,[32:1] 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 Oenonas 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 =kordax=, and from the tragic dance which was called
=emmeleia=, and from the Satyric dance which was called =sikinnis=,
(from which also the Satyrs were called =sikinnistai=,) 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
=orcheomai= 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
Troezenian, 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, Phoebus of the silver quiver.
And Homer too, or one of the Homeridæ, in one of the hymns to Apollo,
says--
How deftly Phoebus 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 diarrhoea 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 =brechô=, 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 =anapiptô=, 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 =anapiptein=." And Cratinus uses the
same expression of rowers--
Ply your oars and bend your backs.
And Xenophon in his Oeconomics 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 (=anapiptousin=) lean back in
regular order?"--The word =anakeisthai= 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 =katakeimai=.
Accordingly Diphilus puts into the mouth of a man at a feast--
I for a while sat down (=anekeimên=):
and his friend, not approving of such an expression, says, =Anakeiso=.
And Philippides has--
I supped too =anakeimenos= in his house.
And then the other speaker rejoins--
What, was he giving a dinner to a statue?
But the word =katakeisthai= is used, and also =katakeklisthai=, 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 =anakeisthai= 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 =anakeitai=.
And Aristotle says, when speaking of the laws of the Tyrrhenians, "But
the Tyrrhenians sup, =anakeimenoi= with the women under the same
covering." Theopompus also says--
Then we the goblets fill'd with mighty wine,
On delicate couches =katakeimenos=,
Singing in turn old songs of Telamon.
And Philonides says--
I have been here =katakeimenos= a long time.
And Euripides says in the Cyclops--
=Anepese= (which is the same as =anekeito=)
Breathing forth long and deep and heavy breath.
And Alexis says--
After that I bade her =anapesein= by my side.
43. The ancients, too, used the word =pasasthai= for to taste. And so
Phoenix says to Achilles, "You would not =pasasthai= anything in any
one else's house. And in another place we find--
When, they =epasanto= 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, (=pasamên=.)
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," =apastos=. But the poet never uses the word
=pasasthai= of those who eat their fill; but in their case he uses words
which express satiety:--
But when their minds were pleased (=tarphthen=) with wholesome food;
and,
When they had ceased to wish for meat and drink.
But more modern writers use the word =pasasthai= for being satisfied.
Callimachus says--
I should like to satiate
(=pasasthai=) myself with thyme;
and Eratosthenes--
They roasted their game in the ashes and ate it,
(=epasanto=) 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, =daita thaleian=,
is the same as =diaita= 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 =daisasthai=.
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.[40:1]
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;[40:2]
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
Phoenix 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 =aithops=. 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 Oenopion 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;
Boeotia 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 Euboea'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;
Phoenicia 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.[46:1]
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;
Phoenicia, 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
assafoetida 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 Troezene entitles the second =Thesmophoriazousai=
of Aristophanes =Thesmophoriasasai=. 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.
Phoenicia 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 Phoenician 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 Phoenician wine, saying, "Nuts,
pomegranates, dates, and other sweetmeats, and small casks of
Phoenician wine." And again,--
A cask of good Phoenician 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 =prodromos=, and
others call it =protropos=.
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 =lagôs=, 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 Oenoe the
Dionysiac vine. And Oenoe 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 =paramenios=, that is to say, _such as can be kept_.
And some say that it is so called from =praunein to menos=, _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,[50:1] 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 Euboea--
Drinking deep draughts of harsh Euboean 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 Oesyma. 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 Troezene, (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 Oenus, and another from
Onoglæ and Stathmi. And these places are all near Pitane. Accordingly,
he says, "And wine from Oenus, 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 =anadendritês=, 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 =hypochytos=, or _the adulterated wine_, being near akin
to sweet wine. But that wine is called =glyxis= which goes through no
process of decoction.
There is also a Rhodian wine, which Polyzelus calls =autitês=:[52:1] and
another which Plato the comic writer calls =kapnias=;[52:2] 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
=trimma=. 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 Troezenian 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 =tainia= 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 =rhaphanos=. And so Apollodorus of
Carystus expressly says--
We call it =rhaphanos=, and strangers =krambê=;
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.
FOOTNOTES:
[1:1] We have adopted the conventional title, "Banquet of the Learned;"
but it may, perhaps, be more accurate to translate it, "The Contrivers
of Feasts." _Vide_ Smith's Biographical Dictionary, _voc._ Athenæus.
[3:1] Callimachus.
[3:2] Marcus Aurelius.
[4:1] Asteropæus was one of the Trojan heroes who endeavoured to fight
Achilles, being armed with two spears.
[4:2] Pindar. Ol. i. 22.--See Moore's translation.
[7:1] Epicharmus.
[8:1] There is a pun here that is untranslateable. =Daktylos= is a
finger; but the =Daktyloi Idaioi= were also priests of Cybele in Crete,
and are the people to whom the discovery of iron, and the art of working
it by fire, is ascribed.
[9:1] =philichthys=, fond of fish.
[9:2] =philodeipnos=, fond of feasting.
[13:1] Odyss. iv. 54. The poetical translations are from the
corresponding passages in Pope's Homer.
[13:2] Ib. iv. 65.
[14:1] Iliad, xxiv. 262.
[15:1] Iliad, i. 469.
[15:2] Ib. xi. 629.
[16:1] Iliad, xxii. 427.
[16:2] Odyss. ii. 340.
[16:3] Ib. xxi. 293.
[17:1] Odyss. xv. 499.
[17:2] Iliad, xxiv. 124.
[18:1] _Vide_ Liddell and Scott, _in voc._, who say, "In Homer it is
taken at sunrise; and so Æsch. Ag. 331, later _breakfast_ was called
=akratisma=, and then =ariston= was the midday meal, our _luncheon_, the
Roman _prandium_, as may be seen from Theoc. iv. 90-7, 8;" and 25:
translate =hesperisma= supper, and =epidorpis= a second course of
sweetmeats.
[18:2] Odyss. xvii. 599. This word is found nowhere else; waiting till
evening, Buttman Lexic. s. v. =deilê=, 12, explains it, having taken an
afternoon meal.--L. & S. _v._ Call. Fr. 190.
[19:1] Odyss. viii. 98.
[19:2] Iliad, ix. 225.
[20:1] The real reading is =Oiônoisi te pysi=, Iliad, i. 5. "He made
them the prey of dogs and of all birds."
[20:2] Odyss. xii. 322.
[21:1] Iliad, xvi. 745.
[21:2] Odyss. vii. 70.
[21:3] Iliad, i. 471.
[21:4] Odyss. vii. 179.
[21:5] Il. iv. 65.
[22:1] Iliad, iv. 3.
[22:2] Odyss. iv. 18.
[23:1] Odyss. vii. 481.
[23:2] Ib. xii. 191.
[25:1] "=hyporchêma=, a hyporcheme or choral hymn to Apollo, near akin
to the Pæan. It was of a very lively character, accompanied with dancing
(whence the name) and pantomimic action; and is compared by Athenæus to
the =kordax= (630 E). Pindar's Fragments, 71-82, are remains of
hyporchemes."--Liddell & Scott, in voc. =hyporchêma=.
[26:1] That is to say, in the eighteenth book of the Iliad, which
relates the making of the arms for Achilles by Vulcan.
[27:1] Odyss. ix. 7.
[28:1] Iliad, xiv. 173.
[28:2] Schweighauser says here that the text of this fragment of Eupolis
is corrupt, and the sense and metre undiscoverable.
[29:1] The Ninth Book.
[30:1] Odyss. xviii. 191.
[30:2] Ib. x. 195.
[30:3] Iliad, xiii. 736.
[32:1] This is a pun which, cannot be rendered in English,
=katallassomai= meaning to be changed, of money; and to be reconciled,
of enemies.
[40:1] Iliad, x. 572.
[40:2] Odyss. x. 362.
[46:1] This is no part of Pyth. 1 or 2, but a fragment of another ode.
[50:1] =Akantha= is Greek for a thorn.
[52:1] =Aititês=, by itself, _i.e._ unmixed.
[52:2] =Kapnias=, _i.e._ smoky.