The Deipnosophists; or, Banquet of the Learned of Athenæus, Vol. 1 (of 3)Athenaeus, of Naucratis
General
The Deipnosophists; or, Banquet of the Learned of Athenæus, Vol. 1 (of 3)
Athenaeus, of Naucratis
Civilization, Greco-Roman; Dinners and dining -- Greece; Greece -- Social life and customs; Homosexuality -- Greece
But of those apples which are in season in the winter, the Cydonian give
out the more bitter juices, and those called strouthian give out juice
more sparingly; though what they do give out is not so harsh tasted, and
is more digestible." But Nicander of Thyatira says, that the Cydonian
apples themselves are called στρούθεια; but he says this out of ignorance.
For Glaucides asserts plainly enough that the best of all fruits which
grow on trees are the Cydonian apples and those called phaulian and
strouthian.
21. Stesichorus also mentions the Cydonian apples, in his Helena,
speaking thus:--
Before the king's most honour'd throne,
I threw Cydonian apples down;
And leaves of myrrh, and crowns of roses,
And violets in purple posies.
Alcman mentions them too. And Cantharus does so likewise, in the Tereus;
where he says--
Likening her bosom to Cydonian apples.
And Philemon, in his Clown, calls Cydonian apples strouthia. And
Phylarchus, in the sixth book of his Histories, says that apples by
their sweet fragrance can blunt the efficacy of even deadly poisons. At
all events, he says, that some Phariacan poison having been cast into a
chest still smelling from having had some of these apples stored away
in it, lost all its effect, and preserved none of its former power, but
was mixed and given to some people who were plotted against, but that
they escaped all harm. And that afterwards it was ascertained, by an
investigation and examination of the man who had sold the poison; and
that he felt sure that it arose from the fact of the apples having been
put away in the chest.
22. Hermon, in his Cretan Dialects, says that Cydonian apples are called
κοδύμαλα. But Polemo, in the fifth book of the treatise against Timæus,
says that some people affirm that the κοδύμαλον is a kind of flower. But
Alcman asserts that it is the same as the στρούθιον apple, when he says,
"less than a κοδύμαλον." And Apollodorus and Sosibius understand the
Cydonian apple by κοδύμαλον. But that the Cydonian apple differs from
the στρούθιον, Theophrastus has asserted clearly enough in the second
book of his History. Moreover, there are excellent apples grown at
Sidus, (that is, a village in the Corinthian territory,) as Euphorion or
Archytas says, in the poem called "The Crane:"--
Like a beautiful apple which is grown on the clayey banks
Of the little Sidus, refulgent with purple colour.
And Nicander mentions them in his Transformed, in this manner:--
And immediately, from the gardens of Sidoeis or Pleistus
He cut green apples, and imitated the appearance of Cadmus.
And that Sidus is a village of the Corinthian territory, Rhianus assures
us, in the first book of the Heraclea; and Apollodorus the Athenian
confirms it, in the fifth book On the Catalogue of the Ships. But
Antigonus the Carystian says, in his Antipater--
More dear to me was he than downy apples
Of purple hue, in lofty Corinth growing.
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