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
3. "And while we were now all amusing ourselves with agreeable trifling,
some flute-playing women and musicians, and some Rhodian players on the
sambuca come in, naked as I fancied, but some said that they had tunics
on. And they having played a prelude, departed; and others came in in
succession, each of them bearing two bottles of perfume, bound with a
golden thong, and one of the cruets was silver and the other gold, each
holding a cotyla,[211:1] and they presented them to each of the guests.
And then, instead of supper, there was brought in a great treasure, a
silver platter with a golden edge of no inconsiderable depth, of such a
size as to receive the entire bulk of a roast boar of huge size, which
lay in it on his back, showing his belly uppermost, stuffed with many
good things. For in the belly there were roasted thrushes, and paunches,
and a most countless number of figpeckers, and the yolks of eggs spread
on the top, and oysters, and periwinkles. And to every one of the
guests was presented a boar stuffed in this way, nice and hot, together
with the dish on which he was served up. And after this we drank wine,
and each of us received a hot kid, on another platter like that on which
the boar had been served up, with some golden spoons. Then Caranus
seeing that we were cramped for the want of room, ordered canisters and
bread-baskets to be given to each of us, made of strips of ivory
curiously plaited together; and we were very much delighted at all this,
and applauded the bridegroom, by whose means we were thus enabled to
preserve what had been given to us. Then chaplets were again brought to
us, and another pair of cruets of perfume, one silver and one gold, of
the same weight as the former pair. And when quiet was restored, there
entered some men, who even in the Potfeast[212:1] at Athens had borne a
part in the solemnities, and with them there came in some ithyphallic
dancers, and some jugglers, and some conjuring women also, tumbling and
standing on their heads on swords, and vomiting fire out of their
mouths, and they, too, were naked.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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