The Deipnosophists; or, Banquet of the Learned of Athenæus, Vol. 2 (of 3)Athenaeus, of Naucratis
Philosophy
The Deipnosophists; or, Banquet of the Learned of Athenæus, Vol. 2 (of 3)
Athenaeus, of Naucratis
Civilization, Greco-Roman; Dinners and dining -- Greece; Greece -- Social life and customs; Homosexuality -- Greece
And in Achaia Ceres is honoured under the title of Δημήτηρ ποτηριοφόρος,
in the territories of the Antheans, as Autocrates informs us in the
second book of his History of Achaia.
[Sidenote: CUPS.]
3. And I think it right that you should inquire, before we begin to
make a catalogue of the cups of which this sideboard (κυλικεῖον) is
full,—(for that name is given to the cupboard where the cups are kept,
by Aristophanes, in his Farmers—
As a cloth is placed in front of a sideboard (κυλικεῖον);
and the same word occurs also in Anaxandrides in his Melilotus; and
Eubulus in his Leda says—
As if he had been offering a libation,
He's broken all the goblets in the sideboard (κυλικεῖον).
And in his Female Singer he says—
And he found out the use of sideboards (κυλικεῖα) for us.
And in his Semele or Bacchus he says—
Hermes the son of Maia, polish'd well
Upon the sideboard . . . . .
And the younger Cratinus, in his Chiron, says—
But, after many years, I now have come
Home from my enemies; and scarce have found
Relations who would own me, or companions
Of the same tribe or borough. I enroll'd
My name among a club of cup-collectors (κυλικεῖον):
Jupiter is the guardian of my doors—
Protector of my tribe. I pay my taxes.)
4. It is worth while, I say, to inquire whether the ancients drank out
of large cups. For Dicæarchus the Messenian, the pupil of Aristotle,
in his Essay on Alcæus, says that they used small cups, and that they
drank their wine mixed with a good deal of water. But Chamæleon of
Heraclea, in his essay on Drunkenness, (if I only recollect his words
correctly,) says—"But if those who are in power and who are rich prefer
this drunkenness to other pleasures, it is no great wonder, for as
they have no other pleasure superior to this, nor more easy to obtain,
they naturally fly to wine: on which account it has become customary
among the nobles to use large drinking-cups. For this is not at all
an ancient custom among the Greeks; but one that has been lately
adopted, and imported from the barbarians. For they, being destitute
of education, rush eagerly to much wine, and provide themselves with
all kinds of superfluous delicacies. But in the various countries of
Greece, we neither find in pictures nor in poems any trace of any cups
of large size being made, except indeed in the heroic times. For the
cup which is called ῥυτὸν they attributed only to the heroes, which
fact will appear a perplexing one to some people; unless indeed any
one should choose to say that this custom was introduced because of
the fierceness of the appearance of these demigods. For they think the
heroes irascible and quarrelsome, and more so by night than by day. In
order, then, that they may appear to be so, not in consequence of their
natural disposition, but because of their propensity for drinking, they
represent them as drinking out of large cups. And it appears to me not
to have been a bad idea on the part of those people who said that a
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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