The Deipnosophists; or, Banquet of the Learned of Athenæus, Vol. 3 (of 3)Athenaeus, of Naucratis
Philosophy
The Deipnosophists; or, Banquet of the Learned of Athenæus, Vol. 3 (of 3)
Athenaeus, of Naucratis
Civilization, Greco-Roman; Dinners and dining -- Greece; Greece -- Social life and customs; Homosexuality -- Greece
That is to say, eloquence in speaking makes up in the case of some men
for their personal ugliness. Now this is what the στέφανος
seems intended to do, on which account, in times of mourning, we do
exactly the contrary. For wishing to testify our sympathy for the dead,
we mutilate ourselves by cutting our hair, and by putting aside our
garlands."
17. Now Philonides the physician, in his treatise on Ointments and
Garlands, says, "After the vine was introduced into Greece from the Red
Sea, and when most people had become addicted to intemperate enjoyment,
and had learnt to drink unmixed wine, some of them became quite frantic
and out of their minds, while others got so stupified as to resemble
the dead. And once, when some men were drinking on the sea-shore, a
violent shower came on, and broke up the party, and filled the goblet,
which had a little wine left in it, with water. But when it became fine
again, the men returned to the same spot, and tasting the new mixture,
found that their enjoyment was now not only exquisite, but free from
any subsequent pain. And on this account, the Greeks invoke the good
Deity at the cup of unmixed wine, which is served round to them at
dinner, paying honour to the Deity who invented wine; and that was
Bacchus. But when the first cup of mixed wine is handed round after
dinner, they then invoke Jupiter the Saviour, thinking him the cause
of this mixture of wine which is so unattended with pain, as being the
author of rain. Now, those who suffered in their heads after drinking,
certainly stood in need of some remedy; and so the binding their heads
was what most readily occurred to them, as Nature herself led them to
this remedy. For a certain man having a headache, as Andreas says,
pressed his head, and found relief, and so invented a ligature as a
remedy for headache.
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