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
Her very mien is worthy of a kingdom.[24]
And in Homer, the old men among the people marvelling at the beauty of
Helen, are represented as speaking thus to one another—
They cried, "No wonder such celestial charms
For nine long years have set the world in arms;—
What winning graces! what majestic mien!
She moves a goddess, and she looks a queen."[25]
And even Priam himself is moved at the beauty of the woman, though he
is in great distress. And also he admires Agamemnon for his beauty, and
uses the following language respecting him—
Say, what Greek is he
Around whose brow such martial graces shine,—
So tall, so awful, and almost divine?
Though some of larger stature tread the green,
None match his grandeur and exalted mien.[26]
And many nations have made the handsomest men their kings on that
account. As even to this day that Æthiopian tribe called the Immortals
does; as Bion relates in his History of the Affairs of Æthiopia. For,
as it would seem, they consider beauty as the especial attribute of
kings. And goddesses have contended with one another respecting beauty;
and it was on account of his beauty that the gods carried off Ganymede
to be their cup-bearer—
The matchless Ganymede, divinely fair,
Whom Heaven, enamour'd, snatch'd to upper air.[27]
And who are they whom the goddesses have carried off? are they not the
handsomest of men? And they cohabit with them; as Aurora does with
Cephalus and Clitus and Tithonus; and Ceres with Jason; and Venus with
Anchises and Adonis. And it was for the sake of beauty also that the
greatest of the gods entered through a roof under the form of gold, and
became a bull, and often transformed himself into a winged eagle, as he
did in the case of Ægina. And Socrates the philosopher, who despised
everything, was, for all that, subdued by the beauty of Alcibiades; as
also was the venerable Aristotle by the beauty of his pupil Phaselites.
And do not we too, even in the case of inanimate things, prefer what
is the most beautiful? The fashion, too, of Sparta is much praised, I
mean that of displaying their virgins naked to their guests; and in
the island of Chios it is a beautiful sight to go to the gymnasia and
the race-courses, and to see the young men wrestling naked with the
maidens, who are also naked.
[Sidenote: BEAUTY.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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