A very celebrated cup among the Athenians was the Thericlean,[463] originally invented by Thericles, a Corinthian potter, contemporary with Aristophanes. This ware was black, highly varnished, with gilt edges;[464] but the name came afterwards to be applied to any vessel of the same form from whatever materials manufactured. There were accordingly Thericlea of gold with wooden stands. The cups of this kind, made at Athens, being very expensive, an inferior sort, in imitation, was produced at Rhodes, which, as far more economical, had a great run among the humbler classes. The Thericlean was a species of deep chalice with two handles, and bulging but little at the sides. Theophrastus[465] speaks of Thericlea turned from the Syrian Turpentine tree, the wood of which being black and taking a fine polish, it was impossible at a glance to distinguish them from those of earthenware. The paintings on these utensils appear to have been various. Sometimes a single wreath of ivy encircled them immediately beneath the golden rim; but it seems occasionally to have been covered with representations of animals, which gave rise to a forced and false etymology of the name.[466] ----- Footnote 463: Cf. Bentley on the Epist. of Phalaris i. 169–189. Footnote 464: Alexis, ap. Athen. xi. 42. Footnote 465: Hist. Plant. v. 4. 2. cum not. Schnei. t. iii. p. 426. Footnote 466: Athen. xi. 41. ἄλλοι δὲ ἱστοροῦσι, θηρίκλειον ὀνομασθῆναι τὸ ποτήριον διὰ τὸ δορὰς θηρίων αὐτῷ ἐντετυπῶσθαι. ----- We have already observed, that the use of drinking-horns[467] was not unknown to the ancients. In fact, it seems, in very remote ages, to have been customary to convert bulls’ horns into cups with very little preparation; and the practice of quaffing wine from this rude kind of goblet had by some been supposed to have suggested the idea to artists of representing Bacchos with horns, and to poets the epithet of the Bull Dionysos. He was moreover worshiped at Cyzicos under the form of a bull. Afterwards, as taste and luxury advanced, these simple vessels were exchanged for horns of silver, which Pindar attributes to the Centaurs.[468] Xenophon[469] found drinking-horns among the Paphlagonians, and afterwards even in the palace of the Thracian king Seuthes. Æschylus speaks of silver horns, with lids of gold, in use among the Perrhæbians, and Sophocles, in his Pandora, makes mention of drinking-horns of massive gold. Philip of Macedon was accustomed among his friends to drink from the common horn. Golden horns were found among the inhabitants of Cythera. Horns of silver were in use at Athens; and, among the articles enumerated as sold at a public auction, mention is made of one of these vessels of a twisted form. ----- Footnote 467: Bœckh. Pub. Econ. of Athens, ii. 254. Footnote 468: Pind. Frag. Incert. 44. i. 244. Dissen. Comm. ii. 659. Jacob. Anthol. vii. 336. Athen. xi. 51. Cf. Damm. v. κέρας. Footnote 469: Anab. vi. 1. 4. vii. 3. 24, seq. -----