Volume 1

The Deipnosophists, or, Banquet of the learned, of Athenæus / literally translated by C.D. Yonge, B.A. ; with an appendix of poetical fragments, rendered into English verse by various authors, and a general index.

  • Athenaeus
Date:
1854
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The Deipnosophists, or, Banquet of the learned, of Athenæus / literally translated by C.D. Yonge, B.A. ; with an appendix of poetical fragments, rendered into English verse by various authors, and a general index. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    61/468 (page 41)
    <ln whicli account also he calls those trees which bear fruit beauteous :— There many a beauteous tree appears— Pomegranates, apples, figs, and pears. And those which are adapted for beiu<^ cut down for timber he calls tall, distinguishing the epithets which he applies to each by their respective uses :— There tall trees a<lorn the grove, The ash, and pine that towers above. And the use of these trees was older than the Trojan war. And Tantalus, even after he is dead, is not cured of his fancy for these fruits; as the god, to punish him, waves such before his eyes (just as men lead on irrational animals by holding branches in front of them), and then prevents him from enjoying them, the moment he begins to entertain a hope of doing so. And Ulysses reminds Laertes of what he gave him when he was a child: “ You gave me thirteen pears —and so on. 46. And that they used to cat fish, Sarpedon proves jfiainl}', when he compai'es the being taken prisoner to fish caught in a large net. Yet Eubidus, jesting in the way that the comic writem allow themselves, says— I pray j’ou, where in Homer is the chief Who e’er eat fish, or anything but beef] And, though so much of liberty they boasted. Their meat was never anything but roasted. Nor did those heroes allow the birds the free enjoyment of the air; setting traps and nets for thrushes and doves. And they practised the art of taking bird.s, and, suspending a dove by a small string to the mast of a ship, then shot aiTows iit it fi'om a di.stance, as is shown in the book describing the funeral games. But Homer passed over the use of vegetables, and fish, and birds, lest to mention them should seem like praising gluttony, thinking besides there would be a want of decorum in dwelling on the preparation of such things, which he considered beneath the dignity of gods and heroe.s. But that they did in reality eat their meat boiled as well as roasted, he shows when he says— But as a c.aldron boils with melting fat Of wcll-fcd pig;