The Deipnosophists, or Banquet of the Learned of Athenaeus Part 1

The Deipnosophists, or Banquet of the Learned of Athenaeus.

by Athenaeus.

PREFACE.

The author of the DEIPNOSOPHISTS was an Egyptian, born in Naucratis, a town on the left side of the Canopic Mouth of the Nile. The age in which he lived is somewhat uncertain, but his work, at least the latter portion of it, must have been written after the death of Ulpian the lawyer, which happened A.D. 228.

Athenaeus appears to have been imbued with a great love of learning, in the pursuit of which he indulged in the most extensive and multifarious reading; and the princ.i.p.al value of his work is, that by its copious quotations it preserves to us large fragments from the ancient poets, which would otherwise have perished. There are also one or two curious and interesting extracts in prose; such, for instance, as the account of the gigantic ship built by Ptolemaeus Philopator, extracted from a lost work of Callixenus of Rhodes.

The work commences, in imitation of Plato's Phaedo, with a dialogue, in which Athenaeus and Timocrates supply the place of Phaedo and Echecrates.

The former relates to his friend the conversation which pa.s.sed at a banquet given at the house of Laurentius, a n.o.ble Roman, between some of the guests, the best known of whom are Galen and Ulpian.

The first two books, and portions of the third, eleventh, and fifteenth, exist only in an Epitome, of which both the date and author are unknown.

It soon, however, became more common than the original work, and eventually in a great degree superseded it. Indeed Bentley has proved that the only knowledge which, in the time of Eustathius, existed of Athenaeus, was through its medium.

Athenaeus was also the author of a book ent.i.tled, "On the Kings of Syria," of which no portion has come down to us.

The text which has been adopted in the present translation is that of Schweighauser.

C. D. Y.

BOOK I.--EPITOME.

1. Athenaeus is the author of this book; and in it he is discoursing with Timocrates: and the name of the book is the Deipnosophists. In this work Laurentius is introduced, a Roman, a man of distinguished fortune, giving a banquet in his own house to men of the highest eminence for every kind of learning and accomplishment; and there is no sort of gentlemanly knowledge which he does not mention in the conversation which he attributes to them; for he has put down in his book, fish, and their uses, and the meaning of their names; and he has described divers kinds of vegetables, and animals of all sorts. He has introduced also men who have written histories, and poets, and, in short, clever men of all sorts; and he discusses musical instruments, and quotes ten thousand jokes: he talks of the different kinds of drinking cups, and of the riches of kings, and the size of ships, and numbers of other things which I cannot easily enumerate, and the day would fail me if I endeavoured to go through them separately.

And the arrangement of the conversation is an imitation of a sumptuous banquet; and the plan of the book follows the arrangement of the conversation. This, then, is the delicious feast of words which this admirable master of the feast, Athenaeus, has prepared for us; and gradually surpa.s.sing himself, like the orator at Athens, as he warms with his subject, he bounds on towards the end of the book in n.o.ble strides.

2. And the Deipnosophists who were present at this banquet were, _Masyrius_, an expounder of the law, and one who had been no superficial student of every sort of learning; _Magnus_ . . . [Myrtilus] a poet; a man who in other branches of learning was inferior to no one, and who had devoted himself in no careless manner to the whole circle of arts and learning; for in everything which he discussed, he appeared as if that was the sole thing which he had studied; so great and so various was his learning from his childhood. And he was an iambic poet, inferior to no one who has ever lived since the time of Archilochus. There were present also _Plutarchus_, and _Leonidas_ of Elis, and _aemilia.n.u.s_ the Mauritanian, and _Zoilus_, all the most admirable of grammarians.

And of philosophers there were present _Pontia.n.u.s_ and _Democritus_, both of Nicomedia; men superior to all their contemporaries in the extent and variety of their learning; and _Philadelphus_ of Ptolemais, a man who had not only been bred up from his infancy in philosophical speculation, but who was also a man of the highest reputation in every part of his life. Of the Cynics, there was one whom he calls _Cynulcus_, who had not only two white dogs following him, as they did Telemachus when he went to the a.s.sembly, but a more numerous pack than even Actaeon had. And of rhetoricians there was a whole troop, in no respect inferior to the Cynics. And these last, as well, indeed, as every one else who ever opened his mouth, were run down by _Uppia.n.u.s_ the Tyrian, who, on account of the everlasting questions which he keeps putting every hour in the streets, and walks, and booksellers' shops, and baths, has got a name by which he is better known than by his real one, _Ceitouceitus_.

This man had a rule of his own, to eat nothing without saying ?e?ta?; ?

?? ?e?ta?; In this way, "Can we say of the word ??a, that it ?e?ta?, or is applicable to any part of the day? And is the word ???s?, or drunk, applicable to a man? Can the word ?t?a, or paunch, be applied to any eatable food? Is the name s?a???? a compound word applicable to a boar?"--And of physicians there were present _Daphnus_ the Ephesian, a man holy both in his art and by his manners, a man of no slight insight into the principles of the Academic school; and _Galenus_ of Pergamos, who has published such numbers of philosophical and medical works as to surpa.s.s all those who preceded him, and who is inferior to none of the guests in the eloquence of his descriptions. And _Rufinus_ of Mylaea.--And of musicians, _Alcides_ of Alexandria, was present. So that the whole party was so numerous that the catalogue looks rather like a muster-roll of soldiers, than the list of a dinner party.

3. And Athenaeus dramatises his dialogue in imitation of the manner of Plato. And thus he begins:--

TIMOCRATES. ATHENaeUS.

_Tim._ Were you, Athenaeus, yourself present at that delightful party of the men whom they now call Deipnosophists; which has been so much talked of all over the city; or is it only from having heard an account of it from others that you spoke of it to your companions?

_Ath._ I was there myself, Timocrates.

_Tim._ I wish, then, that you would communicate to us also some of that agreeable conversation which you had over your cups;

Make your hand perfect by a third attempt,

as the bard of Cyrene[3:1] says somewhere or other; or must we ask some one else?

4. Then after a little while he proceeds to the praises of Laurentius, and says that he, being a man of a munificent spirit, and one who collected numbers of learned men about him, feasted them not only with other things, but also with conversation, at one time proposing questions deserving of investigation, and at another asking for information himself; not suggesting subjects without examination, or in any random manner, but as far as was possible with a critical and Socratic discernment; so that every one marvelled at the systematic character of his questions. And he says, too, that he was appointed superintendant of the temples and sacrifices by that best of all sovereigns Marcus;[3:2] and that he was no less conversant with the literature of the Greeks than with that of his own countrymen. And he calls him a sort of Asteropaeus,[4:1] equally acquainted with both languages. And he says that he was well versed in all the religious ceremonies inst.i.tuted by Romulus, who gave his name to the city, and by Numa Pompilius; and that he is learned in all the laws of politics; and that he has arrived at all this learning solely from the study of ancient decrees and resolutions; and from the collection of the laws which (as Eupolis, the comic writer, says of the poems of Pindar) are already reduced to silence by the disinclination of the mult.i.tude for elegant learning. He had also, says he, such a library of ancient Greek books, as to exceed in that respect all those who are remarkable for such collections; such as Polycrates of Samos, and Pisistratus who was tyrant of Athens, and Euclides who was himself also an Athenian, and Nicorrates the Samian, and even the kings of Pergamos, and Euripides the poet, and Aristotle the philosopher, and Nelius his librarian; from whom they say that our countryman Ptolemaeus, surnamed Philadelphus, bought them all, and transported them with all those which he had collected at Athens and at Rhodes to his own beautiful Alexandria. So that a man may fairly quote the verses of Antiphanes and apply them to him:--

You court the heav'nly muse with ceaseless zeal, And seek to open all the varied stores Of high philosophy.

And as the Theban lyric poet[4:2] says:--

Nor less renown'd his hand essays To wake the muse's choicest lays, Such as the social feast around Full oft our tuneful band inspire.

And when inviting people to his feasts, he causes Rome to be looked upon as the common country of all of them. For who can regret what he has left in his own country, while dwelling with a man who thus opens his house to all his friends. For as Apollodorus the comic poet says:--

Whene'er you cross the threshhold of a friend, How welcome you may be needs no long time To feel a.s.sured of; blithe the porter looks, The house-dog wags his tail, and rubs his nose Against your legs; and servants hasten quick, Unbidden all, since their lord's secret wish Is known full well, to place an easy chair To rest your weary limbs.

5. It would be a good thing if other rich men were like him; since when a man acts in a different manner, people are apt to say to him, "Why are you so mean? Your tents are full of wine."

Call the elders to the feast, Such a course befits you best.

Such as this was the magnanimity of the great Alexander. And Conon, after he had conquered the Lacedaemonians in the sea-fight off Cnidus, and fortified the Piraeus, sacrificed a real hecatomb, which deserved the name, and feasted all the Athenians. And Alcibiades, who conquered in the chariot race at the Olympic games, getting the first, and second, and fourth prizes, (for which victories Euripides wrote a triumphal ode,) having sacrificed to Olympian Jupiter, feasted the whole a.s.sembly.

And Leophron did the same at the Olympic games, Simonides of Ceos writing a triumphal ode for him. And Empedocles of Agrigentum, having gained the victory in the horse race at the Olympic games, as he was himself a Pythagorean, and as such one who abstained from meat, made an image of an ox of myrrh, and frankincense, and the most expensive spices, and distributed it among all who came to that festival. And Ion of Chios, having gained the tragic crown at Athens, gave a pot of Chian wine to every Athenian citizen. For Antiphanes says:--

For why should any man wealth desire, And seek to pile his treasures higher, If it were not to aid his friends in their need, And to gain for himself love's and grat.i.tude's meed?

For all can drink and all can eat, And it is not only the richest meat, Or the oldest wine in the well-chased bowl Which can banish hunger and thirst from the soul.

And Xenophanes of Chalcedon, and Speusippus the Academic philosopher, and Aristotle, have all written drinking songs.

And in the same manner Gellias of Agrigentum, being a very hospitable man, and very attentive to all his guests, gave a tunic and cloak to every one of five hundred hors.e.m.e.n who once came to him from Gela in the winter season.

6. The sophist uses the word Dinnerchaser, on which Clearchus says that Charmus the Syracusan adopted some little versicles and proverbs very neatly to whatever was put on the table. As on seeing a fish, he says:--

I come from the salt depths of aegeus' sea.

And when he saw some ceryces he said--

Hail holy heralds (?????e?), messengers of Jove.

And on seeing tripe,

Crooked ways, and nothing sound.

When a well-stuffed cuttlefish is served up,

Good morrow, fool.

When he saw some pickled char,