The Deipnosophists, or Banquet of the Learned of Athenaeus Part 36

And these rolls are made of new wheat as Philyllius declares in his Auge--

Here I come, bearing in my hand the offspring Of three months' wheat, hot doughy collabi, Mixed with the milk of the gra.s.s-feeding cow.

There is also a kind of loaf called maconidae, mentioned by Alcman, in his fifteenth book, in these terms--"There were seven couches for the guests, and an equal number of tables of maconidae loaves, crowned with a white tablecloth, and with sesamum, and in handsome dishes." Chrysocolla are a food made of honey and flax.[183:1]

There is also a kind of loaf called collyra, mentioned by Aristophanes in his Peace--

A large collyra, and a mighty lump Of dainty meat upon it.

And in his Holcades he says--

And a collyra for the voyagers, Earn'd by the trophy raised at Marathon.

76. There is a loaf also called the obelias, or the penny loaf, so called because it is sold for a penny, as in Alexandria; or else because it is baked on small spits. Aristophanes, in his Farmers, says--

Then perhaps some one bakes a penny loaf.

And Pherecrates, in his Forgetful Man, says--

Olen, now roast a penny roll with ashes, But take care, don't prefer it to a loaf.

And the men who in the festivals carried these penny rolls on their shoulders were called ?e??af????. And Socrates, in his sixth book of his Surnames, says that it was Bacchus who invented the penny roll on his expeditions. There is a roll called etnites, the same which is also named lecithites, according to the statement of Eucrates.

The Messapians call bread pa???, and they call satiety pa??a, and those things which give a surfeit they call p???a; at least, those terms are used by Blaesus, in his Mesotriba, and by Archilochus, in his Telephus, and by Rhinthon, in his Amphitryon. And the Romans call bread _panis_.

Nastus is a name given to a large loaf of leavened bread, according to the statement of Polemarchus and Artemidorus. But the Heracleon is a kind of cheesecake. And Nicostratus says, in his Sofa--

Such was the size, O master, of the nastus, A large white loaf. It was so deep, its top Rose like a tower quite above its basket.

Its smell, when that the top was lifted up, Rose up, a fragrance not unmix'd with honey Most grateful to our nostrils, still being hot.

The name of bread among the Ionians was cnestus, as Artemidorus the Ephesian states in his Memorials of Ionia. Thronus was the name of a particular kind of loaf, as it is stated by Neanthes of Cyzicus, in the second book of his Grecian History, where he writes as follows--"But Codrus takes a slice of a loaf of the kind called thronus, and a piece of meat, such as they give to the old men."

There is, among the Elians, a kind of loaf baked on the ashes which they call bacchylus, as Nicander states in the second book of his treatise On Dialects. And Diphilus mentions it in his Woman who went Astray, in these words--

To bring loaves baked on ashes, strain'd through sieves.

The thing called ?p?p???a? is also a kind of roll; and that also is baked on the ashes; and by some it is called ???t??, or leavened. Cratinus, in his Effeminate People--

First of all I an apopyrias have--

77. And Archestratus, in his Gastronomy, thus speaks of flour and of rolls--

First, my dear Moschus, will I celebrate The bounteous gifts of Ceres the fair-hair'd.

And cherish these my sayings in thy heart.

Take these most excellent things,--the well-made cake Of fruitful barley, in fair Lesbos grown, On the circ.u.mfluous hill of Eresus; Whiter than driven snow, if it be true That these are loaves such as the G.o.ds do eat, Which Mercury their steward buys for them.

Good is the bread in seven-gated Thebes, In Thasos, and in many other cities, But all compared with these would seem but husks, And worthless refuse. Be you sure of this.

Seek too the round Thessalian roll, the which A maid's fair hand has kneaded, which the natives Crimmatias call; though others chondrinus.

Nor let the Tegean son of finest flour, The fine encryphias be all unpraised.

Athens, Minerva's famous city, sends The best of loaves to market, food for men; There is, besides, Erythra, known for grapes, Nor less for a white loaf in shapely pan, Carefully moulded, white and beautiful, A tempting dish for hungry guests at supper.

The epicure Archestratus says this; and he counsels us to have a Phnician or Lydian slave for a baker; for he was not ignorant that the best makers of loaves come from Cappadocia. And he speaks thus--

Take care, and keep a Lydian in thy house, Or an all-wise Phnician; who shall know Your inmost thoughts, and each day shall devise New forms to please your mind, and do your bidding.

78. Antiphanes also speaks of the Athenian loaves as preeminently good, in his Omphale, saying--

For how could any man of n.o.ble birth Ever come forth from this luxurious house, Seeing these fair-complexion'd wheaten loaves Filling the oven in such quick succession, And seeing them, devise fresh forms from moulds, The work of Attic hands; well-train'd by wise Thearion to honour holy festivals.

This is that Thearion the celebrated baker, whom Plato makes mention of in the Gorgias, joining him and Mithaecus in the same catalogue, writing thus. "Those who have been or are skilful providers for the body you enumerated with great anxiety; Thearion the baker, and Mithaecus who wrote the treatise called the Sicilian Cookery, and Sarambus the innkeeper, saying that they were admirable providers for the body, the one preparing most excellent loaves of bread, and the other preparing meat, and the other wine." And Aristophanes, in the Gerytades and olosicon, speaks in this manner--

I come now, having left the baker's shop, The seat of good Thearion's pans and ovens.

And Eubulus makes mention of Cyprian loaves as exceedingly good, in his Orthane, using these words--

'Tis a hard thing, beholding Cyprian loaves, To ride by carelessly; for like a magnet They do attract the hungry pa.s.sengers.

And Ephippus, in his Diana, makes mention of the ????????? loaves (and they are the same as the ????a??) in these terms--

Eating the collix, baked in well-shaped pan, By Alexander's Thessalian recipe.

Aristophanes also says, in his Acharnensians--

All hail, my collix-eating young Botian.

79. When the conversation had gone on this way, one of the grammarians present, whose name was Arrian, said--This food is as old as the time of Saturn, my friends; for we are not rejoicing in meal, for the city is full of bread, nor in all this catalogue of loaves. But since I have fallen in with another treatise of Chrysippus of Tyana, which is ent.i.tled a treatise on the Art of Making Bread; and since I have had experience of the different recipes given in it at the houses of many of my friends, I will proceed to say something myself also on the subject of loaves. The kind of loaf which is called ??t?pt??????, differs in some respect from that made in a pan, and from that made in an oven.

But if you make it with hard leaven, it will be bright and nice, so that it may be eaten dry; but if it be made with a looser leaven, then it will be light but not bright. But the loaf which is made in a pan, and that which is made in an oven, require a softer kind of leaven. And among the Greeks there is a kind of bread which is called tender, being made up with a little milk and oil, and a fair quant.i.ty of salt; and one must make the dough for this bread loose. And this kind of loaf is called the Cappadocian, since tender bread is made in the greatest quant.i.ties in Cappadocia. But the Syrians call loaves of this kind ?a??; and it is the best bread made in Syria, because it can be eaten hot; and it is like a flower. But there is also a loaf called boletinus, from being made like a mushroom, and the kneading-trough is smeared with poppies plastered over the bottom of it, on which the dough is placed, and by this expedient it is prevented from sticking to the trough while the leaven is mixed in. But when it is put in the oven, then some groats are spread under on a tile, and then the bread is put on it, and it gets a most beautiful colour, like cheese which has been smoked.

There is also a kind of bread called strepticias, which is made up with a little milk, and pepper and a little oil is added, and sometimes suet is subst.i.tuted. And a little wine, and pepper, and milk, and a little oil, or sometimes suet, is employed in making the cake called artolaganum. But for making the cakes called capuridia tracta, you mix the same ingredients that you do for bread, and the difference is in the baking.

80. So when the mighty sophist of Rome had enunciated these precepts of Aristarchus, Cynulcus said--O Ceres, what a wise man! It is not without reason that the admirable Blepsias has pupils as the sand of the sea in number, and has ama.s.sed wealth from this excellent wisdom of his, beyond all that was acquired by Gorgias or Protagoras. So that I am afraid, by the G.o.ddesses, to say whether he himself is blind, or whether those who have entrusted his pupils to him have all but one eye, so as scarcely to be able to see, numerous as they are. Happy are they, or rather blessed ought I to call them, whose masters treat them to such divine lectures.

And in reply to this Magnus, a man fond of the table, and very much inclined to praise this grammarian to excess, because of the abundance of his learning, said--But ye--

Men with unwashen feet, who lie on the ground, You roofless wanderers, all-devouring throats, Feasting on other men's possessions,

as Eubulus says--did not your father Diogenes, once when he was eagerly eating a cheesecake at a banquet, say to some one who put the question to him, that he was eating bread excellently well made? But as for you, you

Stranglers of dishes of white paunches,

as the same poet, Eubulus, says, you keep on speaking without ever giving place to others; and you are never quiet until some one throws you a crust or a bone, as he would do to a dog. How do you come to know that cubi (I do not mean those which you are continually handling) are a kind of loaf, square, seasoned with anise, and cheese, and oil, as Heraclides says in his Cookery Book? But Blepsias overlooked this kind, as also he did the thargelus, which some call the thalysius. But Crates, in the second book of his treatise on the Attic Dialect, says that the thargelus is the first loaf made after the carrying home of the harvest.

The loaf made of sesame he had never seen, nor that which is called anastatus, which is made for the Arrephori.[188:1] There is also a loaf called the pyramus, made of sesame, and perhaps being the same as the sesamites. But Trypho mentions all these different kinds in the first book of his treatise on Plants, as he also does those which are called thiagones. And these last are loaves made for the G.o.ds in aetolia. There are also loaves called dramices and araxis among the Athamanes.

81. And the writers of books on dialects give lists of the names of different loaves. Seleucus speaks of one called dramis, which bears this name among the Macedonians; and of another called daratus by the Thessalians. And he speaks of the etnites, saying that it is the same as the lecithites, that is to say, made of the yolks of eggs and of pulse.

And he says that the loaf called ?????t??, has its name from being made of wheat crushed (??????????), and not sifted, and of groats. And Amerias speaks of a loaf called xeropyrites, made of pure wheat, and nothing else; and so does Timachidas. But Nicander says that thiagones is the name given by the aetolians to those loaves which are made for the G.o.ds.

The Egyptians have a bread which is rather bitter, which they call cyllastis. And Aristophanes speaks of it in his Danaides, saying--

Mention the cyllastis and the petosiris.