Chapter II (1)

INDUSTRY: MILLERS, BAKERS, VINTNERS, MARKETS, ETC.

We have examined the condition of the poor at Athens, and shall now consider how far the laws of the state interfered to better their circumstances by promoting industry, and rendering it honourable. Among the Spartans, idleness, the vice of soldiers,[389] was regarded as a proof of rank; whence the remark of that disciple of Lycurgus, who, being present at Athens during a trial for this offence, fatal to a democracy, observed, that they punished the man for being a gentleman.[390] Solon, however, entertained little respect for this mark of gentility. According to his laws, of which the whole design was to create and preserve that feeling of manliness bestowed by the consciousness of independence, the individual, who, possessing no property, refused to labour, was a bad citizen, against whom any one might bring an action of idleness.[391] Draco, the most Utopian and savage of legislators, punished vagabondage with death, or, according to some, with infamy only. But Solon, who would not require too much of human nature, reserved this latter penalty for those who should be thrice convicted.[392]

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Footnote 389:

Lord Bacon, whose opinions were chiefly based on the study of
antiquity, observes, after Plato and Aristotle, that military nations
will always be somewhat inclined to idleness, and should rather be
indulged in it than otherwise. Essays, p. 79. But both the Athenians
and Romans were a hardworking people, and better soldiers have never
been known. The best soldiers in the English army are drawn from the
central provinces, where industry most abounds, and the laborious
Normans are the best troops in France. Cf. Plut. Ages. § 26.

Footnote 390:

Plut. Lycurg. § 24.

Footnote 391:

Diog. Laert. i. ii. § 53. Plut. Sol. §§ 22. 31. Herod. ii. 177.
Pollux. viii. 40. Ælian. Var. Hist. iv. 1.

Footnote 392:

Poll. viii. 40. Plut. Sol. § 17.

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It has been conjectured, that Peisistratos was author of the law against idleness; by which he sought to compel as many of the citizens as had no visible means of support, to take refuge in the country. Be this, however, as it may, it was not alone by severity, that the laws of Athens sought to recommend the pursuits of industry.[393] Superior excellence in any useful art entitled a man to very high honours, to maintenance at the public expense, in the Prytaneion, in company with the chief magistrates and generals of the commonwealth, and one of the first seats at all spectacles and popular assemblies. But to preserve this post, it was not enough to have once done well. The ambitious citizen could maintain it only by persevering in the career of invention and improvement, for if another man in the same line were judged to excel him, he relinquished to the new comer both his dinners and his seat.[394]

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Footnote 393:

In Plutarch’s life of Pericles there occurs a very remarkable passage,
describing the constant employment and plenty which were diffused
through the city by the policy of that great statesman. As for the
mechanics and meaner sort of people, they went not without their share
of the public money, nor yet received it to maintain them in idleness.
By the constructing of great edifices, which require many arts, and a
long time to finish them, they had equal pretensions to be recompensed
out of the treasury, (though they stirred not from the city,) with the
mariners, soldiers, and garrisons. For the different materials, such
as stone, brass, ivory, gold, ebony, and cypress, furnished employment
to carpenters, masons, braziers, goldsmiths, painters, turners, and
other artificers; the conveyance of them by sea employed merchants and
sailors, and, by land, wheelwrights, waggoners, carriers, rope-makers,
leather-cutters, paviers, and iron-founders; and every art had a
number of the lower people ranged in proper subordination to execute
it, like soldiers under the command of a general. Thus, by the
exercise of these different trades, was plenty diffused among persons
of every rank and condition. § 12. Engl. Trans.

Footnote 394:

Aristoph. Ran. 761, ibique Schol. Cf. Meurs. Them. Att. p. 106.

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From this, and other circumstances, it would appear, that there were annual exhibitions of works of art and industry, in principle like our cattle-shows, when a careful scrutiny of every improvement and invention took place, and the premium above described was awarded to the most ingenious. It is very certain that an assembly of the trades, more particularly of the bright-smiths, took place, on the thirtieth of Pyanepsion, in honour of Hephæstos, or Athena, when the festival of Pandemon, or Chalkeia, was celebrated; and the conjecture of Petit[395] is not improbable, that δεῖξις, or exhibition, then took place. It was, perhaps, on the same occasion, that the Athenian potters exhibited their most beautiful works and models.[396] At Sybaris, the author of any invention in the art of cookery enjoyed by patent, during the whole year, a monopoly of the article; and in the same city, the dyers and importers of purple, as well as those who caught and sold eels, were exempted from all taxes and imposts.[397]

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Footnote 395:

Cf. Legg. Att. vi. 6. 426, with Meurs. Gr. Feriat. p. 274, sqq.

Footnote 396:

Cf. Winkelm. Hist. de l’Art, i. 28. Meurs. Gr. Fer. v. Δαίδαλα. p. 74,
sqq.

Footnote 397:

Athen. xii. 22.

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A further incitement to industry, and the apprenticing out of children, was the law which freed any one who had not been instructed in some trade, from the necessity of supporting his parents,[398] to which otherwise all persons were strictly bound. Another law of Solon, which, at the same time shows the erroneousness of the common opinion respecting the condition of women at Athens, proves that to bring industry into good repute was a work of some difficulty. By this it was enacted, that any individual who reproached a citizen, whether male or female, with carrying on any business in the Agora, should be liable to a penalty.[399]

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Footnote 398:

Plut. Sol. § 22.

Footnote 399:

Demosth. cont. Eubul. § 10.

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There were, however, certain callings which the laws considered disreputable, or, at least, unsuitable to a man. Thus, an Athenian citizen could not legally be a perfumer, that effeminate vocation being left to the women.[400] Fishmongers, too, with butchers, cooks, sausage-sellers, fishermen, were held in low estimation both at Rome and Athens. Of all these Attic _pariahs_, however, the poor wretch who hawked fish,[401] and was contemptuously said to wipe his nose in his sleeve, or with his elbow, engrossed the largest share of public scorn. To these we may add bird-catchers, and fruit-sellers, and those low black-legs who subsisted on gambling.[402]

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Footnote 400:

Athen. xiii. 94. xv. 34.

Footnote 401:

In the Peloponnesos we find it was the custom for itinerant
icthyopolists to carry fish in baskets probably, suspended from both
ends of a rough pole (τραχεῖα ἄσιλλα) thrown across the shoulders.
This fact is alluded to in an Olympic inscription preserved in part by
Aristotle. Rhet. i. 7.

Footnote 402:

Casaub. ad Theoph. Charact. p. 185. On sedentary trades, see Poll. i.
51, and Muret, ad Arist. Eth. p. 63.

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As an encouragement to the citizens to addict themselves to industrious pursuits, foreigners, and all persons not free of the city, were legally incapacitated from carrying on business in the agora;[403] but this came in later times to be disregarded, since we find Egyptians, Phœnicians, and other aliens, possessing shops, and growing rich there. It was conceived, moreover, that, if men confined themselves to one calling, they would arrive therein at greater excellence; and the law, accordingly, forbade them to be of two trades.[404] Plato, whose ideal republic was modelled in so many particulars on that of Athens, adopted this law; and for the reason I have stated; comprehending thoroughly what advantages arise from the division of labour. He would not, he says, have the cordwainer meddle with husbandry, weaving, or architecture, that he might carry shoemaking to as great perfection as possible; and, in other branches of industry, men were in like manner to cultivate that only for which nature had fitted them, and wherein they might thus excel.[405] The same philosopher, while on the subject of industry, makes a remark worthy of consideration: It is not, he says, for the interest of the community, that men engaged in any branch of the arts should be so rich as to be independent of their business or profession, which, in such case, they will be apt to neglect; or so poor as to be harassed in mind, or cramped in the means of carrying on their occupations satisfactorily. In these things, as in every other, a comfortable competence is to be preferred to the extremes both of wealth and poverty.[406]

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Footnote 403:

Demosth. in Eubulid. § 10. The Lydians were said to be the first
retail traders. Herod. i. 94. Cf. Huet, Hist. of Commerce, p. 52.

Footnote 404:

Demosth. in Timocrat. § 32. Ulpian ad loc. Arist. Polit. ii. 11. p.
55. Bekk. Petit, Legg. Att. p. 425. Potter, i. 199.

Footnote 405:

Repub. ii. § 11. Stallb. Cf. iii. § 7. In the Laws he states these
reasons more strongly, t. viii. p. 110.

Footnote 406:

Repub. iv. 2. Stallb.

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Another means of carrying the various arts towards perfection, which in India and Egypt prevailed from time immemorial, is supposed to have been a practice, whether founded on law or custom, resembling the system of castes.[407] Theories, not destitute of ingenuity, have been constructed on this view of Athenian society.[408] Thus, the Dædali are supposed to have formed the sculptor caste; the Eupyridæ a caste of husbandmen; the Boutadæ of herdsmen; the Ceryces of heralds; the Hephœstiadæ of blacksmiths; the Poimenidæ of shepherds, and so on. Vestiges of this curious state of things are supposed to be discernible in the history of Attica, even so late as the age of Pericles, when we find Socrates a member of the Dædalian clan, by profession a sculptor. There were certainly in religious matters hereditary offices, which none could with propriety fill but the members of a certain family or clan. Thus, from among the Eteobutadæ was chosen the priestess of Athena Polias, who resided in the temple on the Acropolis; and the priest of Poseidon was drawn by lot from the same house.[409] To the Praxiergidæ were entrusted certain duties about the statue of Athena during the Plynterian festival.[410] The descendants of Buzyges performed those sacred ceremonies which thrice a year attended the ploughing of the soil;[411] to mention for the present no more.

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Footnote 407:

Cf. Plut. Sol. § 23.

Footnote 408:

The younger Ilgen, for example, has written a clever work, in which he
endeavours to prove the existence of a system of castes in Athenian
society. He sets out with giving an account of the four ancient
tribes, and explains the appellations bestowed on them, viz. Γελέοντες
or Τελέοντες, Ἀργαδεῖς, Αἰγικορεῖς and Ὅπλητες, to denote the pursuits
in which the members of those tribes were engaged. This done, he draws
his conclusion: “Quod si verum est,” says he, “efficitur, Tribus hasce
nihil aliud fuisse, quàm ordines variis negotiis distinctos et
separatos, quales apud Ægyptos et Indos cognovimus, et quos Lusitano
vocabulo Castas appellare solemus. Tale vero institutum num apud
Atticos exstiterit, multum à viris doctis est dubitatum. At licet
sint, quæ in contrariam sententiam aliquem ducere possint, tamen
argumenta, quæ revera Tribus castis orientalibus similes fuisse
suadent, tam sunt et multa et gravia, ut non debeat dubitari.”
Disquisit. de Trib. Att. p. 8, seq.

Footnote 409:

Harpocrat. in v. Apollod. iii. 15. 1. Bossier, de Gent. et Famil. Att.
Sacerd. p. 5, seq.

Footnote 410:

Plut. Alcib. § 34.

Footnote 411:

Plut. Præcept. Conjug. § 42.

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But we are not on this account to infer the existence in Attica of anything like the Hindù system of castes, which has itself never been rigidly observed.[412] What happens everywhere took place at Athens: fathers generally found it more convenient to bring up their sons to their own calling,[413] while the latter, observing constantly certain mechanical operations take place under their eye, were led first to admire and then to imitate. Thus the Potter’s boy, as Plato[414] remarks, long ministers to his father before he takes the clay into his own hands and begins to model a vase or tureen.

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Footnote 412:

See the Hindoos, vol. i. p. 111, seq.

Footnote 413:

When, however, they were put out to other masters an agreement,
corresponding to our indentures, was drawn up, in which it was stated
what they were to be taught. Xenoph. De Vectig. ii. 2. A further
resemblance to our own manners is discoverable in the practice of
giving premiums with apprentices, even in the case of the medical
profession. Plat. Menon. t. iii. p. 369.

Footnote 414:

De Repub. v. c. 14. Stallb.

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At Sparta, the heralds, cooks, and flute-players, constituted so many small castes, in which the profession passed down regularly from father to son. Of the absurdity of this practice Herodotus was fully sensible, for he observes, that a man was chosen to be a herald not for the loudness of his voice, but because he was a herald’s son.[415] Upon the whole, however, the practice was no more general among the Greeks than it is in England. When it became fashionable to ape gentility, rustic hinds, like Strepsiades in the “Clouds,” found their sons ashamed of the humble callings by which their childhood had been supported; a passion for aristocratic distinction infested the bosom of the vulgar; all desired to appear what they were not; and, despite the wise institutions of Solon, handicraftsmen and artificers sunk into hopeless contempt.[416] For this reason most trades by degrees were exercised by foreigners, who frequently acquired wealth and independence.

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Footnote 415:

Herod. vi. 60.

Footnote 416:

Muret, in Arist. Ethic. i. p. 63. Plutarch, generally judicious and
wise in his remarks, exhibits unequivocal tokens of his Bœotian soul
by endeavouring in one part of his writings to class even poetry and
sculpture among things disreputable to those who practised them: Ἡ δ᾽
αὐτουργία τῶν ταπεινῶν, τῆς εἰς τὰ καλὰ ῥαθυμὶας μάρτυρα τὸν ἐν τοῖς
ἀχρήστοις πόνον παρέχεται καθ᾽ αὑτῆς· καὶ οὐδεὶς εὐφυὴς νέος, ἢ τὸν ἐν
Πίσῃ θεασάμενος Δία, γενέσθαι φειδίας ἐπεθύμησεν, ἢ τὴν Ἣραν τὴν ἐν
Ἄργει, Πολύκλειτος, οὐδ᾽ Ἀνακρέων, ἢ Φιλήμων, ἢ Ἀρχίλοχος, ἡσθεὶς
αὐτῶν τοῖς ποιήμασιν. Οὐ γὰρ ἀναγκαῖον, εἰ τέρπει τὸ ἔργον ὡς χάριεν,
ἄξιον σπουδῆς εἶναι τὸν εἰργασμένον. Vit. Pericl. § 2.

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Notwithstanding this result, however, at which they arrived but slowly, both manufactures and every other branch of industry were in Greece, and at Athens more particularly, carried to a very high pitch of perfection. Even in the very lowest trades the love of gain, or the necessity of somehow earning a subsistence, led men to persevere. For example, in the occupation of a common fisherman, from which little beyond penury could be hoped for, and which impressed upon the countenance that sordid aspect so successfully represented by Hellenic art,[417] there were always numbers ready to engage. And yet consider in Theocritus[418] their wretched life, sleeping in their weather-beaten hut on the bleak shore, amid heaps of nets, piscatory baskets, lines, &c., and there dreaming, as indigence often does, of discovered treasures and ingots of gold. The patient endurance of the hungry fishers, seated far above the water on steep rocks, watching the entrance of the huge prey into their nets, appears to have been proverbial.[419]

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Footnote 417:

See the statue of the fisherman, British Museum, Gallery of
Antiquities, Room vi. No. 45, and an account of their operation in
Pollux. i. 96, sqq. Lucian, with a few strokes, paints the misery of
this wretched tribe casting their nets, toiling vigorously and then
bringing up a large stone or an earthen pot full of sand, like the
poor fisherman in the Arabian Nights. Hermot. § 65. The same author
speaks of an old half-blind beggar of ninety, who partly earned his
livelihood by the rod and line. Dial. Mort. xxvii. § 9. Persons of
this caste were sometimes by poverty reduced to commit sacrilege. Jup.
Trag. § 25.

Footnote 418:

Eidyll. xxi. 6, sqq.

Footnote 419:

Schol. Aristoph. Eq. 313, conf. ad 361. 862. The transporting of
persons to and from Salamis afforded employment to a hardy and skilful
race of ferrymen whose operations were judged of sufficient importance
to be the subject of a Solonian law: Εάν τὶς τῶν πορθμέων τῶν εἰς
Σαλαμῖνα πορθμευόντων ἄκων ἐν τῳ πόρῳ πλοῖον ἀνατρέψῃ, τούτῳ μὴ
ἐξείναι πάλιν πορθμεῖ γενέσθαι. Petit, Leg. Att. v. 6. p. 427. Æschin.
cont. Ctesiph. § 49. Montaigne speaking of the contradictory customs
of different nations, observes àpropos of fares: “Les Romains payoient
ce qui estoit deu aux bateliers, pour leur naulage (passage money) dès
l’entrée du bateau, ce que nous faisons après estre rendu à port:

Dum æs exigitur, dum mula ligatur,
Tota abit hora.”

(Horat. I. 5. 13, seq.) Essais. t. iii. p. 173. On this passage Coste
has the following note: “En Hollande on paye dans le bateau, environ à
mi-chemin du lieu où l’on va.” This last regulation, as most persons
know, has been adopted by our coast steamers.

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In the superior trades and manufactures there was among several cities an emulation, the result of which was to produce constant improvement. Athens, for example, which excelled in pottery, had rivals in Aulis, Rhodes, Megara, Corinth, Cnidos, and several other cities; Sicily and Bœotia were famous for their chariots; Argos for the manufacture of arms; Thessaly for its easy chairs; Chios and Miletos for their beds; Etruria for its gold-plate and works in bronze.[420]

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Footnote 420:

Athen. i. 49, seq.

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It is to be regretted that into the practice of the several trades and useful arts we can see but a very little way. In order, however, to render our idea of Hellenic civilisation as complete as possible, I shall here bring together as many particulars as I have been able to discover on this subject, commencing with those trades which were of primary necessity.[421] Of these, that of the miller may doubtless be regarded as of the first importance. In very early ages men understood not the art of reducing corn into meal; but either roasted the unripe ears upon the fire, or parched the separated grains in small fryingpans.[422] In process of time, however, the pestle and mortar were invented, by means of which,[423] though at a great expense of labour, flour of the finest possible quality could be obtained. To these succeeded the handmill, an invention of very remote ages,[424] which, notwithstanding, continued in use down to the days of Cicero. This machine, both in Greece and Italy, was at first commonly worked by women,[425] more especially by female slaves. But afterward the rudest and worst conducted of the male domestics were condemned to this severe toil, which at length grew to be regarded in the light of a punishment,[426] as working at the treadmill with us. Among the wealthy, each master of a family possessed his own mill; but as civilisation advanced, the grinding of corn constituted a separate occupation, and the trade of the miller was established. Public mills[427] were common at Athens in the time of Socrates, and it does not appear to have been unusual for strong and sturdy men of free condition to labour for hire in these establishments.

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Footnote 421:

Cf. Plat. De Rep. t. vi. p. 79. The president Goguet commiserates the
ancients on their extreme ignorance of the useful arts. Orig. des
Lois, t. v. p. 174.

Footnote 422:

Goguet, Orig. des Lois, i. 208, seq. 221. iii. 380. Beckman, History
of Inventions, i. 227, seq. Cf. Schol. Aristoph. Pac. 580. Equit. 803.

Footnote 423:

Schol. Aristoph. Vesp. 924.

Footnote 424:

There were those among the ancients who attributed the invention of
mills to the Pelasgian Myles, son of Lelex, probably that they might
have a hero from whose name they could conveniently derive the word
μυλῶν.—Ἀπ’ αὐτου (τοῦ ἱερου Ποσειδῶνος) προελθόντι ὡς ἐπὶ τὸ Ταΰγετον
ὀνομάζουσιν Ἀλεσίας χωρίον, Μύλητα τὸν Λέλεγος πρῶτον ἀνθρώπων μύλην
τε εὑρεῖν λέγοντες καὶ ἐν ταῖς Ἀλεσίαις ταύταις ἀλέσαι. Paus. iii. 20.
2. According to Hesychius, (v. Μυλὰς) this hero Myles or Mylas was one
of the Telchines: Μυλὰς, εἷς τῶν Τελχίνων, ὃς τὰ ἐν Καμείρῳ ἱερα
Μυλαντείων ἱδρύσατο. The tradition attributing to this personage the
invention of mills is thus related by Stephanus: Μυλαντία, ἄκρα ἐν
Καμίρῳ τῆς Ῥόδου. Μυλάντιοι, θεοί ἐπιμύλιοι. ἀπὸ Μύλαντος ἀμφότερα,
τοῦ καὶ πρώτου εὑρόντος ἐν τῷ βίῳ τὴν τοῦ μύλου χρῆσιν. De Urb. et
Popul. p. 570, seq. where we see the able and learned notes of
Berkelius.

Footnote 425:

Who very commonly sang at their employment. Schol. Aristoph. Nub.
1339. Plut. Conviv. Sept. Sap. § 45.

Footnote 426:

Poll. i. 80, informs us, that σιτοποιϊκὸς οἶκος was used by a kind of
euphemism for μυλῶν.

Footnote 427:

Cf. Schol. Aristoph. Eq. 253. Watermills were known in antiquity.
Vitruv. x. 10. Dempster on Rosin. i. 14. p. 87. Pignor. de Serv. 248.
These mills were, doubtless, called into requisition in time of war,
when the soldiers took along with them large quantities of cheese and
meal. Schol. Aristoph. Pac. 304. The ancients appear to have been
partial to small bread, since we find that four or even eight loaves
were sometimes made from a chœnix of flour. Schol. Vesp. 440.

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Thus we find that the philosophers Menedemos and Asclepiades, when young and poor, earned their subsistence, and were enabled to pursue the study of philosophy, by working at night in a mill.[428] As few persons knew this circumstance, and they were observed all day among the learned in the schools, some one brought against them an accusation of idleness, for which they were cited before the senate of Areopagos. In order to prove that they gained their livelihood in an honest way, the miller for whom they worked was brought forward. His testimony confirmed their statement; and he added, moreover, that he paid to each of them two drachmas per night. The Areopagites were so pleased with this proof of their industry and passion for philosophy, that, on pronouncing their acquittal, they at the same time made them a present of two hundred drachmas.[429] But these mills were not always put in motion by the hand of man. Yoked to beams projecting from the upper millstone, oxen and asses, moving about in a circle, blindfold, as at present, when similarly employed, sometimes turned the mill instead of slaves.[430] Upon the construction of these machines little exact information was possessed before the laying open of the ruins of Pompeii, where, in a baker’s shop, four mills, still almost perfect, have been discovered. They consist of a round stone basement with a rim, from the centre of which springs a blunt cone: this is the nether millstone. The upper one consists of an imperfect cylinder, hollowed out within, like an hour-glass, one part of which fits like a cap upon the cone below, while the other expands its bell-mouth above. Into this the corn was poured, and, descending through four small apertures upon the nether stone, was, by the turning round of the upper one thereon, reduced to meal, which passed gradually down, fining as it went, and fell out upon the stone basement below. The corn having been ground, the next operation was, to sever the flour from the bran, though sometimes bread was made from it in the rough,[431] and regarded, moreover, as extremely wholesome. First, and most simple of these contrivances, was the sieve,[432] made with slender rushes, which separated the coarse bran and produced a meal sufficiently cleansed for household bread. A much superior sieve was manufactured with linen threads, by which the flour was bolted to a great degree of fineness. When it was required of still superior purity and whiteness, the bolter would seem to have been bottomed with threads of woollen, which, being woven close, allowed nothing but particles of the utmost tenuity to pass.[433] All the above operations were supposed to be placed under the superintendence of a particular deity named Eunostos,[434] of whom no mention, I believe, is made in modern systems of mythology.

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Footnote 428:

Cleanthes, the disciple of Zeno, earned his subsistence by drawing
water during the night. Suidas, in v. t. i. p. 1467. b.

Footnote 429:

Athen. iv. 65.

Footnote 430:

Lucian. Luc. siv. Asin. § 41. Tim. § 23.

Footnote 431:

Cf. Dioscorid. ii. 107. Schol. Aristoph. Nub. 952; and Athen. iii. 83.

Footnote 432:

Plin. xviii. 28. Goguet, i. 211. Sch. Aristoph. Vesp. 164.

Footnote 433:

Τὸ ἐργαλεῖον ἐν ᾧ τὰ ἄλευρα διεσήθετο, τὸ μὲν ἐκ σχοίνων πλέγμα,
κόσκινον· εἰ δὲ τῷ κοσκίνου κύκλῳ ἀντὶ τοῦ σχοίνου λινοῦν τι σινδόνιον
εἴη ἐξηρτημένον, ὡς ἀκριβέστερον τὸ ἄλευρον καθαίροιτο, ἀλευρότησις
ἐκαλεῖτο· ἡ δὲ ἐξ ἐρίου, κρησέρα. Poll. Onomast. vi. 74.

Footnote 434:

Suid. v. Νοστος. t. i. p. 241. Athen. xiv. 10. Hesych. v. Εὔνοστος.
Eustath. ad Il. β. 162. 21. Ad Odys. γ. 754. 50. Etym. Mag. 394. 3.
Poll. vii. 180.

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The ancients employed in the making of bread a great many kinds of grain besides wheat[435] and barley;[436] as rye, millet, which was little nourishing, panic, which was still less so,[437] sesame, olyra, spelt, rice, tiphe, and a sort of grain from Ethiopia, called orindion. Several other substances were likewise used for the same purpose, not for the sake of adulteration, but either to improve the taste, or from reasons of economy; such as the root of the lotos,[438] and, perhaps, of the day-lily[439] dried, and reduced, like wheat itself, to flour; and the root of the corn-flag,[440] which was previously boiled, and, for the sake of communicating a sweet taste to the bread, would appear to have been mixed with the dough as the meal of the potato is in modern times. This plant grew most plentifully in grounds frequented by the mole, which loved to feed upon it. Another ingredient often mixed with bread was, the pulpy seed of the Star of Bethlehem,[441] of which the root likewise was eaten, both raw and cooked.

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Footnote 435:

A fine light bread was made of the three months summer wheat. Dioscor.
ii. 107. Others speak of this wheat as requiring four months to come
to maturity: Οἱ σιτάνιοι ἄρτοι, ἐκ τῶν σιτανίων πυρῶν, οἵ εἰσιν οἱ
τετράμηνοι Poll. vi. 73.

Footnote 436:

Schol. Aristoph. Eq. 816.

Footnote 437:

Dioscorid. ii. 119, seq. 113, sqq. Poll. i. 248. Schol. Aristoph.
Acharn. 1057. Herod. ii. 36.

Footnote 438:

Theoph. Hist. Plant. iv. 88.

Footnote 439:

Ἀσοὁδέλος. Id. Hist. Plant. vii. 13. 3. Cf. Hesiod. Opp. et Dies, 41.
Plin. xxi. 68. In certain countries of the Levant, even dates were
converted into a kind of bread. Theoph. Hist. Plant. i. 6. 10.

Footnote 440:

Φάσγανον. Theoph. Hist. Plant. vii. 12. 3. In their fondness for roots
the modern Greeks appear to equal their ancestors: “Ce qui a donné
lieu au proverbe, qui dit que les Grecs s’engraissent où les ânes
meurent de faim: cela est vrai à la lettre, les ânes ne mangent que
les feuilles des plantes, et les Grecs emportent jusques à la racine.”
Tournefort, t. i. p. 106.

Footnote 441:

Ὀρνιθόγαλον. Dioscor. ii. 174.

-----

The seed of the pepper-wort,[442] also, was sprinkled over cakes. Among the Thracians, about the river Strymon, they made bread from the flour of the water-caltron,[443] a prickly root of a triangular form, which abounds in the lagoons about Venice, where it is sold commonly in the market-places, and roasted for the table in hot embers.[444] The root of the dragon-wort,[445] eaten both raw and cooked in Greece, was, in the Balearic isles, served up fried with honey at banquets instead of cakes. They gathered it in harvest time, and, having roasted, cut it in slices, which were then strung on a cord and dried in the shade for keeping. The seeds of the garden poppy were used in bread-making, perhaps like carraway-seeds with us, as were those of the wild poppy for medicinal purposes in honeycakes, and certain kinds of sweetmeats.[446] They had in Syria a kind of bread made of mulberries, which caused the hair of those who habitually fed on it to fall off.[447]

-----

Footnote 442:

Μελανθίον. Id. iii. 93.

Footnote 443:

Τριβόλος. Id. iv. 15.

Footnote 444:

Mathée, Notes sur Dioscoride, p. 348.

Footnote 445:

Δρακόντιον. Dioscorid. ii. 196.

Footnote 446:

Id. iv. 65.

Footnote 447:

Athen. iii. 83.

-----

Although in the establishments of the wealthy bread was usually made by the women of the family, whether servile or free, the art of the baker seems early to have been practised as a separate business,[448] frequently at Athens by foreigners. The Lydian bakers, for example,[449] like those of France and Germany among us, enjoyed considerable celebrity, as did likewise the Cappadocians and Phœnicians, the art of the last having been able, it is said, to vary the qualities of the loaf every day in the year.[450]

-----

Footnote 448:

Lucian. Demon. §§ 23. 63.

Footnote 449:

Athen. iii. 77. At present Greek bakers are in most request throughout
the Levant. Wolf, Mission. Research. p. 12. Antiphanes, too, in his
Omphalè celebrates the Athenian bakers. Athen. iii. 78. And Plato in
the Gorgias, t. iii. p. 154, commemorates Thearion, who excelled in
this art. On ancient bread-bags, Casaub. ad Theoph. Char. 297.

Footnote 450:

Athen. iii. 77.

-----

Of the form and structure of a baker’s establishment we may acquire some conception from the ruins of Pompeii, where the mills, the ovens, the kneading-troughs,[451] small and great, would appear to have been sometimes of stone, though generally, perhaps, of wood. When the dough had been properly kneaded and leavened,[452] it was removed to a table with a rim, and fashioned into a variety of forms by the hand or with moulds. The larger loaves were placed in rows in a capacious oven, in which wood had been burnt and raked out carefully. Sometimes, also, a fire would appear to have been kept up in an open space round the oven, having at the top a smoke vent. One kind of loaf was baked in a small fictile or iron oven, called cribanos,[453] which was either placed on the fire, or surrounded by hot coals. There was another which they toasted before the fire on a spit;[454] and a great variety of cakes were baked on the live coals, or in the ashes.[455]

-----

Footnote 451:

Schol. Aristoph. Nub. 660, 666.

Footnote 452:

Cakes of leavened bread were called ζυμίται, those of unleavened bread
ἄζυμοι. Poll. vi. 32.

Footnote 453:

Schol. Aristoph. Acharn. 86.

Footnote 454:

Poll. vi. 75. Tzetz. Chiliad. vii. 770.

Footnote 455:

Athen. iii. 76. Some of these were reckoned so delicate as to create
appetite, and to have the power of removing drunkenness, 74. At Athens
one of the most thriving departments of the baker’s business must have
been supplying the fleets and merchantmen with biscuits, ἄρτοι
ναυτικοὶ ξηροὶ, a sample of which we find a sailor presenting to his
mistress. Luc. Dial. Meret. xiv. § 2. Cf. Poll. vii. 23. Athen. iii.
74.

-----

These it would require a separate treatise to enumerate and describe, since fashion appears to have been constantly varying the materials, the forms, and the appellations, of loaves. Upon the whole, however, the bread sold in the market-place of Athens was esteemed the whitest and most delicious in Greece; for the Rhodians, speaking partially of the produce of their own ovens, supposed they were bestowing on it the highest compliment when they said it was not inferior to that of Athens.[456] The dimensions of loaves depended, of course, on the object of the baker, and varied from those of the smallest roll, prepared for people of delicate appetites, to those of the enormous obeliæ, sometimes containing upwards of three bushels of flour, borne in procession at the festival of Dionysos.[457]

-----

Footnote 456:

Athen. iii. 74.

Footnote 457:

Poll. vi. 75. Tzetz. Chiliad. vii. 770.

-----

The business of the confectioner was in scarcely less request, or less profitable, than that of the baker himself. In most cases, perhaps, the finer kinds of pastry were made by women,[458] whose taste and skill enabled them to gratify the lovers of delicacies with an infinite variety of sweetmeats. The vocabulary connected with this division of the art culinary is singularly rich, but, in many cases, conveys to our minds very little precise information. It may be inferred, however, with something like certainty, that the stock of an Athenian confectioner contained most of those delicious trifles now to be found in the establishments of their successors in London or Paris. It will, consequently, be impossible to enumerate them, or to specify the several ingredients which entered into their composition. It has already, I believe, been observed, in speaking of wine, that the ancients were exceedingly partial to sweets, which, in the making of their confectionary, led them to the constant employment of honey. Most of their favourite cakes contained some portion of this ingredient,[459] sometimes, indeed, found in company with other articles apparently little calculated to combine with it. Wine, too, and cheese, and milk, and seeds, and the juices of vegetables, entered into the composition of various sweetmeats, which were occasionally made to keep long, as when intended for exportation; occasionally to be consumed at the moment, as they issued hot from the oven or the fryingpan. To this latter class belonged those delicate pancakes, the paste of which was poured liquid into the fryingpan, then flooded atop with fresh honey, and sprinkled with sesame and grated cheese.[460] The taste for the _catillus ornatus_ the Greeks appear to have borrowed from the Romans. This was a rich cake, composed of fine flour, kneaded with lard and the juice of lettuces, pounded in a mortar with wine, seasoned with pepper, and fried in boiling oil.[461] Among their pastry was a sort of pie made of vine-birds[462] and beccaficoes,[463] the undercrust of which, kneaded with honey, was sometimes moistened at table in chicken-broth.[464]

-----

Footnote 458:

Poll. iii. 41.

Footnote 459:

Athen. xiv. 51, sqq.

Footnote 460:

Athen. xiv. 55.

Footnote 461:

Id. xiv. 57.

Footnote 462:

Ἀμπελίδες ἅς νῦν ἀμπελιῶνας καλοῦσιν. Poll. vi. 52.

Footnote 463:

Συκαλίδες. Aristot. Hist. Anim. viii. 3. ix. 49.

Footnote 464:

Poll. vi. 77.

-----

These cakes and sweetmeats were sometimes fashioned into very extraordinary forms; one sort, for example, representing the female breast,[465] another a perfect sphere,[466] a third the head and horns of an ox,[467] while others were wrought into mystical figures, and appropriated to certain festivals of the Pagan calendar. The cake called Chærinè, made with the flour of parched wheat and honey, was bestowed as a prize on those who, during the Pannuchia, remained awake all night.[468]

-----

Footnote 465:

Athen. xiv. 55.

Footnote 466:

Athen. xiv. 56.

Footnote 467:

Poll. vi. 76.

Footnote 468:

Athen. xiv. 56.

-----

The trade of the butcher[469] was carried on at Athens by citizens,[470] whose shops in the Agora would seem to have been extremely well furnished, containing every variety of meat, from the chine of a prize ox,[471] to the hind quarter of an ass.[472] Sheep’s and kids’ heads were commonly sought to be rendered more attractive by having a branch of myrtle stuck between the teeth, whence one of the hetairæ was compared to a goat’s head, because she often walked the street with a sprig of myrtle in her mouth.[473] The information which antiquity has left us respecting butchers’ shops and implements is extremely imperfect. We are told simply, that they had chopping-blocks and cleavers, large axes with which animals were felled in the slaughter-houses, flaying knives, hooks whereon to suspend and display their stock, with scales for weighing meat.[474] A very curious anecdote is related of a Milesian butcher: there was a man named Killicon, who betrayed his native city Miletos, to the Prienians. Among his countrymen, who on this occasion became fugitives, was a butcher. This man fled to Samos, where he carried on his old business.[475] Some time after Killicon himself came to that island, and going into the market to buy provisions, by chance addressed himself to the Milesian butcher, whose name was Theagenes. The man remembered the traitor, and when he would have bought of him a piece of meat, desired Killicon to lay hold of the part he wanted, while he severed it from the carcase; then taking up an axe he smote off his hand, saying, “With that hand, at least, you shall never again betray your country.”[476]

-----

Footnote 469:

Κρεωπώλης. Butchers were also called μαγείροι κρεωδαίτας and
κρεουργοὶ. Poll. vii. 25.

Footnote 470:

Athen. xiii. 43.

Footnote 471:

Jason of Pheræ once excited among the Thessalian cities a contention
as to which of them should supply the finest ox: Ἐκήρυξε δὲ καὶ
νικητήριον χρυσοῦν στέφανον ἔσεσθαι, εἴ τις τῶν πόλεων βοῦν ἡγεμόνα
κάλλιστον τῷ θεῷ θρέψειε. Xenoph. Hellen. vi. 4. 29.

Footnote 472:

Poll. ix. 48.

Footnote 473:

Athen. xiii. 23. Plut. Dem. § 12 Id. Dion. § 1.

Footnote 474:

Poll. vii. 25. Suid. v. κρεάγρα, t. i. p. 1521, seq.

Footnote 475:

Among the Romans in the good old days of the republic, gentlemen
killed their own meat. “Suis enim fundum colit nostrum, quin sues
habeat, et qui non audieret patres nostros dicere, ignavum, et
sumptuosum esse, qui succidiam in carnario suspenderit potius ab
laniario, quam ex domestico fundo?” Varro, De Re Rust. ii. 4. From the
same author, (ii. 9,) we learn that ancient, like modern butchers,
were fond of being attended by large fierce dogs, which he advises
shepherds when in search of a co-guardian for their flocks most
especially to eschew.

Footnote 476:

Schol. Aristoph. Pac. 359.

-----

The vintners and tavern-keepers, who were tolerably numerous in Greece,[477] appear to have acquired much the same reputation as they enjoy in modern times. It was regarded as a matter of some difficulty to discover a jar of pure wine beneath their roofs; and, indeed, the honest vine-growers of the country are accused of having understood the art of making Bacchos acquainted with the nymphs on his way to the city. In other words they sold from their waggons in the Agora[478] a certain quantity of the Ilissos, mingled with the juice of the grape. The tavern-keepers, however, stood in very little need of their assistance, since they were not merely adepts in watering and doctoring their wines, but were skilful at giving short measure;[479] and yet understood various contrivances for alluring people to their houses. Thus one of them, for example, used to present a club that dined at his tavern with a kid,[480] reckoning upon paying himself by the profits of the wine.[481] However, when an opulent and delicate company honoured them with their presence, they could, doubtless, supply wines of the finest flavour; and to render them still more delicious, they were accustomed in summer to plunge the flagons into snow,[482] or, occasionally, to mingle it with the wine, as is still the fashion at Naples and in Sicily. Taverns, therefore, were furnished with ice-cellars, where snow could be kept during the hottest weather. Alexander[483] found means of carrying along with him a quantity of this article of luxury into India, where he probably treated Taxilos and Poros with iced wines. This achievement was imitated many ages after by the Khalif Mahadi, who on his pilgrimage to Mecca traversed the desert accompanied by a numerous train of camels laden with ice and snow, the first, according to Oriental historians, ever beheld in the Holy Cities. In the island of Cimolos, people made use, as coolers, of deep pits, in which jars of soft and tepid water,[484] and, doubtless, wine also, were refrigerated.[485]

-----

Footnote 477:

At the doors of these establishments then were probably, as at
Pompeii, holes bored through the stones of the foot pavement, raised
considerably above the road, to receive the halters of horses or
mules. Hamilton, Discov. at Pomp. p. 12.

Footnote 478:

Casaub. ad Theoph. Char. p. 244, seq. Athen. x. 38.

Footnote 479:

Cf. Schol. Aristoph. Thesm. 744.

Footnote 480:

Others defrauded their customers by mixing mutton with kid. Schol.
Arist. Eq. 1396.

Footnote 481:

Athen. xiii. 43.

Footnote 482:

Athen. iii. 97. Prodic. ap. Xen. Mem. ii. 1. 30.

Footnote 483:

Athen. iii. 97.

Footnote 484:

Σῆμος δὲ ὁ Δήλιος ἐν δευτέρῳ Νησιάδος, ἐν Κιμώλω τῇ νήσω φησὶ ψυχεῖα
κατεσκευάσθαι θέρους ὀρυκτὰ, ἔνθα χλιεροῦ ὕδατος πλήρη κεράμια
καταθέντες, ὕστερον κομίζονται χιόνος οὐδὲν διάφορα. Athen. iii. 96.
These coolers are rendered necessary by the entire lack of springs in
the island, whose inhabitants wholly depend for water on what they can
preserve in pits and cisterns. Tournefort, t. i. p. 170.

-----

The wine was laid up in jars, skins, and flasks, which, like the oil-flasks of Florence and Lucca, were cased with fine basket-work.[486] The measures in use were numerous, and somewhat difficult to be reduced with exactness to those of modern times: the metretes (ten gallons two pints) contained twelve choes; the chous (about six pints) six xestæ; the xestes (one pint) two cotylæ; the cotyla (half-pint) two tetarti; the tetarton (one quartern) two oxybapha; the oxybaphon, one cyathus and a-half; the cyathus, two conchæ; the concha, two mystra; the mystron, one chema and a-half; the chema, two cochlearia.[487]

-----

Footnote 485:

But see Beckmann, iii. 327.

Footnote 486:

Aristoph. Av. 799. These flasks were in later times called φλασκία,
whence the modern name. Suid. v. πυτίνη, t. ii. p. 672. d. These we
find were frequently, as well as baskets, the work of prisoners, who
probably thus earned a livelihood. Hesych. v. πυτίνη πλεκτή. Cf. Suid.
v. Διΐτρεφης, i. 729. In the cellars of Pompeii, the wine-jars were
found ranged along the walls without stoppers, instead of which a
little oil was probably poured on the top of the wine, as at present
in Italy. Hamilton, Discov. at Pomp. p. 15.

Footnote 487:

Eisenschmid. de Pond. et Mens. Vet. p. 166.

-----

Respecting the price of wines[488] our information is exceedingly imperfect; for although it be frequently stated how much a certain measure cost, the quality of the wine not being mentioned at the same time, we are very little nearer any real knowledge of the value. In Lusitania, ten gallons of pure wine were at one period sold for three-pence; at Athens the price of the metretes,[489] appears to have varied from about one and eight-pence, to three and four-pence, though occasionally it rose as high as about ten shillings. Even of the Mendæan, a wine of very superior quality, the wholesale price did not, at one period, exceed two drachmas, the metretes; but as the innkeepers were accused of having made enormous profits, it is at the same time quite credible, that they should occasionally have charged an obolos for the hemicotyla, especially to tipling women. Elsewhere, however, we find the chous, or twelve cotylæ, sold for an obolos,[490] the price, doubtless, depending partly on the quality of the wine, partly on the conscience of the innkeeper. For, notwithstanding that there were at Athens three magistrates charged with the inspection of wines,[491] part of whose business it probably was to prevent adulteration and exorbitant prices, the vintners, male and female, in all likelihood were an overmatch for them.

-----

Footnote 488:

Cf. Bœckh. Pub. Econ. i. p. 133.

Footnote 489:

Vid. Athen. iii. 86.

Footnote 490:

Athen. xi. 47. Cf. iii. 86.

Footnote 491:

Athen. x. 25. Poll. vi. 21.

-----

Most of the means by which the ancients adulterated their wines appear to be unknown to us, though we find that they endeavoured to restore the taste of such as were spoiled, by mingling with them a certain quantity of boiled wine[492] and preparations of lime and gypsum. To check the progress of the second fermentation, they were sometimes in the habit of casting a pumice-stone into the jar;[493] but where wine was so cheap, there was little temptation to have recourse to any other art than that of watering a little, which, according to the comic poet, might proceed from a benevolent desire to keep men sober and preserve their health.[494]

-----

Footnote 492:

Cf. Schol. Aristoph. Vesp. 1005. 878.

Footnote 493:

Conf. Beckmann, Hist. Invent. i. 402. sqq. Dioscor. v. 125.

Footnote 494:

A. Ἐν τοῖς συμποσίοισιν οὐ πίνετ᾽
Ἄκρατον. S. Οὐ γὰρ ῥᾴδιον· πωλοῦσι γὰρ
Ἐν ταῖς ἁμάξαις εὐθέως κεκραμένων·
Οὐχ ἵνα τι κερδαίνωσι, τῶν δ᾽ ὠνουμένων
Προνοούμενοι τοῦ τὰς κεφαλὰς ὑγιεῖς ἔχειν
Ἐκ κραιπάλης.
Alex. ap. Athen. x. 38.

-----

The stock of a respectable wine-merchant must have been peculiarly rich and varied,[495] consisting of the Anthosmias, a wine of delicious fragrance; the Lesbian,[496] a favourite wine of Alcibiades;[497] the Pramnian,[498] a strong rough wine, celebrated by Homer;[499] the Lemnian, quaffed by the heroes before Troy;[500] the Chian, light and delicate;[501] the Kapnian, from Beneventum in Italy,[502] a sharp red wine which made the eyes water like smoke;[503] the Mesogeites, from Mount Tmolos,[504] which, however delicious might be its taste, gave those who drank it the head-ache; the Phygelites, from Ephesos, equal to that of Lesbos; those of Cos and Clazomenè, pleasant when new, but which would not keep because mixed with sea-water; the Cydonian;[505] the Maronæan,[506] of great strength; the Mendæan;[507] the Mareotic;[508] the Port; and the Thasian, which may be regarded as the flower of the whole for excellence and celebrity.[509]

-----

Footnote 495:

The Greeks gave fanciful names to their wines and their cups; but the
English have been still more fanciful in the names of their ales. See
Bent. Dissert. on Phalaris, i. pref. xxi.

Footnote 496:

Xen. Hellen. vi. 6. 6. Athen. i. 24.

Footnote 497:

Athen. vii. 9. i. 55. Plut. Alcib. § 12.

Footnote 498:

Athen. i. 55.

Footnote 499:

Schol. Aristoph. Eq. 107. Etym. Mag. 683. 30, seq.

Footnote 500:

Il. η. 467, sqq.

Footnote 501:

Poll. vi. 15. x. 72.

Footnote 502:

Schol. Aristoph. Vesp. 151; and Thurian. Nub. 331.

Footnote 503:

Suid. v. Καπν. t. i. p. 1370.

Footnote 504:

Dioscor. v. 10.

Footnote 505:

“The district of Cydonia must have been celebrated for its wine in
ancient times, for we find on many of its coins a bunch of grapes, or
the head of Dionysos. Some of them also exhibit a female head adorned
with a chaplet of vine-leaves. I found a beautiful silver coin of
Cydonia in the possession of the interpreter of the French Consulate,
and the female head seen on its obverse was thus ornamented.” Pashley,
Travels in Crete, vol. i. p. 23.

Footnote 506:

Athen. i. 95, seq.

Footnote 507:

Id. viii. 67.

Footnote 508:

Id. i. 25.

Footnote 509:

Aristoph. Lysist. 196. Athen. x. 37. i. 24. Poll. vi. 15.

-----

There were several wines among the ancients which acquired peculiar qualities and flavour from the way in which they were made or preserved. Thus, in Galatia,[510] where, as the grapes ripened but imperfectly, the wine had a tendency to grow sour, a hemicotyla of resin was poured into the metretes of wine, which gave it at first a harsh taste, though in time it acquired a better flavour. In this process the resin was pounded in a mortar, with a quantity of the pine-bark. Some persons allowed it to remain in the vessel, while others strained it off immediately after fermentation. The wine which was preserved by an infusion of pitch,[511] was manufactured in the following manner: the pitch was washed with brine and sea-water[512] until it whitened, then cleansed perfectly with fresh-water, after which an ounce or two was mingled with eight choes of wine. The saline wines were made[513] either by dipping the bunches as gathered into sea-water, or sprinkling them therewith, or pouring it along with them into the press after they had been dried in the sun. But in whatever manner prepared, wines of this description were regarded with an evil eye by physicians.

-----

Footnote 510:

Dioscor. v. 43.

Footnote 511:

Schol. Aristoph. Acharn. 189. 643.

Footnote 512:

Dioscor. v. 48.

Footnote 513:

Id. v. 10. 27. Athen. i. 24.

-----

Among the other riches of an Hellenic cellar were mead or metheglin,[514] and hydromel[515] and omphacomel,[516] with perry and cider,[517] and palm-wine[518] and fig-wine[519] and quince-wine[520] and lotos[521] and pomegranate-wine.[522]

-----

Footnote 514:

Aristot. De Mirab. Auscult. t. xvi. p. 185. _Tauchnitz._—Max. Tyr.
Dissert. xi. p. 138. The making of this delicious beverage is the
simplest process imaginable. Speaking of the Ingushians,—“The
excellent honey which they produce,” observes Pallas, “is partly
converted into mead, having been previously diluted with boiling
water; partly used with a fermented liquor made of millet, and called
Busa, and partly eaten at the dessert.” Travels in Southern Russia,
ii. 204.

Footnote 515:

Plin. xiv. 20. Beckmann, Hist. of Invent. iii. 373.

Footnote 516:

Dioscor. v. 31. The physician observes of this beverage:—ἡ χρῆσις δ᾽
αὐτοῦ μετ᾽ ἐνιαυτόν.

Footnote 517:

Pallad. iii. 25. Colum. xii. 45. Dioscor. v. 32.

Footnote 518:

The palm-wine of Æthiopia would appear to have been celebrated in
antiquity, since a small cask of it was thought a fit present for a
Persian king. Herod. iii. 20. Plin. xiii. 4. Diod. Sicul. ii. 136.

Footnote 519:

Damm. Lexic. 2224. Cf. Eustath. ad Odyss. ω. t. iii. p. 839. 8, seq.
Dioscor. v. 41.

Footnote 520:

Dioscor. v. 28.

Footnote 521:

Herod. iv. 177. Theoph. Hist. Plant. iv. 3. 2. Wines were sometimes
flavoured by an infusion of wild carrot-root (δαῦκος). Dioscor. v. 70.
There was a drink called βρύτον, with roots, which sometimes supplied
the place of wine. Athen. x. 67.

Footnote 522:

Dioscor. v. 34.

-----

Numerous odoriferous plants were likewise employed in communicating a variety of flavours and fragrance to wine, as the rose,[523] thyme,[524] germander,[525] anis,[526] œnanthe,[527] wormwood,[528] betony,[529] southern-wood,[530] squills,[531] myrtle,[532] mastic,[533] terebinth,[534] sycamore,[535] fir-cones,[536] cedar-cones,[537] cypress-cones,[538] juniper-berries,[539] pitch, and larchtree-cones.[540] Almost every other aromatic plant, shrub, and tree, was in like manner, employed to communicate a flavour, or an odour, to wine, chiefly, however, for medicinal purposes; and among these was the hyssop, whose leaves were used in the following manner: a pound of them, having been well bruised, were tied up in a sort of gauze, and by the weight of a few intermingled pebbles sunk to the bottom of the amphora. Here they were permitted to remain forty days, after which the wine was racked.[541] Of these wines that which was tinctured with rose-leaves was commonly drunk after dinner to promote digestion.[542] That which, about the Propontis and Thrace, was flavoured with wormwood, people destined for their summer drink, considering it favourable to health.[543]

-----

Footnote 523:

Id. v. 35.

Footnote 524:

Id. v. 59.

Footnote 525:

Χαμαίδρυς. Id. v. 51.

Footnote 526:

Dioscor. v. 75.

Footnote 527:

Id. v. 33.

Footnote 528:

Id. v. 49.

Footnote 529:

Id. v. 54.

Footnote 530:

Id. v. 62.

Footnote 531:

Id. v. 26.

Footnote 532:

Id. v. 37.

Footnote 533:

Id. v. 38.

Footnote 534:

Id. v. 39.

Footnote 535:

Id. v. 42.

Footnote 536:

Id. v. 44.

Footnote 537:

Id. v. 47.

Footnote 538:

Id. v. 45.

Footnote 539:

Id. v. 46.

Footnote 540:

Id. v. 45.

Footnote 541:

Dioscor. v. 50.

Footnote 542:

Id. v. 35.

Footnote 543:

Id. iii. 27.

-----

The greatest enemies of the vintners[544] were the physicians who, by dwelling on the pernicious qualities of wine, deterred the reasonable part of the world from a too frequent use of it. Old wine, they maintained, shatters the nerves and produces headache; new wine is the parent of horrible dreams. That which is middling, however, for example, about seven years old, is liable to fewer objections, and may upon the whole be drunk with some degree of safety. White wine, too, according to their opinion, is better than red, since it corroborates the stomach, and is, probably, that kind which, when of a proper age, produces pleasant dreams.[545] Pure wine, in general, moreover, was admitted to improve the health and beautify the complexion; and Pindar, whom most persons will allow to have been a good judge, though he could not, like Anacreon, dispose of a cask at a sitting,[546] declares in favour of old wine and new songs.

-----

Footnote 544:

Id. v. 7.

Footnote 545:

Athen. i. 47.

Footnote 546:

This achievement the Teian celebrates in one of his own odes, a
fragment of which has been preserved by Athenæus, xi. 45.

Ἠρίστησα μὲν ἰτρίου λέπτον ἀποκλὰς,
Οἴνου δ᾽ ἐξέπιον κάδον.

-----

Of beer, though, as we have elsewhere remarked, it was familiarly known to the Egyptians,[547] as well as to the inhabitants of Gaul, Spain, and Britain, who manufactured it from barley and service-berries, as the people of Dantzic now do from the hips of the wild roses,[548] we need say nothing, as the Greeks were so ignorant of its nature, that when the Ten Thousand met with a quantity in Armenia they diluted it with water as they were accustomed to do their wine, that is to say, entirely spoiled it.[549] The establishments of these vintners were almost of necessity most frequent in the neighbourhood of the agora,[550] where the rustics from the country congregated in crowds on market-days; where were held also, on many occasions, the public assemblies; and where newsmongers and loungers of every description most generally passed their leisure hours.

-----

Footnote 547:

Athen. x. 12. i. 61. Dioscor. ii. 110. Goguet. i. 231.

Footnote 548:

Voyages de la Comp. des Indes, i. 62.

Footnote 549:

Xenoph. Anab. iv. 5.

Footnote 550:

Cf. Plat. de Leg. t. viii. p. 114, seq. De Rep. t. vi. p. 176. Muret.
ad Arist. Ethic. p. 415.