The Deipnosophists, or Banquet of the Learned of Athenaeus Part 84

The char, the mighty tench of size enormous, The channus, and the eel; and he who roves By night, the wary pitynus; the mussel, The horse-fish, or the sea-green corydulis.

And Antimachus the Colophonian mentions it in his Thebais, where he says--

The hyca, or the horse-fish, or the one Which they do call the thrush.

70. There is a fish, too, called the ioulis, concerning which Dorion says, in his treatise on Fishes, "Recollect that if you boil the ioulis, you must do it in brine; and if you roast them, you must roast them with marjoram." And Numenius says--

And ne'er neglect the medicine which keeps off To a great degree the greedy fish ioulis, And scolopendrus that doth poison dart.

But the same writer calls them ioulus, and the entrails of the earth, in the following lines:--

Moreover do not then the bait forget, Which on the highest hills that fringe the sh.o.r.e Shall soon be found. And they are called iouli, Black, eating earth--the entrails of the earth; Or the long-footed gra.s.shopper, what time The sandy rocks are sprinkled with the foam Of the high-rising tide. Then dig them up, And stow them carefully within your bag.

71. There are also fish called ?????, the sea-thrush, and ??ss?f??, the sea-blackbird. The Attic writers call the first ?????, with an ?; and the reason is as follows:--All the feminine nouns which end in ?a have another ? before the ?a; as S????a, s????a, ????a, d???a, ????a, ?a??a: but those which end in ?? do not require a ? to precede the ??; as ?????, f?t??, ?e?????, a????, t?????, and, in like manner, t?????. Cratinus says--

Suppose a man had eaten a red mullet (t??????), Would that alone prove him an epicure?

And Diocles, in the first book of his treatise on Wholesomes, says, "Those fish which are called rocky fish have tender flesh; such as the sea-blackbird, the sea-thrush, the perch, the tench, the phyca, the alphesticus." But Numenius says, in his treatise on Fis.h.i.+ng--

The sea-born race of grayling or of orphus, The black-flesh'd blackbird, or the dainty sea-thrush Sporting beneath the waves.

And Epicharmus, in his Hebe's Wedding, says--

Bambradones, sea-thrushes, and sea-hares; And the bold dragon fish.

And Aristotle, in his treatise on What concerns Animals, says, "And the fishes with black spots, like the sea-blackbird; and the fishes with variegated spots, like the sea-thrush." But Pancrates the Arcadian, in his Works of the Sea, says that the sea-thrush is called by many names:--

Add now to these the sea-thrush red, which they Who seek to snare the wary fish with bait Do call the saurus, and th' aeolias, Add too th' orphiscus with his large fat head.

And Nicander, in the fourth book of his Transformed People, says--

The scarus or the thrush with many names.

72. There is also the sea-boar and the cremys. Aristotle, in his treatise on Animals, says, "But some fish have no teeth and smooth skins, like the needle-fish; and some have stony heads, like the cremys; and some are harsher, with rough skins, like the sea-boar; and some are marked down the back with two lines, like the seserinus; and some are marked with many lines and with red spots, like the salpe." And both Dorion and Epaenatus mention the sea-boar; and Archestratus says--

But when you go to Acta's favour'd land, If you by chance should see a rich sea-boar, Buy it at once, and let it not escape you, Not if you buy it at its weight in gold; Else will the indignation of the G.o.ds O'erpower you; for 'tis the flower of nectar.

But 'tis not all men who can be allow'd To eat this dainty, no, nor e'en to see it; Unless they take a strongly-woven mesh Of marsh-bred rush, and hold it in their hands, Well used to ply the floats with rapid mind.

And with these dainties you must offer up, Thrown on the ground, some gifts of lamb and mutton.

73. There is also the harp-fish. Aristotle, in his treatise on Animals, or on Fish, says, "The harp-fish has serrated teeth, is a fish of solitary habits, he lives on seaweed; he has a very loose tongue, and a white and broad heart." Pherecrates, in his Slave-Tutor, says--

The harp-fish is a good fish; be you sure To buy him when you can. He really is good; But, I by Phbus swear, this does perplex me Exceedingly which men do say, my friend, That there is secret harm within this harp-fish.

Epicharmus says, in his Marriage of Hebe--

There were hyaenides, And fine buglossi, and the harp-fish too.

And Apollodorus has said that, on account of his name, he was considered to be sacred to Apollo. And Callias, or Diocles, whichever was the author of the play, says in the Cyclops--

A roasted harp-fish, and a ray, And the head of a well-fed tunny.

And Archestratus, in his Luxurious Way of Living, says--

I counsel you always to boil a harp-fish If he is white and full of firmish meat; But if he's red and also no great size, Then it were best, when you have p.r.i.c.k'd him o'er With a new sharpen'd knife, to roast him gently.

Sprinkle him then with oil and plenteous cheese, For he does like to see men liberal, And is himself intemperate.

74. There is also the cordylus. Aristotle calls this fish an amphibious animal, and says that it dies if it is dried by the sun. But Numenius, in his book on the Art of Fis.h.i.+ng, calls it the courylus:--

All things are ready. First I strip the thighs Of courylus, or pirene, and treat too In the same way the marine gra.s.shopper.

He also speaks of the fish called the cordylis, in these lines--

Mussels, sea-horses, or the sea-green cordylis.

75. There is also a fish called cammorus. Epicharmus, in his Marriage of Hebe, says--

Then after this there are boaces and Smarides, anchovies, also cammori.

And Sophron, in his Female Farces, mentions them. But they are a species of squill, and this name was given them by the Romans.

76. There is also a fish called the carcharias. Numenius of Heraclea, in his Art of Fis.h.i.+ng, says--

At times you may too a carcharias catch, At times a psamathis who loves the surf.

And Sophron, in his Tunny-hunter, says, "But if your stomach happens to have swallowed a carcharias." But Nicander the Colophonian, in his essay on Dialects, says that the carcharias is also called the lamias and the squill.

77. There is also the cestreus. Icesius says, "Of the fish which are called by one general name of leucisci there are many sorts; for some are called cephali, and some cestres, and some ch.e.l.lones, and some myxini. But the cephali are the best both in flavour and juiciness; the next to them are those called the cestres; the myxini are inferior to either. But the worst of all are the ch.e.l.lones, which are called bacchi; and they are all full of wholesome juice, not very nutritious, but very digestible." And Dorion, in his essay on Fish, mentions the sea cestreus, but does not approve of the river one. And the sea cestreus he subdivides into two species--the cephalus and the nestis. But the cestreus, which is like the sea-urchin about the head, he calls sphondylus. And he says "that the cephalinus differs from the cephalus, and that this last is also called the blepsias." But Aristotle says, in the fifth book of his treatise on the Parts of Animals, "But of the different kinds of cestreus, the ch.e.l.lones begin to be pregnant in the month Poseideon; so does the sargus and the fish called the myxus; and so does the cephalus: and they go thirty days with young. But some of the cestres are not generated by copulation, but are produced by the slime and the sand."

And in other places Aristotle says, "The cestreus is a fish with serrated teeth, but he does not eat other fishes; and, indeed, he is in no respect carnivorous. But of these fish there are several kinds--the cephalus, the ch.e.l.lon, and the pheraeus. And the ch.e.l.lon feeds close to land, but the pheraeus does not; and they use the following food--the pheraeus uses the mucus which proceeds from itself, and the ch.e.l.lon eats slime and sand. It is said, also, that the sp.a.w.n of the cestreus is not eaten by any other fish, just as the cestreus also eats no other fish."

But Euthydemus the Athenian, in his treatise on Cured Fish, says that the spheneus and the dactyleus are both different species of cestres; and also that there is a species which are called cephali, because they have very large heads. And those which are called spheneus,[481:1] are called so because they are thin and four-cornered; and the dactyleis are not so thick as two fingers. But the most excellent of the cestres are those which are caught near Abdera, as Archestratus has told us; and the second-best are those which come from Sinope.

78. But the cestres are called by some writers plotes, as Polemo says, in his treatise on the Rivers in Sicily. And Epicharmus, in his Muses, gives them this name--

aeolians, and plotes, and cynoglossi.

There also were sciathides.

And Aristotle, in his treatise on the Dispositions and Way of Living of Animals, says that "the cestres live even if they are deprived of their tails. But the cestreus is eaten by the pike, and the conger is eaten by the turbot." And there is an often-quoted proverb, "The cestreus is fasting," which is applied to men who live with strict regard to justice, because the cestreus is never carnivorous. Anaxilas, in his Morose Man, attacking Maton the Sophist for his gluttony, says--

Maton seized hold of a large cestreus' head, And ate it all. But I am quite undone.

And that beautiful writer, Archestratus, says--

Buy if you can a cestreus which has come From the sea-girt aegina; then you shall For well-bred men be fitting company.

Diocles, in his Sea, says--

The cestreus leaps for joy.