Page:The Deipnosophists (Volume 2).djvu/346

 60. Then there is the [Greek: kylix]. Pherecrates, in his Slave Tutor, says—

Now wash the [Greek: kylix] out; I'll give you then Some wine to drink: put o'er the cup a strainer, And then pour in some wine.

But the [Greek: kylix] is a drinking-cup made of earthenware, and it is so called from being made circular ([Greek: apo tou kyliesthai]) by the potter's wheel; from which also the [Greek: kylikeion], the place in which the cups are stored up, gets its name, even when the cups put away in it are made of silver. There is also the verb [Greek: kylikêgoreô], derived from the same source, when any one makes an harangue over his cups. But the Athenians also call a medicine chest [Greek: kylikis], because it is made round in a turning-lathe. And the [Greek: kylikes], both at Argos and at Athens, were in great repute; and Pindar mentions the Attic [Greek: kylikes] in the following lines—

O Thrasybulus, now I send This pair of pleasantly-meant odes As an after-supper entertainment for you. May it, I pray, be pleasing To all the guests, and may it be a spur To draw on cups of wine, And richly-fill'd Athenian [Greek: kylikes].

61. But the Argive [Greek: kylikes] appear to have been of a different shape from the Athenian ones. At all events, they tapered towards a point at the brims, as Simonides of Amorgos says—

But this is taper-brimm'd ([Greek: phoxicheilos]),

that is to say, drawn up to a point towards the top; such as those which are called [Greek: ambikes]. For they use the word [Greek: phoxos] in this sense, as Homer does when speaking of Thersites—

His head was sharp at top.

And the word is equivalent to [Greek: phaoxos],—it being perceived to be sharp ([Greek: oxys]) in the part where the eyes ([Greek: ta phaê]) are.

And very exquisitely wrought [Greek: kylikes] are made at Naucratis, the native place of our companion Athenæus. For some are in the form of phialæ, not made in a lathe, but formed by hand, and having four handles, and being widened considerably towards the bottom: (and there are a great many potters at Naucratis, from whom the gate nearest to the potteries ([Greek: kerameiôn]) is called the Ceramic gate:) and they are dyed in such a manner as to appear like silver. The