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Matron, in his Parodies, speaks of animals being fattened for food, and birds also, in these lines—
Thus spake the hero, and the servants smiled,
And after brought, on silver dishes piled,
Fine fatten'd birds, clean singed around with flame,
Like cheesecakes on the back, their age the same.
And Sopater the farce-writer speaks of fattened sucking-pigs in his Marriage of Bacchis, saying this—
If there was anywhere an oven, there
The well-fed sucking-pig did crackle, roasting.
But Aeschines uses the form δελφάκιον for δέλφαξ in his Alcibiades, saying, “Just as the women at the cookshops breed sucking-pigs (δελφάκια).” And Antiphanes, in his Physiognomist, says—
Those women take the sucking-pigs (δελφάκια),
And fatten them by force;
And in his Persuasive Man he says—
To be fed up instead of pigs (δελφακίων).
Plato, however, has used the word δέλφαξ in the masculine gender in his Poet, where he says—
Leanest of pigs (δέλφακα ῥαιότατον).
And Sophocles, in his play called Insolence, says—
Wishing to eat τὸν δέλφακα.
And Cratinus, in his Ulysseses, has the expression—
Large pigs (δέλφακας μεγάλους).
But Nicochares uses the word as feminine, saying—
A pregnant sow (κύουσαν δέλφακα);
And Eupolis, in his Golden Age, says—
Did he not serve up at the feast a sucking-pig (δέλφακα),
Whose teeth were not yet grown, a beautiful beast (καλὴν)?
And Plato, in his Io, says—
Bring hither now the head of the sucking-pig (τῆς δέλφακος).
[p. 1051] Theopompus, too, in his Penelope, says—
And they do sacrifice our sacred pig (τὴν ἱερὰν δέλφακα).
Theopompus also speaks of fatted geese and fatted calves in the thirteenth hook of his History of Philip, and in the eleventh book of his Affairs of Greece, where he is speaking of the temperance of the Lacedæmonians in respect of eating, writing thus—“And the Thasians sent to Agesilais, when he arrived, all sorts of sheep and well-fed oxen; and beside this, every kind of confectionery and sweetmeat. But Agesilaus took the sheep and the oxen, but as for the confectionery and sweetmeats, at first he did not know what they meant, for they were covered up; but when he saw what they were, he ordered the slaves to take them away, saying that it was not the custom of the Lacedæmonians to eat such food as that. But as the Thasians pressed him to take them, he said, Carry them to those men (pointing to the Helots) and give them to them; saying that it was much better for those Helots to injure their health by eating them than for himself and the Lacedæmonians whom he had with him.” And that the Lacedæmonians were in the habit of treating the Helots with great insolence, is related also by Myron of Priene, in the second book of his History of Messene, where he says—“They impose every kind of insulting employment on the Helots, such as brings with it the most extreme dishonour; for they compel them to wear caps of dogskin, and cloaks also of skins; and every year they scourge them without their having committed any offence, in order to present their ever thinking of emancipating themselves from slavery. And besides all this, if any of them ever appear too handsome or distinguished-looking for slaves, they impose death as the penalty, and their masters also are fined for not checking them in their growth and fine appearances. And they give them each a certain piece of land, and fix a portion which they shall invariably bring them in from it.”

The verb χηνίζω, to cackle like a goose (χὴν), is used and applied to those who play on the flute. Diphilus says in his Synoris—

᾿εχήνισας,,—this noise is always made
By all the pupils of Timotheus.

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