Since then there are a great many different kinds of fish which we eat at different seasons, my most admirable Timocrates, (for, as Sophocles says—
A chorus too of voiceless fish rush'd on,The tails not fawning on their mistress, but beating against the dish. And as Achæus says in his Fates—
Making a noise with their quick moving tails.
There was a mighty mass of the sea-born herd—I will now recapitulate to you what the Deipnosophists said about each: for each of them brought to the discussion of the subject some contribution of quotation from books; though I will not mention the names of all who took part in the conversation, they were so numerous. Amphis says in his Leucas—
A spectacle which fill'd the wat'ry waste,
Breaking the silence with their rapid tails;)
Whoever buys some ὄψον for his supper,And that you may find it easy to remember what was said, I will arrange the names in alphabetical order For as [p. 436] Sophocles, in his Ajax Mastigophorus, called fish ἐλλοὶ, saying—
And, when he might get real genuine fish,
Contents himself with radishes, is mad.
He gave him to the ἐλλοὶ ἰχθύες to eat;one of the company asked whether any one before Sophocles ever used this word; to whom Zoilus replied,—But I, who am not a person ὀψοφαγίστατος [exceedingly fond of fish], (for that is a word which Xenophon has used in his Memorabilia, where he writes, “He is ὀψοφαγίστατος and the greatest fool possible,”) am well aware that the man who wrote the poem Titanomachia [or the Battle of the Giants], whether he be Eumelus the Corinthian, or Arctinus, or whatever else his name may chance to have been, in the second book of his poem speaks thus—
In it did swim the gold-faced ἐλλοὶ ἰχθύες,And Sophocles was very fond of the Epic Cycle, so that he composed even entire plays in which he has followed the stories told in their fables.
And sported in the sea's ambrosial depths.