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--- home:texts_and_library:essays:the-true-history [2019/07/08 22:49] – frank
+++ home:texts_and_library:essays:the-true-history [2019/07/08 22:51] (current) – [Section 41] frank
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 [1] Here Lucian gives a very fair mockery of descriptions of naval engagements such as that in Thucydides at Naupactus 2.83-92 or the sea-fight in the harbor of Sicily 7.70-71.
-[2] Huge captive squids | Aelian, //Varia Historia//, Chapter 1, described the habits of the polypus (squid) and its mode of lying in wait for and catching its prey: “Of the Polypus. The Polypusses are so ravenous that they devour all they light on; so that many times they abstain not even from one another. The lesser taken by the greater, and falling into his stronger nets, (which are usually called the hairs or grasps of the Fish) becometh his prey. They also betray Fishes in this manner; lurking under the Rocks they change themselves to their color, and seem to be all one with the Rock itself. When therefore the Fishes swim to the Rocks, and so to the Polypus, they entangle them in their nets, or grasps.”(( A A A A A A A Aelian, Claudius, and Thomas Stanley. //Claudius Ælianus His Various History//. London: Printed for Thomas Dring, 1665. Print.
+[2] Huge captive squids | Aelian, //Varia Historia//, Chapter 1, described the habits of the polypus (squid) and its mode of lying in wait for and catching its prey: “Of the Polypus. The Polypusses are so ravenous that they devour all they light on; so that many times they abstain not even from one another. The lesser taken by the greater, and falling into his stronger nets, (which are usually called the hairs or grasps of the Fish) becometh his prey. They also betray Fishes in this manner; lurking under the Rocks they change themselves to their color, and seem to be all one with the Rock itself. When therefore the Fishes swim to the Rocks, and so to the Polypus, they entangle them in their nets, or grasps.”((Aelian, Claudius, and Thomas Stanley. //Claudius Ælianus His Various History//. London: Printed for Thomas Dring, 1665. Print.
 )) Pliny, //Natural History// 9.29, mentions an enormous one with feelers thirty feet long, which is doubtless and exaggeration of fact as it appears from the actual size of an octopus.(( **Pliny, , Philemon Holland, and Adam Islip.**//**The Historie of the World: Commonly Called the Natural Historie of C. Plinius Secundus**//**. London: Printed by Adam Islip, 1601. Print.** **Spelling modernized.:** Of Polypus or Pourcontrels, there be sundry kinds. They that keep near to the shore are bigger than those that haunt the deep. All of them help themselves with their fins and arms, like as we do with feet and hands: as for their tail, which is sharp and two-forked, it serves them in the act of generation. These Pourcontrels have a pipe in their back, by the help whereof they swim all over the seas; and if they can shift, one while to the right side, and another while to the left. They swim awry or side-long with their head above, which is very hard and as it were puffed up, so long as they be alive. Moreover, they have certain hollow concavities dispersed within their claws or arms like to ventoses or cupping glasses, whereby they will stick too, and cleave fast, as it were by sucking, to anything; which they clasp and hold so fast (lying upward with their bellies) that it cannot be plucked from them. They never settle so low as the bottom of the water: and the greater they be, the less strong they are to clasp or hold anything. Of all soft fishes, they only go out of the water to dry land, especially into some rough place; for they cannot abide those that are plain and even. They live upon shell-fishes, and with their hairs or strings that they have, they will twine about their shells and crack them in pieces: and therefore a man may know where they lie and make their abode, by a number of shells that lie before their nest. And albeit otherwise it be a very brutish and senseless creature, so foolish withal, that it will swim and come to a man’s hand; yet it seems after a sort to be witty and wise, and keeping of house and maintaining a family: for all that they can take, they carry home to their nest. When they have eaten the meat of the fishes, they throw the empty shells out of dores, and lie as it were in ambuscade behind, to watch and catch fishes that swim thither. They change their color eftsoones, and resemble the place where they be, and especially when they be afraid. That they gnaw and eat their own claws and arms, is a mere untruth; for they be the Congress that doe them that shrewd turn: but true it is, that they will grow again, like as the tail of snakes, adders, and lizards. But among the greatest wonders of Nature, is that fish, which of some is called Nautilos, of others Pompilos. This fish, for to come aloft above the water, turns upon his back, and raises or heaves himself up by little and little: and to the end he might swim with more ease, as disburdened of a sink, he discharges all the water within him at a pipe. After this, turning up his two foremost claws or arms, he displayed and stretched out between them, a membrane or skin of a wonderful thinness: this serves him instead of a sailed in the air above water: with the rest of his arms or claws, he rows and labors under water; and with his tail in the midst, he directs his course, and steers as it were with an helm. Thus holds he on and makes way in the sea, with a faire show of a foist or galley under sail. Now if he be afraid of anything in the way, he makes no more adoe but draws in water to balance his body, and so plunges himself down and sinks to the bottom.
 )) See endnote for detail.
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 **During the meal there is music and song [1]. In the latter kind, Homer’s verse is the favorite; he is himself a member of the festal company, reclining next above Odysseus [2]. The choirs are of boys and girls, conducted and led by Eunomus the Locrian [3], Arion of Lesbos [4], Anacreon [5] and Stesichorus [6]; this last had made his peace with Helen, and I saw him there. When these have finished, a second choir succeeds, of swans [7] and swallows and nightingales; and when their turn is done, all the trees begin to pipe, conducted by the winds.**
-[1] Epic poetry was performed by a bard, like Demodocus in the //Odyssey//, accompanied by the lyre and song. It appears that Lucian had a real respect for Homer, notwithstanding what he said about him in his preface. //Odyssey// 8.42-45: “And summon hither the divine minstrel, Demodocus; for to him above all others has the god granted skill in song, to give delight in whatever way his spirit prompts.”(( H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H Homer, , George E. Dimock, and A T. Murray. //Odyssey//. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1919. Print.
+[1] Epic poetry was performed by a bard, like Demodocus in the //Odyssey//, accompanied by the lyre and song. It appears that Lucian had a real respect for Homer, notwithstanding what he said about him in his preface. //Odyssey// 8.42-45: “And summon hither the divine minstrel, Demodocus; for to him above all others has the god granted skill in song, to give delight in whatever way his spirit prompts.”((Homer, George E. Dimock, and A T. Murray. //Odyssey//. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1919. Print.
 ))
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 [4] Lais the Courtesan | The celebrated courtesan of Corinth who had real life relations with Aristippus for whom Lucian substitutes Diogenes, the founder of the Cynic School which held opposing beliefs to Aristippus.
-[5] Steep hill of Virtue | A reference to Hesiod //Works and Days// 286-292: “To you, foolish Perses, I will speak good sense. Badness can be got easily and in shoals; the road to her is smooth, and she lives very near us. But between us and Goodness [Virtue] the gods have placed the sweat of our brows; long and steep is the path that leads to her, and it is rough at the first; but when a man has reached the top, then is she easy to reach, though before that she was hard.”(( H H H H H H H Hesiod, , and Hugh G. Evelyn-White. //The Homeric Hymns: Homerica//. Cambridge (Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1914. Print.
+[5] Steep hill of Virtue | A reference to Hesiod //Works and Days// 286-292: “To you, foolish Perses, I will speak good sense. Badness can be got easily and in shoals; the road to her is smooth, and she lives very near us. But between us and Goodness [Virtue] the gods have placed the sweat of our brows; long and steep is the path that leads to her, and it is rough at the first; but when a man has reached the top, then is she easy to reach, though before that she was hard.”((Hesiod, and Hugh G. Evelyn-White. //The Homeric Hymns: Homerica//. Cambridge (Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1914. Print.
 ))
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 [5] Scyron | Scyron and Pityocamptes were two famous robbers who used to seize on travelers and commit the most horrid cruelties on them.
-[6] At Delium | Socrates fought at the Battle of Delium, 424 BC, and, when the Athenians were routed and fled in disorder, he retreated quietly and steadily, calmingly surveying friends and foes. On this occasion his superior courage was shown by not retreating at all. Plato //Symposium// 36: “And further let me tell you, gentlemen, what a notable figure he made when the army was retiring in flight from Delium: I happened to be there on horseback, while he marched under arms. The troops were in utter disorder, and he was retreating along with Laches, when I chanced to come up with them and, as soon as I saw them, passed them the word to have no fear, saying I would not abandon them. Here, indeed, I had an even finer view of Socrates than at Potidaea—for personally I had less reason for alarm, as I was mounted; and I noticed, first, how far he outdid Laches in collectedness, and next I felt—to use a phrase of yours, Aristophanes—how there he stepped along, as his wont is in our streets, ‘strutting like a proud marsh-goose, with ever a side-long glance,’ turning a calm sidelong look on friend and foe alike, and convincing anyone even from afar that whoever cares to touch this person will find he can put up a stout enough defense. The result was that both he and his comrade got away unscathed: for, as a rule, people will not lay a finger on those who show this disposition in war; it is men flying in headlong rout that they pursue.”(( P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P Plato, ; Benjamin Jowett. //Dialogues//. New York: C. Scribner's sons, 1871. Print.
+[6] At Delium | Socrates fought at the Battle of Delium, 424 BC, and, when the Athenians were routed and fled in disorder, he retreated quietly and steadily, calmingly surveying friends and foes. On this occasion his superior courage was shown by not retreating at all. Plato //Symposium// 36: “And further let me tell you, gentlemen, what a notable figure he made when the army was retiring in flight from Delium: I happened to be there on horseback, while he marched under arms. The troops were in utter disorder, and he was retreating along with Laches, when I chanced to come up with them and, as soon as I saw them, passed them the word to have no fear, saying I would not abandon them. Here, indeed, I had an even finer view of Socrates than at Potidaea—for personally I had less reason for alarm, as I was mounted; and I noticed, first, how far he outdid Laches in collectedness, and next I felt—to use a phrase of yours, Aristophanes—how there he stepped along, as his wont is in our streets, ‘strutting like a proud marsh-goose, with ever a side-long glance,’ turning a calm sidelong look on friend and foe alike, and convincing anyone even from afar that whoever cares to touch this person will find he can put up a stout enough defense. The result was that both he and his comrade got away unscathed: for, as a rule, people will not lay a finger on those who show this disposition in war; it is men flying in headlong rout that they pursue.”((Plato, ; Benjamin Jowett. //Dialogues//. New York: C. Scribner's sons, 1871. Print.
 ))