Mar. 9. 1850.] 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 
301 
denote “blood broth,” and go on to state, upon 
the authority of Manso, that blood was a principal 
ingredient in this celebrated Lacedemonian dish. 
Certainly, if the case were really so, the German 
writer would have succeeded in preparing for us a 
most disagreeable and warlike kind of food; but 
my astonishment has not been small, upon turning 
to the passage, to find that “R. O.’s” authorities 
had misled him, and that Pollux really says nothing 
of the kind. His words (I quote from the edition 
2 vols. folio, Amst. 1706) are these, 
““O be wéeAas radovmevos Cauds Aaxwviky piv ws em) 
\ ” 4 ie E / € , a 4 
7b TOAD Td Bdecun. oT. SE 7] KaAOUMEVY aiwartia. TO Be 
Cpioy mde éak<vafoy, K.T. A.” 
The general subject of the section is the different 
kinds of flesh used by man for food, and inci- 
dentally the good things which may be made from 
these; which leads the writer to mention by name 
many kinds of broth, amongst which he says to- 
wards the end, is that called péeaas fwuds, which 
might be considered almost as a Lacedeemonian 
dish; adding further, that there was a something 
called hematia (and this might have been a black 
pudding or sausage for anything that appears to 
the contrary); also the thrium, which was pre- 
pared in a manner he proceeds to describe. Now 
the three parts of the sentence which has been 
given above in the original do, to the best of my 
judgment, clearly refer to three different species 
of food; and I would appeal to the candid opinion 
of any competent Greek scholar, whether, accord- 
ing to the idiom of that language, the second part 
of it is so expressed, as to connect it with, and 
make it explanatory of, the first. We want, for 
this purpose, a relative, either with or without 
éort; and the change of gender in hematia seems 
perfectly unaccountable if it is intended to have 
any reference to fwpds. 
It may not be unimportant to add that the sig- 
nificant silence of Meursius, (an author surely not 
to be lightly thought of), who in his Miscellanea 
Laconica says nothing of blood broth at the Phidi- 
tia, implies that he understood the passage of 
Pollux as intended to convey the meaning ex- 
pressed above. 
Another lexicographer, Hesychius, informs us 
that dpa was the Lacedemonian term for Cauds ; 
and this, perhaps, was the genuine appellation for 
that which other Greeks expressed by a peri- 
phrasis, either in contempt or dislike, or because 
its colour was realiy dark, the juices of the meat 
being thoroughly extracted into it. That it was 
nutritive and powerful may be inferred from what 
Plutarch mentions, that the older men were con- 
tent to give up the meat to the younger ones, and 
live upon the broth only *, which, had it been very 
poor, they would not have done. 
* Plut. in Lye. 
| 
When these remarks were commenced, it was 
for the purpose of showing, by means of a passage 
not generally referred to, what the ancients con- 
ceived the “black broth” to be, and that conse- 
quently, all idea of coffee entering into its com- 
position was untenable. How far this has been 
accomplished the reader must decide: but I cannot 
quit the subject without expressing my sincere 
persuasion, founded upon a view of the authorities 
referred to, that the account given by Athenzeus is 
substantially correct. Pig meat would be much 
in use with a people not disposed to take the 
trouble of preparing any other: the animal was fit 
for nothing but food; and t:e refuse cf their little 
farms would be sufficient for his keep. Athenzus 
also, in another passage, supplies us with a con- 
firmation of the notion that the stock was made 
from pig, and this is stronger because it occurs in- 
cidentally, It is found in a quotation from Matron, 
the maker of parodies, who alluding to some per- 
son or other who had not got on very well at a 
Lacedemonian feast, explains the cause of his 
failure to have been, that the black broth, and 
boiled odds and ends of pig meat, had beaten him; 
« Aduva pw Souds Te méAas aKpoxdrd 7 EpOd,” * 
That their cookery was not of a very recondite 
nature, is evident from what is mentioned by 
Plutarch, that the public meals were instituted at 
first in order to prevent their being in the hands 
of artistes and cooks}, while to these every one 
sent a stated portion of provisions, so that there 
would neither be change nor variety in them. 
Cooks again were sent out of Sparta, if they could 
do more than dress meat{; while the only season- 
ing allowed to them was salt and vinegar$; for 
which reason, perhaps, Meursius considers the 
composition of the fwuds uédas to have been pork 
gravy seasoned with vinegar and salt ||, since there 
seemed to have been nothing else of which it could 
possibly have been made. 
For Mr. Treveryan’s suggestion of the cuttle- 
fish, I am greatly obliged to him; but this was an 
Athenian dish, and too good for the severity of 
Spartan manners. It is impossible not to smile at 
the idea of the distress which Cineparius must 
have felt, had he happened to witness the per- 
formances of any persons thus swallowing ink 
bottles by wholesale. 
The passages which have been already quoted, 
* Ath. Deip. iv. 13. 1. 9S. 
+ Plut. in Lyc. “?Ev xepot Snmtovpyav nad payel- 
pov.” 
¢ Ede = dWorotous ev Aakedaluorr elvar pews pdvou* 
6 5& mapa roiro emfduevos eLeAavveto THs Srdprys.” — 
fil. Var. Hist. xiv. 7. , 
§ “Oi Adnwves bios mev Kal Gras dévres TE woryelpp, Te 
Aoura KeAevourw ev TP lepelp Cyreiv.” — Plut. de tuenda 
Sunitate, 
|| Meursii Misc. Lacon. lib. i. cap. 8. 
