Friday, September 09, 2022
Epitaph of Primus
Inscriptiones Graecae V,2 327 = Georg Kaibel, Epigrammata Graeca ex Lapidibus Conlecta 480a (pp. xiii-xiv) = Werner Peek, Griechische Vers-Inschriften 1066 (p. 301), from Arcadia, 2nd century A.D.? (my rough translation, following Peek's text):
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[...] begat me, and my mother Phila bore me,Inscriptiones Graecae: Kaibel: Peek: On Arcadian feasting see Athenaeus 4.148f-149d, esp. 4.149b (tr. S. Douglas Olson):
my name is Primus, and Mantinea is my fatherland;
not yet having completed my twenty-eighth year
I leave the light, having left to my wife a child, Iole.
The swift racecourse does not allow me to be forgotten, nor to be left behind
does the band of revellers allow; being good at solemn feasts, I am the leader.
Having learned these things, stranger, drink, be licentious, revel, anoint yourself with perfume.
For common to mortals are these arrangements.
[–⏕– μ' ἐ]τέκνωσε, Φίλα δέ με γεί[νατο μήτ]ηρ,
Πρεῖμος δ' οὔνομά μοι, [Μαντινέη] δὲ πάτρη·
εἰκοστὸν λυγά[βαντα καὶ] ὄγδοον οὐκέτι πλήσας
[φῶς λ]ε[ί]πω, γαμετῇ παῖδα λιπὼν Ἰόλην. 5
[οὔδε λ]αθεῖν εἴα με ταχὺς δρόμος, οὐδὲ [λιπέσθα]ι
κ[ῶ]μος, ἐν ἠλαπίναις δ' ἐσθλὸς [ἐὼν] ἕπομαι.
ταῦτα μαθ[ώ]ν, ξένε, πεῖνε, τρύ[φα, κώμ]αζε, μυρίζου·
κοινὰ γάρ ἐστι [βροτο]ις ταῦτα τὰ συνθέματα. 10
At all their dinners, but especially those referred to as mazones—this name is still used today for the Dionysiac guild—it was their custom to pour more broth into the bowls of the young men who ate more heartily, and to serve them more barley-cakes and bread. This is because they considered such individuals noble and manly, since gluttony was regarded as something that deserved respect and acclaim.
ἐνόμιζον δ' ἐν ἅπασι τοῖς δείπνοις, μάλιστα δὲ τοῖς λεγομένοις μαζῶσι — τοῦτο γὰρ ἔτι καὶ νῦν ἡ Διονυσιακὴ σύνοδος ἔχει τοὔνομα — τοῖς ἐσθίουσι τῶν νέων ἀνδρικώτερον ζωμόν τ' ἐγχεῖν πλείω καὶ μάζας καὶ ἄρτους παραβάλλειν. γενναῖος γὰρ ὁ τοιοῦτος ἐκρίνετο καὶ ἀνδρώδης ὑπάρχειν· θαυμαστὸν γὰρ ἦν καὶ περιβόητον παρ' αὐτοῖς ἡ πολυφαγία.