But that this Telemachus was a citizen of the borough of Acharnæ, the same poet shows us in his Bacchus, where he says—

And in his Icarians, a satyric drama, he says—

From this it is plain that Telemachus, being a person who was constantly eating dishes of beans, was always celebrating the festival Pyanepsia.

74. And bean soup is mentioned by Heniochus the comic writer, in his play called the Wren, where he says—

75. So after this conversation had gone on for some time, water for the hands was brought round; and then again Ulpian asked whether the word χέρνιβον, which we use in ordinary conversation, was used by the ancients; and who had met with it; quoting that passage in the Iliad—

But the Attic writers say χερνίβιον, as Lysias, for instance, in his speech against Alcibiades, where he says, "With all his golden wash-hand basins (χερνιβιοις) and incense-burners;" but Eupolis uses the word χειρόνιπτρον, in his Peoples—

But Epicharmus, in his Ambassadors for a Sacred Purpose, uses the word χειρόνιβον in the following lines:—

But it is more usual to say κατὰ χειρὸς ὕδωρ (water to be poured over the hands), as Eupolis does say in his Golden Age, and Ameipsias in his Sling, and Alcæus in his Sacred Wedding: and this is a very common expression. But Philyllius, in his Auge, says κατὰ χειρῶν, not χειρὸς, in these lines:—

And Menander, in his Pitcher, says—

76. But Aristophanes the grammarian, in his Commentary on the Tablets of Callimachus, laughs at those who do not know the difference between the two expressions, κατὰ χειρὸς and ἀπονίψασθαι; for he says that among the ancients the way in which people washed their hands before breakfast and supper was called κατὰ χειρὸς, but what was done after those meals was called ἀπονίψασθαι. But the grammarian appears to have taken this observation from the Attic writers, since Homer says, somewhere or other—

And somewhere else he says—

And Sophron, in his Female Actresses, says—

And among both the tragic and comic writers the word χερνίβα is read with an acute accent on the penultima. By Euripides, in his Hercules—

And also by Eupolis, in his Goats—

And χέρνιψ means the water into which they used to dip a firebrand which they took from the altar on which they were offering the sacrifice, and then sprinkling the bystanders with it, they purified them. But the accusative χερνιβα ought to be written with an acute accent on the antepenultima; for all compound words like that, ending in ψ, derived from the perfect passive, preserve the vowel of the penultima of that perfect tense. And if the perfect ends its penultimate syllable with a double μμ, then the derivative has a grave on the ultima, as λέλειμμαι αἰγίλιψ, τέτριμμαι οἰκότριψ, κέκλεμμαι βοόκλεψ (a word found in Sophocles and applied to Mercury), βέβλεμμαι κατώβλεψ (a word found in Archelaus of the Chersonese, in his poem on Things of a Peculiar Nature: and in the oblique cases such words keep the accent on the same syllable). And Aristophanes, in his Heroes, has used the word χερνίβιον.

77. And for washing the hands they also used something which they called σμῆμα, or soap, for the sake of getting off the dirt; as Antiphanes mentions in his Corycus—

And besides this they used to anoint their hands with perfumes, despising the crumbs of bread on which men at banquets used to wipe their hands, and which the Lacedæmonians called κυνάδες,[35] as Polemo mentions in his Letter on Mean Appellations. But concerning the custom of anointing the hands with perfumes, Epigenes or Antiphanes (whichever was the author of the play called the Disappearance of Money) speaks as follows:—

And Philoxenus, in his play entitled the Banquet, says—

And Dromo, in his Female Harp-player, says—

78. But they called the water in which they washed either their hands or their feet equally απονιπτρον, Aristophanes says—

And they used the word λεκάνη, or basin, in the same way as they used χειρόνιπτρον (a wash-hand basin); but the word ἀπόνιμμα is used in a peculiar sense by the Attic writers only for the water used to do honour to the dead, and for purifying men who have incurred some religious pollution. As also Clidemus tells us, in his book entitled Exegeticus; for he, having mentioned the subject of Offerings to the Dead, writes as follows:—"Dig a trench to the west of the tomb. Then look along the side of the trench towards the west. Then pour down water, saying these words,—'I pour this as a purifying water for you to whom it is right to pour it, and who have a right to expect it.' Then after that pour perfume." And Dorotheus gives the same instructions; saying, that among the hereditary national customs of the people of Thyatira, these things are written concerning the purification of suppliants,—"Then having washed your hands yourself, and when all the rest of those who have joined in disembowelling the victim have washed theirs, take water and purify yourselves, and wash off all the blood from him who is to be purified: and afterwards stir the purifactory water, and pour it into the same place."

79. But the cloth of unbleached linen with which they used to wipe their hands was called χειρόμακτρον, which also, in some verses which have been already quoted, by Philoxenus of Cythera, was called ἔκτριμμα. Aristophanes, in his Cook's Frying, says—

(And we may remark here, that in this passage he uses the expression κατὰ χειρὸς with reference to washing the hands after eating; not, as Aristophanes the grammarian says, that

the Athenians used the expression κατὰ χειρὸς before eating, but the word νίψασθαι after eating.) Sophocles, in his Œnomaus, says—

And Herodotus, in the second book of his History, speaks in a similar manner. But Xenophon, in the first book of his Cyropædia, writes—"But when you have touched any one of these things, you immediately wipe your hands in a towel, as if you were greatly annoyed at their having been polluted in such a manner." And Polemo, in the sixth book of his books addressed to Antigonus and Adæus, speaks of the difference between the two expressions κατὰ χειρὸς and νίψασθαι. And Demonicus, in his Achelonius, uses the expression κατὰ χειρὸς, of water used before a meal, in these lines:—

And Cratinus also mentions towels, which he calls ὠμόλινον, in his Archilochi,—

And Sappho, in the fifth book of her Melodies addressed to Venus, when she says—

speaks of these towels as a covering for the head; as Hecatæus shows, or whoever else it was who wrote those Descriptions of the World in the book entitled Asia,—"And the women wear towels (χειρόμακτρα) on their heads." And Herodotus, in his second book, says, "And after this they said that this king descended down alive into the lower regions, which the Greeks call αἵδης, and that there he played at dice with Ceres, and that sometimes he won and sometimes he lost; and that after that he returned to earth with a gold-embroidered towel, which he had received as a present from her."

80. And Hellanicus, in his Histories, says that the name of the boy who, when he had given Hercules water to wash his hands, and poured it over his hands from the basin, was afterwards slain by Hercules with a blow of his fist, (on which account Hercules left Calydon,) was Archias; but in the second book of the Phoronis he calls him Cherias: but Herodorus, in the seventeenth book of his account of the Exploits of Hercules, calls him Eunomus. And Hercules also, without intending it, killed Cyathus, the son of Pyles and brother of Antimachus, who was acting as his cupbearer, as Nicander relates in the second book of his History of Œta; to whom also he says that a temple was dedicated by Hercules in the Proschium, which to this day is called the Temple of the Cupbearer.

But we will stop this conversation at this point, and begin the next book with an account of the voracity of Hercules.