[749] See Theokritus, Idyll, iv, 6-35, which illustrates the point here stated.
[750] Suidas, v. Ῥίνθων; Stephan. Byz. v. Τάρας: compare Bernhardy, Grundriss der Römischen Litteratur, Abschnitt ii, pt. 2, pp. 185-186, about the analogy of these φλύακες of Rhinthon with the native Italic Mimes.
The dialect of the other cities of Italic Greece is very little known: the ancient Inscription of Petilia is Doric: see Ahrens, De Dialecto Doricâ, sect. 49, p. 418.
[751] Aristophan. Vesp. 1260. Αἰσωπικὸν γελοῖον, ἢ Συβαριτικόν. What is meant by Συβαριτικὸν γελοῖον is badly explained by the Scholiast, but is perfectly well illustrated by Aristophanês himself, in subsequent verses of the same play (1427-1436), where Philokleon tells two good stories respecting “a Sybaritan man,” and a “woman in Sybaris:” Ἀνὴρ Συβαρίτης ἐξέπεσεν ἐξ ἅρματος, etc.—ἐν Συβάρει γυνή ποτε Κατέαξ᾽ ἐχῖνον, etc.
These Συβάρια ἐπιφθέγματα are as old as Epicharmus, whose mind was much imbued with the Pythagorean philosophy. See Etymolog. Magn. Συβαρίζειν. Ælian amused himself also with the ἱστόριαι Συβαριτικαί (V. H. xiv, 20): compare Hesychius, Συβαριτικοὶ λόγοι, and Suidas, Συβαριτικαῖς.
[752] Thus Herodotus (vi, 127) informs us that, at the time when Kleisthenês of Sikyon invited from all Greece suitors of proper dignity for the hand of his daughter, Smindyridês of Sybaris came among the number, “the most delicate and luxurious man ever known,” (ἐπὶ πλεῖστον δὴ χλιδῆς εἷς ἀνὴρ ἀφίκετο—Herodot. vi, 127), and Sybaris was at that time (B. C. 580-560) in its greatest prosperity. In Chamæleon, Timæus, and other writers subsequent to Aristotle, greater details were given. Smindyridês was said to have taken with him to the marriage one thousand domestic servants, fishermen, bird-catchers, and cooks (Athenæ. vi, 271; xii, 541). The details of Sybaritic luxury, given in Athenæus, are chiefly borrowed from writers of this post-Aristotelian age,—Herakleidês of Pontus, Phylarchus, Klearchus, Timæus (Athenæ. xii, 519-522). The best-authenticated of all the examples of Sybaritic wealth, is the splendid figured garment, fifteen cubits in length, which Alkimenês the Sybarite dedicated as a votive offering in the temple of the Lakinian Hêrê. Dionysius of Syracuse plundered that temple, got possession of the garment, and is said to have sold it to the Carthaginians for the price of one hundred and twenty talents: Polemon, the Periegetes, seems to have seen it at Carthage (Aristot. Mirab. Ausc. 96; Athenæ. xii, 541). Whether the price be correctly stated, we are not in a situation to determine.
[753] Herodot. vii, 102. τῇ Ἑλλάδι πενίη μὲν αἰεί κοτε σύντροφός ἐστι.
[754] Varro, De Re Rusticâ, i, 44. “In Sybaritano dicunt etiam cum centesimo redire solitum.” The land of the Italian Greeks stands first for wheaten bread and beef; that of Syracuse for pork and cheese (Hermippus ap. Athenæ. i, p. 27): about the excellent wheat of Italy, compare Sophoklês, Triptolem. Fragm. 529, ed. Dindorf.
Theophrastus dwells upon the excellence of the land near Mylæ, in the territory of the Sicilian Messênê, which produced, according to him, thirty-fold. (Hist. Plant. ix, 2, 8, p. 259, ed. Schneid.) This affords some measure of comparison, both for the real excellence of the ancient Sybaritan territory, and for the estimation in which it was held; its estimated produce being more than three times that of Mylæ.
See in Mr. Keppel Craven’s Tour in the Southern Provinces of Naples (chapters xi, xii, pp. 212-218), the description of the rich and productive plain of the Krathis (in the midst of which stood the ancient Sybaris), extending about sixteen miles from Cassano to Corigliano, and about twelve miles from the former town to the sea. Compare, also, the picture of the same country, in the work by a French officer, referred to in a [previous note], “Calabria during a Military Residence of three years,” London, 1832, Letter xxii, pp. 219-226.