And Pherecrates, in his Deserters, has—
The woman boil'd some pulse porridge, and lentils,
And so awaited each of us, and roasted
Besides an orphan small ταρίχιον.
Epicharmus also uses the word in the masculine gender, ὁ τάριχος. And Herodotus does the same in his ninth book; where he says—"The salt-fish (οἱ τάριχοι) lying on the fire, leaped about and quivered." And the proverbs, too, in which the word occurs, have it in the masculine gender:—
Salt-fish (τάριχος) is done if it but see the fire.
Salt-fish (τάριχος) when too long kept loves marjoram.
Salt-fish (τάριχος) does never get its due from men.
But the Attic writers often use it as a neuter word; and the genitive case, as they use it, is τοῦ ταρίχους. Chionides says, in his Beggars—
Will you then eat some pickled fish (τοῦ ταρίχους), ye gods!
And the dative is ταρίχει, like ξίφει—
Beat therefore now upon this pickled fish (τῷ ταρίχει τῷδε).