And Icesius says that these fish are the best of all fish in sweetness, and also in delicacy of flavour in other respects. They are also most nutritious. They produce their young, as Aristotle says, in a manner similar to the cestres, wherever there are flowing rivers. Epicharmus mentions them in his Muses; and Dorion also, in his book on Fishes. And Eupolis, in his Flatterers, says—
I spent a hundred drachmas upon fish,
And only got eight pike, and twelve chrysophryes.
But the wise Archestratus, in his Suggestions, says—
Pass not the chrysophrys from Ephesus
Unheeded by; which the Ephesians call
The ioniscus. Take him eagerly,
The produce of the venerable Selinus;
Wash him, and roast him whole, and serve him up,
Though he be ten full cubits long.
137. There is a fish, too, called the chalcis; and others which resemble it, namely, the thrissa, the trichis, and the eritimus. Icesius says, the fish called the chalcis, and the sea-goat, and the needle-fish, and the thrissa, are like chaff, destitute alike of fat and of juice. And Epicharmus, in his Hebe's Wedding, says—
The chalcides, the sea-pig too,
The sea-hawk, and the fat sea-dog.
But Dorion calls it the chalcidice. And Numenius says,—
But you would thus harpoon, in the same way,
That chalcis and the little tiny sprat.
But the χαλκεὺς is different from the χαλκὶς; and the χαλκεὺς is mentioned by Heraclides, in his Cookery Book; and by Euthydemus, in his book on Cured Fish, who says that they are bred in the country of the Cyzicenes, being a round and circular fish.
But the thrissa is mentioned by Aristotle in his book on Animals and Fishes, in these words—"The following are stationary fish: the thrissa, the encrasicholus, the membras anchovy, the coracinus, the erythrinus, and the trichis." And Eupolis mentions the trichis in his Flatterers;—