And Apollodorus, in his treatise on Perfumes and Garlands, has said the same thing in the very same words. And this, my friends, is enough to say on this subject.
18. But concerning the Naucratite Crown, and what kind of flowers that is made of, I made many investigations, and inquired a great deal without learning anything, till at last I fell in with a book of Polycharmus of Naucratis, entitled On Venus, in which I found the following passage:—"But in the twenty-third Olympiad Herostratus, a fellow-countryman of mine, who was a merchant, and as such had sailed to a great many different countries, coming by chance to Paphos, in Cyprus, bought an image of Venus, a span high, of very ancient workmanship, and came away meaning to bring it to Naucratis. And as he was sailing near the Egyptian coast, a violent storm suddenly overtook him, and the sailors could not tell where they were, and so they all had recourse to this image of Venus, entreating her to save them. And the goddess, for she was kindly disposed towards the men of Naucratis, on a sudden filled all the space near her with branches of green myrtle, and diffused a most delicious odour over the whole ship, when all the sailors had previously despaired of safety from their violent sea-sickness. And after they had been all very sick, the sun shone out, and they, seeing the landmarks, came in safety into Naucratis. And Herostratus having disembarked from the ship with his image, and carrying with him also the green branches of myrtle which had so suddenly appeared to him, consecrated it and them in the temple of Venus. And having sacrificed to the goddess, and having consecrated the image to Venus, and invited all his relations and most intimate friends to a banquet in the temple, he gave every one of them a garland of these branches of myrtle, to which garlands he then gave the name of Naucratite." This is the account given by Polycharmus; and I myself believe the statement, and believe that the Naucratite garland is no other than one made of myrtle, especially as in Anacreon it is represented as worn with one made of roses. And Philonides has said that the garland made of myrtle acts as a check upon the fumes of wine, and that the one made of roses, in addition to its cooking qualities, is to a certain extent a remedy for headache. And, therefore, those men are only to be laughed at, who say that the Naucratite garland is the wreath made of what is called by the Egyptians biblus, quoting the statement of Theopompus, in the third book of his History of Greece, where he says, "That when Agesilaus the Lacedæmonian arrived in Egypt, the Egyptians sent him many presents, and among them the papyrus, which is used for making garlands." But I do not know what pleasure or advantage there could be in having a crown made of biblus with roses, unless people who are enamoured of such a wreath as this should also take a fancy to wear crowns of garlic and roses together. But I know that a great many people say that the garland made of the sampsychon or amaracus is the Naucratite garland; and this plant is very plentiful in Egypt, but the myrtle in Egypt is superior in sweetness to that which is found in any other country, as Theophrastus relates in another place.
19. While this discussion was going on, some slaves came in bringing garlands made of such flowers as were in bloom at the time; and Myrtilus said;—Tell me, my good friend Ulpian, the different names of garlands. For these servants, as is said in the Centaur of Chærephon—
Make ready garlands which they give the gods,
Praying they may be heralds of good omen.
And the same poet says, in his play entitled Bacchus—
Cutting sweet garlands, messengers of good omen.
Do not, however, quote to me passages out of the Crowns of Ælius Asclepiades, as if I were unacquainted with that work; but say something now besides what you find there. For you cannot show me that any one has ever spoken separately of a garland of roses, and a garland of violets. For as for the expression in Cratinus—
ναρκισσίνους ὀλίσβους,
that is said in a joke.