The Life of Polycrates and Other Stories for Antiquated Children

by Connell, Brendan

Hail, my master

  Are you yet familiar with the works of Hipponax? He, with his limping iambics, is all the rage in Ephesus right now: I have heard that he is quite deformed and his verses speak much about his obviously malicious disposition. Do you know of the Chian sculptors, those sons of Archermus9, Athenis and Bupalos? The latter did some wonderful Graces for the Sanctuary of the Vengeance at Smyrna and some others which are at Pergamon in the bridal chamber of Adonis. He is also known for a few temples he has built, many wonderful sculptures of animals and a heavily-draped statue of Fortune with a sphere on her head and one hand holding Amaltheia’s horn. Well, in any case, these two seem to have taken it into their heads to caricature Hipponax, who promptly revenged himself by issuing a series of satires so acrasscent that the brothers have reportedly hung themselves, as Lycambes and his daughters did when assailed by the sharp pen of Archilocus. I have sent Maeandrius out to try and procure me a copy of these verses against Bupalos and Athenis, as I am eager to read them. I cannot deny that his poems have a certain coarseness of thought and feeling, and that his vocabulary is somewhat rude, but I do believe that his originality of expression and metre, his sheer genius, override these faults and that he is not a poet who one needs to make excuses for.

  Epistle:

  Heracles, buffoon, to Maeandrius, secretary

  Health to you, honoured one, and twice that much health to your master!

  While at the agora at Colophon, and while eating figs, I read your tablet, your advertisement in search of a comedian, and so emboldened, it is to you now I do apply regarding employment under Polycrates, full ready to offer all the secrets of my person for his personal pleasure and ready to demonstrate, both bodily and verbally, my ability at any time convenient for yourself those skills which are in a small part listed below:

  a) Of humour I have countless succinct and jolly witticisms, most precious, and am often able to live for months on the power of a single joke. I am in possession of twenty more than twelve-hundred Attic jokes and never need have recourse to those from Rhodes. Impromptu, I can make jokes about bald men and then men of Cyme. In my possession are sundry amusing, very original doctor jokes.

  b) I speak and behave playfully and in a merry way.

  c) I can compare any man’s face to that of the particular animal that suits him, and thereby cause amusement.

  d) When it comes to telling riddles, I do not exaggerate when I say that there is none better than myself, and never has been since the time of Necho, that pygmy clown of the Pharaoh Dadkeri-Assi.

  e) I give an imitation of a cyclops trying to sing.

  f) I can ingurgitate a pigeon at a mouthful and forty duck eggs in rapid succession.

  g) I am a dwarf of ridiculous appearance and am skilled at humorous body language to match all occasions.

  h) I am a eunuch and therefore can be trusted around both wives and daughters; though, like a gelded charger I am far from lacking spirit.

  i) I know many tricks, such as how to make a man’s face turn green, how to make your guests’ urine phosphorescent, and how, with a tincture of coloquintida, to make it so everything they put in their mouths tastes harsh and disagreeably acrid like wormwood.

  In sum: whether it be engaging in japes, down-to-earth leg-pullings or quips, dealing out pranks or weighty hilarity, you will not find one more skilled, search you from Caria to Euboea, scrounge through distant Thrace or far away Carmania.

  I eagerly await your response.

  Epistle:

  Anacreon to Polycrates {in the handwriting of the former’s anagnostes}

  To my Lord,

  You have given me an exposition on Hipponax and asked if I have heard of him. The answer is in the affirmative, for he is the author of that piece which begins with the line ‘Very little wit have men who dine on drink’. But he himself does not possess keen perception and cleverly apt expression of those connections between ideas which awaken amusement and pleasure in the least and, to tell the truth, I am rather shocked that you should have become such a fan of his. Simply because he substitutes a spondee for the final iambus of an iambic senarius does not make him a genius. He uses vulgar language. Will you, whose sensibilities I have always considered to be more delicate than the rose, be angry if I say that he is just a fad? And then, my Lord, I understand the interest you might feel in these brothers, Athenis and Bupalos, hanging themselves, but of what use is it to then catalogue the various works of art of the latter? Do you not know that the surest way to bore your reader is to tell him everything? Have I not often told you that less is more? And the word acrasscent, which you use with such authority. Where did you find it, as I have never known any of the old authors to use it, or for that matter any modern? Or yet is it merely a quaint spelling of some common word, as when Sappho uses ‘zapaton’ for ‘diabaton’? In either case, better if you stick to the old vintage. Furthermore, you should not say ‘make excuses’ but rather ‘apologetic’ just as one should not say ‘make speech’ but rather ‘perorate’ and instead of using ‘make parallels’ use ‘collimate’. But to conclude, talking about the niceties of language when the subject is Hipponax is in itself absurd, and not unlike serving lentils seasoned with myrrh oil.

  XIII.

  The palace of Polycrates, the roof covered with quasi-translucent Pentelic stone tiles from Naxos, was splendidly decorated, the floors of certain chambers interlaid with precious stones and agate, others with extravagant mosaics, the walls of all painted with a hundred interesting scenes. One room was frescoed like an ocean deep, with octopuses, urchins, lantern-fish and dolphins, tritons, nereides and sea-dragons. Another had diverse birds of the air admirably depicted flying across wall and ceiling, perched on branches and pecking or scratching at the earth. There was a chamber which displayed scenes from the Cypria of Stasinus, another with scenes from Aesop’s fables. In his room of oddities he had a stuffed hippopotamus, the skeleton of a winged snake, and jars, one containing an enormous and misshapen foetus, another the embalmed body of Hieronymus, a kind of memorabilia of Polycrates’ rise to power. In his courtyards he had statues of athletes, satyrs, a naked woman playing a flute, an acrobat, a bull, a drunken old woman stumbling, a portrait of Anacreon.

  On leisure days he would sit in his garden, under the shade of the amamaxudes, or else wander along the paths, sniff at the flowers and sample prime pieces of fruit from his orchard. There were roses that were half white and half red and vines which carried both white and black grapes together, grapes that were not fit for wine, but for eating were deliciously sweet. He had a mulberry tree which was grafted to a chestnut tree, a chestnut tree grafted to a hazelnut tree and a pomegranate grafted to an oak. He grew cadmium-yellow lemons which smelled of cinnamon, melons odiferous as peach blossoms, and artichokes which breathed the aroma of hyacinth, were without sharp prickles and tasted not unlike sweet plums. There were peach and cherry trees that produced fruit without pit and almond trees whose nuts had shells so tender and thin that a mere touch would leave the flesh naked. And then, planted in an enormous clay pot, grew his fructiferous tree of delicacies, the trunk of which split off into three boughs, one engrafted with pomegranates, one with golden pears, and the third with tinzenite-red oranges. And interspersed amongst his real trees he had bronze trees elaborately painted in impossible colours and along certain walks there were beds of artificial flowers made of ivory and electrum.

  He collected dogs from Epirus, Dalmatia and Lacedaemon; introduced to the island goats from Scyros and Naxos, sheep from Miletus and Attica, and swine from Sicily. He had an aviary with diverse kinds of birds, including ospreys, and even a theocronus, a bird generated from a male hawk and a female eagle. There was a crane with two heads, a chicken with four wings . . .

  XIV.

  He was also a patron of letters and was the first to have the Homeric epics collated; and he collected a library of all known writers, a vast hall full of rare and valuable papyri from Egypt, Macedonia, Persia and beyond. There was the Theog
onia of Cnossos, a Historical Geography of the Aegean Sea by Archilochos the Parian, The Smyrnian Epic of Mimnermus, and Colaios’ Calculation of the Length of the World by the Assistance of Oblique Triangles. He had the complete works of Agias, Arctinus and Creophylus; he had books on harmony, warfare, rain water, indivisible lines, appellative nouns, lawgivers, definitions of neutral things, Zacynthian suppers, economics, asymmetric numbers, erotics, etymologies, mechanical problems, dialectic terms, votive offerings, hunting, and a great variety of other instructive subjects. And he let the architects, engineers and poets of his court have free access to these works, thus greatly advancing the level of the sciences of the island, so they did match or exceed in every way those of other parts of the world.

  XV.

  From a Catalogue of Literary Treasures:

  Philammon:

  A Hymn to Demeter, engraved on a heart made of mountain copper

  Peisander of Camiros:

  Epic of Heracles, in forty books on amphitheatric papyrus

  Arctinus of Miletus and Eumelus of Corinth:

  Titanomachy

  Imhotep:

  On Quadrilateral Masonry, written in hieratic script with notes in an unknown hand in Greek

  Cinthaethon of Lacedaemon:

  Oedipodea

  Lesches of Mitylene:

  Little Iliad

  Eugammon of Cycene:

  Telegony, written in gold lettering on vellum of gazelle

  Hesiod:

  Aegimius, with pictorial designs by Clitias and Ergotimos

  Antimachus of Teas:

  The After-Born, decorated with bands of purple and black rays

  Asios, son of Amphiptolemos:

  Epic of Phoinix, written in boustrophedon, Greek cattle-track

  Hybrias:

  Wine Songs, a series of eighteen, each engraved on an individual wax tablet

  Panyassis of Halicarnassus:

  Heracleia, in the handwriting of the author

  Olen:

  Hymns

  Phocylides:

  Epigrams Against Bestiality, recto

  Styptic Sayings, verso

  XVI.

  Fragment of a Popular Song Invented by Ibycus10 Sung to the Sound of that Instrument Called the Sambuca, also Invented by Ibycus:

  You are always aloft, my mind,

  Like some old porphyris, with outstretched wings.

  Said Ibycus:

  Spartan girls are naked-thighed and man-crazy.

  Said Anacreon:

  I am pining for you boy with maiden’s eyes and voice more musical than a monaulos,

  but you ignore me, oblivious to the fact that you hold the reins of my heart.

  Said Anacreon:

  He’s so fresh; he exhales sagda and his skin smells like apples.

  Said Anacreon:

  Love, like a smith, hits with a huge hammer.

  Said Anacreon:

  In truth boy, you are more skittish than a horse.

  XVII.

  Bathyllus was a youth of remarkable beauty, thoroughly effeminate in his manners. His hair, saturated with odiferous oil of flowers, was parted evenly in the middle and streamed down over either cheek; he had a plump neck, a delicate mouth and a full jaw with a dimpled chin. His eyes were painted green with malachite, like a woman’s. He sang the song which begins with the words:

  Pallid and pink as his *****

  was his penumbra;

  blushing is my heart when aflame,

  plucking at his lyre with his plectrum between each saccharine verse. When this was over all applauded vigorously. Polycrates, his face flushed with wine, offered a toast to the young man.

  Ibycus murmured, “Bathyllus, off-shoot of the opal-eyed Graces and pet of the flaxen-haired Muses, it is you that Cypris and Persuasion of the tender looks rear amid the roses.”

  Anacreon, touching the young man’s hand, declared it to be “softer than a fine robe,” looking at his complexion, said that it was “fresher than water,” at his neck, “whiter than milk or even an egg,” .

  “Bring me water—mixed with wine,” the poet cried out to the pantry slave, “Instantly boy! And bring also,

  Many flowers interwoven; I mean garlands;

  Then fill my cup; and so elevated

  Beneath the glad dominion of the vine

  I might not think of hopeless love.”

  “ . . . Auge . . .”

  “. . . A woman with thick ankles is a whore.”

  “The groans of Auge are far sweeter in tone than a harp.”

  “Very Anacreontic,” said lushy Anacreon as his eyes followed a train of Sicilian slaves winding into the room laden with baskets heaped high with purple-hued apples from Corinth, Tithrasian figs and Carystian nuts; golden bowls filled with dainties, fish steeped in Cleonaean vinegar, pink shrimps swimming in saffron-coloured broth, fried daffodils, chickens glazed with honey and meat suffocated with caper sauce.

  “My cook, Echoiax, when growing up,” Polycrates said, “never played with hoops and balls as other children did, but with cloves of garlic and roasted giblets and even as a baby demanded that his mother’s milk be boiled with Lampsacene honey before he would condescend to drink it.”

  Polycrates, ensconced in a pile of purple cushions, ate a plate of rape dressed with new wine and raisins, two roasted crabs and a good portion of batter-fried piglet raised on milk; cercope, monkey grasshoppers, to further stimulate the appetite; stuffed crayfish and an eel with green garlic sauce.

  “Watch those twenty-four white beasts,” said Heracles, standing on one leg, with one hand uplifted, himself outstretched in the posture of Hermes, “and watch the red one lick them all.”

  “He can certainly eat a great deal,” Maeandrius commented.

  “It is fine,” Telesarchus, a citizen, said. “If he gets sick he will vomit gold.”

  XVIII.

  Polycrates, hearing of the glory Theodorus had given the Spartans, sent a letter recalling him to Samos with promises of great reward. The artist returned home and was given audience with the tyrant, who sat eating fruit and listening to his daughter, shallow-eyed long-necked Eriphyle, recite with stressed euphony the poems of Sappho: (this dust was unmarried Timas . . . who when she perished, all her virgin friends groomed with sharpened steel their lovely curls, and to her tomb brought and strew those hairs) . . . . . . That malleable and ductile, that precious yellow metallic element was hauled out, commissions piled one on top of the next: for statues, for temples, to re-build the Heraion in grand style. . . . A chest of coins from Lydia set in the middle of the room . . .

  “Father,” Eriphyle said (her own hair more gold than the gold, quince-coloured, dyed so with chrusoxylon, more commonly called Scythian wood), “it seems to me that you are moving far too quickly. It is true that we have heard marvellous things of this man; but here he is, at his first interview with you, his cup of wine barely tasted, and he has already received charges enough to last him more than a lifetime. Would it not be best if, before intrusting him with such a number of important tasks, before trusting such a quantity of precious metal into his hands, you tried his ability with some smaller project?”

  “But daughter, I have seen his work in Delphi11, and we all know what he has done for the Lacedaemonians.”

  “You have seen what he can do, or is reputed to have done, in foreign parts, but we do not yet know what he can do in Samos.”

  “Well . . .” said Polycrates.

  Theodorus bowed to the tyrant, more gracefully still to Eriphyle, and then, plucking a single coin from the treasure, said: “Allow me to borrow this for a short time, to give you some slight demonstration of my skill.” He drained his wine and took his leave and three days later returned.
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  To Eriphyle he presented a golden fly, in exact proportions and likeness to the real insect. To Polycrates, a ring of sardonyx set in gold, a ring of truly marvellous workmanship and unsurpassed beauty, its band intertwined vine tendrils across which satyrs leaped lightly forth and played on pipes of reeds, and its gem engraved with a lyre seal.

  Theodorus, together with his father Rhoecus, under the patronage of Polycrates, invented a spectacular method of ore smelting and hollow casting. On his own he invented the water level, the lock and key, the lathe, the carpenter’s rule and square; and through these tools was able to greatly advance his art. . . . . . . He cast a statue of Polydor which was installed in the temple of Ares and then, at a later date, a statue of Polycrates’ cook, Echoiax, in the attitude of a valiant warrior, wielding pot and ladle, which was sent as an offering to Delphi. He also cast a miniature of himself in bronze, a perfect likeness; in his right hand he held a file, while on the extended fingers of his left sat a chariot drawn by four horses, a masterpiece of chasing, so small that the very fly that he had made would have been able to cover it with its wings. . . . . . . Then later, he made a golden vine with grapes of purple sapphires for Pythios, the son of Atys and grandson of Croesus, which that famous extravagant gave to Darius12 . . .