Set III-1-ibi-002. A collection of selected literary quotations associated with "Ibis" as the main subject. The entries are organised chronologically, from the the earliest to the latest. The intentionally omitted textual fragments are indicated by an ellipsis placed inside angle brackets. The translator's notes and curator's commentaries are placed inside square brackets and indicated by the quartz colour. Direct mentions of the main subject are indicated by the azure colour. Direct mentions of snakes/serpents and their derivatives are indicated by the amber colour and complemented by references to the sources' original language and the words' lemmas. Important descriptive details that inform the artefacts' iconographic interpretation are indicated by the malachite colour.
------------------------------------------------- « ● Selected Classical Quotations ● » --------------------------------------------------
“
Some people say that ravens and the ibis have sexual congress through the mouth, and that among four-footed animals the weasel gives birth through the mouth. This is what both Anaxagoras and some of the other natural philosophers say ⟨...⟩
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Anaxagoras
(c. 500-428 BC) |
Peculiarities
of Animal
Reproduction
(D91-D92) |
● D91 (‹ A114)
(via Aristotle, Generation
of Animals) |
André Laks, Glenn Warren Most |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 529) © Harvard
University Press, 2016 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
Though Egypt has Libya on its borders, it is not a country of many animals. All of them are held sacred some of these are part of mens' households and some not; but were I to declare the reason why they are dedicated, I should be brought to speak of matters of divinity, of which I am especially unwilling to treat; I have never touched upon such save where necessity has compelled me. But I will now show how it is customary to deal with the animals. ⟨...⟩ Whoever kills an ibis or a hawk, with intention or without, must die for it.
„
“
Near Thebes there are sacred snakes [ὄφις], harmless to men, small in size and bearing two horns on the top of their heads. These, when they die, are buried in the temple of Zeus, to whom they are said to be sacred. Not far from the town of Buto, there is a place in Arabia to which I went to learn about the winged serpents [ὄφις]. When I came thither, I saw innumerable bones and backbones of serpents [ὄφις]; many heaps of backbones there were, great and small and smaller still. This place, where lay the backbones scattered, is where a narrow mountain pass opens into a great plain, which is joined to the plain of Egypt. Winged serpents [ὄφις] are said to fly at the beginning of spring, from Arabia, making for Egypt; but the ibis birds encounter the invaders in this pass and kill them. The Arabians say that the ibis is greatly honoured by the Egyptians for this service, and the Egyptians give the same reason for honouring these birds. Now this is the appearance of the ibis. It is all deep black, with legs like a crane's, and a beak strongly hooked; its size is that of a landrail. Such is the outward form of the ibis which fights with the serpents [ὄφις]. Those that most consort with men (for the ibis is of two kinds) [Translator's note: Geronticus Calvus and Ibis Aethiopica.] have all the head and neck bare of feathers; their plumage is white, save the head and neck and the tips of wings and tail (these being deep black); the legs and beak of the bird are like those of the other ibis. The serpents [ὄφις] are like water-snakes [ὕδρα]. Their wings are not feathered but most like the wings of a bat. I have now said enough concerning creatures that are sacred.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Herodotus
(c. 484-425 BC) |
Histories |
● II: 65
● II: 74-76 |
Alfred Denis Godley |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 117) © Harvard
University Press, 1920 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
Arabia is the most distant to the south of all inhabited countries: and this is the only country which yields frankincense and myrrh and casia and cinnamon and gum-mastich. All these but myrrh are difficult for the Arabians to get. They gather frankincense by burning that storax which Phoenicians carry to Hellas; this they burn and so get the frankincense; for the spice-bearing trees are guarded by small winged snakes [ὄφις] of varied colour, many round each tree; these are the snakes [Ø] that attack Egypt. Nothing save the smoke of storax will drive them away from the trees. The Arabians also say that the whole country would be full of these snakes [ὄφις] were it not with them as I have heard that it is with vipers [ἔχιδνα]. It would seem that the wisdom of divine Providence (as is but reasonable) has made all creatures prolific that are timid and fit to eat, that they be not minished from off the earth by being eaten up, whereas but few young are born to creatures cruel and baneful. The hare is so prolific, for that it is the prey of every beast and bird and man; alone of all creatures it conceives in pregnancy; some of the unborn young are hairy, some still naked, some are still forming in the womb while others are just conceived. But whereas this is so with the hare, the lioness, a very strong and bold beast, bears offspring but once in her life, and then but one cub; for the uterus comes out with the cub in the act of birth. This is the reason of it: when the cub first begins to stir in the mother, its claws, much sharper than those of any other creature, tear the uterus, and as it grows, much more does it scratch and tear, so that when the hour of birth is near seldom is any of the uterus left whole. It is so too with vipers [ἔχιδνα] and the winged serpents [ὄφις] of Arabia: were they born in the natural manner of serpents [Ø] no life were possible for men; but as it is, when they pair, and the male is in the very act of generation, the female seizes him by the neck, nor lets go her grip till she has bitten the neck through. Thus the male dies; but the female is punished for his death; the young avenge their father, and gnaw at their mother while they are yet within her; nor are they dropped from her till they have eaten their way through her womb. Other snakes [ὄφις], that do no harm to men, lay eggs and hatch out a vast number of young. The Arabian winged serpents [ὄφις] do indeed seem to be many; but it is because (whereas there are vipers [ἔχιδνα] in every land) these are all in Arabia and are nowhere else found.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Herodotus
(c. 484-425 BC) |
Histories |
● III: 107-109 |
Alfred Denis Godley |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 118) © Harvard
University Press, 1921 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
SOCRATES: I heard, then, that at Naucratis, in Egypt, was one of the ancient gods of that country, the one whose sacred bird is called the ibis, and the name of the god himself was Theuth. He it was who invented numbers and arithmetic and geometry and astronomy, also draughts and dice, and, most important of all, letters.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Plato
(c. 428-347 BC) |
Phaedrus or On
the Beautiful |
● 58 D |
Harold North Fowler |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 036) © Harvard
University Press, 1914 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
Krex is a seabird with variegated plumage, like the ibis as described by Herodotus [c. 484-425 BC]. The ibis is an Egyptian bird that eats filth. Callimachus [c. 310-240 BC] in his work On Birds says that it is a bird of ill-omen to those getting married.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Euphorion of Chalcis
(c. 275-190 BC) |
Poetic Fragments |
● 6. Apollodorus (via Scholiast, Tzetzes on Lycophron, Alexandra) |
Jane Lucy Lightfoot |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 508) © Harvard
University Press, 2010 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
⟨...⟩ the Egyptians, whom we laugh at, deified animals solely on the score of some utility which they derived from them; for instance, the ibis, being a tall bird with stiff legs and a long horny beak, destroys a great quantity of snakes [serpens]: it protects Egypt from plague, by killing and eating the flying serpents [anguis] that are brought from the Libyan desert by the south-west wind, and so preventing them from harming the natives by their bite while alive and their stench when dead.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Marcus Tullius Cicero
(106-43 BC) |
On the Nature
of the Gods |
● I: xxxvi, 101 |
Harris Rackham |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 268) © Harvard
University Press, 1933 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
Never could custom conquer nature; for nature is always un-conquered; but as for us we have corrupted our souls with bowered seclusion, luxury, ease, indolence and sloth, we have enervated and weakened them by false beliefs and evil habits. Who does not know of the custom of the Egyptians? Their minds are infected with degraded superstitions and they would sooner submit to any torment than injure an ibis or asp [aspis] or cat or dog or crocodile, and even if they have unwittingly done anything of the kind there is no penalty from which they would recoil.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Marcus Tullius Cicero
(106-43 BC) |
Tusculan Disputations |
● V: xxvii, 78 |
John Edward King |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 141) © Harvard
University Press, 1927 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
As regards the consecration of animals in Egypt, the practice naturally appears to many to be extraordinary and worthy of investigation. For the Egyptians venerate certain animals exceedingly, not only during their lifetime but even after their death, such as cats, ichneumons and dogs, and, again, hawks and the birds which they call "ibis", as well as wolves and crocodiles and a number of other animals of that kind.
„
“
When one of these animals dies they wrap it in fine linen and then, wailing and beating their breasts, carry it off to be embalmed; and after it has been treated with cedar oil and such spices as have the quality of imparting a pleasant odour and of preserving the body for a long time, they lay it away in a consecrated tomb. And whoever intentionally kills one of these animals is put to death, unless it be a cat or an ibis that he kills; but if he kills one of these, whether intentionally or unintentionally, he is certainly put to death, for the common people gather in crowds and deal with the perpetrator most cruelly, sometimes doing this without waiting for a trial. And because of their fear of such a punishment any who have caught sight of one of these animals lying dead withdraw to a great distance and shout with lamentations and protestations that they found the animal already dead.
„
“
And of the sacred birds the ibis is useful as a protector against the snakes [ὄφις], the locusts, and the caterpillars, and the hawk against the scorpions, horned serpents [κεράστης], and the small animals of noxious bite which cause the greatest destruction of men.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Diodorus Siculus
(c. 90-30 BC) |
Library of
History |
● I: lxxxiii, 1
● I: lxxxiii, 5-7
● I: lxxxvii, 6-7 |
Charles Henry Oldfather |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 279) © Harvard
University Press, 1933 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
In fact, certain animals are worshipped by all Aegyptians in common, as, for example, three land animals, bull and dog and cat, and two birds, hawk and ibis, and two aquatics, scale-fish and oxyrynchus, but there are other animals which are honoured by separate groups independently of the rest ⟨...⟩
„
“
As for indigenous animals, Aegypt has also the ichneumon and the Aegyptian asp [ἀσπίς], which latter has a peculiarity as compared with the asp [Ø] of other countries; but it is of two kinds, one only a span [spithame; ~23 cm] long, which causes a quicker death, and the other nearly a fathom [orgyia; ~1.8 m], as is stated by Nicander [fl. 100s BC], who wrote the Theriaca. Among the birds are found the ibis and the Aegyptian hierax, which latter is tame, like the cat, as compared with those elsewhere; and also the nycticorax is here of a peculiar species, for in our country it has the size of an eagle and a harsh caw, but in Aegypt the size of a jackdaw and a different caw. The ibis, however, is the tamest bird; it is like a stork in shape and size, but it is of two kinds in colour, one kind like the stork and the other black all over. Every cross-road in Alexandria is full of them; and though they are useful in one way, they are not useful in another. The bird is useful because it singles out every animal and the refuse in the meat-shops and bakeries, but not useful because it eats everything, is unclean, and can only with difficulty be kept away from things that are clean and do not admit of any defilement.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Strabo
(c. 64 BC-24 AD) |
Geography |
● XVII: i, 40
● XVII: ii, 4 |
Horace
Leonard
Jones |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 267) © Harvard
University Press, 1932 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
She sang of the battle of the gods and giants, ascribing undeserved honour to the giants, and belittling the deeds of the mighty gods: how Typhoeus, sprung from the lowest depths of earth, inspired the heavenly gods with fear, and how they all turned their backs and fled, until, weary, they found refuge in the land of Egypt and the seven-mouthed Nile. How even there Typhoeus, son of earth, pursued them, and the gods hid themselves in lying shapes: "Jove [Jupiter] thus became a ram," said she, "the lord of flocks, whence Libyan Ammon even to this day is represented with curving horns; Apollo hid in a crow's shape, Bacchus in a goat; the sister of Phoebus [Diana], in a cat, Juno in a snow-white cow, Venus in a fish, Mercury in an ibis bird."
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Publius Ovidius Naso
(43 BC-17 AD) |
Metamorphoses |
● V: 319-331 |
Frank Justus Miller; Revised by George Patrick Goold |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 042) © Harvard
University Press, 1916 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
The Egyptians have promoted to divine honours irrational animals, not only of the tame sort but also beasts of the utmost savagery, drawn from each of the kinds found below the moon, from the creatures of the land the lion, from those of the water their indigenous crocodile, from the rangers of the air the hawk and the Egyptian ibis. And though they see these creatures brought to their birth, requiring food, eating voraciously, full of ordure, venomous too and man-eating, the prey of every sort of disease, and perishing not only by a natural but often by a violent death, they render worship to them, they the civilized to the uncivilized and untamed, the reasonable to the irrational, the kinsfolk of the Godhead to ugliness unmatched even by a Thersites, the rulers and masters to the naturally subservient and slavish.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Philo of Alexandria
(c. 20 BC-50 AD) |
On the Contemplative Life or Suppliants |
● I, 8-9 |
Francis Henry Colson |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 363) © Harvard
University Press, 1941 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
⟨...⟩ in the ⟨...⟩ country of Egypt ⟨...⟩ the bird called the ibis ⟨...⟩ makes use of the curve of its beak to purge itself through the part by which it is most conducive to health for the heavy residue of foodstuffs to be excreted. Nor is the ibis alone, but many animals have made discoveries destined to be useful for man as well. The value of the herb dittany for extracting arrows was shown by stags when wounded by that weapon and ejecting it by grazing on that herb; likewise stags when bitten by the phalangium, a kind of spider, or any similar animal cure themselves by eating crabs. There is also a herb that is particularly good for snake-bites [serpens], with which lizards heal themselves whenever they fight a battle with snakes [Ø] and are wounded. Celandine was shown to be very healthy for the sight by swallows using it as a medicine for their chicks' sore eyes. The tortoise eats cunila, called ox-grass, to restore its strength against the effect of snake-bites [serpens]; the weasel cures itself with rue when it has had a fight with mice in hunting them. The stork drugs itself with marjoram in sickness, and goats use ivy and a diet consisting mostly of crabs thrown up from the sea. When a snake's [anguis] body gets covered with a skin owing to its winter inactivity it sloughs this hindrance to its movement by means of fennel-sap and comes out all glossy for spring; but it begins the process at its head, and takes at least 24 hours to do it, folding the skin backward so that what was the inner side of it becomes the outside. Moreover as its sight is obscured by its hibernation it anoints and revives its eyes by rubbing itself against a fennel plant, but if its scales have become numbed it scratches itself on the spiny leaves of a juniper. A large snake [draco] quenches its spring nausea with the juice of wild lettuce.
„
“
⟨...⟩ the people of Egypt invoke their ibis to guard against the arrival of snakes [serpens].
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Gaius Plinius Secundus
(23-79 AD) |
Natural History |
● VIII: xli, 97-99
● X: xl, 75 |
Harris Rackham |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 353) © Harvard
University Press, 1940 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
Moses then, ⟨...⟩ on coming of age gave the Egyptians signal proof of his merits and that he was born for their humiliation and for the advancement of the Hebrews; here is the occasion which he seized. The Ethiopians, who are neighbours the Egyptians, invaded their territory and pillaged their possessions; the Egyptians in indignation made a campaign against them to avenge the affront and, being beaten in battle, some fell and the rest ingloriously escaped to their own land by flight. But the Ethiopians followed in hot pursuit, and, deeming it feebleness not to subdue the whole of Egypt, they assailed the country far and wide and, having tasted of its riches, refused to relinquish their hold; and, since the neighbouring districts exposed to their first incursions did not venture to oppose them, they advanced as far as Memphis and to the sea, none of the cities being able to withstand them. Oppressed by this calamity, the Egyptians had recourse to oracles and divinations; and when counsel came to them from God to take the Hebrew for their ally, the king bade his daughter give up Moses to serve as his general. And she, after her father had sworn to do him no injury, surrendered him, judging that great benefit would come of such an alliance, while reproaching the knavish priests who, after having spoken of putting him to death as an enemy, were now not ashamed to crave his succour. Moses, thus summoned both by Thermuthis [!] and by the king, gladly accepted the task, to the delight of the sacred scribes of both nations; for the Egyptians hoped through his valour both to defeat their foes and at the same time to make away with Moses by guile, while the Hebrew hierarchy foresaw the possibility of escape from the Egyptians with Moses as their general. He thereupon, to surprise the enemy before they had even learnt of his approach, mustered and marched off his army, taking the route not by way of the river but through the interior. There he gave a wonderful proof of his sagacity. For the route is rendered difficult for a march by reason of a multitude of serpents [ἑρπετόν], which the region produces in abundant varieties, insomuch that there are some found nowhere else and bred here alone, remarkable for their power, their malignity, and their strange aspect; and among them are some which are actually winged, so that they can attack one from their hiding-place in the ground or inflict unforeseen injury by rising into the air. Moses, then, to provide security and an innocuous passage for his troops, devised a marvellous stratagem: he had baskets, resembling chests, made of the bark of papyrus, and took these with him full of ibises. Now this animal is the serpents' [ὄφις] deadliest enemy: they flee before its onset and in making off are caught, just as they are by stags, and swallowed up. The ibis is otherwise a tame creature and ferocious only to the serpent [ὄφις] tribe; but I refrain from further words on this subject, for Greeks are not unacquainted with the nature of the ibis. When, therefore, he entered the infested region, he by means of these birds beat off the vermin [ἑρπετόν], letting them loose upon them and using these auxiliaries to clear the ground. Having thus accomplished the march, he came wholly unexpected upon the Ethiopians, joined battle with them and defeated them, crushing their cherished hopes of mastering the Egyptians, and then proceeded to attack and overthrow their cities, great carnage of the Ethiopians ensuing. After tasting of this success which Moses had brought them, the Egyptian army showed such indefatigable energy that the Ethiopians were menaced with servitude and complete extirpation.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Titus Flavius Josephus
(c. 37-100 AD) |
Antiquities of
the Jews |
● II: x, 1-2 |
Henry St. John Thackeray |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 242) © Harvard
University Press, 1930 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
Of the animals that are held in honour ⟨...⟩ The ibis, which kills the deadly creeping things [ἑρπετόν], was the first to teach men the use of medicinal purgations when they observed her employing clysters and being purged by herself. The most strict of the priests take their lustral water for purification from a place where the ibis has drunk: for she does not drink water if it is unwholesome or tainted, nor will she approach it. By the spreading of her feet, in their relation to each other and to her bill, she makes an equilateral triangle. Moreover the variety and combination of her black feathers with her white picture the moon in its first quarter. There is no occasion for surprise that the Egyptians were so taken with such slight resemblances; for the Greeks in their painted and sculptured portrayals of the gods made use of many such.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus
(c. 46-120 AD) |
Moralia V: Isis
and Osiris |
● 75, 381 C-E |
Frank Cole Babbitt |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 306) © Harvard
University Press, 1936 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
They say that the ibis when hatched weighs two drachms, as much as the heart of a new-born infant, and forms an equilateral triangle by the position of its outspread feet and bill. How could anyone blame the Egyptians for such irrationality when it is recorded that the Pythagoreans respect even a white cock, and that they abstain particularly from the red mullet and the sea anemone among marine animals?
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus
(c. 46-120 AD) |
Moralia VIII:
Table-Talk |
● IV: Question 5,
2, 670 C-D |
Herbert Benno Hoffleit |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 424) © Harvard
University Press, 1969 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
"Hermes", said Hermeias, "was, we are told, the god who first invented writing in Egypt. Hence the Egyptians write the first of their letters with an ibis, the bird that belongs to Hermes ⟨...⟩"
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus
(c. 46-120 AD) |
Moralia IX:
Table-Talk |
● IX: Question 3,
2, 738 E |
Francis Henry Sandbach |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 425) © Harvard
University Press, 1961 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
The Egyptians declare that they have observed and imitated the ibis' clyster-like purging of herself with brine; and the priests make use of water from which an ibis has drunk to purify themselves; for if the water is tainted or unhealthy in any way, the ibis will not approach it.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus
(c. 46-120 AD) |
Moralia XII: Whether Land or Sea Animals Are Cleverer |
● 20, 974 C |
William Clark Helmbold |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 406) © Harvard
University Press, 1957 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
Volusius of Bithynia, is there anyone who doesn't know the kind of monsters that crazy Egypt worships? One district reveres the crocodile, another quakes at the ibis, glutted with snakes [serpens].
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Decimus Junius Juvenalis
(c. 55-130 AD) |
Satires |
● Satire 15, 1-3 |
Susanna Morton Braund |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 091) © Harvard
University Press, 2004 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
The Arabian desert breeds among other wild creatures birds called Stymphalian, which are quite as savage against men as lions or leopards. These fly against those who come to hunt them, wounding and killing them with their beaks. All armour of bronze or iron that men wear is pierced by the birds; but if they weave a garment of thick cork, the beaks of the Stymphalian birds are caught in the cork garment, just as the wings of small birds stick in bird-lime. These birds are of the size of a crane, and are like the ibis, but their beaks are more powerful, and not crooked like that of the ibis. Whether the modern Arabian birds with the same name as the old Arcadian birds are also of the same breed, I do not know. But if there have been from all time Stymphalian birds, just as there have been hawks and eagles, I should call these birds of Arabian origin, and a section of them might have flown on some occasion to Arcadia and reached Stymphalus. Originally they would be called by the Arabians, not Stymphalian, but by another name. But the fame of Heracles, and the superiority of the Greek over the foreigner, has resulted in the birds of the Arabian desert being called Stymphalian even in modern times.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Pausanias
(c. 110-180 AD) |
Description
of Greece |
● VIII. Arcadia:
xxii, 4-7 |
William Henry Samuel Jones |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 297) © Harvard
University Press, 1935 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
DAMIS: Thank you kindly, Timocles, for reminding me of what the nations believe. From that you can discern particularly well that there is no certainty in the theory of gods, for the confusion is great, and some believe one thing, some another. The Scythians offer sacrifice to a scimitar, the Thracians to Zamolxis, a runaway slave who came to them from Samos, the Phrygians to Men, the Ethiopians to Day, the Cyllenians to Phales, the Assyrians to a dove, the Persians to fire, and the Egyptians to water. And while all the Egyptians in common have water for a god, the people of Memphis have the bull, the people of Pelusium a wild onion, others an ibis or a crocodile, others a dog-faced god or a cat or a monkey.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Lucian of Samosata
(c. 120s-180s AD) |
Zeus Rants |
● 42 |
Austin Morris Harmon |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 054) © Harvard
University Press, 1915 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
LYCINUS: ⟨...⟩ my good friend, in the name of Isis remember to bring us those delicate pickled Nile fish from Egypt, perfume from Canopus, or an ibis from Memphis, and one of the Pyramids - if the ship can carry it.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Lucian of Samosata
(c. 120s-180s AD) |
The Ship or the Wishers |
● 15 |
K. Kilburn |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 430) © Harvard
University Press, 1959 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
Apollonius replied with a laugh, "Gentlemen, you have made great use of the wisdom of Egypt and Ethiopia if a dog, an ibis, or a goat seems more venerable and godlike than yourselves, or so I hear from the wise Thespesion. What is venerable or formidable about these things? Perjurers, temple robbers, and sacrilegious gangs are more likely to despise such sacred objects than to fear them. If these things gain venerability by being 'suggestive', the gods would be much more venerable in Egypt if no cult statue were set up to them at all, and you applied your divine lore in some other way, more profound and more mysterious. You could build temples and altars to them, and prescribe how to sacrifice and how not, when and for how long, what to say or do, and rather than introducing a statue, you could leave the shapes of the gods to those visiting your holy places. The mind portrays and imagines an object better than creation does, yet you have prevented the gods both from seeming and being imagined as beautiful."
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Lucius Flavius Philostratus
(c. 170-250 AD) |
Life of Apollonius
of Tyana |
● VI: xix, 4 |
Christopher Prestige Jones |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 017) © Harvard
University Press, 2005 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
⟨...⟩ the Egyptians maintain that all snakes [ὄφις] dread the feathers of the ibis.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Claudius Aelianus
(c. 175-235 AD) |
On the
Characteristics
of Animals |
● I: 38 (iv) |
Alwyn Faber Scholfield |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 446) © Harvard
University Press, 1958 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
The Egyptians assert that a knowledge of clysters and intestinal purges is derived from no discovery of man's, but they commonly affirm that it was the Ibis that taught them this remedy. And how it instructed those who were the first to see it, some other shall tell. And I have also heard that it knows when the moon is waxing and when waning; and I cannot deny that I have learnt from some source that it diminishes or increases its food according as the goddess [Selene] herself diminishes or increases.
„
“
Here is another story relating to the Egyptian Ibis which I have heard. The bird is sacred to the moon. At any rate it hatches its eggs in the same number of days that the goddess [Selene] takes to wax and to wane, and never leaves Egypt. The reason for this is that Egypt is the moistest of all countries and the moon is believed to be the moistest of all planets. Of its own free will the Ibis would never quit Egypt, and should some man lay hands upon it and forcibly export it, it will defend itself against its assailant and bring all his labour to nothing, for it will starve itself to death and render its captor's exertions vain. It walks quietly like a maiden, and one would never see it moving at anything faster than a foot's pace. The Black Ibis does not permit the winged serpents [ὄφις] from Arabia to cross into Egypt, but fights to protect the land it loves, while the other kind encounters the serpents [Ø] that come down the Nile when in flood and destroys them. Otherwise there would have been nothing to prevent the Egyptians from being killed by their coming.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Claudius Aelianus
(c. 175-235 AD) |
On the
Characteristics
of Animals |
● II: 35
● II: 38 |
Alwyn Faber Scholfield |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 446) © Harvard
University Press, 1958 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
The Priests of Egypt do not purify themselves with water of every kind, nor even with such water as they may chance upon, but only with that from which they believe an Ibis has drunk. For they know full well that this bird would never drink water that was dirty or that had been tainted with any drugs; for they believe that the bird possesses a certain prophetic faculty, seeing that it is sacred.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Claudius Aelianus
(c. 175-235 AD) |
On the
Characteristics
of Animals |
● VII: 45 (i) |
Alwyn Faber Scholfield |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 448) © Harvard
University Press, 1959 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
Here is another peculiarity of the Ibis which I have learnt from Egyptian narratives. When it buries its neck and head beneath its breast-feathers, it imitates the shape of the heart. Of its special hostility to creatures injurious to man and to crops I think I have already spoken earlier on [See I: 38 (iv); II: 38]. The birds couple with their mouth and beget offspring in that way. And the Egyptians say, though I for one am not easily persuaded, yet they say that those who see to the embalming of animals and who are experts at it, agree that the entrails of the Ibis measure ninety-six cubits. I have heard further that its stride when walking measures a cubit. And when the moon is in eclipse it closes its eyes until the goddess [Selene] shines out again. It is said to be beloved of Hermes the father of speech because its appearance resembles the nature of speech: thus, the black wing-feathers might be compared to speech suppressed and turned inwards, the white to speech brought out, now audible, the servant and the messenger of what is within, so to say. Now I have already mentioned that the bird lives to a very great age. And Apion [c. 25 BC-45 AD] states that it is immortal and adduces the priests of Hermopolis as witnesses to prove it. Yet even he considers that this is very far from the truth, and to me it would seem to be an absolute falsehood. The Ibis is a very hot-blooded creature, at any rate it is an exceedingly voracious and foul feeder if it really does eat snakes [ὄφις] and and scorpions. And yet some things it digests without difficulty, while others it easily expels in its excrement. And very rarely would one see a sick Ibis, yet it thrusts its beak down in every place, caring nothing for any filth and treading upon it in the hope of tracking down something even there. And yet when it turns to rest it first of all washes itself and purges. It makes its nest in the top of date-palms in order to escape the cats, for this animal cannot easily clamber and crawl up a date-palm as it is constantly impeded and thrown off by the protuberances on the stem.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Claudius Aelianus
(c. 175-235 AD) |
On the
Characteristics
of Animals |
● X: 29 |
Alwyn Faber Scholfield |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 448) © Harvard
University Press, 1959 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------- « ● ● ● » ---------------------------------------------------------------------
“
Among Egyptian birds, the variety of which is countless, the ibis is sacred, harmless, and beloved for the reason that by carrying the eggs of serpents [serpens] to its nestlings for food it destroys and makes fewer those destructive pests. These same birds meet the winged armies of snakes [anguis] which issue from the marshes of Arabia, producing deadly poisons, and before they leave their own lands vanquish them in battles in the air, and devour them. And it is said of those birds that they lay their eggs through their beaks. Egypt also breeds innumerable serpents [serpens], surpassing all their destructive kind in fierceness: basilisks [basiliscus], amphisbaenae [amphisbaena], scytalae [scytala], acontiae [acontias], dipsades [dipsas], vipers [vipera], and many others, all of which are easily surpassed in size and beauty by the asp [aspis], which never of its own accord leaves the bed of the Nile.
„
| Author: |
Work/Anthology: |
Verse/Fragment: |
Translator(s): |
Collection & Publisher: |
Ammianus Marcellinus
(c. 325-395 AD) |
History |
● XXII: xv, 25-27 |
John Carew Rolfe |
Loeb Classical Library
(LCL 315) © Harvard
University Press, 1940 |
|
|
Search Functionality Demonstration
