Kitap 7
5
Amphis says in his Leucas— Whoever buys some ὄψον for his supper, And, when he might get real genuine fish, Contents himself with radishes, is mad. And that you may find it easy to remember what was said, I will arrange the names in alphabetical order For as Sophocles, in his Ajax Mastigophorus, called fish ἐλλοὶ, saying— He gave him to the ἐλλοὶ ἰχθύες to eat; one of the company asked whether any one before Sophocles ever used this word; to whom Zoilus replied,—But I, who am not a person ὀψοφαγίστατος [exceedingly fond of fish], (for that is a word which Xenophon has used in his Memorabilia, where he writes, He is ὀψοφαγίστατος and the greatest fool possible,) am well aware that the man who wrote the poem Titanomachia [or the Battle of the Giants], whether he be Eumelus the Corinthian, or Arctinus, or whatever else his name may chance to have been, in the second book of his poem speaks thus— In it did swim the gold-faced ἐλλοὶ ἰχθύες, And sported in the sea's ambrosial depths. And Sophocles was very fond of the Epic Cycle, so that he composed even entire plays in which he has followed the stories told in their fables.
