The works of Horace : with English notes, critical and ... - Cristo Raul

708 EXCURSUS IX. DILUTION OF ANCIENT WINES.
wines.* Such methods were by no means calculated to enhance any of
those qualities in good wine, and it is obvious that the repeated transfo-
eions and changes of temperature must have tended to deaden and dissi-
' pate a great portion of the aroma, on the retention of which the excels
lence of all wines so mateioally depends.
As the wines thus diluted were frequently drunk Warm, hot water became
an indispensable article at the entertainments of the ancients.
Whether the Greeks and Bomans were in the habit of taking draughts
of hot water by itself at their meals, is a point which, though of no great
importance, has been much discussed by^gramraarians, without ever being
satisfactorily determined. When we find the guests at an entertainment,
or the interlocutors in an ancient drama, calling for hot and tepid
water {^ep/iov Kol fierdKepac^),' it does not follow that this was to he
drunk unmixed; the water so required might be merely for diluting their
wines, or for the purposes of ablutaon. So far, indeed, was mere hot water
from being considered a luxury by the Romans, as some have absurdly
imagined to be the fact, that we find Seneca speaking of it as fit only
for the sick, and as quite insufferable to those who were accustomed to
the delicacies of life.^ In certain conditions of the stomach, however, as
in tijat which arises from too free indulgence in the pleasures of the table,
or from the use of gross and indigestible food, it can not be denied that hot
water wiU allay the uneasy feelings fnore effectually than cold ; and^ as
the Romans were notorious for their intemperance in eating, we shall
probably find in this circumstance the true explanation of their frequent ,
calls for that sort of beverage.
Such of the citizens as had no regular establishment were dependent
for their daily supply of hot water on the tkermopolia, or public houses, in
which all kinds of-prepared liquors were sold.* These places of entertainment,
which were frequented in much the same way as our modem
coffee-houses, appear to have existed in considerable number even during
the republic,- as we meet with frequent allusions to them in the comedies
of Flautus. In the reign of Claudius they attracted the attention of the
government, having probably become obnoxious by the freedom of conver-
sation which prevailed in them ; for an edict was issued ordering the suppression
of taverns, where people met together to drink, and forbidding
the sale of hot water and boiled meats under severe penalties.* This
mandate, however, like many of the other arbitrary acts of that empetor,
would seem to have been little regarded, and was probably soon repealed
; for, in a subsequent age, we find Ampelius, the prefect of Rome, subjecting
these places Of public resort to new regulations, according to which
they were not allowed to be opened before ten o'clock of the forenoon,
and no one was to sell hot water to the common people ; but it is evident
that the rage for warm drinks continued as prev^ent as ever ;
for the historian
who relates the above-mentioned circumstance observes, in another
place, when speaking of the luxurious habits and capricious conduct of the
higher classes, that, "When they have called for hot water, if a slave baa
been tardy in his obedience, he is instantly chastised with three hundred
1. fie N^turali Viuorum Hist., Eomffl, 1596, p. 93. £S. Athenaus, m., 96.
3. Epist 79. 4. Flavtus, Paeudol., il, 4.
5. JHo Caseins, Ix., 6, vol ii., p. 945, ed. J "
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