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+--- Thread: Making wine (/showthread.php?tid=20401)
Making wine - Epictetus - 02-26-2012
I have a few questions about ancient wine-making that hopefully someone can answer. I’ve been reading Longus’ pastoral Daphnis and Chloe and came across this passage:
Quote:This one was busy with a small hook for cutting the grape clusters, that one was looking for a stone big enough to crush the clusters of juicy grapes, and another hunted for a dry stick smoothed by blows so that the must of the grapes could be carried out at night under the lead of a lantern… Daphnis lifted grapes in baskets and emptied them into the presses and stomped on them.
First, if people stomped on the grapes (I suppose the traditional image of wine-making), what was the big stone used for? Was it used before stomping, or after, or what?
Second, what is going on with the dry stick? I assume the must was beaten with the stick, but I don’t understand the phrase “carried out at night under the lead of a lantern.”
Re: Making wine - D B Campbell - 02-26-2012
You may find the answer here. (No promises, though.)
Re: Making wine - D B Campbell - 02-26-2012
You've intrigued me, now.
Quote:..., and another hunted for a dry stick smoothed by blows so that the must of the grapes could be carried out at night under the lead of a lantern
I think your translation is faulty (or extremely archaic). The new-ish Oxford World's Classics version reads:
Quote:... a sixth was making a bundle of dry withies, which had been pounded and shredded for use as torches, so that there would be light for conveying the grape-juice after dark.The phrase literally reads "another [was looking for] a dry withy which had been shredded and pounded, so that, by night, the grape-juice would be carried in the light".
The torch (or lamp) seems to be understood.
Re: Making wine - Epictetus - 02-27-2012
Aha. Yes, my translation is a very old one, and it could also be faulty. Thanks.