SC - De Nola Arrives

[Robin Carroll-Mann]

<< Most of the restaurant's 30 or so recipes are based on the Luxury of
Life, a 15-volume opus by the 4th-century BC Sicilian Greek
Archestratus. >> (from an Article)

<< Archestratus?  Not Athenaeus' The Deipnosophists?  I'm shocked. >>
(Bear)

I guess they mean the 62 fragments from Archestratus as they are extant
in the younger work of Athenaeus.

Archestratus wrote on food, and what he wrote was published 1994 in the
Prospect Books translation under the title "The life of luxury". The
Greek original was edited by Paulus Brandt in 1888: the "Archestrati
reliquiae" (all that came down to us from Archestratus) fill only half
of a slim volume. What is extant from his work is not really a cookbook,
rather sort of a guide to the 'best food' in a poem. Sure, there are
recipe-oid passages and passages on preparation that can possibly be
used to reconstruct recipes. If I am not mistaken, these 62 fragments
are extant (only) as they are mentioned or quoted in the work of
Athenaeus.

Athenaeus' 'Deipnosophists' is divided into 15 "books" (i.e. chapters,
not really volumes). The text makes up three volumes in the Kaibel
edition (1887-1890). The Prospect book translation of Archestratus
always gives a reference to the Athenaeus text, e.g. "Fragment 31
[Athenaeus 306a]". 

Thus, the 'Life of Luxury' is of Archestratus, the 15 "books" are of
Athenaeus, and what is extant of Archestratus is extant mostly in
Athenaeus.

Thomas