[Sca-cooks] watermelons and Pliny continued

Sun Jul 26 18:41:55 PDT 2015

The Loeb Classical Library is online through Harvard and available through academic libraries.
Based on Janick and the request below, I was looking for

Pliny (Book 19, 24: 69–70) and In the other instance (Book 20, 6: 11), and also looking for "pepones."

PLINY THE ELDER Natural History
Africae, grandissimi Moesiae. cum magnitudine excessere, pepones vocantur. vivunt hausti in stomacho in posterum

Translated by H. Rackham. 
LCL 371, Pages 462-463, 1 of 1 matches

This passage in translation from Book 19 [on pages 462-463 and 464-465  in the LOEB edition] reads:

XXIII. Belonging to the class of cartilaginous
 plants and growing on the surface of the ground is the cucumber, a delicacy for which the emperor Tiberius had a remarkable partiality; in fact there was never a day on which he was not supplied with it, as his kitchen-gardeners had cucumber beds mounted on wheels which they moved out into the sun and then on wintry days withdrew under the cover of frames glazed with transparent stone. Moreover it is actually stated in the writings of early Greek authors that cucumber seed should be soaked for two days in milk mixed with honey before it is sown, in order to make the cucumbers sweeter. They grow in any shape they are forced to take; in Italy green ones of the smallest possible size are popular, but the provinces like the largest ones possible, and of the colour of wax or else dark. African cucumbers are the most prolific, and those of Moesia the largest. When they are exceptionally big they are called pumpkins. Cucumbers when swallowed remain in the stomach till the next day and cannot be digested with the rest of one’s food, but nevertheless they are not extremely unwholesome. They have by nature a remarkable repugnance for oil, and an equal fondness for water; even when they have been cut from the stem, they creep towards water a moderate distance away, but on the contrary they retreat from oil, or if something is in their way or if they are hanging up, they grow curved and twisted. This may be observed to take place even in a single night, because if a vessel with water is put underneath them they descend towards it a hand’s breadth before the next morning, but if oil is similarly near they will be found curved into crooked shapes. Also if their flower is passed down into a tube they grow to a remarkable length. Curious to say, just recently a new form of cucumber has been produced in Campania, shaped like a quince. I am told that first one grew in this shape by accident, and that later a variety was established grown from seed obtained from this one; it is called apple-pumpkin. Cucumbers of this kind do not hang from the plant but grow of a round shape lying on the ground; they have a golden colour. A remarkable thing about them, beside their shape, colour and smell, is that when they have ripened, although they are not hanging down they at once separate from the stalk. Columella gives a plan
XI. of his own for getting a supply of cucumbers all the year round—to transplant the largest blackberry bush available to a warm, sunny place, and about the spring equinox to cut it back, leaving a stump two inches long; and then to insert a cucumber seed in the pith of the bramble and bank up fine earth and manure round the roots, so that they may withstand the cold. The Greeks have produced three kinds of cucumbers, the Spartan, the Scytalic and the Boeotian; of these it is said that only the Spartan variety is fond of water. Some people tell us to steep cucumber seed in the plant called culix pounded up before sowing it, which will produce a cucumber having no seed.
PLINY THE ELDER Natural History
clysteribus simul cum cumino infunditur. VI. Qui pepones vocantur refrigerant maxime in cibo et emolliunt

Translated by W. H. S. Jones. 
LCL 392, Pages 8-9, 

From Book XX or 20, 

VI. The gourds called peponesc make a very
 refreshing food, and are also laxative. Their pulp is used as an application for fluxes or pains of the eyes. The root is a cure for the hard sores, like honey-comb, which they call ceria. It also acts as an emetic; it is dried and pounded into flour, the dose being four oboli taken in hydromel, but after it has been drunk a walk of half a mile must be taken. This flour is also used as an ingredient in skin-smoothing cosmetics. The rind too serves as an emetic and clears the face of spots. The leaves also of any kind of cultivated gourd have when applied externally the same effect. The same, mixed with honey, also cure night rash,d and mixed with wine dog-bites and the bite of multipedes, an insect called sepse by the Greeks. It is rather long, with hairy legs, and is particularly harmful to cattle. The bite is followed by swelling, the wound suppurating. The cucumber itself by its smell revives those who have fainted. When peeled and cooked in oil, vinegar and honey, cucumbers are, it is firmly held, more pleasant to the taste.
Johnna

On Jul 25, 2015, at 11:41 PM, JIMCHEVAL at aol.com wrote:

> See if you can find the Pliny reference: 19, 67-8  20, 11-12. These do  not 
> align with anything relevant in the text I know.
> 
> In Book XIX, 23, Pliny has a passage which has been read to mean a  melon:
> 
> "It is only of late, too, that a cucumber of entirely new shape has been  
> produced in Campania, it having just the form of a quince.61 It was quite by  
> accident, I am told, that the first one acquired this shape in growing, and 
> it  was from, the seed of this that all the others have been reproduced. 
> The name  given to this variety is "melopepo." These last do not grow hanging, 
> but assume  their round shape as they lie on the ground. A thing that is 
> very remarkable in  them, in addition to their shape, colour, and smell, is 
> the fact that, when  ripe, although they do not hang from the stem, they 
> separate from it at the  stalk."
> 
> But there is no reason to believe this specifically refers to a watermelon; 
> it is not even sure that it refers to a melon.
> 
> _https://books.google.com/books?id=IUoMAAAAIAAJ&dq=inauthor%3Apliny%20melope
> po&pg=PA158#v=onepage&q&f=false_ 
> (https://books.google.com/books?id=IUoMAAAAIAAJ&dq=inauthor:pliny%20melopepo&pg=PA158#v=onepage&q&f=false) 
> 
> Jim  Chevallier
> www.chezjim.com
> 
> FRENCH BREAD HISTORY: Late medieval  bread
> http://leslefts.blogspot.com/2015/06/french-bread-history-late-medieval-brea
> d.html
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> In  a message dated 7/25/2015 7:42:58 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, 
> johnnae at mac.com  writes:
> I was speaking about the Pliny reference. The CWHF is only one of his  
> references. I'll try to unbury my set tomorrow and look at the actual entry in  
> print.
> 
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