1869 Drinking Cups and their Customs (Mixellany)

CUPS AND THEIR CUSTOMS.

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and tlie Bomans kept their wine in large earthenware jars, made with narrow necks, swollen bodies, and pointed at the bottom, by which they were fixed into the earth; these vessels, called Amphorae, though generally of earthenware, are mentioned by Homer as being constructed of gold and of stone. Among the Botnans it was customary, at the time of filling their wine-vessels, to inscribe upon them the name of the consul under whose office they were filled, thus supply- ing them, with a good means of distinguishing their vintages and pointing out the excellence of particular ones, much in the same way as we now speak of the vintages of *20, J 34, or '41. Thus, Pliny mentions a celebrated wine which took its name from Opimius, in whose consulate it was made, and was preserved good to his time (a period of nearly 200 years). The vessel used for carrying the wine to the table was called Ampulla, being a small bulging bottle covered with leather and having two handles, which it would be fair to consider the original type of the famous " leathern bottel/ J the inventor of which is so highly eulogized in the old song,'—• The wine was frequently cooled by keeping the vessels in snowj and it was brought to the table in flasks, which, instead of being corked, had a little fine oil poured into the necks to exclude the air. Although the ancients were well acquainted with the excellence of wine, they were not ignorant ofthe dangers (( I wish that his soul in heaven may dwell, Whofirst invented the leathern bottel."