Classical gems

Latest gem from Rick Stein while he was filming in Laconia, Greece. The word laconic comes from the taciturnity attributed to the people from that region. He retells the story of Philip II of Macedon threatening to invade and destroy Sparta after invading Greece. He sends a message to the leaders in Laconia saying,’If I invade Laconia, it will be destroyed never to rise again’. The Spartans replied with a one-word message ‘If’. He never invaded Laconia. I really must read Herodotus again. If you’ve never encountered this master historian and teller of tall tales, I urge you to rectify that error ASAP. He’s a hoot. I love that story. It almost overthrows my favourite example of a pithy message which is that sent by General Napier after he disobeyed orders and occupied Maini in the Sindh region of India. He sent a message home saying ‘Peccavi’. If you are not a latin-mass attending Roman Catholic, you need to do some research to find out why it’s such a good message.

Battlefield stories are full of these yarns. It is sometimes difficult to reconcile the indomitability of the human spirit with the agony and horrors that we are capable of. Deploring man’s warlike nature does not seem to have any effect on our behaviour. Of course, there will always come a time when we have to fight for our beliefs, in micro or in macro, with physical weapons or not. It brings to mind the old Chinese curse,’May you live in interesting times’.

Gallows humour is nothing new. One of my favourite stories is told about the US Commander Chesty Puller during the Korean War. Finding themselves outflanked by the Chinese army in the Battle of Chosin Reservoir, he said,’We’ve been looking for the enemy for some time now. We’ve finally found him. We’re surrounded. That simplifies things. Great. Now we can shoot at those bastards from every direction’. Talk about accentuating the positive. To all the warriors out there, no matter what your circumstances are – never bow down and never give in.

I leave you with another story about the Spartans. Their main meals consisted of a stew called Melas Zomos ( black broth). This gastronomic delicacy was made from pig blood, pig legs, salt and vinegar, and nothing else. Hmmmmm. Apparently the addition of vinegar was considered to be a sissy step too far, but it was included to stop the blood from clotting. That fact alone is wrong on so many levels. There’s an apocryphal story about a traveller from Sybaris (source of the word ‘sybarite’.The people from Sybaris loved their pleasures). After tasting Melas Zomos, presumably at spear-point, he said ‘No wonder the Spartans do not fear death. ‘