Solon at the table

The archaic Greek meal has nothing to do with our starter-main-dessert trio. The day is organized around the *ariston* (light morning snack) and the *deipnon* (main evening meal). One eats a *sitos*, the staple cereal food (most often barley *maza*), accompanied by an *opson*, the "what-goes-with-it": fish, pulses, cheese, olives. Once the *deipnon* is over, free men move on to the *symposion*: the tables are removed, the guests are crowned, and they drink wine mixed with water while nibbling on *tragemata* (figs, nuts, honey cakes). Under Solon, a proponent of moderation, all this remains sober: one dines to live, not lives to dine.

Athens is a land of barley far more than of wheat: *maza*, a paste of roasted barley, distinguishes the frugal Greek from the wheat-bread eater. And Attica produces the most renowned honey in the Greek world, that of the bees of Mount Hymettus, which forage on wild thyme. This duo—humble grain and fragrant honey—is the true signature of the Athenian table in Solon's time.