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Greece - The game of the

by Egenia Salza Prina Ricotti

THE COTTABUS
When the dinner was finished and, as it was the custom the guests were drinking their wine in large cups, the moment had come to play at the “cottabus”, a game highly in fashion at those times. Over many ceramic cups we find the representations of persons competing at this game. Usually we see those players laying over the tricliniar couches. They are leaning on their left elbow and, with their’s forefinger well fixed in the cup’s handle, they hold a “Kylix” in their right hand. The game is in full swing and they are ready to throw the last drops of wine left in their cups against the target, a small figurine perched on top of an high metal staff. Some of those “cottabi” have been found and are now exposed in museums; one, that is now in Perugia’s archaeological museums, consist in a figurine with a concave base that made easier to put it in uncertain equilibrium over a bronze staff that stood upright on a round metallic large basin. Of course “cottabi” could have different shapes: some of them had a figurine as a target others a little vase and so on but also uf there were many kinds of them, the game was always the same. The player who could hit the figurine with the last drops of wine left in his cup and made it fall resoundingly down in the basin, won the stake that had been fixed before each game.
During all the V cen. B.C. the Greeks were very fond of this sport that from Sicily, where it was ideated, had been imported in Grece, and later on arrived also in Italy. Thus of the “cottabus” as a Sicilian game writes Anacreon of Teos
“While with his flexed arm he make the Sicilian cottabus resound”
Also Pindarus cite the “cottabus” in his merry convivial songs full of descriptions of this game.
“………..immersed in the pleasures of love inspired by Aphrodites, I drink with Cheimarus and throw the “cottabus” for Agathon.”
And Agathon of course must have been the prize at stake, because many could be the prizes that were wagered in a game of “cottabus”. One could play for anything: money, jewels or love, and if love was had been at stake, the winner, according to his personal preference, could get one of the girls or one of the boys, young people engaged by the host of the party to entertain his guests with exhibitions that were not only musical or artistic.
In other cases in which for instance the contenders were two women, often ethairas who on ceramics cups are represented playing the game, the prize usually consisted in precious wines, special delicacies, sums of money or even better a jewel, but never love. At those times the men were the ones who could pick the company for a night of sex, not the girls.