Note (return) — OUR PROGRESS

That their cookery was not of a very recondite nature, is evident from what is mentioned by Plutarch, that the public meals were instituted at first in order to prevent their being in the hands of artistes and cooks12, while to these every one sent a stated portion of provisions, so that there would neither be change nor variety in them. Cooks again were sent out of Sparta, if they could do more than dress meat13; while the only seasoning allowed to them was salt and vinegar14; for which reason, perhaps, Meursius considers the composition of the [Greek: zomos melas] to have been pork gravy seasoned with vinegar and salt15, since there seemed to have been nothing else of which it could possibly have been made.