Courtesans and Fishcakes: The Consuming Passions of Classical Athens

A brilliantly entertaining and innovative history of the ancient Athenians’ consuming passions for food wine and sex.Sex shopping and fish-madness Athenian style.This fascinating book reveals that the ancient Athenians were supreme hedonists. Their society was driven by an insatiable lust for culinary delights – especially fish – fine wine and pleasures of the flesh. Indeed great fortunes were squandered and politicians’ careers ruined through ritual drinking at the symposium or the wooing of highly-coveted costly prostitutes.James Davidson brings an incisive eye and an urbane wit to this refreshingly accessible and different history of the people who invented Europe democracy and art.