David says: "I have become as a wineskin in a frost."[1] A wineskin when heated becomes porous and when inflated it swells, but in the frost it is hardened and frozen. Thus also the nature of the body becomes complacent with luxury and is swollen, but with ascetic training it is humbled and oppressed. And Paul is a witness to this, saying: "But I oppress my body and treat it as a slave, lest somehow I, having exhorted others should myself become disreputable."[2] For also the prophet [David], when he was pursued by Saul, was stronger than his sufferings, but after enjoying peace he was injured by the impulses [resulting] from luxury; he humbled his body and renewed his memory of the divine laws.
Also [sc. attested is the phrase] "Ktesiphon's wineskin;" Aristophanes [writes]: "according to our customs, at the trumpet signal drink your pitchers; whoever drains his first will win Ktesiphon's wineskin."[3] For in the Pitchers[4] there was a contest concerning who could drain his pitcher first, and the winner was crowned with a wreath of leaves and got a skin of wine. At a trumpet signal they would drink. Ktesiphon was ridiculed for being fat and paunchy. An inflated wineskin was set forth in the festival of the Pitchers, on which those drinking in the competition would stand. The first one to finish his drink won, and got a wineskin. They drank a certain measure, a choa, of wine.[5]
Also [sc. attested is the verb] "to bear a wineskin" [a)skoforei=n]. In the Dionysiac processions, some things were done by the townspeople, but others had been assigned to the metics to do by the lawgivers. Accordingly the metics would put on chitons which had a crimson color and carry troughs;[6] wherefore they were called tray-bearers [skafhfo/roi]. The townspeople wore whatever clothing they wanted and carried wineskins on their shoulders, wherefore they were called "wineskin-bearers" [a)skofo/roi].
And [there is] a proverb: "to be spooked by a little wineskin" [a)skw=| mormolu/ttesqai], in reference to those who are frightened absurdly and for no good reason.[7]
Also [sc. attested is the verb] a)skolia/zon ["they used to dance as at the Askolia"]; the Athenians had a festival, the Askolia[8], in which they would hop on wineskins to the honor of Dionysus.[9] The creature[10] appears to be a natural enemy of the vine. In any event an epigram appears addressed to a goat that goes like this: "devour me to the root, yet all the same I will bear fruit; enough to pour a libation for you, goat, as you are being sacrificed."[11] But "dance on a wineskin" means [dance] on the other [leg]; strictly a)skwlia/zein is what they used to call hopping on wineskins to make people laugh. In the middle of the theatre they placed wineskins which were inflated and oiled and when they hopped onto these they slipped; just as Eubulus says in Damalia[12]: "and in addition to these things, they put wineskins in the middle and hopped and guffawed at those who fell off the track."
Also [sc. attested is the participle] a)skwlia/zontes, [meaning] they who hop on one foot and who lag behind those [who move] according to nature.
"He, it seemed to me, came to his master in his rush from the [temple] of Asclepius hopping on one of his feet and when at daybreak the paean to Asclepius was sung, he showed up as one of the chorus dancers. He stood in the line as if he'd been given his stance by some chorus director, and as much as he was able he tried to sing along with the bird-like strain."[13]
Also [attested is] a)skwliasmo/s [used] likewise, [meaning] going on one foot.
Wineskins smeared with salt become better.[14]