（书籍翻译）拜占庭的味道：传奇帝国的美食 （第二十二部分）
作者生平：
安德鲁·达尔比（Andrew Dalby）是一位古典学者、历史学家、语言学家和翻译家，以他关于食物史（尤其是希腊和罗马帝国）的书籍而闻名。 《Siren Feasts》 是安德鲁·达尔比的第一本美食书籍，获得了 Runciman（朗西曼）奖，他的第二本书《dangerous Tastes》在2001年获得了美食作家协会年度美食书籍。他还是《The Classical Cookbook》和《Empire of Pleasures》以及巴克斯和维纳斯的传记的作者。
《Tastes of Byzantium ：The Cuisine of a Legendary Empire》于 2003 年首次出版
ISBN: 978 1 84885 165 8
本书完整的 CIP 记录可从大英图书馆、美国国会图书馆获得
由 Thomson Press India Ltd 在印度印刷和装订
Other excitements
其他刺激物
An extensive section of the Book of Ceremonies is devoted co a calendar of festivals and grand dinners at the Palace, with the ritual and the guest list appropriate to each. The reader of this unique and very Byzantine compilation might be forgiven for concluding chat dinner at the Palace was boring and predictable. That was not always true. Anna Comnena, who will have heard the story from her father Alexius I, is able to tell us all about the uncomfortable dinner that he and his brother Isaac enjoyed at the Palace, shortly before they risked their successful coup d"tat in 1081. The reigning Emperor, Nicephorus III, had heard at that very moment that the city of Cyzicus, just across the Sea of Marmara, had fallen to the Turks. The brothers knew perfectly well that they were suspected of disloyalty but they did not know why the atmosphere at dinner was so charged or what the courtiers were muttering about. They were in terror of arrest or poisoning till one of the cooks, whom Isaac had wisely befriended, whispered the news. Hearing of this real disaster to the Empire they were, ironically, able to breathe a sigh of relief: they were not, after all, the focus of the Emperors silent anger and were ready with sympathy and advice when he broached the subject.
《礼记》中，有一部分专门列出了宫殿的节日和盛大晚宴的日历，并附有适合每个人的仪式和宾客名单。这个独特且非常拜占庭式汇编，能够让读者知道自己在宴会中该做些什么。但这并不总是正确的。安娜·科穆宁娜(Anna Comnena) 会从她父亲阿列克修斯一世那里听到这个故事，她能够告诉我们所有关于他和他的兄弟艾萨克 (Isaac) 在 1081 年冒着成功政变的风险之前，在皇宫享用的不舒服的晚餐。在位的皇帝尼西弗鲁斯三世，就在此时听说马尔马拉海对岸的基齐库斯城落入了土耳其人之手，兄弟俩明知他们被怀疑不忠，却不知道为什么会出现这种气氛。晚餐时，他们被指控和朝臣们在喋喋不休。他们害怕被捕或中毒而亡，直到以撒明智地结交的一位厨师并悄悄地告诉他这个消息。听到这个真正的消息，对帝国来说，是讽刺的，不过也让他们能够松一口气：他们毕竟不是皇帝沉默愤怒的焦点，在他提出这个话题时已经准备好建议和同情的态度。
Poison is never mentioned in the Book of Ceremonies, In the real world it was a serious concern. Simeon Seths dietary manual suggests several reliable antidotes and prophylactics, the nicest perhaps being 'dried figs with walnuts and rue, taken before the main meal'. Anna Comnena tells us how at the palace her mother (the Empress Irene) was, as was proper for Byzantine ladies, modestly veiled and was very seldom heard to speak in public. On campaign, however, like it or not, she travelled with her husband and was always to be seen at his side. She was the only taster and guardian against poison that he could trust. I She also shows us that in 1095 a Crusader prince, Bohemond of Taranto, was wisely fearful of Byzantine poison and found his own way to deal with the threat.
Bohemond went off to the Kosmidion, where lodgings had been made ready for him and a rich table was laid full of food, including fish dishes of all kinds. Then the cooks brought in meat of animals and birds, uncooked.
'This seafood, as you see, has been prepared in our customary way,' they said, 'but in case that does not suit you we have here raw meat which can be cooked in whatever way you like.'
The Emperor had instructed them to do and say exactly this ... The cunning Frank not only refused to taste any of the seafood: he pushed it away without even letting it touch his finger-tips. Saying nothing of his secret suspicions he shared it out among the others present with apparent generosity (in reality, as the reader will see, he was mixing them a cup of death, and so utterly despised those under him that he did not trouble to conceal his trick); meanwhile he told his own cooks to prepare the meat a fa Tarentine.
On the next day he asked those who had eaten the fish dishes how they felt.
'Very well,' they replied: none of them was ill at all. In reply he let slip what he had kept secret till that moment:
' ... I was afraid he might arrange to kill me by putting some deadly drug in the seafood.'
《礼记》中从未提及毒药，在现实世界中，这是一个严重的问题。 Simeon Seth 的饮食手册建议了几种可靠的解毒剂和预防剂，最好的可能是“在主餐前服用的干无花果、核桃和芸香”。 Anna Comnena 告诉我们，她的母亲（艾琳皇后）在宫殿里是这样做的，这对拜占庭女士来说是恰当的，谦虚的面纱，很少被听到在公共场合讲话。 然而，在竞选期间，不管你喜不喜欢，她都会和她的丈夫一起出行，并且总是在他身边。 她是他唯一可以信任的品酒师和预防毒杀的守护者。 她还向我们展示了 1095 年，一位十字军王子，塔兰托的博希蒙德，明智地畏惧拜占庭的毒药，并找到了自己的方法来应对这种威胁。
博希蒙德去了科斯米迪翁，那里已经为他准备好了住处，一张丰盛的桌子上摆满了食物，包括各种鱼类菜肴。然后厨师们带来了生的动物和鸟类的肉。
“正如你所见，这种海鲜是按照我们惯用的方式烹制的，”他们说，“但如果你不喜欢，我们这里有生肉，你可以用任何你喜欢的方式烹制。”
皇帝吩咐他们这样做，而且说的正是这个……狡猾的弗兰克不仅拒绝品尝任何海鲜，甚至连指尖都没有把它推开。他显然很慷慨地与在场的其他人分享了这一做法（实际上，正如读者将看到的那样，他正在为他们掺入死亡之杯，并且完全鄙视他手下的人，以至于他毫不费力地隐瞒他的把戏）；与此同时，他告诉自己的厨师把肉制作成塔伦丁。
第二天，他问那些吃过鱼菜的人感觉如何。
“很好，”他们回答说：他们都没有生病。作为回应，他泄露了他一直保留到最后一刻的秘密：
'......我担心他会安排人在海鲜里放一些致命的药物来杀了我。
Such a banquet, generally without poison, delivered to the lodgings of an important guest with the Emperor's compliments, was no unusual honor. Bishop Liutprand of Cremona, kicking his heels unhappily in a city that had become hateful to him, tells us drily of a similar favor. 'The sacred Emperor,' as he describes his benefactor with more than a hint of sarcasm, 'lessened my woes with a big gift,' and Liutprand's reader will not wait long to hear how big and how welcome this gift was. The Emperor had sent him 'one of his most delicate dishes, a fat kid of which he had himself partaken-proudly stuffed with garlic, onion, leeks, swimming in fish sauce'. The Byantine dishes served to Liutprand were (he repeatedly complains) overloaded with garlic. This may well have been for the best of reasons. Byzantine dieticians were well aware of the health benefits of garlic, particularly for those with a 'hot constitution', and they had probably found sufficient reason to class Liutprand's constitution thus.
如此盛宴，竟然无毒，送至贵客住处，受到皇上的称赞，实属难得。克雷莫纳 (Cremona) 主教柳特普兰德 (Liutprand) 在这座令他憎恨的城市中不满地踢着脚后跟，冷冷地告诉我们一个类似的恩惠。 “神圣的皇帝，”他用一种不只是讽刺的语气描述他的恩人，“用一件大礼物减轻了我的痛苦”，Liutprand 的读者很快就会听到这个礼物有多大，多么受欢迎。皇帝给他送来了“他最精致的菜肴之一，一个他自己吃过的菜肴——里面塞满了大蒜、洋葱、韭菜，混合着鱼露”。供应给 Liutprand 的 Byantine 菜肴（他一再抱怨）大蒜过多。这很可能是出于最好的原因。拜占庭的营养师很清楚大蒜对健康的好处，特别是对于那些“热体质”的人，他们可能已经找到了充分的理由对Liutprand的体质进行分类。
Having referred to the occasional excitements of dinner at the Palace, it would be fair to add that Byzantine diplomats, dining abroad during an embassy, sometimes encountered even greater excitement. A late sixth-century embassy to the Persian king Chosroes 'camped at Dinabadon, where Chosroes feasted the Roman and Persian leaders':
When the dinner was already in progress, Bryzacius was led in chains into the middle, with his nose and ears mutilated. After the diners had made fun of him, Chosroes, to offer them a memorable dinnertime spectacle, signaled with his hand to his bodyguards (Persians do not speak while they are eating) to put the man to death. So they stabbed him to death. To follow this bloodshed, Chosroes gave his guests a further pleasure: after drenching them with perfume he wreathed them with garlands of flowers and told them to drink to Victory. And so his guests departed to their tents, describing everything that had happened to them at dinner. Bryzacius figured largely in their stories.
提到在皇宫吃饭时偶尔会令人兴奋，公平地说，拜占庭外交官在使馆期间在国外用餐时，有时会遇到更大的兴奋。 六世纪晚期波斯国王乔斯罗伊斯的大使馆“在迪纳巴顿扎营，乔斯罗伊斯在那里宴请罗马和波斯领导人”：
晚餐已经开始时，布吕扎修斯被锁链带到中间，鼻子和耳朵都被肢解了。 在食客们取笑他之后，乔斯罗斯为了给他们一个难忘的晚餐奇观，他用手示意他的保镖（波斯人在吃饭时不说话）杀死这个人。于是保镖们将他刺死。为了缓解这场流血事件给人带来的冲击感，乔斯罗斯给他的客人带来了更多的乐趣：在用香氛浸湿他们之后，他用花环给他们戴上花环，并告诉他们为胜利干杯。于是他的客人们就各自回到他们的帐篷里，描述他们在晚餐时所发生的一切。布里扎修斯出现在他们的故事中。
未完待续！
