John Bartlett (1820–1905). Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. 1919.
8902 Plutarh AD 46?-AD 120 John Bartlett
| NUMBER: | 8902 |
| AUTHOR: | Plutarch (A.D. 46?–A.D. c. 120) |
| QUOTATION: | Antiphanes said merrily, that in a certain city the cold was so intense that words were congealed as soon as spoken, but that after some time they thawed and became audible; so that the words spoken in winter were articulated next summer. 1 |
| ATTRIBUTION: | Of Man’s Progress in Virtue. |
| Note 1. In the “Adventures of Baron Munchausen” (Rudolphe Erich Raspe), stories gathered from various sources, is found the story of sound being frozen for a time in a post-horn, which when thawed gave a variety of tunes. A somewhat similar account is found in Rabelais, book iv. chaps. lv. lvi., referring to Antiphanes. [back] |