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In Farsi they’re called Sepidāj, these green-blooded, porous-boned relatives of squid. Some think, and Wikipedia takes them at their word, that the animal’s name in a few Latinate languages was borrowed from Farsi. Stranger linguistic things have happened. In Greece, you can buy them in the markets labeled Σουπιες — “soupies” — and what with the Greeks and Persians* battling each other and taking vocabulary as spoils from time to time, the word could have ended up in Latin from either source.
As Romans evolved culturally and became Italians and invented Italian food, seppia found their way involuntarily into pots of risotto. At times the seppia’s ink, a deep rich brown in color and used as a camouflaging defense after the manner of squids, found its way into the pot too, adding color and flavor.
That ink or at least the pigment extracted from it, found its way into painter’s pots as well. The common cuttlefish thus lent its name to a color, and indirectly — through the vicissitudes of the technological history of photography — to a mood connoting a delicate antiquarianism, quaint images of times three generations ago, poised on the verge of the deep forgotten past.
And what better day to meditate on the word “sepia” than on Cephalopod Awareness Day?
* After all, one man’s Mede is another man’s… oh, never mind. Best that old stolen joke vanish without a thrace.
Posted by: Chris Clarke
Note: A database glitch in 2008 ate a bunch of archived comments. Don't be offended if yours isn't here, or confused if the conversation seems disjointed. Thanks!
Ouch.
By: By Theriomorph on 2007 10 08
Best that old stolen joke vanish without a thrace.
Damn, I’ve always been parthian to old jokes.
By: By Rob G on 2007 10 08
Try and keep a lydian it, Rob.
Achaemenid this time.
By: By Chris Clarke on 2007 10 08
OK, I’ll mind my own phrygian business then.
By: By Rob G on 2007 10 08
That’s seleucid response, Rob. Thank you.
Now can we all get bactriality here?
By: By Chris Clarke on 2007 10 08
Wow. I should have backed off when you ptolemy to earlier.
By: By Rob G on 2007 10 08
<snort, giggle>
By: By sravana on 2007 10 08
STOP BEING SILLY, SRAVANA!!!!1!
By: By Chris Clarke on 2007 10 08
oh, and you forgot to close your tags, dang it.
</snort, giggle>
Have to do everything around here grumble grumble.
By: By Chris Clarke on 2007 10 08
