Ankaios and the Untasted Wine
Beginning with you, Melpomene, who keeps record of all tragedies which have befallen the Greeks, I shall tell the brief story of Ankaios of Samos, Argonaut and son of Poseidon. The other Ankaios who sailed aboard the Argo, Ankaios Polemistes, (Ankaios the Warrior), was the son of king Lykourgos of Arkadia, and his story will be told at another time.
As befits the son of Poseidon, Ankaios Naftes was given to rule the island of Samos. In these days when the gods walked the earth, Samos was notorious for the poor quality of the grapes the island produced, and as such, no serious efforts had been made to bring wine production to the island, for all knew naught would come of it. Finding the land around the city-state empty and suitable for the cultivation of grain, Ankaios Naftes had barley and wheat planted to the south and east of the city, and built his palace overlooking the fields. In spite of the ardent advice of his servants, Ankaios also planted a field of grapevines on the slopes of the foothills that rose gently over the north side of the natural harbor around which the city was built. Overlooking his fields of barley and wheat, and guarded from his sheep flock’s grazing, in time Ankaios’ grapeseed grew into a field of thin woody stems straining upwards towards the sun. It would be several years before his grapevines bore fruits, and yet a year or two more before the wine would be ready to drink. In spite of these facts and the poor reputation for wine grapes the island had, Ankaios would at every opportunity brag to his guests of how his grapes would be among the best in all of Greece, and the wine they would produce would be fit even for the gods.
Word of these grapes eventually spread across the seas and reached Olympos, where the gods held their feasts. Among them, Dionysos, god of wine, heard these stories of fabulous wine and sought out their origin, crossing the seas to the island. The god was not the only one making their way to Samos at this time however, for Iason was sailing with his band of heroes aboard the Argo, recruiting the children of gods and great kings to join him in his search for the Golden Fleece. When he heard the Argo had landed in his harbor, Ankaios threw a lavish feast to welcome the rightful king of Iolkos, and upon hearing of Iason’s plight, pledged himself to the heroes’ quest so that the king might reclaim his throne. The feasting and drinking continued long into the evening, and just as the revelries reached their peak, the god Dionysos appeared at the palace entrance. He was disguised as a feeble old man richly dressed in a purple tunic and dark green cloak, his normally thick, wavy black hair turned to a few scant white wisps on his head and his normally deep purple eyes recast as pale brown beads nestled in a bed of wrinkles. As tradition dictated, the stranger was welcomed in and offered food and a bed for as long as he desired to rest. Escorted into the feast and offered wine brought from off the island, the disguised god asked of his host if the shining golden liquid in his cup, which he knew came from Thira, was not the wine he had heard so much boasting of, the wine that was supposedly fit for the gods themselves.
Ankaios had already grown inebriated, and was embarrassed to have his lies called out so directly. Growing red in the face, he demanded of the god “who’re yoou, old man, to demand wine from your host? My wine’ll be the greatest in all of Greece! It would be washted on you, and I wouldn’t share a drop with you even were it ready to drink! Apologize for your insholence and then come back in five yearsh, and I may share my table with you, if you have yet to drop dead by then.”
It is now that most of the other gods, especially Dionysos’ father Zeus, would have struck Ankaios down for his failures as a host, but Dionysos, still in his guise as an old enfeebled man, merely smiled and calmly asked of Ankaios “you have yet to even press of your grapes into wine, so how is it that you can boast of wine you yourself have yet to finish, let alone to taste?”
Ankaios grew even angrier at the old man’s seeming lack of emotion. His face glowing red, he shouted at the old man “You won’t inshult me in my own palace! Out with you, old man! Before I bloody your noshe and your lip!” Pushing the old man, he continued “you’re nothing but a fool anyway, what would you know of grapes? My wine’d be wasted on you, damned fool that you are, you wouldn’t know good wine if Dionysos himself served it to shou from his own vineyards!”
The old man placidly wiped the spittle from his face and turned to go, but paused at the door to the palace. Turning, he called out to Ankaios in the most theatrical voice he could muster. “Arrogant child! Thy hubris is an affront to the very gods, and for thy crime, I curse thee in the name of all those who live on Olympos. Thou shalt ne’er taste of the wine which comes from thy grapes, no matter what thou try, thy efforts shall end in aught but failure. Thou shalt die afore thou know the taste of thine own wines” Then, with a whirl of his cloak, he turned and disappeared into the night. Fuming, Ankaios returned to his guests, who had by this point drunk even more than their host, and consequently paid no attention to this exchange, Herakles having challenged Iason to a friendly battle of drunken wits before the stranger arrived.
A week of revelry in Ankaios’ palace passed, and incident with the old man was all but forgotten as the heroes set off on their journey aboard the Argo, a tale which I shall tell another time, although it may suffice to say that many adventures were had, and Iason would most certainly have failed in his quest had the son of Poseidon not journeyed with the other heroes.
After a grueling four-month journey and the deaths of a number of his friends and comrades, Ankaios found his way back home, while Iason went to reclaim his throne, wed to wise Medea. On his return, Ankaios was astounded to see that his grapevines had grown at such speed while he had been gone, that in the short time he had been away, that his subjects had already picked and pressed the grapes into juice, which had fermented at astonishing speeds and already been stored in the usual clay jars sealed with cloth and pine resin.
Ecstatic at the news, Ankaios ordered a jar of the wine be brought from his palace storerooms and the old seer who had cursed him sought out and brought before him. The king’s men found the old man three hours later, asleep beneath an olive tree in a nearby village, and roughly brought him up to the palace, where Ankaios was waiting, a cup of wine in his hand, savoring the moment. “Old Man!” he exclaimed when the disguised god entered his palace hall. “It would seem you were wrong, Old Fool. Despite all your warnings and dire threats of doom, I survived my journey and all of the great dangers we faced! And now, I return to find that the wine which you prophesied I would never taste has miraculously been made ready for me! Even the gods themselves favor me it seems! They have guided me through trials and back home to this great prize! What say you now?”
Dionysos remained expressionless throughout Ankaios’ abuse of him, but now, with a wicked smile playing about his lips, he retorted “be careful of what you say, child, for there is many a slip between the cup and the lip.”
Ankaios scoffed. “Make your prophecies Old Fool, and I’ll write them on my balls.” With that, he raised the cup to his lips to take a sip of wine just as a servant came flying into the room.
“My king! A boar ravages your vines! Come quickly!”
Cursing, Ankaios Naftes dropped his cup of wine and picked up his axe, though he knew he was far more skilled as a helmsman than a warrior. Dashing out of the palace and into the midst of the vines, Ankaios ran, cursing the boar for delaying his revenge the whole while. Rushing down the hill, he held his axe in a guard, his muscles tense and ready to swing the heavy weapon. Turning at the end of a row of vines, he saw the animal. The boar was massive, with coarse brown-black hair covering its body, its head reaching as high as Ankaios’ hips. From either side of its mouth grew tusks as long as Ankaios’ hand and sharp as his axe blade. In the mere minutes since its appearance, the boar had already destroyed multiple grapevines, ripping them out by their roots and trampling the grapes into the dirt, their juice staining the ground like blood. Seeing Ankaios, the boar growled and charged at him, running beneath the mistimed swing of the axe, the animal’s momentum carrying it past the range Ankaios’ reach. The boar turned and charged again. Naftes swung upwards, this time hitting the animal in the rear leg as the boar rammed into his side, sinking one of its tusks deep into his gut and throwing him on his back. Winded and struggling to staunch the flow of crimson from his side, Ankaios was able to raise his head in time to see an arrow loosed by one of his hunters embed itself in the animal’s head, killing it instantly.
Weakened, Ankaios was carried back up to his palace by his servants and laid in his bed, but despite the efforts of his subjects and the herbs provided by the local healer, they were unable to stop the bleeding, for the boar’s tusk had pierced his intestines, and he died within the hour, cursing the boar and the old man’s prophecy.
On the hill overlooking the vineyard, Dionysos stood up from the shade of the tree he was reclining against and dusted himself off. Smiling at having seen his prophecy through, he blessed the island of Samos to always produce the sweetest wines in all of Greece as a final act of cruel irony. Slipping into the sea as a dolphin and swimming away, the god cackled to himself at the hubris of a man who would boast of wine he was never to taste.
