Greek: Crocodiles Flashcards
To some of the Egyptians crocodiles are sacred, and to others they are not, but they treat them as enemies. Those who live around Thebes and Lake Moeris actually consider them to be very holy.
Each community raises 1 crocodile, taught to be tame, inserting ornaments into their ears and bracelets around their front feet, and giving them specially prepared food and animals for sacrifice, they treat them as the noblest of living things; and when they doe, embalming them, they bury them in holy tombs.
But those who live around the city Elephantine actually eat them, since they do not consider them holy. Many and various methods of catching them have been established, and the one which seems to me most worthy of narration, this one I write here. Whenever someone puts the back of a hog as bait on a hook, he casts it into the middle of the river.
And he himself having a living sow on the riverbank, strikes her. The crocodile, having heard the noise, heads towards the sound; and coming upon the pig back, swallows it down and they drag it in.
Then, when it has been dragged out onto land, first of all the hunter smears its eyes with mud; having done this, he masters the rest very easily; if he did not do this, he would master it with difficulty.
