LSJ s.v. A defines ἀληθινός as meaning ‘truthful, trusty’ of persons and ‘true, genuine’ of objects, and offers Amphis, fr. 26 (preserved at Ath. Deipn. 2.57b and 7.277c, and identified in the latter passage as drawn from a play entitled Leukas) as an example of the second sense:Footnote ¹

The context of the fragment is unknown. But the speaker is patently drawing a contrast not between ‘real fish’ and something that resembles fish (‘false fish’), as LSJ would have it, but between a type of fish that any sensible person would buy for dinner, should the opportunity arise, and radishes, which are edible but unexciting fare. So too at Macho 28–32, when King Ptolemy's guests were served a variegated rockfish (πετραίου … ποικίλου), three κωβιοί cut into steaks, and καράβων … ἀληθινῶν (29)—literally ‘real crayfish’—they were astonished and delighted. The reaction suggests that the banqueters were happy because the crayfish Ptolemy served matched the quality of the other seafood he set before them, not because the king had declined to deceive them (sc. by serving a different food disguised as crayfish).

ἀληθινός in both of these passages thus appears to have a sense unnoted in LSJ or in Montanari: the object in question is ‘true, genuine’ not because it is what it should be (‘true’ vs ‘false’), but because it is an ideal exemplar of its type. Cf. the use of English ‘real’ in collocations such as ‘a real man’ (that is, ‘an ideal man’, as opposed to a man who fails to meet some nominal standard of masculinity) or ‘a real answer’ (that is, an answer of the sort one wants, as opposed to an evasion of the issue), and of Italian ‘verace’ (‘true, truthful, genuine, real’ but also ‘of excellent quality’). This interpretation of the use of the adjective in Amphis and Macho is supported by at least four other passages. The first is from Callixeinus’ description of symposium scenes featuring figures from tragedy, comedy and satyr play that made up part of the decorative programme of an elaborate pavilion set up by Ptolemy II Philadelphus (reigned 283–246 b.c.e.) in Alexandria (FGrHist 627 F 2.56–7 ap. Ath. Deipn. 5.196f–197a): ἀληθινὸν ἐχόντων ἱματισμόν, οἷς παρέκειτο καὶ ποτήρια χρυσᾶ (‘they wore alêthinon clothing, and gold drinking-vessels lay beside them’); what Callixeinus means cannot be that the clothing was genuine (since this is a work of art), but that it was made of rare and expensive materials to match the gold of the cups. So too further on in the same fragment of Callixeinus, from the end of his summary account of the various gods whose images were carried as part of Ptolemy's grand procession (FGrHist 627 F 2.338–9 ap. Ath. Deipn. 5.202a): καὶ ἐπὶ πᾶσιν Ἀλεξάνδρου, ὃς ἐφ’ ἅρματος ἐλεφάντων ἀληθινῶν ἐφέρετο χρυσοῦς (‘and after all of them Alexander, who was made of gold and carried on a chariot drawn by alêthinoi elephants’); what Callixeinus is saying is that the Alexander statue was drawn by particularly magnificent elephants as opposed to everyday elephants, rather than that it was drawn by real elephants as opposed to elephant-substitutes (which must on that thesis have pulled the chariots that carried images of the various Olympians). Likewise in Callixeinus’ description of some of the decoration of an enormous luxury yacht constructed by Ptolemy IV Philopator (FGrHist 627 F 1.125–7 ap. Ath. Deipn. 5.205e–f): χρῶμα μὲν ἦν ἔχον τὴν πετροποιίαν ἐκ λίθων ἀληθινῶν καὶ χρυσοῦ δεδημιουργημένην (‘the exterior featured stonework constructed out of alêthinoi stones and gold’); the materials in question are not ‘real stones’ but precious gems, and are thus appropriately paired with gold. Compare finally Mnaseas’ account of the cult of Atargatis (fr. 31 Cappelleto ap. Ath. Deipn. 8.346d–e): νόμιμον ἔτι διαμένειν, ἐπὰν εὔξωνται τῇ θεῷ, ἰχθῦς ἀργυροῦς ἢ χρυσοῦς ἀνατιθέναι· τοὺς δὲ ἱερεῖς πᾶσαν ἡμέραν τῇ θεῷ ἀληθινοὺς ἰχθῦς ἐπὶ τὴν τράπεζαν ὀψοποιησαμένους (‘it remains a custom to dedicate gold or silver fish whenever they pray to the goddess; and the priests cook alêthinoi fish for the goddess every day and place them on the table’). At first glance, Mnaseas seems to be drawing a contrast between the gold and silver fish dedicated to the goddess by her suppliants, on the one hand, and the ‘real fish’ cooked by her priests and placed on her cult table, on the other. But there is no μέν … δέ construction, and the passages discussed above suggest that Mnaseas is instead offering two separate bits of evidence for the importance of fish to Atargatis: her worshippers offer her ἰχθῦς ἀργυροῦς ἢ χρυσοῦς, and her priests cook ἀληθινοὺς ἰχθῦς—enormous fish, the sort a deity deserves—for her every day.

All these authors belong to the mid fourth century b.c.e. or later. Amphis (PAA 126100)—the first writer known to have used ἀληθινός this way, and active in the mid 300s b.c.e. or so—is said at Suda α 1760 to have been Athenian. The name is not otherwise attested in Athens, however, and KoumanoudesFootnote ² (followed by Wilhelm,Footnote ³ who argued the point more vigorously, and eventually by Kirchner in the Addenda to his Prosopographia Attica) convincingly identified him with the Amphis of Andros (PAA 126105) honoured in a proxenos decree of 331 b.c.e. (IG II³ 347).Footnote ⁴ Macho (mid third century b.c.e.) was certainly from Alexandria, and Mnaseas (of Patrae or Patara; late third century b.c.e.?) is supposed to have studied there with Eratosthenes. Callixeinus (second century b.c.e.?) originated in Rhodes, but he too must have had strong connections with the Ptolemaic capital, given the subjects to which he devoted his treatises, and all the material attributed to him must in any case go back more or less direct to mid third-century b.c.e. Ptolemaic documents. ἀληθινός in the sense ‘excellent, ideal for its type’ is not attested in Athenian sources other than Amphis, fr. 26. Although the matter is today beyond proof, the evidence that survives thus suggests that this may be a bit of originally Eastern Mediterranean usage that eventually established a firm presence for itself in the colloquial Greek of the Ptolemaic kingdom.Footnote ⁵