Athenaeus, The Deipnosophists
C. D. Yonge, B.A., Ed.

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Now, of the sea-nettle there are two kinds, For some live in hollows, and are never separated from the rocks; but some live on smooth and level ground, and do separate themselves from what they are attached to, and move their quarters. But Eupolis, in the Autolycus, calls the κνίδη, or sea-nettle, ἀκαλήφη. And Aristophanes, in his Phœnissæ, says—

Know that pot-herbs first were given,
And then the rough sea-nettles (ἀκάληφαι);

and in his Wasps he uses the same word. And Pherecrates, in his Deserters, says—

I'd rather wear a crown of sea-nettles (ἀκάληφαι).

And Diphilus the Siphnian, a physician, says, “But the sea-nettle (ἀκαλήφη) is good for the bowels, diuretic, and a strengthener of the stomach, but it makes those who collect them itch violently, unless they anoint their hands beforehand. And it is really injurious to those who hunt for it; by whom it has been called ακαλήφη, by a slight alteration of its original name. And perhaps that is the reason why the plant the nettle has had the same name given to it. For it was named by euphemism on the principle of antiphrasis,— for it is not gentle and ἁπαλὴ τῇ ἀφῇ, tender to the touch, but very rough and disagreeable.” Philippides also mentions [p. 150] the sea-nettle (calling it ἀκαλήφη) in his Amphiaraus, speaking as follows:—

He put before me oysters and sea-nettles and limpets.

And it is jested upon in the Lysistrata of Aristophanes—-

But, you most valiant of the oyster race,
Offspring of that rough dam, the sea-nettle;

for the τῆθος and the ὄστρεον are the same. And the word τῆθος is here confused in a comic manner with τήθη, a grandmother, and with μητὴρ, a mother.