Apicius, the name of three noted Roman epicures. I. Lived in the earlier part of the 1st century B. C. He spent much of his time at intervals in Latium, on account of its excellent lobsters, but having heard that the African lobsters were larger, set sail for that continent. Several fishermen came off to his vessel with the finest; but seeing that they were inferior to those of Minturnae, he ordered the pilot to steer for Italy. He is said to have procured the banishment of Rutilius Rufus in 92.

II. Mar-cus Gabins,.who lived in the time of Augustus and Tiberius, established a school where the art of good cooking was taught. In the cultivation of his own appetite and that of his scholars, he had expended more than $3,000,000, when he settled up his accounts, and perceiving that but about $300,000 remained, concluded that he could not live as he wished upon that sum, and poisoned himself. He invented several sauces and cakes which long bore his name. Apion, the grammarian, made his life and labors the basis of a volume; and all cooks for centuries belonged to the Apician or anti-Apician faction.

III. A contemporary of Trajan, who taught the world how to pickle oysters. - A treatise, De Re Culinaria, or De Obsoniis et Condimentis, etc, bearing the name of CAelius Apicius, by an unknown writer (probably a CAelius who added to his own the famous name of Apicius), is the most ancient cookery book in the world.