There’s no by-line, but I have to assume that Mathew Ingram wrote the business column in The Globe and Mail that contained this gem.
EURIPEDES CLOTHES OFF: Sex sells. Sure, you’ve heard that before, but new research suggests it’s even older than you think. A paper on branding in ancient times, by business professors Karl Moore of McGill and Susan Reid of Bishop’s, reveals the oldest use of brand imagery, dating from around 2000 BC, was an Indian seal of what is believed to be the fertility god Shiva. By the sixth century BC, potters in ancient Greece were branding vases with standard slogans such as “Exekias painted and made me.” One potter, Euthymides, went further, boasting that his vases were of “high quality as never (were those of) Euphronios.” But one creative potter promised sexual returns with the inscription “Nestor had a most drink-worthy cup, but whoever drinks of mine will straightaway be smitten with desire of fair-crowned Aphrodite.” So not that much has changed. Sex clearly still sells in modern Greece, judging from the Olympic beach volleyball cheerleaders.