Hence, as both a symbol of the worthless gift and the easy meals of the frequent man, the lupini derive from the same semiotic register as the pears left for the pigs within the story of the Calabrian host or the corn that the fox consumes. In contrast, those who know the Homeric story keep in mind that Telemachus receives a bowl of precious metal—aes—in place of the rejected horses and chariot (Od. 4.590–619). In Homer, this bowl is a keimelion, a valuable object retrieved from Menelaus’s innermost chamber. The aristocratic world of reward exchange is thus the mannequin during which the poet chooses to inscribe his personal experience, likening the establishment of amicitia to the guest-host relations of Homeric xenia.