Being as they didn't have Araldite or polystyrene cement (or even plastic) to build their childhood playthings from (Ἁθύρματα δὲ ἦν αὐτοῖς ποιμενικὰ καὶ παιδικά). Besides the desire to craft and build things from small pieces I see my own facination and passion to somehow capture flight in a model plane mirrored in their desire capture a flying insect in their locust-trap (ἀκριδοθήρα). This passage says they used wax to join the little pieces together. My question is about the wax.Longus 1.10.2 wrote:ὁ δὲ καλάμους ἐκτεμὼν λεπτοὺς καὶ τρήσας τὰς τῶν γονάτων διαφυὰς ἐπαλλήλους τε κηρῷ μαλθακῷ συναρτήσας μέχρι νυκτὸς συρίττειν ἐμελέτα
Is the "soft" bees' wax (κηρῷ μαλθακῷ) that they are using to join the sections of reed a natural (and sticky) state of a particular kind of wax or is it like heated by fire (or body heat by rubbing or holding)? That is to ask, is it soft or (temporarily) softened?