Has a food taster ever thwarted an assassination attempt?
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In general, awareness of the taster is likely to preclude the planning of an assassination in which a person would be poisoned through food.
One example of a food taster ‘doing his job’ may be seen in the story of Mark Antony and Cleopatra. Although the two are arguably one of ancient history’s best-known lovers, it looks like they seemed to have distrusted each other. According to Pliny the Elder in his Natural History, during the time leading up to the fateful Battle of Actium in 31 BC, Mark Antony distrusted Cleopatra and was worried that she would poison him when she no longer had any use for him,and because of thathe had a food taster on hand all the time.
Pliny says that Cleopatra found this amusing, and decided to entertain herself at his expense. Therefore, at a banquet, she wore a circlet of flowers, of which their extremities were dipped in poison, on her head. As the party progresses, Cleopatra challenged Mark to swallow the flowers by mixing them with wine. Antony could not refuse the challenge, and nearly drank the poisoned wine when the queen herself stopped him. She then summoned his food taster, who, needless to say, dropped dead after drinking the wine. Thus, Cleopatra demonstrated to Mark Antony that the best precaution he had against being poisoned was to trust her. And that she was ruthless for letting a taster die knowing it was poisonous. A Deadly Bite: The Plight of the Ancient Food Taster
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Source: stackoverflow.com
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