The earliest known example of a blood libel is from a certain democritus (not the philosopher) only mentioned by the suda,23 who alleged that "every seven years the jews captured a stranger, brought him to the temple in jerusalem, and sacrificed him, cutting his flesh into bits."24 the greco-egyptian author apion claimed that jews sacrificed greek victims in their temple. this accusation is known from josephus' rebuttal of it in against apion. apion states that when antiochus epiphanes entered the temple in jerusalem, he discovered a greek captive, who told him that he was being fattened for sacrifice. every year, apion claimed, the jews would sacrifice a greek and consume his flesh, at the same time swearing eternal hatred towards the greeks.25 apion's claim probably repeats ideas already in circulation because similar claims are made by posidonius and apollonius molon in the 1st century bce.26 another example concerns the murder of a christian boy by a group of jewish youths. socrates scholasticus (fl. 5th century) reported that some jews, in a drunken frolic, bound a christian child to a cross in mockery of the death of christ and scourged him until he died.