This paper was written in Spanish for a conference in Seville. Plutarch, Table Talks 3.6 is an important source of information about what Epicurus, in his Symposion, as well as the Stoic Zeno and the Pythagorean Clinias (in philosophical works now equally lost), had to say on this peculiar question, which is also addressed in other classical texts, both in prose (Xenophon) and in poetry (Homer, Menander). A philological analysis of the passage deals with a number of problems posed by the transmitted text, leading to new proposals and improvements, as well as to a better appreciation of Plutarch’s anti-Epicurean stance (pursued by using to his best advantage the opening lines of Menander’s Misoumenos).