1 Again and again I hear leading
men of our state condemning now the unfruitfulness of the soil, now the
inclemency of the climate for some seasons past, as harmful to crops;
and some I hear reconciling the aforesaid complaints, as if on
well-founded reasoning, on the ground that, in their opinion, the soil
was worn out and exhausted by the over-production of earlier days and
can no longer furnish sustenance to mortals with its old-time
benevolence.1
2 Such reasons, Publius Silvinus,2
I am convinced are far from the truth; for it is a sin to suppose that
Nature, endowed with perennial fertility by the creator of the universe,
is affected with barrenness as though with some disease; and it is
unbecoming to a man of good judgment to believe that Earth, to whose lot
was assigned a divine and everlasting youth, and who is called the
common mother p5of all things — because she has always brought forth all
things and is destined to bring them forth continuously — has grown old
in mortal fashion.3
3 And, furthermore, I do not believe that such
misfortunes come upon us as a result of the fury of the elements, but
rather because of our own fault; for the matter of husbandry, which all
the best of our ancestors had treated with the best of care, we have
delivered over to all the worst of our slaves, as if to a hangman for
punishment.4
As for me, I cannot cease to
wonder why those who wish to become speakers are so careful in the
choosing of an orator whose eloquence they may imitate; those who
investigate the science of surveying and mathematics emulate a master of
the art of their choice; those who devote themselves to the study of
dancing and music are most scrupulous in their search for one to teach
modulation of the speaking and singing voice, and no less for an
instructor in graceful movement of the body; 4 even
those who wish to build call in joiners and master-builders; those who
entrust ships to the sea send for skilful pilots; those who make
preparations for war call for men practised in arms and in campaigning;
and, not to go through the list one by one, for any study which one
wishes to pursue he employs the most expert director; in short, everyone
summons from the company of the wise a man to mould his intellect and
instruct him in the precepts of virtue; but agriculture alone, which is
without doubt most closely related and, as it were, own sister to
wisdom, is as destitute of learners as of teachers. 5 For
that there are to this day schools for rhetoricians and, as I have said,
for mathematicians and musicians, p7or, what is more to be wondered at,
training-schools for the most contemptible vices — the seasoning of food
to promote gluttony and the more extravagant serving of courses, and
dressers of the head and hair — I have not only heard but have even seen
with my own eyes; but of agriculture I know neither self-professed
teachers nor pupils. 6 For even if the state were
destitute of professors of the aforementioned arts, still the
commonwealth could prosper just as in the times of the ancients — for
without the theatrical profession and even without case-pleaders5
cities were once happy enough, and will again be so; yet without tillers
of the soil it is obvious that mankind can neither subsist nor be fed.
7
For this reason, what has come to pass is the more amazing — that the
art of the highest importance to our physical welfare and the needs of
life should have made, even up to our own time, the least progress; and
that this method of enlarging and passing on an inheritance, entirely
free from guilt, should be looked upon with scorn. For other methods,
diverse and in conflict as it were, are at odds with justice; unless we
think it more equitable to have acquired spoils by the soldier's method,
which profits us nothing without bloodshed and disaster to others.
8 Or, to those who detest war, can the hazard of the sea
and of trade be more desirable, that man, a terrestrial being, violating
the law of nature and exposing himself to the wrath of wind and sea,
should hang on the waves and always p9wander over an unknown world in
the manner of birds, a stranger on a distant shore? Or is usury more
commendable, a thing detested even by those whom it appears to aid?
9 But certainly no more admirable is the "canine
pursuit,"6
as the ancients called it, of barking at every man of outstanding
wealth, and the practice of legal banditry against the innocent and in
defence of the guilty — a fraud despised by our ancestors, but even
allowed by us within the city and in the very forum. Or should I regard
as more honourable the hypocritical fawning of the man who frequents the
levees, for a price, and hovers about the thresholds of the mighty,7
divining the sleeping hours of his lord by hearsay? For the servants do
not deign to reply to his questions as to what is going on indoors.
10 Or am I to think it a greater gift of fortune for a
man, rebuffed by a door-keeper in chains, to loiter about those
ungrateful doors, often until late at night, and by the most demeaning
servility to purchase at the price of dishonour the honour and power of
the fasces,8
though with the dissipation of his own inheritance? For it is not with
voluntary servitude, but with bribes, that preferments are bought.
If good men are to shun these
pursuits and their kind, there remains, as I have said, one method of
increasing one's substance that befits a man who is a gentleman and
free-born, and this is found in agriculture. 11 If the
precepts of this science were put in practice in the old-fashioned way,
even in imprudent fashion by those without previous instruction
(provided, however, that they were owners of the land), the business of
husbandry would sustain smaller loss; for the diligence that goes with
proprietorship p11would compensate in large measure the losses
occasioned by lack of knowledge; and men whose interests were at stake
would not wish to appear forever ignorant of their own affairs, and for
that reason more zealous to learn, they would gain a thorough knowledge
of husbandry. 12 As it is, we think it beneath us to
till our lands with our own hands, and we consider it of no importance
to appoint as an overseer a man of very great experience or at least, if
he is inexperienced, one who is wide-awake and active, that he may learn
more quickly what he does not know. But if a rich man purchases a farm,
out of his throng of footmen and litter-bearers he sends off to the
fields the one most bankrupt in years and strength, whereas such work
requires, not only knowledge, but the age of vigour and physical
strength as well, to endure its hardships; or, if the owner is of
moderate means, out of the number of his hands for hire he orders
someone who now refuses him the daily tribute money, since the man
cannot be a source of income, to be made a foreman, though he may know
nothing of the work which he is to superintend.
13
When I observe these things, reviewing in my mind and reflecting upon
the shameful unanimity with which rural discipline has been abandoned
and passed out of use, I am fearful lest it may be disgraceful and, in a
sense, degrading or dishonourable to men of free birth. But when I am
reminded by the records of many writers that it was a matter of pride
with our forefathers to give their attention p13to farming, from which
pursuit came Quinctius Cincinnatus,9
summoned from the plough to the dictatorship to be the deliverer of a
beleaguered consul and his army, and then, again laying down the power
which he relinquished after victory more hastily than he had assumed it
for command, to return to the same bullocks and his small ancestral
inheritance of four iugera;10
14 from which pursuit came also Gaius Fabricius11
and Curius Dentatus,12
the one after his rout of Pyrrhus from the confines of Italy, the other
after his conquest of the Sabines, tilling the captured land which they
had received in the distribution of seven iugera to a man, with an
energy not inferior to the bravery in arms with which they had gained
it; and, not unseasonably to run through individual cases at this time,
when I observe that so many other renowned captains of Roman stock were
invariably distinguished in this twofold pursuit of either defending or
tilling their ancestral or acquired estates, I understand that
yesterday's morals and strenuous manner of living are out of tune with
our present extravagance and devotion to pleasure. 15 For,
even as Marcus Varro13
complained in the days of our grandfathers, all of us who are heads of
families have quit the sickle and the plough and have crept within the
city-walls; and we ply our hands14
in the circuses and theatres rather than in the grainfields and
vineyards; and we gaze in astonished admiration at the posturings of
effeminate males, because they counterfeit by p15their womanish motions
a sex which nature has denied to men, and deceive the eyes of the
spectators. 16 And presently, then, that we may come to
our gluttonous feasts in proper fettle, we steam out our daily
indigestion in sweat-baths,15
and by drying out the moisture of our bodies we arouse a thirst; we
spend our nights in licentiousness and drunkenness, our days in gaming
or sleeping, and account ourselves blessed by fortune in that "we behold
neither the rising of the sun nor its setting."16
17 The consequence is that ill health attends so
slothful a manner of living; for the bodies of our young men are so
flabby and enervated that death seems likely to make no change in them.
But, by heaven, that true stock of
Romulus, practised in constant hunting and no less in toiling in the
fields, was distinguished by the greatest physical strength and,
hardened by the labours of peace, easily endured the hardships of war
when occasion demanded, and always esteemed the common people of the
country more highly than those of the city. For as those who kept within
the confines of the country houses17
were accounted more slothful than those who tilled the ground outside,
so those who spent their time idly within the walls, in the shelter of
the city, were looked upon as more sluggish than those who tilled the
fields or supervised the labours of the tillers. 18 It
is evident, too, that their p17market-day18
gatherings were employed for this purpose — that city affairs might be
transacted on every ninth day and country affairs on the other days. For
in those times, as we have previously remarked, the leading men of the
state used to pass their time in the fields and were summoned from their
farms to the senate when advice on matters of state was wanted; as a
result of which those who summoned them were called viatores19
or "road-men." 19 And so long as this custom was
preserved, with a most persevering enthusiasm for tilling their lands,
those old Sabine Quirites and our Roman forefathers, even though exposed
to fire and sword, and despite the devastation of their crops by hostile
forays, still laid by a greater store of crops than do we, who, with the
sufferance of long-continued peace, might have extended the practice of
agriculture.
20
So, then, in "this Latium and Saturnian land,"20
where the gods had taught their offspring of the fruits of the fields,
we let contracts at auction21
for the importation of grain from our provinces beyond the sea, that we
may not suffer hunger; and we lay up our stores of wine from the
Cyclades Islands and from the districts of Baetica22
and Gaul. Nor is it to be wondered at, seeing that the common notion is
now generally entertained and established that farming is a mean
employment and a business which has no need of direction or of precept.
21 But for my part, when I review the magnitude of the
p19entire subject, like the immensity of some great body, or the
minuteness of its several parts, as so many separate members, I am
afraid that my last day may overtake me before I can comprehend the
entire subject of rural discipline.
22
For one who would profess to be a master of this science must have a
shrewd insight into the works of nature; he must not be ignorant of the
variations of latitude, that he may have ascertained what is suitable to
every region and what is incompatible. He should tell over in his mind
the rising and setting of the stars, that he may not begin his
operations when rains and winds are threatening, and so bring his toils
to naught. 23 He must observe the behaviour of the
current weather and season, for they do not always wear the same habit
as if according to a fixed rule; summer and winter do not come every
year with the same countenance; the spring is not always rainy or the
autumn moist. These matters I cannot believe that any man can know
beforehand without the light of intelligence and without the most
accurate instruction. Indeed, it is granted to few to discern what the
very diversity of land and the nature of each soil may deny us, or what
they may promise us. 24 Of how many, in fact, is it the
lot to survey all parts of this science, so as thoroughly to understand
the practice of cropping and ploughing and to have an accurate knowledge
of the varied and very unlike types of soil (of which some deceive us by
their colour, some by their texture; in some lands the black soil which
they call pulla, as in Campania, is commended; in others a fat,
glutinous soil answers p21better; in some countries, as in Africa and
Numidia, a crumbling, sandy soil surpasses in fertility even the
strongest land; while in Asia and Mysia23
a stiff and viscous soil is especially productive)? 25 Of
how many is it the lot to have an understanding in the matter of these
soils, as to what crop a hillside will refuse to yield, what a level
situation, what a cultivated land, what a wooded land, what a land that
is moist and grassy or dry and blasted; to discern also the method of
planting and tending trees and vineyards, of which there are endless
varieties; and of acquiring and keeping cattle, since we have admitted
this as a part of agriculture, though the herdsman's art is distinct
from husbandry? 26 And yet even this is not of one
pattern; for a stud of horses requires one kind of management; a herd of
cattle another; a flock of sheep still another, and of these the
Tarentine breed24
demands a different method from the coarse-wooled; a still different
treatment is required by the goat kind, and of these the hornless and
thin-haired are cared for in one way, the horned and shaggy-haired, as
in Cilicia,25
in another way. Moreover, the business of the swine-breeder and
swineherd is different, their method of feeding is different; nor do
light-coated and heavy-coated swine require the same climate, rearing,
and care. 27 And, to take my leave of cattle, as a part
of which the care of farmyard poultry and bees is reckoned, who has
extended his studies so far as to be acquainted, in addition to the
points which I have enumerated, with the many methods of grafting and
pruning? to put in practice the cultivation of the many fruits and
vegetables? to devote his attention to the many p23varieties of figs as
well as to rose-gardens, when even greater things are neglected by most
people even though they have now begun to be, for many farmers, not the
least part of their revenue? 28 For meadows and
willow-thickets, broom-plants and reeds, though they require little
attention, still require some.
After this announcement of
subjects so many and so varied, it does not escape me that, if I demand,
of those who are concerned with farm-work, the farmer whom we seek and
shall describe, the enthusiasm of the learners will be cooled; for,
being disheartened by the hopelessness of mastering so varied and so
vast a science, they will not wish to try what they distrust their
ability to attain. 29 Nevertheless, as Marcus Tullius
has very properly said in his Orator,26
it is right that those who have an earnest desire to investigate
subjects of the greatest utility for the human race, and to transmit to
posterity their carefully weighed findings, should try everything. And
if the force of an outstanding genius or the equipment of celebrated
arts is wanting, we should not immediately relapse into idleness and
sloth, but rather that which we have wisely hoped for we should
steadfastly pursue. For if only we aim at the topmost peak, it will be
honour enough for us to be seen even on the second summit.
30 Have not the Muses of Latium admitted to their sanctuaries, not
Accius27
and Vergil alone, but also assigned seats p25of honour to those next to
them and to those far from second rank? The far-famed fulminations of
Cicero28
did not deter from the pursuit of eloquence Brutus or Caelius, Pollio or
Messala or Calvus;29
for Cicero himself had not yielded in fright to the thunderings of
Demosthenes and Plato, and the father of eloquence, that divine
Maeonian,30
with the mighty floods of his rhetoric had not quenched the zeal of
those who came after him. 31 And we observe that even
artists of lesser fame, who through these many generations have been
admirers of Protogenes and Apelles and Parrhasius,31
have not ceased from their own labours; and, though stunned by the
beauty of Phidias' Olympian Jove and of his Minerva,32
men of the succeeding age, Bryaxis, Lysippus, Praxiteles, and
Polyclitus,33
were not reluctant to try what they could do or how far they could
advance. But in every branch of knowledge the highest have attained to
admiration and reverence, and those of lesser worth have received their
meed of praise. 32 Added to this is that in the case of
the man whom we wish to be a finished husbandman, even though he be not
a man of consummate skill, though he may not have attained to the
sagacity of a Democritus or a Pythagoras34
in the nature of the universe, and the foreknowledge of Meton or Eudoxus35
in the movements of the stars and the winds, the learning of Chiron36
and Melampus37
p27in the care of cattle and the prudent wisdom of Triptolemus38
or Aristaeus39
in the tilling of the fields and the soil, still he will have made great
progress if he has equalled in practice our own Tremelliuses and
Sasernas and Stolos.40
33 For agriculture can be conducted without the
greatest mental acuteness, but not on the other hand, "by the
fat-witted,"41
to use a frequent expression. For far from the truth is the belief, held
by many, that the business of husbandry is extremely easy and requires
no mental keenness. There is no occasion for further discussion of the
subject as a whole at this point, inasmuch as its several divisions are
to be set forth in the several Books assigned to them, which I shall
carry through, each in its own order, but only after I have said by way
of preface what I judge to be especially pertinent to the science in
general.
The Editor's Notes:
1
An Epicurean theory; cf., e.g., Lucretius, II.1150‑1174.
Columella holds to the Aristotelian theory.
2
See Introduction p. xiii.
3
Cf. Lucretius, V.826‑827, sed quia finem aliquam pariendi debet
habere, destitit ut mulier spatio defessa vetusto.
4
So Pliny
(N. H. XVIII.19‑21), who
attributes the former plenty to cultivation of the soil by the hands of
generals, consuls, tribunes, and senators.
5
In a contemptuous sense, as commonly in the use of causidicus (e.g. Quintilian,
XII.1.25).
6
The expression is attributed by Sallust (Hist. Fr. 2.37 Dietsch)
to Appius Claudius, censor in 312 B.C., and refers, of course, to the
profession of the snarling causidici; cf. also
Quint. XII.9.9. Lactantius (Div. Inst. VI.18.26)
accuses even Cicero of canina eloquentia.
7
I.e. at the salutatio or early morning call.
8
The bundles of rods carried by attendants of high officials as symbols
of authority.
Thayer's Note: For comprehensive
details and sources, plus illustrations, see the article
Fasces
in Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities.
9
According to tradition, Cincinnatus was called from the plough to the
dictatorship in 458 B.C., to save the Roman army besieged by the
Aequians on Mt. Algidus. He delivered the consul Minucius and his army,
resigned the dictatorship, and returned to his little farm after holding
the office only sixteen days. Cf. Livy,
III.26‑29.
10
One iugerum = •about
three-fifths of an acre.
Thayer's Note: For comprehensive
details and sources, see the article
Jugerum
in Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities.
11
Consul in 282 and 278 B.C., his noble conduct toward Pyrrhus, king of
Epirus, led to the evacuation of Italy by that king.
12
Consul in 290 and 275 B.C. Famous for his frugality and his conquests
over the Samnites, Sabines, Lucanians, and Pyrrhus, he retired to his
farm, refusing all share in the booty.
13
Varro, R. R. II. Praef. 3.
14
That is, in applauding the performers.
15
The Laconicum, or sweat-chamber, was so called because thought to have
been first used by the Laconians; though (p15)Herodotus
(IV.75) speaks of it as well known
throughout Greece, and not peculiar to the Spartans. For a description
of this chamber, see Vitruvius, De Arch.
V.10.5,
VII.10.2.
16
Cato ap. Sen.
Epist. 122.3.º
17
I.e. those members of the familia rustica whose duties kept them
indoors or close to the farm buildings.
18
The nundinae (ninth day, according to the Roman method of reckoning) at
the end of the eight-day week, was a day of rest from agricultural
labour, set aside for buying and selling and attention to public and
religious affairs in the city; cf. Varro,
R. R. II. Praef. 1;
Paul. ex Fest. 176L;
Macrob. Sat. I.16.34.
19
Cf. Cicero,
De Sen. 16.56.
20
The authorship of this phrase is attributed to Ennius; cf. V. Lundström,
"Nya Enniusfragment," Eranos, XV.1‑3, and Warmington, Remains
of Old Latin, II. frag. 26 (L.C.L.).
21
Lit. "at the spear." A spear was stuck in the ground at the place where
an auction was held, originally as a sign of the sale of plunder taken
in battle.
Thayer's Note: For fuller details
and sources, see the article
Hasta in
Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities.
22
A district of southern Spain, modern Andalusia. Here Columella was born,
in the town of Gades (Cadiz).
23
In Asia Minor, south of the Propontis (Sea of Marmara); now a part of
Turkey.
24
On the sheep of Tarentum (in southern Italy) see
VII.4, and Palladius, XII (November) 13.5.
Sheep of this breed were covered with skins to protect their fine wool;
cf. Varro,
R. R. II.2.18, and
Horace, Od. II.6.10.
25
In the south-eastern part of Asia Minor.
26
Columella expresses the sense, though not the exact wording, of
Cicero, Orat. 1‑2.
27
A tragic poet of the second century B.C., highly rated by Quintilian
(X.1.97). His works survive only
in fragments. See Warmington, Remains of Old Latin, II, L.C.L.
28
Cf. Cicero,
Ad Fam. IX.21.1.
29
Five famous Roman orators, younger contemporaries of Cicero.
30
Homer.
31
Three celebrated Greek painters of the fourth century B.C.
32
I.e. the chryselephantine statue of Zeus at Olympia and of Athena
in the Parthenon.
33
Bryaxis, Lysippus and Praxiteles (all of the fourth cent. B.C.) and
Polyclitus (fifth cent. B.C.) were, like Phidias who overtopped them,
distinguished Greek statuaries.
34
Democritus (fifth cent. B.C.) and Pythagoras (sixth cent. B.C.), early
Greek philosophers.
35
Two Greek astronomers of the fifth and fourth centuries B.C.
36
According to Greek mythology Chiron was a Centaur, half-man and
half-horse, learned in many arts and the tutor of many mythological
heroes.
37
A famous seer and physician of Greek mythology.
38
A mythical character, said to have been the founder of agriculture and
the inventor of the plough
(Servius on Vergil, Georg. I.163).
39
Son of Apollo and the nymph Cyrenê, said to have taught mankind the
management of bees and cattle and the cultivation of the olive.
40
Writers on husbandry, often cited by Varro and Columella: i.e. Cn. Tremelius
Scrofa (cf. Varro, R. R. I.2.9‑10,
II.4); the (p27)two Sasernas,
father and son (I.1.12;
Varro I.2.22); and C. Licinius
Stolo (I.3.11;
Varro I.2.9).
41
Lit. "fat Minerva." Cf. Cicero, De Amic. 5.19, pingui
Minerva;
Horace, Serm. II.2.3,
rusticus . . . crassaque Minerva.