Varro: RERVM RVSTICARVM DE AGRI CVLTURA

Cum duae vitae traditae sint hominum, rustica et urbana, quidni, Pinni, dubium non est quin hae non solum loco discretae sint, sed etiam tempore diversam originem habeant. Antiquior enim multo rustica, quod fuit tempus, cum rura colerent homines neque urbem haberent. Etenim vetustissimum oppidum cum sit traditum Graecum Boeotiae Thebae, quod rex Ogyges aedificarit, in agro Romano Roma, quam Romulus rex; nam in hoc nunc denique est ut dici possit, non cum Ennius scripsit:

Since two lives of men have been handed down, the rustic and the urban, surely, Pinni, there is no doubt that these are distinguished not only by place, but also have a diverse origin in time. For the rustic is by much the more ancient, because there was a time when men tilled the fields and did not have a city. For indeed, although the most ancient town is held to be the Greek Thebes of Boeotia, which King Ogyges built, in the Roman countryside it is Rome, which King Romulus built; for only now at last is it so that it can be said, not as Ennius wrote:

septingenti sunt paulo plus aut minus anni,
augusto augurio postquam inclita condita Roma est.

seven hundred years, a little more or less, have passed,
since illustrious Rome was founded by august augury.

Thebae, quae ante cataclysmon Ogygi conditae dicuntur, eae tamen circiter duo milia annorum et centum sunt. Quod tempus si referas ad illud principium, quo agri coli sunt coepti atque in casis et tuguriis habitabant nec murus et porta quid esset sciebant, immani numero annorum urbanos agricolae praestant. Nec mirum, quod divina natura dedit agros, ars humana aedificavit urbes, cum artes omnes dicantur in Graecia intra mille annorum reperte, agri numquam non fuerint in terris qui coli possint.

Thebes, which are said to have been founded before the cataclysm of Ogyges, are nevertheless about 2,100 years old. If you refer that span to that beginning when fields began to be cultivated and people lived in huts and hovels, and did not know what a wall and a gate were, then farmers surpass townsmen by an immense number of years. Nor is it a marvel, since divine nature gave fields, human art built cities, seeing that all the arts are said to have been discovered in Greece within 1,000 years, whereas there have never not been fields on the earth that could be tilled.

Neque solum antiquior cultura agri, sed etiam melior. Itaque non sine causa maiores nostri ex urbe in agros redigebant suos cives, quod et in pace a rusticis Romanis alebantur et in bello ab his allevabantur. Nec sine causa terram eandem appellabant matrem et Cererem, et qui eam colerent, piam et utilem agere vitam credebant atque eos solos reliquos esse ex stirpe Saturni regis.

And not only was the cultivation of the field more ancient, but also better. Therefore, not without cause did our ancestors bring their fellow-citizens back from the city into the fields, because both in peace they were nourished by rustic Romans, and in war they were relieved and supported by them. Nor without cause did they call the same earth both Mother and Ceres, and they believed that those who cultivated it led a pious and useful life, and that they alone were the survivors of the stock of King Saturn.

Cui consentaneum est, quod initia vocantur potissimum ea quae Cereri fiunt sacra. Nec minus oppidi quoque nomen Thebae indicat antiquiorem esse agrum, quod ab agri genere, non a conditore nomen ei est impositum. Nam lingua prisca et in Graecia Aeolis Boeoti sine afflatu vocant collis tebas, et in Sabinis, quo e Graecia venerunt Pelasgi, etiam nunc ita dicunt, cuius vestigium in agro Sabino via Salaria non longe a Reate miliarius clivus cum appellatur tebae.

Consistent with this is the fact that the rites called “initiations” are most especially the sacra that are made for Ceres. No less does the town-name Thebes indicate the field to be more ancient, since a name was imposed on it from the kind of land, not from a founder. For in the old language, in Greece the Aeolians, the Boeotians, without aspiration, call hills “tebas”; and among the Sabines, whither from Greece the Pelasgians came, even now they speak thus—a trace of which survives in the Sabine country on the Via Salaria not far from Reate, when a slope at a milestone is called “tebae.”

Agri culturam primo propter paupertatem maxime indiscretam habebant, quod a pastoribus qui erant orti in eodem agro et serebant et pascebant; quae postea creverunt peculia diviserunt, ac factum ut dicerentur alii agricolae, alii pastores. Quae ipsa pars duplex est, tametsi ab nullo satis discreta, quod altera est villatica pastio, altera agrestis. Haec nota et nobilis, quod et pecuaria appellatur, et multum homines locupletes ob eam rem aut conductos aut emptos habent saltus; altera villatica, quod humilis videtur, a quibusdam adiecta ad agri culturam, cum esset pastio, neque explicata tota separatim, quod sicam, ab ullo.

At first, on account of poverty, they had agriculture very undifferentiated, because, sprung from shepherds, in the same field they both sowed and pastured; later, as their private estates grew, they divided them, and it came about that some were called farmers, others shepherds. This branch itself is twofold, although by no one sufficiently distinguished, because one is villatic pasturage, the other rural. The latter is well-known and noble, since it is also called “pecuaria,” and wealthy men, for that purpose, have many woodland-pastures either leased or bought; the other, villatic, because it seems humble, has by some been appended to agriculture, though it is pasturage, and has not been set forth entirely on its own, so far as I know, by anyone.

Itaque cum putarem esse rerum rusticarum, quae constituta sunt fructus causa, tria genera, unum de agri cultura, alterum de re pecuaria, tertium de villaticis pastionibus, tres libros institui, e quis duo scripsi, primum ad Fundaniam uxorem de agri cultura, secundum de pecuaria ad Turranium Nigrum; qui reliquus est tertius de villaticis fructibus, in hoc ad te mitto, quod visus sum debere pro nostra vicinitate et amore scribere potissimum ad te. Cum enim villam haberes opere tectorio et intestino ac pavimentis nobilibus lithostrotis spectandam et parum putasses esse, ni tuis quoque litteris exornati parietes essent, ego quoque, quo ornatior ea esse posset fructu, quod facere possem, haec ad te misi, recordatus de ea re sermones, quos de villa perfecta habuissemus. De quibus exponendis initium capiam hinc.

Therefore, since I thought that in rural affairs, which have been constituted for the sake of produce, there are three genera—one about agriculture, another about the pecuarian matter (stock‑raising), a third about villatic pasturings—I instituted three books, of which I have written two: the first to my wife Fundania on agriculture, the second on stock‑raising to Turranius Niger; the one that remains, the third, on villatic fruits, this I send to you, because I seemed bound, on account of our neighborhood and affection, to write most especially to you. For since you had a villa to be looked upon for its plaster‑work and interior finish and for pavements noble with lithostrota (mosaic‑stone spreads), and you deemed it too little unless the walls also were adorned with your letters, I too, that it might be more adorned with profit, have sent these things to you, doing what I could, recalling the conversations we had had on that matter, about the perfect villa. From the setting forth of these things I shall take my beginning here.

II.

Comitiis aediliciis cum sole caldo ego et Q. Axius senator tribulis suffragium tulissemus et candidato, cui studebamus, vellemus esse praesto, cum domum rediret, Axius mihi, Dum diribentur, inquit, suffragia, vis potius villae publicae utamur umbra, quam privati candidati tabella dimidiata aedificemus nobis? Opinor, inquam, non solum, quod dicitur, "malum consilium consultori est pessimum", sed etiam bonum consilium, qui consulit et qui consulitur, bonum habendum. Itaque imus, venimus in villam.

At the aedilician comitia, with the sun hot, when Q. Axius, a senator and fellow-tribesman, and I had cast our vote, and we wished to be on hand for the candidate whom we favored when he should return home, Axius said to me: “While the votes are being counted, would you rather that we use the shade of the Villa Publica, than that we build ourselves a shelter with the halved tablet of a private candidate?” “I am of the opinion,” said I, “not only, as the saying goes, that ‘bad counsel is worst for the counselor,’ but also that good counsel ought to be held good both by the one who consults and the one who is consulted.” And so we go, we come into the villa.

Ibi Appium Claudium augurem sedentem invenimus in subselliis, ut consuli, siquid usus poposcisset, esset praesto. Sedebat ad sinistram ei Cornelius Merula consulari familia ortus et Fircellius Pavo Reatinus, ad dextram Minucius Pica et M. Petronius Passer. Ad quem cum accessissemus, Axius Appio subridens, Recipis nos, inquit, in tuum ornithona, ubi sedes inter aves?

There we found Appius Claudius, augur, sitting on the benches, so that he might be at hand for the consul, if any need should demand. At his left sat Cornelius Blackbird, sprung from a consular family, and Fircellius Peacock of Reate; at the right, Minucius Magpie and M. Petronius Sparrow. When we had approached him, Axius, smiling at Appius, said, Do you receive us into your ornithon—your aviary—where you sit among birds?

Ille, Ego vero, inquit, te praesertim, quoius aues hospitales etiam nunc ructor, quas mihi apposuisti paucis ante diebus in Villa Reatina ad lacum Velini eunti de controversiis Interamnatium et Reatinorum. Sed non haec, inquit, villa, quam aedificarunt maiores nostri, frugalior ac melior est quam tua illa perpolita in Reatino? Nuncubi hic vides citrum aut aurum?

He said, Indeed I do—especially you, whose hospitable birds I am even now eructating, which you set before me a few days ago at the Reatine Villa by Lake Velinus, as I was going about the disputes of the Interamnates and the Reatines. But is not this villa, he said, which our ancestors built, more frugal and better than that thoroughly polished one of yours in the Reatine country? Do you see anywhere here citrus-wood or gold?

Num minium aut armenium? Num quod emblema aut lithostrotum? Quae illic omnia contra.

Surely not vermilion or Armenian blue? Surely not some emblem or lithostrotum? All those things, there, are quite the reverse.

Et cum haec sit communis universi populi, illa solius tua; haec quo succedant e campo cives et reliqui homines, illa quo equae et asini; praeterea cum ad rem publicam administrandam haec sit utilis, ubi cohortes ad dilectum consuli adductae considant, ubi arma ostendant, ubi censores censu admittant populum. Tua scilicet, inquit Axius, haec in campo Martio extremo utilis et non deliciis sumptuosior quam omnes omnium universae Reatinae? Tua enim oblita tabulis pictis nec minus signis; at mea, vestigium ubi sit nullum Lysippi aut Antiphili, at crebra sartoris et pastoris.

And whereas this one is common to the whole people, that other is yours alone; this one, where citizens and the rest of men come up from the field, that one, where mares and asses; moreover, since for administering the commonwealth this one is useful—where cohorts, led to the consul for the levy, take their seats, where they display arms, where the censors admit the people to the census. “Yours, forsooth,” says Axius, “this one at the far end of the Campus Martius, useful and not more sumptuous in luxuries than all the entire Reatine estates of everyone? For yours is plastered over with painted panels and no less with statues; but mine, where there is no trace of Lysippus or Antiphilus, but frequent traces of the tailor and the shepherd.”

Et cum illa non sit sine fundo magno et eo polito cultura, tua ista neque agrum habeat ullum nec bovem nec equam. Denique quid tua habet simile villae illius, quam tuus avos ac proavos habebat? Nec enim, ut illa, faenisicia vidit arida in tabulato nec vindemiam in cella neque in granario messim.

And whereas that one is not without a great estate and that polished by culture, your setup has neither any field nor ox nor mare. Finally, what does yours have similar to that villa which your grandfather and great‑grandfather had? For it has seen, not as that one, no hay-mows dried in the loft, nor a vintage in the cellar, nor a harvest in the granary.

Nam quod extra urbem est aedificium, nihilo magis ideo est villa, quam eorum aedificia, qui habitant extra portam Flumentanam aut in Aemilianis.

For a building that is outside the city is for that reason no more a villa than are the buildings of those who dwell outside the Flumentana Gate or in the Aemilian district.

Appius subridens, Quoniam ego ignoro, inquit, quid sit villa, velim me doceas, ne labar imprudentia, quod volo emere a M. Seio in Ostiensi villam. Quod si ea aedificia villae non sunt, quae asinum tuum, quem mihi quadraginta milibus emptum ostendebas aput te, non habent, metuo ne pro villa emam in litore Seianas aedes. Quod aedificium hic me Lucius Merula impulit ut cuperem habere, cum diceret nullam se accepisse villam, qua magis delectatus esset, cum apud eum dies aliquot fuisset; nec tamen ibi se vidisse tabulam pictam neque signum aheneum aut marmoreum ullum, nihilo magis torcula vasa vindemiatoria aut serias olearias aut trapetas.

Appius, smiling, said, “Since I am ignorant what a villa is, I would like you to teach me, lest I slip through imprudence, because I wish to buy from M. Seius a villa in the Ostian district. But if those edifices are not of a villa which do not have your donkey, which you were showing to me at your place as bought for 40,000, I fear lest, instead of a villa, I buy on the shore the Seian house. This edifice Lucius Merula here impelled me to desire to have, when he said that he had come to no villa with which he had been more delighted, when he had stayed with him for several days; and yet he said he had seen there neither a painted panel nor any bronze or marble statue, no more the presses, the vintage vessels, or the oil jars, or the trapeta (olive-mills).”

Axius aspicit Merulam et, Quid igitur, inquit, est ista villa, si nec urbana habet ornamenta neque rustica membra? Quoi ille; Num minus villa tua erit ad angulum Velini, quam neque pictor neque tector vidit umquam, quam in Rosea quae est polita opere tectorio eleganter, quam dominus habes communem cum asino? Cum significasset nutu nihilo minus esse villam eam quae esset simplex rustica, quam eam quae esset utrumque, et ea et urbana, et rogasset, quid ex iis rebus colligeret, Quid?

Axius looks at Merula and says, “What then is that villa, if it has neither urban ornaments nor rustic members?” To whom he: “Is your villa at the angle of the Velinus any the less a villa, which neither painter nor plasterer has ever seen, than that in the Rosea which is polished with plaster-work elegantly, which you, as master, have in common with a donkey?” When he had signified by a nod that the one which was simple rustic was nonetheless no less a villa than that which was both, both that and urban, and had asked what he would collect from these things, “What?”

inquit, si propter pastiones tuus fundus in Rosea probandus sit, et quod ibi pascitur pecus ac stabulatur, recte villa appellatur, haec quoque simili de causa debet vocari villa, in qua propter pastiones fructus capiuntur magni. Quid enim refert, utrum propter oves, an propter aves fructus capias? Anne dulcior est fructus apud te ex bubulo pecore, unde apes nascuntur, quam ex apibus, quae ad villam Sei in alvariis opus faciunt?

he says, if on account of pasturings your estate in the Rosea is to be approved, and because there the herd is pastured and stabled it is rightly called a villa, this too for a similar cause ought to be called a villa, in which on account of pasturings great fruits are taken. For what does it matter whether you take fruit on account of sheep or on account of birds? Or is the fruit sweeter in your estimation from bovine cattle, whence bees are born, than from the bees, which at Seius’s villa do their work in alvearies?

Et num pluris tu e villa illic natos verres lanio vendis, quam hinc apros macellario Seius? Qui minus ego, inquit Axius, istas habere possum in Reatina villa? Nisi si apud Seium Siculum fit mel, Corsicum in Reatino; et hic aprum glans cum pascit empticia, facit pinguem, illic gratuita exilem.

And do you sell boar-hogs born there from your villa to the butcher for a higher price than Seius here sells wild boars to the market-man? Why any the less, said Axius, can I have those in the Reatine villa? Unless, indeed, at Seius’s place the honey is Sicilian, but in the Reatine it is Corsican; and here, when the acorn that feeds the boar is purchased, it makes him fat, there, being free, it makes him lean.

Appius: Posse ad te fieri, inquit, Seianas pastiones non negauit Merula; ego non esse ipse vidi. Duo enim genera cum sint pastionum, unum agreste, in quo pecuariae sunt, alterum villaticum, in quo sunt gallinae ac columbae et apes et cetera, quae in villa solent pasci, de quibus et Poenus Mago et Cassius Dionysius et alii quaedam separatim ac dispersim in libris reliquerunt, quae Seius legisse videtur et ideo ex iis pastionibus ex una villa maioris fructus capere, quam alii faciunt ex toto fundo. Certe, inquit Merula; nam ibi vidi greges magnos anserum, gallinarum, columbarum, gruum, pavonum, nec non glirium, piscium, aprorum, ceterae venationis.

Appius: That Seian pasturings could be brought about at your place, said he, Merula did not deny; I myself have seen that they are not there. For since there are two kinds of pasturings, one agrestic, in which are the pastoral herdings, the other villatic, in which are hens and doves and bees and the rest which are wont to be fed in a villa—about which both the Poenus Mago and Cassius Dionysius and others have left certain things severally and dispersedly in books—which Seius seems to have read, and for that reason from those pasturings from a single villa he takes greater returns than others make from an entire estate. Certainly, said Merula; for there I saw great flocks of geese, hens, doves, cranes, peacocks, and likewise dormice, fish, wild boars, and the rest of the game.

Ex quibus rebus scriba librarius, libertus eius, qui apparuit Varroni et me absente patrono hospitio accipiebat, in annos singulos plus quinquagena milia e villa capere dicebat. Axio admiranti, Certe nosti, inquam, materterae meae fundum, in Sabinis qui est ad quartum vicesimum lapidem via Salaria a Roma. Quidni?

From these operations the scribe-librarian, his freedman—who attended upon Varro and, with my patron absent, received me as a guest—said that he took each year more than fifty thousand from the villa. As Axius marveled, “Surely you know,” I said, “my aunt’s farm, in the Sabine country, which is at the 24th milestone on the Via Salaria from Rome.” “Why not?”

inquit, ubi aestate diem meridie dividere soleam, cum eo Reate ex urbe aut, cum inde venio hieme, noctu ponere castra. Atque in hac villa qui est ornithon, ex eo uno quinque milia scio venisse turdorum denariis ternis, ut sexaginta milia ea pars reddiderit eo anno villae, bis tantum quam tuus fundus ducentum iugerum Reate reddit. Quid?

he said, where in summer I am accustomed to divide the day at midday, either going with him to Reate from the city, or, when I come from there in winter, to pitch camp for the night. And in this villa the ornithon (bird-house) which is there, from that one alone I know that five thousand thrushes came at three denarii each, so that that part returned sixty thousand to the villa in that year, twice as much as your farm of 200 iugera at Reate yields. What?

sexaginta, inquit Axius, sexaginta, sexaginta? derides. Sexaginta, inquam.

"Sixty," said Axius, "sixty, sixty? You deride." "Sixty," I said.

Sed ad hunc bolum ut pervenias, opus erit tibi aut epulum aut triumphus alicuius, ut tunc fuit Scipionis Metelli, aut collegiorum cenae, quae nunc innumerabiles excandefaciunt annonam macelli. Reliquis annis omnibus si non hanc expectabis summam, spero, non tibi decoquet ornithon; neque hoc accidit his moribus nisi raro ut decipiaris. Quotus quisque enim est annus, quo non videas epulum aut triumphum aut collegia non epulari?

But to reach this mouthful, you will need either an epulum or someone’s triumph—as then it was that of Scipio Metellus—or the dinners of the collegia, which now, innumerable, inflame the macellum’s annona. In all the other years, if you do not expect this sum, I trust your ornithon will not be ruined; nor under these conditions does it happen except rarely that you are deceived. For how many, pray, are the years in which you do not see an epulum or a triumph, or the collegia not feasting?

Sed propter luxuriam, inquit, quodam modo epulum cotidianum est intra ianuas Romae. Nonne item L. Abucius, homo, ut scitis, apprime doctus, cuius Luciliano charactere sunt libelli, dicebat in Albano fundum suum pastionibus semper vinci a villa? Agrum enim minus decem milia reddere, villam plus vicena.

But on account of luxury, he says, in a certain way there is a daily banquet within the gates of Rome. Is it not likewise that L. Abucius, a man, as you know, exceedingly learned, whose little books are in the Lucilian character, used to say that on his Alban estate his pasturage revenues were always beaten by the villa? For the field returned less than ten thousand, the villa more than twenty.

Idem secundum mare, quo loco vellet, si parasset villam, se supra centum milia e villa recepturum. Age, non M. Cato nuper, cum Luculli accepit tutelam, e piscinis eius quadraginta milibus sestertiis vendidit piscis? Axius, Merula mi, inquit, recipe me quaeso discipulum villaticae pastionis.

The same man said that, along the sea, in whatever place he wished, if he had procured a villa, he would take in over 100 thousand from the villa. Come now, did not M. Cato recently, when he accepted the guardianship of Lucullus, sell fish from his fishponds for 40 thousand sesterces? “Axius,” he says, “my Merula, receive me, I beg, as a disciple of villatic pasturage.”

Ille: Quin simul ac promiseris minerval, incipiam, inquit. Ego vero non recuso, vel hodie vel ex ista pastione crebro. Appius: Credo simul ac primum ex isto villatico pecore mortui erunt anseres aut pavones.

He: “Why, as soon as you shall have promised the minerval (tuition-fee), I will begin,” he says. “For my part I do not refuse, either today, or often out of that husbandry.” Appius: “I suppose, as soon as the geese or the peacocks from that villatic stock shall have died first.”

Cui ille: Quid enim interest, utrum morticinas editis volucres an pisces, quos nisi mortuos estis numquam? Sed oro te, inquit, induce me in viam disciplinae villaticae pastionis ac vim formamque eius expone.

To which he: For what, indeed, is the difference, whether you eat dead birds as carrion or fish, which you never eat unless dead? But I beg you, bring me into the way of the discipline of villatic pasturing and expound its force and its form.

III.

Merula non gravate, Primum, inquit, dominum scientem esse oportet earum rerum, quae in villa circumve eam ali ac pasci possint, ita ut domino sint fructui ac delectationi. Eius disciplinae genera sunt tria: ornithones, leporaria, piscinae. Nunc ornithonas dico omnium alitum, quae intra parietes villae solent pasci.

Merula, not reluctantly: “First,” he said, “the master ought to be knowing of those things which in the villa and around it can be nourished and pastured, so that they may be for the master’s profit and delectation. The genera of that discipline are three: ornithones, leporaria, piscinae. Now by ornithones I mean the enclosures for all winged creatures (birds) which are accustomed to be fed within the walls of the villa.”

Leporaria te accipere volo non ea quae tritavi nostri dicebant, ubi soli lepores sint, sed omnia saepta, afficta villae quae sunt et habent inclusa animalia, quae pascantur. Similiter piscinas dico eas, quae in aqua dulci aut salsa inclusos habent pisces ad villam. Harum rerum singula genera minimum in binas species dividi possunt: in prima parte ut sint quae terra modo sint contentae, ut sunt pavones turtures turdi; in altera specie sunt quae non sunt contentae terra solum, sed etiam aquam requirunt, ut sunt anseres querquedulae anates.

I want you to take leporaria not as those which our great-great-grandfathers used to call so, where only hares are, but as all the enclosures, affixed to the villa, which have animals shut in, to be pastured. Similarly I call fishponds those which, in fresh or in salt water, have fish enclosed at the villa. Each of these things, as to kind, can at a minimum be divided into two species: in the first part are those which are content with land only, as peacocks, turtledoves, thrushes; in the other species are those which are not content with earth alone, but also require water, as geese, teal, ducks.

Sic alterum genus illud venaticum duas habet diversas species, unam, in qua est aper caprea lepus; altera item extra villam quae sunt, ut apes cochleae glires. Tertii generis aquatilis item species duae, partim quod habent pisces in aqua dulci, partim quod in marina. De his sex partibus ad ista tria genera item tria genera artificum paranda, aucupes venatores piscatores, aut ab iis emenda quae tuorum servorum diligentia tuearis in fetura ad partus et nata nutricere saginesque, in macellum ut perveniant.

Thus the second, that venatic kind, has two diverse species: one, in which are the boar, the roe-deer, the hare; the other likewise those which are outside the villa, such as bees, snails, dormice. Of the third, the aquatic kind, likewise two species: partly those which have fishes in fresh water, partly those in the marine. From these six parts, for those three genera likewise three genera of artificers are to be provided—fowlers, hunters, piscators—or things to be bought from them, which by the diligence of your slaves you should keep in breeding unto births, and nourish the newborn and fatten them, so that they may come to the meat-market.

Neque non etiam quaedam adsumenda in villam sine retibus aucupis venatoris piscatoris, ut glires cochleas gallinas. Earum rerum cultura instituta prima ea quae in villa habetur; non enim solum augures Romani ad auspicia primum pararunt pullos, sed etiam patres familiae rure. Secunda, quae macerie ad villam venationis causa cluduntur et propter alvaria; apes enim subter subgrundas ad initio villatico usae tecto.

Nor indeed are there not also certain things to be brought into the villa without the nets of fowler, hunter, or fisherman, such as dormice, snails, and chickens. Of these things the instituted cultivation first is that which is kept in the villa; for not only did the Roman augurs first of all prepare chicks for the auspices, but so too did heads of households in the countryside. Second is that which is enclosed by a dry-stone wall at the villa for the sake of venation and on account of the apiaries; for the bees, beneath the eaves, from the beginning in a villatic setting have made use of the roof.

Tertiae piscinae dulces fieri coeptae et e fluminibus captos recepere ad se pisces. Omnibus tribus his generibus sunt bini gradus; superiores, quos frugalitas antique, inferiores, quos luxuria posterior adiecit. Primus enim ille gradus anticus maiorum nostrum erat, in quo essent aviaria duo dumtaxat: in plano cohors, in qua pascebantur gallinae, et earum fructus erat ova et pulli; alter sublimis, in quo erant columbae in turribus aut summa villa.

Third, freshwater fishponds began to be made, and they took in to themselves fish caught from the rivers. In all these three kinds there are two tiers: the higher, which ancient frugality established; the lower, which later luxury added. For that first, ancient tier of our ancestors was one in which there were only two aviaries: on level ground an enclosure in which hens were pastured, and their produce was eggs and chicks; the other, elevated, in which there were doves in towers or on the top of the villa.

Contra nunc aviaria sunt nomine mutato, quod vocantur ornithones, quae palatum suave domini paravit, ut tecta maiora habeant, quam tum habebant totas villas, in quibus stabulentur turdi ac pavones. Sic in secunda parti ac leporario pater tuus, Axi, praeterquam lepusculum e venatione vidit numquam. Neque enim erat magnum id saeptum, quod nunc, ut habeant multos apros ac capreas, complura iugera maceriis concludunt.

By contrast, now the aviaries, with the name changed, are called ornithones, which the sweet palate of the master has contrived, so that they have roofs larger than whole villas had then, in which thrushes and peacocks are stabled. Thus in the second grade and in the leporarium, your father, Axius, never saw anything except a little hare from the hunt. For that enclosure was not large, whereas now, in order to have many wild boars and roe-deer, they enclose several iugera with dry-stone walls.

Non tu, inquit mihi, cum emisti fundum Tusculanum a M. Pisone, in leporario apri fuerunt multi? In tertia parti quis habebat piscinam nisi dulcem et in ea dumtaxat squalos ac mugiles pisces? Quis contra nunc minthon non dicit sua nihil interesse, utrum iis piscibus stagnum habeat plenum an ranis?

“Were there not,” he says to me, “when you bought the Tusculan estate from M. Piso, many boars in the leporarium?” In the third class who had a piscina except a fresh-water one, and in it only dogfish and mullets? Who, on the contrary, does not now tell his Mintho that it is no concern of his whether he has his pool full of those fishes or of frogs?

Non Philippus, cum ad Ummidium hospitem Casini devertisset et ei e tuo flumine lupum piscem formosum apposuisset atque ille gustasset et exspuisset, dixit, "Peream, ni piscem putavi esse"? Sic nostra aetas in quam luxuriam propagavit leporaria, hac piscinas protulit ad mare et in eas pelagios greges piscium revocavit. Non propter has appellati Sergius Orata et Licinius Murena? Quis enim propter nobilitates ignorat piscinas Philippi, Hortensi, Lucullorum?

Did not Philippus, when he had turned aside to Ummidius, his host, at Casinum, and he had set before him a handsome sea-bass from your river, and when he had tasted it and spat it out, say, "Let me perish, if I thought it was fish"? Thus our age, to what luxury it has propagated rabbit-warrens, has with this carried fishponds out to the sea and has drawn back into them pelagic shoals of fish. Were not Sergius Orata and Licinius Murena so called on account of these? For who, because of their renown, does not know the fishponds of Philippus, of Hortensius, of the Luculli?

Quare unde velis me incipere, Axi, dic.

Therefore, tell me, Axi, from where you wish me to begin.

IV.

Ille, Ego vero, inquit, ut aiunt post principia in castris, id est ab his temporibus quam superioribus, quod ex pavonibus fructus capiuntur maiores quam e gallinis. Atque adeo non dissimulabo, quod volo de ornithone primum, quod lucri fecerunt hoc nomen turdi. Sexaginta enim milia Fircellina excande me fecerunt cupiditate.

He said, “I indeed, as they say after the principia in the camp, that is, from these times rather than earlier ones, that gains are taken from peacocks greater than from hens. And so I will not dissemble, that I wish, about the ornithon first, that thrushes have made this name a matter of profit. For sixty thousand at Fircellina made me flare up with desire.”

Merula, Duo genera sunt, inquit, ornithonis: unum delectationis causa, ut Varro hic fecit noster sub Casino, quod amatores invenit multos; alterum fructus causa, quo genere macellarii et in urbe quidam habent loca clausa et rure, maxime conducta in Sabinis, quod ibi propter agri naturam frequentes apparent turdi. Ex iis tertii generis voluit esse Lucullus coniunctum aviarium, quod fecit in Tusculano, ut in eodem tecto ornithonis inclusum triclinium haberet, ubi delicate cenitaret et alios videret in mazonomo positos coctos, alios volitare circum fenestras captos. Quod inutile invenerunt.

Merula, There are two kinds, he says, of aviary: one for the sake of delight, as our Varro here made near Casinum, because it found many lovers; the other for the sake of profit, of which kind the butchers and certain men both in the city have enclosed places and in the countryside, especially rented in the Sabine land, because there, on account of the nature of the field, thrushes appear in great numbers. Out of these Lucullus wanted a third kind to be a conjoined aviary, which he made at his Tusculan estate, so that under the same roof of the aviary he might have an enclosed triclinium, where he could dine delicately and see some, cooked, set on the serving-platter, others, having been caught, flitting around the windows. Which they found to be useless.

Nam non tantum in eo oculos delectant intra fenestras aves volitantes, quantum offendit quod alienus odor opplet nares.

For the birds flying within the windows do not so much delight the eyes in that, as an alien odor filling the nostrils offends.

Sed quod te malle arbitror, Axi, dicam de hoc quod fructus causa faciunt, unde, non ubi, sumuntur pingues turdi. Igitur testudo, aut peristylum tectum tegulis aut rete, fit magna, in qua milia aliquot turdorum ac merularum includere possint, quidam cum eo adiciant praeterea aves alias quoque, quae pingues veneunt care, ut miliariae ac coturnices. In hoc tectum aquam venire oportet per fistulam et eam potius per canales angustas serpere, quae facile extergeri possint (si enim late ibi diffusa aqua, et inquinatur facilius et bibitur inutilius), et ex eis caduca quae abundat per fistulam exire, ne luto aves laborent.

But what you prefer, I think, Axius, I will say about this which they do for the sake of profit, whence, not where, fat thrushes are procured. Accordingly a large shed (testudo), or a peristyle roofed with tiles or with netting, is made, in which they can enclose several thousands of thrushes and blackbirds, and some, along with them, moreover add other birds as well, which when fat sell dear, such as miliariae and quails. Into this roofed place it is proper that water come by a pipe, and that it rather creep along through narrow channels, which can be easily wiped clean (for if the water is spread out widely there, it is both more easily polluted and is drunk less usefully), and from these the surplus that falls away should go out through a pipe, lest the birds toil in mud.

Ostium habere humile et angustum et potissimum eius generis, quod cocliam appellant, ut solet esse in cavea, in qua tauri pugnare solent; fenestras raras, per quas non videantur extrinsecus arbores aut aves, quod earum aspectus ac desiderium marcescere facit volucres inclusas. Tantum locum luminis habere oportet, ut aves videre possint, ubi assidant, ubi cibus, ubi aqua sit. Tectorio tacta esse levi circum ostia ac fenestras, nequa intrare mus aliave quae bestia possit.

To have a doorway low and narrow, and most preferably of that kind which they call a cochlea, as it is wont to be in the pen in which bulls are accustomed to fight; windows few, through which trees or birds are not seen from outside, because the sight of them and the desire makes the enclosed birds wither. It ought to have only so much opening for light that the birds can see where they may perch, where the food is, where the water is. To be touched with a light plaster around the doors and windows, so that no mouse or any other beast can enter.

Circum huius aedifici parietes intrinsecus multos esse palos, ubi aves assidere possint, praeterea perticis inclinatis ex humo ad parietem et in eis transversis gradatim modicis intervallis perticis adnexis ad speciem cancellorum scaenicorum ac theatri. Deorsum in terram esse aquam, quam bibere possint, cibatui offas positas. Eae maxime glomerantur ex ficis et farre mixto.

Around the inside walls of this building there are many poles, where the birds may perch; in addition, poles are set inclined from the ground to the wall, and on them transverse pieces, stepwise, at moderate intervals, poles being fastened in the fashion of scenic lattice-work and of a theater. Down on the ground there is water, which they can drink, and lumps set out for feed. These are chiefly massed from figs and far (spelt) mixed together.

Diebus viginti antequam tollere vult turdos, largius dat cibum, quod plus ponit et farre subtiliore incipit alere. In hoc tecto caveas, quae caveae tabulata habeant aliquot ad perticarum supplementum. Contra hic aviarius, quae mortuae ibi sunt aves, ut domino numerum reddat, solet ibidem servare.

Twenty days before he wishes to take up the thrushes, he gives food more liberally, in that he sets down more and begins to nourish them with finer spelt-meal (far). In this roofed place, cages whose cage-platforms have several tiers as a supplement to the perches. On the other hand, the bird-keeper is accustomed to keep there the birds that have died there, so that he may render the number to the master.

Cum opus sunt, ex hoc auiario ut sumantur idoneae, excludantur in minusculum aviarium, quod est coniunctum cum maiore ostio, lumine illustriore, quod seclusorium appellant. Ibi cum eum numerum habet exclusum, quem sumere vult, omnes occidit. Hoc ideo in secluso clam, ne reliqui, si videant, despondeant animum atque alieno tempore venditoris moriantur.

When they are needed, so that suitable ones may be taken from this aviary, let them be shut off into a very small aviary, which is conjoined with the larger at a doorway, with brighter light, which they call the seclusory. There, when he has shut off the number which he wishes to take, he kills them all. This is done for that reason secretly in the seclusory, lest the rest, if they see it, lose heart and die at a time alien to the seller.

Non ut advenae volucres pullos faciunt, in agro ciconiae, in tecto hirundines, sic aut hic aut illic turdi, qui cum sint nomine mares, re vera feminae quoque sunt. Neque id non secutum ut esset in merulis, quae nomine feminino mares quoque sunt. Praeterea volucres cum partim advenae sint, ut hirundines et grues, partim vernaculae, ut gallinae ac columbae, de illo genere sunt turdi adventicio ac quotannis in Italiam trans mare advolant circiter aequinoctium autumnale et eodem revolant ad aequinoctium vernum, et alio tempore, turtures ac coturnices immani numero.

Not that, as the adventive birds make their chicks—storks in the field, swallows on the roof—so do thrushes either here or there; for, although by name they are males, in reality there are females as well. Nor did a like consequence fail to occur in the blackbirds, which, with a feminine name, are also males. Moreover, since birds are in part adventive, as swallows and cranes, and in part vernacular (native-born), as hens and doves, thrushes are of that adventitious kind, and every year they fly into Italy across the sea about the autumnal equinox and at the same time fly back at the vernal equinox; and, at another season, turtle-doves and quails do so in enormous number.

Hoc ita fieri apparet in insulis propinquis Pontiis, Palmariae, Pandateriae. Ibi enim in prima volatura cum veniunt, morantur dies paucos requiescendi causa itemque faciunt, cum ex Italia trans mare remeant.

It appears that this takes place thus on the neighboring islands Pontiae, Palmaria, Pandateria. For there, on their first flight when they come, they linger a few days for the sake of repose, and they do likewise when they return across the sea from Italy.

Appius Axio, Si quinque milia hoc coieceris, inquit, et erit epulum ac triumphus, sexaginta milia quae vis statim in fenus des licebit multum. Tum mihi, tu dic illud alterum genus ornithonis, qui animi causa constitutus a te sub Casino fertur, in quo diceris longe vicisse non modo archetypon inventoris nostri ornithotrophion M. Laenii Strabonis, qui Brundisii hospes noster primus in peristylo habuit exhedra conclusas aves, quas pasceret obiecto rete, sed etiam in Tusculano magna aedificia Luculli. Quoi ego: Cum habeam sub oppido Casino flumen, quod per villam fluat, liquidum et altum marginibus lapideis, latum pedes quinquaginta septem, et e villa in villam pontibus transeatur, longum pedes DCCCCL derectum ab insula, quae est in imo fluvio, ubi confluit altera amnis, ad summum flumen, ubi est museum, circum huius ripas ambulatio sub dio pedes lata denos, ab hac est in agrum versus ornithonis locus ex duabus partibus dextra et sinistra maceriis altis conclusus.

Appius to Axius: If you throw in five thousand for this, he says, there shall be a banquet and a triumph; you may at once put out at interest sixty thousand, as much as you please. Then for me, do you tell that other kind of ornithon, which, established by you for pleasure near Casinum, is reported, in which you are said to have by far surpassed not only the archetype, the ornithotrophion of our inventor, Marcus Laenius Strabo—who at Brundisium, our host, first had in the peristyle an exedra with birds enclosed, to feed them with a net thrown before them—but also the great buildings of Lucullus at Tusculum. To whom I: Since I have below the town of Casinum a river, which flows through the villa, limpid and deep, with stone margins, fifty-seven feet wide, and from villa to villa one crosses by bridges, its length is 950 feet in a straight line from the island which is at the bottom of the river, where another stream flows together, to the upper river, where the museum is; around its banks there is a walk under the open sky, ten feet wide; from this, toward the field, is the place of the ornithon, on two sides, right and left, enclosed with high dry-stone walls.

Inter quas locus qui est ornithonis deformatus ad tabulae litterariae speciem cum capitulo, forma qua est quadrata, patet in latitudinem pedes XLVIII, in longitudinem pedes LXXII; qua ad capitulum rutundum est, pedes XXVII. Ad haec, ita ut in margine quasi infimo tabulae descripta sit, ambulatio, ab ornithone plumula, in qua media sunt caveae, qua introitus in aream est. In limine, in lateribus dextra et sinistra porticus sunt primoribus columnis lapideis, pro mediis arbusculis humilibus ordinatae, cum a summa macerie ad epistylium tecta porticus sit rete cannabina et ab epistylio ad stylobaten.

Among these, the place which belongs to the aviary, shaped to the appearance of a writing tablet with a capitulum, where the form is square, extends 48 feet in width, 72 feet in length; to the rounded capitulum, 27 feet. In addition, so that, as if along the lowest margin of the tablet, a walkway is traced— from the aviary a plumula, in the middle of which are cages—by which there is an entrance into the area. At the threshold, on the right and left sides there are porticoes with the foremost columns of stone, arranged with low little trees in place of the middle ones, since from the top of the garden-wall to the epistyle the portico is roofed with a hempen net, and from the epistyle to the stylobate.

Hae sunt avibus omnigenus oppletae, quibus cibus ministratur per retem et aqua rivolo tenui affluit. Secundum stylobatis interiorem partem dextra et sinistra ad summam aream quadratam e medio diversae duae non latae oblongae sunt piscinae ad porticus versus. Inter eas piscinas tantummodo accessus semita in tholum, qui est ultra rutundus columnatus, ut est in aede Catuli, si pro parietibus feceris columnas.

These are packed with birds of every kind, to whom food is served through the net and water flows in by a thin rivulet. Along the inner part of the stylobate, on the right and left, toward the upper square court, there are from the middle two not-wide oblong pools facing the porticoes. Between those pools there is only a path of access into the tholus, which is beyond, round and colonnaded, as in the Temple of Catulus, if you were to make columns in place of walls.

Extra eas columnas est silva manu sata grandibus arboribus, ut infima perluceat, tota saepta maceriis altis. Intra tholi columnas exteriores lapideas et totidem interiores ex abiete tenues locus est pedes quinque latus. Inter columnas exteriores pro pariete reticuli e nervis sunt, ut prospici in silvam possit et quae ibi sunt videri neque avis ea transire.

Outside those columns there is a wood planted by hand with large trees, so that the lower level lets light through, the whole enclosed with high walls. Within the tholus, between the outer stone columns and just as many inner slender ones of fir, there is a space five feet wide. Between the outer columns, in place of a wall, there are lattices of cords, so that one can look out into the wood and see the things that are there, and yet a bird cannot pass through them.

Intra interiores columnas pro pariete rete aviarium est obiectum. Inter has et exteriores gradatim substructum ut theatridion avium, mutuli crebri in omnibus columnis impositi, sedilia avium. Intra retem aves sunt omnigenus, maxime cantrices, ut lusciniolae ac merulae, quibus aqua ministratur per canaliculum, cibus obicitur sub retem.

Within the inner columns, in place of a wall, an aviary net is set up. Between these and the outer columns, there is, built up stepwise like a little theater for birds, mutules in thick array set upon all the columns—the birds’ seats. Within the net are birds of every kind, chiefly songstresses, such as nightingales and blackbirds, to whom water is supplied through a little channel, and food is cast beneath the net.

Subter columnarum stylobaten est lapis a falere pedem et dodrantem alta; ipsum falere ad duo pedes altum a stagno, latum ad quinque, ut in culcitas et columellas convivae pedibus circumire possint. Infimo intra falere est stagnum cum margine pedali et insula in medio parva. Circum falere et navalia sunt excavata anatium stabula.

Under the stylobate of the columns there is a stone, higher than the falere by a foot and three-quarters; the falere itself is two feet high from the pool, five in breadth, so that the convives can go around on foot to the cushions and the little columns. At the lowest point within the falere is a pool with a margin a foot wide and a small island in the middle. Around the falere there are also dockyards excavated, stalls for ducks.

In insula est columella, in qua intus axis, qui pro mensa sustinet rotam radiatam, ita ut ad extremum, ubi orbile solet esse, arcuata tabula cavata sit ut tympanum in latitudinem duo pedes et semipedem, in altitudinem palmum. Haec ab uno puero, qui ministrat, ita vertitur, ut omnia una ponantur et ad bibendum et ad edendum et admoveantur ad omnes convivas. Ex suggesto faleris, ubi solent esse peripetasmata, prodeunt anates in stagnum ac nant, e quo rivus pervenit in duas, quas dixi, piscinas, ac pisciculi ultro ac citro commetant, cum et aqua calida et frigida ex orbi ligneo mensaque, quam dixi in primis radiis esse, epitoniis versis ad unum quemque factum sit ut fluat convivam.

On the island there is a little column, within which is an axle, which, serving for a table, supports a radiated (spoked) wheel, such that at the extremity, where the orbile (little hub) is wont to be, a curved board is hollowed like a tympanum (drum), in breadth 2 feet and a half‑foot, in height a palm. This is turned by a single boy who ministers, so that all things both for drinking and for eating are set down together and are brought near to all the convives. From the dais of the falerae, where peripetasmata (curtains) are wont to be, ducks come forth into the pond and swim, from which a rivulet reaches into the two pools which I mentioned, and little fishes go to and fro, while both hot and cold water, from the wooden orb and the table which I said to be on the first spokes, with the epitonia (stopcocks) turned to each person, has been arranged to flow for each guest.

Intrinsecus sub tholo stella lucifer interdiu, noctu hesperus, ita circumeunt ad infimum hemisphaerium ac moventur, ut indicent, quot sint horae. In eodem hemisphaerio medio circum cardinem est orbis ventorum octo, ut Athenis in horologio, quod fecit Cyrrestes; ibique eminens radius a cardine ad orbem ita movetur, ut eum tangat ventum, qui flet, ut intus scire possis.

On the inside, under the dome, the star lucifer by day, at night hesperus, go around toward the lowest hemisphere and are moved so as to indicate how many hours there are. In the same hemisphere, in the middle around the cardinal pivot, there is a circle of eight winds, as at Athens in the horologium which Cyrrestes made; and there a projecting radius from the pivot to the circle is moved in such a way that it touches the wind which is blowing, so that you can know it inside.

Cum haec loqueremur, clamor fit in campo. Nos athletae comitiorum cum id fieri non miraremur propter studia suffragatorum et tamen scire vellemus, quid esset, venit ad nos Pantuleius Parra, narrat ad tabulam, cum diriberent, quendam deprensum tesserulas coicientem in loculum, eum ad consulem tractum a fautoribus competitorum. Pavo surgit, quod eius candidati custos dicebatur deprensus.

While we were saying these things, a clamor arises in the Campus. We, athletes of the elections, since we were not surprised that this was happening on account of the zeal of the suffragators, and yet wished to know what it was, Pantuleius Parra comes to us; he relates that at the tallying-board, when they were sorting (the votes), a certain man had been caught tossing little tesserae (voting tickets) into a box, and that he was dragged to the consul by the supporters of the competitors. Pavo rises, because the guardian of his candidate was said to have been apprehended.

VI.

Axius, De pavonibus, inquit, libere licet dicas, quoniam discessit Fircellius, qui, secus siquid diceres de iis, gentilitatis causa fortasse an tecum duceret serram. Quoi Merula, De pavonibus nostra memoria, inquit, greges haberi coepti et venire magno. Ex iis M. Aufidius Lurco supra sexagena milia nummum in anno dicitur capere.

Axius said, “About peacocks you may speak freely, since Fircellius has departed, who, if you were to say anything otherwise about them, perhaps for the sake of clan-kinship would even draw a saw with you.” To which Merula said, “In our memory, flocks of peacocks began to be kept and to fetch a high price. From these M. Aufidius Lurco is said to take in above 60,000 coins in a year.”

Ii aliquanto pauciores esse debent mares quam feminae, si ad fructum spectes; si ad delectationem, contra; formosior enim mas. Pascendi greges agrestes. Transmarini esse dicuntur in insulis, Sami in luco Iunonis, item in Planasia insula M. Pisonis.

In these, the males ought to be somewhat fewer than the females, if you look to profit; if to delectation, the contrary—for the male is more beautiful. The flocks are to be pastured in the countryside. Overseas they are said to be on islands, at Samos in the grove of Juno, likewise on the island Planasia of M. Piso.

Hi ad greges constituendos parantur bona aetate et bona forma. Huic enim natura formae e volucribus dedit palmam. Ad admissuram haec minores bimae non idoneae nec iam maiores natu.

These are prepared for constituting flocks at a good age and with good form. For to it nature has given the palm of form among the birds. For mating, those less than two years old are not suitable, nor those already older by birth.

Pascuntur omne genus obiecto frumento, maxime hordeo. Itaque Seius iis dat in menses singulos hordei singulos modios, ita ut in fetura det uberius, antequam salire incipiant. In has a procuratore ternos pullos exigit eosque, cum creverunt, quinquagenis denariis vendit, ut nulla avis hunc assequatur fructum.

They are fed on every kind of grain set before them, especially barley. Accordingly Seius gives them, for each single month, a single modius of barley, in such a way that during breeding he gives more abundantly, before they begin to mate. From them the manager exacts three chicks apiece and, when they have grown, sells them for 50 denarii each, so that no bird matches this profit.

Praeterea ova emit ac supponit gallinis, ex quibus excusos pullos refert in testudinem eam, in qua pavones habet. Quod tectum pro multitudine pavonum fieri debet et habere cubilia discreta, tectorio levata, quo neque serpens neque bestia accedere ulla possit; praeterea habere locum ante se, quo pastum exeant diebus apricis. Utrumque locum purum esse volunt hae volucres.

Moreover, he buys eggs and sets them under hens, from which, when the chicks are hatched out, he brings them back into the vaulted shelter (testudo) in which he keeps the peacocks. This roofed structure ought to be made in proportion to the multitude of peacocks and to have separate cubicles, smoothed with stucco, so that neither serpent nor any beast can approach; moreover, it should have a place before it, where they may go out to feed on sunny days. These birds want both places to be clean.

Itaque pastorem earum cum vatillo circumire oportet ac stercus tollere ac conservare, quod et ad agri culturam idoneum est et ad substramen pullorum. Primus hos Q. Hortensius augurali aditiali cena posuisse dicitur, quod potius factum tum luxuriosi quam severi boni viri laudabant. Quem cito secuti multi extulerunt eorum pretia, ita ut ova eorum denariis veneant quinis, ipsi facile quinquagenis, grex centenarius facile quadragena milia sestertia ut reddat, ut quidem Abucius aiebat, si in singulos ternos exigeret pullos, perfici sexagenas posse.

Therefore their keeper ought to go around with a little shovel and remove and preserve the dung, which is suitable both for agriculture and for the bedding of chicks. Quintus Hortensius is said to have been the first to set these birds at an augural aditial dinner, a deed which at that time the extravagant rather than austere good men were praising. Many, quickly following him, raised their prices, so that their eggs sell for 5 denarii, the birds themselves easily for 50; so that a flock of 100 easily yields 40,000 sesterces, as indeed Abucius used to say, if he exacted 3 chicks from each, 60,000 could be realized.

VII.

Interea venit apparitor Appi a consule et augures ait citari. Ille foras exit e villa. At in villam intro involant columbae, de quibus Merula Axio: Si umquam peristerotrophion constituisses, has tuas esse putares, quamvis ferae essent.

Meanwhile an apparitor of Appius comes from the consul and says that the augurs are being summoned. He goes outside from the villa. But into the villa doves fly in, about which Merula says to Axius: “If you had ever established a peristerotrophion (dovecote), you would think these to be yours, although they were wild.”

Duo enim genera earum in peristerotrophio esse solent: unum agreste, ut alii dicunt, saxatile, quod habetur in turribus ac columinibus villae, a quo appellatae columbae, quae propter timorem naturalem summa loca in tectis captant; quo fit ut agrestes maxime sequantur turres, in quas ex agro evolant suapte sponte ac remeant. Alterum genus columbarum est clementius, quod cibo domestico contentum intra limina ianuae solet pasci. Hoc genus maxime est colore albo, illud alterum agreste sine albo, vario.

For there are usually two kinds of them in a peristerotrophion (dovecote): one rustic—rock-dwelling, as others say—which is kept in the towers and the roof-ridges of the villa, from which they have been named “doves,” who, on account of a natural timidity, seek out the highest places in the roofs; whence it comes about that the rustic ones especially follow the towers, into which from the fields they of their own accord fly forth and return. The other kind of doves is gentler, which, content with domestic food, is wont to be fed within the thresholds of the doorway. This kind is most often white in color; that other rustic kind, without white, is variegated.

Ex iis duabus stirpibus fit miscellum tertium genus fructus causa, atque incedunt in locum unum, quod alii vocant peristerona, alii peristerotrophion, in quo uno saepe vel quinque milia sunt inclusae. Peristeron fit ut testudo magna, camara tectus, uno ostio angusto, fenestris punicanis aut latioribus reticulatis utrimque, ut locus omnis sit illustris, neve quae serpens aliudve quid animal maleficum introire queat. Intrinsecus quam levissimo marmorato toti parietes ac camarae oblinuntur et extrinsecus circum fenestras, ne mus aut lacerta qua adrepere ad columbaria possit.

From these two stocks a mixed third kind is made for the sake of profit, and they go into a single place, which some call a peristeron, others a peristerotrophion, in which one place often even five thousand are enclosed. The peristeron is made like a great tortoise, covered with a vault, with one narrow doorway, with Punic windows or wider latticed ones on either side, so that the whole place may be full of light, and lest any serpent or any other baneful animal be able to enter. On the inside the whole walls and vaults are smeared with marble plaster made as smooth as possible, and on the outside around the windows as well, so that a mouse or lizard cannot anywhere creep up to the dovecotes.

Nihil enim timidius columba. Singulis paribus columbaria fiunt rutunda in ordinem crebra, ordines quam plurimi possunt a terra usque ad camaram. Columbaria singula esse oportet ut os habeat, quo modo introire et exire possit, intus ternarum palmarum ex omnibus partibus.

For nothing is more timorous than the dove. For each pair, the columbaria are made round, closely set in order, with as many ranks as possible from the ground up to the vault. Each individual columbarium ought to be such as to have a mouth, by which it may be able to enter and exit, and within to be three palms on every side.

Sub ordines singulos tabulae fictae ut sint bipalmes, quo utantur vestibulo ac prodeant. Aquam esse oportet quae influat, unde et bibere et ubi lavari possint. Permundae enim sunt hae volucres.

Under each row let there be fictile tiles two palms in size, which they may use as a vestibule and go forth upon. There ought to be water that flows in, whence they may both drink and where they may wash; for these birds are very clean.

Itaque pastorem columbarum quotquot mensibus crebro oportet everrere; est enim quod eum inquinat locum appositum ad agri culturam, ita ut hoc optimum esse scripserint aliquot. Siquae columba quid offenderit, ut medeatur; siquae perierit, ut efferatur; siqui pulli idonei sunt ad vendendum, promat. Item quae fetae sunt, certum locum ut disclusum ab aliis rete habeat, quo transferantur, e quo foras ex peristerone evolare possint matres.

Therefore the keeper of doves must frequently sweep it out every month; for there is that which pollutes the place, yet is apt for agriculture, so that several have written that this is the best. If any dove has met with some mishap, that he may remedy it; if any has perished, that it be carried out; if any squabs are fit for selling, let him bring them forth. Likewise, for those that are breeding, let him have a fixed place, shut off from the others by a net, to which they may be transferred, from which the mothers may be able to fly out from the dovecote (peristeron).

Quod faciunt duabus de causis: una, si fastidiunt aut inclusae consenescunt, quod libero aere, cum exierint in agros, redintegrentur; altera de causa propter inlicium. Ipsae enim propter pullos, quos habent, utique redeunt, nisi a corvo occisae aut ab accipitre interceptae. Quos columbarii interficere solent duabus virgis viscatis defictis in terra inter se curvatis, cum inter eas posuerint obligatum animal, quod petere soleant accipitres, qui ita decipiuntur, cum se obleverunt visco.

This they do for two reasons: one, if they grow fastidious or, being enclosed, grow old, because in the free air, when they go out into the fields, they are reintegrated; the other reason is on account of an allurement (illicium). For they themselves, on account of the chicks which they have, in any case return, unless killed by a crow or intercepted by an accipiter (hawk). These the dovecote-keepers are accustomed to kill with two birdlime-smeared rods fixed in the ground and bent toward each other, when they have placed between them a bound animal which hawks are wont to seek; thus they are deceived, when they have besmeared themselves with the birdlime (viscum).

Columbas redire solere ad locum licet animadvertere, quod multi in theatro e sinu missas faciunt, atque ad locum redeunt, quae nisi reverterentur, non emitterentur. Cibus apponitur circum parietes in canalibus, quas extrinsecus per fistulas supplent. Delectantur milio, tritico, hordeo, piso, fasiolis, ervo.

It may be observed that doves are wont to return to the place, because many in the theater send them out from the bosom, and they return to the place— which, if they did not return, would not be released. Food is set around the walls in channels, which they replenish from outside through pipes. They delight in millet, wheat, barley, peas, phaseoli (beans), and vetch.

Item fere haec, in turribus ac summis villis qui habent agrestes columbas, quoad possunt, imitandum. In peristeronas aetate bona parandum, neque pullos neque vetulas, totidem mares quot feminas. Nihil columbis fecundius.

Likewise, for the most part these things are to be imitated, by those who have rustic doves in towers and on the tops of villas, as far as they can. For the peristerones (dovecotes), provide birds of good age—neither chicks nor little old females—with as many males as females. Nothing is more fecund than doves.

Itaque diebus quadragenis concipit et parit et incubat et educat. Et hoc fere totum annum faciunt; tantummodo intervallum faciunt a bruma ad aequinoctium vernum. Pulli nascuntur bini, qui simulac creverunt et habent robur, cum matribus pariunt.

Therefore in forty-day periods it conceives, gives birth, broods, and rears. And they do this for nearly the whole year; only an interval do they make from the winter solstice to the vernal equinox. The chicks are born in pairs, and as soon as they have grown and have vigor, they breed along with the mothers.

Qui solent saginare pullos columbinos, quo pluris vendant, secludunt eos, cum iam pluma sunt tecti. Deinde manducato candido farciunt pane; hieme hoc bis, aestate ter, mane meridie vesperi; hieme demunt cibum medium. Qui iam pinnas incipiunt habere, relincunt in nido inlisis cruribus et matribus, uberius ut cibo uti possint, obiciunt.

Those who are wont to fatten squab pigeons, in order to sell them at a higher price, seclude them when they are now covered with down. Then, with white bread chewed, they stuff them; in winter they do this twice, in summer thrice—morning, midday, evening; in winter they remove the middle feeding. Those who already begin to have pinions they leave in the nest with the legs bruised, and they present them to the mothers, so that they may be able to make use of food more abundantly.

Eo enim totum diem se et pullos pascunt. Qui ita educantur, celerius pinguiores fiunt quam alii, et candidae fiunt parentes eorum. Romae, si sunt formosi, bono colore, integri, boni seminis, paria singula volgo veneunt ducenis nummis nec non eximia singulis milibus nummum.

On that, indeed, they feed themselves and the chicks all day long. Those who are brought up thus become fat more quickly than others, and their parents become white. At Rome, if they are comely, of good color, sound, of good seed (stock), single pairs commonly are sold for 200 coins, and outstanding ones for 1,000 coins apiece.

Quas nuper cum mercator tanti emere vellet a L. Axio, equite Romano, minoris quadringentis denariis datorum negavit. Axius, Si possem emere, inquit, peristerona factum, quem ad modum in aedibus cum habere vellem, emi fictilia columbaria, iam issem emptum et misissem ad villam. Quasi vero, inquit Pica, non in urbe quoque sint multi.

Which a merchant lately wished to buy at such a price from L. Axius, a Roman equestrian; he refused to give them for less than 400 denarii. Axius said, “If I could buy a peristeron ready-made, in the fashion in which I would want to have it in my house, earthenware columbaria, I would already have gone to buy and would have sent them to the villa.” “As though, indeed,” said Pica, “there were not many even in the city.”

An tibi columbaria qui in tegulis habent, non videntur habere peristeronas, cum aliquot supra centum milium sestertium habeant instrumentum? E quis alicuius totum emas censeo, et antequam aedificas rure, magnum condiscas hic in urbe cotidie lucrum assem semissem condere in loculos. Tu, Merula, sic perge deinceps.

Do those who have dove‑cotes on the roof‑tiles not seem to you to have peristerones, since they have equipment amounting to some sum above one hundred thousand sesterces? Of these I advise that you buy the whole of someone’s setup; and before you build in the countryside, learn here in the city to lay up each day into your little purses a great lucre—an as and a half. You, Merula, go on thus henceforth.

VIII.

Ille, Turturibus item, inquit, locum constituendum proinde magnum, ac multitudinem alere velis; eumque item ut de columbis dictum est, ut habeat ostium ac fenestras et aquam puram ac parietes camaras munitas tectorio; sed pro columbariis in pariete mutulos aut palos in ordinem, supra quos tegeticulae cannabinae sint impositae. Infimum ordinem oportet abesse a terra non minus tres pedes, inter reliquos dodrantes, a summo ad camaram semipedem, aeque latum ac mutulus a pariete extare potest, in quibus dies noctesque pascuntur. Cibatui quod sit, obiciunt triticum siccum, in centenos vicenos turtures fere semodium, cottidie everrentes eorum stabula, a stercore ne offendantur, quod item servatur ad agrum colendum.

He said, For turtledoves likewise, a place must be appointed just as large, if you wish to nourish a multitude; and it must likewise, as was said about doves, have a door and windows and pure water and walls and chambers fortified with plaster; but in place of columbaria in the wall, set corbels or poles in a row, above which little hempen coverlets are to be placed. The lowest row ought to be no less than three feet away from the ground, between the remaining rows three-quarters of a foot, and from the top to the vault half a foot; it can project from the wall just as wide as a corbel; in these they feed day and night. As for their provender, they throw in dry wheat—at a rate of about a half-modius for each 120 turtledoves—sweeping out their stalls daily, lest they be offended by the dung, which likewise is kept for cultivating the field.

Ad saginandum adpositissimum tempus circiter messem. Etenim matres eorum tum optimae sunt, cum pulli plurimi gignuntur, qui ad farturam meliores. Itaque eorum fructus id temporis maxime consistit.

For fattening the most suitable time is around the harvest. For indeed their mothers are then the best, when very many chicks are begotten, who are better for fattening. Therefore their yield at that time is at its greatest.

IX.

Axius, Ego quae requiro farturae membra, de gallinis dic sodes, Merula: tum de reliquis siquid idoneum fuerit ratiocinari, licebit. Igitur sunt gallinae quae vocantur generum trium: villaticae et rusticae et Africanae. Gallinae villaticae sunt, quas deinceps rure habent in villis.

Axius, As I am seeking the divisions of fattening, speak, please, about hens, Merula; then about the remaining kinds, if anything shall be suitable to reason out, it will be allowed. Therefore there are hens that are called of three kinds: villatic, rustic, and African. Villatic hens are those which they keep continually in their villas in the country.

De his qui ornithoboscion instituere vult, id est adhibita scientia ac cura ut capiant magnos fructus, ut factitaverunt Deliaci, haec quinque maxime animadvertant oportet; de emptione, cuius modi et quam multas parent; de fetura, quem ad modum admittant et pariant; de ovis, quem ad modum incubent et excudant; de pullis, quem ad modum et a quibus educentur; hisce appendix adicitur pars quinta, quem ad modum saginentur. Ex quis tribus generibus proprio nomine vocantur feminae quae sunt villaticae gallinae, mares galli, capi semimares, qui sunt castrati. Gallos castrant, ut sint capi, candenti ferro inurentes ad infima crura, usque dum rumpatur, et quod exstat ulcus, oblinunt figlina creta.

Concerning those who wish to institute an ornithoboscion—that is, with applied science and care to take great profits, as the Delians were wont to do—these five things above all ought to be observed: about purchase, of what sort and how many they should provide; about breeding, in what manner they should admit and bring forth; about the eggs, how they should incubate and hatch them; about the chicks, how and by whom they should be reared; to these an appendix is added as a fifth part, how they should be fattened. Of these three kinds the females are by their proper name called household hens, the males cocks, and capons are half-males, that is, castrated ones. They castrate cocks, that they may be capons, by branding with a glowing iron at the lowest shanks until it is ruptured, and the ulcer that results they smear with potter’s clay.

Qui spectat ut ornithoboscion perfectum habeat, scilicet genera ei tria paranda, maxime villaticas gallinas. E quis in parando eligat oportet fecundas, plerumque rubicunda pluma, nigris pinnis, imparibus digitis, magnis capitibus, crista erecta, amplas; hae enim ad partiones sunt aptiores. Gallos salaces qui animadvertunt, si sunt lacertosi, rubenti crista, rostro brevi pleno acuto, oculis ravis aut nigris, palea rubra subalbicanti, collo vario aut aureolo, feminibus pilosis, cruribus brevibus, unguibus longis, caudis magnis, frequentibus pinnis; item qui elati sunt ac vociferant saepe, in certamine pertinaces et qui animalia quae nocent gallinis non modo non pertimescant, sed etiam pro gallinis propugnent.

Whoever aims to have a perfect ornithoboscion must, namely, provide three kinds, especially villatic hens. Of these, in procuring he ought to choose fecund ones, for the most part with rubicund plumage, black feathers, unequal toes, large heads, the crest erect, ample-bodied; for these are more apt for layings. They recognize lusty cocks if they are brawny, with a reddening crest, a beak short, full, and sharp, ravid (gray‑tawny) or black eyes, a wattle red and somewhat whitish, a neck variegated or aureolate, thighs feathered, shanks short, talons long, tails large, with abundant feathers; likewise those who are high‑spirited and often vociferate, pertinacious in contest, and who not only do not dread the animals that harm the hens, but even champion on behalf of the hens.

Nec tamen sequendum in seminio legendo Tanagricos et Melicos et Chalcidicos, qui sine dubio sunt pulchri et ad proeliandum inter se maxime idonei, sed ad partus sunt steriliores. Si ducentos alere velis, locus saeptus adtribuendus, in quo duae caveae coniunctae magnae constituendae, quae spectent ad exorientem versus, utraeque in longitudinem circiter decem pedum, latitudine dimidio minores, altitudine paulo humiliores: in utraque fenestra lata tripedalis, et eae pede altiores e viminibus factae raris, ita ut lumen praebeant multum, neque per eas quicquam ire intro possit, quae nocere solent gallinis. Inter duas ostium sit, qua gallinarius, curator earum, ire possit.

Nor, however, should one follow, in choosing breeding stock, the Tanagric and the Melic and the Chalcidian birds, who without doubt are handsome and most fit for doing battle among themselves, but are more sterile for births. If you wish to keep two hundred, an enclosed place must be assigned, in which two large conjoined cages are to be set up, which should face toward the East, each about ten feet in length, in width smaller by half, in height a little lower. In each, a broad window three feet across, and these set a foot higher, made of withies with a sparse weave, such that they provide much light, and yet through them nothing can go in that is wont to harm hens. Between the two let there be a door, by which the gallinarius, their curator, may go.

In caveis crebrae perticae traiectae sint, ut omnes sustinere possint gallinas. Contra singulas perticas in pariete exclusa sint cubilia earum. Ante sit, ut dixi, vestibulum saeptum, in quo diurno tempore esse possint atque in pulvere volutari.

In the coops let frequent perches be set across, so that they can support all the hens. Opposite each perch, in the wall, let their nesting-places be cut out. In front, as I said, let there be an enclosed vestibule, in which they may be during the daytime and wallow in the dust.

Praeterea sit cella grandis, in qua curator habitet, ita ut in parietibus circum omnia plena sint cubilia gallinarum aut exsculpta aut adficta firmiter. Motus enim, cum incubat, nocet. In cubilibus, cum parturient, acus substernendum; cum pepererunt, tollere substramen et recens aliud subicere, quod pulices et cetera nasci solent, quae gallinam conquiescere non patiuntur; ob quam rem ova aut inaequabiliter maturescunt aut consenescunt.

Furthermore, let there be a large cell in which the curator may dwell, such that on the surrounding walls all be filled with hens’ nests, either excavated or firmly affixed. For motion, when she incubates, harms. In the nests, when they are parturient, chaff should be strewn beneath; when they have brought forth, remove the bedding and put other fresh beneath, because fleas and other things are wont to be born, which do not allow the hen to rest; for which reason the eggs either mature unevenly or senesce.

Quae velis incubet, negant plus XXV oportere ova incubare, quamvis propter fecunditatem pepererit plura, optimum esse partum ab aequinoctio verno ad autumnale. Itaque quae ante aut post nata sunt et etiam prima eo tempore, non supponenda; et ea quae subicias, potius vetulis quam pullitris, et quae rostra aut ungues non habeant acutos, quae debent potius in concipiendo occupatae esse quam incubando. Adpositissimae ad partum sunt anniculae aut bimae.

Let the one you wish brood; they say it is not proper to incubate more than 25 eggs, although on account of fecundity she may have produced more; the optimum time for a brood is from the vernal equinox to the autumnal. Therefore those laid before or after, and even the very first at that season, are not to be put under; and those you set, set rather under old hens than under pullets, and under those which do not have sharp beaks or claws—for pullets ought rather to be occupied in conceiving than in incubating. Most apposite for parturition are year-old or two-year-old hens.

Si ova gallinis pavonina subicias, cum iam decem dies fovere coepit, tum denique gallinacia subicere, ut una excudat. Gallinaciis enim pullis bis deni dies opus sunt, pavoninis ter noveni. Eas includere oportet, ut diem et noctem incubent, praeterquam mane et vespere, dum cibus ac potio is detur.

If you set peacock eggs under hens, when she has already begun to brood for 10 days, then at last set hen-eggs as well, so that she may hatch them together. For chicken chicks need 20 days, peacock chicks 27. It is proper to enclose them, so that they incubate by day and by night, except in the morning and evening, while food and drink are given to them.

Curator oportet circumeat diebus interpositis aliquot ac vertere ova, ut aequabiliter concalefiant. Ova plena sint atque utilia necne, animadverti aiunt posse, si demiseris in aquam, quod inane natet, plenum desidit. Qui ut hoc intellegant concutiant, errare, quod vitale venas confundant in iis.

The curator ought to go around at intervals of several days and turn the eggs, so that they may be warmed evenly. Whether the eggs are full and useful or not, they say can be observed, if you let them down into water: the empty floats, the full sinks. Those who, in order to understand this, shake them are in error, because they confound the vital veins in them.

Idem aiunt, cum ad lumen sustuleris, quod perluceat, id esse inane. Qui haec volunt diutius servare, perfricant sale minuto aut muria tres aut quattuor horas eaque abluta condunt in furfures aut acus. In supponendo ova observant ut sint numero imparia.

They likewise say that, when you have held an egg up to the light, that which shines through is empty. Those who wish to preserve these longer rub them thoroughly with fine salt or with brine for three or four hours, and, after they have been washed, they store them in bran or pine-needles. In placing eggs under the hen they observe that they be odd in number.

Ova, quae incubantur, habeantne semen pulli, curator quadriduo post quam incubari coepit intellegere potest. Si contra lumen tenuit et purum unius modi esse animadvertit, putant eiciendum et aliud subiciundum. Excusos pullos subducendum ex singulis nidis et subiciendum ei quae habeat paucos; ab eaque, si reliqua sint ova pauciora, tollenda et subicienda aliis, quae nondum excuderunt et minus habent triginta pullos.

Whether the eggs that are being incubated have the seed of a chick, the curator can understand four days after incubation has begun. If he has held it against the light and has noticed it to be pure and of one uniform kind, they think it must be ejected and another substituted. The chicks that have been hatched should be drawn off from the several nests and put under her who has few; and from her too, if the remaining eggs are fewer, they should be taken away and put under others who have not yet hatched and have fewer than 30 chicks.

Hoc enim gregem maiorem non faciendum. Obiciendum pullis diebus XV primis mane subiecto pulvere, ne rostris noceat terra dura, polentam mixtam cum nasturti semine et aqua aliquanto ante factam intritam, ne tum denique in eorum corpore turgescat; aqua prohibendum. Qua de clunibus coeperint habere pinnas, e capite, e collo eorum crebro eligendi pedes; saepe enim propter eos consenescunt.

For in this way a larger flock ought not to be made. For the first 15 days there should be set before the chicks in the morning—dust placed beneath, lest the hard earth harm their beaks—polenta mixed with nasturtium seed and water, prepared somewhat beforehand and well triturated, lest it swell only then in their body; water must be withheld. When they have begun to have feathers from the rump, the lice are frequently to be picked from their head and neck; for often on account of them they grow feeble.

Circum caveas eorum incendendum cornum cervinum, ne quae serpens accedat, quarum bestiarum ex odore solent interire. Prodigendae in solem et in stercilinum, ut volutare possint, quod ita alibiliores fiunt; neque pullos, sed omne ornithoboscion cum aestate, tum utique cum tempestas sit mollis atque apricum; intento supra rete, quod prohibeat eas extra saepta evolare et in eas involare extrinsecus accipitrem aut quid aliud; evitantem caldorem et frigus, quod utrumque iis adversum. Cum iam pinnas habebunt, consuefaciundum ut unam aut duas sectentur gallinas, ceterae ut potius ad pariendum sint expeditae, quam in nutricatu occupatae.

Around their cages hartshorn should be burned, lest any serpent approach, which kind of beasts are wont to perish from the odor. They are to be driven out into the sun and onto the dung-heap, so that they may wallow, because thus they become more nourishing; not the chicks, but all the ornithoboscion both in summer and especially when the weather is mild and sunny; with a net stretched above, which may prevent them from flying out beyond the enclosures and keep a hawk or something else from outside from flying in upon them; avoiding heat and cold, both of which are adverse to them. When they already will have feathers, they should be accustomed to follow one or two hens, the rest being rather made ready for laying than occupied in nursing.

Incubare oportet incipere secundum novam lunam, quod fere quae ante, pleraque non succedunt. Diebus fere viginti excudunt. De quibus villaticis quoniam vel nimium dictum, brevitate reliqua compensabo.

One ought to begin to incubate in accordance with the new moon, since, for the most part, those begun earlier do not succeed. They hatch out in about twenty days. Concerning these farmyard matters, since perhaps even too much has been said, I will compensate the remainder with brevity.

Gallinae rusticae sunt in urbe rarae nec fere nisi mansuetae in cavea videntur Romae, similes facie non his gallinis villaticis nostris, sed Africanis. Aspectu ac facie incontaminatae in ornatibus publicis solent poni cum psittacis ac merulis albis, item aliis id genus rebus inusitatis. Neque fere in villis ova ac pullos faciunt, sed in silvis.

Wild hens are rare in the city, and at Rome they are hardly seen except tame and in a cage, resembling in appearance not our farmyard hens, but the African kind. Unsullied in aspect and countenance, they are wont to be set in public adornments together with parrots and white blackbirds, likewise with other unusual things of that sort. Nor do they generally produce eggs and chicks in villas, but in the woods.

Ab his gallinis dicitur insula Gallinaria appellata, quae est in mari Tusco secundum Italiam contra montes Liguscos, Intimilium, Album Ingaunum; alii ab his villaticis invectis a nautis, ibi feris factis procreatis. Gallinae Africanae sunt grandes, variae, gibberae, quas meleagridas appellant Graeci. Haec novissimae in triclinium cenantium introierunt e culina propter fastidium hominum.

From these hens the island Gallinaria is said to have been appellated, which is in the Tuscan sea along Italy, over against the Ligurian mountains, Intimilium, Album Ingaunum; others (say it was named) from these villatic (farmyard) hens brought in by sailors, there made feral and propagated. African hens are large, variegated, gibbous, which the Greeks appellate meleagrides. These, the newest, were the last to enter the triclinium of diners from the kitchen, on account of the fastidiousness of men.

Veneunt propter penuriam magno. De tribus generibus gallinae saginantur maxime villaticae. Eas includunt in locum tepidum et angustum et tenebricosum, quod motus earum et lux pinguitudinis vindicta, ad hanc rem electis maximis gallinis, nec continuo his, quas Melicas appellant falso, quod antiqui, ut Thetim Thelim dicebant, sic Medicam Melicam vocabant.

They are sold at a high price because of scarcity. Of the three kinds of hens, the villatic (farmyard) are most of all fattened. They shut them up in a warm and narrow and dark place, because their movement and light are the nemesis of fatness, the largest hens being chosen for this purpose, and not invariably those which they wrongly call “Melic,” because the ancients, just as they said Thelim for Thetis, so they called the Median “Melic.”

Hae primo dicebantur, quae ex Medica propter magnitudinem erant allatae quaeque ex iis generatae, postea propter similitudinem amplae omnes. Ex iis evulsis ex alis pinnis et e cauda farciunt turundis hordeaceis partim admixtis farina lolleacia aut semine lini ex aqua dulci. Bis die cibum dant, observantes ex quibusdam signis ut prior sit concoctus, antequam secundum dent.

These were at first so called, namely those which had been brought from Median land because of their magnitude and those generated from them; afterwards, on account of likeness, all the large ones. From these, the feathers having been plucked from the wings and from the tail, they cram them with barley rolls, partly mixed with darnel-meal or with linseed, made up with fresh water. Twice a day they give food, observing from certain signs that the prior has been digested before they give the second.

Dato cibo, quom perpurgarunt caput, nequos habeat pedes, rursus eas concludunt. Hoc faciunt usque ad dies XXV; tunc denique pingues fiunt. Quidam et triticeo pane intrito in aquam, mixto vino bono et odorato, farciunt, ita ut diebus XX pingues reddant ac teneras.

After the food has been given, when they have thoroughly cleansed the head and the feet, so that they may have nothing on them, they shut them up again. They do this up to 25 days; then at last they become fat. Some also stuff them with wheaten bread crumbled into water, mixed with good and aromatic wine, so that in 20 days they render them fat and tender.

Si in farciendo nimio cibo fastidiunt, remittendum in datione pro portione, ac decem primis processit, in posterioribus ut deminuat eadem ratione, ut vicesimus dies et primus sint pares. Eodem modo palumbos farciunt ac reddunt pingues.

If in the stuffing they become fastidious from excessive food, one must reduce the giving in proportion; and the increase made in the first ten days, in the later ones let him diminish by the same ratio, so that the twentieth day and the first may be equal. In the same way they stuff wood‑pigeons and render them fat.

10.

Transi, inquit Axius, nunc in illud genus, quod non est ulla villa ac terra contentum, sed requirit piscinas, quod vos philograeci vocatis amphibium. In quibus ubi anseres aluntur, nomine alieno chenoboscion appellatis. Horum greges Scipio Metellus et M. Seius habent magnos aliquot.

“Pass on,” says Axius, “now to that kind which is not contained by any villa and land, but requires fishponds, which you philo-Greeks call ‘amphibious.’ In which, when geese are reared, you, by a foreign name, appellate it ‘chenoboscion.’ Of these, Scipio Metellus and M. Seius have several large flocks.”

Merula, Seius, inquit, ita greges comparavit anserum, ut hos quinque gradus obseruaret, quos in gallinis dixi. Hi sunt de genere, de fetura, de ovis, de pullis, de sagina. Primum iubebat servum in legendo observare ut essent ampli et albi, quod plerumque pullos similes sui faciunt.

“Merula,” says Seius, “thus arranged flocks of geese, so that he might observe those five grades which I mentioned in hens. These are: of the breed, of the breeding, of the eggs, of the chicks, of the fattening. First, he ordered the slave, in selecting, to observe that they were large and white, because for the most part they make their young similar to themselves.”

Est enim alterum genus varium, quod ferum vocatur, nec cum iis libenter congregantur, nec aeque fit mansuetum. Anseribus ad admittendum tempus est aptissimum a bruma, ad pariendum et incubandum a Kalendis Februariis vel Martiis usque ad solstitium. Saliunt fere in aqua, iniguntur in flumen aut piscinam.

For there is another, varied kind, which is called wild, and they do not gladly congregate with these, nor do they become equally tame. For geese the most suitable time for admitting is from the winter solstice; for laying and incubating, from the Kalends of February or of March up to the solstice. They usually leap in the water; they couple in a river or a fishpond.

Singulae non plus quam ter in anno pariunt. Singulis, ubi pariant, faciendum haras quadratas circum binos pedes et semipedem; eas substernendum palea. Notandum earum ova aliquo signo, quod aliena non excudunt.

Each one lays not more than three times in a year. For each, where they may lay, square pens approximately two and a half feet should be made, and these are to be bedded with straw. Their eggs should be marked with some sign, since they do not hatch those of another.

Ad incubandum supponunt plerumque novem aut undecim, qui hoc minus, quinque, qui hoc plus, XV. Incubat tempestatibus dies triginta, tepidioribus XXV. Cum excudit, quinque diebus primis patiuntur esse cum matre. Deinde cotidie, serenum cum est, producunt in prata, item piscinas aut paludes, iisque faciunt haras supra terram aut suptus, in quas non inducunt plus vicenos pullos, easque cellas provident ne habeant in solo umorem et ut molle habeant substramen e palea aliave qua re, neve qua eo accedere possint mustelae aliaeve quae bestiae noceant.

For incubation they usually put under nine or eleven; those who do less, five; those who do more, 15. She broods in stormy seasons for 30 days, in milder for 25. When she has hatched, they allow the young to be with the mother for the first five days. Then each day, when it is fair, they lead them out into the meadows, likewise into pools or marshes, and for them they make pens above ground or beneath, into which they do not put more than twenty chicks; and they arrange those cells so that they do not have dampness on the floor and that they have a soft substratum of straw or some other material, and so that by no way can weasels or other beasts that harm gain access there.

Anseres pascunt in umidis locis et pabulum serunt, quod aliquem ferat fructum, seruntque his herbam, quae vocatur seris, quod ea aqua tacta, etiam cum est arida, fit viridis. Folia eius decerpentes dant, ne, si eo inegerint, ubi nascitur, aut obterendo perdant aut ipsi cruditate pereant; voraces enim sunt natura. Quo temperandum iis, qui propter cupiditatem saepe in pascendo, si radicem prenderunt, quam educere velint e terra, abrumpunt collum; perimbecillum enim id, ut caput molle.

Geese graze in humid places and they sow provender that may bear some fruit, and they sow for them a herb which is called seris, because that, touched by water, even when it is arid, becomes green. Plucking its leaves they give them, lest, if they have thrust themselves into the place where it grows, they either destroy it by trampling or they themselves perish from crudity; for they are voracious by nature. Therefore tempering is to be used with them, since because of cupidity they often, while grazing, if they have seized a root which they wish to draw out of the earth, break the neck; for that is very imbecile, as the head is soft.

Si haec herba non est, dandum hordeum aut frumentum aliud. Cum est tempus farraginis, dandum, ut in seri dixi. Cum incubant, hordeum iis intritum in aqua apponendum.

If this herb is not available, barley or other grain is to be given. When it is the time of farrago, it is to be given, as I said under seris. When they are brooding, barley for them, bruised in water, must be set out.

Pullis primum biduo polenta aut hordeum apponitur, tribus proximis nasturtium viride consectum minutatim ex aqua in vas aliquod. Cum autem sunt inclusi in haras aut speluncas, ut dixi, viceni, obiciunt iis polentam hordeaceam aut farraginem herbamve teneram aliquam concisam. Ad saginandum eligunt pullos circiter sesquimensem qui sunt nati; eos includunt in saginario ibique polentam et pollinem aqua madefacta dant cibum, ita ut ter die saturent.

To the goslings at first for two days polenta or barley is set before them, in the next three nasturtium, green, chopped finely with water into some vessel. But when they are shut up in pens or caves, as I said, twenty at a time, they throw to them barley polenta or a farrago, or some tender herbage chopped. For fattening they choose goslings that were born about a month and a half before; they shut them in a fattening-house and there give as food polenta and fine meal moistened with water, so that they may be filled three times a day.

Secundum cibum large ut bibant faciunt potestatem. Sic curati circiter duobus mensibus fiunt pingues. Quotienscumque sumpeserunt, locus solet purgari, quod amant locum purum neque ipsi ullum, ubi fuerunt, relincunt purum.

After the meal they give ample permission to drink. Thus cared for, in about two months they become fat. Whenever they have taken food, the place is wont to be cleansed, because they love a clean place, and they themselves leave no place clean where they have been.

XI.

11.

Qui autem volunt greges anatium habere ac constituere nessotrophion, primum locum, quoi est facultas, eligere oportet palustrem, quod eo maxime delectantur; si id non, potissimum ibi, ubi sit naturalis aut lacus aut stagnum aut manu facta piscina, quo gradatim descendere possint. Saeptum altum esse oportet, ubi versentur, ad pedes quindecim, ut vidistis ad villam Sei, quod uno ostio claudatur. Circum totum parietem intrinsecus crepido lata, in qua secundum parietem sint tecta cubilia, ante ea vestibulum earum exaequatum tectorio opere testaceo.

Those, however, who wish to have flocks of ducks and to establish a nessotrophion, ought first—if one has the means—to choose a marshy place, because they take especial delight in that; if not, then preferably in a place where there is a natural lake or pool or a man-made fishpond, to which they can descend by steps. The enclosure where they range about ought to be high, up to 15 feet, as you saw at the villa of Seius, and it should be closed by a single doorway. Along the whole wall on the inside there should be a wide crepidō (ledge), on which, along the wall, there are roofed sleeping-places; before these, their vestibule leveled with plasterwork of brick (tile).

In eo perpetua canalis, in quam et cibus imponitur iis et immittitur aqua; sic enim cibum capiunt. Omnes parietes tectorio levigantur, ne faeles aliave quae bestia introire ad nocendum possit, idque saeptum totum rete grandibus maculis integitur, ne eo involare aquila possit neve evolare anas. Pabulum iis datur triticum, hordeum, vinacei, non numquam etiam ex aqua cammari et quaedam eius modi aquatilia.

In it there is a permanent channel, into which both food is set for them and water is let in; for thus they take food. All the walls are smoothed with plaster, lest a cat or any other beast can enter to do harm, and that whole enclosure is covered with a net of large meshes, lest an eagle be able to fly in there and lest a duck fly out. Fodder is given them—wheat, barley, grape-pressings, and sometimes also from the water prawns/shrimps and certain aquatic things of that sort.

Quae in eo saepto erunt piscinae, in eas aquam large influere oportet, ut semper recens sit.

The pools that will be in that enclosure ought to have water flowing in copiously, so that it is always fresh.

Sunt item non dissimilia alia genera, ut querquedulae, phalarides, sic perdices, quae, ut Archelaus scribit, voce maris audita concipiunt. Quae, ut superiores, neque propter fecunditatem neque propter suavitatem saginantur et sic pascendo fiunt pingues. Quod ad villaticarum pastionum primum actum pertinere sum ratus, dixi.

There are likewise other kinds not dissimilar, such as teals, coots, and so partridges, which, as Archelaus writes, conceive upon the voice of the male being heard. These, like the foregoing, are fattened neither for fecundity nor for suavity, and thus by feeding they become fat. What I judged to pertain to the first act of villatic pasturings, I have said.

XII.

12.

Interea redit Appius, et percontati nos ab illo et ille a nobis, quid esset dictum ac factum. Appius, Sequitur, inquit, actus secundi generis adficticius ad villam qui solet esse, ac nomine antico a parte quadam leporarium appellatum. Nam neque solum lepores in eo includuntur silva, ut olim in iugero agelli aut duobus, sed etiam cervi aut capreae in iugeribus multis.

Meanwhile Appius returns, and both we questioned him and he us, as to what had been said and done. Appius says, “There follows the adfectitious act of the second kind at the villa which is wont to exist, and by an ancient name, from a certain part, it is called a leporarium. For not only are hares enclosed in it with a wood, as once on one or two iugera of a small field, but also stags or roe-deer on many iugera.”

Quintus Fulvius Lippinus dicitur habere in Tarquiniensi saepta iugera quadraginta, in quo sunt inclusa non solum ea quae dixi, sed etiam oves ferae, etiam hoc maius hic in Statoniensi et quidam in locis aliis; in Gallia vero transalpina T. Pompeius tantum saeptum venationis, ut circiter passum locum inclusum habeat. Praeterea in eodem consaepto fere habere solent cocliaria atque alvaria atque etiam dolia, ubi habeant conclusos glires. Sed horum omnium custodia, incrementum et pastio aperta, praeterquam de apibus.

Quintus Fulvius Lippinus is said to have in the Tarquinian district enclosures of forty iugera, in which are included not only the things I have said, but even wild sheep; likewise, something even larger here in the Statonian district, and some in other places; but in Transalpine Gaul T. Pompeius has so great an enclosure for venation that he has about a mile of ground enclosed. Besides, in the same enclosure they commonly have snail-beds and apiaries and even jars, where they keep dormice confined. But the guardianship, increase, and open pasturing of all these are in the open, except in the case of the bees.

Quis enim ignorat saepta e maceriis ita esse oportere in leporario, ut tectorio tacta sint et sint alta? Alterum ne faelis aut maelis aliave quae bestia introire possit, alterum ne lupus transilire; ibique esse latebras, ubi lepores interdiu delitiscant in virgultis atque herbis, et arbores patulis ramis, quae aquilae impediant conatus. Quis item nescit, paucos si lepores, mares ac feminas, intromiserit, brevi tempore fore ut impleatur?

For who is ignorant that in a hare‑park the enclosures ought to be of rubble‑walls, so that they are touched with plaster and are high? The one, lest a cat or a badger or some other beast be able to enter; the other, lest a wolf leap across; and that there should be hiding‑places there, where the hares by day may skulk among the brushwood and grasses, and trees with spreading branches, which may impede the attempts of an eagle. Who likewise does not know that, if one has introduced a few hares, males and females, in a short time it will come to be filled?

Tanta fecunditas huius quadripedis. Quattuor modo enim intromisit in leporarium, brevi solet repleri. Etenim saepe, cum habent catulos recentes, alios in ventre habere reperiuntur.

Such is the fecundity of this quadruped. For if he has introduced only four into the hare‑warren, it is usually filled in a short time. Indeed, often, when they have newborn pups, they are found to have others in the womb.

Itaque de iis Archelaus scribit, annorum quot sit qui velit scire, inspicere oportere foramina naturae, quod sine dubio alius alio habet plura. Hos quoque nuper institutum ut saginarent plerumque, cum exceptos e leporario condant in caveis et loco clauso faciant pingues. Quorum ergo tria genera fere sunt: unum Italicum hoc nostrum pedibus primis humilibus, posterioribus altis, superiore parte pulla, ventre albo, auribus longis.

Accordingly, about these Archelaus writes that whoever wishes to know how many years old it is ought to inspect the natural orifices, since without doubt one has more than another. These too it has recently become the practice for the most part to fatten, when, after taking them out of the warren, they put them into cages and in an enclosed place make them fat. Of which, therefore, there are almost three genera: one Italic, this one of ours, with the forefeet low, the hind ones high, the upper part dusky, the belly white, the ears long.

Qui lepus dicitur, cum praegnas sit, tamen concipere. In Gallia Transalpina et Macedonia fiunt permagni, in Hispania et in Italia mediocres. Alterius generis est, quod in Gallia nascitur ad Alpis, qui hoc fere mutant, quod toti candidi sunt; ii raro perferuntur Romam.

The hare is said, when she is pregnant, nevertheless to conceive. In Transalpine Gaul and in Macedonia they become very large, in Spain and in Italy moderate. There is another kind which is born in Gaul by the Alps; they differ for the most part in this, that they are wholly white; these are rarely conveyed to Rome.

Tertii generis est, quod in Hispania nascitur, similis nostro lepori ex quadam parte, sed humile, quem cuniculum appellant. L. Aelius putabat ab eo dictum leporem a celeritudine, quod levipes esset. Ego arbitror a Graeco vocabulo antico, quod eum Aeolis leporin appellabant.

Of the third kind is that which is born in Spain, similar to our hare in a certain part, but low-slung, which they call a cuniculus (rabbit). L. Aelius thought that the hare was named from celerity, because it is light-footed. I consider it to be from an ancient Greek vocable, since the Aeolians called it leporin.

Cuniculi dicti ab eo, quod sub terra cuniculos ipsi facere solent, ubi lateant in agris. Horum omnium tria genera, si possis, in leporario habere oportet. Duo quidem utique te habere puto, quod in Hispania annis ita fuisti multis, ut inde te cuniculos persecutos credam.

Rabbits are called so from the fact that under the earth they themselves are accustomed to make burrows, where they may lie hidden in the fields. Of all these there are three kinds, which, if you can, you ought to have in a warren. Two indeed I for my part think you certainly have, since you were in Spain for so many years that I believe you to have pursued rabbits from there.

XIII.

13.

Apros quidem posse haberi in leporario nec magno negotio ibi et captivos et cicuris, qui ibi nati sint, pingues solere fieri scis, inquit, Axi. Nam quem fundum in Tusculano emit hic Varro a M. Pupio Pisone, vidisti ad bucinam inflatam certo tempore apros et capreas convenire ad pabulum, cum ex superiore loco e palaestra apris effunderetur glans, capreis victa aut quid aliud. Ego vero, inquit ille, apud Q. Hortensium cum in agro Laurenti essem.

You know, said he, Axius, that boars can indeed be kept in a hare-park, and that with no great trouble there both the captive ones and the tame, those which have been born there, are wont to grow fat. For on the farm in the Tusculan which this Varro bought from M. Pupius Piso, you have seen, at a set time, at the buccina being blown, the boars and the roe-deer come together to fodder, when from an upper place, from the palestra, acorn was poured out for the boars, for the roe-deer vetch or something else. I indeed, said he, at Q. Hortensius’s, when I was in the Laurentine country.

Ibi istuc magis thraikikos fieri vidi. Nam silva erat, ut dicebat, supra quinquaginta iugerum maceria saepta, quod non leporarium, sed therotrophium appellabat. Ibi erat locus excelsus, ubi triclinio posito cenabamus, quo Orphea vocari iussit.

There I saw that being done in a more Thracian fashion. For there was a wood, as he said, enclosed by a maceria (stone wall) of over fifty iugera, which he called not a leporarium, but a therotrophium. There there was a lofty place, where, with a triclinium set up, we were dining, which he ordered to be called “Orphea.”

Qui cum eo venisset cum stola et cithara cantare esset iussus, bucina inflavit, ut tanta circumfluxerit nos cervorum aprorum et ceterarum quadripedum multitudo, ut non minus formosum mihi visum sit spectaculum, quam in Circo Maximo aedilium sine Africanis bestiis cum fiunt venationes.

When he had come there with a stola and cithara and had been ordered to sing, he blew the buccina, with the result that so great a multitude of deer, boars, and other quadrupeds flowed around us that the spectacle seemed to me no less beautiful than when, in the Circus Maximus, the aediles’ venations are held without African beasts.

XIV.

14.

Axius, Tuas partes, inquit, sublevavit Appius, O Merula noster. Quod ad venationem pertinet, breviter secundus trasactus est actus, nec de cochleis ac gliribus quaero, quod relicum est; neque enim magnum molimentum esse potest. Non istuc tam simplex est, inquit Appius, quam tu putas, O Axi noster.

Axius, “Your part,” he said, “Appius has upheld, O our Merula. As far as the hunting pertains, briefly the second act has been transacted, nor do I ask about the snails and dormice, as to what remains; for it cannot be a great exertion.” “That is not so simple,” said Appius, “as you think, O our Axius.”

Nam et idoneus sub dio sumendus locus cochleariis, quem circum totum aqua claudas, ne, quas ibi posueris ad partum, non liberos earum, sed ipsas quaeras. Aqua, inquam, finiendae, ne fugitivarius sit parandus. Locus is melior, quem et non coquit sol et tangit ros.

For a suitable place under the open sky must be taken for the snail-pens, which you should enclose all around with water, lest, those which you have placed there for breeding, you seek not their offspring but themselves. Water, I say, ought to be the boundary, so that no escape-prone setup need be prepared. That place is better which the sun does not bake and the dew touches.

Qui si naturalis non est, ut fere non sunt in aprico loco, neque habeas in opaco ubi facias, ut sunt sub rupibus ac montibus, quorum adluant radices lacus ac fluvii, manu facere oportet roscidum. Qui fit, si adduxeris fistula et in eam mammillas imposueris tenues, quae eructent aquam, ita ut in aliquem lapidem incidat ac late dissipetur. Parvus iis cibus opus est, et is sine ministratore, et hunc, dum serpit, non solum in area reperit, sed etiam, si rivus non prohibet, parietes stantes invenit.

Which, if it is not natural—as for the most part they are not in a sunlit place—and you do not have in a shady spot where you might make it, such as under crags and mountains whose roots are washed by lakes and rivers, you must make dewy by hand. This is done if you lead in a pipe and set upon it slender nipples, which eructate water, so that it strikes upon some stone and is widely dissipated. Little food is needed for them, and that without an attendant; and this, while it creeps, it finds not only on the ground-plot, but even, if a rivulet does not hinder, it finds on standing walls.

Denique ipsae et ruminantes ad propolam vitam diu producunt, cum ad eam rem pauca laurea folia intericiant et aspergant furfures non multos. Itaque cocus has vivas an mortuas coquat, plerumque nescit. Genera cochlearum sunt plura, ut minutae albulae, quae afferuntur e Reatino, et maximae, quae de Illyrico apportantur, et mediocres, quae ex Africa afferuntur; non quo non in his regionibus quibusdam locis ac magnitudinibus sint disperiles; nam et valde amplae sunt ex Africa, quae vocantur solitannae, ita ut in eas LXXX quadrantes coici possint, et sic in aliis regionibus eaedem inter se collatae minores ac maiores.

Finally, they themselves, even ruminating, prolong life long for retail sale, provided that for that purpose they interpose a few laurel leaves and sprinkle not much bran. Thus the cook for the most part does not know whether he is cooking these alive or dead. There are several kinds of snails, such as minute whitish ones, which are brought from the Reatine country, and very large ones, which are imported from Illyricum, and middling ones, which are brought from Africa; not that in these regions they are not unlike in certain localities and sizes; for there are also very ample ones from Africa, which are called solitannae, such that into them 80 quadrantes can be thrown, and so in other regions the same kinds, when compared among themselves, are smaller and larger.

Hae in fetura pariunt innumerabilia. Earum semen minutum ac testa molli diuturnitate obdurescit. Magnis insulis in areis factis magnum bolum deferunt aeris.

These, in breeding, bring forth innumerable. Their seed is minute, and the shell, being soft, hardens with long duration. On large “islands,” with areas constructed, they bring in a great chunk of money.

Has quoque saginare solent ita, ut ollam cum foraminibus incrustent sapa et farri, ubi pascantur, quae foramina habeat, ut intrare aer possit; vivax enim haec natura.

These too they are accustomed to fatten in this way: they plaster a pot with perforations with sapa and spelt-meal, where they may be fed, which should have holes so that air can enter; for this nature is long-lived.

XV.

15.

Glirarium autem dissimili ratione habetur, quod non aqua, sed maceria locus saepitur; tota levi lapide aut tectorio intrinsecus incrustatur, ne ex ea erepere possit. In eo arbusculas esse oportet, quae ferant glandem. Quae cum fructum non ferunt, intra maceriem iacere oportet glandem et castaneam, unde saturi fiant.

However, the glirarium is kept by a dissimilar method, in that the place is fenced not by water but by a masonry wall; the whole is encrusted on the inside with smooth stone or with plaster, so that it may not be able to crawl out. In it there ought to be small trees that bear acorns. And when these do not bear fruit, acorns and chestnuts ought to lie within the wall, whence they may become sated.

Facere iis cavos oportet laxiores, ubi pullos parere possint; aquam esse tenuem, quod ea non utuntur multum et aridum locum quaerunt. Hae saginantur in doliis, quae etiam in villis habent multi, quae figuli faciunt multo aliter atque alia, quod in lateribus eorum semitas faciunt et cavum, ubi cibum constituant. In hoc dolium addunt glandem aut nuces iuglandes aut castaneam.

It is proper to make for them somewhat roomier hollows, where they can bear their young; the water should be scant, because they do not use it much and they seek a dry place. These are fattened in casks, which many also have in their villas, which the potters make very differently from the others, because in their sides they make little paths and a hollow where they may set the food. Into this cask they add acorns or walnuts or chestnuts.

Quibus in tenebris cum operculum impositum est in doleis, fiunt pingues.

When, in the vats, a lid is put on and they are in darkness, they become fat.

XVI.

16.

Appius, Igitur relinquitur, inquit, de pastione villatica tertius actus de piscinis. Quid tertius? inquit Axius.

Appius, "Therefore it remains," he said, "in villatic pasturing, the third act about fishponds." "Why 'third'?" said Axius.

An quia tu solitus es in adulescentia tua domi mulsum non bibere propter parsimoniam, nos mel neclegemus? Appius nobis, Verum dicit, inquit. Nam cum pauper cum duobus fratribus et duabus sororibus essem relictus, quarum alteram sine dote dedi Lucullo, a quo hereditate me cessa primum et primus mulsum domi meae bibere coepi ipse, cum interea nihilo minus paene cotidie in convivio omnibus daretur mulsum.

Or because you were accustomed in your adolescence at home not to drink mulsum on account of parsimony, shall we neglect honey? Appius said to us, “He speaks true.” For when, poor, I had been left with two brothers and two sisters—of whom I gave one without a dowry to Lucullus—from whom, the inheritance having come to me, for the first time I myself began to drink mulsum in my own house, while meanwhile nonetheless almost every day at the convivium mulsum was given to everyone.

Praeterea meum erat, non tuum, eas novisse volucres, quibus plurimum natura ingeni atque artis tribuit. Itaque eas melius me nosse quam te ut scias, de incredibili earum arte naturali audi. Merula, ut cetera fecit, historicos quae sequi melitturgoe soleant demonstrabit.

Moreover, it was my part, not yours, to have known those birds, to whom nature has granted very much ingenuity and art. And so, that you may know that I know them better than you, listen about their incredible natural art. Merula, as he did with the rest, will demonstrate from the historics what the melitturgi (bee-workers) are accustomed to follow.

Primum apes nascuntur partim ex apibus, partim ex bubulo corpore putrefacto. Itaque Archelaus in epigrammate ait eas esse

First, bees are born partly from bees, partly from a putrefied bovine body. And so Archelaus in an epigram says that they are

boos phthimenes peplanemena tekna,

children fashioned from a slain ox,

idem

the same

hippon men sphekes genea, moschon de melissai.

of horses, indeed, the wasps are the offspring; of calves, the bees.

Apes non sunt solitaria natura, ut aquilae, sed ut homines. Quod si in hoc faciunt etiam graculi, at non idem, quod hic societas operis et aedificiorum, quod illic non est, hic ratio atque ars, ab his opus facere discunt, ab his aedificare, ab his cibaria condere. Tria enim harum: cibus, domus, opus, neque idem quod cera cibus, nec quod mel, nec quod domus.

Bees are not solitary by nature, as eagles are, but as humans. And even if in this respect jackdaws do likewise, yet not the same, because here there is a society of work and of edifices, which is not there; here there is reason and art: from them they learn to do the work, from them to build, from them to lay up provisions. For there are three of these: food, house, work—and they are not the same: wax is not food, nor honey a house, nor is the house the work.

Non in favo sex angulis cella, totidem quot habet ipsa pedes? Quod geometrae hexagonon fieri in orbi rutundo ostendunt, ut plurimum loci includatur. Foris pascuntur, intus opus faciunt, quod dulcissimum quod est, et deis et hominibus est acceptum, quod favus venit in altaria et mel ad principia convivi et in secundam mensam administratur.

Is not the cell in the honeycomb six-angled, just as many as she herself has feet? The geometers show that the hexagon arises in the round circle, so that the greatest amount of space may be enclosed. Outside they feed; inside they make the work, which, being most sweet, is acceptable both to gods and to men, for the honeycomb comes to the altars and honey is served at the beginnings of the banquet and for the second table.

Haec ut hominum civitates, quod hic est et rex et imperium et societas. Secuntur omnia pura. Itaque nulla harum adsidit in loco inquinato aut eo qui male oleat, neque etiam in eo qui bona olet unguenta.

These are as the cities of men, in that here there is both a king and imperium and society. They pursue all things pure. And so none of these settles in a polluted place or in one that smells ill, nor even in one that smells of good unguents.

Itaque iis unctus qui accessit, pungunt, non, ut muscae, ligurriunt, quod nemo has videt, ut illas, in carne aut sanguine aut adipe. Ideo modo considunt in eis quorum sapor dulcis. Minime malefica, quod nullius opus vellicans facit deterius, neque ignava, ut non, qui eius conetur disturbare, resistat; neque tamen nescia suae imbecillitatis.

Therefore they sting whoever, anointed with such unguents, has approached; they do not, like flies, lick, since no one sees them, as one does those, on flesh or blood or fat. Therefore they only settle upon those whose savor is sweet. Hardly maleficent, because by plucking at no one’s work do they make it worse; nor slothful, so as not to resist whoever tries to disturb them; nor yet unaware of their own imbecility.

Quae cum causa Musarum esse dicuntur volucres, quod et, si quando displicatae sunt, cymbalis et plausibus numero redducunt in locum unum; et ut his dis Helicona atque Olympon adtribuerunt homines, sic his floridos et incultos natura adtribuit montes. Regem suum secuntur, quocumque it, et fessum sublevant, et si nequit volare, succollant, quod eum servare volunt. Neque ipsae sunt inficientes nec non oderunt inertes.

For which cause they are said to be the birds of the Muses, because, if ever they are displeased, with cymbals and with applauses, by measure they lead them back into one place; and as to those gods men assigned Helicon and Olympus, so to these Nature has assigned flowery and uncultivated mountains. They follow their king, wherever he goes, and they lift up the weary, and if he is unable to fly, they shoulder him beneath, because they wish to preserve him. Nor are they themselves defiling, and indeed they hate the inert.

Itaque insectantes ab se eiciunt fucos, quod hi neque adiuvant et mel consumunt, quos vocificantes plures persecuntur etiam paucae. Extra ostium alvi opturant omnia, qua venit inter favos spiritus, quam erithacen appellant Graeci. Omnes ut in exercitu vivunt atque alternis dormiunt et opus faciunt pariter et ut colonias mittunt, iique duces conficiunt quaedam ad vocem ut imitatione tubae.

Therefore, attacking, they cast out the drones, because these neither aid and they consume the honey; vociferating, many pursue them—indeed even small numbers do so. Outside the doorway of the hive they stop up (obturate) everything by which breath (air) comes between the combs, which the Greeks call “erithace.” All live as in an army and sleep by turns and do the work equally; and when they send out colonies, their leaders produce certain signals by voice in imitation of a trumpet.

Tum id faciunt, cum inter se signa pacis ac belli habeant. Sed, O Merula, Axius noster ne, dum haec audit physica, macescat, quod de fructu nihil dixi, nunc cursu lampada tibe trado.

Then they do this, when they have among themselves signs of peace and of war. But, O Merula, lest our Axius, while he listens to these physical (natural) matters, grow emaciated, since I have said nothing about the fruit (profit), now at a run I hand the torch to you.

Merula, De fructu, inquit, hoc dico, quod fortasse an tibi satis sit, Axi, in quo auctorem habeo non solum Seium, qui alvaria sua locata habet quotannis quinis milibus pondo mellis, sed etiam hunc Varronem nostrum, quem audivi dicentem duo milites se habuisse in Hispania fratres Veianios ex agro Falisco locupletis, quibus cum a patre relicta esset parva villa et agellus non sane maior iugero uno, hos circum villam totam alvaria fecisse et hortum habuisse ac relicum thymo et cytiso opsevisse et apiastro, quod alii meliphyllon, alii melissophyllon, quidam melittaenam appellant. Hos numquam minus, ut peraeque ducerent, dena milia sestertia ex melle recipere esse solitos, cum dicerent velle exspectare, ut suo potius tempore mercatorem admitterent, quam celerius alieno. Dic igitur, inquit, ubi et cuius modi me facere oporteat alvarium, ut magnos capiam fructus.

Merula, “About the profit,” he says, “this I say, which perhaps whether it will be enough for you, Axius, I have as author not only Seius, who has his apiaries leased out for 5,000 pounds of honey every year, but also this our Varro, whom I heard saying that he had in Spain two soldiers, the Veianian brothers, wealthy, from the Faliscian territory, to whom, when a small villa and a little field not indeed larger than one iugerum had been left by their father, these men made apiaries around the whole villa and had a garden and sowed the rest with thyme and cytisus and with apiastor, which some call meliphyllon, others melissophyllon, some melittaena. These men were accustomed to receive never less, so that they might share it evenly, than 10,000 sesterces from the honey, since they would say that they wished to wait, to admit a merchant at their own time rather than more quickly at another’s. Tell me, then,” he says, “where and of what sort it behooves me to make an apiary, so that I may take great profits.”

Ille, melittonas ita facere oportet, quos alii melitrophia appellant, eandem rem quidam mellaria. Primum secundum villam potissimum, ubi non resonent imagines (hic enim sonus harum fugae existimatur esse protelum), esse oportet aere temperato, neque aestate fervido neque hieme non aprico, ut spectet potissimum ad hibernos ortus, qui prope se loca habeat ea, ubi pabulum sit frequens et aqua pura. Si pabulum naturale non est, ea oportet dominum serere, quae maxime secuntur apes.

He said, one ought to make melittonae thus, which others call melitrophia, and some call the same thing mellaria. First, preferably next to the villa, where echoes do not resound (for this sound is thought to be the impelling cause of their flight), it ought to be in a temperate air, neither fervid in summer nor sunless in winter, so that it faces preferably toward the winter risings, and has near it places where forage is frequent and water pure. If natural forage is not present, the owner ought to sow those plants which bees most follow.

Ea sunt rosa, serpyllon, apiastrum, papaver, faba, lens, pisum, ocimum, cyperum, medice, maxime cytisum, quod minus valentibus utilissimum est. Etenim ab aequinoctio verno florere incipit et permanet ad alterum aequinoctium. Sed ut hoc aptissimum ad sanitatem apium, sic ad mellificium thymum.

These are the rose, serpyllon, apiastrum, poppy, bean, lentil, pea, ocimum, cyperus, medick, and especially cytisus, which is most useful for those less strong. For it begins to flower from the vernal equinox and continues to the other equinox. But as this is most apt for the health of the bees, so thyme is for mellification.

Propter hoc Siculum mel fert palmam, quod ibi thymum bonum frequens est. Itaque quidam thymum contundunt in pila et diluunt in aqua tepida; eo conspergunt omnia seminaria consita apium causa. Quod ad locum pertinet, hoc genus potissimum eligendum iuxta villam, non quo non in villae porticu quoque quidam, quo tutius esset, alvarium collocarint.

For this reason Sicilian honey wins the palm, because there good thyme is abundant. And so some bruise thyme in a mortar and dilute it in tepid water; with this they sprinkle all the seedbeds planted for the sake of the bees. As concerns the place, this sort ought especially to be chosen next to the villa, not that some have not also placed an alveary in the villa’s portico, in order that it might be safer.

Ubi sint, alii faciunt ex viminibus rutundas, alii e ligno ac corticibus, alii ex arbore cava, alii fictiles, alii etiam ex ferulis quadratas longas pedes circiter ternos, latas pedem, sed ita, ubi parum sunt quae compleant, ut eas conangustent, in vasto loco inani ne despondeant animum. Haec omnia vocant a mellis alimonio alvos, quas ideo videntur medias facere angustissimas, ut figuram imitentur earum. Vitiles fimo bubulo oblinunt intus et extra, ne asperitate absterreantur, easque alvos ita collocant in mutulis parietis, ut ne agitentur neve inter se contingant, cum in ordinem sint positae.

As to their construction, some make round ones from withies, others from wood and barks, others from a hollow tree, others earthenware, others even from ferule-stalks, square, about three feet long and a foot wide; but in such a way, when there are too few to fill them, that they narrow them, lest in a vast empty space they despond in spirit. They call all these, from the aliment of honey, hives, which for that reason they seem to make very narrow in the middle, so as to imitate their shape. The wicker ones they smear with ox-dung inside and out, lest they be driven off by roughness, and they set these hives thus on the corbels of a wall, so that they are not shaken nor touch one another, when they are placed in a row.

Sic intervallo interposito alterum et tertium ordinem infra faciunt et aiunt potius hinc demi oportere, quam addi quartum. Media alvo, qua introeant apes, faciunt foramina parva dextra ac sinistra. Ad extremam, qua mellarii favum eximere possint, opercula imponunt.

Thus, an interval interposed, they make a second and a third order below, and they say that it ought rather to be taken away from here than that a fourth be added. In the middle of the hive, where the bees may enter, they make small openings on the right and on the left. At the far end, where the mellarii can take out the honeycomb, they place little lids.

Alvi optimae fiunt corticeae, deterrimae fictiles, quod et frigore hieme et aestate calore vehementissime haec commoventur. Verno tempore et aestivo fere ter in mense mellarius inspicere debet fumigans leniter eas et ab spurcitiis purgare alvum et vermiculos eicere. Praeterea ut animadvertat ne reguli plures existant; inutiles enim fiunt propter seditiones.

The best hives are of bark, the worst are earthenware, because in winter by cold and in summer by heat these are most vehemently agitated. In the vernal and estival season the beekeeper ought almost three times in a month to inspect them, gently smoking them, and to purge the hive from foulnesses and cast out the little worms. Besides, he should take note that several kings do not exist; for they become useless on account of seditions.

Et quidam dicunt, tria genera cum sint ducum in apibus, niger ruber varius, ut Menecrates scribit, duo, niger et varius, qui ita melior, ut expediat mellario, cum duo sint in eadem alvo, interficere nigrum, cum sit cum altero rege, esse seditiosum et corrumpere alvom, quod fuget aut cum multitudine fugetur. De reliquis apibus optima est parva varia rutunda. Fur qui vocabitur, ab aliis fucus, est ater et lato ventre.

And some say that, since there are three kinds of leaders among bees—black, red, variegated—yet, as Menecrates writes, there are two, the black and the variegated; and the variegated is so much the better that it is expedient for the apiarist, when two are in the same hive (alveary), to kill the black one, since when he is with the other king he is seditious and corrupts the hive, because he either flees, or is driven to flee, with the multitude. Of the remaining bees, the best is the small, variegated, rounded one. The one that will be called “thief,” by others “drone,” is black and with a broad belly.

Vespa, quae similitudinem habet apis, neque socia est operis et nocere solet morsu, quam apes a se secernunt. Hae differunt inter se, quod ferae et cicures sunt. Nunc feras dico, quae in silvestribus locis pascitant, cicures, quae in cultis.

The wasp, which has a similarity to the bee, is not a companion in work and is wont to harm with its bite, which the bees separate from themselves. These differ among themselves, in that there are wild and tame. Now I call wild those which feed in woodland places, tame those which in cultivated (places).

Silvestres minores sunt magnitudine et pilosae, sed opifices magis.

The woodland ones are smaller in magnitude and hairy, but more efficient as workers.

In emendo emptorem videre oportet, valeant an sint aegrae. Sanitatis signa, si sunt frequentes in examine et si nitidae et si opus quod faciunt est aequabile ac leve. Minus valentium signa, si sunt pilosae et horridae, ut pulverulentae, nisi opificii eas urget tempus; tum enim propter laborem asperantur ac marcescunt.

In buying, the purchaser ought to observe whether they are strong or are sickly. Signs of soundness: if they are numerous in the swarm, and if they are shining, and if the work which they do is equable and light. Signs of the less-robust: if they are hairy and bristly, as if dusty—unless the time of the workmanship presses them; for then on account of the toil they grow rough and wither.

Si transferendae sunt in alium locum, id facere diligenter oportet et tempora, quibus id potissimum facias, animadvertendum et loca, quo transferas, idonea providendum: tempora, ut verno potius quam hiberno, quod hieme difficulter consuescunt quo translatae manere, itaque fugiunt plerumque. Si e bono loco transtuleris eo, ubi idonea pabulatio non sit, fugitivae fiunt. Nec, si ex alvo in alvum in eodem loco traicias, neglegenter faciendum, sed et in quam transiturae sint apes, ea apiastro perfricanda, quod inlicium hoc illis, et favi melliti intus ponendi a faucibus non longe, ne, cum animadverterint aut inopiam esse *** habuisse dicit.

If they must be transferred into another place, that ought to be done diligently, and the times at which you should especially do this must be observed, and suitable places to which you transfer them must be provided: the times, so that rather in the vernal than the hibernal season, because in winter they with difficulty grow accustomed to remain where they have been transferred, and so for the most part they flee. If you transfer them from a good place to one where there is not suitable pasturage, they become fugitive. Nor, if you move them from hive into hive in the same place, should it be done negligently, but both the hive into which the bees are to pass should be rubbed with apiastrum (for this is a lure to them), and honeyed combs should be placed inside not far from the entrance, lest, when they have noticed either that there is a lack of *** he says they have had.

Is ait, cum sint apes morbidae propter primoris vernos pastus, qui ex floribus nucis graecae et cornus fiunt, coeliacas fieri atque urina pota reficiendas. Propolim vocant, e quo faciunt ad foramen introitus protectum ante alvum maxime aestate. Quam rem etiam nomine eodem medici utuntur in emplastris, propter quam rem etiam carius in sacra via quam mel venit.

He says that, since bees are sickly because of the earliest vernal feedings, which are made from the flowers of the walnut (the Greek nut) and the cornel, they become coeliac and must be restored by having urine drunk. They call it propolis, with which they make the entrance-hole protected before the hive, especially in summer. This substance, under the same name, physicians also use in plasters, on account of which it even fetches a higher price on the Sacred Way than honey.

Erithacen vocant, quo favos extremos inter se conglutinant, quod est aliud melle et propoli; itaque in hoc vim esse illiciendi. Quocirca examen ubi volunt considere, eum ramum aliamve quam rem oblinunt hoc admixto apiastro. Favus est, quem fingunt multicavatum e cera, cum singula cava sena latera habeant, quot singulis pedes dedit natura.

They call it Erithace, with which they glue together the endmost honeycombs among themselves, which is something other than honey and propolis; and thus in this there is a force of luring. Wherefore, where they want the swarm to settle, they smear that branch or some other thing with this, mixed with apiastum. A honeycomb is what they fashion many-celled out of wax, since each single cell has six sides, as many as nature has given feet to the individual.

Neque quae afferunt ad quattuor res faciendas, propolim, erithacen, favum, mel, ex iisdem omnibus rebus carpere dicunt. Simplex, quod e malo punico et asparago cibum carpant solum, ex olea arbore ceram, e fico mel, sed non bonum. Duplex ministerium praeberi, ut e faba, apiastro, cucurbita, brassica ceram et cibum; nec non aliter duplex quod fit e malo et piris silvestribus, cibum et mel; item aliter duplex quod e papavere, ceram et mel.

Nor do they say that what they bring for making four products—propolis, erithace, honeycomb, honey—they gather from all the same sources. Single: that from the pomegranate and asparagus they pluck only food; from the olive tree, wax; from the fig, honey—but not good. A double service is furnished, as from the bean, bee-wort, gourd, and cabbage: wax and food; and likewise another sort of double which is made from the apple and wild pears: food and honey; likewise another double which from the poppy: wax and honey.

Triplex ministerium quoque fieri, ut ex nuce Graeca et e lapsano cibum, mel, ceram. Item ex aliis floribus ita carpere, ut alia ad singulas res sumant, alia ad plures, nec non etiam aliud discrimen sequantur in carptura aut eas sequatur, ut in melle, quod ex alia re faciant liquidum mel, ut e siserae flore, ex alia contra spissum, ut e rore marino; sic ex alia re, ut e fico mel insuave, e cytiso bonum, e thymo optimum. Cibi pars quod potio et ea iis aqua liquida, unde bibant esse oportet, eamque propinquam, quae praeterfluat aut in aliquem lacum influat, ita ut ne altitudine escendat duo aut tres digitos; in qua aqua iaceant testae aut lapilli, ita ut exstent paulum, ubi adsidere et bibere possint.

A threefold ministry also is made, so that from the Greek nut and from Lapsana there are food, honey, wax. Likewise from other flowers they harvest in such a way that from some they take for single uses, from others for several, and indeed they also follow another distinction in the gathering, or it follows upon them, as in honey: that from one thing they make liquid honey, as from the flower of sisera, from another, on the contrary, thick, as from rosemary; so from another thing, as from the fig, honey unsavory, from Cytisus good, from thyme the best. Part of food is that which is drink, and that for them must be liquid water, from which they may drink, and it must be near, which flows past or flows into some pool, such that it does not rise in depth by two or three fingers; in which water there should lie potsherds or little stones, such that they stand out a little, where they may sit and drink.

In quo diligenter habenda cura ut aqua sit pura, quod ad mellificium bonum vehementer prodest. Quod non omnis tempestas ad pastum prodire longius patitur, praeparandus his cibus, ne tum melle cogantur solo vivere aut relinquere exinanitas alvos. Igitur ficorum pinguium circiter decem pondo decoquont in aquae congiis sex, quas coctas in offas prope apponunt.

In this matter diligent care must be taken that the water be pure, which greatly profits good honey-making. Since not every weather permits them to go out farther to pasture, food must be prepared for them, lest then they be compelled to live on honey alone or to leave their hives emptied. Therefore they boil down about 10 pounds of rich figs in six congii of water, and when cooked they set them nearby in lumps.

Alii aquam mulsam in vasculis prope ut sit curant, in quae addunt lanam puram, per quam sugant, uno tempore ne potu nimium impleantur aut ne incidant in aquam. Singula vasa ponunt ad alvos, haec supplentur. Alii uvam passam et ficum cum pisierunt, affundunt sapam atque ex eo factas offas apponunt ibi, quo foras hieme in pabulum procedere tamen possint.

Others take care that honeyed water (mulsum) be near in little vessels, into which they add clean wool, through which they may suck, so that at one time they be not overfilled with drink nor fall into the water. They place single vessels at the hives; these are replenished. Others, when they have pounded dried grapes and figs, pour on sapa (boiled must) and set down cakes made from it there, in a spot from which they can nevertheless go forth outside in winter for provender.

Cum examen exiturum est, quod fieri solet, cum adnatae prospere sunt multae ac progeniem ut coloniam emittere volunt, ut olim crebro Sabini factitaverunt propter multitudinem liberorum, huius quod duo solent praeire signa, scitur: unum, quod superioribus diebus, maxime vespertinis, multae ante foramen ut uvae aliae ex aliis pendent conglobatae; alterum, quod, cum iam evolaturae sunt aut etiam inceperunt, consonant vehementer, proinde ut milites faciunt, cum castra movent. Quae primum exierunt, in conspectu volitant reliquas, quae nondum congregatae sunt, respectantes, dum conveniant. A mellario cum id fecisse sunt animadversae, iaciundo in eas pulvere et circumtinniendo aere perterritae, quo volunt perducere, non longe inde oblinunt erithace atque apiastro ceterisque rebus, quibus delectantur.

When a swarm is about to go out, which is wont to happen when many have been born successfully and they wish to emit progeny as a colony, as once the Sabines often used to do because of the multitude of children, this is known because two signs are accustomed to go before it: one, that on the preceding days, especially in the evenings, many hang before the entrance, conglobated like grapes, one bunch from another; the second, that, when they are now about to fly out or have even begun, they resound vehemently, just as soldiers do when they move camp. Those which first have gone out fly about in sight, looking back at the rest, which are not yet congregated, until they come together. When they have been noticed by the beekeeper to have done this, terrified by his throwing dust upon them and by ringing bronze around them, he leads them where he wishes; not far from there they smear with erithace and apiastros and other things with which they are delighted.

Ubi consederunt, afferunt alvum eisdem inliciis litam intus et prope apposita fumo leni circumdato cogunt eas intrare. Quae in novam coloniam cum introierunt, permanent adeo libenter, ut etiam si proximam posueris illam alvum, unde exierunt, tamen novo domicilio potius sint contentae.

When they have settled, they bring a hive smeared within with the same enticements, and, placed near and with a gentle smoke drawn around, they compel them to enter. When they have gone into the new colony, they remain so willingly that even if you were to set close by that hive from which they went out, nevertheless they would rather be content with the new domicile.

Quod ad pastiones pertinere sum ratus quoniam dixi, nunc iam, quoius causa adhibetur ea cura, de fructu dicam. Eximendorum favorum signum sumunt ex ipsis uiris alvos habeat nem congerminarit coniecturam capiunt, si intus faciunt bombum et, cum intro eunt ac foras, trepidant et si, opercula alvorum cum remoris, favorum foramina obducta videntur membranis, cum sint repleti melle. In eximendo quidam dicunt oportere ita ut novem partes tollere, decumam relinquere; quod si omne eximas, fore ut discedant.

Since I have said what I thought to pertain to feedings, now at last, for whose sake that care is applied, I will speak about the fruit. For the removing of the honeycombs they take the sign from the bees themselves; they form a conjecture whether the hive has fully compacted, if inside they make a bombinating hum and, when they go in and out, they are in trepidation; and if, when you have removed the lids of the hives, the apertures (foramina) of the combs seem overlaid with membranes, when they are filled with honey. In the removing, some say it is proper thus: to take nine parts, to leave the tenth; but if you remove the whole, it will come to pass that they depart.

Alii hoc plus relincunt, quam dixi. Ut in aratis qui faciunt restibiles segetes, plus tollunt frumenti ex intervallis, sic in alvis, si non quotannis eximas aut non aeque multum, et magis his assiduas habeas apes et magis fructuosas. Eximendorum favorum primum putant esse tempus vergiliarum exortu, secundum aestate acta, antequam totus exoriatur arcturus, tertium post vergiliarum occasum, et ita, si fecunda sit alvos, ut ne plus tertia pars eximatur mellis, reliquum ut hiemationi relinquatur; sin alvus non sit fertilis, ne quid eximatur.

Others leave more than I said. As in arable fields those who make restible crops take off more grain from the intervals, so in the hives, if you do not remove every year or not equally much, you will have the bees more assiduous and more fructuous. They reckon the first time for removing the combs to be at the rising of the Vergiliae (Pleiades), the second when summer is spent, before Arcturus has wholly risen, the third after the setting of the Vergiliae; and thus, if the hive be fecund, that not more than a third part of the honey be taken out, the remainder to be left for wintering; but if the hive be not fertile, that nothing be removed.

Exemptio cum est maior, neque universam neque palam facere oportet, ne deficiant animum. Favi qui eximuntur, siqua pars nihil habet aut habet incunatum, cultello praesicatur. Providendum ne infirmiores a valentioribus opprimantur, eo enim minuitur fructus; itaque imbecilliores secretas subiciunt sub alterum regem.

When the extraction is greater, one ought neither to do it entire nor openly, lest they lose heart. The combs which are taken out, if any part has nothing or has brood, are trimmed off with a little knife. Care must be taken that the weaker are not oppressed by the stronger, for thereby the fruit is diminished; and so they place the feebler ones apart, under another king.

Quae crebrius inter se pugnabant, aspargi eas oportet aqua mulsa. Quo facto non modo desistunt pugna, sed etiam conferciunt se lingentes, eo magis, si mulso sunt asparsae, quo propter odorem avidius applicant se atque obstupescunt potantes. Si ex alvo minus frequentes evadunt ac subsidit aliqua pars, subfumigandum et prope apponendum bene olentium herbam maxime apiastrum et thymum.

Those which more frequently were fighting among themselves ought to be sprinkled with honeyed water. With this done, they not only desist from the fight, but even crowd together, licking; all the more if they have been sprinkled with mulsum, whereby, on account of the odor, they press themselves more eagerly and grow dazed while drinking. If from the hive they come out less numerous and some part settles down, it should be slightly fumigated, and a well‑scented herb should be set nearby, especially apiastrum and thyme.

Providendum vehementer ne propter aestum aut propter frigus dispereant. Si quando subito imbri in pastu sunt oppressae aut frigore subito, antequam ipsae providerint id fore, quod accidit raro ut decipiantur, et imbris guttis uberibus offensae iacent prostratae, ut efflictae, colligendum eas in vas aliquod et reponendum in tecto loco ac tepido, proximo die quam maxime tempestate bona cinere facto e ficulneis lignis infriandum paulo plus caldo quam tepidiore. Deinde concutiendum leviter ipso vaso, ut manu non tangas, et ponendae in sole.

It must be seen to vehemently, lest they perish because of heat or because of cold. If ever they are suddenly overwhelmed in pasture by a shower or by a sudden chill, before they themselves have provided for that it would be so—which happens rarely, that they are deceived—and, struck by the copious drops of the rain, they lie prostrate, as if dashed down, they must be collected into some vessel and put back in a roofed and warm place; on the next day, the weather being as good as possible, ash made from fig-wood is to be rubbed in upon them, a little more warm than tepid. Then the vessel itself should be shaken lightly, so that you do not touch them with your hand, and they are to be set in the sun.

Quae enim sic concaluerunt, restituunt se ac revivescunt, ut solet similiter fieri in muscis aqua necatis. Hoc faciendum secundum alvos, ut reconciliatae ad suum quaeque opus et domicilium redeant.

For those that have thus been warmed, they restore themselves and revive, as it is wont similarly to happen in flies killed by water. This must be done alongside the hives, so that, once reconciled, each may return to its own work and domicile.

XVII.

17.

Interea redit ad nos Pavo et, Si vultis, inquit, ancoras tollere, latis tabulis sortitio fit tribuum, ac coepti sunt a praecone recini, quem quaeque tribus fecerit aedilem. Appius confestim surgit, ut ibidem candidato suo gratularetur ac discederet in hortos. Merula, Tertium actum de pastionibus villaticis postea, inquit, tibi reddam, Axi.

Meanwhile Pavo returns to us and says, “If you wish, weigh anchors,” and with broad tablets the casting of lots of the tribes is done, and they began to be recited by the herald, which aedile each tribe had made. Appius immediately rises, so that there on the spot he might congratulate his candidate and depart to the gardens. Merula, “The third act on villatic pasturings I will render to you afterward, Axius,” he says.

Consurgentibus illis, Axius mihi respectantibus nobis, quod et candidatum nostrum venturum sciebamus, Non laboro, inquit, hoc loco discessisse Merulam. Reliqua enim fere mihi sunt nota, quod, cum piscinarum genera sint duo, dulcium et salsarum, alterum apud plebem et non sine fructu, ubi Lymphae aquam piscibus nostris villaticis ministrant; illae autem maritimae piscinae nobilium, quibus Neptunus ut aquam et piscis ministrat, magis ad oculos pertinent, quam ad vesicam, et potius marsippium domini exinaniunt, quam implent. Primum enim aedificantur magno, secundo implentur magno, tertio aluntur magno.

As they were rising, Axius said to me, with us looking back, since we also knew that our candidate would be coming, “I do not trouble myself that Merula has departed at this point. For the rest are almost known to me, since, as the kinds of fishponds are two, of fresh and of salt, the former is with the common folk and not without profit, where the Lymphae supply water to our villatic fishes; but those maritime fishponds of the nobles, for which Neptune, as it were, supplies both water and fish, pertain more to the eyes than to the belly, and rather empty the master’s purse than fill it. For first they are built at great expense, second they are stocked at great expense, third they are maintained at great expense.”

Hirrus circum piscinas suas ex aedificiis duodena milia sestertia capiebat. Eam omnem mercedem escis, quas dabat piscibus, consumebat. Non mirum; uno tempore enim memini hunc Caesari duo milia murenarum mutua dedisse in pondus et propter piscium multitudinem quadragies sestertio villam venisse.

Hirrus was taking 12,000 sesterces from the buildings around his fishponds. He consumed all that rent on the feeds which he gave to the fish. No wonder; at one time I remember this man to have given to Caesar as a loan 2,000 moray eels, by weight, and on account of the multitude of fish his villa came for sale at 4,000,000 sesterces.

Quae nostra piscina mediterranea ac plebeia recte dicitur dulcis et illa amara; quis enim nostrum non una contentus est hac piscina? Quis contra maritumas non ex piscinis singulis coniunctas habet pluris? Nam ut Pausias et ceteri pictores eiusdem generis loculatas magnas habent arculas, ubi discolores sint cerae, sic hi loculatas habent piscinas, ubi dispares disclusos habeant pisces, quos, proinde ut sacri sint ac sanctiores quam illi in Lydia, quos sacrificanti tibi, Varro, ad tibicinem gregatim venisse dicebas ad extremum litus atque aram, quod eos capere auderet nemo, cum eodem tempore insulas Lydorum ibi choreuousas vidisses, sic hos piscis nemo cocus in ius vocare audet.

Our fishpond, inland and plebeian, is rightly called sweet, and that one bitter; for who among us is not content with this one fishpond? Who, on the contrary, of those with maritime ones does not have several, joined together out of single pools? For just as Pausias and the other painters of the same kind have large compartmented little boxes, where the waxes are multicolored, so these men have compartmented fishponds, where they keep disparate fishes shut apart—fishes which, as though they were sacred and more sanctified than those in Lydia (those whom, as you said, Varro, while you were sacrificing, came in a flock to the flute-player at the farthest shore and at the altar, because no one dared to seize them, while at the same time you saw the islands of the Lydians there dancing in chorus)—so no cook dares to call these fishes into court—into the jus.

Quintus Hortensius, familiaris noster, cum piscinas haberet magna pecunia aedificatas ad Baulos, ita saepe cum eo ad villam fui, ut illum sciam semper in cenam pisces Puteolos mittere emptum solitum. Neque satis erat eum non pasci e piscinis, nisi etiam ipse eos pasceret ultro ac maiorem curam sibi haberet, ne eius esurirent mulli, quam ego habeo, ne mei in Rosea esuriant asini, et quidem utraque re, et cibo et potione, cum non paulo sumptuosius, quam ego, ministraret victum. Ego enim uno servulo, hordeo non multo, aqua domestica meos multinummos alo asinos; Hortensius primum qui ministrarent piscatores habebat complures, et ei pisciculos minutos aggerebant frequenter, qui a maioribus absumerentur.

Quintus Hortensius, our familiar friend, when he had fishponds built with great money at Baulos, I was so often with him at the villa that I know he was always accustomed to send to Puteoli to buy fish for dinner. Nor was it enough that he did not feed from his fishponds, unless he also himself fed them besides, and had greater care that his mullets not hunger than I have that my donkeys at Rosea not hunger, and indeed in both respects, both food and drink, since he supplied their victuals by no small measure more sumptuous than I. For I, with one little servant, with not much barley, with domestic water, feed my donkeys worth many coins; Hortensius, first, had several fishermen to minister to them, and they frequently piled up to them tiny little fishes, which were consumed by the larger ones.

Praeterea salsamentorum in eas piscinas emptum coiciebat, cum mare turbaret ac per tempestatem macellum piscinarum obsonium praeberet neque everriculo in litus educere possent vivam saginam, plebeiae cenae piscis. Celerius voluntate Hortensi ex equili educeres redarias, ut tibi haberes, mulas, quam e piscina barbatum mullum. Atque, ille inquit, non minor cura erat eius de aegrotis piscibus, quam de minus valentibus servis.

Moreover, he would cast purchases of salt-fish into those fishponds, when the sea was rough and, during a storm, the market supplied provisions for the fishponds, and they could not with a drag-net bring to shore live feed—the fish of a plebeian dinner. More quickly, with Hortensius’s will, you would lead out from the stable carriage-mules, to have for yourself, than from the fishpond a bearded mullet. And, he says, his care was no less for sick fishes than for servants of lesser strength.

Itaque minus laborabat ne servos aeger aquam frigidam, quam ut recentem biberent sui pisces. Etenim hac incuria laborare aiebat M. Lucullum ac piscinas eius despiciebat, quod aestuaria idonea non haberet, ac reside aqua in locis pestilentibus habitarent pisces eius; contra ad Neapolim L. Lucullum, posteaquam perfodisset montem ac maritumum flumen immisisset in piscinas, qui reciproce fluerent ipsae, Neptuno non cedere de piscatu. Factum esse enim ut amicos pisces suos videatur propter aestus eduxisse in loca frigidiora, ut Apuli solent pecuarii facere, qui per calles in montes Sabinos pecus ducunt.

Therefore he was less troubled that a sick slave drink cold water than that his own fish drink it fresh. For he used to say that Marcus Lucullus suffered from this neglect and he looked down on his fishponds, because he did not have suitable estuaries, and his fish dwelt with stagnant water in pestilent places; by contrast, at Naples Lucius Lucullus, after he had tunneled through a mountain and had let a sea‑river into the fishponds so that they themselves might flow reciprocally, did not yield to Neptune in fishing. For it came about that he seems, on account of the tides, to have led out his friendly fish into cooler places, as Apulian herdsmen are wont to do, who lead their herd along by‑paths into the Sabine mountains.

In Baiano autem aedificans tanta ardebat cura, ut architecto permiserit vel ut suam pecuniam consumeret, dummodo perduceret specus e piscinis in mare obiecta mole, qua aestus bis cotidie ab exorta luna ad proximam novam introire ac redire rursus in mare posset ac refrigerare piscinas.

But while building at Baiae he burned with such care that he allowed the architect even to consume his own money, provided that he would conduct a tunnel from the fishponds into the sea with a thrown-up mole, by which the tide, twice daily from the moon’s rising to the next new moon, might enter and return again into the sea and refrigerate the fishponds.

Nos haec. At strepitus ab dextra et cum lata candidatus noster designatus aedilis in villam. Cui nos occedimus et gratulati in Capitolium persequimur.

We said these things. But a clatter arose from the right, and with a large following our candidate, the aedile-designate, entered the villa. We go to meet him and, having offered congratulations, we escort him to the Capitol.

Illi inde endo suam domum, nos nostram, o Pinni noster, sermone de pastione villatica summatim hoc, quem exposui, habito.

They, from there, into their own house; we to ours, O our Pinnius, the discourse on villatic pasturage having been held summarily in this fashion which I have expounded.