Delphi Complete Works of Varro

by Marcus Terentius Varro

Here Atticus looked around as if to enquire whether he had omitted any thing.

  “This is the silence,” said I, “which summons another player on the boards.”

  Of shepherds

  X. “The rest of this act,” I added, “relates to how many and what kind of shepherds are necessary.”

  Cossinius took the cue. “For large cattle,” he said, “men of full age are required; for small cattle boys will do: but in either case those who drive their flocks and herds on the drift ways must be stouter than those who remain on the farm and return to the steading every day.

  “So in the wood pastures (saltus) it behooves one to have young men and usually armed men, while on the farm boys or even girls may tend the flock. Those who use the distant feeding grounds should require their shepherds to feed their flocks together all day, but at night to remain each one with his own flock. They should all be under the supervision of one flock master, who should be older and more experienced than the others, because they will obey more cheerfully one who surpasses them in age and knowledge; and yet the flock master should be of such years that he may not be prevented by age from hard work: for neither old men nor boys can endure the steeps of the drift ways, nor the ardours and roughness of the mountains, which must be suffered by those who follow flocks, especially cattle and goats, to whom the rocks and the forests are pleasant grazing places.

  “So far as concerns the conformation of the men chosen for these occupations, they should be strong and swift and active, with ready limbs not only able to follow the cattle but to defend them from the incursions of wild beasts and of brigands: men who can load the packs on the sumpter beasts: can run and throw a javelin.107

  “Every nation is not fit for tending cattle, especially the Basculi and the Turduli [of Spain]. The Gauls are the best of all, particularly for draught cattle.

  “In the matter of the purchase of shepherds, there are six usual methods of obtaining lawful title to a slave: (i) by inheritance, (2) by due form of mancipation, which is delivery of possession by one who has the legal right, (3) by the legal process called surrender in court (cessio in jure) from one who has that right, the transfer taking place where it should, (4) by prescriptive use (usucapion), (5) by purchase of a prisoner of war “under the crown” (6) by auction at the distribution of some one’s property by order of court under the process known as bonorum emptio.108

  “The peculium or personal property of the slave usually passes with him to a new master unless it is specially excepted in the terms of sale: there is also the usual guaranty as to the health of the slave and that he has committed no theft or tort for which his master is legally responsible, and, unless the purchase is by mancipation, the bargain is bound by an obligation of double indemnity, or in the amount of the purchase price alone, if that is the agreement.

  “The shepherds should take their meals separately during the day, each one with his flock, but in the evening they should meet at a common supper under the supervision of the flock master.109 It should be the duty of the flock master to see that every thing is provided which may be required by the flock or by the shepherds, chiefly the victuals for the men and medicine for the flock: for which the master should provide beasts of burden, either horses or some thing else which can carry a load on its back.

  “As to what relates to the breeding of shepherds, it is easy, so far as concerns those who remain on the farm all the time because they can have a fellow servant to wife at the farmstead, for Venus Pastoralis demands no more. Some hold that it is expedient also to furnish women110 for those who pasture the flocks in the Saltus and the forests and have no residence but find their shelter from the rain under improvised sheds: that such women following the flocks and preparing the food for the shepherds keep the men better satisfied and more devoted to their duty. But they must needs be strong though not deformed, and not less capable of work then the men themselves, as they are in many localities and as may be seen throughout Illyricum, where the women feed the flocks or carry in wood for the fire and cook the food, or keep watch over the household utensils in their cottages.

  “As to the method of raising their children, it suffices to say that the shepherd women are usually both mothers and nurses at the same time.”

  At this Cossinius looked at me and said: “I have heard you relate that, when you were in Liburnia, you saw women big with child bringing in fire wood and at the same time carrying a nursing child, or even two of them, thus putting to shame those slender reeds, the women of our class, who are wont to lie abed under mosquito bars for days at a time when they are pregnant.”

  “That is true,” I replied, “and the contrast is even more marked in Illyricum, where it often happens that a pregnant woman whose time has come will leave her work for a little while and return with a new born child which you would think she had found rather than borne.111

  “Not only this, the custom of that country permits the girls as much as twenty years of age, whom they call virgins, to go about unprotected and to give themselves to whomever they wish and to have children before marriage.”

  “As to what pertains to the health of man and beast,” resumed Cossinius, “and the leech craft which may be practised without the aid of a physician, the flock master should have the rules written down: indeed, the flock master must have some education, otherwise he can never keep his flock accounts properly.112

  “As to the number of shepherds, some make a narrow, some a broad, allowance. I have one shepherd for every eighty long wool sheep: Atticus here has one for every hundred. One can reduce the number of men required in respect of large flocks (like those containing a thousand head or more) much more readily than in respect of comparatively small flocks, like Atticus’ and mine, for I have only seven hundred head of sheep, and you, Atticus, have, I believe, eight hundred, though we are alike in providing a ram for every ten ewes. Two men are required to care for a herd of fifty mares: and each of them should have a mare broken for riding to serve as a mount in those localities where it is the custom to drive the mares to pasture, as often happens in Apulia and Lucania.”

  Of milk and cheese and wool

  XI. “And now that we have fulfilled our promise, let us go,” said

  Cossinius.

  “Not until you have added some thing,” I cried, “concerning that supplemental profit from cattle which was promised; namely, of milk and cheese and the shearing of wool.”

  So Cossinius resumed:

  “Ewes’ milk, and, after it, goats’ milk, is the most nourishing of all liquids which we drink. As a purgative, mares’ milk ranks first, and, after it, in order, asses’ milk, cows’ milk and goats’ milk, but the quality depends upon what has been fed to the cattle, upon the condition of the cattle, and upon when it is milked.

  “So far as concerns the food of the cattle, milk is nourishing which is made from barley and stover and other such kinds of dry and hard cattle food.

  “So far as concerns its purgative qualities, milk is good when made from green stuff, especially if it is grass containing plants which, taken by themselves, have a purgative effect upon the human body.

  “So far as concerns the condition of the cattle, that milk is best which comes from cattle in vigorous health and from those still young.

  “So far as concerns the time of milking, that milk is best which comes neither from a ‘stripper’ nor from a recently fresh dam.

  “The cheese made of cows’ milk is the most agreeable to the taste but the most difficult to digest: next, that of ewes’ milk, while the least agreeable in taste, but the most easily digested, is that of goats’ milk.

  “There is also a distinction between cheese when it is soft and new made and when it is dry and old, for when it is soft it is more nourishing and digestible, but the opposite is true of old and dry cheese.

  “The custom is to make cheese from the rising of the Pleiades in spring to their rising in summer, and yet the rule is not invariable, because of difference in locality and the su
pply of forage.

  “The practice is to add a quantity of rennet, equal to the size of an olive, to two congii of milk to make it curdle. The rennet taken from the stomachs of the hare and the kid is better than that from lambs, but some use as a ferment the milk of the fig tree mixed with vinegar, and some times sprinkled with other vegetable products. In parts of Greece this is called [Greek: opos], elsewhere [Greek: dakruos].”

  “I am prepared to believe,” I said, “that the fig tree standing beside the chapel of the goddess Rumina113 was planted by shepherds for the purpose you mention, for there is it the practice to make libations of milk rather than of wine or to sacrifice suckling pigs. For men used to use the word rumis or ruma where we now say mamma, signifying a teat: hence even now suckling lambs are called subrumi from the teat they suck, just as we call suckling pigs lactantes from lac, the milk that comes from the teat.”

  Cossinius resumed:

  “If you sprinkle your cheese with salt it is better to use the mineral than the marine kind.

  “Concerning the shearing of sheep, the first thing to be looked into before you begin is that the sheep are not suffering from scab or sores, as it is better to wait, if necessary, until they are cured before shearing.

  “The time to shear is between the vernal equinox and the summer solstice, when the sheep begin to sweat (it is the sweat which gives new clipped wool its name sucida). As soon as the sheep are sheared they are smeared with a mixture114 of wine and oil, some add white wax and hogs’ grease. If they are sheep which are kept blanketed, the inside of the blanket should be anointed with this mixture before it is put on again.

  “If the sheep has suffered any wound during the shearing, it should be treated with liquid tar.

  “Long wool sheep are usually sheared about the time of the barley harvest: in some places before the hay harvest.

  “Some men shear their sheep twice a year, as in hither Spain, investing double work because they think they get more wool, just as some men mow their meadows twice a year. Careful shepherds are wont to shear on a mat so as not to lose any of the wool. A clear day should be chosen for the shearing and it is usually done between the fourth and the tenth hours (10 a.m.-4 p.m.) since wool sheared in the hot sun is softer, heavier and of better colour by reason of the sweat of the sheep. Wool which has been collected and packed in bags is called vellera or velamina, words derived from vellere, to pull, whence it may be concluded that the practice of pulling wool is older than shearing. Those who pull the wool today make a practice of starving their sheep for three days before, because when they are weak the wool yields more readily.”

  “Speaking of shearing,” I said, “it is reported that the first barbers were brought into Italy from Sicily in the year 453 after the foundation of Rome (B.C. 300) by P. Ticinius Menas, as appears from the inscription in the public square of Ardea. The statues of the ancients show that formerly there were no barbers because most of them have long hair and a heavy beard.”115

  Cossinius resumed:

  “As the wool of the sheep serves to make clothes, so the hair of goats is employed: on ships, in making military engines and certain implements of industry. Certain nations, indeed, are clad in goat skins, as in Gaetulia and Sardinia. Their use for this purpose by the ancient Greeks is apparent, because old men in the tragedies are called [Greek: diphtheriai], from the fact that they were clad in goat skins: and it is the custom also in our comedies to dress rustic characters in goat skins, like the youth in the Hypobolimaeus (the Counterfeit) of Caecilius, and the old man in the Heautontimorumenos (the Self Tormentor) of Terence.

  “It is the practice to shear goats in the greater part of Phrygia because there the goats have heavy coats, of which cilicia (so called because the practice of shearing goats began in the city of that name) and other hair cloth materials of that kind are made.”

  With this Cossinius stopped, and, while he was waiting for criticism of what he had said, Vitulus’ freedman, coming into town from the gardens [of his master] turned to us and said, “I was on my way to your house to invite you to come early so as not to shorten the holiday.”

  And so, my dear Turranius Niger, we separated: Scrofa and I going to the gardens of Vitulus; the others, some home and some to see Menas.

  BOOK III

  THE HUSBANDRY OF THE STEADING

  Introduction: the antiquity of country life

  I

  There are two modes of human life, my dear Pinnius, which are manifestly as different in the time of their origin as they are in their habitat, that of the country and that of the town. Country life is much the more ancient, for time was when men lived altogether in the country and had no towns: indeed, the oldest town in Greece, according to the tradition, is the Boeotian Thebes, which was founded by King Ogyges, and in our own land that of Rome, founded by King Romulus of which now it may be affirmed with confidence, as was not possible when Ennius wrote:

  “’Tis seven hundred years, or more or less,

  Since first illustrious Rome began her sway,

  With hallowed augury.”

  Now, if it is admitted that Thebes was founded before the deluge, which is known by Ogyges’ name, its age is not more than about twenty-one hundred years: and if that period is compared with the lapse of time since men began to cultivate the land and to live in huts and hovels, knowing naught of city walls and gates, it is evident that life in the country preceded life in town by a tale of immemorial years. Nor is this to be wondered at since ‘God made the country and man made the town.’116 While the tradition is that all the arts were invented in Greece within a thousand years, there never was a time when the earth could not be cultivated. And, as life in the country is the more ancient, so it is the better life: for it was not without good reason that our ancestors were wont to plant colonies of citizens in the country, because by them they were both fed in times of peace and protected in times of war: nor was it without significance that they called both the Earth and Ceres by the common name of Mother and esteemed that those who worshipped her lead a life at once pious and useful and were the sole representatives left on earth of the race of Saturn. A proof of this is that the mysteries peculiar to the cult of Ceres were called Initia, the very name indicating that they related to the beginning of things.

  A further proof that country life was earlier than that of town is found in the name of the town of Thebes, which was bestowed from the character of its situation rather than from the name of its founder: for in the ancient language, and among the Aeolians who had their origin in Boeotia, a small hill is called tebas without the aspirate; and in the Sabine country, where Pelasgians from Greece settled, they still have the same locution: witness that hill called Tebae which stands in the Sabine country on the via Salaria not far from the mile stone of Reate. At first agriculture was conducted on so small a scale that it had little distinction, since those who followed it, being sprung from shepherds, at once sowed their corn and pastured their flocks on the same land, but as later this art grew in importance the husbandry of live stock was separated, and it befel that some men were called farmers and others shepherds.

  The art of feeding live stock should really be divided into two branches, as is not yet fully appreciated, one relating to the stock kept at the steading, the other to the stock pastured in the fields. The latter, which is designated by the name pecuaria, is well known and highly esteemed so that rich men, either lease or buy much pasture land in order to carry it on: the other, which is known as villatice, has, because it seemed to be of less importance, been treated by some as an incident of the husbandry of agriculture, when in fact it should be made a part of the husbandry of live stock: nor has it been described separately and at length by any one, so far as I know.

  And so, as I think that there are three branches of farm management which are undertaken for profit, namely: agriculture, live stock and the industries peculiar to the steading, I have planned three books, of which I have already written two, the first concerning t
he husbandry of agriculture, which I dedicated to my wife Fundania, and the second concerning the husbandry of live stock to Turranius Niger: the third, relating to the profits of those industries which are carried on at the steading, I now send herewith to you; for the fact that we are neighbours and entertain a mutual affection seems to demand that it should be dedicated to you above all others.

  Although you have a villa, which is remarkable for the beauty of its workmanship within and without, and for the splendour of its mosaic pavements, still you deem it to be bare unless you have the walls decorated also with books: so in like manner that your villa may be more distinguished by the profits you derive from it than by the character of its construction, and that I may be of assistance to that end, so far as may be, I have sent you this book, which is a summary of some conversations which we have had on the subject of what makes the perfectly equipped villa: and so I begin as follows:

  Of the definition of a Roman villa

  II. The Senator Q. Axius, my fellow tribesman, and I had cast our votes at the comitia for the election of aediles, and, although it was the heat of the day, we wished to be on hand when the candidate whom we were supporting should go home. So Axius said to me: “What would you think of taking shelter in the villa publica117 while the votes are being sorted rather than in the booth of our candidate.” “I hold,” said I, “not only with the proverb that bad advice is worst for him who gives it, but that good advice is good for both the giver and the taker.”

  And so we made our way to the villa publica, where we found Appius Claudius,118 the Augur, seated on a bench waiting for any call for his services by the Consul: on his left was Cornelius Merula (blackbird) of the Consular family of that name, and Fircellius Pavo (pea-cock) of Reate, and on his right Minutius Pica (mag-pie) and M. Petronius Passer (sparrow). When we had approached them Axius, smiling, said to Appius: “May we come into your aviary where you are sitting among the birds?”