Translated by H.Rackham (1952), with some minor alterations. Click on the L symbols to go to the Latin text of each chapter.
← Book 13
{1.} L [1] So far we have been dealing mostly with foreign trees that cannot be trained to grow elsewhere than in their place of origin and that refuse to be naturalised in strange countries. We may now speak of those common to various countries, of all of which Italy can be thought to be the special parent. Only it must be remembered by the student that for the present we are specifying their natures and not their modes of cultivation, although actually a very large factor in the nature of a tree is due to its cultivation. [2] There is one thing at which I cannot sufficiently wonder - that of some trees the very memory has perished, and even the names recorded by authors have passed out of knowledge. For who would not admit that now that intercommunication has been established throughout the world by the majesty of the Roman Empire, life has been advanced by the interchange of commodities and by partnership in the blessings of peace, and that even things that had previously lain concealed have all now been established in general use? [3] Still, it must be asserted, we do not find people acquainted with much that has been handed down by the writers of former days: so much more productive was the research of the men of old, or else so much more successful was their industry, when a thousand years ago at the dawn of literature Hesiod began putting forth rules for agriculture, and not a few writers followed him in these researches which has been a source of more toil to us, inasmuch as nowadays it is necessary to investigate not only subsequent discoveries but also those that had already been made by the men of old, because general slackness has decreed an utter destruction of records.
[4] And for this fault who can discover other causes than the general movement of affairs in the world? The fact is that other customs have come into vogue, and the minds of men are occupied about other matters: the only arts cultivated are the arts of avarice. Previously a nation's sovereignty was self-contained, and consequently the people's genius was also circumscribed; and so a certain barrenness of fortune made it a necessity to exercise the gifts of the mind, and kings innumerable received the homage of the arts, and put these riches in the front place when displaying their resources, believing that by the arts they could prolong their immortality. This was the reason why the rewards of life and also its achievements were then so abundant. [5] But later generations have been positively handicapped by the expansion of the world and by our multiplicity of resources. After senators began to be selected and judges appointed on the score of wealth, and wealth became the sole adornment of magistrate and military commander, after lack of children to succeed one began to occupy the place of highest influence and power, and legacy-hunting ranked as the most profitable profession, and the only delights consisted in ownership, the true prizes of life went to ruin, and all the arts that derived their name 'liberal' from liberty, the supreme good, fell into the opposite class, and servility began to be the sole means of advancement. [6] This deity was worshipped by different men in different manners and in different matters, although every man's prayer was directed to the same end and to hopes of possessing; indeed even men of high character everywhere preferred to cultivate the vices of others rather than the good gifts that were their own. The consequence is, I protest, that pleasure has begun to live and life itself has ceased. [7] We, however, will carry our researches even into matters that have passed out of notice, and will not be daunted by the lowliness of certain objects, any more than we were when dealing with the animals, although we see that Virgil, the prince of poets, was led by this consideration to make omissions among the resources of the garden and in those which he has recorded has only culled out the flower of his subject, happy and gracious as he is: he has only named fifteen kinds of grapes in all and three of olives and as many pears, and of apples only the Assyrian citron, neglecting all the rest.
{2.} L [8] But where can we better make a beginning than with the vine? Supremacy in respect of the vine is to such a degree the special distinction of Italy that even with this one possession she can be thought to have vanquished all the good things of the world, even in the department of scents, inasmuch as when the vine is in blossom all over the country it gives a scent that surpasses any other in fragrance.
[9] Even on account of its size the vine used in early days rightly to be reckoned as belonging to the class of trees. In the city of Populonium is to be seen a statue of Jupiter made of a single vine-stalk that has resisted decay for many ages; and similarly a bowl at Massilia; the temple of Juno at Metapontum has stood supported by pillars of vine-wood; and even at the present day we ascend to the roof of the temple of Diana at Ephesus by a staircase made from a single vine, grown it is said at Cyprus, inasmuch as vines grow to an exceptional height in that island. And no other timber lasts for longer ages. But I am inclined to believe that the things mentioned were made of the wood of the wild vine.
{3.} L [10] Our own vines are kept down by yearly pruning, and all their strength is drawn out into shoots, or else thrown downward into layers, and the only benefit these supply is that of their juice, obtained by means of a variety of methods adapted to the peculiarities of the climate and the qualities of the soil. In Campania the vines espouse the poplars, and embracing their brides and climbing with wanton arms in a series of knots among their branches, rise level with their tops, soaring aloft to such a height that a hired vintager expressly stipulates in his contract for the cost of a funeral and a grave! In fact they never stop growing; [11] and I have before now seen entire country houses and mansions encircled by the shoots and clinging tendrils of a single vine. And a thing that was considered in the first degree worthy of record also by Valerianus Cornelius is that a single vine in the Colonnades of Livia at Rome protects the open walks with its shady trellises, while at the same time it produces 12 amphorae of juice yearly.
[12] Elms indeed are everywhere overtopped by vines, and there is a story that Cineas, the ambassador of King Pyrrhus, was surprised at the height to which the vines grew at Aricia and made an amusing joke about the rather rough flavour of the wine, to the effect that the parent of it thoroughly deserved being hung on such a lofty gibbet! There is an Italian tree on the other side of the Po called the rumpotinus, or by another name the opulus, the broad circular stories of which are covered by vines which spread out with their bare snaky growth to where the tree forks and then throw out their tendrils along the upraised fingers of the branches. [13] Also vines when propped up with stakes about as tall as a man of middle height make a shaggy growth and form a whole vineyard from a cutting, by the unconscionable creeping of their rods and the rambling of their tendrils over all the empty gaps, completely filling the middle of a courtyard. So many are the different varieties that even Italy alone harbours.
In some of the provinces the vine stands by itself without any prop, gathering its limbs together inward and providing nutriment for thick growth by means of their shortness. [14] In other places this is prohibited by the wind, for instance, in Africa and in parts of the province of Narbonensis, where vines are prevented from growing beyond their pruned stumps and always resemble plants that are hoed, straying across the fields like herbaceous plants and drinking up the juice of the soil with their grapes as they go; and consequently in the interior of Africa the clusters exceed the body of an infant child in size. In no other country are the vines harsher, but nowhere else have the grapes a more agreeable firmness, which is very possibly the source of the name 'hard grape.' [15] As to varieties in respect of size, colour and flavours of the berry they are innumerable and they are actually multiplied by the varieties of wine: in one district they have a brilliant purple colour, in another a rosy glow or a glossy green tint; for grapes that are merely white and black are the common sorts. But the large-cluster grapes swell out like a breast and the finger-grapes have an exceptionally long berry. Also such is the sportiveness of nature that very large grapes have small grapes clinging to them as companions which rival them in sweetness: these are called in Greek 'small-berry' vines. [16] Some grapes will last all through the winter if the clusters are hung by a string from the ceiling, and others will keep merely in their own natural vigour by being stood in earthenware jars with casks put over them, and packed round with fermenting grape-skins; others can be given a flavour by smoke, which also adds flavour to wines, and the authority of Tiberius Caesar has caused particular glory in regard to the efficiency of smoke in this respect to attach to the forges of Africa; before his time priority at the table belonged to the Ilaetic grapes from the territory of Verona. [17] Moreover, raisins are called 'passi' from having 'endured' the sun. Grapes are also preserved in must, and so made drunk with their own wine, and some are made sweeter by being placed in must that has been boiled down; but others remain on the parent vine to await the coming of a new generation, acquiring a glassy transparency, and the astringency of pitch poured on the footstalk gives them the same durable hardness that it gives to wine in casks or jars. [18] A vine has now been discovered that of itself produces a flavour of pitch in the wine: this vine gives celebrity to the territory of Vienna by the varieties of Taburnus and of the (?) Sotani and Helvii; it has become famous only recently and was unknown in the period of the poet Virgil, who died 90 years ago. [19] Add that the vine has been introduced into the camp, and in the hand of the centurions is the mainstay of supreme authority and command and with its rich reward it lures on the laggard ranks to the tardy eagles, and even in offences it confers honour on punishment itself. Moreover it was vineyards that suggested a method for siege-trains. As for medicines, grapes hold such an important place among them that they act as remedies in themselves, merely by supplying wine.
{4.} L [20] Democritus, who professed to know all the different kinds of vines in Greece, was alone in thinking it possible for them to be counted, but all other writers have stated that there is a countless and infinite number of varieties; and the truth of this will appear more clearly if we consider the various kinds of wines. We shall not mention all of them, but the most famous, inasmuch as there are almost as many wines as there are districts, so that it will be enough to have pointed out the most celebrated kinds of wine or the ones remarkable for some special property.
[21] The highest rank is given to the vines of Aminaea, on account of the body of that wine and its life, which undoubtedly improves with age. There are five varieties of these vines; of these the 'younger sister' with a smaller berry sheds its blossom better! and can stand rain and stormy weather, which is not the case with the 'elder sister,' though this is less liable to damage when trained on a tree than when on a frame. [22] The 'twin sisters,' which have got this name because the bunches always grow in pairs, give a wine with a very rough flavour but of exceptional strength; the smaller of these 'twins' is damaged by a south wind, but the other winds give it nutriment, for instance on Mount Vesuvius and the hills of Surrentum, but in all other parts of Italy it only flourishes when trained on trees. The fifth kind is the 'woolly' grape - for, to prevent our being very much surprised at the Chinese or the Indians, it is covered with a coat of down. It ripens first of the Aminaean grapes, and decays the most quickly.
[23] The next rank belongs to the vines of Mentana, the wood of which is red, in consequence of which some people have called them the 'ruddy vines.' These produce less wine, as they have too much husk and lees, but they are very strong in resisting frost, and they suffer worse from drought than rain and from heat than cold, and consequently they hold the first place in cold and damp localities. The variety with a smaller berry is more productive, and the one with a cleft leafless.
[24] The 'bee-vine' is so called because bees are specially fond of it. It has two varieties, which also are covered with down in the young state; the difference between them is that one ripens more quickly than the other, although the latter also ripens fast. These vines do not object to cold situations, and nevertheless no others rot more quickly from rain. The wines made from them are sweet at first but acquire roughness in the course of years. In Etruria this vine flourishes more than any other.
[25] So far we assign the chief distinction to the vines peculiar and indigenous to Italy. The remaining kinds have come from abroad. From Chios or Thasos is imported a Greek light wine not inferior in quality to the Aminaean vintages; the vine has a very tender grape, and such small clusters that it does not pay to grow it except in a very rich soil. The eugenia, with its name denoting high quality, has been imported from the hills of Tauromenium to be grown only in the territory of Alba, as if transplanted elsewhere it at once degenerates: for in fact some vines have so strong an affection for certain localities that they leave all their reputation behind there and cannot be transplanted elsewhere in their full vigour. [26] This occurs also with the Rhaetian and Allobrogian grapes - the latter the grape with the flavour of pitch which we mentioned above - which are famous at home but not worth recognition elsewhere. All the same, being good bearers they make up in quantity what they lack in quality, the eugenia grape in warm localities, the Rhaetian in those with a moderate climate and the Allobrogian in cold districts, as it ripens in frost and has a black colour. [27] The wines made from the grapes so far mentioned, even from the black ones, turn to a white colour with age. The remaining vines are of no quality, although occasionally owing to the agency of climate or soil they are not disappointing when old, as in the case of the Faecenian vine, and that of which blossoms at the same time but has fewer grapes; their blossom is never liable to injury, as they do not come before the west wind of early spring and can withstand wind and rain, although they do better in cold places than in warm ones and in damp situations than in dry. [28] The visulla bears clusters of large size rather than closely packed; it cannot stand changes of weather, but lasts well against a continuous spell of cold or heat. The smaller variety of this kind is the better one. It is difficult to please in choice of soil, as in a rich soil it decays and in a thin soil it does not come on at all; its fastidiousness requires an intermediate blend of soil, and that is why it is common in the Sabine hill country. Its grapes are not attractive to look at, but have an agreeable flavour; if they are not gathered as soon as they are ripe, they will fall off even before they decay. Its hardiness and the size of the leaves protect the grapes against hailstorms.
[29] The grapes called helvolae again are remarkable for rather frequently varying in their colour, which is midway between the purple grapes and the black ones, and they have consequently been called by some people varianae. Among them the blacker kind is preferred; both kinds bear large crops every other year, though they make better wine when the crop is less abundant. Also the praecia vine has two varieties, distinguished by the size of the grape; these vines make a great deal of wood, and their bunches are most useful for storing in jars; the leaf resembles parsley. [30] The people of Dyrrachium speak highly of the balisca vine, which the Spanish provinces call coccolobis; its grapes grow in rather scanty bunches and can stand hot weather and south winds; its wine is apt to go to the head, but the yield is abundant. The Spanish provinces distinguish two kinds of this vine, one having an oblong grape and the other a round one; they gather them last of all. The sweeter the coccolobis grape is, the better it is; but even if it has a rough taste it turns sweet with age, and one that was sweet turns rough; in the last state they are held to rival the wine of Alba. [31] It is said that to drink the juice of this grape is very good for disorders of the bladder. The albuelis vine bears more fruit at the top of the trees that it is grown on, the visulla on the bottom branches; and consequently, when both are planted round the same trees, owing to this difference of habit they produce rich crops. One of the black grapes has been named 'the good-for-nothing,' though it might more properly be styled the sober, as the wine it produces is admirable, particularly when old, but though strong it has no ill effects: in fact this is the only vintage that does not cause intoxication. [32] All the other kinds of vine have the recommendation of bearing freely, and chief among them the helvennaca. Of this there are two kinds, one larger, which some people call the long helvennaca, the other smaller, called emarcus; the latter is not so prolific but produces a wine of more agreeable flavour; it is distinguished by its rounded leaf, but both kinds have a slender growth. They require to he supported on forked props, otherwise they cannot support the weight of their abundant fruit. They like a sea breeze, and dislike damp dews. [33] None of the vines love Italy less, for there it grows leafless and stunted and soon decays, and also the wine it produces will not keep beyond the summer; and no other vine is more at home in a thin soil. Graecinus, who has generally copied Cornelius Celsus, thinks that it is not the nature of this vine to which Italy is not friendly but the mode of cultivating it, as growers are too eager to make it put out shoots; the consequence of this, he says, is that it is used up by its own fertility, unless the bounty of the soil is so rich as to afford it support when it begins to droop. It is said that this vine never contracts carbuncle, which is a very valuable property, if indeed it is true that there is any vine that is exempt from the power of the climate.
[34] The spionia, called by some the thorn-vine, is able to bear heat, and is ripened by rainy weather in autumn; what is more, indeed, it is the only vine that thrives from fog, on which account it is specially grown in the district of Ravenna. The venicula is one of the best vines that shed their flowers, and its grapes are particularly well suited for preserving in jars; the people of Campania prefer to call it by the name of surcula, and others by that of scapula, while the name for it at Tarracina is Numisiana; it has no strength of its own but is entirely conditioned by the strength of the soil; all the same, as far south as Vesuvius it is very potent if kept in earthenware jars from Surrentum. [35] For at Vesuvius there is Murgentina, a very strong vine imported from Sicily, called by some Pompeiana, which only bears well in a rich soil, just as the horconia vine only flourishes in Campania. The opposite is the case with the arceraca, called in Virgil argitis, which has the property of imparting extra richness to the soil, while itself offering a very stout resistance to rain and to old age, though it will hardly produce wine every year, and its grapes are only valued for eating, but it bears exceptionally large crops. The mettica vine also stands the years, and faces all weather very strongly; it bears a black grape, and its wines acquire a reddish colour in old age.
[36] The kinds of vine mentioned so far are grown everywhere, but those remaining belong to particular districts and places, or are crosses produced by grafting one of these on another: thus among the vines of the Tuscans that of Tuder is a special variety, and also they have special names, a vine at Florentia being called sopina and some at Arretium 'mole-vine' and 'seasonal vine' and 'crossed vine.' The mole-vine has black grapes and makes a white must; the seasonal vine is a deceptive plant, giving a more admirable wine the larger crop of grapes it bears, and, remarkable to say, coming to the end of its fertility and its good quality at the same time; the crossed vine has black grapes and makes a wine that does not keep at all long, but its grape keeps a very long time, and it is gathered a fortnight later than any other variety, bearing a large crop of grapes but only good for eating. [37] The leaves of this vine, like those of the wild vine, turn a blood-red colour before they fall off; this also happens with some other vines, and is a sign of extremely inferior quality. The itriola is peculiar to Umbria and to the districts of Mevania and Picenum, and the 'dwarf-vine' to that of Amiternum. The same districts have the bananica, an unreliable vine, though people become fond of it. [38] The people of Pompeii give the name of their township to a grape, although it grows in greater quantity at Clusium; the people of Tibur also name a grape after their township, although they have lately discovered the 'olive-grape', so called from its resemblance to an olive: this is the latest grape introduced hitherto. The vinaciola grape is only known to the Sabines and the calventina to the people of Mount Gaurus. Vines transplanted from the Falernian territory are, I am aware, called 'Falernian,' but they very quickly degenerate everywhere. Some people also have made out a Surrentum variety, with a very sweet grape. [39] The 'smoke-grape,' the 'mouthful' and the tharrupia, which grow on the hills of Thurii, are not picked before there has been a frost. Pisa rejoices in the vine of Paros, and Mutina in the vine of Perusia , which has a black grape and makes a wine that within four years turns white. It is a remarkable fact that at Mutina there is a grape that turns round with the sun and is consequently called in Greek the 'revolving grape'; and that in Italy a grape from Gaul is popular, but across the Alps that of Picenum. Virgil { Georg. 2.91 ff. } mentions a Thasian vine, a Maraeotid and a Lagean, and a number of other foreign kinds that are not found in Italy.
[40] But again there are some vines which are distinguished for their grapes and not for their wine, for instance, among the hard-berry group the ambrosia grape, which needs no jars but will keep on the vine, so strong is its resistance to cold and heat and to bad weather, nor does it require a tree or stakes to support it, as it sustains its own weight, though this is not the case with the dactylis, the stalk of which is only the thickness of a finger; and among the vines with large bunches the pigeon-vine, and still more the purple 'double-bosomed' vine, [41] so called because it does not bear clusters but only secondary bunches; and also the 'three-foot vine', named from its size, and also the 'rush vine' with its shrivelled grape and the vine called the Rhaetian vine in the Maritime Alps, which is quite unlike the famous vine of that name, because this is a short-stalked vine with closely packed clusters and producing a low class of wine; but it has the thinnest skin of any grape, and a single very small stone (called chium), and one or two grapes in each bunch are exceptionally large. There is also the black Aminaean grape to which they give the name of 'Syrian grape', and also the Spanish grape, which is the most highly rated of the inferior kinds.
[42] The kind called 'table-grapes,' one of the hard-berry group, are grown on trellises - they are both white and black - and so are the 'cow's-udder' grapes, also of both colours, and those of Aegiurn and of Rhodes, not mentioned before, and the 'one-ounce' grape, apparently named from the weight of the berry, and also the 'pitch grape,' the darkest in colour of all the black grapes, and the 'garland grape', the clusters of which by a sport of nature are arranged in a wreath with leaves interspersed among the berries, and the grapes called 'market-grapes,' a very quick bearer that attracts buyers by its appearance and stands carriage well. On the other hand the ashy grape and the dusky grape and the donkey-grape are condemned even by their appearance, though this is less the case with the alopecis, which resembles a fox's brush. [43] A grape growing in the vicinity of Phalacra is called the Alexandrian grape; it is a low-growing vine with branches only a cubit long and a black grape the size of a bean, with a soft and very small stone; the clusters hang aslant and are extremely sweet; the leaf is small and round, and has no clefts. Within the last seven years there has been discovered at Alba Helvia in the province of Narbonensis a vine whose blossoms wither in a day and which is consequently extremely immune to bad weather; it is called the 'charcoal-vine,' and is now grown by the whole province.
{5.} L [44] The elder Cato, who was exceptionally celebrated for his triumph and his censorship, though yet more for his literary distinction and for the precepts that he has given to the Roman nation upon every matter of utility, and in particular as to agriculture - a man who by the admission of his contemporaries was a supremely competent and unrivalled agriculturalist - has dealt with only a few varieties of the vine, including some even the names of which are now extinct. [45] His opinion deserves to be set out separately and handled at full length, to make us acquainted with the varieties which were the most famous in the whole of this class in A.U.C. 600 { 154 B.C. }, just before the time of the taking of Carthage and Corinth, which was the period when Cato died - and to show us how great an advance civilisation has made in the subsequent 230 years. The following therefore are the remarks that he made on the subject of vines and grapes { R.R. 6.4-7.2 }: [46] 'In the locality pronounced to be best for the vine and fully exposed to the sun, you should plant the small variety of Aminian and the double eugenium, and also the small helvia. In a denser soil or a locality more liable to fog you should plant the larger Aminian or the Murgentine, the Apician, and the Lucanian. All the other varieties of vine, especially hybrids, are suited to any kind of land. The small Aminian grape and the larger one and the Apician are stored unstoned in a jar; they can also be kept in new wine boiled down and must, and properly in after-wine. The larger Aminian hard-berry grapes, which one you hang up, are properly kept, for instance at a blacksmith's forge, to make raisins. [47] Nor are there any older instructions on this subject written in Latin, so near we are to the origin of things. The Aminian grape last mentioned is called by Varro the Scantian.
In our own period there have been few instances consummate skill in this field, but it is all the more proper on that account not to omit them, so as also to make known the rewards of success, which in every department attract the greatest attention. [48] Well, the greatest distinction was achieved by Acilius Sthenelus, a plebeian, the son of a freedman, by his intensive cultivation of a vineyard of not more than 60 iugera, in the region of Mentana, which he sold for 400,000 sestertii. [49] Also Vetulenus Aegialus, he too a freedman, gained a great reputation in the district of Liternum in Campania, and a still greater reputation in public esteem on account of his cultivating the estate which had been the place of exile of Africanus; but the greatest reputation, thanks to the activity of the same Sthenelus, attached to Remmius Palaemon, also famous for his treatise on grammar, who within the last 20 years bought a farm for 600,000 sestertii in the same region of Mentana, at the turning off the main road ten miles from Rome. [50] The low price of property through all the districts just outside the city in every direction is notorious, but especially in the neighbourhood referred to, since Palaemon had bought farms that had also been let down by neglect and that were not above the average quality of soil even among those extremely poor estates. He undertook the cultivation of this property not from any high motive but at first out of vanity, for which he was known to be so remarkable; but he had the vineyards dug and trenched afresh under the superintendence of Sthenelus, and so, though only playing the part of a farmer, he finally got the estate into an almost incredibly wonderful condition, as within eight years, the vintage, while still hanging on the trees, was knocked down to a purchaser at a price of 400,000 sestertii; [51] and everybody ran to see the piles of grapes in these vineyards, while the sluggish neighbourhood vindicated itself against this discredit by the excuse of his exceptionally profound studies, and recently Annaeus Seneca, the most learned person of the day, and eminent in power which ultimately grew to excess and came crashing about his ears - a man who was at all events no admirer of frivolities - was seized with such a passionate desire for this estate that he was not ashamed to concede this victory to one whom he otherwise hated and who was sure to make the most of this advertisement, by buying the vineyards in question at four times the price Palaemon had paid for it within hardly more than ten years of its being under his management. [52] This was a method of cultivation which it would be profitable to apply to the farms of Caecubum and Setia, since even subsequently the estate has frequently produced seven sacks, that is 140 amphorae, of must to the iugerum. And to prevent anyone from supposing that the records of the days of old were beaten on this occasion, Cato also wrote that there were returns of 10 sacks to the iugerum, these instances conclusively proving that the merchant does not obtain more profit by rashly trespassing on the seas nor by going as far as the coast of the Red Sea or of the Indian Ocean to seek for merchandise, than is yielded by a diligently cultivated homestead.
{6.} L [53] The most ancient celebrity belongs to the wine of Maronea grown in the seaboard parts of Thrace, as we learn from Homer. However, we need not pursue the legendary or variously reported stories conceding its origin, except the statement that Aristaeus was the first person of all in the same nation who mixed honey with wine, because of the outstandingly agreeable quality of each of these natural products. Homer has recorded { Od. 9.209 } the mixing of Maronean wine with water in the proportion of 20 parts of water to one of wine. [54] This class of wine in the same district still retains its strength and its insuperable vigour, inasmuch as one of the most recent authors, Mucianus, who was three times consul, ascertained when actually visiting that region that it is the custom to mix with one pint of this wine eight pints of water, and that it is black in colour, has a strong bouquet, and improves in substance with age.
The Pramnian wine as well, also celebrated by Homer { Od. 10.235 } , still retains its fame. It is grown in the territory of Smyrna, in the neighbourhood of the shrine of the Mother of the Gods.
[55] Among the remaining wines no kind was particularly famous, but the year of the consulship of Lucius Opimius, when the tribune Gaius Gracchus was assassinated for stirring up the common people with seditions, was renowned for the excellence of its vintages of all kinds - the weather was so fine and bright (they call it the 'boiling' of the grape) thanks to the power of the sun, in A.U.C. 633 { 121 B.C. }; and wines of that year still survive, having kept for nearly 200 years, though they have now been reduced to the consistency of honey with a rough flavour, for such in fact is the nature of wines in their old age; and it would not be possible to drink them neat or to counteract them with water, as their over-ripeness predominates even to the point of bitterness, but with a very small admixture they serve as a seasoning for improving all other wines. [56] Assuming that by the valuation of that period their cost may be put at 100 sestertii per amphora, but that the interest on this sum has been adding up at 6 per cent. per annum, which is a legal and moderate rate, we have shown by a famous instance that in the principate of Gaius Caesar, son of Germanicus { 39 A.D. }, 160 years after the consulship of Opimius, the wine cost that amount for one-twelfth of an amphora - this appears in our biography of the bard Pomponius Secundus and the banquet that he gave to the emperor mentioned: so large are the sums of money that are kept stored in our wine-cellars! [57] Indeed there is nothing else which experiences a greater increase of value up to the twentieth yearor a greater fall in value afterwards, supposing that there is not a rise of price. Rarely indeed has it occurred hitherto and only in the case of some spendthrift's extravagance, for wine to fetch a thousand sestertii a cask. It is believed that the people of Vienna alone sell their wines flavoured with pitch, the varieties of which we have specified { 14.18 }, for a higher price, though out of patriotism they only sell it among themselves; and this wine when drunk cold is believed to be cooler than all the other kinds.
{7.} L [58] Wine has the property of heating the parts of the body inside when it is drunk and of cooling them when poured on them outside. And it will not be out of place to recall here what the famous philosopher Androcydes wrote to Alexander the Great in an attempt to restrain his intemperance: 'When you are about to drink wine, O King, remember that you are drinking the earth's blood. Hemlock is poison to a human being and wine is poison to hemlock.' If Alexander had obeyed this advice, doubtless he would not have killed his friends in his drunken fits; so that in fact we are justified in saying that there is nothing else that is more useful for strengthening the body, and also nothing more detrimental to our pleasures if moderation be lacking.
{8.} L [59] Who can doubt, however, that some kinds of wine are more agreeable than others, or who does not know that one of two wines from the same vat can be superior to the other, surpassing its relation either owing to its cask or from some accidental circumstance? And consequently each man will appoint himself judge of the question which wine heads the list. [60] Julia Augusta gave the credit for her eighty-six years of life to the wine of Pucinum, having never drunk any other. It is grown on a bay of the Adriatic not far from the source of the Timavus, on a rocky hill, where the breeze off the sea ripens enough grapes to make a few casks; and no other wine is considered more suitable for medicinal purposes. I am inclined to believe that this is the wine from the Adriatic Gulf which the Greeks have extolled with such marvellous encomiums under the name of Praetutian. [61] The deified Augustus preferred Setinum to all wines whatsoever, and so for the most part did the Emperors who came after him, owing to the verdict of experience that because injurious attacks of indigestion do not readily arise from this liquor. . . . It grows just above Forum Appii. Previously Caecuban wine had the reputation of being the most generous of all; it was grown in some poplar woods on marshy ground on the Bay of Amyclae, but the vineyard has now disappeared owing to the neglect of the cultivator and the confined area of the ground, though in a greater degree owing to the ship canal from the lake of Baiae to Ostia that was begun by Nero.
[62] The second rank belonged to the Falernian district, and in it particularly to the estate of Faustus in consequence of the care taken in its cultivation; but the reputation of this district also is passing out of vogue through the fault of paying more attention to quantity than to quality. The Falernian district begins at the Campanian bridge as you turn left to reach the Colonia Urbana of Sulla lately attached to Capua, and the Faustus estate begins about four miles from the village of Caedicium, which is about six miles from Sinuessa. No other wine has a higher rank at the present day. It is the only wine that takes light when a flame is applied to it. [63] It has three varieties, one dry, one sweet and one a light wine. Some people distinguish three vintages as follows - Caucinian growing on the tops of the hills, Faustian half-way up them, and Falernian at the bottom. It must also not be omitted that none of the grapes that produce the celebrated vintages are agreeable to eat.
[64] The third prize is attained in various degrees by the vines of Alba in the neighbourhood of the city, which are extremely sweet and occasionally dry, and also by those of Surrentum which only grow in vineyards, and which are very highly recommended for convalescents because of their thinness and health-giving qualities. The Emperor Tiberius used to say that the doctors were promoting the Surrentum vintage, but that except for that it was only a generous vinegar, and his successor the Emperor Gaius called it best quality flat wine. Its place is contested by the vineyards of Massicus and the slopes of Mount Gaurus looking towards Puteoli and Baiae. [65] For the Statana vineyards adjoining the Falernian territory unquestionably once reached the first place, and established the fact that each locality has its own period and its own rise and decline of fortune. The adjacent vintages of the Calenian hills used to be preferred to them, as were those of Fundi where the vines are grown on trellises or trained up small trees, and others from the vicinity of Rome, those of Velitrae and Privernum. As for the wine produced at Signia, it counts as a medicine, being useful as a stomachic astringent owing to its excessive dryness.
[66] For public banquets the fourth place in the race has been held from the time of the deified Julius { Caesar } onward - for he was the first person to bring them into favour, as appears from his letters - to the Mamertine vintages grown in the neighbourhood of Messana in Sicily; of these the Potitian, so called after the name of its original grower, is particularly highly spoken of - it grows in the part of Sicily nearest to Italy. In Sicily also is grown the Tauromenium vintage, which when bottled is constantly passed off for Mamertine.
[67] Among the remaining wines there are, in the vicinity of the Adriatic and Ionian Sea, the Praetutian and those grown at Ancona and the vines called sprig-vines, because they were all struck from a single chance sprig; and in the interior the wines of Caesena and those called by the name of Maecenas; also in the district of Verona the wines of Rhaetia, reckoned by Virgil { Georg. 2.95 } inferior only to Falernian; and next at the top of the Adriatic the wines of Hadria, and from the Lower Sea the Latiniensian, Graviscan and Statoniensian. [68] Luna carries off the palm of Etruria and Genua that of Liguria. Between the Pyrenees and the Alps Massilia has wine of two flavours, as it produces a richer variety, the local name for which is the `juicy' brand, which is also used for seasoning other wines. The importance of the wine of Baeterrae does not extend outside the Gallic provinces; and about the rest of the wines grown in the province of Narbonensis no positive statement can be made, inasmuch as the dealers have set up a regular factory for the purpose and colour them by means of smoke, and I regret to say also by employing noxious herbs and drugs - inasmuch as a dealer actually uses aloe for adulterating the flavour and the colour of his wines.
[69] But also the wines of Italy grown further away from the Ausonian Sea are not without note, those of Tarentum and Servitium, and those grown at Consentia and Tempsa and Bari, and the Calabrian and Lucanian vintages, which hold a better place than those of Thurii. But the wines of Lagaria, grown not far from Grumentum, are the most famous of them all, on the ground of their having restored the health of Messala Potitus. Campania, whether by means of careful cultivation or by accident, has lately excited consideration by some new names - boasting the Trebellian vintage four miles from Neapolis, the Cauline close to Capua, and the Trebulan when grown in the district of the same name (though otherwise it is always classed as a common wine), and the Trifoline. [70] As for the wines of Pompeii, their topmost improvement is a matter of ten years, and they gain nothing from age; also they are detected as unwholesome because of a headache which lasts till noon on the following day. These instances, if I am not mistaken, go to show that it is the country and the soil that matter, not the grape, and that it is superfluous to go on with a long enumeration of kinds, since the same vine has a different value in different places. [71] In the Spanish provinces the vineyards of Lacetanum are famous for the quantity of wine they produce, while for choice quality the vineyards of Taracco and Lauron and those of the Balearics among the islands challenge comparison with the first vintages of Italy. And I am not unaware that most people will think that many have been passed over, inasmuch as everybody has his own favourite, and wherever one may go one finds the same story current - [72] how that one of the freedmen of the deified Augustus, who was the most skilful among them for his judgement and palate, in tasting wine for the emperor's table passed this remark to the master of the house where Augustus was visiting in regard to a wine of the district: 'The flavour of this wine is new to me, and it is not of a high class, but all the same I prophesy that the emperor will not drink any other.' I would not deny that other wines also deserve a high reputation, but the ones that I have enumerated are those on which the general agreement of the ages will be found to have pronounced judgement.
{9.} L [73] We will now in a similar manner specify the wines of countries overseas. The wines held in highest esteem subsequent to the great vintages of the Homeric age about which we have spoken above { 14.53 } were those of Thasos and Chios, and of the latter the wine called Ariusian. To these the authority of the eminent physician Erasistratus, about four hundred and fifty years after the foundation of Rome { 304 B.C. }, added Lesbian. At the present time the most popular of all is the wine of Clazomenae, now that they have begun to flavour it more sparingly with seawater. [74] The wine of Lesbos by dint of its own nature smacks of the sea; and that of Mount Tmolus also is not esteemed as a wine to drink neat, but because being a sweet wine an admixture of it gives sweetness to the dry quality of the remaining vintages, at the same time also giving them age, as it at once makes them seem more mature. Next after these in esteem are the wines of Sicyon, Cyprus, Telmesus, Tripolis, Berytus, Tyre and Sebennytus. This last is grown in Egypt, being made from three famous kinds of grapes that grow there, the Thasian, the soot-grape and the pine-tree grape. [75] Ranking after these are the wines of Hippodamas, of Mystus and of the canthareos vine, the protropum of Cnidos, and the wines of the volcanic region in Mysia, of Petra and of Myconos. As for the vintage of Mesogis, it has been found to cause headache, and that of Ephesus has also proved to be unwholesome, because sea-water and boiled must are employed to season it. Apamea wine is said to be particularly suitable for making mead, and so likewise is the Praetutian in Italy - for this too is a property peculiar to certain kinds of wine: two sweet wines do not generally go well together. [76] Protagion also has quite gone out, a wine which the medical profession had put next to those of Italy. The physician Apollodorus in his pamphlet advising King Ptolemy what wines to drink - the Italian vintages being even then unknown - praised the wine of Naspercene in Pontus, and next to it the Oretic, Oeneate, Leucadian, Ambraciote and Peparethian vintages - the last he put before all the rest, but said it was less well thought of on account of its not being fit to drink before it was six years old. A sweet wine drawn off before treading the grapes.
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