1546 A mere puerility, as Fée remarks.
1547 He does not state the reason, nor does it appear to be known. At the present day warmed wine is sometimes given to a jaded horse, to put him on his legs again.
1548 Though practised by those who wished to drink largely, this was considered to diminish the flavour of delicate wines.
1549 See B. xxii. c. 23, and B. xxv. c. 95; also c. 7 of the present Book. Wine is no longer considered an antidote to cicuta or hemlock.
1550 See B. xxxvi. c. 42.
1551 This seems to be the meaning of “lectum;” but the passage is obscure.
1552 Tunicam.
1553 He satirizes, probably, some kind of gymnastic exercises that had been introduced to promote the speedy passage of the wine through the body.
1554 “In vino veritas.”
1555 Fée remarks that this is one proof that the wine of the ancients was essentially different in its nature from ours. In our day wine gives anything but a “pallid” hue.
1556 “Rapere vitam.”
1557 See B. xxiii. c. 23.
1558 Three gallons and three pints!! There must have been some jugglery in this performance.
1559 Probably towards those guilty of excesses in wine.
1560 As Præfectus Urbis.
1561 Love of drinking.
1562 The mode of testing whether any “heeltaps” were left or not. It was this custom, probably, that gave rise to the favourite game of the cottabus.
1563 Dr. Middleton, in his Life of Cicero, in his unlimited partiality for the family, quotes this as an instance of courage and high spirit.
1564 According to Paterculus, he was fond of driving about in a chariot, crowned with ivy, a golden goblet in his hand, and dressed like Bacchus, by which title he ordered himself to be addressed.
1565 He alludes to beer, or rather sweet wort, for hops were not used till the latter part, probably, of the middle ages. Lupines were sometimes used for flavouring beer.
1566 Diodorus Siculus says that the Egyptian beer was nearly equal to wine in strength and flavour.
1567 See end of B. iii.
1568 See end of B. vii.
1569 See end of B. vii.
1570 See end of B. iii.
1571 See end of B. x.
1573 See end of B. ii.
1574 Decimus Junius Silanus. He was commissioned by the senate, about B.C. 146, to translate into Latin the twenty-eight books of Mago, the Carthaginian, on Agriculture. See B. xviii. c. 5.
1575 See end of B. x.
1576 See end of B. vii.
1577 See end of B. iii.
1578 See end of B. iii.
1579 Julius Græcinus. He was one of the most distinguished orators of his time. Having refused to accuse M. Julius Silanus, he was put to death A.D. 39. He wrote a work, in two books, on the culture of the vine.
1580 He was a contemporary of Celsus and Columella, the latter of whom states that he wrote a work on a peculiar method of cultivating the vine. See also B. xvii. c. 18.
1581 See end of B. viii.
1582 See end of B. vii.
1583 See end of B. viii.
1584 Nothing is known of him. He may possibly have written on Husbandry, and seems to have spoken in dispraise of the son of Cicero. See c. 28 of the present Book.
1585 The famous Roman Comic poet, born B.C. 184. Twenty of his comedies are still in existence.
1587 Or Dorsenus Fabius, an ancient Comic dramatist, censured by Horace for the buffoonery of his characters, and the carelessness of his productions. In the 15th Chapter of this Book, Pliny quotes a line from his Acharistio.
1588 Q. Mutius Scævola, consul B.C. 95, and assassinated by C. Flavius Fimbria, having been proscribed by the Marian faction. He wrote several works on the Roman law, and Cicero was in the number of his disciples.
1589 Sextus Ælius Pætus Catus, a celebrated jurisconsult, and consul B.C. 198. He wrote a work on the Twelve Tables.
1590 See end of B. iii.
1591 Son of Corvinus Messala. He appears to have been a man of bad repute: of his writings nothing seems to be known.
1592 See end of B. ii.
1593 A freedman of Pompey, by whose command he translated into Latin the work of Mithridates on Poisons. After Pompey’s death, he maintained himself by keeping a school at Rome.
1594 For Fabianus Papirius, see end of B. ii. Fabianus Sabinus is supposed to have been the same person.
1596 He is mentioned by the elder Seneca, but nothing whatever is known of him.
1597 See end of B. vii.
1598 See end of B. iii.
1599 See end of B. ii.
1600 See end of B. ii.
1601 See end of B. viii.
1602 See end of B. viii.
1603 See end of B. viii.
1604 See end of B. iv.
1605 See end of B. viii.
1606 See end of B. viii.
1607 See end of B. viii.
1608 See end of B. viii.
1609 See end of B. viii.
1610 See end of B. viii.
1611 See end of B. viii.
1612 See end of B. viii.
1614 See end of B. viii.
1615 See end of B. vi.
1616 See end of B. viii.
1617 Supposed to have been a writer on Agriculture, but nothing further is known of him.
1618 See end of B. viii.
1619 See end of B. viii.
1620 See end of B. ii.
1621 See end of B. x.
1622 See end of B. viii.
1623 See end of B. viii.
1624 See end of B. viii.
1625 See end of B. viii.
1627 See end of B. viii.
1628 See end of B vii.
1629 See end of B. ii.
1630 See end of B. v.
1631 Hist. Plant. iv. c.
1632 The Olea Europæa of Linnæus. See B. xxi. c. 31.
1633 This has not been observed to be the fact. It has been known to grow in ancient Mesopotamia, more than one hundred leagues from the sea.
1634 It is supposed that it is indigenous to Asia, whence it was introduced into Africa and the South of Europe. There is little doubt that long before the period mentioned by Pliny, it was grown in Africa by the Carthaginians, and in the South of Gaul, at the colony of Massilia.
1635 This work of Hesiod is no longer in existence; but the assertion is exaggerated, even if he alludes to the growth of the tree from seed. Fée remarks that a man who has sown the olive at twenty, may gather excellent fruit before he arrives at old age. It is more generally propagated by slips or sets. If the trunk is destroyed by accident, the roots will throw out fresh suckers.
1636 This is the case. We may remark that the tree will grow in this country, but the fruit never comes to maturity.
1637 Georg. ii. 85, also ii. 420.
1638 Probably the Olea maximo fructu of Tournefort. It has its name from the Greek ὄρχις the “testis,” a name by which it is still known in some parts of Provence.
1639 Or “shuttle” olive. Probably the modern pickoline, or long olive.
1640 Probably the Olea media rotunda præcox of Tournefort. It is slightly bitter.
1641 This is so much the case, that though the olives of Spain and Portugal are among the finest, their oils are of the very worst quality.
1642 It does not appear that the method of preparing oil by the use of boiling water was known to the ancients. Unripe olives produce an excellent oil, but in very small quantities. Hence they are rarely used for the purpose.
1643 Called “virgin,” or “native” oil in France, and very highly esteemed.
1644 Sporta.
1645 “Exilibus regulis.” A kind of wooden strainer, apparently invented to supersede the wicker, or basket strainer.
1646 It is more insipid the riper the fruit, and the less odorous.
1647 By absorbing the oxygen of the air. It may be preserved two or three years even, in vessels hermetically closed. The oil of France keeps better than any other.
1648 As well as the grape.
1649 In consequence of the faulty mode of manufacture, the oil of Italy is now inferior to that of France. The oil of Aix is particularly esteemed.
1650 In Campania. See B. xvii. c. 3. Horace and Martial speak in praise of the Venafran olive. Hardouin suggests that Licinius Crassus may have introduced the Licinian olive.
1651 The heat of Africa is unfavourable to the olive.
1652 The fæces, marc, or lees. This is a crude juice contained in the cellular tissue of the fruit, known as viridine or chlorophylle.
1653 This is owing, Fée says, to a sort of fermentation, which alters the tissue of the cells containing the oil, displaces the constituent elements, and forms others, such as mucus, sugar, acetic acid, ammoniac, &c. When ripe, the olive contains four oils; that of the skin, the flesh, the stone, and the kernel.
1655 See B. xviii. c. 74.
1656 16th of September.
1657 De Causis, B. i. c. 23.
1658 This cannot possibly increase the oil, but it would render it more fluid, and thereby facilitate its escape from the cells of the berry.
1659 But Cato, Re Rust. c. 144, adds the very significant words, “injussu domini aut custodis.” “Without the leave of the owner or the keeper.”
1660 It is found that the olive, after an abundant season, will not bear in the following year; probably the result of exhaustion.
1661 More commonly spelt “pausia.”
1662 “Regia.” It is impossible to identify these varieties.
1663 8th of February.
1664 This assertion of Pliny is not generally true. The large olives of Spain yield oil very plentifully.
1665 Probably a member of the variety known to naturalists as the Olea fructu majori, carne crassâ, of Tournefort, the royal olive or “triparde” of the French. The name is thought to be from the Greek φαῦλος, the fruit being considered valueless from its paucity of oil.
1666 There are but few olive-trees in either Egypt or Decapolis at the present day, and no attempts are made to extract oil from them.
1667 “Carnis.” He gives this name to the solid part, or pericarp.
1668 See B. iii. c. 9.
1669 These methods are not now adopted for preserving the olive. The fruit are first washed in an alkaline solution, and then placed in salt and water. The colymbas was so called from κολυμβάω, “to swim,” in its own oil, namely. Dioscorides descants on the medicinal properties of the colymbades. B. i. c. 140.
1670 There are several varieties known of this colour, and more particularly the fruit of the Olea atro-rubens of Gouan.
1671 The Spanish olive, Hardouin says. Fée thinks that the name “superba,” “haughty,” is given figuratively, as meaning rough and austere.
1672 The olives of the present Merida, in Spain, are of a rough, disagreeable flavour.
1673 This seems to be the meaning of “pinguis;” but, as Fée observes, salt would have no such effect as here stated, but would impart a disagreeable flavour to the oil.
1674 Fée regards this assertion as quite fabulous.
1675 It will be stated in B. xxviii. c. 13, to what purposes this abominable collection of filth was applied.
1676 15th of July. He alludes to the inspection of the Equites, which originally belonged to the Censors, but afterwards to the Emperors. On this occasion there was “recognitio,” or “review,” and then a “transvectio,” or “procession” of the horsemen.
1677 The ovation was a lesser triumph, at which the general entered the city not in a chariot, but on foot. In later times, however, the victor entered on horseback: and a wreath of myrtle, sometimes laurel, was worn by him. For further particulars as to the ovation, see c. 38 of the present Book.
1678 Or “oleaster.”
1679 De Re Rust. c. 6.
1680 A middling or even poor soil is chosen for the olive at the present day.
1681 Apparently meaning the “white wax” olive.
1682 In warm countries, a site exposed to the north is chosen: in colder ones, a site which faces the south.
1683 See B. xvii. c. 37. This moss has not been identified with precision; but the leaf of the olive is often attacked by an erysiphus, known to naturalists as the Alphitomorpha communis; but it is white, not of a red colour.
1684 Fée queries how any one could possibly eat olives that had been steeped in a solution of mastich. They must have been nauseous in the extreme.
1685 De Re Rust. c. 64.
1686 “Fracibus.” The opinion of Pliny, that olives deteriorate by being left in the store-room, is considered to be well founded; the olives being apt to ferment, to the deterioration of the oil: at the same time, he is wrong in supposing that the amount of oil diminishes by keeping the berries.
1687 “Cortinas.” If we may judge from the name, these vessels were three-footed, like a tripod.
1688 There are no good grounds for this recommendation, which is based on the erroneous supposition that heat increases the oil in the berry. The free circulation of the air also ought not to be restricted, as nothing is gained by it. In general, the method of extracting the oil is the same with the moderns as with the ancients, though these last did not employ the aid of boiling water.
1689 Labra.
1690 A “making,” or “batch.”
1691 Or “flower.”
1692 It may be remarked, that in this Chapter Pliny totally confounds fixed oils, volatile oils, and medicinal oils. Those in the list which he here gives, and which are not otherwise noticed in the Notes, may be considered to belong to this last class.