140 1 If you wish to till the ground, offer a second sacrifice in the same way, with the addition of the words: “for the sake of doing this work.” So long as the work continues, the ritual must be performed in some part of the land every day; and if you miss a day, or if public or domestic feast days intervene, a new offering must be made.
141 1 The following is the formula for purifying land: Bidding the suovetaurilia to be led around, use the words: “That with the good help of the gods success may crown our work, I bid thee, Manius, to take care to purify my farm, my land, my ground with this suovetaurilia, in whatever part thou thinkest best for them to be driven or carried around.” 2 Make a prayer with wine to Janus and Jupiter, and say: “Father Mars, I pray and beseech thee that thou be gracious and merciful to me, my house, and my household; to which intent I have bidden this suovetaurilia to be led around my land, my ground, my farm; that thou keep away, ward off, and remove sickness, seen and unseen, barrenness and destruction, ruin and unseasonable influence; 3 and that thou permit my harvests, my grain, my vineyards, and my plantations to flourish and to come to good issue, preserve in health my shepherds and my flocks, and give good health and strength to me, my house, and my household. To this intent, to the intent of purifying my farm, my land, my ground, and of making an expiation, as I have said, deign to accept the offering of these suckling victims; Father Mars, to the same intent deign to accept the offering of these suckling offering.” 4 Also heap the cakes with the knife and see that the oblation cake be hard by, then present the victims. When you offer up the pig, the lamb, and the calf, use this formula: “To this intent deign to accept the offering of these victims.” . . . If favourable omens are not obtained in response to all, speak thus: “Father Mars, if aught hath not pleased thee in the offering of those sucklings, I make atonement with these victims.” If there is doubt about one or two, use these words: “Father Mars, inasmuch as thou wast not pleased by the offering of that pig, I make atonement with this pig.”
142 Those things which are the duty of the overseer, the instructions which the master has given, all those things which should be done on the farm and what should be bought or brought in, and how food and raiment should be issued to the servants — the same I warn that he do and perform, and that he hearken to the master’s instructions. Furthermore, he must know how to manage the housekeeper and how to give her directions, so that the master, at his coming, will find that all necessary preparations and arrangements have been made with care.
143 1 See that the housekeeper performs all her duties. If the master has given her to you as wife, keep yourself only to her. Make her stand in awe of you. Restrain her from extravagance. She must visit the neighbouring and other women very seldom, and not have them either in the house or in her part of it. She must not go out to meals, or be a gadabout. She must not engage in religious worship herself or get others to engage in it for her without the orders of the master or the mistress; let her remember that the master attends to the devotions for the whole household. She must be neat herself, and keep the farmstead neat and clean. She must clean and tidy the hearth every night before she goes to bed. On the Kalends, Ides, and Nones, and whenever a holy day comes, she must hang a garland over the hearth, and on those days pray to the household gods as the opportunity offers. She must keep a supply of cooked food on hand for you and the servants. She must keep many hens and have plenty of eggs. She must have a large store of dried pears, sorbs, figs, raisins, sorbs in must, preserved pears and grapes and quinces. She must also keep preserved grapes in grape-pulp and in pots buried in the ground, as well as fresh Praenestine nuts kept in the same way, and Scantian quinces in jars, and other fruits that are usually preserved, as well as wild fruits. All these she must store away diligently every year. She must also know how to make good flour and to grind spelt fine.
144 1 Terms for letting the gathering of olives: The contractor will gather the whole harvest carefully, according to the directions of the owner or his representative or the purchaser of the crop. He will not pick or beat down olives without the orders of the owner or his representative. If anyone violates this rule, no one will pay or be liable for what he has picked that day. All gatherers will take an oath before the owner or his representative that they have not stolen olives, nor has anyone with their connivance stolen olives from the estate of Lucius Manlius during that harvest; if any refuse to take the oath, no one will pay or be liable for what he has gathered. He must give security for the proper harvesting of the olives, satisfactory to Lucius Manlius. Ladders are to be returned in as good condition as when they were issued, except those which have been broken because of age; if they are not returned, a fair deduction will be made by arbitration of an honest man. Whatever damage is done the owner through the fault of the contractor the latter will make good, the amount to be deducted after arbitration by an honest person. The contractor will furnish as many gatherers and pickers as are needed; and if he fails to do so, a deduction will be made of the cost of hiring or contracting, and the total will be less by that amount. He is not to remove firewood or olives from the farm; and if any of his gatherers carry them off, a deduction will be made of 2 sesterces for each load, and that amount will not be due. All olives will be measured clean in an olive measure. He is to furnish fifty active workmen, two-thirds being pickers. No one shall form a combination for the purpose of raising the contract price for harvesting and milling olives, unless he names his associate at the time; in case of a violation of this rule, if the owner or his representative wish, all the associates shall take an oath, and if anyone refuses so to swear, no one will pay or be liable for pay for the gathering or milling of the olives to one who has not so sworn. Bonuses: The extra allowance for a harvest of 1200 modii will be 5 modii of salted olives, 9 pounds of pure oil, 5 quadrantals of vinegar for the whole harvest; for that part of the salted olives which they do not take during the harvesting, an allowance of 5 sesterces per modius of the aforesaid will be made.
145 1 Terms on which contracts are to be made for the milling of olives: Mill them honestly, to the satisfaction of the owner or his representative in charge of the work. If necessary, supply six complete equipments. Furnish workmen to the satisfaction of the representative of the owner or the one who has bought the olives. If a mill is necessary, set it up. If labourers are hired, or the work has to be sublet, settle for this, or let it be deducted. Do not touch any oil by way of use or pilfering beyond what the owner or his representative issues; if he takes it, 40 sesterces will be deducted for each offence, and that amount will not be due. All hands engaged in the manufacturing will take an oath before the owner or his representative that neither they nor anyone with their connivance has stolen oil or olives from the farm of Lucius Manlius. If any one of them will not take such an oath, his share of the pay will be deducted, and that amount will not be due. You will have no partner without the approval of the owner or his representative. Any damage done to the owner through the fault of the contractor will be deducted on the decision of an honest person. If green oil is required, make it. There will be an allowance of a sufficient quantity of oil and salt for his own use, and two victoriati as toll.
146 1 Terms for the sale of olives on the tree: Olives for sale on the tree on an estate near Venafrum. The purchaser of the olives will add one per cent. of all money more than the purchase price; the auctioneer’s fee of 50 sesterces; and pay 1500 pounds of Roman oil, 200 pounds of green oil, 50 modii of windfall olives, 10 modii of picked olives, all measured by olive measure, and 10 pounds of lubricating oil; and pay 2 cotylae of the first pressing for the use of the weights and measures of the owner. Date of payment: within ten months from the first of November he will pay the contract price for gathering and working up the olives, even if the purchaser has made a contract, on the Ides. Sign a contract and give bond to the satisfaction of the owner or his representative that such payments will be made in good faith, and that all will be done to the satisfaction of the owner or his representative. Until payment is made, or such security has been given, all property of the purchaser on the place will be held in pledge, and none of it shall be removed from the place; whatever is so removed becomes the property of the owner. All presses, ropes, ladders, mills, and whatever else has been furnished by the owner, will be returned in the same good condition, except articles broken because of age; and a fair price will be paid for all not returned. If the purchaser does not pay the gatherers and the workmen who have milled the oil, the owner may, if he wishes, pay the wages due; and the purchaser will be liable to the owner for the amount, and give bond, and his property will be held in pledge as described above.
147 1 Terms for the sale of grapes on the vine: The purchaser will leave unwashed lees and dregs. Storage will be allowed for the wine until the first of October next following; if it is not removed before that time, the owner will do what he will with the wine. All other terms as for the sale of olives on the tree.
148 1 Terms for the sale of wine in jars: Forty-one urns to the culleus will be delivered, and only wine which is neither sour nor musty will be sold. Within three days it shall be tasted subject to the decision of an honest man, and if the purchaser fails to have this done, it will be considered tasted; but any delay in the tasting caused by the owner will add as many days to the time allowed the purchaser. The acceptance will take place before the first of January next following; and in default of the acceptance by the purchaser the owner will measure the wine, and settlement will be made on the basis of such measurement; if the purchaser wishes the owner will take an oath that he has measured it correctly. Storage will be allowed for the wine until the first of October next following; if it is not removed before that date, the owner will do what he wishes with the wine. Other terms as for olives on the tree.
149 Terms for the lease of winter pasturage: The contract should state the limits of pasturage. The use of the pasturage should begin on the first of September, and should end on dry meadows when the pear trees begin to bloom, and on water meadows when the neighbours above and below begin irrigating, or on a definite date fixed for each; on all other meadows on the first of March. The owner reserves the right to pasture two yoke of oxen and one gelding while the renter pastures; the use of vegetables, asparagus, firewood, water, roads, and right of way is reserved for the owner. All damage done to the owner by the renter or his herdsmen or cattle shall be settled for according to the decision of an honest man; and all damage done to the renter by the owner or his servants or cattle shall be settled for according to the decision of good man. Until such damage is settled for in cash or by security, or the debt is assigned, all herds and servants on the place shall be held in pledge; and if there arises any dispute over such matters, let the decision be made at Rome.
150 1 Terms for the sale of the increase of the flock: The lessee will pay per head 1½ pounds of cheese, one-half dry; one-half of the milking on holy days; and an urn of milk on other days. For the purpose of this rule a lamb which lives for a day and a night is counted as increase; the lessee will end the increase on the first of June, or, if an intercalation intervene, on the first of May. The lessor will not promise more than thirty lambs; ewes which have borne no lambs count in the increase two for one. Ten months after the date of the sale of wool and lambs he shall receive his money from the collector. He may feed one whey-fed hog for every ten sheep. The lessee will furnish a shepherd for two months; and he shall remain in pledge until the owner is satisfied either by security or by payment.
151 1 As to cypress seed, the best method for its gathering, planting, and propagation, and for the planting of the cypress bed has been given as follows by Minius Percennius of Nola: The seed of the Tarentine cypress should be gathered in the spring, and the wood when the barley turns yellow; when you gather the seed, expose it to the sun, clean it, and store it dry so that it may be set out dry. Plant the seed in the spring, in soil which is very mellow, the so-called pulla, close to water. First cover the ground thick with goat or sheep dung, then turn it with the trenching spade and mix it well with the dung, cleaning out grass and weeds; break the ground fine. Form the seed-beds four feet wide, with the surface concave, so that they will hold water, leaving a footway between the beds so that you may clean out the weeds. After the beds are formed, sow the seed as thickly as flax is usually sowed, sift dirt over it with a sieve to the depth of a half-finger, and smooth carefully with a board, or the hands or feet. In case the weather is dry so that the ground becomes thirsty, irrigate by letting a stream gently into the beds; or, failing a stream, have the water brought and poured gently; see that you add water whenever it is needed. If weeds spring up, see that you free the beds of them. Clean them when the weeds are very young, and as often as necessary. This procedure should be continued as stated throughout the summer. The seed, after being planted, should be covered with straw, which should be removed when they begin to sprout.
152 1 Of brush-brooms, according to the directions of the Manlii: At several times during the thirty days of the vintage, make brooms of dry elm twigs bound around a stick. With these scrape continually the inner surfaces of the wine jars, to keep the wine dregs from sticking to the sides.
153 1 To make lees-wine: Keep two Campanian olive baskets for the purpose; fill them with lees, place them under the press-beam, and force out the juice.
154 1 A convenient method of measuring wine for buyers: Take for this purpose a cask of culleus size, with four handles at the top for easy handling; make a hole at the bottom, fitting into it a pipe so that it can be stopped tight, and also pierce near the top at the point where it will hold exactly a culleus. Keep it on the elevation among the jars, so that the wine can run from the jar into the cask; and when the cask is filled close it up.
155 1 Land ought to be drained during the winter, and the drain-ditches on the hillsides kept clean. The greatest danger from water is in the early autumn, when there is dust. When the rains begin, the whole household must turn out with shovels and hoes, open the ditches, turn the water into the roads, and see that it flows off. You should look around the farmstead while it is raining, and mark all leaks with charcoal, so that the tile can be replaced after the rain stops. During the growing season, if water is standing anywhere, in the grain or the seed-bed or in ditches, or if there is any obstruction to the water, it should be cleared, opened and removed.
156 1 Of the medicinal value of the cabbage: It is the cabbage which surpasses all other vegetables. It may be eaten either cooked or raw; if you eat it raw, dip it into vinegar. It promotes digestion marvellously and is an excellent laxative, and the urine is wholesome for everything. If you wish to drink deep at a banquet and to enjoy your dinner, eat as much raw cabbage as you wish, seasoned with vinegar, before dinner, and likewise after dinner eat some half a dozen leaves; it will make you feel as if you had not dined, and you can drink as much as you please.
2 If you wish to clean out the upper digestive tract, take four pounds of very smooth cabbage leaves, make them into three equal bunches and tie them together. Set a pot of water on the fire, and when it begins to boil sink one bunch for a short time, which will stop the boiling; when it begins again sink the bunch briefly while you count five, and remove. 3 Do the same with the second and third bunches, then throw the three together and macerate. After macerating, squeeze through a cloth about a hemina of the juice into an earthen cup; add a lump of salt the size of a pea, and enough crushed cummin to give it an odour, and let the cup stand in the air through a calm night. Before taking a dose of this, one should take a hot bath, drink honey-water, and go to bed fasting. 4 Early the next morning he should drink the juice and walk about for four hours, attending to any business he has. When the desire comes on him and he is seized with nausea, he should lie down and purge himself; he will evacuate such a quantity of bile and mucus that he will wonder himself where it all came from. Afterwards, when he goes to stool, he should drink a hemina or a little more. If it acts too freely, if he will take two conchas of fine flour, sprinkle it into water, and drink a little, it will cease to act. 5 Those who are suffering from colic should macerate cabbage in water, then pour into hot water, and boil until it is quite soft. Pour off the water, add salt, a bit of cummin, barley flour dust, and oil, and boil again; 6 turn into a dish and allow it to cool. You may break any food you wish into it and eat it; but if you can eat the cabbage alone, do so. If the patient has no fever, administer a very little strong, dark wine, diluted; but if he has fever give only water. The dose should be repeated every morning, but in small quantities, so that it may not pall but continue to be eaten with relish. The treatment is the same for man, woman, and child. 7 Now for those who pass urine with difficulty and suffer from strangury: take cabbage, place it in hot water and boil until it is half-done; pour off most of the water, add a quantity of oil, salt, and a bit of cummin, and boil for a short time. After that drink the broth of this and eat the cabbage itself, that it may be absorbed quickly. Repeat the treatment daily.
157 1 Of Pythagoras’s cabbage, what virtue and health-giving qualities it has. The several varieties of cabbage and the quality of each should first be known; it has all the virtues necessary for health, and constantly changes its nature along with the heat, being moist and dry, sweet, bitter, and acid. The cabbage has naturally all the virtues of the so-called “Seven Blessings” mixture. To give, then, the several varieties: the first is the so-called smooth; it is large, with broad leaves and thick stem; it is hardy and has great potency. 2 The second is the curly variety, called “parsley cabbage”; it has a good nature and appearance, and has stronger medicinal properties than the above-mentioned variety. So also has the third, the mild, with small stalk, tender, and the most pungent of all; and its juice, though scanty, has the most powerful effect. No other variety of cabbage approaches it in medicinal value. 3 It can be used as a poultice on all kinds of wounds and swellings; it will cleanse all sores and heal without pain; it will soften and open boils; it will cleanse suppurating wounds and tumours, and heal them, a thing which no other medicine can do. But before it is applied, the surface should be washed with plenty of warm water, and then the crushed cabbage should be applied as a poultice, and renewed twice a day; it will remove all putridity. The black ulcer has a foul odour and exudes putrid pus, the white is purulent but fistulous, and suppurates under the surface; 4 but if you macerate cabbage it will cure all such sores — it is the best remedy for sores of this kind. Dislocations will be healed quickly if they are bathed twice a day in warm water and a cabbage poultice is applied; if applied twice a day, the treatment will relieve the pain. A contusion will burst, and when bruised cabbage is applied, it will heal. 5 An ulcer on the breast and a cancer can be healed by the application of macerated cabbage; and if the spot is too tender to endure the astringency, the cabbage should be mixed with barley-flour and so applied. All sores of this kind it will heal, a thing which no other medicine can do or cleanse. When applied to a sore of this kind on a boy or girl the barley-meal should be added. If you eat it chopped, washed, dried, and seasoned with salt and vinegar, nothing will be more wholesome. 6 That you may eat it with better appetite, sprinkle it with grape vinegar, and you will like a little better when washed, dried, and seasoned with rue, chopped coriander and salt. This will benefit you, allow no ill to remain in the body, and promote digestion; and will heal any ill that may be inside. Headache and eyeache it heals alike. It should be eaten in the morning, on an empty stomach. 7 Also if you are bilious, if the spleen is swollen, if the heart is painful, or the liver, or the lungs, or the diaphragm — in a word, it will cure all the internal organs which are suffering. (If you grate silphium into it, it will be good.) For when all the veins are gorged with food they cannot breathe in the whole body, and hence a disease is caused; and when from excess of food the bowels do not act, if you eat cabbage proportionately, prepared as I direct above, you will have no ill effects from these. But as to disease of the joints, nothing so purges it as raw cabbage, if you eat it chopped, and rue, chopped dry coriander, grated asafetida, and cabbage out of vinegar and honey, and sprinkled with salt. 8 After using this remedy you will have the use of all your joints. There is no expense involved; and even if there were, you should try it for your health’s sake. It should be eaten in the morning, on an empty stomach. One who is sleepless or debilitated you can make well by this same treatment. But give the person, without food, simply warm cabbage, oiled, and a little salt. The more the patient eats the more quickly will he recover from the disease. 9 Those suffering from colic should be treated as follows: Macerate cabbage thoroughly, then put in a pot and boil well; when it is well done pour off the water, add plenty of oil, very little salt, cummin, and fine barley-flour, and let it boil very thoroughly again. After boiling turn it into a dish. The patient should eat it without bread, if possible; if not, plain bread may be soaked in it and if he has no fever he may have some dark wine. The cure will be prompt. 10 And further, whenever such occasion arises, if a person who is debilitated will eat cabbage prepared as I have described above, he will be cured. And still further, if you save the urine of a person who eats cabbage habitually, heat it, and bathe the patient in it, he will be healed quickly; this remedy has been tested. Also, if babies are bathed in this urine they will never be weakly; those whose eyes are not very clear will see better if they are bathed in this urine; and pain in the head or neck will be relieved if the heated urine is applied. 11 If a woman will warm the privates with this urine, they will never become diseased. The method is as follows: when you have heated it in a pan, place under a chair whose seat has been pierced. Let the woman sit on it, cover her, and throw garments around her.
12 Wild cabbage has the greatest strength; it should be dried and macerated very fine. When it is used as a purge, let the patient refrain from food the previous night, and in the morning, still fasting, take macerated cabbage with four cyathi of water. Nothing will purge so well, neither hellebore, nor scammony; it is harmless, and highly beneficial; it will heal persons whom you despair of healing. 13 The following is the method of purging by this treatment: Administer it in a liquid form for seven days; if the patient has an appetite, feed him on roast meat, or, if he has not, on boiled cabbage and bread. He should drink diluted mild wine, bathe rarely, and rub with oil. One so purged will enjoy good health for a long time, and no sickness will attack him except by his own fault. If one has an ulcer, whether suppurated or new, sprinkle this wild cabbage with water and apply it; you will cure him. 14 If there is a fistula, insert a pellet; or if it will not admit a pellet, make a solution, pour into a bladder attached to a reed, and inject into the fistula by squeezing the bladder. It will heal quickly. An application of wild cabbage macerated with honey to any ulcer, old or new, will heal it. 15 If a nasal polypus appears, pour macerated dry wild cabbage into the palm of the hand; apply to the nostril and sniff with the breath as vigorously as possible. Within three days the polypus will fall out, but continue the same treatment for several days after it has fallen out, so that the roots of the polypus may be thoroughly cleaned. 16 In case of deafness, macerate cabbage with wine, press out the juice, and instil warm water into the ear, and you will soon know that your hearing is improved. An application of cabbage to a malignant scab will cause it to heal without ulcerating.
158 Recipe for a purgative, if you wish to purge thoroughly: Take a pot and pour into it six sextarii of water and add the hock of a ham, or, if you have no hock, a half-pound of ham-scraps with as little fat as possible. Just as it comes to a boil, add two cabbage leaves, two beet plants with the roots, a shoot of fern, a bit of the mercury-plant, two pounds of mussels, a capito fish and one scorpion, six snails, and a handful of lentils. 2 Boil all together down to three sextarii of liquid, without adding oil. Take one sextarius of this while warm, add one cyathus of Coan wine, drink, and rest. Take a second and a third dose in the same way, and you will be well purged. You may drink diluted Coan wine in addition, if you wish. Any one of the many ingredients mentioned above is sufficient to move the bowels; but there are so many ingredients in this concoction that it is an excellent purgative, and, besides, it is agreeable.
159 1 To prevent chafing: When you set out on a journey, keep a small branch of Pontic wormwood under the anus.
160 1 Any kind of dislocation may be cured by the following charm: Take a green reed four or five feet long and split it down the middle, and let two men hold it to your hips. Begin to chant: “motas uaeta daries dardares astataries dissunapiter” and continue until they meet. Brandish a knife over them, and when the reeds meet so that one touches the other, grasp with the hand and cut right and left. If the pieces are applied to the dislocation or the fracture, it will heal. And none the less chant every day, and, in the case of a dislocation, in this manner, if you wish: “huat haut haut istasis tarsis ardannabou dannaustra.”
161 1 Method of planting asparagus: Break up thoroughly ground that is moist, or is heavy soil. When it has been broken, lay off beds, so that you may hoe and weed them in both directions without trampling the beds. In laying off the beds, leave a path a half-foot wide between the beds on each side. Plant along a line, dropping two or three seeds together in a hole made with a stick, and cover with the same stick. After planting, cover the beds thickly with manure; plant after the vernal equinox. When the shoots push up, weed often, being careful not to uproot the asparagus with the weed. The year it is planted, cover the bed with straw through the winter, so that it will not be frostbitten. Then in the early spring uncover, hoe, and weed. The third year after planting burn it over in the early spring; after this do not work it before the shoots appear, so as not to injure the roots by hoeing. In the third or fourth year you may pull asparagus from the roots; for if you break it off, sprouts will start and die off. You may continue pulling until you see it going to seed. The seed ripens in autumn; when you have gathered it, burn over the bed, and when the asparagus begins to grow, hoe and manure. After eight or nine years, when it is now old, dig it up, after having thoroughly worked and manured the ground to which you are to transplant it, and made small ditches to receive the roots. The interval between the roots of the asparagus should be not less than a foot. In digging, loosen the earth around the roots so that you can dig them easily, and be careful not to break them. Cover them very deep with sheep dung; this is the best for this purpose, as other manure produces weeds.
162 1 Method of curing hams and Puteolan ofella. You should salt hams in the following manner, in a jar or large pot: When you have bought the hams cut off the hocks. Allow a half-modius of ground Roman salt to each ham. Spread salt on the bottom of the jar or pot; then lay a ham, with the skin facing downwards, and cover the whole with salt. Place another ham over it and cover in the same way, taking care that meat does not touch meat. Continue in the same way until all are covered. When you have arranged them all, spread salt above so that the meat shall not show, and level the whole. When they have remained five days in the salt remove them all with their own salt. Place at the bottom those which had been on top before, covering and arranging them as before. Twelve days later take them out finally, brush off all the salt, and hang them for two days in a draught. On the third day clean them thoroughly with a sponge and rub with oil. Hang them in smoke for two days, and the third day take them down, rub with a mixture of oil and vinegar, and hang in the meat-house. No moths or worms will touch them.