4 plint's KATUEAL HISTOET. [Book XVIII. 



alwaj's attends its owner. In those early da3's, two jugera of 

 land were considered enough for a citizen of Rome, and to none 

 was a larger portion than this allotted. And yet, at the present 

 day, men who but lately were the slaves of the Emperor ISTero 

 have been hardly content with pleasure-gardens that occupied 

 the same space as this ; while they must have fishponds, for- 

 sooth, of still greater extent, and in some instances I might 

 add, perhaps, kitchens even as well. 



Numa first established the custom of offering com to the 

 gods, and of propitiating them with the salted** cake; he was 

 the first, too, as we learn from Hemina, to parch spelt, from 

 the fact that, when in this state, it is more wholesome as an 

 aliment.^ This method, however, he could only establish one 

 way : by making an enactment, to the effect that spelt is not 

 in a pure state for offering, except when parched. He it was, 

 too, who instituted the Fornacalia,^^ festivals appropriated 

 for the parching of corn, and others,^^ observed with equal 

 solemnity, for the erection and preservation of the "termini," 

 or boundaries of the fields : for these termini, in those days, 

 they particularly regarded as gods ; while to other divinities 

 they gave the names of Seia,^- from "sero," " to sow," and of 

 8egesta, from the '' segetes," or "crops of standing corn," the 

 statues of which goddesses we still see erected in the Circus. 

 A third divinity it is forbidden by the rules of our religion to 

 name even ^^ beneath a roof. In former days, too, they would 

 not so much as taste the corn when newly cut, nor yet wine 

 when just made, before the priests had made a libation of the 

 first-fruits. 



CHAr. 3. (3.) THE jrGERUM OF LAI^^D. 



That portion of land used to be known as a " jugcrum," 



8 Mado of salt and the meal or flour of spelt. Salt was the emblem of 

 wisdom, friendship, and other virtues. 



9 Tins, Fee ohserves, is not the case with any kind of wheat ; Avith 

 manioc, which has an acrid principle, the process may be necessary, iu 

 order to make it fit for food. 



"> Or Feast of the Furnace or Oven. See Ovid's Fasti, E. ii. 1. 5—25. 



" Called the Terininalia. See Ovid's Fasti, B. ii. 1. 641, ct seq. 



•2 Teitullian, De Spect. i. 16, calls this goddess by the name of Sessia. 



'3 Coelius Rhodiginus, Turuebus, and Vossius, conjecture that the name 

 of this goddess, who might only he named in the field, was Tutelina. 

 Ilardouin thinks that it was Scgesta, here mentioned. 



