Book I. AGRICULTURE OF THE ROMANS, 27 



compartments of Achilles's shield. (//. lib. xviii. 550.) Reapers were set in bands on 

 the opposite side of the field or plat, and worked towards the centre. As the land was 

 ploughed in the same manner from the sides to the middle, there was an open furrow 

 left there, to which the reapers hastened in the way of competition. A reaper was ex- 

 pected to cut down a jugerum of wheat in a day and a half; barley, legumes, and medica 

 or clover, in one day, and flax in three days. 



135. Threshing was performed in the area or threshing floor, a circular space of 40 to 

 60 feet in diameter, in the open air, with a smooth hard surface. The floor was generally 

 made of well wrought clay mixed with amurca or the lees of oil ; sometimes it was 

 paved. It was generally placed near the nubilarium or barn, in order that when a 

 sudden shower happened, during the process of threshing, the ears might be carried in 

 there out of the ra'n. Sometimes also the ears or unthreshed corn of the whole farm 

 were first put in this barn and carried out to the area afterwards. Varro and Columella 

 recommended that the situation of the area should be high and airy, and within sight of 

 the farmer or bailiff's house, to prevent fraud; distant from gardens and orchards, 

 because, though dung and straw are beneficial to the roots of vegetables, they are de- 

 structive when they iiall on their leaves." (Fa-. lib. i. cap. 51.) 



136. The cm-n Ixing spread over the area a foot or two 

 in thickness, was threshed or beaten out by the hoofs 

 of cattle, or horses driven round it, by their dragging 

 a machine. The machine, Varro informs us, was 

 " made of a lioard, rough with stones or iron, with a 

 driver or great weight placed on it." A machine com- 

 posed of rollers studded with iron kHobs, and furnished 

 with a seat for the driver, [,Jig. 17.) was used in the 

 Carthaginian territory. Sometimes also they threshed 

 with rods or flails : far or Indian com, {Zea Mays, L.) 

 was generally hand picked, or passed through a 

 handmill. 



1 S7. Corn luas cleansed or winnowed by throwing it from one part of the floor to another, 

 (in the wind when there was any,) with a kind of shovel called ventilarium ; another im- 

 plement, called a van, probably a kind of sieve, was used when there was no wind. After 

 being dressed, the corn was laid in the granary, and the straw either laid aside for litter, 

 or, what is not a little remarkable, " sprinkled with brine; then, when dried, roiled up in 

 bundles, and so given to the oxen for hay." {Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. xviii. cap. 30.) 



l'}8. Hay-7)iaking among the Romans was performed much in the same way as in 

 modern times. The meadows were mown when the flowers of the grass began to fade ; 

 " as it dries," says Varro, " it is turned with forks ; it is then tied up in bundles of four 

 pounds each, and carried home, and what is left strewed upon the meadow is raked 

 together, and added to the crop." " A good mower," Columella informs us, "cuts a 

 jugerum of meadow, and binds twelve hundred bundles of hay." It is probable that this 

 quantity, which is nearly two tons, was the produce per acre of a good crop. A second 

 crop was cut, called cordum, and was chiefly used for feeding sheep in winter. Hay 

 was also made of leafy twigs for the same purpose. Cato directs tlie bailifi' to ** cut 

 down poplar, elm, and^oak spray, and put them up in time, not over dry, for fodder to 

 the sheep." (Cap. 5.) 



139. Weeding and stirring the soil were performed, the first by cutting with a hook, or 

 pulling the weeds up with the hand ; and the second by sarchng or hoeing. Beans were 

 hoed three times, and corn twice ; the first time they were earthed up, but not the second or 

 third; "for," says Columella, '* when the corn ceases to tiller, it rots if covered with 

 earth. " Lupines were not sarcled at all, " because so far from being infested with weeds, 

 they destroy them." Horse hoeing was also practised, the origin of which is thus given 

 bv Pliny. " We must not omit," says he, "a particular method of ploughing, at this 

 time practised in Italy beyond the Po, and introduced by the injuries of war. The 

 Salassi, when they ravaged the lands lying under the Alps, tried likewise to destroy the 

 panic and millet that had just come above ground : finding that the situation of the crop 

 prevented them from destroying it in the ordinary way, they ploughed the fields ; but 

 the crop at harvest being double of what it used to be, taught the farmer to plough 

 amongst the corn." This operation, he informs us, was performed, either when the stalk 

 was beginning to appear, or when the plant had put forth two or three leaves. The 

 corn being generally sown in drills, or covered with the plough, so as to come up in 

 rows, readily admitted this practice. 



140. Pasturing and harroiving corn, when too luxuriant, were practised. Virgil says, 

 *' What commendation shall I give to him, who, lest his corn should lodge, pastures it 

 w^hile young, as soon as the blade equals the furrow." (Geor. i. 1. 111.) Pliny directs 

 to comb the corn with a harrow before it is pastured, and sarcle it afterwards. 



141 . Watering on a large scale was applied both to arable and grass lands. Virgil advises 

 to " bring down the waters of a river upon the sown corn, and when the field is parched, 

 and the plants drying, convey it from the brow of a hill in channels." ( Gcor. i. 1. 106.) 

 Pliny mentions tfie practice, and observes that the water destroys the weeds, nourishes 



