INTRODUCTION 



propagation of the vine, the olive, and various trees ; 

 and, while its subject matter is treated more fully 

 in the Res Riistica, the work is still of considerable 

 interest and value in that it throws some light on the 

 larger and later work, especially on the corrupt 

 manuscript text of the fifth book. 



The works of Columella, though comparatively 

 neglected since the eighteenth century, have held 

 an important place in their special field. The author 

 is cited by his contemporary Pliny among authorities 

 for his work on natural history .^ The veterinarian 

 Pelagonius, who wrote before the time of Vegetius 

 (foiu-th century), often quotes verbatim precepts from 

 Columella's sixth book ; ^ so often Eumelus, a Greek 

 writer on the veterinary art.^ Vegetius praises his 

 facultas dice?idi^ He is much quoted in the fourth- 

 century De Re Rusiica of Palladius,^ who seems also 

 to have been inspired by Columella's metrical De 

 Cultu Hortorum to write his last book, De Insitione, 

 in verse. Cassiodorus ^ of the sixth century mentions 

 him as one of the outstanding writers on agriculture, 

 as also does Isidore ' in the seventh century. The 

 Hortuhis of Walafrid Strabo {circa 809-849), in 443 

 hexameters, may owe something to Columella's 



1 E.g., Pliny, N.H. VIII. 153; XV. 17-19, 66; XVII. 

 51-52, 137, 162; XVIII. 70, 303; XIX. 68. 



^ Ihm lists seventeen parallel passaf^es in the index of his 

 Teubner edition of Pelagonius, Artis Veterinariae quae exstant, 

 p. 241. 



' Ihm, op. cit., p. 7. 



* Vegetius, Ars Veterinaria, Praef. 2. 



■• Becher (op. cit., p. 55) finds twenty-five such citations. 



* Div. Lect.2S; see page xii, note 2, above. 



' Orig. XVII. 1. 1, Columella, insignia orator, qui totum 

 corpus disciplinae eiusdcm. complexus est. 



