BOOK I, PREFACE 18-21 



market-day ° gatherings were employed for this 

 purpose — that city affairs might be transacted on 

 every ninth day only and country affairs on the other 

 days. For in those times, as we have previously 

 remarked, the leading men of the state used to pass 

 their time in the fields and were summoned from 

 their farms to the senate when advice on matters 

 of state was wanted ; as a result of which those who 

 summoned them were called viatores^ or " road-men." 

 And so long as this custom was preserved, with a 19 

 most persevering enthusiasm for tilling their lands, 

 those old Sabine Quirites and our Roman forefathers, 

 even though exposed to fire and sword, and despite 

 the devastation of their crops by hostile forays, still 

 laid by a greater store of crops than do we, who, with 

 the sufferance of long-continued peace, might have 

 extended the practice of agriculture. 



So, then, in " this Latium and Saturnian land," "^ 20 

 where the gods had taught their offspring of the 

 fruits of the fields, we let contracts at auction '^ for 

 the importation of grain from our provinces beyond 

 the sea, that we may not suffer hunger; and we lay 

 up our stores of wine from the Cyclades Islands 

 and from the districts of Baetica <^ and Gaul. Nor 

 is it to be wondered at, seeing that the common 

 notion is now generally entertained and established 

 that farming is a mean employment and a business 

 which has no need of direction or of precept. But 21 

 for my part, when I review the magnitude of the 



^ Lit. " at the spear." A spear was stuck in the ground 

 at the place where an auction was held, originally as a sign 

 of the sale of plunder taken in battle. 



' A district of southern Spain, modem Andalusia. Here 

 Columella was bom, in the town of Gades (Cadiz). 



