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VALUE OF COLUMELLA raz 
Columella’s chief contribution * to knowledge of Aster is his as- 
signing it high rank as a favorite source of honey to the bees: and 
his setting forth the manner of its use as a remedy for them in dis- 
ease. Compared with Vergil, he lacks description; he may have 
owed his knowledge of the plant partly to Vergil, and partly to cur- 
rent reputation among others fond like himself of country life ; he 
may never have seen it in its native state; he adds to what Vergil 
* Of Columella little has been written for a hundred years, till just now there reaches 
us a dissertation presented for oa doctorate by Wm. Becher, De Columellae vita et 
on Leipsic, Teubner, 1897. Becher’s principal points made are thes 
he latest edition es Se is that of Schneider, 1794-7. Men i greatly 
id Columella; some hold him the best of writers de rustica, and elegantissimus 
poeta; some, but a rude compiler. Columella was born of a not ignoble family at 
Cadiz, about the beginning of the Christian era, and knew rural life there ; in Rome h 
frequented schools of rhetoric and of other Greek and Roman learning ; was military 
tribune in Syria and Cilicia, returned to honors in hiner and retired to rural life in his 
agellum Ardentinum. Under Tiberius or between 20-30 A. D., he had written his 
three short books o n agriculture, his Praecepia rustica, addressed to Eprius Marcellus ; 
a work now lost in its full form but known to Pliny and from which Pliny took the ex- 
tracts he quotes from Columella. The second book of these Praecepia survives form- 
ing the book of Columella now known as ‘‘ De arboribus,’’ a work of his youth, imbued 
with his fatherland at Cadiz. It had its influence on his paterson, * ss oe 
Columella’s example, Atticus, Celsus and Graecinus took to writing de rz 
eanwhile Columella composed an astrological work, now lost, eee ‘his mind 
with results of Greek and Roman culture, and continued his own studies of rural life, 
diligently scrutinizing the writings of his contemporaries and elders, though not always 
Possessing accurate copies, so that his quotations cannot be re elied on as unimpeach- 
Caeretanum, Entreated by his friends he added a book of “ gromatica praecepta,”’ 
taken, says Columella, ‘ex trito commentariolo,’ but without naming the author. After 
€ manner of Vergil, WD wrote a book, de hortulano, on — culture, adding an 
index which is now los 
his cntempore none but Pliny mentions him, and Pliny knew only his 
caaaal work. Writers of succeeding ages who mention him are: 
Eumelus, Giciinae sie perhaps 210 A. D., who has ten passages supposed to be 
derived from Col 
Gargilius Martialis, 2 0 A. D., quotes Pliny and Columella on the chestnut. 
alladius, perhaps 440 A. D., quotes from all of Columella’s 12 books; and 
hoa is also mentioned by an unknown Lao een of Servius’ commentary on 
Vergil, and by Vegetius, Pelagonius and Cassiod 
Cassiodorus, of about 540 A. D., a man of a reading and great erudition, 7 
y 
acquainted with ; but states that had been superseded by the writings of Palladius, 
Saying ¢* Balis tine” censured him, and the volumes of Columella passed into oblivion. 
Co! olumella’ s volumes contain so many arguments and full complex treatises that for his 
