Trees, Shrubs, and Plants of Virgil 



Of the vineyard there were two types. For one 

 type the technical name seems to have been ' vinea,' 

 though usage is not quite consistent. In this the 

 vines either crept along the ground or were held up 

 by short sticks — Shakespeare's ' pole-clipt vinyard.' 

 Both methods survive in Italy, the sticks nowadays 

 being often a tripod of bamboo canes. This system 

 reduces labour, but the vines are more liable to damage 

 from hailstorms. It does not appear that Virgil men- 

 tions it, his use of the name ' vinea ' being merely 

 for metrical convenience, and his principles would 

 involve a preference for the ' vinetum ' or ' arbustum,' 

 as it was sometimes called. In this the vines were 

 trained to trees, usually elms {Ec. ii. 70 ; Ge. i. 2 ; 

 ib. ii. 221). The only other tree mentioned by Virgil 

 is a willow (Ec. x. 40), but many others were occa- 

 sionally used. The plane was rejected rather for its 

 shaling bark than for its large leaves, for in well- 

 managed vineyards no more leaves were allowed on 

 the supporting tree than served to keep it alive 

 (Ge. ii. 400; Ec. ii. 70). Indeed, when the soil 

 was thin only a single shoot was allowed to grow 

 from the top of the trunk. On the other hand, in 

 rich soil it was usual to have a system of trained 

 branches. 



On this method the young vines were at first 

 trained to reeds, or poles, or folded sticks {ib. 358 sq.), 

 which reached up to the lowest tier of branches, the 

 name for the tiers being ' tabulata,' or stories. The 

 interval between the tiers was not less than three 

 feet, and no branch was immediately under one in 



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