8 Explōrātiō Secunda (II) Adventure Two

Cato the Elder, De Agricultura A-Verbs (First Conjugation) Accusative Personal Pronouns Word Order

Infinitives

 

Tusculum, Italia Mēnsis Quintilis

L. Aniciō Gallō M. Cornēliō Cēthēgō cōnsulibus

Tusculum, Italy July, 160 B.C.E.

Ūnus, duō, trēs, quattuor, quīnque, sex, septem, octō, novem… Novem adsunt, ūnus abest. Ubi est Porcius?

T
“One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine… nine are present, one is absent. Where is Porcius?”

he next night, after the ritual of the drink, we were transported to the entrance hall of a villa, a grand farmhouse at the foot of a hill in the Italian countryside. Waves of summer heat emanating from the fields outside rolled over us from behind as we stood there.

Arranged in the reception room in front of us were three rows of benches on which sat nine middle-aged Roman men, evenly spaced out, each accompanied by one or two slave attendants. An older man with a straight bearing and a very severe look on his face was standing in front of them, scanning the audience. He was evidently waiting for a man named Porcius. Porcius finally arrived – his attendant nudged us out of the way – and took a seat on the back bench, on the end, crossing his arms skeptically.

“The host here is Cato Maior, Cato the Elder,” Latinitas said to me, “a famous conservative Roman statesman. Cato served as a proconsul, or colonial governor, in the Roman provinces of Sardinia and Spain, cracking down hard on corruption among the Roman administration there while also putting down rebellions in ruthless fashion. As with many important Roman politicians, there was a vein of inhumanity running through his character. Karthāgō dēlenda est, Carthage must be destroyed – those are the famous words he ended every speech to the Senate

 

with; and Carthage, Rome’s great rival, a city of hundreds of thousands of people, was indeed destroyed, shortly after Cato’s death. Yet, he also stood up for humanity at times, defending the people on the Greek island of Rhodes after they had supported Greek resistance to Roman rule; he spared them from massacre and enslavement. He was a cruel, talented, occasionally principled, often complicated man.”

“We are visiting him today because of a book he wrote, the first book of Latin prose, entitled dē Agricultūrā, About Agriculture. These men you see here have come for its first public reading.

Cato made himself wealthy through farming, and they all hope he will reveal some of the secrets of his success. All of them, that is, except Porcius; Porcius is only here because he is Cato’s cousin and lives in a villa about a mile from here.”

With all present and accounted for, the reading started. The beginning of Cato’s advice was as follows:

“A farm: when you are planning to acquire one, have in mind the following. Don’t buy greedily, don’t spare any effort to tour it, and don’t consider it enough to go around it just once; the more times you visit, the more a good farm will please you. Pay attention to how the neighbors look: in a good area, they ought to look neat. Also, go into it and be cautious, so that you can back out of the deal. It should have good weather, not be prone to disaster, be endowed with good soil, and be strong by its own merit. If you can, let it be at the foot of a mountain, facing south, in a healthy location. There should be a supply of workmen, and a good water supply, and a thriving town nearby. There should be sea or a river where boats travel, or a road in good shape, and fast.”

Praedium cum parāre cōgitābis, sīc in animō habētō: ut nē cupidē emās nēve operā tuā parcās vīsere et nē satis habeās semel circumīre; quotiēns ībis, totiēns magis placēbit quod bonum erit. Vīcīnī quō pactō niteant, id animum advertitō: in bonā regiōne bene nitēre oportēbit. Et ut eō introeās et circumspiciās, ut inde exīre possīs. Ut bonum caelum habeat; nē calamitōsum sit; solō bonō, suā virtūte valeat. Sī poteris, sub rādīce montis sit, in merīdiem spectet, locō salūbrī; operāriōrum cōpia sit, bonumque aquārium, oppidum validum prope sit; aut mare aut amnis, quā nāvēs ambulant, aut via bona celerisque.

 

“It should be among pieces of land that don’t change owners often; the people who sell farms among such properties should regret selling them. It should be well built up. Don’t look down on another man’s routines without reason: better to purchase from a good owner and a good builder… Know that a piece of land is just like a person: even if it generates income, if it has many expenses, there won’t be much left over. If you ask me what kind of farm is first, I would say: a hundred acres with all kinds of land, in a prime location. A vineyard is first, or a place with many vines; in second place, an irrigated vegetable farm; in third place a willow grove; in fourth place an olive grove; in fifth, a hay meadow; in sixth, a field of grain; in seventh, a forest for cutting wood; in eighth, an orchard; in ninth, a forest with acorns.”

Sit in hīs agrīs quī nōn saepe dominum mūtant: quī in hīs agrīs praedia vēndiderint, eōs pigeat vēndidisse. Ut bene aedificātum sit. Cavētō aliēnam disciplīnam temere contemnās: dē dominō bonō bonōque aedificātōre melius emētur… Scītō idem agrum quod hominem, quamvīs quaestuōsus sit, sī sūmptuōsus erit, relinquī nōn multum. Praedium quod prīmum sit, sī mē rogābis, sīc dīcam: dē omnibus agrīs optimōque locō iūgera agrī centum, vīnea est prīma, vel sī vīnō multō est; secundō locō hortus irriguus; tertiō salictum; quārtō olētum; quīntō prātum; sextō campus frūmentārius; septimō silva caedua; octāvō arbustum; nōnō glandāria silva.

Once the final sentence was read Porcius suddenly stood up. He made clear through his gestures that he thought Cato was crazy; he went on to argue, Latinitas told me, that a forest with oaks and acorns is best, the best land for profit, because you can feed porcōs, pigs, on acorns, and pigs are the most delicious and most profitable farm animal to raise.

While he and the others got into an argument, we slipped outside. As we left, Latinitas surreptitiously grabbed one of the ten gift copies of the book that we found piled in a red leather container by the entrance. Out in the yard we sat at the foot of a statue of Mercury, the god of commerce. She unrolled the scroll to the passage we had just heard Cato read. She made me read the whole passage in Latin, which I did.

 

“Let’s look at the first sentence in Cato. I will turn it into English for you, one word at a time:”

 

Praediumcumparārecōgitābis,sīcinanimōhabētō. (A)

Farmwhen to acquireyou will plan,thusinmindhave.

 

“You will notice that a single Latin word may be translated by more than one English words, like

parāre, ‘to acquire’. This is a very common occurrence.”

 

“Also notice the word order – it is not like English at all! And it does not make much sense translated in order. This is because English (and many other modern languages) conveys meaning through word order: compare ‘The dog bites the mailman’ and ‘The mailman bites the dog’. Latin, however, conveys meaning through Inflection, the different endings or ‘forms’ that a word takes. We will learn these different endings, their meanings, and how to translate them in the coming weeks. When translating, we must always keep in mind that the English and Latin word order of a sentence will often be different.

Here are some common words that are straightforward, since they do not change their forms. You should enter these into your book:”

benewell (as in ‘I feel well’, not a water source) “This always comes before a verb in Latin, not after it.”

sīif

nisiunless; except

sīcthus, so

cumwhen

 

“But for most words – like praedium, parāre, cōgitābis, animō, habētō – you also need to recognize their specific forms, since these tell you their function and meaning in the sentence. The forms are what help you determine the order in which you translate the Latin into English. We’ll return to this point soon.”