PALLADIUS RUTILIUS

TAURI AEMILIANUS

ILLUSTRIOUS MAN

ON

RURAL AFFAIRS

BOOK I.

I. The first part of wisdom is to evaluate the very person whom you are about to instruct. For the educator of the farmer ought not to emulate rhetoricians in art and eloquence, as has been done by many: who, while they speak eloquently to farmers, have achieved the result that their learning cannot be understood even by the most eloquent. But let us cut short the delay of a preface, lest we imitate those whom we criticize. We must speak (if the divine powers favor us) on all agriculture, on pastures, and on rural buildings, according to the masters of construction, and on the discovery of water, and on every type of thing which a farmer ought to do or cultivate for the sake of pleasure and profit, yet distinguished by their own times throughout the whole. Indeed, I have decided to observe this first: that in the month in which individual things must be done, I shall set them forth with their entire instruction.

II. Therefore, first, the selecting and proper cultivating of fields.