  It appears from Aulus Gellius, that, even in his time, the works of Cato had begun to be corrupted by the ignorance of transcribers. As mentioned in the text, his book on Agriculture, the only one of his numerous writings which survives, has come down to us in a very imperfect and mutilated state. A MS. of Cato, but very faulty and incomplete, was in possession of Niccolo Niccoli; and a letter from him is extant, requesting one of his correspondents, called Michelotius, to borrow for him a very ancient copy from the Bishop Aretino, in order that his own might be rendered more perfect628. Most of the editions we now have, follow a MS. which is said to have been discovered at Paris by the architect Fra Giocondo of Verona, and was brought by him to Italy. Varro’s treatise on Agriculture was first discovered by Candidi, as he himself announces in a letter to Niccolo Niccoli629. [pg A-44]The agricultural works of Cato and Varro have generally been printed together, and also along with those of Columella and Palladius, under the title of Rei RusticÆ Scriptores. There is no ancient MS. known, in which all the Rei RusticÆ Scriptores are collected together. They were first combined in the Editio Princeps, edited by Georgius Merula, and printed at Venice, in 1470. The next edition, superintended by Bruschius, and printed in 1482, has almost entirely disappeared. In many passages, its readings were different from those of all other editions, as appears from the annotations communicated from Rome, by Pontedera to Gesner, while he was preparing his celebrated edition630. Philippus Beroaldus corrected a good many faults and errors which had crept into the Editio Princeps. His emendations were made use of in the edition of Bologna, 1494, by Benedict Hector. Gesner has assiduously collated that edition with the Editio princeps, and he informs us, that it contained many important corrections. Though differing in some respects, he considers all the editions previous to that of Aldus, as belonging to the same class or family. The Aldine edition, printed 1514, was superintended by Fra Giocondo of Verona, who, having procured at Paris some MSS. not previously consulted, introduced from them many new readings, and filled up several chasms in the text, particularly the fifty-seventh chapter631. This edition, however, is not highly esteemed; “Sequitur,” says Fabricius, “novi nec optimi generis editio Aldina:” And Schneider, the most recent editor of the Rei RusticÆ Scriptores, affirms that Giocondo corrupted and perverted almost every passage which he changed. Nicholas Angelius took charge of the edition published by the Giunta at Florence, in 1515. His new readings are ingenious; but many of them are quite unauthorized and conjectural. The Aldine continued to form the basis of all subsequent editions, till the time of Petrus Victorius, who was so great a restorer and amender of the Rei RusticÆ Scriptores, that he is called their Æsculapius by Gesner, and Sospitator by Fabricius. Victorius had got access to a set of MSS. which Politian had collated with the Editio Princeps. The most ancient and important of these MSS., containing Cato, and almost the whole of Varro, was found by Victorius in the library of St Mark; another in French characters was in the Medicean library; and a third had belonged to Franciscus Barbarus, and was transcribed by him from an excellent exemplar at Padua632. But though Victorius had the advantage of consulting these MSS., it does not appear that he possessed the collation by the able hand of Politian; because that was inserted, not in the MSS., but in his own printed copy of the Editio Princeps; and Gesner shows at great length that Petrus Victorius had never consulted any copy whatever of the Editio Princeps633. Victorius first employed his learning and critical talents on Varro. Some time afterwards, Giovanni della Casa being sent by the Pope on some public affairs to Florence, where Victorius at that time resided, brought him a message from the Cardinal Marcellus Cervinus, requesting that he should exert on Cato some part of that diligence which he had formerly employed on Varro. Victorius soon completed the task assigned him. He also resumed Varro, and attentively revised his former labours on that author634. At last he determined to collate whatever MSS. of the Rustic writers he could procure. Those above-mentioned, as having been inspected by Politian, were the great sources whence he derived new and various readings. It is not known that Victorius printed any edition containing the text of the Rei RusticÆ Scriptores in Italy. His letter to Cervinus speaks as if he was just about to At length Gesner undertook a complete edition of the Rei RusticÆ Scriptores, under circumstances of which he has given us some account in his preface. The eminent bookseller, Fritschius, had formed a plan of printing these authors; and to aid in this object, he had employed Schoettgenius, a young, but even then a distinguished scholar. A digest of the best commentators, and a collection of various readings, were accordingly prepared by him. The undertaking, however, was then deferred, in expectation of the arrival of MSS. from Italy; and Schoettgenius was meanwhile called to a distance to some other employment, leaving the fruits of his labour in the hands of Fritschius. In 1726, that bookseller came to Gesner, and informed him, that Politian’s collations, written on his copy of the Editio Princeps, had at length reached him, as also some valuable observations on the rustic writers, communicated from Italy by Pontedera and Facciolati. Fritschius requested that Gesner should now arrange the whole materials which had been compiled. Selections from the commentaries, and the various readings previous to the time of Victorius, were prepared to his hand; but he commenced an assiduous study of every thing that was valuable in more recent editions. At length his ponderous edition came out with a preface, giving a full detail of the labours of others and his own, and with the prefaces to the most celebrated preceding editions. Some of the notes had been previously printed, as those of Meursius, Scaliger, and Fulvius Ursinus—others, as those of Schoettgenius, Pontedera, and Gesner himself, had never yet seen the light. Though Gesner never names Pontedera without duly styling him Clarissimus Pontedera, that scholar was by no means pleased with the result of Gesner’s edition, and attacked it with much asperity, in his great work, Antiquitatum Rusticarum. Gesner’s first edition was printed at Leipsic, 1735. Ernesti took charge of the publication of the second edition; and, in addition to the dissertation of Ausonius Popma, De Instrumento Fundi, which formed an appendix to the first, he has inserted Segner’s description and explanation of the aviary of Varro. The most recent edition of the Scriptores Rei RusticÆ, is that of Schneider, who conceives that he has perfected the edition of Gesner, by having collated the ancient edition of Bruschius, and the first Aldine edition, neither of which had been consulted by his predecessor. Besides forming parts of every collection of the Rei RusticÆ Scriptores, the agricultural treatises of Cato and Varro have been repeatedly printed by themselves, and apart from those of Columella and Palladius. Ausonius Popma, in his separate edition of Cato, 1590, has chiefly, and without much acknowledgment, employed some valuable annotations and remarks contained in the Adversaria of Turnebus. This edition was accompanied by some other fragments of Cato. These, however, were of small importance; and the principal part of the publication being the work on Agriculture, its sale was much impeded by Commellinus’ full edition of the agricultural writers, published five years afterwards. Raphellengius, however, reprinted it in 1598, with a new title; and with the addition of the notes of Meursius. Popma again revised his labours, and published an improved edition in 1620. Varro’s treatise, De Re RusticÂ, was published alone in 1545, and with his other writings, by Stephens, in 1569. Ausonius Popma also edited it in 1601, appropriating, according to his custom, the notes and observations of others. Cato’s work De Re RusticÂ, has been translated into Italian by Pagani, whose version was printed at Venice, 1792; and into French by Saboureux, Paris, 1775. I am not aware of any full English translation of Cato, but numerous extracts are made from it in Dickson’s Husbandry of the Ancients. Italy has produced more translations of the Latin writers than any other country; and one would naturally suppose, that the agricultural writings of those who had cultivated the same soil as themselves, would be peculiarly interesting to the Italians. I do not know, however, of any version of Varro in their language. There is an English translation, by the Rev. Mr Owen, printed at Oxford in 1800. In his preface, the author says,—“Having collated many copies of this work of the Roman writer in my possession, and the variations being very numerous, I found it no easy task to make a translation of his treatise on agriculture. To render any common Arabic author into English, would have been a labour less difficult to me some years ago, than it has been to translate this part of the works of this celebrated writer.” |
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