The works of Horace : with English notes, critical and ... - Cristo Raul

694 EXCUESUS VI* INSPISSATED WINES.
ta^e pl-ace. Aa the more volatile parts of^the must were often evaporated
by lioiling-, and aa varioas Bolid or viscid ingredients were added to the
wine previously to its introduction into the amphoreerit is manifest that o
further exhalation must have reduced it to the state of a sirap or extract
Jn the case of the finer wines, it is tme, this effect woald be in some measure
counteracted by the influence of the insensible fermentation; and a
large proportion of the original extractive matter, aswell as of the heterogeneous
substances suspended with it, would be precipitated on the sides
and bottoms of the vessels, in the form of lees ; but in other instances, the
process of inspissation would go on, without much abatement from this
cause. Hence it comes that so many of the ancient wines have been described
as thick and fat, and that they were not deemed ripe for use until
they had acquired an oily smoothness from age. Hence, too, the prac
tice of employing strainers [cola vinaria) to clarify them, and free them
from their dregs. In fact, they often became consolidated to such a degree
that they could no longer be poured from the vessels, and it was
necessary to dissolve them in hot water before they could be drunk. We
learn from Aristotle that some of the stronger wines, such as the Arcadian,
were reduced to a concrete mass when exposed in skins to the action of
the smoke ;^ and the wine-vases, discovered among the ruins of Hercu
laneum and Pompeii, have generally been foaud to contain a quantity of
earthy matter. It is clear, then, that those wines which were designed
for long keeping could not have been subjected to the highest temperature
of the fumarinm without being almost) always reduced to an extract. Indeed,
Columella warns the operator that such might be the issue of the
process, and recommends that there should be a lofb above the apothei^
.-into which the wines could be removed, "«e rursus nimia su£Uione medr.
icata sint"
'
,
For the more precious wines the ancients occasionally employed ves-
sels of glass. The bottles, vases, cnps, and other articles of that material,
which are to be seen in every collection of antiquities, prove that they had
brought the manufacture to a great degree of perfection. We know that,
for preserving fruits, they certainly gave-the preference to glass jars ; and
at the sapper of Trimalcio, so admirably .depicted by Petronins, even amphorcQ
of glass are said to have been introduced.^ Wbetfier they were
of the full quadrantal measure does not appear; but, in all probability,
they were of more moderate dimensions, for we are told by Martial that
the choicest Falernian was kept in small glass bottles,' and neither the
number of the guests nor the quality of the liquor, supposing it to have
Deen genuine, would have justified the use of full-sized amphorae on the
occasion above alluded to.
The ancients were careful to rack their wines only when the wind was
northerly, as they had observed that they were apt to be turbid wfaen it
blew in an opposite direction. The weaker sorts were transferred, in the
spring, to the vessels in which they were destined to remain ; the stronger
kinds during summer ; but those grown on dry soils were not drawn off nn
til after the winter solstice.^ According to Plutarch, wines were most af^
fected by the west wind ; and such as rem-ained unchanged by it were
1. Meteorolog., iv., 10. 2. Satyric, 34 3. Epig., ii., 40. 4 Qeoponica, vii., 6