Pliny the Elder, The Natural History, BOOK XIV. THE NATURAL HISTORY OF THE FRUIT TREES., CHAP. 24.

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CHAP. 24.—How MUST IS USUALLY PREPARED.

It will be as well now to make some mention of the methods used in preparing wines; indeed, several of the Greeks have written separate treatises on this subject, and have made a complete art of it, such, for instance, as Euphronius, Aristomachus, Commiades, and Hicesius. The people of Africa are in the habit of neutralizing such acidity¹ as may be found with gypsum, and in some parts with lime. The people of Greece, on the other hand, impart briskness to their wines when too flat, with potters' earth, pounded marble, salt, or sea-water; while in Italy, again, brown pitch is used for that purpose in some parts, and it is the universal practice both there as well as in the adjoining provinces to season their new wines with resin: sometimes, too, they season them with old wine-lees or vinegar² They make various medicaments, also, for this purpose with the must itself. They boil it down till it becomes quite sweet, and has lost a considerable portion of its strength; though thus prepared, they say it will never last beyond a single year. In some places they boil down the must till it becomes sapa,³ and then mix it with their wines for the purpose of modifying their harshness. Both for these kinds of wines, as, indeed, all others, they always employ vessels which have themselves received an inner coat of pitch; the method of preparing them will be set forth in a succeeding Book.⁴

1 See B. xxiii. c. 24, and B. xxxvi. c. 48.

2 A process very likely, as Fée remarks, to turn the wines speedily to vinegar.

3 Down to one-third. This practice of using boiled grape-juice as a seasoning, is still followed in Spain in making some of the liqueurs; but it is not generally recommended.

4 B. xvi. c. 21.

The Natural History. Pliny the Elder. John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S. H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A. London. Taylor and Francis, Red Lion Court, Fleet Street. 1855.

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Pliny the Elder, The Natural History
John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S., H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A., Ed.

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CHAP. 24.—How MUST IS USUALLY PREPARED.

Pliny the Elder, The Natural History John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S., H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A., Ed.

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CHAP. 24.—How MUST IS USUALLY PREPARED.

Pliny the Elder, The Natural History
John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S., H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A., Ed.