Lucius Junius Moderatus Columella was the author of the most comprehensive, systematic agricultural manual to survive from antiquity, but his birth and death dates are uncertain. Internal references and some remarks in the works of other writers indicate that he was one of many prominent writers of the Neronian period (including the Senecas and their nephew Lucan) who were of Spanish descent. Columella was born in Gades (modern Cadiz), a municipium (self-governing community) in the southern Spanish province of Baetica, probably toward the end of the first century B.C. His parents are unknown, but he mentions an uncle named Marcus Columella, whom he calls a doctissimum et diligentissimum agricolam (very learned and careful farmer, 2.15.4) on whose farm near Gades he spent much of his youth and from whom he may have derived much of the knowledge and inspiration for his work. Plutarch mentions a Pythagorean philosopher named...