ANCIENT ROME AUTHOR · NATURAL HISTORY · PRE-LINNEAN WORKS
Also known as: Pliny the Elder, Pliny the elder.
The elder Pliny on the human animal
2005
"The seventh book of Pliny's Natural History, his magisterial survey of nature, records his researches into the human race. Book 7 encapsulates the core of the complex and ambivalent relationship between nature and her human prodigy. Although structured around the human natural life cycle, Pliny's enquiries go far beyond a purely biological description to reveal the cultural belief system of the Roman world in the first century A.D. with a detail and variety unmatched by any other ancient record. The present study, the first detailed commentary on Book 7, is intended to highlight the cultural importance of Pliny's text. While giving due emphasis to Pliny's comments on 'mainstream' historical data involving well-known individuals and events, it focuses in particular on the off-beat, the curious, and the obscure, where investigation frequently reveals a complex substratum of ancient beliefs and ideas. As a result, fresh light is shed on the popular cultural heritage of Pliny's era, much of which was already of considerable antiquity, and may also, in some cases, reach beyond the confines of early imperial Rome to offer analogies with other cultures and eras."--BOOK JACKET.
Pliny
PLINY, the Elder, Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23-79), a Roman of equestrian rank of Transpadane Gaul (N. Italy), was uncle of Pliny the letter writer. He pursued a career partly military in Germany, partly administrative in Gaul and Spain under the emperor Vespasian, and became prefect of the fleet at Misenum. He died in the eruption of Vesuvius when he went to get a closer view and to rescue friends. Tireless worker, reader, and writer, he was author of works now lost; but his great Natural History in 37 books with its vast collection of facts (and alleged facts) survives -- a mine of information despite its uncritical character. The contents of the books are as follows. Book 1: table of contents of the others and of authorities ; 2: mathematical and metrological survey of the universe; 3-6: Geography and ehtnography of the known world; 7: anthropology and physiology of man; 8-11: zoology; 12-19: botany, agriculture, and horticulture; 20-27: plant products as used in medicine; 28-32: medical zoology; 33-37: minerals (and medicine), the fine arts, and gemstones.