The scourge of Puccinia graminis

Volume 15, Part 4, November 2001

Correspondence - The Scourge of Puccinia graminis

After reading Eric Caulton's very enjoyable "Odeto a Rust" (Mycologist 15/2) I was reminded of ahandout I used to give my students by the Romanpoet Ovid (43BC-17AD): the Robigalia from hisFasti (iv, 904). It, too, deals with the scourge ofPuccinia graminis - and the way the Romanstried to placate 'The Force' that caused it . Itstranslation reads as follows.

The rains will be your sign and the constellationof the Dog Star Sirius' will rise.

9050n that day as I was returning to Rome fromMontana, a white-robed crowd blocked the middleof the road. A priest was on his way to the groveof harsh Robigo to throw the entrails of a dog andthe entrails of a sheep into the flames .Straightaway I went up to him to inform myself ofthe rite. There he, Quirinus, intoned these words:Cruel Robigo, spare the sprouting grain and letthe unblemished tops quiver above the ground.Let the crops, nursed by the heaven's propitiousstars, growtill they are ripe for the sickle. Yours isno feeble power - the crops on which you havebranded your mark the husbandman gives up forlost. Not the winds, nor the showers, nor theglistening frost that nips the sallow grain, harm itso much as when the sun warms the wet stalks;then, dread goddess, is it the hour you wreak yourwrath. Spare, I pray, and take your scabby handsfrom off the harvest! Harm not the tilth; be itenough that you have the power to harm. Grip notthe tender crops but rather grip the hard iron.Forestall the destroyer. Better that you should

gnaw at swords and baneful weapons. There is noneed of them: the world is at peace. Now let therustic gear, the rakes and the hard hoe and thecurved share be burnished bright; but let the rustdefile the arms and when one essays to draw thesword from the scabbard let him feel it stick fromlong disuse . But do not profane the grain and evenmay the husbandman be able to pay his vows toyou in your absence." So he spoke. On his righthand he had a towel with a loose nap and he hada bowl of wine and a casket of incense. Theincense and wine and sheep's guts and the foulentrails of a filthy dog he put upon the hearth - wesaw him perform the ritual. Then he said to me:"You ask why an innocent victim is assigned tothese rites?" Indeed, I had asked the question."Learn the cause", the priest replied. "There is aDog (they call it the Icarian" dog) and when theconstellation rises the earth is parched and dryand the crop ripens too soon. This dog is put onthe altar instead of the starry dog, and the onlyreason for sacrificing him is his name."

'According to the Romans the dog-star Sirius,the brightest star in the sky, rising with the sunadded to its heat, and the dog-days (about 3 Julyto 11August) bore the combined heat of the dog-star and the sun.

2Icarius, the constellation Bootes, rises in Julya little before the dog-star.

Roy Moore

lID