Vinaceis vero omnino abstinere iusserim, [232] quod quanvis tolerabiliter pascant, ex eorum tamen usu, raro pariant, et ova exigua faciant. Sint igitur ipsis cibus post autumnum, cum a partu cessant. Quod etiam Columellae praeceptum est. Eo tempore, inquit[1], quo parere desinent aves, id est, ab idibus Novembris pretios<i>ores cibi subtrahendi sunt, et vinacea praebenda, quae satis commode pascunt adiectis interdum tritici excrementis. Vitentur herbae amarae, maxime {absynthium} <absinthium>, siquidem ex eius esu ova amarissima pariunt. Sunt qui ex impura cibaria pascentibus Gallinis putrida plerunque venenataque ova nasci velint, et excrementosa, si humanas faeces comederint. Lupinis etiam abstinere debent ob eandem causam, tum vero quod sub oculis grana gignant, ut Crescentiensis observavit[2], quae nisi acu, teste Palladio[3], leviter apertis pelliculis auferantur, oculos extinguunt.

But I would like to advise that hens ought to abstain absolutely from grape husks since, although they are fairly well nourishing, they seldom lay eggs and small ones when using them. Therefore they must be a food for them after the autumn when they stop laying. This is also an advice of Columella. He says: At the time when the birds cease laying, that is, starting from the ides of November - November 13th, more expensive foods should be withheld, and grape husks given them since they are satisfactory nourishing, occasionally adding wheat discards. Bitter herbs should be avoided, chiefly wormwood, because when eating it they lay very bitter eggs. There are people who think that from hens eating impure foods they take birth generally rotten and poisoned eggs, as well as with taste of excrements if they ate human feces. They should also abstain from lupines for the same reason, as well as for the reason that granules occur under their eyes, as Pier de’ Crescenzi observed, which cause the loss of the sight unless, as Palladius reports, they are removed with a needle after the thin skin covering them has been delicately opened.

Uvae, quarum alioqui sapore maxime afficiuntur, propter  vinacea prohibentur, quae steriles reddunt, tum etiam, quod pituitam generent communem huius avium generis pestem, maxime si immaturae fuerint. Idem incommodum ficus adferunt, quorum esu non minus gaudent, et perperam Ornithologus[4] aut lectum ab Hermolao[5], aut male intellectum hoc Graecum carmen suspicatur.

Σῦκα φιλ'ὀρνίθε{ο}<σ>σι, φυτεύειν δ’οὐκ ἐθέλουσιν, id est:

Ficus amant aves, plantare vero nolunt.

Grapes, by whose taste on the other hand they are exceedingly attracted, are forbidden on account of the grape-stones, which make them sterile, and also because they cause the pip, a common disease among this genus of birds, especially if grapes are immature. Figs cause them the same disease, and in eating them they do not take less pleasure, and the Ornithologist is suspicious that the following Greek verse has been either misread or misunderstood by Ermolao Barbaro.

Sûka phil’orníthessi, phyteúein d’ouk ethélousin, that is:

The birds like the figs, but they do not wish to plant them.

Cum ceu proverbialiter recenseat Gallinaceos amantibus {ficus} <ficum>[6] ne serito: quasi vero Barbarus Gallinaceos neget ficus amare. Sed hoc voluit indicare, ut qui eiusmodi aves lucri causa educant, ficus non offerant, quod, ut dixi, pituitam generent. Ut igitur huic malo obviam eas, caprificum una cum cibo decoctam offeres, atque ita, teste Columella, ficus fastidire facies. Item uvarum fastidium inducit uva labrusca de vepribus immatura lecta. Plinius alibi simpliciter cibo incoctam dari iubet, alibi cum farre mistam[7]. Columella[8] cum farre triticeo minuto coctam esurientibus obijci vult, polliceturque eius sapore offendi ita aves, ut omnem aspernentur uvam. Sed videndum est, num eandem plantam intellexerit, quam Plinius. Hic enim alibi[9] etiam uvae florem id praestare scripsit his verbis: Uvae florem in cibis si edere Gallinacei, uvas non attingunt. Fortassis {oenantem} <oenanthen>[10] e Graeco uvae florem transtulit. A Dioscoride quidem memoratur genus vitis sylvestris sterile, quod fructum non profert, sed florem tantum, {quen} <quem> oenanthen vocant[11]. Sed Labrusca alioqui fructum fert, at exiguum eumque prius admodum austerum, post mellitum, atque dulcissimum.

Since by a sort of proverb he bids: you don't will plant a fig for those who love chickens; as though Ermolao Barbaro affirms that chickens don't like figs. But he wished to indicate this: so that those who raise chickens for profit should not offer them figs, because, as I said, they cause the pip. Then, to ward off this disease you should offer the hens boiled wild figs with their food and thus, as Columella testifies, you will make them dislike figs. Likewise the wild grape - or lambrusca, picked unripe among thorny shrubs, gives a dislike for different kind of grapes. In a passage Pliny urges it must be cooked and given them as food  just as it is; in another it must be given mixed with emmer meal. Columella wishes it to be given hungry hens boiled with fine wheat flour, and promises that its taste will so disgust the birds that they will refuse all grapes. But it must be seen whether he means the same plant as Pliny does. For the latter elsewhere wrote that also the grape flower accomplishes the same purpose, by these words: If the chickens eat the flower of the grape in their food they do not touch grapes. Perhaps he translated from the Greek oenanthe as grape’s flower. Dioscorides indeed mentions a kind of sterile wild vine which does not give a fruit but only a flower, which they call oenanthe. But however the lambrusca bears a fruit, which however is small, and which before is very sour, later honeyed and very sweet.

Caeterum quaecunque dabitur esca per cohortem vagantibus, monet Columella[12], ut die incipiente, et iam in vesperam inclinante bis dividatur, ne scilicet mane a cubili latius evagentur, et ante crepusculum vespertinum propter cibi spem tempestivius ad officinam redeant, possitque numerus capitum saepius recognosci. Nam omne volatile pecus pastoris custodiam facile decipit. Quantum autem cuique avi exhibendum est difficulter exprimi posse putem. Palladius[13] tamen duobus hordei cyathis[14], unam, quae vaga est, Gallinam bene pasci dixit.

Whatever food is given the flock when it wanders through the barnyard, Columella advises that it must be divided in two times, at daybreak and towards evening, so that they will not wander far from the pen in the morning and will return to the poultry house early before evening twilight because of their hope of food, and the number of head can be repeatedly counted. For whatever flock of fowls easily deceives the check of the keeper. I should think it is difficult to tell how much food should be given each bird. Palladius said, however, that two cyathi of barley feed well a wandering hen.

Qui vero saginare eas, et ad mensae luxum educare volunt, diligentius, et maiori impensa eas nutriunt, ut ea dignam mercedem consequantur. Quae res antiquissima certe est, et quam Deliaci primi exercuisse perhibentur, de quibus ita Plinius[15]: Gallinas saginare Deliaci coepere: unde pestis exorta {optimas} <opimas> aves, et suopte corpore unctas devorandi. Hoc primum antiquis caenarum interdictis exceptum invenio iam lege C. Fannii Cos. XI. annis ante tertium Punicum bellum, ne quid {volucrum} <volucre> poneretur praeter unam Gallinam, quae non esset altilis: quod deinde caput translatum per omnes leges ambulavit. Meminit eorundem Cicero[16]: Vides ne, inquiens, ut in proverbio sit ovorum inter se similitudo? Tamen hoc accepimus, Deli fuisse complures salvis rebus illis, qui Gallinas alere permultas, quaestus causa solerent. {Hi} <Ei> cum ovum inspexerant, quae id Gallina peperisset dicere solebant. <A> Petronio Arbitro[17] Deliaci Gallinarum curatores <dicti sunt> Molles, veteres, Deliaci manu recisi, id est castrati, ut Scaliger exponit.

But those who wish to fatten and raise them for table pleasures, they feed them more carefully and with greater expense, in order to obtain a worthwhile profit. This practice is certainly very ancient, and the inhabitants of Delos are regarded as firsts to have carried it out, of whom Pliny writes as follows: They have been the inhabitants of Delos who began to fatten hens, whence arose the very bad practice of eat up fat poultry basted in its own greasy. Among the ancient prohibitions concerning courses, in the law promulgated by the consul Caius Fannius eleven years before the Third Punic War - 161 BC - I first find the prohibition of serving no course of fowl except a single not fattened hen; this article of law was later resumed and drifted from law to law. Cicero mentioned them when saying: Are you aware how the likeness of one egg to another is proverbial? Nevertheless we have been told what follows, that at Delos, without damage for those things, a great number of people were in the habit of keeping large numbers of hens for profit purposes. Whenever they looked at an egg they used to tell which hen laid it. The hens keepers of Delos are called by Petronius Arbiter The ancient effeminate Delians cut by the hand, that is, castrated, as Giulio Cesare/Giuseppe Giusto Scaligero explains.

Saginantur autem hyeme melius, quam aestate. Sunt tamen qui asserunt Gallinas potissimum pinguescere, quo tempore arbores  florent: maxime, si flores depascantur: ova vero tunc etiam cito corrumpi ac putrescere. Locus ad saginandum {calidissimus} <tepidus> deligendus, et modici luminis, quod motus earum, et lux pinguedini inimica sit, ut Varro[18] tradit, et experientia suffragatur: unde et Martialis[19] ganeae non imperitus fuisse videri potest, cum non tantum nobis tradiderit, quo loco saginentur, verum etiam, quo cibo maxime. Ait autem:

Pascitur et dulci facili<s>  Gallina farina,

Pascitur et tenebris{,}<.> {ingenios agula est} <Ingeniosa gula est>.

Vocat autem dulcem farinam, quae ex milio fit mulso lacteve elotam, unde etiam Plinius[20] dicebat: Inventumque diverticulum est in fraude<m> earum Gallinaceos quoque pascendi lacte madidis cibis, multo ita gratiores approbantur.

They are fattened better in winter than in summer. There are those, however, who assert that hens fatten above all in the season when trees are blooming: especially if they eat flowers: but at that time their eggs are also quickly corrupted and grow rotten. A lukewarm place for fattening hens should be chosen and with a moderate light, because their motion and the light are adverse to fattening, as Varro reports and experience supports. Hence, also Martial can appear to have been experienced in carousing since he not only reported the place where hens are to be fattened, but also the food which fattens them most. For he says:

The hen is easily nourished also with sweet meal,

she is also nourished by darkness. The palate is ingenious.

And he calls sweet flour that made from millet, moistened with hydromel or milk, whence also Pliny said: A loophole to evade these laws has been found by feeding also roosters with foods soaked in milk: in this way they are regarded as much more tasteful.

Pinguescunt fere viginti quinque diebus, singulae caveis inclusae, quae ab utraque parte foramina habeant, unum, quo caput alterum, quo caudam exerant, ut scilicet cibum capere, et excrementa deponere queant.

They grow fat within almost twenty-five days, enclosed singly in coops which have holes on each side, one for thrusting out their head and another for the tail, that is, so that they can both eat and put down their dung.