537. Roman Nature by Mary Beagon. - Summary

537.  Roman Nature by Mary Beagon.  Naturalis Historiae was the first encyclopedia.  This scholar takes the Natural History of Pliny the Elder and uses it to reconstruct the thoughts, musings and views of the world from the point of view of an educated Roman, not necessarily the most intelligent but a person with a good mind wondering about the mystery of life and the world around him.  So her approach is not to disparage Pliny in any way.  Pliny defines life as being awake.  He possesses an interest in anything which pertains to humans.  This includes almost everything imaginable: land, sea, sky and religion.  He defines God thus:  God is Nature/Nature is God. 

The beauty of Pliny is that he wrestles with inconsistencies.  Nature is the source from which all good things for humans come but is also the source of danger and destruction.  His interest in Nature extends to what is useful to man and he apparently realizes that what is not useful now may be later on.  Consequently he is not always consistent in his thinking (but who is?).  He also thinks that man is part of nature.  But this thought manifests itself differently than it does in modern thinking.

In modern thought the idea is for man to make his/her presence have as little impact or change on the environment as possible.  To Pliny the great building program of the Romans is part of nature as much as a cave or grotto.  Man is meant to live with nature and also use nature.  Nature is a servant of man, yet it is something to be treated with respect partly because of the awesome power Natura possesses.  Roman gardens are not like, say French gardens, with everything trimmed, neat and tidy.  Roman gardens melded into the wild of Natura.  Romans loved it when vines entwined around a pergola or gazebo.  In fact this discussion about gardens helped me to appreciate Roman paintings in Pompeii and musea throughout Italy.  Garden plants such as cabbage grew right beside flowers.  Wild Natura was permitted to be part of “man’s” garden.  This section of the book also helped me to understand better the naturalizing aspects of Romans as pertains to architecture.  This concept is so foreign to us and so foreign to our typical understanding of Romans as practical people that the concept is very tricky for us to grasp.  I find this book hard to read but very rewarding.