Columella's Defrutum [Today's News Poem, October 12 2010]

Columella's Defrutum [Today's News Poem, October 12 2010]

Essence is sweetest.
Nothing in nature's
Adequate. Only
Glorious chasing
Offers the flavors
Purified, drawn from
Traces. For every
Cure for our boredom,
Pain will stay single.
Each of the pleasures
Smothers, but never
Substitutes bitterness.

"Equities research analysts at Deutsche Bank (NYSE: DB) downgraded shares of Archer-Daniels-Midland (NYSE: ADM) form a “buy” Rating to a “hold” rating in a research note to investors on Monday.
Archer Daniels Midland Company is principally engaged in procuring, transporting, storing, processing, and merchandising agricultural commodities and products. It is a processor of oilseeds, corn, wheat, cocoa, and other agricultural commodities and is a manufacturer of vegetable oil and protein meal, corn sweeteners, flour, biodiesel, ethanol, and other food and feed ingredients."
—American Banking News, October 12th, 2010
http://www.americanbankingnews.com/2010/10/12/deutsche-bank-nyse-db-downgrades-archer-daniels-midland-nyse-adm/

"A Mexican police commander investigating the death of American tourist David Hartley in Mexican waters was found murdered on Tuesday, authorities in the border state of Tamaulipas confirmed."
—Nacha Cattan, The Christian Science Monitor, October 12, 2010
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Americas/2010/1012/Murder-of-Mexican-investigator-in-Falcon-Lake-probe-reveals-drug-cartels-reach

"Writing in the first century AD, Columella elaborates on this process.
"Some people put the must in leaden vessels and by boiling reduce it by a quarter, others by a third. There is no doubt that anyone who boiled it down to one-half would be likely to make a better thick form of must and therefore more profitable for use....But, before the must is poured into the boiling-vessels, it will be well that those which are made of lead should be coated inside with good oil and be well-rubbed, and that then the must should be put in....The vessels themselves in which the thickened and boiled-down must is boiled should be of lead rather than of brass; for, in the boiling, brazen vessels throw off copper rust [aerugo], and spoil the flavour of the preservative....Must of the sweetest possible flavour will be boiled down to a third of its original volume and when boiled down, as I have said above, is called defrutum" (XII.19.1, 19.6, 20.1, 21.1; notice that the definition is not always consistent).""
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/wine/leadpoisoning.html

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