Olus

**Ὁlus** or **Holus** is a winter cole vegetable with large, edible leaves. It is usually identified as a cabbage, but can refer broadly to pottage greens.

The identity of the *olus* cole is complicated by the selective breeding of *Brassica Oleracea* (common cole) that has occurred since the time of Vergil. Modern cabbage, kale, collard, cauliflower, broccoli, brussels sprouts, and jerseystalk are all the same species of *oleracea*.

A distinction between *olus* and *brassica* may have understood by Roman writers in the time of Vergil. Varro and Plautus both indicate that *brassica* related specifically to the immature cabbage head, while Catullus and other poets in Vergil’s era used *olus* to refer to leafing cole varieties more akin to collard. Cato in *De Agri Cultura* identified the cabbage as “best among the greens” (*brassica est quae omnibus holeribus antistat*; Cato 156.1) and elsewhere applies *olus* to mean general winter greens (a similar use is employed by Ausonius, cf Aus. *De Rosis Nascentibus*). *Caulis*, also sometimes translated as cabbage, referred to the stalk of the common cole.

The agricultural writers Vergil is drawing from (chiefly Varro and Cato) routinely include reference to *olus*, although not as a particularly significant vegetable. Varro is primarily concerned with its impact on soil, noting it is a nutrient-intensive vegetable that should be kept away from olives. Cato refers to *olus* in passing as a winter pasture crop. However, medical writers (particularly Celsus, about a generation after Vergil) extensively described the benefits of *olus.* In the Greek world it was something of a panacea; references to it in the Roman world in Vergil’s day focus on its ability to forestall intoxication. The simple, healthful, sober vegetable of hard winters is characteristic of Vergil’s idealized farmer.

The *olus* would have a small place in the history of the imperium. In the waning years of the tetrarchy, Diocletian is purported to have retired to his cabbage garden in Dalmatia (*Utinam Salonae possetis visere olera nostris manibus instituta, profecto numquam istud temptandum iudicaretis*).

### Declension and Etymology

*Olus* derives from the somewhat uncertain collection of European color words, with the cognates *χλωρός*, *glas, gelb*, and *yellow*. The Greek, Germanic, and Celtic descendants dealing directly with color span the spectrum from gold to aquamarine, but the Proto-Indo-European root may originally have been associated with “natural” colors such as green. In Latin, *Olus* as a noun refers to some natural green, in the way someone in English might refer to a salad as “greens.” The simple substantive ending *-us* suggests a second declension noun, but *olus* in practice declines as a third declension neuter noun.

Olus/Oleris
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### Usages

*Olus* occurs exactly once in the Georgics (IV.130), as a vegetable that can be grown in environments unsuitable for grapes, corns, or livestock. Its occurrence alongside other plants like lilies, poppies, and verbena implies that cole has some benefit for bees; no other writers suggest this.

### Occurrence

> hic rarum tamen in dumis **olus** albaque circum lilia uerbenasque premens uescumque papauer regum aequabat opes animis seraque reuertens nocte domum dapibus mensas onerabat inemptis (IV.130)
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