Sacri Pulli: A Tale of War and Chickens

by Emma Vanderpool

Piccius is not your average Roman chicken... Sure, he lives in a chicken coop like other chickens. But, the gods tell him their will and Piccius shares the gods' will to the Romans through Marcus, the Pullarius... if only Roman generals would listen to Marcus and Piccius! This is the story of not just a sacred chicken and his keeper but also the story of the Roman general Publius Claudius Pulcher and what happens when he consults the sacred chickens of Rome...Suitable for novice Latin readers in their 1st-2nd year of Latin study.

55 pages, paperback

Published August 16, 2019

Reviews

[John Damon Davis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hic liber deos falsos colit

[Sineala · Rating 3 out of 5]

I acknowledge that I am not the best or most knowledgeable person to write this review; my wife is a Latin teacher and had bought this book to use with her students and I saw it and said "hey, is that the 'if they don't want to eat, then let them drink' guy?" and she said "yep" and then I stole it out of her bag and read it before she took it to school. (I put it back.)

Anyway. Someone who is better at Latin than me can give this book an actual review but I very much enjoyed the tale of the sacred chickens and thought the use of multiple POVs -- a chicken-keeper, Publius Claudius Pulcher, a chicken itself, and also the very annoyed gods at the end -- was interesting and really enlivened the tale. I am pretty sure a beginning student would enjoy this although "negotium," "auspicia referre," and "bellum gerere" were glossed a whole lot more times than I personally needed to see them.

But, hey, now I know what noise a chicken makes in Latin.

[Leila Chandler · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am a big fan of Latin easy readers, especially when there is a lot of repitition to help the vocabulary sink in. However, this book seemed to be nothing but repitition of the same things. The plot never advanced until the very end. My kids did not like it at all because it was too repititive. There are other easy Latin readers out there that use a lot of repitition while at the same time still able to drive the plot forward and be amusing.

[Kelly Macfarlane · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good addition for any free voluntary reading program --- a simple story with lots of repetitions of high frequency vocabulary, forms, and constructions, and a straightforward but compelling story. A couple of typos (nominative where there should be a vocative) but those are easily corrected.

[Donna Parker · Rating 5 out of 5]

I started studying Latin (on my own at home) around Mother's Day. I read this book today (for the first time). I am delighted to have found this author, and look forward to re-reading this book and also reading other books by this author.

[Bethany · Rating 4 out of 5]

This gets 4 stars just for the laughs at times.
This was really repetitive, and I understand that it would help with learning vocabulary, but seeing the description of the power about 4 times did seem excessive. I did feel a bit sad at the end - I wanted the chickens to be ok

[Caitlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

First book in Latin. I learnt a lot about chickens. I am a sacred chicken.

[Jeffrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

A most unfortunate chain of events for the sacred chickens.

[Rebecca Thomason · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cute story. I think my students will get a kick out of this. I love the stories from this era of Roman history. It's fun to read.

[Levi]

So joyously jealous of Emma! After meeting her this summer at a Latin immersion experience, I was happy to find out about her book! Plus I love this story and I love teaching it in history and now I’ll get to share the story in my Latin classes as well. I had thought about writing a story like this after my history class last year enjoyed the story of what I termed “The Battle Chickens” as much as I do.

Great, comprehensible material for beginning students. Plus, I liked the three different perspectives throughout the book. Macte, amica!