Origin of Cultivated Plants. Alphonse de Candolle

---

Скачать книгу

---

found wild with certainty. It appears to me, therefore, more probable than ever that it is a modification of A. Cepa, dating from about the beginning of the Christian era – a modification less considerable than many of those observed in other cultivated plants, as, for instance, in the cabbage.

      Rocambole—Allium scorodoprasum, Linnæus.

      If we cast a glance at the descriptions and names of A. scorodoprasum in works on botany since the time of Linnæus, we shall see that the only point on which authors are agreed is the common name of rocambole. As to the distinctive characters, they sometimes approximate the plant to Allium sativum, sometimes regard it as altogether distinct. With such different definitions, it is difficult to know in what country the plant, well known in its cultivated state as the rocambole, is found wild. According to Cosson and Germain,255 it grows in the environs of Paris. According to Grenier and Godron,256 the same form grows in the east of France. Burnat says he found the species undoubtedly wild in the Alpes-Maritimes, and he gave specimens of it to Boissier. Willkomm and Lange do not consider it to be wild in Spain,257 though one of the French names of the cultivated plant is ail or eschalote d’Espagne. Many other European localities seem to me doubtful, since the specific characters are so uncertain. I mention, however, that, according to Ledebour,258 the plant which he calls A. scorodoprasum is very common in Russia from Finland to the Crimea. Boissier received a specimen of it from Dobrutscha, sent by the botanist Sintenis. The natural habitat of the species borders, therefore, on that of Allium sativum, or else an attentive study of all these forms will show that a single species, comprising several varieties, extends over a great part of Europe and the bordering countries of Asia.

      The cultivation of this species of onion does not appear to be of ancient date. It is not mentioned by Greek and Roman authors, nor in the list of plants recommended by Charlemagne to the intendants of his gardens.259 Neither does Olivier de Serres speak of it. We can only give a small number of original common names among ancient peoples. The most distinctive are in the North. Skovlög in Denmark, keipe and rackenboll in Sweden.260 Rockenbolle, whence comes the French name, is German. It has not the meaning given by Littré. Its etymology is Bolle, onion, growing among the rocks, Rocken.261

      Chives—Allium schœnoprasum, Linnæus.

      This species occupies an extensive area in the northern hemisphere. It is found all over Europe, from Corsica and Greece to the south of Sweden, in Siberia as far as Kamtschatka, and also in North America, but only near the Lakes Huron and Superior and further north262– a remarkable circumstance, considering its European habitat. The variety found in the Alps is the nearest to the cultivated form.263

      The ancient Greeks and Romans must certainly have known the species, since it is wild in Italy and Greece. Targioni believes it to be the Scorodon schiston of Theophrastus; but we are dealing with words without descriptions, and authors whose specialty is the interpretation of Greek text like Fraas and Lenz, are prudent enough to affirm nothing. If the ancient names are doubtful, the fact of the cultivation of the plant at this epoch is yet more so. It is possible that the custom of gathering it in the fields existed.

       Colocasia—Arum esculentum, Linnæus; Colocasia antiquorum, Schott.264

      This species is cultivated in the damp districts of the tropics, for the swelled lower portion of the stem, which forms an edible rhizome similar to the subterraneous part of the iris. The petioles and the young leaves are also utilized as a vegetable. Since the different forms of the species have been properly classed, and since we have possessed more certain information about the floras of the south of Asia, we cannot doubt that this plant is wild in India, as Roxburgh265 formerly, and Wight266 and others have more recently asserted; likewise in Ceylon,267 Sumatra,268 and several islands of the Malay Archipelago.269

      Chinese books make no mention of it before a work of the year 100 B.C.270 The first European navigators saw it cultivated in Japan and as far as the north of New Zealand,271 in consequence probably of an early introduction, and without the certain co-existence of wild stocks. When portions of the stem or of the tuber are thrown away by the side of streams, they naturalize themselves easily. This was perhaps the case in Japan and the Fiji Islands,272 judging from the localities indicated. The colocasia is cultivated here and there in the West Indies, and elsewhere in tropical America, but much less than in Asia or Africa, and without the least indication of an American origin.

      In the countries where the species is wild there are common names, sometimes very ancient, totally different from each other, which confirms their local origin. Thus the Sanskrit name is kuchoo, which persists in modern Hindu languages – in Bengali, for instance.273 In Ceylon the wild plant is styled gahala, the cultivated plant kandalla.274 The Malay names are kelady,275 tallus, tallas, tales, or taloes,276 from which perhaps comes the well-known name of the Otahitans and New Zealanders —tallo or tarro,277 dalo278 in the Fiji Islands. The Japanese have a totally distinct name, imo,279 which shows an existence of long duration either indigenous or cultivated.

      European botanists first knew the colocasia in Egypt, where it has perhaps not been very long cultivated. The monuments of ancient Egypt furnish no indication of it, but Pliny280 spoke of it as the Arum Ægyptium. Prosper Alpin saw it in the sixteenth century, and speaks of it at length.281 He says that its name in its country is culcas, which Delile282 writes qolkas, and koulkas. It is clear that this Arab name of the Egyptian arum has some analogy with the Sanskrit kuchoo, which is a confirmation of the hypothesis, sufficiently probable, of an introduction from India or Ceylon. De l’Ecluse283 had seen the plant cultivated in Portugal, as introduced from Africa, under the name alcoleaz, evidently of Arab origin. In some parts of the south of Italy, where the plant has become naturalized, it is, according to Parlatore, called aro di Egitto.284

      The name colocasia, given by the Greeks to a plant of which the root was used by the Egyptians, may evidently come from colcas, but it has been transferred to a plant differing from the true colcas. Indeed, Dioscorides applies it to the Egyptian bean, or nelumbo,285 which has a large root, or rather rhizome, rather stringy and not good to eat. The two plants are very different, especially in the flower. The one belongs to the Araceæ, the other to the Nymphæaceæ; the one belongs to the class of Monocotyledons, the other to that of the Dicotyledons. The nelumbo of Indian origin has ceased to grow in Egypt, while the colocasia of modern botanists has persisted there. If there is any confusion, as seems probable in the Greek authors, it must be explained by the fact that the colcas rarely

---

Скачать книгу