Origin of Cultivated Plants

I cannot accept Godron’s hypothesis that the numerous cultivated varieties come from an unknown Asiatic species.1153 It seems that they may be ranked, as Decaisne says, either with P. communis or P. nivalis of which I am about to speak, taking into account the effect of accidental crossing, of cultivation, and of long-continued selection. Besides, Western Asia has been explored so thoroughly that it is probable it contains no other species than those already described.

Snow Pear—Pyrus nivalis, Jacquin.

This variety of pear is cultivated in Austria, in the north of Italy, and in several departments of the east and centre of France. It was named Pyrus nivalis by Jacquin1154 from the German name Schneebirne, given to it because the Austrian peasants eat the fruit when the snow is on the ground. It is called in France Poirier sauger, because the under side of the leaves is covered with a white down which makes them like the sage (Fr. sauge). Decaisne1155 considered all the varieties of P. nivalis to be derived from P. kotschyana, Boissier,1156 which grows wild in Asia Minor. The latter in this case should take the name of nivalis, which is the older.

The snowy pears cultivated in France to make the drink called perry have become wild in the woods here and there.1157 They constitute the greater number of the so-called “cider pears,” which are distinguished by the sour taste of the fruit independent of the character of the leaf. The descriptions of the Greeks and Romans are too imperfect for us to be certain if they possessed this species. It may be presumed that they did, however, since they made cider.1158

Sandy Pear, Chinese Pear—Pyrus sinensis, Lindley.1159

I have already mentioned this species, which is nearly allied to the common pear. It is wild in Mongolia and Mantchuria,1160 and cultivated in China and Japan. Its fruit, large rather than good, is used for preserving. It has also been recently introduced into European gardens for experiments in crossing it with our species. This will very likely take place naturally.

Apple—Pyrus Malus, Linnæus.

The apple tree grows wild throughout Europe (excepting in the extreme north), in Anatolia, the south of the Caucasus, and the Persian province of Ghilan.1161 Near Trebizond, the botanist Bourgeau saw quite a small forest of them.1162 In the mountains of the north-west of India it is “apparently wild,” as Sir Joseph Hooker writes in his Flora of British India. No author mentions it as growing in Siberia, in Mongolia, or in Japan.1163

There are two varieties wild in Germany, the one with glabrous leaves and ovaries, the other with leaves downy on the under side, and Koch adds that this down varies considerably.1164 In France accurate authors also give two wild varieties, but with characters which do not tally exactly with those of the German flora.1165 It would be easy to account for this difference if the wild trees in certain districts spring from cultivated varieties whose seeds have been accidentally dispersed. The question is, therefore, to discover to what degree the species is probably ancient and indigenous in different countries, and, if it is not more ancient in one country than another, how it was gradually extended by the accidental sowing of forms changed by the crossing of varieties and by cultivation.

The country in which the apple appears to be most indigenous is the region lying between Trebizond and Ghilan. The variety which there grows wild has leaves downy on the under side, short peduncles, and sweet fruit,1166 like Malus communis of France, described by Boreau. This indicates that its prehistoric area extended from the Caspian Sea nearly to Europe.

Piddington gives in his Index a Sanskrit name for the apple, but Adolphe Pictet1167 informs us that this name seba is Hindustani, and comes from the Persian sêb, sêf. The absence of an earlier name in India argues that the now common cultivation of the apple in Kashmir and Thibet, and especially that in the north-west and central provinces of India, is not very ancient. The tree was probably known only to the western Aryans.

This people had in all probability a name of which the root was ab, af, av, ob, as this root recurs in several European names of Aryan origin. Pictet gives aball, ubhall, in Erse; afal in Kymric; aval in Armorican; aphal in old High German; appel in old English; apli in Scandinavian; obolys in Lithuanian; iabluko in ancient Slav; iabloko in Russian. It would appear from this that the western Aryans, finding the apple wild or already naturalized in the north of Europe, kept the name under which they had known it. The Greeks had mailea or maila, the Latins malus, malum, words whose origin, according to Pictet, is very uncertain. The Albanians, descendants of the Pelasgians, have molé.1168 Theophrastus1169 mentions wild and cultivated maila. Lastly, the Basques (ancient Iberians) have an entirely different name, sagara, which implies an existence in Europe prior to the Aryan invasions.

The inhabitants of the terra-mare of Parma, and of the palafittes of the lakes of Lombardy, Savoy, and Switzerland, made great use of apples. They always cut them lengthways, and preserved them dried as a provision for the winter. The specimens are often carbonized by fire, but the internal structure of the fruit is only the more clearly to be distinguished. Heer,1170 who has shown great penetration in observing these details, distinguishes two varieties of the apple known to the inhabitants of the lake-dwellings before they possessed metals. The smaller kind are 15 to 24 mm. in their longitudinal diameter, and about 3 mm. more across (in their dried and carbonized state); the larger, 29 to 32 mm. lengthways by 36 wide (dried, but not carbonized). The latter corresponds to an apple of German-Swiss orchards, now called campaner. The English wild apple, figured in English Botany, pl. 179, is 17 mm. long by 22 wide. It is possible that the little apples of the lake-dwellings were wild; however, their abundance in the stores makes it doubtful. Dr. Gross sent me two apples from the more recent palafittes of Lake Neuchâtel; the one is 17 the other 22 mm. in longitudinal diameter. At Lagozza, in Lombardy, Sordelli1171 mentions two apples, the one 17 mm. by 19, the other 19 mm. by 27. In a prehistoric deposit of Lago Varese, at Bardello, Ragazzoni found an apple in the stores a little larger than the others.

From all these facts, I consider the apple to have existed in Europe, both wild and cultivated, from prehistoric times. The lack of communication with Asia before the Aryan invasion makes it probable that the tree was indigenous in Europe as in Anatolia, the south of the Caucasus, and Northern Russia, and that its cultivation began early everywhere.

Quince—Cydonia vulgaris, Persoon.

The quince grows wild in the woods in the north of Persia, near the Caspian Sea, in the region to the south of the Caucasus, and in Anatolia.1172 A few botanists have also found it apparently wild in the Crimea, and in the north of Greece;1173 but naturalization may be suspected even in the east of Europe, and the further we advance towards Italy, especially towards the south-west of Europe and Algeria, the more it becomes probable that the species was naturalized at an early period round villages, in hedges, etc.

No Sanskrit name is known for the quince, whence it may be inferred that its area did not extend towards the centre of Asia. Neither is there any Hebrew name, though the species is wild upon Mount Taurus.1174 The Persian name is haivah,1175 but I do not know whether it is as old as Zend. The same name, aiva, exists in Russian for the cultivated quince, while the name of the wild plant is armud, from the Armenian armuda.1176 The Greeks grafted upon a common variety, strution, a superior kind, which came from Cydon, in Crete, whence κυδωνιον, translated by the Latin malum cotoneum, by cydonia, and all the European names, such as codogno in Italian, coudougner, and later coing in French, quitte in German, etc. There are Polish, pigwa, Slav, tunja,1177 and Albanian (Pelasgian?), ftua,1178 names which differ entirely from the others. This variety of names points to an ancient knowledge of the species to the west of its original country, and the Albanian name may even indicate an existence prior to the Hellenes.

Its antiquity in Greece may also be gathered from the superstition, mentioned by Pliny and Plutarch, that the fruit of the quince was a preservation from evil influences, and from its entrance into the marriage rites prescribed by Solon. Some authors go so far as to maintain that the apple disputed by Hera, Aphrodite, and Athene was a quince. Those who are interested in such questions will find details in Comes’s paper on the plants represented in the frescoes at Pompeii.1179 The quince tree is figured twice in these, which is not surprising, as the tree was known in Cato’s time.1180

It seems to me probable that it was naturalized in the east of Europe before the epoch of the Trojan war. The quince is a fruit which has been little modified by cultivation; it is as harsh and acid when fresh as in the time of the ancient Greeks.

Pomegranate—Punica granatum, Linnæus.

The pomegranate grows wild in stony ground in Persia, Kurdistan, Afghanistan, and Beluchistan.1181 Burnes saw groves of it in Mazanderan, to the south of the Caspian Sea.1182 It appears equally wild to the south of the Caucasus.1183 Westwards, that is to say, in Asia Minor, in Greece, and in the Mediterranean basin generally, in the north of Africa and in Madeira, the species appears rather to have become naturalized from cultivation, and by the dispersal of the seeds by birds. Many floras of the south of Europe speak of it as a “subspontaneous” or naturalized species. Desfontaines, in his Atlantic Flora, gives it as wild in Algeria, but subsequent authors think1184 rather it is naturalized.1185 I doubt its being wild in Beluchistan, where the traveller Stocks found it, for Anglo-Indian botanists do not allow it to be indigenous east of the Indus, and I note the absence of the species in the collections from Lebanon and Syria which Boissier is always careful to quote.

In China the pomegranate exists only as a cultivated plant. It was introduced from Samarkhand by Chang-Kien, a century and a half before the Christian era.1186

The naturalization in the Mediterranean basin is so general that it may be termed an extension of the original area. It probably dates from a very remote period, for the cultivation of the species dates from a very early epoch in Western Asia.

Let us see whether historical and philological data can give us any information on this head.

I note the existence of a Sanskrit name, darimba, whence several modern Indian names are derived.1187 Hence we may conclude that the species had long been known in the regions traversed by the Aryans in their route towards India. The pomegranate is mentioned several times in the Old Testament, under the name of rimmon,1188 whence the Arabic rumman or rûman. It was one of the fruit trees of the promised land, and the Hebrews had learnt to appreciate it in Egyptian gardens. Many localities in Palestine took their name from this shrub, but the Scriptures only mention it as a cultivated species. The flower and the fruit figured in the religious rites of the Phœnicians, and the goddess Aphrodite had herself planted it in the isle of Cyprus,1189 which implies that it was not indigenous there. The Greeks were acquainted with the species in the time of Homer. It is twice mentioned in the Odyssey as a tree in the gardens of Phæacia and Phrygia. They called it roia or roa, which philologists believe to be derived from the Syrian and Hebrew name,1190 and also sidai,1191 which seems to be Pelasgic, for the modern Albanian name is sige.1192 There is nothing to show that the species was wild in Greece, where Fraas and Heldreich affirm that it is now only naturalized.1193

The pomegranate enters into the myths and religious ceremonies of the ancient Romans.1194 Cato speaks of its properties as a vermifuge. According to Pliny,1195 the best pomegranates came from Carthage, hence the name Malum punicum; but it should not be supposed, as it has been assumed, that the species came originally from Northern Africa. Very probably the Phœnicians had introduced it at Carthage long before the Romans had anything to do with this town, and it was doubtless cultivated as in Egypt.

If the pomegranate had formerly been wild in Northern Africa and the south of Europe, the Latins would have had more original names for it than granatum (from granum and Malum punicum. We should have perhaps found local names derived from ancient Western tongues; whereas the Semitic name rimmon has prevailed in Greek and in Arabic, and even occurs, through Arab influence, among the Berbers.1196 It must be admitted that the African origin is one of the errors caused by the erroneous popular nomenclature of the Romans.

Leaves and flowers of a pomegranate, described by Saporta1197 as a variety of the modern Punica granatum, have been discovered in the pliocene strata of the environs of Meximieux. The species, therefore, existed under this form, before our epoch, along with several species, some extinct, others still existing in the south of Europe, and others in the Canaries, but the continuity of existence down to our own day is not thereby proved.

To conclude, botanical, historical, and philological data agree in showing that the modern species is a native of Persia and some adjacent countries. Its cultivation began in prehistoric time, and its early extension, first towards the west and afterwards into China, has caused its naturalization in cases which may give rise to errors as to its true origin, for they are frequent, ancient, and enduring. I arrived at these conclusions in 1869,1198 which has not prevented the repetition of the erroneous African origin in several works.

Rose Apple—Eugenia Jambos, Linnæus; Jambosa vulgaris, de Candolle.

This small tree belongs to the family of Myrtaceæ. It is cultivated in tropical regions of the old and new worlds, as much perhaps for the beauty of its foliage as for its fruit, of which the rose-scented pulp is too scanty. There is an excellent illustration and a good description of it in the Botanical Magazine, pl. 3356. The seed is poisonous.1199

As the cultivation of this species is of ancient date in Asia, there was no doubt of its Asiatic origin; but the locality in which it grew wild was formerly unknown. Loureiro’s assertion that it grew in Cochin-China and some parts of India required confirmation, which has been afforded by some modern writers.1200 The jambos is wild in Sumatra, and elsewhere in the islands of the Malay Archipelago. Kurz did not meet with it in the forests of British Burmah, but when Rheede saw this tree in gardens in Malabar he noticed that it was called Malacca-schambu, which shows that it came originally from the Malay Peninsula. Lastly, Brandis says it is wild in Sikkim, to the north of Bengal. Its natural area probably extends from the islands of the Malay Archipelago to Cochin-China, and even to the north-east of India, where, however, it is probably naturalized from cultivation and by the agency of birds. Naturalization has also taken place elsewhere – at Hong-kong, for instance, in the Seychelles, Mauritius, and Rodriguez, and in several of the West India Islands.1201

Malay Apple—Eugenia malaccensis, Linnæus; Jambosa malaccensis, de Candolle.

A species allied to Eugenia jambos, but differing from it in the arrangement of its flowers, and in its fruit, of an obovoid instead of ovoid form; that is to say, the smaller end is attached to the stalk. The fruit is more fleshy and is also rose-scented, but it is much1202 or little1203 esteemed according to the country and varieties. These are numerous, differing in the red or pink colour of the flowers, and in the size, shape, and colour of the fruit.

The numerous varieties show an ancient cultivation in the Malay Archipelago, where the species is indigenous. In confirmation, it must be noted that Forster found it established in the Pacific Islands, from Otahiti to the Sandwich Isles, at the time of Cook’s voyages.1204 The Malay apple grows wild in the forests of the Malay Archipelago, and in the peninsula of Malacca.1205

Tussac says that it was brought to Jamaica from Otahiti in 1793. It has spread and become naturalized in several of the West India Islands, also in Mauritius and the Seychelles.1206

Guava—Psidium guayava, Raddi.

Ancient authors, Linnæus, and some later botanists, admitted two species of this fruit tree of the family of Myrtaceæ, the one with elliptical or spherical fruit, with red flesh, Psidium pomiferum; the other with a pyriform fruit and white or pink flesh, more agreeable to the taste. Such diversity is also observed in pears, apples, or peaches; so it was decided to consider all the Psidii as forming a single species. Raddi saw a proof that there was no essential difference, for he observed pyriform and round fruits growing on the same tree in Brazil.1207 The majority of botanists, especially those who have observed the guava in the colonies, follow the opinion of Raddi,1208 to which I was inclined, even in 1855, from reasons drawn from the geographical distribution.1209

Lowe,1210 in his Flora of Madeira, maintains with some hesitation the distinction into two species, and asserts that each can be raised from seed. They are, therefore, races like those of our domestic animals, and of many cultivated plants. Each of these races comprehends several varieties.1211

The study of the origin of the guava presents in the highest degree the difficulty which exists in the case of many fruit trees of this nature: their fleshy and somewhat aromatic fruits attract omnivorous animals which cast their seeds in places far from cultivation. Those of the guava germinate rapidly, and fructify in the third or fourth year. Its area has thus spread, and is still spreading by naturalization, principally in those tropical countries which are neither very hot nor very damp.

In order to simplify the search after the origin of the species, I may begin by eliminating the old world, for it is sufficiently evident that the guava came from America. Out of sixty species of the genus Psidium, all those which have been carefully studied are American. It is true that botanists from the sixteenth century have found plants of Psidium guayava (varieties pomiferum and pyriferum) more or less wild in the Malay Archipelago and the south of Asia,1212 but everything tends to show that these were the result of recent naturalization. In each locality a foreign origin was admitted; the only doubt was whether this origin was Asiatic or American. Other considerations justify this idea. The common names in Malay are derived from the American word guiava. Ancient Chinese authors do not mention the guava, though Loureiro said a century and a half ago that they were growing wild in Cochin-China. Forster does not mention them among the cultivated plants of the Pacific Isles at the time of Cook’s voyage, which is significant when we consider how easy this plant is to cultivate and its ready dispersion. In Mauritius and the Seychelles there is no doubt of their recent introduction and naturalization.1213

It is more difficult to discover from what part of America the guava originally came. In the present century it is undoubtedly wild in the West Indies, in Mexico, in Central America, Venezuela, Peru, Guiana, and Brazil.1214 But whether this is only since Europeans extended its cultivation, or whether it was previously diffused by the agency of the natives and of birds, seems to be no more certain than when I spoke on the subject in 1855.1215 Now, however, with a little more experience in questions of this nature, and since the specific unity of the two varieties of guava is recognized, I shall endeavour to show what seems most probable.

J. Acosta,1216 one of the earliest authors on the natural history of the new world, expresses himself as follows, about the spherical variety of the guava: “There are mountains in San Domingo and the other islands entirely covered with guavas, and the natives say that there were no such trees in the islands before the arrival of the Spaniards, who brought them, I know not whence.” The mainland seems, therefore, to have been the original home of the species. Acosta says that it grows in South America, adding that the Peruvian guavas have a white flesh superior to that of the red fruit. This argues an ancient cultivation on the mainland. Hernandez1217 saw both varieties wild in Mexico in the warm regions of the plains and mountains near Quauhnaci. He gives a description and a fair drawing of P. pomiferum. Piso and Marcgraf1218 also found the two guavas wild in the plains of Brazil; but they remark that it spreads readily. Marcgraf says that they were believed to be natives of Peru or of North America, by which he may mean the West Indies or Mexico. Evidently the species was wild in a great part of the continent at the time of the discovery of America. If the area was at one time more restricted, it must have been at a far more remote epoch.

Different common names were given by the different native races. In Mexico it was xalxocotl; in Brazil the tree was called araca-iba, the fruit araca guacu; lastly, the name guajavos, or guajava, is quoted by Acosta and Hernandez for the guavas of Peru and San Domingo without any precise indication of origin. This diversity of names confirms the hypothesis of a very ancient and extended area.

From what ancient travellers say of an origin foreign to San Domingo and Brazil (an assertion, however, which we may be permitted to doubt), I suspect that the most ancient habitation extended from Mexico to Columbia and Peru, possibly including Brazil before the discovery of America, and the West Indies after that event. In its earliest state, the species bore spherical, highly coloured fruit, harsh to the taste. The other form is perhaps the result of cultivation.

Gourd,1219 or Calabash—Lagenaria vulgaris, Seringe; Cucurbita lagenaria, Linnæus.

The fruit of this Curcubitacea has taken different forms in cultivation, but from a general observation of the other parts of the plant, botanists have ranked them in one species which comprises several varieties.1220 The most remarkable are the pilgrim’s gourd, in the form of a bottle, the long-necked gourd, the trumpet gourd, and the calabash, generally large and without a neck. Other less common varieties have a flattened, very small fruit, like the snuff-box gourd. The species may always be recognized by its white flower, and by the hardness of the outer rind of the fruit, which allows of its use as a vessel for liquids, or a reservoir of air suitable as a buoy for novices in swimming. The flesh is sometimes sweet and eatable, sometimes bitter and even purgative.

Linnæus1221 pronounced the species to be American. De Candolle1222 thought it was probably of Indian origin, and this opinion has since been confirmed.

Lagenaria vulgaris has been found wild on the coast of Malabar and in the humid forests of Deyra Doon.1223 Roxburgh1224 considered it to be wild in India, although subsequent floras give it only as a cultivated species. Lastly, Rumphius1225 mentions wild plants of it on the sea-shore in one of the Moluccas. Authors generally note that the pulp is bitter in these wild plants, but this is sometimes the case in cultivated forms. The Sanskrit language already distinguished the common gourd, ulavou, and another, bitter, kutou-toumbi, to which Pictet also attributes the name tiktaka or tiktika.1226 Seemann1227 saw the species cultivated and naturalized in the Fiji Isles. Thozet gathered it on the coast of Queensland,1228 but it had perhaps spread from neighbouring cultivation. The localities in continental India seem more certain and more numerous than those of the islands to the south of Asia.