A PRELIMINARY TREATMENT OF THE GENUS 



CASTILLA. 



Rv Hknky IMttikb. 



INTRODUCTION. 



ESTABLISHMENT OF THE GENUS. 



The genus Castilla was proposed and described for the first time 

 in an inaugural lecture on botany given at the Royal Botanic Garden 

 of Mexico City June 22, 1793, by the titular professor Vicente Cer- 

 vantes. The text of the lecture was subsequently printed, and the 

 plant figured, in a supplement to the " Gaceta de Literatura," this 

 being the way in which one of Cervantes' few contributions to botany 

 has come down to the present generation." 



After mentioning the old Xanuatl name " holguahuitl," and the 

 half-Spanish one of ki arbol del hide," under which the Mexican rub- 

 ber tree was then known, Cervantes provides it, according to the then 

 dogmatically applied Linnsean rules, with Latin generic and specific 

 names. The generic name is Castilla, the tree being dedicated as a 

 testimony of "just gratitude for the friendship" and the meritorious 

 work of the major pharmacist and economic explorer, Juan del Cas- 

 tillo (1744-1793). The specific name elastica refers to the remark- 

 able property of the gum contained in the latex. 



Cervantes's description is far from perfect and its deficiencies were 

 noted even by his contemporaries, as is shown in the " Notas y descrip- 

 cion que hace un imparcial aficionado a la botanica, para aclarar los 

 defectos de la que leyo el catedratico D. Vicente Cervantes, etc." The 

 author of this document, who signs with his initials only (J. L. M.) 



°A native of the province of Extremadura (Spain) and a disciple of C. Gomez 

 Ortega, Cervantes went to Mexico in 1780 to iill the newly created and first 

 chair of botany in the vice-kingdom of New Spain. The best Mexican botanists 

 of the time, among them Mociiio and Maldonado, number among his pupils. 

 For eighteen years he also superintended the pharmacy of the San Andres Hos- 

 pital, devoting special attention to the medicinal properties of the plants. He 

 died at Mexico City July 26, 1829, at the age of TO. See also N. Leon, Biblioteca 

 bot.-mexicana, p. 88. 



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