464 Durand: Classification of the Fleshy Pezizineae 



The development of the classification of the Discomycetes has 

 been along similar lines. In 17 19 Dillenius* described a genus 

 of fungi under the name Peziza. The catalogue proper and the 

 apppendix are paged separately, and on page 76 of the latter oc- 

 curs the description in the following terms : " Tab. i, Peziza vel 

 ut Plinins habet Pezica pediculo etiam utplurimum, pileo vero 

 semper caret, et ex substantia homogenea membranacea, concava 

 et aquam continere apta, tenera plerumque, aliquando tamen, ut in 

 seminiferis, subdura constat. Pertinent enim Fungi illi calyciformes 

 seminiferi ad Pezizas, et corpuscula ilia lentiformia minime vera 

 semina sunt" No species are mentioned in this connection, but in 

 the catalogue proper, which is arranged by months in which the 

 plants appear, several Pezizas are enumerated on pp. 194—196 — in 

 all, thirteen forms. 



The name Peziza is a modification of the Latin word Pezica f 

 which is itself borrowed from the Greek Tti^xs- or Tte^eac. Pezica 

 was mentioned by Pliny \ in the following terms : " Belonging to 

 the mushroom kind, also, there is a species known to the Greeks 

 by the name i Pezica/ which grows without root or stalk." 

 Whether Pliny's Pezica refers to any of the plants at present in- 

 cluded under the Discomycetes, it is of course, impossible to de- 

 termine. 



Linnaeus in the Species Plantar um of 1753 % adopted the genus 

 Peziza in very nearly the sense of Dillenius, and described eight 

 species. In the Systema §, also, he retained the genus in the same 

 sense and enumerated several species. 



In the Observationes Mycologicae 1796 || Persoon described the 

 genus Peziza with sixteen species, and Ascobolus with three species. 



Practically the first attempt at systematic classification of the 

 Pezizaceous plants was made by Persoon in his Synopsis, in i8oi1f. 

 In this work the cup-shaped Discomycetes were described under 

 three genera ijPesi&a, Ascobolus and Helotium. The group of the 

 Ascoboli is quite distinct and well defined, so that, however much 

 systematists may have differed as to its relative rank, the autonomy 

 of the group has been preserved in nearly all systems of arrange- 

 ment. The genus thus early defined had practically the same 



♦Dillenius, appendix, p. 76. % Linnaeus (1), p. 1180. || Persoon (1), p- 26. 

 f Pliny, 19, 3, 14 §38. \ Linnaeus (2). fl Persoon (2), p. 631. 



