ioo Sino-Iranica 



number of additional species as compared with its predecessor. The 

 introduction of foreign plants begins from the latter part of the second 

 century B.C., and it was two plants of Iranian origin, the alfalfa and 

 the grape-vine, which were the first exotic guests in the land of Han. 

 These were followed by a long line of other Iranian and Central-Asiatic 

 plants, and this great movement continued down to the fourteenth 

 century in the Yuan period. The introduction of American species in 

 the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries denotes the last phase in 

 this economic development, which I hope to set forth in a special 

 monograph. Aside from Iran, it was Indo-China, the Malayan region, 

 and India which contributed a large quota to Chinese cultivations. 

 It is essential to realize that the great Iranian plant-movement extends 

 over a period of a millennium and a half; for a learned legend has been 

 spread broadcast that most of these plants were acclimatized during 

 the Han period, and even simultaneously by a single man, the well- 

 known general, Can K'ien. It is one of my objects to destroy this 

 myth. Can K'ien, as a matter of fact, brought to China solely two 

 plants, — alfalfa and the grape-vine. No other plant is attributed to him 

 in the contemporaneous annals. Only late and untrustworthy (chiefly 

 Taoist) authors credit him also with the introduction of other Iranian 

 plants. As time advanced, he was made the centre of legendary fabrica- 

 tion, and almost any plant hailing from Central Asia and of doubtful 

 or obscure history was passed off under his name: thus he was ulti- 

 mately canonized as the great plant-introducer. Such types will 

 spring up everywhere under similar conditions. A detailed discussion 

 of this point will be found under the heading of each plant which by 

 dint of mere fantasy or misunderstanding has been connected with 

 Can K'ien by Chinese or European writers. In the case of the spinach 

 I have furnished proof that this vegetable cannot have been culti- 

 vated in Persia before the sixth century a.d., so that Can K'ien could 

 not have had any knowledge of it. All the alleged Cah-K'ien plants 

 were introduced into China from the third or fourth century a.d. down 

 to the T'ang period inclusively (618-906). The erroneous reconstruction 

 alluded to above was chiefly championed by Bretschneider and Hirth; 

 and A. de Candolle, the father of the science of historical botany, who, 

 as far as China is concerned, depended exclusively on Bretschneider, 

 fell victim to the same error. 



F. v. Richthofen, 1 reproducing the long list of Bretschneider's 

 Cah-K'ien plants, observes, "It cannot be assumed that Can K'ien 

 himself brought along all these plants and seeds, for he had to travel 



1 China, Vol. I, p. 459. 



