BRASSICA 



32. Of the two species of mustard, Brassica or Sinapis juncea and 

 S. alba, the former has always been a native of China {kiai ^r). The 

 latter, however, was imported as late as the T'ang period. It is first 

 mentioned by Su Kun in the Pen ts'ao of the T'ang (about a.d. 650) as 

 coming from the Western Zuh (Si Zuh), 1 a term which, as noted, fre- 

 quently refers to Iranian regions. In the Su pen ts'ao lij ^ ^, published 

 about the middle of the tenth century by Han Pao-sen $$ ffi. Jr, we 

 find the term ffll ^t* hu kiai ("mustard of the Hu"). C'en Ts'ah-k'i of 

 the T'ang states that it grows in T'ai-yuan and Ho-tuh ?*f 3f€ (San-si), 

 without referring to the foreign origin. Li Si-cen 2 annotates that this 

 cultivation comes from the Hu and Zuh and abounds in Su (Se-6'wan), 

 hence the names hu kiai and iw kiai ("mustard of Se-c'wan"), while 

 the common designation is pai kiai ("white mustard"). This state 

 of affairs plainly reveals the fact that the plant was conveyed to China 

 over the land-route of Central Asia, while no allusion is made to an 

 oversea transplantation. As shown by me on a previous occasion, 3 

 the Si-hia word si-na ("mustard") appears to be related to 

 Greek sinapi, and was probably carried into the Si-hia kingdom 

 by Nestorian missionaries, who, we are informed by Marco 

 Polo, were settled there. The same species was likewise foreign 

 to the Tibetans, as is evidenced by their designation "white turnip" 

 {yuns-kar). In India it is not indigenous, either: Watt 4 says that 

 if met with at all, it occurs in gardens only within the tem- 

 perate areas, or in upper India during the winter months; it is not 

 a field crop. \ 



This genus comprises nearly a hundred species, all natives of the 

 north temperate zones, and most of them of ancient European cultiva- 

 tion (with an independent centre in China). 



Abu Mansur 5 distinguishes under the Arabic name karnab five kinds 

 of Brassica, — Nabathaean, Brassica silvestris, B. marina, B. cypria 



1 The same definition is given by T'an Sen-wei in his Cen lei pen ts'ao (Ch. 27, 

 P- 15). 



2 Pen ts'ao kan mu, Ch. 26, p. 12. 



3 T'oung Pao, 1915, p. 86. 



4 Commercial Products of India, p. 176. 

 6 Achundow, Abu Mansur, p. no. 



380 



