Fenugreek 447 



is ianbaltd, Sanbaltle in Ispahan, and lamllz in Shiraz, which appears 

 in India as lamli. As is well known, the plant occurs wild in Kashmir, 

 the Panjab, and in the upper Gangetic plain, and is cultivated in many 

 parts of India, particularly in the higher inland provinces. The Sanskrit 

 term is meihl, meihika, or methini. 1 In Greek it is /Sowcepas ("ox-horn"), 2 

 Middle Greek xovXirev (from the Arabic), Neo-Greek ttjXu; Latin 

 joenum graecum. 3 According to A. de Candolle, 4 the species is wild 

 (besides the Panjab and Kashmir) in the deserts of Mesopotamia and 

 of Persia, and in Asia Minor. John Fryer 5 enumerates it among the 

 products of Persia. 6 



Another West-Asiatic plant introduced by the Arabs into China under the 

 Sung is ffl ^ jl[ ya-pu-lu, first mentioned by Cou Mi ffi $? (1230-1320) as a 

 poisonous plant growing several thousand li west from the countries of the Moham- 

 medans (Kwei sin tsa H, sii tsi A, p. 38, ed. of Pai hai; and Ci ya fan tsa I'ao, Ch. A, 

 p. 40 b, ed. of Yue ya fan ts'un Su). This name is based on Arabic yabruh or abruh 

 (Persian jabruh), the mandragora or mandrake. This subject has been discussed by 

 me in detail in a monograph "La Mandragore" (in French), T'oung Pao, 1917, 

 pp. 1-30. 



des simples, Vol. I, p. 443. Schlimmer (Terminologie, p. 547) remarks, "L'infusion 

 de la semence est un remede favori des m^decins indigenes dans les blennorhagies 

 urethriques chroniques." 



1 It occurs, for instance, as a condiment in an Indian tale of King Vikramaditya 

 (A. Weber, Abh. Berl. Akad., 1877, p. 67). 



2 Hippocrates; Theophrastus, Hist, plant., IV. iv, 10; or t<JXw: ibid., III. xvi, 

 2; Dioscorides, II, 124. 



* Pliny, xxiv, 120. 



4 Origin of Cultivated Plants, p. 112. 



5 New Account of East India and Persia, Vol. II, p. 311. 



6 For further information see Fluckiger and Hanbury, Pharmacographia, 

 P- 172. 



