2 CORALS 



The derivation of the word from -^eipaXiov was probably 

 suggested by the belief of the ancients that the Precious 

 coral is soft in the sea and hardens when exposed to the air. 



Sic et Corallium, quo primum contigit auras 

 tempore, durescit ; mollis fuit herba sub undis. 



Ovid, Metani. xv. 416-7. 



This idea prevailed for a great many centuries, and it is not 

 clear who was the first to prove its error ; but Imperato 

 writing in 1699 denied its accuracy, and even before that 

 time Nicolay ^ had assured himself that the axis was hard 

 in the water by making the sailors plunge their hands into 

 the sea to test it before the coral was brought on deck. 



In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries we find the 

 word Coral applied to other things than the Precious coral, 

 thus Gesner (1565) called the coral now known as Oculina 

 CoraUiuni verrucosuni, and Lobel (1575) the coral now 

 known as Dendrophyllia Coralloides sive Corallii varietas. 

 Imperato applied the name Corallium album to examples 

 of several w'hite corals, but also introduced the name Poms 

 maironalis ramosits, from which the generic name Madrepore 

 has been derived for Dendrophyllia, and the word Millepora 

 for the coral now known as Caryophyllia. 



From that time onwards the word Corallium and the 

 modernised forms of it. Coral, Corail, Koralle, Corallo, etc., 

 have been applied to such a variety of animal and vegetable 

 marine organisms that it has lost its original restricted 

 meaning. It is difficult, therefore, to give a definition of 

 the term Coral that would satisfy at the same time modern 

 usage and historical research. But some kind of definition 

 must be attempted in order to indicate the scope of the 

 present work, and in making this attempt I shall endeavour 

 to convey the meaning that the word has acquired. 



It is clear from what has already been said that the 

 Precious coral of commerce must be included in the defini- 

 tion, and it is also clear that the large white Madrepores 



1 Nicolas tie Xicolay, who is described as the " valet de chambre et 

 geographe ordinaire " to the King of France, was sent in 1551 to the coast 

 of Algiers to investigate and report upon the coral fisheries of that region 

 (Masson). 



