CHAPTER XVI 

 CURRANTS AND GOOSEBERRIES 



Several species of Ribes are cultivated in cold temperate and 

 even subarctic climates under the names currants and goose- 

 berries. The two fruits are often grouped as groselles, from the 

 French groseilles, a word now applied to gooseberries, which, 

 however, at one time included currants as well. Originally, the 

 word currant was applied to small seedless raisins, produced 

 from several varieties of grapes in the Levant, the name coming 

 from Corinth, w^hich was the center of the industry. The dried 

 currants of modern as well as of ancient commerce are these 

 seedless grapes, adding to the confusion in the nomenclature of 

 the two fruits. 



Currants and gooseberries are very different in aspect of 

 plant, and in appearance and taste of fruit, yet their close rela- 

 tionship is show^n not only by similarities in the botanical char- 

 acters on which classifications are founded, but also by the 

 hybridization of species of the two fruits and the ease of inter- 

 grafting, Ribes is probably an Arabic name for Rheum Rihes, 

 but is supposed by some to be the Latinized form of rieJ)s, an old 

 German word for currant. Ribes belongs to SaxifragaceiB, the 

 Saxifrage family, closely related to the Rose family. 



273. Saxifragaceae compared with Rosacese. — All of the 

 fruits so far studied, except the grape, are members of the Rose 

 family, but currants and gooseberries belong to the Saxifrage 

 family distinguished from the former, so far as pomological 

 characters are concerned, by having opposite as well as alternate 

 leaves ; usually no stipules ; the stamens mostly definite in num- 

 ber; the carpels commonly fewer than the sepals, separate or 

 combined into a compound pistil ; calyx either free or adherent, 

 usually persistent; and stamens and petals almost always in- 

 serted on the calyx. The currant and the gooseberry are the 

 only cultivated fruits among the saxifrages. 



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