3fi 1 pliny's NATURAL HISTORY. [Book XV r. 



onty the roots. Theopompus has stated in his writings that in 

 the territory of the Apolloniates there is found a kind of mineral 

 pitch, 61 not inferior to that of Macedonia. The best pitch 03 

 everywhere is that obtained from trees planted on sunny spots 

 with a north-east aspect ; while that which is produced from 

 more shaded localities has a disagreeable look and a repulsive 

 odour. Pitch, too, that is produced amid the cold of winter is 

 of inferior quality, being in smaller quantity, too, and compara- 

 tively colourless. Some persons are of opinion that in moun- 

 tainous localities this liquid is produced in the greatest abun- 

 dance, and that it is of superior colour and of a sweeter taste 

 and has a finer smell so long as it remains in a state of resin ; 

 but that when, on the other hand, it is subjected to boiling, it 

 yields a smaller quantity of pitch, because so much of it goes 63 

 off in a serous shape. They say that the resinous trees, too, 

 that grow on mountains are thinner than those that are found 

 on plains, but that they are apt, both of them, to be unpro- 

 ductive in clear, dry weather. 



Some trees, too, afford a flow of resinous juice the year after 

 the incision is made, some, again, in the second year, and 

 others in the third. The wound so made is filled with resin, 

 but not with bark, or by the cicatrization of the outer coat ; 

 for the bark in this tree never unites. Among these varie- 

 ties some authors have made the sappium 64 to constitute a 

 peculiar kind, because it is produced from the seed of a kin- 

 dred variety, as we have already stated when speaking of the 

 nuts 65 of trees ; and they have given the name of tseda 66 to 

 the lower parts of the tree ; although in reality this tree is no- 

 thing else but a pitch-tree, which by careful cultivation has 

 lost some small portion of its wild character. The name 

 "sappinus" is also given to the timber of these trees when 

 cut, as we shall have occasion to mention 67 hereafter. 



61 See B. xxxv. c. 51. He alludes to the bitumen known as asphalt, 

 bitumen of Judsea, mineral pitch, mountain pitch, malthe, pissalphate. 



62 These particulars, borrowed from Theophrastus, are in general correct. 



63 This is not the fact ; the essential oil in which the resin so greatly 

 abounds, becomes volatile with remarkable facility. 



* 4 Most probably one of the varieties of the pine ; but the mode in which 

 Pliny expresses himself renders it impossible to identify it with any 

 precision. 65 B. xv. c. 9. 



66 The name borne also by the torch-tree. 



67 See c. 76 cf this Book." 



