336 



to find some evidence that the Italians called either the plant, or 

 its tubers, Girasole, at or before the date when the name Jerusalem 

 Artichoke came into use in England. No less than that will 

 support the etymology. Even if it be established that the name 

 Girasole has occasionally been extended in the semi-scientific 

 lang-uagre of modern Italian botanical authors to cover Helianthus 



b w a 



tuber ox us as well as Helianthus annum, it will not account for 

 %i Jerusalem " at a date when there is no trace of girasole having 

 been used by the Italians (as it came to be later) for the annual 

 .sunflower, much less for the tuberous species. 



The earliest use of the word girasole seems to have been in a 

 inineralogical sense for the fire-opal, and it seems to have first been 

 employed botanically not for a sunflower, but for Ricinus 

 communis, the Castor oil plant ! Such is its meaning in Mattioli's 

 Commentaries on Dioscorides, of which many editions appeared, 

 some in Italian, some in Latin, from 1544 to 1604. 



Cesalpini, De plantis libri xvi. p. 380 (1583), says " Ricinus 

 vulgo Girasole," and in Florio's quaintly named Italian-English 

 vocabularies, Giardino di Ilicreatione (1591), A worlde of words 

 (1598), Queen Anne's New worlde of words (1611), and in his 

 Vocabolario Italiano e Inglese, ed. Torriano (1659), girasole is 

 said to mean " an herbe called in Latin Ricinus or Croton; also 

 as Heliotropia ; also changeable taffeties ; some take it for fine- 

 leaved grass." Above all, Allacci in his account of the Farnese 

 garden, already referred to, at pag-e 87, says of Ricinus Ameri- 

 ca)) us " aliqui dixere girasole." In fact it is not till the 

 Phytologia of Ambrosini (1606) p. 287, that girasole is found to 

 mean Helianthus annuus in Italian. How then is it possible for 

 it to have been in general use for H. tuber osus at such a date as 

 to have begotten the English "Jerusalem artichoke " by 1622? 

 * Allacci's remark is alone quite fatal to the theory that plant 

 and name were introduced from the Farnese garden. 



In the Voeabolario della Crusca (1738) the tubers of Helianthus 

 tuberosus are called tartufi bianchi, white truffles;* u Tartufi 

 bianchi diciamo ad alcune Radiche simili a quelle delle canne, 

 che si mangiano in diverse maniere in tempo d'inverno, e si cavano 

 da una pianta detta dal Lat. Aster Peruanm tuberosa radice" 

 It is not till Targioni-Tozzetti's Dizionario botanico italiano 



(1809) ii. p. 52, that we find Girasole del Canada among the 

 Italian equivalents of H. tuberosus, the others being Patata ameri- 

 cana, Patata del Canada, Tartujo bianco, Tartufo di Carina, 

 Topinambour. Yet in the various editions of the same author's 

 Istituzioni botaniehe. of 1796 (ii. p. 192), 1802 (iii. p. 238) and 



1813 (iii. p. 202), Girasole del Canada does not occur among 

 the sundry vernacular names. No doubt it has been inserted in the 

 Diziomnio a> a quasi-learnrd book-name, without having ever 

 been employed in current usage. It reappears later in Cam i sola's 

 Flora Astese (1854) p. 245, and a<rain m Tommaseo e Bellini, 

 Diz. della Lingua Italiana, although the chief Italian floras do 

 not include it among their synonyms for //. tuberosus. Prof, 

 ^lattirolo of Turin tells me that he has heard his students speak 



* Not the famous tartufi bianchi of Piedmont, which are true truffles, 

 Tuber Magnatum Vittad., as to which see Colla, Herb. Pod. vii. p. 212 (1837). 



