THE OREGON NATURALIST. 



PALEOBOTANY. 



AN HLSTORICAL SKETCPL 



It is only in our own times that Paleobot- 

 any, the study of ancient plants by means of 

 the remains and imprints found in geological 

 formations, has risen to the rank of a science. 

 Even now it has not entered upon the full light 

 of day, yet it has behind it a misty dawning of 

 centuries of duration, a twilight in which earn- 

 est investigators have groped in a vain search 

 after truth. 



The first definite mention we have of vege- 

 table petrifactions is in the De Mineral/bus 

 of Albertus Magnus in the thirteenth century, 

 for strange to say the ancients, although ac- 

 quainted with various other kinds offossilsand 

 devising ingenious theories to account for their 

 origin, have left us no mention of fossil plants. 

 Considering the vast extent of Greek and Ro- 

 man public works and the rich beds of fossil 

 plants now found in what were once Roman 

 territories it seems remarkable that the atten- 

 tion of thinking men was not earlier attracted 

 to the remains of ancient vegetation. 



Brongniart's explanation, that coal was not 

 mined by the Greeks and Romans and that fos- 

 sil plants were not studied until coal mines were 

 opened applies only to carbonifeic>us vegetation 

 and fails to account for their inattention to the 

 fossil plants found in the vast Roman mines and 

 quarries. The true explanation is to be found 

 in the artificial civilization which leads men to 

 disregard natural phenomena until the .nulti- 

 tude of new facts compel then- atten.ion. 



The mention made by Albertus Magnus of 

 petrified wood attracted no attention until Ag- 

 ncola repeatedly discussed the subject (De Re 

 Metallica, 1546) and !e 1 other writers to take 

 the matter up. Specimens were discovered at 

 different places from time to time and described 

 by various writers who urged fantastic theories 

 to explain their origin and nature. Tims a 

 new complication was added to the controversy 

 which had been raging for centuries regarding 

 fossils in general. 



Aristotle's doctrine of s]3ontaneous generation 

 was revived and enlarged upon by some who 

 declared that it was possible for stones to pro- 

 duce themselves in any form, while others, like 

 Libavius, protested that fossils came from true 

 germs or seeds. 



A specimen was at length found in which one 

 side was stone and the other coal and this exci- 

 ted great curiosity and gave Matthiolus a clue 

 from which he elaborated a new theory. Wood, 

 he said, changed into stone, and stone into 

 coal, stone being the second and coal the third 

 and final step in a systematic transformation. 



A few incrustations and impressions of the 

 folia organs of plants had been discovered and 

 described without attracting especial notice, 

 even among those who had given their atten- 

 tion to fossil wood, and the study of fossil 

 plants as we understand it remained untouclied 

 until the close of the seventeenth century. 



In 1699 Lhwyd published his) Lithophylacii 

 Britannici Ichnogiaphia in which he describ- 

 ed and figured with marked fidelity a consider- 

 able number of fern leaves from the British coal 

 measures. This publication opened all depart- 

 ments of ]3aleontology to discussion and a pe- 

 riod of research and great activity in this branch 

 of study followed. 



At that time men had not yet learned that 

 the first steps ia a new science must be the in- 

 vestigation of facts, and theory and speculation 

 proceeded far more rapidly than the accumula- 

 tion of material for study. One mystic view would 

 be held for a tiine and ttien be replaced by an- 

 other equally irrational and maintained by the 

 slightest show of proof. The belief in a creat- 

 ive "stone spirit", an inherent tendency in all 

 nature to turn to stone, vis lapidificti, and fi- 

 nally in an all pervading petrifyingjuice, succus 

 petrijicus, each had its adherents, while still 

 others looked upon fossils as meaningless freaks 

 of nature. The belief which gained widest 

 credence was, however that of Comerarius 

 (1712) who taught that when God created the 

 the earth he made the fossils in its interior just 

 as He made the plants and animals on its sur- 

 face. Nor was the subject kept entirely out of 

 the demonology of the time, for there were people 



